Unchained Potential (The Whispering Crystals: A LitRPG Series Book 4), page 3
I roll my eyes. “Oh, cut the crap, Akir. I know you’re not as tough as you pretend to be and I know you like me—”
“Do not,” Akir grumbles almost petulantly.
“—so help a girl out,” I stubbornly continue. “Please,” I add after a moment of awkward silence.
He eyes me warily, then sighs. “Explain. Because I literally can’t Imagine an emergency that can be resolved by a non-alcoholic White Russian.”
“I need to find Raindrop so I can warn her, but I’m low on Espir. Last time, I was able to extend my Visit when I was drinking here. I need you to help me extend it again, so I can look for her.”
Akir’s eyes continue to stare at me, unreadable, even as his tentacles start pulling bottles out from under the bar. “What is it you need to warn her about?”
“I need to warn her not to come see me the next time I Visit, as I’ll be... supervised.”
His eye-slits blink closed one after the other. “Ah,” he says, in a tone that makes me wonder how much he actually knows. “Very well, but if that’s the case, a non-alcoholic White Russian—ugh, just the idea—isn’t going to cut it.”
I frown. “Why... I mean, tell me why it wouldn’t, please.”
“I hope you don’t seriously expect me to keep a stock of bovine milk, because that would be a sure sign of madness.”
I blink. “I... thought you just Imagined these drinks, so I don’t see—”
He lets out a long-suffering sigh. “She thinks she can just absorb Espir from other people’s Imaginations... The only reason you can absorb some Espir from my drinks is that I make them from as many Extant ingredients as I can, like these fruit juices.”
Extant? “I... wasn’t aware there’s a difference,” I say slowly, trying hard not to let a questioning tone enter my words. “I thought everything here was Imaginary.”
“How do you not know basic stuff like this by now?” Akir complains as he pours a liberal amount of said fruit juices into a huge cocktail glass, where they begin to take on a layered structure of colours. I count at least eleven. “You’re here. Tell me, are you Imaginary? Am I?”
I stare at him in stunned silence.
“You know what, don’t answer that,” he continues. “The answer is no. Anything that can sustain its own existence in this Realm is not Imaginary, but Extant. Like this Rainbow Paradise. Well, most of it.” With a flick of his tentacle he adds a novelty straw and a tiny umbrella, then presents it with a flourish. “Now take it and go ask around about your friend.”
Ask around? That... is a much better idea than just flying around willy-nilly like I planned.
I stammer out a thank you as I grab it, then rush for the exit. It’s not until I’m almost through the door that it hits me. “Hey!” I call out as I spin on my heel. “You asked me questions!”
The skin around his eye-slits crinkle in what I suspect is his equivalent of a smile. “You told me to cut the crap, didn’t you? Now go!”
CHAPTER 3
Child’s play
I keep a wary eye on my Espir as I swim around Hangspire and ask friendly looking beings if they’ve seen Raindrop. A surprising number of them seem to know her, but so far none of them know where she’s at.
I diligently sip my cocktail as I go. It’s delicious, and there’s a lot of Espir inside. However, I quickly find that I absorb perhaps a fifth of the motes at best—less if I drink too fast. Even sipping it at a rate that keeps my Espir Pool level, it won’t last me long.
By the time my drink runs out and I’m down to twelve motes, I’m feeling pretty desperate, and am starting to reconsider my options.
Would Akir be willing to give me a refill? Enough to last me for a longer time? Not that I could even carry the amount I’d need to scour an area of any significance. Maybe I should just hand the whistle off to Akir instead; Raindrop can’t find me without it anyway, right?
However, at that moment, a huge ostrich with a feather plume hat approaches me, flapping awkwardly through the air. “Excuse me, dear, a-are you the one looking for Raindrop?”
With the help of some directions, I manage to find Raindrop in a field of flowers somewhere between the upside-down forest and the sea of glitter. Seeing her—and realising I still have plenty of motes to carry on a decent conversation—I am finally able to calm down a little.
“Come on, you can do it!” Raindrop chirps excitedly at the tangerine-coloured flower in front of her.
