Closed A New Expedition: Scouting a Location

[Clyde Sullins]

91 Spring 515- Second day of scouting It was the third day since they'd arrived at the shoreline, and still they had not settled on a site for the outpost. The first day had been a basic familiarization with the surroundings, and the setting up of a temporary base camp. The next day, or yesterday, had been spent fully in search of a proper site for a base. They'd broken up into small groups, and were scouring the coastline in either direction of their temporary camp for miles. They didn't want to go too far, since they did want to be as close to Ravok as possible, which limited their outpost location to a degree. Right now they were more or less directly north of the city of Ravok. If they headed east, the coast slowly tilted further north. If they headed west, the coast slowly tilted south before suddenly shooting straight north... Or so Clyde could tell from looking at the coastline on his map of Sylira. He'd not had too many reasons to use it, but now that he found himself map in hand and trying to understand it, he came to realize how different reading a map was from reading a letter or a book. Of course, the map wasn't perfect, and he had to assume that some bits would be more accurate than others. If he knew more of maps he might have known which bits he could trust. The coastlines far from any city were likely to be less accurate than ones closer to a city. But reading over it, it did give him a vague idea of where they were, where they wanted to go, and where they'd come from. Perhaps if he was more practiced with map reading or navigating he could have told more from it, but with his little skill he was lucky to have a vague notion of where they were. Most of that was from one of the guides with the group pointing out Ravok on the map, and comparing it to where they were last. Looking at the map, he recalled back to when he'd acquired it seasons ago, back in Syliras. It brought a small smile to his facing, realizing once more were he had gotten it. He'd bet a handful of mizas that the shop owner who'd sold the map to him hadn't imagined it being used for a task such as this! Perhaps that was irony... Or perhaps not. Either way, he found it funny. He almost wished he could go back to Syliras and show the man the map, just so he could know what he'd used it for. But he had a task at hand, and looking up from the map he tried to think to survival, tactics, and construction, and the talk he'd had from the expert back in Ravok about what they should look for in a location. It needed to be defensible. It needed to have resources nearby that could be used in its construction... It needed to be close to the ocean... And it needed to be close to a source of fresh water. Talking to the group he was in charge of, Clyde looked about, and issued his first order since they'd set off on their own. “Everyone, be on the lookout for fresh water. A stream, a brook, any source of fresh water. We'll need it for the location.” Clyde himself found his attention waning, boredom setting in. They'd been walking for a bell or so today, and his legs were already beginning to ache a bit. Mostly the calf muscles. He pushed through the tiredness, not giving in, enduring. Hoping to distract himself, Clyde set himself a magical task after putting up his map. Voiding. He'd not practiced it in a bit. As he walked he held out one hand extended, and willed the spot of air just above it to empty, to void, focusing on the concept of true nothingness and attempting to use djed to cause such a occurrence. He kept at it for a chime... Then two... Five... By then he was getting a bit annoyed. He'd not managed to make as much as a flicker, even a tiny portal opening and then closing. Clyde let out a huff of air, took in another one slowly and held it, and tried to calm himself, to put himself into a proper state to open a opening to the void. Clearly though it was discouraging to so utterly fail at opening even the tiniest of portals.

[Clyde Sullins]

