A Demon's Core

Today I discovered that I can, in fact, feel pain. The pain I felt when I stepped past the threshold of the void was excruciating. It overwhelmed my senses and I could no longer focus on anything. It felt like my mind had shut down. When I could finally think straight again, I realized my body was gone and I was back to just being inside my orb.

I know my imps have gathered around me and I can hear them talking, but I am once again unable to understand them. But now I can not even see anything anymore, so I am even worse off than when I started. I can still sense the general layout of my domain and where my imps are positioned within that area so it is not as bad as being completely blind, but it is still terribly vexing. Now I am even more frustrated than before.

Wait...what happened before, maybe that is the answer. I try to calm down and remember when I first got my body. It started with my mana pulsing through the structure of the room so I try to emulate that. It feels strange trying to move my mana around the room without actually spending it on anything. It takes a few attempts to get it right and with each pulse of mana, it feels like I can sense the structure of the room more acutely, noticing finer details that I could not see before.

After the mana pulsing, I remember some of my mana being consumed, but where did it go? It was not into the rift, I am sure, because my body did not appear at the rift but rather above the chair. Maybe if I release the mana into the air? But when I try that the mana just dissipates, so that did not work.

Instead of just releasing the mana, perhaps I need to try and shape it. I try gathering mana in the space above my chair, but making sure to hold onto it rather than letting it dissipate. But how do I shape it? Do I start by visualizing how I want to look? How do I want to look though? Last time I just looked like First. I suppose I could do that again. Though, since no one could see me anyway it probably does not actually matter what I look like. So I will just do the same as before, that was plenty good enough. I can feel my mana draining for a few seconds, then suddenly I can see again. I look down and can see my body, it looks just as is did before, even the same clothes.

I look to my gathered imps and can see they look quite distressed. But Second quickly calms down.

“I think it’s okay now.” She says, reassuringly. First turned to her, looking like she was only one step away from full blown panic.

“Not okay! Heard pain. Now it gone!” First wailed.

“Close your eyes. Take a deep breath. You can feel it now, can’t you? It’s back.” Second instructs the others. First and Third both do as she said and soon relax.

“Oh, it back,” First says, now much calmer. What is this “it” they are referring to? Are they talking about me? I did not go anywhere did I? Sure, I was out of my mind with pain, but I was still here. Obviously they could tell something was wrong though. Perhaps my ability to sense their presence is not a simple one-sided connection.

Everything is alright now. I am okay. I was just conducting another experiment. This one, unfortunately, did not go well. I am sorry for worrying you...again. First turns to my orb with an angry expression.

“No scare like that!” she chastises. I am surprised to be scolded like that by First. But it is endearing to know she worries so much about me.

I am sorry. I will need to conduct more experiments in the future. It is important for me to learn what my capabilities and limitation are. I can not promise that those experiments will never backfire. But I will be more careful from now on.

“Well now that we know that you’re alright, would you tell us about your experiment?” Second queries. First and Third do not look that interested, but Second seems genuinely curious. How should I answer though? Telling them that I tried to walk into the void would not make a lot of sense when they can not see my body. They only see me as an orb which can not move independently.

I was trying to see beyond the void. But instead I was temporarily blinded. They all look confused at that and are silent for a moment. Third is the first one to speak.

“What is void?” He questions.

“You say that before,” First interjects. “I not know void, but you scared of it.”

“I also don't know what you mean by ‘void’”. Second adds. Now it is my turn to be confused.

The void is the black wall of darkness beyond the door that leads outside. I explain to them but receive blank stares in response.

“Is not void. Is hallway.” First retorts.

You do not see the black wall? What about outside the windows, what do you see there? They all look towards the nearest window.

“Outside widow is outside.” Third states confidently. “See buildings and trees and bird.” So the void is something only I can see then. A barrier to my senses that I have no way of breaching...for now at least. “All okay now? I go back to sleep. I sleepy.” He says with a yawn. First scowls at him but I interject before she can scold him.

That is fine. I am alright now, no need to keep fussing over me if you have other things to do.

“Well if you do not mind, then I would also like to get some sleep.” Second says as she and Third return to their rooms. First just sits down in her nest and folds her arms, pouting.

You do not also want to sleep?

“No. I not need sleep.” She insists.

Then would you be willing to help me by telling me more about the outside, since I can not see it for myself? She thinks for a moment, then nods. Excellent, let us start with the hallway. What does it look like? Please tell me as much as you can about it.

“Long. Lots of doors. Big metal doors at end. They not open. Hmm, other doors, some broken, some not open.”

