Crusade – Chapter 99: Speaking Truth

"Where does the System get its mana from?" Mayeia asked without hesitation. The confirmation she had received from Aperio seemed to have erased the doubts she might have had.

The All-Mother exhaled in amusement at the question. "From me, of course. It draws on my well to satiate its demand for mana."

"Isn't that exhausting?"

Aperio offered a miniscule shrug in reply. "I do not even notice it if I do not focus on it. What the System needs to sustain itself is laughable when compared to what my body requires."

"What your body …requires?" The confusion was apparent on Mayeia's face.

"Creating a vessel to contain me is not as easy as it sounds," Aperio said, shifting slightly. Calling her body a vessel or shell — while true — was not to her liking. "You might have noticed that the amount of mana I carry inside is growing steadily. It is needed to ensure my body is strong enough to survive, well, me." That she also enjoyed the feeling of her mana flowing through her body was left unsaid. Mayeia did not need to know everything.

"I did notice that," the Goddess said, lightly clearing her throat and adjusting her dress as she shifted a little on her chair. "I did not think all that mana was used to strengthen your body, however." She hesitated for a moment before she leaned a little closer. "That is a lot more mana than I have ever sensed, and you are telling me it all goes to reinforcing your 'vessel'? What happens if you don't have a corporeal form?"

Aperio merely waited for Mayeia to make the connection on her own. The Goddess had already scrunched her brows in thought and the All-Mother was sure she would figure it out if she had a moment to ponder it. In the meantime, she pulled her wing closer to herself, gently nudging Caethya along. The Elf did not resist. Quite the opposite in fact; she closed her eyes and let herself be fully supported by her Goddess.

For a moment, Aperio thought something was amiss, a sliver of her mana gently flowing through Caethya in an effort to find what might be wrong. She did not find anything, and a mental query revealed that her disciple was merely tired. The ascension to a Demigoddess, the ensuing conversation, and then meeting her old Goddess had been more exhausting than she had anticipated.

The offer to bring her back to her room was denied, Caethya being quite happy to stay where she was. And while Aperio herself was not quite as fond of the likely reason behind her disciple's decision, she still pulled her wing closer to better cover her disciple, and let her rest her head on an unnaturally firm arm. Is that really comfortable?

"Was that presence a few hours ago you?" Mayeia asked with a start, ignoring the almost sleeping Caethya beneath Aperio's wing. "Is that what happens when you don't restrict yourself to a body?"

"Yes," Aperio replied. "And I dislike it." For now, at least.

She was no longer bound by the silly rules of mortality and, at one point or another, she would likely grow tired of a physical form. But that was for her future-self to deal with. As it currently stood, she very much wanted to be on Verenier to mingle with mortals that inhabited her creation.

"I…" the other Goddess began. "I don't know what to say. I can't even begin to fathom what it would feel like, and trying to think about it more deeply gives me a headache. Do you experience all there is at once? Or are you more like a cloud of All-Mother?"

Aperio chuckled at the words, quite happy that the voice at the back of her mind she had been sure would demand Mayeia's head was quiet. "The former," she replied. "I take in all that there is; would only need a thought to make my will reality." Not that it takes much more than a thought now, she mused, and took an unneeded breath before continuing. "All of creation connects to me, wanting to feed me information I do not desire to know. When outside of my body, it is much harder to avoid gazing past the surface and wind up seeing what I do not wish to."

"So much information, and I only asked where the System gets its mana," Mayeia mumbled to herself. A touch of her magic lazily drifted around Aperio, likely trying to better understand what the All-Mother was doing to her body.

While she did not really enjoy the idea of the other Goddess examining her like she was, Aperio did not stop her either. Mayeia had been nothing but helpful thus far and a bit of goodwill was in order. I have been awfully short on that, even towards my own daughter…

Her by now regular queries to Ferio had mostly been left unanswered, with the rare instance of being told that she was busy and did not have time at the moment. She had considered asking Roots or her daughter's [High Priestess] Diana, but decided against it. If she truly wished to know what her daughter was doing, she could just look. Bringing her followers and friends into it for spying purposes was plain wrong. Do Ferio and Roots even consider each other to be their friend?

"I hope I am not shattering too many of your theories," Aperio said after a moment of continued silence, trying to redirect her mind to the conversation at hand. "I am awfully out of touch with the mortal world." Or anything, really.

"Well," Mayeia began, "I would have never expected to actually meet or talk to you. And most definitely not while you are using a wing as a blanket for your disciple, who is using you as a pillow. The stories I have heard made you out to be a vastly different person."

"Because I was. In the past, I did not care what happened to the mortals, nor what the Gods and Goddesses I had appointed did. I… still do not feel much compassion for mortals outside a select few, but neither do I ignore them anymore."

Indeed, she had not felt much after having killed the mages shortly after returning. Nor did she feel any grand stirrings of emotion following the eradication of the guards Natio and Vigil had sent, or following the decimation of an entire army. It was true that they had all been slavers and, in her mind, deserved what they got; but even the slaves she had succeeded in freeing did not manage to get much of an emotional reaction from her. Most of the emotionality of the situation had come from her memories of living as one of them — the reason she freed them in the first place. …That's just me being selfish, is it not?

"I expected you to be something beyond my ability to comprehend," Mayeia went on to say. "That I would lose my mind if I tried to understand you. Instead, you are an Elf with wings. You are not the cosmic entity that I expected, but a person. That you don't care for every mortal is a given. Nobody cares for everyone.