Perhaps Clyde just wasn't to the level where he could form voiding portals while walking. Perhaps he was, and just wasn't doing it right. Either way, he wasn't one to give up so easily, and so he kept on trying as his group walked along. Having given his orders, he assumed if they saw a suitable location a member of his group would point it out. The term delegating came to mind, something he was fairly certain had to do with leadership. Perhaps a good leader would pay a bit more attention to his men, but for the given task Clyde didn't see a direct need for it. Besides, he had magic to do. Considering he was walking, a means of focus would likely be useful. So Clyde fell once more into his most recently most used method of focus, an incantation. He also slipped from trying to open it over his hand, to attempting to open it over Cha's head. The staff worked as a extra means of focus, of sorts. As he walked, he chanted under his breath, focusing on emptiness and nothing and of forcing it into existence in the location of his choosing by sheer force of will and djed. Mostly djed, however djed acted upon and guided by said force of will. “Dipping and dropping the digger does dive. Nothing from something is coming alive. Something seethes and settles on sight. Something by nothing is cutting through the live.” As he finished his last stanza, Clyde saw and felt the sudden blooming of nothing, a pinprick in space leading into the void, into a realm of cold emptiness. For a moment. For that was all it lasted. No sooner did he note it, feel the tiny twisting of djed to cause it, did it vanish and collapse upon itself. He'd managed to open a portal, but not hold it open. A success, and yet a failure. “Petch!” Several of the members of his group paused to look back at Clyde, confusion on their face at his sudden outburst. Not being attuned as Clyde was, he reminded himself, they'd likely not noticed anything at all. Attempting to play it off, and keep up morale, Clyde smiled back at them, shaking his head and waving back out towards the coast. Only one of the men seemed to question this any further, most having seen what Clyde could do, and having seen his somewhat erratic nature. Likely they assumed he'd done it just to break up the monotony, or for some reason they didn't understated. The rest turned back about and continued their searching. The one that seemed unsatisfied quirked an eyebrow at Clyde, and continued staring. Niceness having failed, Clyde fell to his backup, intimidation. He glared at the last man, his face growing serious and solid. Unblinking. After less than half a chime the man flinched and looked away. Persuasion first, and intimidation and a show of strength if needed should the first fail. All just tools in the quiver of a good leader. He wouldn't be leading an army anytime soon, but he was learning, and was getting to be quite decent at leading men in a common cause or task such as this one.

[Clyde Sullins]

Having dealt with his leadership duties for the moment, Clyde turned back to his voiding. He'd managed to open a portal for a moment over Cha, but it'd closed upon itself almost instantly. He needed to open a portal, and keep it open for a good bit. To stretch those voiding muscles so to speak, in the same way he was stretching his physical muscles to make his legs stronger. Focusing once more on emptiness and nothing, on less than nothing, on guiding his djed and using it to push the substance of a spot, he began to chant quietly once more. “Skidding and sliding silently slipping. Forming and frowning and freeing the fishes. Trading and trusting to teach the trades. Bleeding and bonding to bear the breadth.” To a degree what Clyde said made no sense. At the same time it also had a deeper meaning. Sometimes a statement of the times, or the goal. Sometimes though it was just a way of clearing his head, of getting his head out of things, and within his own words, to forget his distractions and to hone in his focus. Incantations were a good mental exercise. As he talked he felt his djed slowly humming, moving and thrusting about, twisting in the air above Cha's head like a man wringing his hands. It went up through him, through Cha an aspect of himself, and extended his will through her. There was a moment of nothing, and then there was a moment of Nothing, and he felt the buzz of the impossible, of djed working itself upon the substance of the world to cause a change, in this case a visible one. A rent opened, a portal to the void, a pinprick opened above Cha. This time the portal didn't break, didn't fall upon itself. He could feel it, was aware of it, connected to it through his control over it. As he walked he used Cha like a guide, a torch with the portal the flame floating just above, and guided the portal along with him as he paced. A slow but steady stream of djed flowed into the portal, at first simply making it firmer, more sturdy, but after a moment pushing its edges and making it wider. He kept feeding it djed till it reached a size nearly that of a miza. Then he cut the feed, watching the opening in space, tied to him, waiting for it to slowly starve and shrink. Nothing happened immediately, as there was little drain upon it, but in time it would shrink and sputter and close. Sealing itself over.