And what was behind those doors, the ones that did open?

“More rooms. Like this one. But no pink orb. One door, near metal doors have stairs. Some stairs up, some stairs down.” So it seems we are on one of the middle floors in a multi story building then.

So did you try go up the stairs? She nods

“Found more hallways. Highest hallway have less doors. Only one opened. Was bigger room inside. All hallways have metal doors. Never open.”

What about down?

“More hallways. Bigger room with door to outside. More big rooms. Not like this one. Then very big rooms. Have metal boxes. Boxes have wheels. Lots of colours.” She yawns as she said this and I can see her eyelids starting to droop. It seems she is more tired than she claimed.

You can go to sleep if you want. We do not need to talk about this now.

“No. Not sleep. I help.” She states defiantly.

You can help more later, but sleep is important. She looks conflicted, but eventually decides to follow my advice as she curls up in her nest to sleep. I will ask Second more about this later. As much as I know First wants to be helpful, I am sure Second can give me much more detailed information.

While the imps sleep, I have something new I want to investigate. When sending mana pulses through the structure of the room earlier, I was able to see much finer details than I normally can. I was too focused on my objective to really pay it much mind at the time, but now I think it is something worth looking into. I close my eyes and concentrate on my mana and send out a pulse and feel it move through the floor, the walls, the ceiling and the furniture, though only the frames of the beds and couch. But not the doors. That is odd. But the doors are not all that is missing.

I focus on Second’s room and send out another pulse. I can feel the desk, but not the chair that I know is in front of it...an idea strikes me and I turn my attention to the bone pile then send out another pulse. I can feel some of the bones, but not as many as I know are actually there. I think I am getting closer to an answer about why I can touch some things but not others. All the things I can not touch, I also can not feel through these mana pulses. I continue to send out more pulses while focusing on the bones and after several pulses, something changes. I can feel more of the bones than I could before. I open my eyes and look at the bones, but I can not see any visible difference in them.

I send out another pulse, still focusing on the bones, but with my eyes open this time, looking at them in hopes of observing further change. I do see something. A faint shimmer, barely perceptible, but definitely there. But it only covered the bones that I can actually touch. I get closer so I can look at them as closely as possible then send out another pulse. The shimmer does not cover the bones uniformly. It seems to follow very thin strings that are covering the bones. Or perhaps filaments would be a better description.

I send out a few more pulses and I can see the filaments growing ever so slightly with each pulse, covering more of the bones. I step away from the bone pile and look around the room as I send out the next few pulses. I can see the whole room shimmering. The filaments cover everything. Or at least everything I can touch. They seem to be radiating outward from my orb. It makes me think of mycelium. Except it is not actually a fungus. Or, at least, I hope it is not a fungus. That would be weird.

So the things covered in these filaments are what is solid to me. Anything else is intangible. But it seems these filaments can grow and spread if I focus on it. I shift my focus back to the chair in Second’s room. Focusing as much of my attention as I can, I send out another pulse and the filaments latch on the bottom of the chair’s legs. I send more mana pulses and feel the filament slowly climbing the chair legs and I can feel some of my mana actually being consumed. So I can intentionally force it to grow, but it takes mana to do so. Only a little, but still noticeable to me. But what about the bones, they had filaments growing over them already and I did not do that intentionally, nor did it cost any mana. Perhaps it can grow naturally over time but it only takes mana to forcibly accelerate that growth.

I wonder if I can make it go faster by expending mana in a stream instead of just pulses. I focus on the chair again and start sending mana through the filaments in a consistent steady stream and I can feel them extending up the chair legs much faster than before. I try sending the mana faster and the filament growth accelerates even further. In only a few moments the whole chair is covered. But straining my senses to their limit, I can feel that the filaments are not only on the surface of the chair, they have infested its entire structure.

There are still some questions, such as why the filaments had not already claimed the chair in Second’s room like it had others or why the doors are unaffected. But I have learned a lot of important and useful information.

I walk up to the void door. I close my eyes and focus on the mana filaments along the edge of the doorway. I start pushing mana into them and try to force the filaments to grow outwards into the darkness. I can feel my senses slowly expanding beyond the doorway. The mana cost is extraordinary, far more than what it took to cover the chair in Second’s room. By the time I have used enough mana that I feel like I am on the verge of losing consciousness, I have only gained enough area to take a single step past the door. Beyond it, I see the void all around and a small semicircle of floor extending outward from the doorway. It was a lot of mana for such little gain. But it means I can expand my domain. I am no longer confined. It will take a long time to make any significant progress. But every journey begins with the first step.