PSTH: Chapter Four

War. Poverty. Famine. While each of these are complicated topics with a great deal of nuance, the crux of their creation is one of two things: resource scarcity or human greed. With the return of magic allowing anyone with enough drive to fix the problem of scarcity, human greed was put under some serious stress testing.

-

Excerpt from the first newspaper article published in the new nation of Eligos after overthrowing their Oblivion King, 79 Modern-Era

-

“We’re going to track down a legendary primal,” Vince said. “And, if the records I have are correct, there’s a chance of finding some essence stones. Maybe even a mystic jewel or two, if we’re really lucky.”

I sucked in a breath at his statement, but River crinkled his eyebrows, clearly confused. 

“I’ve used an essence stone before, it let me pull power directly into myself to expand and improve my anima, pneuma, and ousia, and everyone knows what mystic jewels are… But I’m only guessing that legendary primals are really strong ones?” 

“Not necessarily,” Laurel said, shaking her head. “The rarity of a primal doesn’t always correspond to its power, just how common it is on a global scale. Caracoals are only uncommon, but one of the strongest fire and earth primals out there.” 

“It’s still a decent general metric, though,” I said. “Don’t treat it like an absolute, but generally speaking, if you take two level ten air element primals, the rarer breed will be stronger.”

“And of course, this is all base level,” Vince said. “You know the spiderweb principle? The same thing applies to primals.” 

“Of course,” River agreed. 

“I don’t,” I said, frowning, and River explained. 

“Some people awaken with their ousia already formed into complex patterns, giving them more natural power than someone else at the same level. But there’s a series of techniques that can be used to refine basic patterns into more complex ones, letting people who awaken with simpler shapes make them more complex over time.” 

“If you or your primals ever hit level hundred, it’s the only way left to advance,” Vince said. “But even that starts hitting diminishing returns eventually. Anyhow, that’s why common primals like Sqaurrels tend to be less powerful at the same level than a rarer primal.”  

“The theory is actually pretty interesting,” Laurel said, her voice taking on a note of some excitement for the first time since I’d met her. “Most people actually think that’s why they’re rare – since the ousia structure of rarer primals is more complex, an essence heart is less likely to produce them.”

I nodded slowly. I actually hadn’t known that, not entirely. I’d known bits and pieces, of course. One of the Regents had a Kirow, which was a common migratory wind primal, so I’d figured that the rarity could be accounted for somehow. Just not the whole 

“Regardless of why they’re rare, plenty of tamers go for prestige rather than power,” Vince said, “Even though trading primals is a big risk, there’s still a massive market for it.” 

“Why is it a risk?” River asked. “Laurel mentioned it once, but we got off topic.”

I glanced at Laurel, wondering how long they’d been dating, since River was clearly not up to date on information about tamers. She must have misinterpreted my look as me not knowing, though, because she rolled her eyes.

“An unhappy primal can break the bond and leave you. If you abuse them, they can attack you. Try to trap them, they can emit a distress signal through ambient essence that will alert primals and even heart guardians.” 

“Right. We’re not going to have to deal with a heart guardian, are we?” River asked nervously, and Vince shook his head. 

“Oh, definitely not,” he said, sounding vaguely offended. “What kind of monster do you think I am?” 

“Sorry,” River said, and I cleared my throat. 

“We should probably get back on track?” 

“You’re right, we should: Betsy, my Glayker primal, is getting older, and she’s expressed less interest in battles,” Vince explained. 

I tried to recall what I could about Glaykers. I knew they were a leonine primal with dual ice and combat elements, but nothing else sprung to mind. I’d have to search for it later. 

“I’m hoping to track down this legendary, and either help it escape back home, or bond to it and raise it up to be the next member of my team,” Vince continued, then leaned in. “So, this is where you come in, Aiden. Do you know where the old mine and castle, probably from around the Oblivion King Era, is? It’s located somewhere around Syenite village, but I don’t know exactly where.” 