[Clyde Sullins]

Clyde watched the voiding portal slowly dwindle and die, feeling the rent in space ripple and shrink over time. Perhaps it was a few chimes, but Clyde did not keep track of how long it took to vanish. Instead he focused on the sensations of it. The buzz of magic upon his aura, like a tickle on his skin. The change upon the space, causing the change that was the magical portal into nothing. The connection Clyde felt to it, through which he willed it to act. To pull, or grow, or to shrink. The movement in and of itself was beyond him, something he couldn't have done on his own. It was only with Cha that guiding the portal became possible. Perhaps stronger voiders could have guided and moved it with simple skill alone, but Clyde was no where near there. As the voiding portal shrunk and collapsed, shrinking to a pinprick before finally sealing over, Clyde thought of a new exercise, one he'd yet to attempt. Why not store a voiding portal within Cha, as he'd stored and later released other magics? He wasn't totally sure how it would work. If he formed a larger portal, would it come out full sized? Would it tear open a pinprick like a normal portal opening, and then grow to full size and effect? He wasn't sure. Though he'd opened portals through Cha, he'd yet to do so inside of her. It would be interesting to try, and informative. Focusing once more, Clyde chanted, focusing on the emptiness and nothingness, and forcing such a thing into existence, this time focusing on the image of such a spot opening inside of Cha. A frozen moment of nothing, stored and prepared within. Currently he was slow to open portals. But if he could learn how to store a completed and prepared one within Cha, he'd be able to do much better with it. And once he got better, and could open larger portals, it'd be of even more use to fully form it and release it as such. “Gliding the gilding does glisten and gladden. Singing the sorrow does sweeten the sadness. Bringing the birthing does brighten the billows. Dredging the dropping does darken the day's droves.” With the first stanze nothing happened. Neither did anything happen with the second utterance. On the third however, Clyde felt a swelling of djed, felt the effect occuring, popping outward. For a moment it was inside of Cha, and then the next it was outside, a portal opening to the void the size of a pinhole just above Cha's head. Clearly he'd not yet mastered the particulars of storing a voiding spell. He could store spells, but he'd had a learning curve with storing other types of spells, and clearly voiding would be no different. Focusing on the portal Clyde willed it to close, forcing substance back into it, filling it like a small divot in the ground. Just as it appeared it popped back out of existence. Letting out a sigh, Clyde prepared himself for a few more tries before he got it right.

[Clyde Sullins]

