Realization

  One tick, two, three ticks. Ryun’s being healed, the parts of him that were vaporized restored themselves. It was too slow, agonizingly so, compared to what he was capable of before, at least. Before, he would’ve been regenerating from an injury like this one from the moment he was injured. The wound would’ve been closing up behind the attack, and he would’ve been whole barely a moment after the damage was done.

  Compared to most people, his regeneration was still monstrous, probably even faster than everybody else's. Unless there was someone in the world who was fully focused on such things.

  Still, to him it was noticeable, and it was annoying. But he had far more other advantages now that he didn’t let his annoyance affect him for long.

  “Are you alright?” Ryun sent to Erdania.

  “Yes,” she responded from somewhere far beneath him. Where the attack had cut through Ryun’s being as if it had no resistance—because it didn’t, he had no endurance at all—Erdania’s body was so dense and powerful that she was actually sent flying. “I am buried deep. What hit us?”

  Ryun slowly spread his authority, making pockets of larger density in places around the territory, but didn’t manifest a vessel just yet. His perception recognized what was coming out of the Void above them; he had encountered it before. “The Memory of Stars,” he answered the question.

  The flagship of the Exalted Empire, the personal vessel of the Herald of the Machine, had come to make war. Ryun pushed his authority, expanding his being up until it engulfed the massive ship. There were a dozen smaller ships, serving as its escorts. On their own, they would be impressive, each the size of a ten story building, but here, flanking the Memory of Stars, they looked tiny.

  The Herald’s ship was a mountain, an elongated wedge shaped monstrosity of sleek metal and weapon platforms lined over its surface. Long turrets, some of which were as long as the ships flanking it. It covered the territory in its shadow, obscuring the sun as it disrupted the spatial bend of the boundary between the Sky and Void that served as a window into the realm where the singular Sun of the Infinite Realm cast its light down on everything in existence.

  Ryun pushed his authority and expanded his being into the ships, getting through the defenses of the escorts easily enough. The Memory of Stars however was a different story. There was resistance. He could tell where its protective shield lay in the layers of the Real Realm outside of the visual spectrum. It enveloped the ship, and would keep any attack from reaching its surface. Though it didn’t stop his perception, that was stopped by the surface of the ship itself. The material it was made out of muted his senses, kept him from being able to perceive anything within. At least with his passive sense.

  He let his willpower infuse his skill and slowly pushed through, leading first with his sense, then following with his authority and being. His perception was blocked at every turn, but as he forced his authority to spread through he started getting the picture of everything that his being engulfed. Spreading his being into the ship was hard, far harder than he had expected. He could tell that the materials used were not only powerful but also aligned in a way that made them serve a singular purpose. Each piece dedicated to the whole. It was the meaning of an Essence used in a way to perfectly align it with an idea.

  It surprised him; it shocked him. He hadn’t thought about it that way before. His understanding of meaning had always been more focused on how to align Essence or a Path with the meaning of his Soul. The thing that he had thought was the core point of all the different focuses available to them. Align them perfectly and you got power; you advanced faster and with a firmer foundation. Misalign them and you got focus madness.

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  It wasn’t about putting together pieces that were the same or similar, it was putting different pieces together that would serve the same idea, that would match the meaning that a person carried in their Soul.

  A swordsman could have a Cultivation Path that was focused on the enhancing of the body, a Class that was related to the blade, and Skills related to perception, different things, but all honed with the idea of embodying a swordsman.

  He was seeing the same thing here, only applied not to a Soul but an object. Ryun could feel it; the Memory of Stars embodied an idea. It was forged with it deep down in its individual Essence grains. He didn’t know what that idea was, but he could feel the effects it had on it.

  That it could even rebuff Ryun’s perception and authority was a testament to its power. But… he still managed to expand his being into it, because no matter how much the meaning of its hull served the idea of defense, no matter how its suppression devices focused on halting perceptions, and its shield worked to prevent harm, all those things had an end. There were systems upon systems built into the ships, contingencies, and backups, because they too understood that they would lose them in battle. That defense would fail, that damage would be incurred.

  As powerful as the meaning of the Memory of Stars was, it was built with the idea of an End from the beginning. Because of course it was, especially for the people like the cthul of the Exalted Empire. They lived a creed that rejected the empowerment of the connection with the Aspect, the manipulation of them, the forcing of the world to bend to their will. Instead, they venerated the machine, the creation of tools, and enhancing of them other than the self. It was ironic to him, because in Ryun’s mind there was not much difference in what they were doing compared to what he and the rest of the world did. Both advanced.

  But their materials lacked a Soul, the one thing that was truly Eternal, the one thing that Ryun had no domain in. He couldn’t expand his authority into a Soul, he couldn’t End it. He could kill the body, he could sever the connection that kept it tethered to the Real Realm, and even the Ethereal, sending it to the beyond where True Death lies, but he couldn’t touch it directly.

  He spread his authority throughout the ship, getting a clear image of it in its entirety, along with all the crew. There was a lot of power inside of it, power that slowed and hindered his authority, but didn’t stop it; it only made it harder for him to influence and read.

  Two familiar Souls were within, he focused on the one that wasn’t hostile to him and used his Send Thought perk.

  “You couldn’t have warned me?”

  “I don’t even know where we are,” Ereclaw’s voice spoke inside of his head. “I didn’t know.”

  He found Ereclaw’s Soul inside the ship, hiding in the vents. Ryun had sent him on a mission to follow the Herald, and kill him if possible. It looked like he had been close to achieving that goal.

  “Why didn’t you kill him yet?”

  “He’s in the area of the ship I cannot reach unnoticed,” Ereclaw responded.

  Ryun could sense what he was likely referring to. There were sections within the ship that were defended by powerful protections. If he had trouble pushing his being and authority through it, he couldn’t imagine anybody else being able to impact it quietly.

  “Look for a chance to strike,” Ryun sent, then turned his attention back on the enemy. He could sense their scanners blasting the territory, looking for him. Or perhaps mapping his being, he was sure that they knew that he was around them. Though they probably didn’t know the true nature of his existence, they could probably detect his presence.

  He then focused and pulled some of his being and manifested a vessel in the air in front of the Memory of Stars.

  A moment later external speakers of the ship blasted transmitted a message loud enough to shake the air.

  “You finally decided to stop hiding?” The Herald of the Machine spoke.

  “I was never hiding in the first place,” Ryun spoke, not bothering to transmit his voice to the ship. They already had thousands of probes the size of an insect flying through the territory; a few were close enough that he knew they would catch his speech.

  “At last, we’ll have our great battle. Finally, you will know the price for your arrogance,” the Herald said, his voice sounding almost animated. Their rivalry had never been much more than a pastime for Ryun, but it seemed that the Herald had taken it more to heart.

  Ryun didn’t respond, instead he waited for the enemy to make the first move. He didn’t have to wait for long.