I wrinkled my nose at the mention of the Oblivion King Era, the disgust at greed well-drilled into me. After magic’s arrival in the world, some of the people who had been wealthy tried to exploit magic in the same way, and had done some pretty awful things.

Still, I knew the place he was talking about. I just couldn’t figure out why he’d want to go there, since there was no way anything from, what, fifteen or so generations ago would still be laying around… Right? 

“I know it. It’s on an island outside of the moors, a ways away. We’ll have to kayak out that way. Why?” 

“I was doing research about the downfall of that era and stumbled across the castle,” Vince explained. “I wound up finding some information about a shipment that arrived at the castle and was logged into some recovered digital records from the old tech, as well as the stones and other stuff. But the records were cut off less than a week later, probably because of a rebellion or something.” 

Vince’s eyes flickered around, and I felt my augpad buzz in my pocket. I pulled it out to see a blurry, terrible photo. The essence impressions in it were shaky, which caused the image to blur, even if the camera itself was of a decent quality. 

Hardly surprising. Magic’s existence rewriting physics had broken a lot of tech, and the damage of the Oblivion Kings had pushed us back even further. I was honestly kind of impressed that the Oblivion King had been able to get a camera to work at all. 

I studied the picture. There was a large crate of essence stones, four glowing rocks I couldn’t identify, lots of food…

Then I spotted what Vince had.

There was an egg, nestled in a crate of straw. It was roughly the size of two loaves of bread, and was white, with yellow spots, black swirls, and purple slash-shaped marks. I pursed my lips, trying to recall what I knew about primal eggs. Most of the time, essence hearts just spawned fully formed primals, so I’d never really looked into eggs.

“I don’t recognize it,” Laurel said, “Then again, they’re rare, so I’ve never really looked into eggs.”

I had to stop myself from smiling at the mirrored lines of thought. 

“I cross referenced it with everything in the region, as well as pulled some planet-net info on eggs,” Vince said. “It doesn’t match with any of them. There are over a thousand logged primal eggs, but none have this shell pattern.”

Red light was leaking from his eyes as he excitedly began to jitter his leg. 

“That means that this is from something unusual. Really unusual. Even if I’m wrong, and it isn’t a legendary, it’s at least an epic that nobody's seen an egg of.” 

“I don’t want to burst your bubble, but there’s only one egg in the image,” River pointed out. “Nowhere near enough to have a stable population.” 

“That’s because you’re treating a primal egg like an animal egg,” Vince said. “Egg is really a misnomer from when we were still figuring things out. Eggs are more like a stasis spell surrounding a primal who didn’t have enough essence to finish forming. The egg should still be there, in stasis, and I’ll have more than enough anima to help it hatch.” 

“Oh!” River said, eyes widening. “Then… there’s a real chance. Even if the revolutionaries, primals, or animals took the essence stones and mystic jewels, the egg might be untouched, since it ate essence, instead of granting it.” 

“Exactly!” Vince half shouted, pointing at him. “It’s also why you’re here. Laurel mentioned you were interested in Pre-Arrival history and technology…”

Despite myself, I couldn’t help but get excited as well. It wasn’t a guarantee, but there was a real chance. Besides, I was getting paid either way. 

River and Vince excitedly babbled at one another for a bit, and I caught Laurel dreamily watching her boyfriend and mentor. Though I didn’t want to admit it, I felt a twinge of jealousy at her expression. Or, perhaps jealousy wasn’t the right word. I didn’t want to take what she had – I just wanted something of my own.

“So, are there any more questions about the theory, or can our guide start laying out what we need?” Vince asked once things calmed down. 

