The girl, her gaze sharp and consuming like a walking encyclopedia, finally blinked. “Yeah… You’re definitely a monster.”
I glanced at Synthia.
“NOT HER!” Mei shouted.
I turned to my left, expecting someone else to be standing there, but of course, there was no one. I knew exactly who she meant, but still, that was a pretty rude way to greet someone fresh out of… whatever that was.
“You. Are. A. Monster,” Mei repeated, each word landing like a deliberate strike, punctuated with a beat of emphasis.
I couldn’t help but chuckle. “Better than freak. But still, have some tact. Monsters have feelings, you know.”
Mei shook her head firmly, no trace of humor in her eyes.
“No. I mean you literally can’t be human. Humans are limited. It’s rare enough to be an elementalist, but you? You’ve got two. Not unheard of, sure, but the way you spoke—”
“Synthia can use all of them,” I said, cutting her off. “And besides that, my flower—”
This time she interrupted me with her small hand, standing in the air to silence me.
“Do you want to lose?” Mei groaned, clearly regretting letting me get a word in. “You’re giving me insight into your own abilities now?”
She exhaled, straightening herself with the poise of a teacher ready to instruct both Seith and me.
“A long time ago, our clan performed the awakening as a rite of passage. The hunt of a beast. You would take in its essence, engraining its life into your own. Cycling its pulse through your body—alive still, in its own way.”
I wasn’t sure if that was meant as a justification, but honestly, after everything I’ve seen, it wouldn’t surprise me if something could live on inside you in some energy form.
Just look at the worm.
“A consciousness floods into you. It fuses, becomes part of you.” Her expression turned serious, eyes narrowing with warning. “The danger in taking in something self-aware... it can be catastrophic. Losing yourself to it is the least of your worries. Worst case…”
She trailed off, staring past us at something not present. Then she shook her head.
“Trying it on something with similar awareness and Animora is dangerous. That’s the point. That’s what makes it dangerous.”
“How do you do it?” I asked, nodding toward the mechanical brace on her arm. “And that? Do the implants help?”
She pressed her lips together, then gave a half-shrug that turned into a head-tilt side to side. “Yes and no. The Engineer’s System is more about amplifying our physical abilities through mechanics powered by Animora. Before that tech, most were limited in what they could do.”
She held out her arm, letting the glow of flowing life-energy shimmer in front of us. Synthia and I both leaned in, watching it swirl beneath the surface of her device.
“The thing is, most people—even if they manage the first extraction, can’t actually use what they get. These systems provide an alternative.” Her smirk curled faintly, a flash of pride against her pale cheek. “Something I’m sure you can appreciate.”
She withdrew her arm. “Though this one’s my own design. Don’t ask for details.”
“Fantastic.” I sighed, leaning back with a contented stretch. “But Extraction... How does it work? What can someone do with Animora once they’ve learned to manipulate it?”
“Beginning Extraction is similar to how you described Force,” she began, her voice taking on a rhythm. “There’s a pulse inside everything that lives, or at least, anything that holds Animora.”
Seeing the question forming on my face, she added:
“Basically, someone helps you attune to that pulse of life. The flow of it. There are old records that mention self-initiated Extraction, but until you’re past the basics, it’s not possible alone. You need help.”
“‘Pulse of life’?” I asked. The phrase stirred thoughts of my own abilities.
She paused, letting the idea circulate through Synthia’s mind and mine like a slow current. Only after a long breath did she find the right words to continue.
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“It’s… difficult to describe,” she admitted. “Even at my level, sensing it is still a challenge. But when you’re in direct contact with something that radiates Animora, and focus, clear your mind of everything else—you can start to feel the energies flowing between you.”
As she spoke, I found myself wondering how hard it must be to sense someone or something that had begun cultivating. Would it be possible to distinguish between Force and this Animora? Could they bleed into each other? Or were they always distinct?
“It feels like a…” She hesitated, rolling the words around. “A heartbeat, I guess. Kinda. That’s really the only way to describe it. As if the energy itself has life.”
She glanced down briefly, then added, “She couldn’t say it in her own words, of course, but the records show that Ancestor Amei reached a level where she could just barely perceive that energy.”
My own heartbeat quickened.