For a moment, I watch in confusion as she spouts an endless stream of encouragement at the plant, which seems to lightly pulse and grow with every word.
“Ehm, Raindrop?”
“Aack!” she squawks, flapping her arm-wings as she shoots upright. “Oh, Eh-ma, you startled me!”
“Really? I hadn’t noticed,” I reply dryly. “What were you doing?”
“Hmm? Oh! I was just practising for the flower-growing contest! I’m totally gonna win this year,” she chirps confidently.
“A contest?” I ask, bemusedly raising a brow as I fold my arms across my chest. “Isn’t it child’s play to Imagine a flower growing really large?”
Raindrop cocks her head sideways in her jerky, bird-like manner. I can’t quite tell if it’s because she finds my question odd or just a tic. “Why would it being a child’s play be an issue? Are there no competitions in children’s games where you come from?”
I smile wryly as my mind goes to the grown men who become multi-millionaires running after a ball back on Earth.
“No, we’ve got those... I meant it sounds too easy to have a contest in. I mean, how hard is it to Imagine a flower and make it grow?”
Raindrop shakes her tail feathers, seeming amused by my question. “You can’t just Imagine your own flower, silly! You have to pick an Extant flower and make that grow.”
Extant... right. So even Raindrop knows stuff like this.
I check my Espir. Five motes. I guess I can give it a try.
I turn to a pretty purple flower and try to Imagine it growing a little bigger. It doesn’t budge.
I frown. “Why doesn’t that work?”
Raindrop cackles. “You can’t just force it like that, silly—well, unless you’re Goddess—it’s a separate entity, with its own Espir, its own will. It’d be like if you tried to turn me into a fish or something!” She shudders at the idea.
I shake my head. “I take it Goddess won’t be joining the contest, since you actually have hope of winning.”
Apparently, that idea is terribly funny, for Raindrop practically falls over laughing. “Oh Goddess, you’re so funny, Eh-ma!”
“Thanks,” I reply dryly as she hangs off my shoulder with a feathery hand. “This is all mighty interesting, but I actually came here with a reason.”
Her eyes go round as dinner plates as I hold up the whistle. She squawks and apologises profusely, and it takes me a while to calm her down enough that I can explain to her about my upcoming supervised Visit, and that my chaperone can under no circumstances find out what I’ve been up to here, and especially should never catch sight of the whistle.
I make her repeat it back to me, and only once I’m sure she’s internalised the importance of the matter, do I relent.
Unfortunately, my drink is gone by now, so it seems like I’m going to have to cut my Visit short.
My eyes fall on the purple flower. I hesitate, then reach out and pick it.
Since this is all Imaginary, there’s no reason I can’t eat it, right? And since this thing is Extant, I might be able to absorb some Espir from it.
Guess I’m reduced to trying to eat flowers. Oh Emma, how low you’ve sunk, I joke to myself.
Raindrop watches me curiously. It’s not until I bring it to my mouth that she flaps her wings in alarm. “Eh-ma, what are you doing?! You can’t just eat her!”
I blink at her as she snatches the flower out of my hands, and carefully—impossibly—reconnects the stem to its roots. I watch, bewildered, as the trembling flower slowly curls out its petals again under her gentle encouragement.
Then she stands up and frowns at me. “You need to apologise!”
“Right, it’s a separate entity with its own will,” I murmur, catching on. “Ehm, I’m sorry, flower.”
Raindrop stills for a moment. “She forgives you,” she chirps happily. “As long as you don’t try it again.”
Well, this certainly puts a damper on my idea.
I scratch my immaterial-yet-perhaps-not-so-Imaginary head. “But, Raindrop, Akir made me a drink made of Extant fruit juices, why is it okay to drink that?”
She cocks her head. “Fruit aren’t entities, silly, fruit trees are. Not everything Extant is alive. The whole Realm is Extant, otherwise it would Fade if we stopped paying attention to it, wouldn’t it?”
Ah. That’s actually pretty insightful.
