[Infinity Manor] Breaching the Reservoir

[Savis Maren]

17th of Winter, 518 AV

Restlessness. Anxiety. Helplessness.

The feelings arose and melded into one another as Savis Maren processed the fact that she was no longer alone in the world. The Nuit left her apartment and with it, her solitude when at last she committed to stay within walking distance of Madeira Craven, accepting the Spiritist's hospitality. For the first time in her unlife, Savis Maren willingly accepted an invitation to relinquish her solitude, to allow other people (or even a single person) in. The high walls layered with venom and hatred wilted in the presence of a determined Madeira. The specter of a captor lurked in Madeira Craven's shadow, the past arisen to pierce through the veil of Savis Maren's composure. She fled from the Spiritist when she tried to initiate contact, she hid herself from the remaining denizens of the estate in her effort for solitude. And when it was obtained there was only emptiness to greet her. The Nuit kept her solitude for bells until the living denizens of the Manor surrendered their consciousness to the veil of sleep, a realm that the Nuit no longer understood. In the silence of night, the Nuit was truly alone.

But solitude did nothing to assuage her concerns. Savis allowed her silver gaze to hover over the unnecessary bed that lingered within the room she stayed in for the time being, those eyes narrowed in distaste. For her, beds took too much space, disallowed her from roaming the entirety of a room as she often chose to in the depths of her musings. She saw the bed as an obstacle, stopping her from forging the circular path she'd take in her room at the Solar Wind Apartments and it irked her. Not since the near end of her wretched existence in the Summer had Savis Maren felt such trepidation, such fear overwhelm. Madeira Craven saw insights into the fragility within Savis. She saw a personality that the Nuit often sought to hide. Always it was so much easier to be feared than appreciated. Always it was so much easier to be hated than be understood. Savis allowed djed to permeate within the depths of her soul. Rather than beginning at her spine and travelling thorughout, she felt the djed rise from the lengths of her arms. She willed it to slide between the layers of her soul, and felt the rush of exhiliration that accompanied such manipulation. However, she also felt an ease to the process that caused her to momentarily forget herself. Savis Maren plunged into that ease and slid her astral limbs out of their place, the arms of her shell falling to her sides as the astral limbs rose in unison.

Then, Savis Maren willed them forward. The Nuit felt her astral body respond much faster, much steadier than it ever had before. She felt a strength in her astral limbs as they sprung forth. Savis watched as the limbs stretched and she wrapped her spectral hands around the satchel that housed so many of her possessions. She lifted it from its place on the floor and was astonished to find the task possible. She allowed her left astral arm to slide from the satchel, and her right lifted the bag up before pulling it back towards her. The Nuit's other arm withdrew, fleeing back to her shell and sliding back into place. The Nuit re-connected the astral limb to its corresponding arm as her right arm remained with the satchel in tow. Troubles were forgotten in the moment as realization dawned within Savis Maren that her mastery of personal djed had truly grown in her time in Lhavit. She'd known about the burgeoning prowess of Auristics and how auras not only became bolder, more visible, but also revealed more information to her... But her astral body strengthened in a manner similar to that? The Nuit considered the new potential as she placed the satchel on her desk before sliding the remaining astral limb back into place.


WC: 669

[Savis Maren]

4th of Winter, 518 AV

Detachment was growing easier and easier the more I used Projection. That much I knew. But even re-attachment, manipulation of the astral limbs... and now, the strength of the astral body? There's much to explore in this new knowledge and yet... that's not why I reached for the satchel. In search of a distraction, have I become distracted from my initial distraction? It seems a silly idea... However, a bedroom is hardly the place to test the bounds of this new potential. And the dead of night is hardly the time to do so, as well. I'll come back to this later, Savis reasoned, her silver eyes wide, her mind whirling with possibilities before she forcibly shut them away. Savis Maren allowed her wide eyes to narrow before falling entirely shut. The Nuit willed away her distractions, as legitimate as they were, as she allowed her focus to shift to the task she'd retrieved her satchel for in the first place.

Unbelievable. Here I was in the midst of reaching for my things to attempt a previously untouched aspect of Glyphing and I come to realize that I no longer need to drag this bulky satchel to bring it to my shell with the atral body. In any case, I think it's about time for me to attempt a sigil I've yet to have the occasion to actually use. I've the one in my notebook, tampered with in order to render it ineffective. But there was never an attempt to use that. Tonight I leave my troubles behind, she affirmed as she reached with her physical arm into the satchel and set aside several pieces of parchment, taken from the basement of Infinity Manor, her treasured paintbrush, and her long, elegant tube of black paint. With a flourish of movement, she placed each key item in its proper place, with her tube left open, her brush in her left hand and the parchment directly in front of her.