Could the two powers be connected?
Precursor Energy. The sensation I unlocked when I first began circulating it.
That strange rhythm—the pulse that allowed me to sense circulations of Force in anything. Elric had been the reason for that discovery, but what if he and I weren't exactly right?
Animora seemed separate. Isolated, even. Precursor Sense offered control and precision. Animora, by contrast, seemed untethered from that system. Or at least, I wasn't able to sense it. And yet, the parallels were too precise to ignore.
“So with extraction…” I leaned forward. “You just draw the energy into yourself? Take all of it from the source?”
Mei furrowed her brows, parsing the question.
“It’s another ‘yes and no,’” she said. “Extraction becomes fairly simple after you learn how to locate the energy. Then understand your own. After that…” She shrugged lightly, “The process becomes almost instinctual. You circulate your own Animora to pull the others in.”
She mumbled something under her breath as I glanced at Synthia. She seemed much more intrigued now, leaning forward toward Mei like a student drawn into the lesson.
Synthia opened her mouth, hesitated, then finally asked with gentle certainty, “What’s the ‘no’ part?”
Mei glanced up from the flower she’d been absentmindedly twirling between her fingers.
“Oh. Well… you don’t have to take everything. It’s slower, and not ideal for progression, but Animora does replenish. You can siphon a small amount, let it merge with your own, and wait before drawing more.”
That opened a different door in my mind.
“But what about the consciousness?” I asked. “If the energy is only partially siphoned, what happens to the mind of the creature it came from?”
She blinked at me, genuinely stunned. It was obvious: she hadn’t really considered it before.
Did… did they really use something like cattle here to absorb energy? Just draining whatever they could, without ever wondering what it did to the things they took it from? I wasn't judging, but maybe it was really inefficient if the idea was no longer considered.
“I—well, there’s not much information on that,” she admitted, her voice dipping. “Dominating something with a consciousness strong enough to be felt... it’s more than taboo.”
Her voice dropped to a hush, like the words themselves could summon something dark.
“I’ve hardly even seen records of it. But I have been told some stories, and those always end in tragedy.”
Deep down, I couldn’t believe no one in her world had gone down darker paths. Maybe where she lived, she was shielded from that kind of exposure, kept safe from the ones with looser morals and hungrier appetites.
But if I could imagine it just from one conversation, how many others could do the same? Especially the ones born here, who have been living with this power all their lives.
“Though,” she said, placing her hand thoughtfully beneath her chin, “Animora is tied to a creature’s consciousness. So, if you only take a small portion… I imagine they might fall into a kind of numbness. Depending on how much is drawn, they could slip into a comatose state, or even deeper. But in time, they should recover.”
The process reminded me of my Beast Force, though it wasn’t quite the same. Still, what stood out, what mattered was the possibility of recovery. You weren’t obliterating their mind. If she was right, of course.
“Do you have evidence for that?” I asked, trying to pin down a thought that had begun to form, slow and heavy, in the back of my mind.
She nodded confidently. “Of course. I wouldn’t say it otherwise. Many beasts end up in that state when acted on. Those without strong self-awareness.”
Somehow I also doubted that every monster they culled or siphoned from was as brainless as the words seem to imply, but I wasn’t interested in judging the culture, only in what I could glean from it.
She went on. “They become stiff. Like statues. If you prick them with a needle, nothing happens. No reaction at all. Take more, and they fall into a deeper sleep. But when left alone long enough, they always recover... There is a certain threshold that leads to a permanent sleep.”
Then she raised a finger, punctuating the moment with a sharp warning. “BUT! This only applies to beasts. Not intelligent creatures.”
That made me curious. What exactly did she mean by intelligent? Did she mean humans only? Or did that include other beings from different worlds she’d encountered? Were there native species like the snake… or like Luna?
Still, there was something here. A thread. A chance.
The uncertainty didn’t erase the possibility.
If you could dull the pain, sever just enough of the consciousness to leave behind just enough to perform the process of forming a false core.
Form a needle. Puncture the Grand Channel.
Then allow the consciousness to recover fully.
If that worked…
Maybe Lyra could still move forward.
Maybe she could still grow.
Maybe she could advance with the rest of us again.