Unfortunately, since there’s nothing to eat, I’m forced to say my goodbyes.
“Awww, well okay, see you soon, Eh-ma! I’m going to see if Mr Fluffybutt wants to play; I haven’t seen him for a while!”
“Tell him I said hi,” I reply, fondly recalling the nightmarish, black-feathered hawk that basically saved my life by bringing Raindrop to me the first time I Visited the Realm of Imagination unsupervised.
As a wave of fatigue sweeps over me, I quickly yank on the chain that represents my spirit’s connection to my body and Imagine it pulling me back.
[Really, Emma?] Suri chimes when I return to my body. [I’d hoped we’d be done with your little nightly accidents by now.]
‘Did you really have to put it like that?’ I send back as I stretch out my stiff limbs and rub the sleep from my eye.
[Like what?] Suri chimes innocuously.
‘Just... never mind. Sorry, I guess. It’s not under my control,’ I lie.
[Oh, forget it. I suppose experience has proven your nightly incidents to be harmless,] Suri chimes. [Just do me a favour and make sure you keep quiet about their nature to your fellow participants, and I mean all of them. I’m sure you believe you can trust your current bedmate, but anything you say to her will be listened in on by that incessant chatterbox, and he’d rat us out in a second if he believed it to be to his advantage.]
‘I won’t tell her,’ I promise just as the girl in question starts to stir.
Why would I? She already knows!
Of course, I’m not about to let Suri in on the fact that Kaitlynn knows all about my Visits, and is actively helping me to hide them from Kai. But this is certainly an interesting development. Seems like Suri doesn’t care too much about my Visits anymore, as long as the people running this place don’t find out.
It wouldn’t be the first time Suri’s played loose with the rules. Suri’s definition of ‘five minutes’ during our Q&A sessions was already becoming increasingly malleable before we reached Hub Three, for example.
Part of me is burning to ask her about it, but I really don’t want to rock the boat, let alone draw attention to it from anyone who might be monitoring us. Frankly, I have this sneaking suspicion I wouldn’t get a satisfying answer out of Suri anyway.
Regardless, I’m very relieved to have achieved my goal of warning Raindrop, and I also learned some interesting new things!
I’m definitely looking for some fruit trees next Visit. Well, next Visit that isn’t a Skilldream.
Though I have to say I don’t quite understand the whole Extant thing yet... Raindrop said not everything that’s Extant is alive, but is everything that’s alive Extant? Wait, am I Extant when I Visit? Akir said anything that could sustain its own existence is Extant, but if I stay in the Realm of Imagination too long, I’ll Fade...
I’ll have to find a chance to ask more about this next time.
Kaitlynn turns around groggily—though I suspect she may have been faking sleep and waiting for me to return—and smiles at me. “Good morning,” she says with a raspy voice as her languid stretch pushes her chest up towards my face.
I avert my gaze and swallow. “Yup. Good morning.”
This is going to be a long day.
“Let’s try this step by step,” I say. “Start with entering a lucid trance, please.”
Kaitlynn closes her eyes, and I wait for the Lavi flows barely visible beneath her skin to slow down.
“Very good. Now push it to the next level. Shut off your senses of sight, taste, and smell. All you need is to hear my voice and sense your body. You got that?”
Since she has the requisite third level of Meditation, this shouldn’t be too much of a challenge, so I just give her a moment to figure it out. Soon enough, she slowly nods.
“Good. Now picture Alec’s painting of the Hydra in your mind, particularly the first pane, the rallying cry. Focus on that sensation, the urgency. Can you feel it?”
After a moment, another nod follows.
“Hold that in the back of your mind. Now tap into the connection to your body’s senses, that stream of information coming up through your spine. Are you in?”
A longer pause, followed by a third nod.
“Perfect. Now, when you’re ready... send the signal.”
Kaitlynn remains still for a moment, then a frown begins to creep over her face. She shakes her head minutely.
“Not working, huh...” I purse my lips. It’s probably the required sense of urgency that’s tripping her up. She doesn’t feel like she’s in danger. However, I’d rather not wait for the right opportunity to come along where she’s actually in danger for her to gain it.