Savis Maren plunged into the work she set for herself. With difficulty, she managed to collect herself from her jarring introspection and paralleled the plunge of her brush into black paint with her plunge into a new course of action. Savis Maren mused for a moment as to which glyphs in combination might create the effect she was after. Thought creased her grayish skin, her silver eyes narrowed as she reflected on her knowledge of the most practical of the arcane disciplines she was privy to. Thoughts whirled in her mind before she began, paint at last caressing parchment.

Djuun, she mused, forging the glyph as a single dot in the center of the image before expanding upon it. Djuun transformed into a spiral that wound counter-clockwise from the center dot from which it spawned. Djuun formed into a focus, meant to store the fruits of her first work of arcane craftsmanship after her arrival within Lhavit. Savis widened the scope of Djuun, the heavy, dark spiral dominating the center of the parchment but leaving several inches of space for her to broaden the complexity of the sigil she intended to create.

"Within Djuun I'll store Sil, which has grown too frail from its experience alone in the Bharani Library to be of use anymore. It'll be forever treasured, a precious memory of the rekindling of my love for Animation, hallowed as the spark which ignited the flame that is Savis Maren," she said, as if presenting a eulogy to no one but herself. Indeed, Sil was, for all intents and purposes, dead. While the magic of Animation clung to the automaton's wooden body, its feet were too damaged to balance it. While the astral body was strong and willing to continue, Sil could no longer bend at the waist nor could his right leg move with any degree of competence. It struggled to exist when she activated it, even more so than it had when it was a complete structure. She'd lay it to rest inside of a sigil, where no despicable feline (for at least one resided in Infinity Manor) could bother it any longer. Satisfied with her creation of Djuun, the Nuit moved on to the next step in her journey to create a home for Sil. The focus that would act to store Sil was complete, but there needed to be a means to contain it within the bounds of the focus. Merely thrusting Sil into a focus would not keep it inside.

WC: 755

[Savis Maren]

4th of Winter, 518 AV

There lies the purpose of the Barrier. Which rune might serve the purpose of containing Sil? she asked herself. The Nuit created barriers in the past, and moreover, created a Path which required the use of two parallel barriers. However, she'd used links of a compound rune Yaq-pond as a means of containing the flow of djed within the circles of Animation. Her experience with Yaq-pond drove her to the conclusion that the compound rune was too complicated for her utilization. However, perhaps it wasn't now? Better safe than dead, she mused, very well aware of the consequences of miscalculating. A glyph of this size and caliber bursting was hardly something she considered very dangerous, but nonetheless, caution won out over courage and the Nuit decided on a different Glyph that had served her purposes well enough previously.

Daeq is the most reliable Barrier rune I can think of using. I've heard of the merits of Randaq. Sutla might also be reasonable. But Daeq is my choice.

The Nuit remained resolute on her choice as she began the task of forging Daeq into the form of an intricate chain that wound around Djuun. First, she created the first link, winding a single line as a curved length that defined the boundaries of the Barrier. True to the definition of Daeq, she created those boundaries before completing the rune with an inverted curve. Brush strokes defined Daeq, connecting the two thick black lines together as she occasionally separated brush from parchment to replenish the paint. Once the Barrier was complete, the Nuit looked down at her work before adjusting an unclosed line at the base of the rune and creating a complete, intricate design that mirrored her perception of Daeq.

Satisfied with the second step of her venture into creating a functional sigil, the Nuit moved on to the final step needed before she'd attempt to utilize the sigil for its intended purpose.

Barriers and Foci are all well and good, but there's no sense in permanently storing Sil in a scroll with no means of releasing it. Someday, Sil will have the death it deserves and its remains cast to the winds, she assured herself. The Nuit created this sigil because she needed to delay that inevitability; she needed to have a safe place for Sil to exist until she was mentally prepared to let her first personal automaton go. Sil, more than any other automaton she'd created, held Savis Maren's disdain and adoration in equal measure. The wooden, featureless doll was the memory of her first experience with magic in Lhavit and the personal hell it created for her later in the season. Sil was the representation of Savis' independence, the propriety of her future Animations and perhaps an already very dated relic of an understanding of Animation that was much poorer than the knowledge she currently possessed.

A trigger, to bring Sil back from the depths of the Focus and into the world again. I need not linger in considering which rune will personify this trigger.