"But," she continued, "that not caring for all of them makes you uncomfortable just shows that you, in a way, do care. Probably in a way that would actually stretch my sanity if I tried to understand it. Looking at you through my aura for extended amounts of time already gives me a headache, after all; what goes in your thoughts would likely shatter my mind."

"Perhaps, but I also do not intend to let anyone into my mind," Aperio said, shifting her wing slightly to better support the now-sleeping Caethya. How she had managed to fall asleep leaning against her while in the presence of another Goddess was a mystery to the All-Mother. Perhaps she was just that tired?

"The closest thing I do is a simple mental message," Aperio continued. "Besides a mild headache, my followers do not seem to have much of a problem with it. Monsters on the other hand… They simply die. I do believe you are more durable than some monster."

"I hope I am," Mayeia laughed. "But, you cannot really compare your followers to anyone else. Especially not those close to you. They are all blessed by you, are they not?" Aperio nodded at that, the Goddess continuing shortly after.

"I am not sure if this applies to you, but the System makes any mental communication with someone who is not a follower and therefore lacking any of that deity's mana exceedingly painful and costly."

"The System does not facilitate my actions," Aperio said, the fact Mayeia had implied she depended on it annoying her more than she thought it would. "I merely find it hard to hold back enough to not hurt them. It is harder than you might imagine when you use magic without even thinking about it." Almost like I am the magic.

"I can only imagine… Just sitting there you go through more mana than I have ever seen, but I’ve said that already. ...How much do you use to repair the System? Or does that not use mana? Is there something else that one could use for magic besides mana?"

"No," Aperio said. She did not know for certain that there was not something else, but there was only mana in her well and the manaless world she had sensed appeared to be pretty devoid of magic. But then, it wasn't like there was no mana at all — just very, very little.

"There are, however, different purities as you rightly observed. What is flowing through my body is not the purest there is, but what is currently needed for it. If I were to draw from deeper in my well, it would have some unpleasant side-effects.

"The System's repairs do need a decent amount of mana," she continued, a touch of her magic brushing a few hairs out of Caethya's face. "But it is mainly an effort in trying to understand what broke and how it might be repaired." And trying to remember what those runes mean…

She had found a few more she knew, not because she remembered them from her life as a slave but because her mind so helpfully supplied them from seemingly nowhere. The section of the System that worked under the rune of [Class] was the busiest at the moment; her mana flowing around the various constructs as they shifted, split apart, and reassembled themselves quicker than they had any right to. At least I added a self-repair function…

The other Goddess hesitated for a moment before she asked her next question. "Can I see the System?"

"I am not certain?" Aperio replied, tilting her head slightly. Ignoring the fact that Mayeia was unable to see the threads of reality, the All-Mother was not sure if she could bring someone to the space the System occupied. It should be possible — mana was a physical thing after all — but she was not sure what that would do to anyone she brought there. "I have never tried that and I do not know what it would do to you."

A flex of her mental muscles caused the air around her to shift, her mana forming a recreation of the System as she saw it. At least, a small part of it. Aperio had only chosen the bit labelled [Class], the module of the System already taking up more space than she had thought it would.

"I think this is the best compromise," she said, her eyes focused on the ever-changing representation of the System she had made. Its runes flowed into each other, forming new combinations altogether or merging to become another rune — always flowing into more runes that seemed to spawn from the kaleidoscope that was her System. Each change was accompanied by a small shift in the threads of reality that Aperio tried as best as she could to make visible for the other Goddess. She could not show the threads themselves, opting to give the runes a blurry haze whenever they messed with the fabric of reality instead. Not that it is a close analogy… 

"I could slow it down if it is too fast for you," Aperio said as the other Goddess remained silent with her eyes fixed on the [Class] module. Why do I have to be so far beyond anyone else?

Mayeia nodded slowly, and Aperio did as promised in response. "I already have trouble understanding what most of this does, thank you for allowing me this chance to further understand. I can recognise some of the runes, but most are ones I have never seen before…"

Neither have I, Aperio thought as she glanced at the runes Mayeia pointed out. "I cannot really help you there, sadly. As it stands, my understanding of what broke and what changed is limited and I find it hard to make sense of large parts of the System."

The other Goddess tore her eyes off the model of the System at her words, studying the Elven-looking woman for a moment. She opened her mouth to speak, only to close it a moment later as she was seemingly not sure what to ask.

It took a moment longer for Mayeia to find the words, or perhaps courage, to ask what was on her mind. "Did you …forget? Is that why you are not like the stories I have been told? Ediscio did say you changed…" Her last words were mumbled to herself, the Goddess just voicing her thoughts quietly.

Aperio tensed at the question, waking Caethya in the process as she pressed her wing against her disciple with more force than she had intended. She was not sure if she should tell Mayeia of her affliction; that she could not remember. Caethya's gentle touch and rhythmic breathing gave the All-Mother something to focus on as she did her best to stop her mind from running in circles and trying to imagine the worst possible outcome. Her disciple trusted her former Goddess, and Aperio was willing to trust Caethya.

A touch of Aperio’s magic gently lowered Caethya’s head against the side of her chest as she carefully wrapped her arm around the other woman. She would trust her Disciple's old Goddess, if only for the care and comfort she had given her.

"Yes," the All-Mother finally said, her voice quiet as she lowered her head. "I have forgotten."

GamingWolf

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