“All right, give me a moment,” I say, as I reach for her backpack, and retrieve something. “Stay in your trance, stay connected, and hold that feeling.”
‘Suri,’ I send. ‘Could you turn off this room’s Restoration Crystal for a bit, please?’
[Done.]
I take one of Kaitlynn’s hands in mine and press the sharp point of one of her throwing knives against the tip of her index finger. Her brows rise, but her eyes remain closed.
“Do you trust me?” I ask.
She hesitates, then nods.
“Good. This is going to hurt, but it’ll be worth it.” I hope. “I’m going to count to three, okay? One... Two...”
I press harder, until the knife pierces her skin.
Kaitlynn lets out a soft gasp.
I pull the knife back and stare intensely at the small cut. “Now, send the signal. Send it!”
For a moment, nothing seems to happen. Then a visible pulse travels through her subdermal Lavi Flows, and the small cut begins to close up, flesh knitting together neatly.
Her eyes jump open. “I did it!”
I laugh as she launches herself around my neck with a squeal. “I figured you just needed a little... motivation. I bet the adrenaline helped too, with the, ehm...”
I trail off for a moment, caught off guard by the sensation of a pair of warm lips pressing into the sensitive skin of my neck.
“The, ehm, sense of urgency, required...”
My attempt to rally is quickly derailed as Kaitlynn’s mouth slowly works its way up my neck to my jaw, the breath coming from her nose warm and shaky as she makes her way onto my face until finally—
I pull away with a shuddering breath, holding her by the shoulders.
Kaitlynn gives me a familiar, smouldering look through half-lidded eyes. She bites her bottom lip, and it takes all I have to tear my eye away from the alluring sight.
I swallow thickly. “We, ehm, we said we wouldn’t.”
She takes a deep breath and leans back to rake a hand through her hair. “Right, right...” she says, her voice breathy and her chest still heaving a little, like she just took a sprint up some stairs. “I know. It’s just hard, having you this close, and not...”
I nod like a bobblehead on the dashboard of a moving vehicle. “I know. I’m sorry.”
She shakes her head. “It’s okay. I knew what I signed up for.” She clears her throat. “Anyway, we should probably, like, eat something. And talk Skilldreams.”
We keep our lunch simple again, opting to eat some zirot fruit as we didn’t pack too much firewood.
I’ve eaten a lot of zirot fruit over the past few weeks, but I can honestly say I’m not tired of them yet. There’s just something very satisfying about biting through that waxy peel to the sweet goodness beneath.
It’s definitely a step up from jicca nuts and birberries, and not just in terms of taste. After all, at 3 Onkh per minute, the Lavi supplement the zirot fruit provide is double that of our previous rations.
Finished first, I wait in silence for Kaitlynn to swallow her last bite.
She licks her lips and turns my way. “It’s time, Emma. You can’t postpone it any longer.”
“Is it though?” I ask thoughtfully. “Suri, how much time do we have?”
[Of your mandatory twenty-four-hour wait, 19 hours, 36 minutes, and 15 seconds remain.]
“That’s quite a lot, still!”
Kaitlynn snorts and gives me a light shove. “Just get it over with, you goof.”
I groan. “Do I have to? It’s just getting worse and worse!”
She shakes her head, staring at me with a glint in her eyes. “What, are you chicken?”
Damnit. She knows just how to push my buttons.
I sigh and cross my arms over my chest. “Fine, but let the record state I’m doing this under protest. Suri?”
[Yes, dear?]
Gritting my teeth, I force out the words I know I have to say. “Would you please show us ‘Suri's Hyper-Amazing, Stunningly-Custom, Stylishly Colour Coded, Natural Growth, Tempering, and Levelling Results Window and Skill Overview’?”
[Why of course!]
I roll my eyes at the gaudy display of the window’s title. “I really hate you sometimes, you know that?”
[Is it the alternating colours in the word tempering? It’s too much, isn’t it?]
Ignoring her, I go over our respective Lavi and Qi Pools.