Since he knew how to store spells already, learning how to store a new magic wasn't nearly as hard as when he'd first been learning. So far he'd only stored Reimancy, and he had it down quite well. Storing a voiding portal was more of a deviation on something he could do. Albeit it was more difficult due to his skill in the magic. While he was a master of Reimancer with nearly unparallelled skill, he was still a initiate in voiding. Concentrating on getting the magic to work was a tricky thing in and of itself, let alone while also trying to focus on storing the spell. Still though it was something he needed to learn how to do, and a new skill within voiding he could try out. First he needed to open the portal, or do the equivalent step of it, but stored within the staff. Then he could focus on adding djed to the spell, on increasing its size. This as usual entailed a good bit of repetition. He was getting to the point where his opening of portals was a bit more predictable, but still wasn't to where he could open one every time he tried. This time it only took two utterances of a chanting to get an opening. “A slipping a sliding as a timing they are biding. A listen a lesson in lessening the dressed in. A focus upon a stormy cloud. A magic wrought to make one quite proud.” As he chanted Clyde kept moving, kept focusing, kept his mind empty and upon emptiness. A tricky task, as emptiness was nothing, but in voiding true nothing was a emptiness beyond nothing. Such an emptiness was what one wanted to create. But with the air in and out of ones lungs, the wind on ones skin, and the sounds of feet on the ground moving, it was tricky to concentrate within oneself and to the concept of true nothingness. He willed upon reality the alteration to occur, willed his djed to make manifest his desire, to bring his focus of nothingness into a reality. To make a change, if but small one, upon the world itself and its environs. Djed spent and exchanged. It was odd to Clyde that such thoughts did not take away from his feeling of emptiness, of concentrating on such, as the repetition of the same concept with different words seemed to clarify in his mind that each meant nothing. If so many different things worded could be used to describe one, then it didn't really many anything. All were a fumbling at understanding and explaining, but a failure in truth of grasping the actual concept of Magic. It was upon one such logical mental meandering that Clyde opened the grain of a portal without even realizing. This time he'd done it right, and it sat frozen within a niche of Cha's inner foldings. A non-physical gap within Cha, within its djed, where the djed was folded and allowed for the build up of djed into a spell. In reality there was no gap, no niche, it was all a concept. Perhaps this knowledge also helped in his focus upon nothing. Mentally grasping at the grain, he willed it to slow, to freeze, to not move. At the same time he willed it to grow, fed a stream of djed into it, willing it to expand and widen. Imparting the djed in the correct pattern that he would if doing the spell upon true space. If the same djed in the same pattern was released, the spell would take effect, but stored and frozen within Cha it had no physical affect. It was a cup of water, still, unable to flow free. Only when he broke the glass would it come flowing outward and be experienced. Such supposition, such odd trails of logic, seemed to work for Clyde, helping him in his focus. Along with that he carried on with a small gesture, sweeping the palm of his hand over Cha's head in a circular gesture, like he was rubbing the belly of a beast to calm it. Once he felt it was right, was nearing his capacity, Clyde stopped, enforcing the coldness and stillness upon the spell, holding it in its totality. Then all at once he defrosted it, release it out upon the world. Clyde watched eagerly as the djed met true space, and took effect. Though it happened fast, and the entire spell was open in but a second or two, Clyde felt the truth of it. First a grain opened, breaking through the skin of space and opening a path to the void. Then in a quick order the portal expanded outward, swelling to the size of Clyde's fist far quicker than he could have managed if he'd been making the spell right then. But then, he'd spent the time, just not at the moment. He'd taken the time and done it before when building the spell, and so had spent just as much time in the doing. Only the time was at the front end. Clyde heard a yelp off to his right, and saw a flurry of motion. Turning to look he saw a man who was not of his group. Apparently he'd been about to reach out to Clyde, when the portal had popped intro existence. The man had jerked back and landed on his rear in his hurry to get away. Clyde, deep in his magic as he was, hadn't noticed that they'd stopped walking, nor that someone had walked up to him and was trying to get his attention. Turning to the new man, and noticing his horse off to the side, he realized he was a messenger. “Yes?” The man seemed scared for a moment, as if he could not speak, but worked up the courage soon enough. "Ah... Yes... I said the search is over. One of the other groups found a usable spot. I have orders to find all of the groups in this direction and tell them this, so we can converge at the base camp, and then go to the new destination." Clyde nodded, and looked over at his other men. Having seen his magic during the trip here, a small portal into the void wasn't so scary, but then this was also more sudden, and not during a battle with its related distractions. “Alright men, we're heading back. Messenger, on your way, message received.” As the group turned back to go the way they'd come, Clyde was a bit saddened. He'd hoped to be the one to find the spot. But in the end he'd learned more of voiding, and as the spot had been found it didn't truly matter who had found it. He did wonder who's group it was that had done so...

[Ball]

And the grades come rolling in.

 

Overall Comments

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Clyde Sullins

Experience Points.

Land Navigation	+1
Leadership	+1
Meditation	+1
Voiding	+3
Concentration	+1

Lores.

• Land Navigation: Reading a Map and determining inaccuracies
• Voiding: Pinpoint sized Portals are no easier than larger ones
• Voiding: Feeding Djed into a Portal to strength it.
• Voiding: Grain of Djed Beginnings
• Voiding: Continuous Djed stream for feeding and growing, cut the djed and it slowly shrinks
• Voiding: Closing of a Void – Folding over itself
• Voiding: Storing a portal within Cha
• Voiding: Releasing a portal from Cha, all the prep seen rapidly.

Template Credit: Edric Wingard