I was tempted to ask if Rane could come. She was attending an arts college in Tourmaline City, but if she got a bus ticket, she could be here within a few days. A week at most. I knew she’d love the opportunity to photograph an ancient castle… 

But no. She wasn’t a tamer or a magian, and this could be dangerous. Plus, I didn’t want to annoy Vince, so I just shook my head. When nobody else said anything, Vince nodded for me to start. I pulled up a copy of the local map and sent it to everyone on their aug-gear, marking things. 

“Alright, the X is where we’re going to start kayaking, and the Y is the castle. It’s about a twenty-five mile straight shot. I’ve been to the isle twice, but I never explored inside the castle or the mines. Even apart from the fact it’s old, creepy, and probably haunted, the primals there are completely wild, and the more combative ones are liable to try and attack and steal your essence.” 

“What kind of primals can we expect?” Laurel asked. 

“Mostly it’s common things like Gebcats and Aquarbs, but there are supposedly some shade, toxic, and arcane primals on the island. I didn’t see any, but we can’t ignore that they may be there.” 

I had actually thought about going out to the island and seeing if I could find a partner for Scales, since he and I were strong enough to handle it now, but I didn’t want to head out that way alone. Now, though? 

“What’s the ambient essence?” River questioned. 

“It’s a little bit stronger out there, but not much, about essence level seven or eight,” I said. “And I figure that we can take a break here after about four and a half hours, then complete the next five after that.” 

I marked a spot with a Z. It was a small island, barely big enough for all three of us to stand on during high tide.

“Hours?” Vince, Laurel, and River asked in unison, identical looks of horror on their faces.

"How fast do you think you can kayak?" I laughed. "I can go about four miles an hour, but y'all are rookies. And we'll have to slow down to eat and such."

"We should go in the morning," Vince said after a second. “I don’t think arriving at a possibly haunted island at ten at night is a good idea. I also don’t own a kayak, nor did Laurel or River bring one if they do.” 

“We don’t,” Laurel said, shaking her head.

“Willie rents them during the summer to those who come for the beaches,” I said, shrugging. “Since it’s the off season, he runs a discount.”

“Oh, I’ll cover it,” Vince said, shaking his head. 

He squinted for a moment, then I had an account forwarded to my augpad with some temporary permissions to use it. There was also a three hundred and fifty credit payment deposited directly into my account.

“What’s this for?” I asked. 

“Well, you clearly know the boat guy, so you’ll be in charge of getting them for us,” Vince said. “Also we’ve got three days of food packed in our bags for the island, but we need some food for our break tomorrow, and may as well make it lunch and dinner, so we can keep the travel stuff for later. Since you’re running errands and it’s past noon, that’s a half-day of pay.” 

I stared at him, my glowing yellow eyes meeting his sparking red, then I inclined my head in thanks. 

“Thank you, Vince, you didn’t need to do that,” I said, and he just waved me off. 

“Don’t worry about it.” 

Laurel glanced up and frowned. 

“It’s a long shot, but does this town have a taming supplies shop? If there really are some arcane types on the island, I’d be interested in trying to bond one, so I need a storage gem.” 

She let out a somewhat embarrassed sounding sigh, her neon green eyes flicking to the side, then to Vince, then River, then back to me. 

“Plus, I want to buy an imprint disk for the Willow Switch spell. It will help us against any earth or water primals that attack.” 

She said the last bit defiantly, as if expecting me to accuse her of wanting it just because Scales had defeated her Serest in battle. I just shrugged. 

“No taming specialty shop, sorry, but we do have a general essence supply shop. It might be able to get you what you want, and I know they stock weaker storage gems.

Laurel grunted and pulled herself to her feet, then looked at River and Vince questioningly. River shook his head, as did Vince.

“Nah, you all have fun. I’m gonna try and see if I can get a handle on expanding the range of my freecast teleports.”

“I’ve got a meeting with the other three Regents and the head of the Tamer’s Consortium in half an hour,” Vince said. “Thanks though!”

Laurel nodded, then looked at me. I rose, waved to Vince and River while saying my goodbyes, then turned to lead Laurel around the village.