Savis already knew. Without her needing to mention or muse upon it, Savis Maren reached for her brush and dipped it anew within the font of her paint. The Nuit set the brush on a virgin patch of parchment and began to inscribe the rune that when spoken aloud, would be the heralding of its doom. Savis Maren painted Roza as a featureless skull shape in the corner of the scroll. She decorated the Trigger with a set of bones at its base, a rudimentary representation of the sign of death and doom that many throughout the world knew. Roza manifested on the sheet and the Nuit imagined the numerous occasions that she spoke that same word aloud to shut the impertinent, useless, and all-too-loved Sil down. The kill-switch she'd embedded into the automaton would serve as the trigger that when spoken one final time marked its utter end.


WC: 672

[Savis Maren]

4th of Winter, 518 AV

The Nuit looked down at the completed scroll with a sort of tragic pride, knowing the temporary home she made for Sil would crumble apart just moments before he would once she spoke that trigger. She mused on the poetic end she'd give to the automaton before she stood from her place at the desk. She allowed the scroll to sit so that the paint could dry as she retrieved Sil from the belly of her automaton, Wheels. The Nuit allowed her gaze to jump from Wheels to Sil and then to the Gadget Arm and the Voice Box. All four of the animations the Nuit possessed were in her room with her, four astral bodies she'd created in her journey. First, she created Sil in an effort to test the bounds of her knowledge of Animation, the rusty teachings she hadn't utilized since her life on Sahova. Then, she created the Voice Box just days later, in an effort to fix the utter mess that creating Sil had put her in. Savis Maren reflected on her joruney. The summer put so very many obstacles in her path and she'd done her best (and failed) to meet the demand of those roadblocks. Believing herself truly dead and waiting to die, she emerged in the Autumn with a rekindled determination. She created Wheels next, which currently maintained its place as her most practical Animation to date. Then, she met Raeyn and the Gadget Arm was born out of their association. Later still, she created the Dowsing Platform, which resided in the belly of Infinity Manor as a safety measure for Madeira and Savis' future arcane meanderings. As the Nuit reflected on her journey within Lhavit, she lifted Sil from its place in her satchel.

Then, the Nuit attempted to thrust the inert, wooden doll into the scroll. Savis Maren felt the scroll absorb Sil's djed-rich composition, swallowing it within the bounds of the Focus. Little by little, the automaton dwindled into nothingness, and the focus settled once its purpose was fulfilled. Savis watched the scroll that held Sil within it, and all was still for a number of chimes. The Nuit left the scroll in place on that desk, and moved away in favor of standing in the center of the room. The Nuit allowed her bitter nostalgia to fade into obscurity, her grief whittling with it. However, her grief had only just begun. Savis didn't see it happen, but the Trigger she created was faulty, the skull she designed left open at the base. The faulty Glyph triggered without her uttering the phrase, and launched Sil into the air. Savis Maren noticed none of it until she heard the resounding crack as the automaton smashed into the ceiling, thrust by the same force she invoked to push Sil into the scroll itself. Savis turned in time to see Sil fall from the ceiling, the doll's head already snapped, held together only by a myriad of wooden fibres. Then, gravity brought Sil down. The automaton fell to the desk and smashed into the edge of the desk. The force did not break the automaton as its ascent had, but chips of wood splintered on the desk as Sil fell into a waste receptacle that lay adjacent to the desk.

Savis Maren's eyes widened as she watched the first of her series of Animations fall into its grave. Silver orbs grew wide as moons, her teeth grinding against one another as anguish poured from her lips in a bitter scream that she muffled against the palm of her hand. She collapsed onto the bed as her silver eyes unwaveringly clung to the broken and battered doll in the trashcan. her knees brought to her chest as she stared down the automaton and the broken scroll that served as its murderer.

Bitter failure. Sil... I'm so sorry, she thought, the words a murmur against her hand.

I... I'll never make this mistake again. I'll check... double check and even triple check my work before I decide I'm finished with it, she vowed.

WC: 694
Total WC: 2790

[Neologism]

Skills
Philosophy +1, Astral Projection +1, Planning +2, Painting +2, Glyphing +3, Rhetoric +1, Observation +2

Lores
Madeira: Breaches your solitude, Philosophy: It is easier to be hated than understood, Assessing the progression of skill in one’s self, Nader-Canoch: Djunn, Crafting a glyph to hold an animation, The mourning of a dead animation, Nader-Canoch: Yaq-pond, Using caution when glyphing, Glyphing: Focus, Glyphing: Barrier, Glyphing: Pathway, Glyphing: Trigger, Giving a glyph the same trigger as an animation, Observation: Animation holding glyph, The death of Sil

Notes
Don't forget to edit your entry in the Grading Queue as completed.