| Present day Ortal's home, The Spires The writer sat himself down in the chair in front of the desk, slowly lowering himself into it. It felt like all his bones were creaking and protesting against every movement he made. Finally sitting down, he looked out the window of his library towards the water running down the glass. He mumbled something about 'blasted rain' as he stretched his arm out towards the quill on the desk. With trained patience, the writer dipped his quill in the inkwell and brought it over to the parchment, where he started writing. |
| Winter, 42nd, Year 464 Sahova The Undrykas sat cross legged on the floor, the book lying in front of him. He slowly flipped the page as he tilted his head to read the last of the words on the page he was turning. Eagerly, he continued on the next page. There was the slightest incling of a smile on his lips as he started reading on the next page. His fingers trailed down the paper, going down line by line as he read the words on the page. The black hair curled around his finger as he twisted it before gritting his teeth. With a small groan, he pulled some of his own hair. He dropped the severed hairs on the book, making sure to see them from up close and determine their color. Black, or a very dark brown. Placing his hands on his knees, the Undrykas sat up straight and straightened his back before closing his eyes. Focusing on the 'Eye', he tried to remove himself from the world around him, ban all influences, all unneccesary sounds and motions, all unwanted feelings of hot and cold or air brushing past and focused purely on what he needed. Following the instructions in the book, the young man molded his Djed, shaped it and moved it. Concentrating, he pulled his Djed forward, grasped at it with his mind, readying it for usage. According to different texts and different languages, it all come down to seeing yourself differently in order to make yourself different. Focus on the changes, focus on the things you want make different in order to look different. White, the Undrykas focused on complete and utter white. He poured his djed upwards, towards the top of his head, towards the roots of his hair. White was the color and the hair was the location. The Undrykas looked at it from all angles, from all directions, trying to see it better in his mind. Hair, long strands of hair, pure white with barely any shadow and no shade, the whitest white you could find. It was only possible in someone's mind. He pooled his Djed in his hair, could feel and sense ever single strand of it. He imagined looking at himself, from outside his own body, tried to see himself with the whitest white hair he could imagine, spotless white hair. He molded his Djed, pushed it up and willed it to change, willed it to make changes to his hair. No more dark hair. Whitest white. The Undrykas focused on the task at hand, focused on what needed to be done. It was difficult to see himself in complete detail with the white hair, for some reason he couldn't exactly grasp the concept of it. It looked strange, but he pushed on. According to the books he had read and the images he had desciphered or seen, the mind could control the body, completely if desired. By using Djed, one could focus it inwards, into the body and cause it to reshape or change the body. With higher skill, the entire body could be altered, allowing humans to take on the shape of birds or wolves or even monsters or other people. At his current level and understanding, however, the Undrykas was severely limited in his possibilities and he had to focus intensly on simply changing the color of his hair. So the young man sat there as time passed, constantly swirling his Djed through his hair, pushing it up through the root and pulling it into the air out of the tips of his hair. He could see how his hair changed color, how it slowly but surely altered in hue and turned from its dark brown/black to a lighter color. Before his eyes, his hair changed, his Djed manipulating and changing the color of it as he willed it. From black to a dark grey, from dark grey to grey to light grey to white. Once he was at white, he focused on filtering out any and all other colors, leaving only bright, shining, whitest white. Slowly but surely he let his Djed calm down, let it relax, like a muscle. The young man opened his eyes slowly, unused to the light as he let go of the Djed in his hands, let it slip through his fingers as the Djed made its way back to normal. Carefully, anxious, the Undrykas lifted his hand up to his forehead and grasped at his hair, pulling it down in front of his eyes as he tried to see the result. |
| Present day Ortal's home, The Spires The writer put the quill down again, groaning slightly at all the movement he had to make in order to do so. Every time he tried to move when it rained, every bone in his body protested to it. With a groan he managed to will his fingers to let go off the quill, dropping it on the writer's block next to the inkwell. His free hand grabbed into the bag on the table and sprinkled the sawdust and sand mix over the parchment, letting it soak up the excess ink from the written text. The scroll would be placed with the rest of them, adding to his ever growing collection of texts and fragments. |
