Chapter 36: 36: Scales of Light

The female-who-was-not-Needle had finally stopped scratching away at my head-scales and making her incessant noises. A few minutes had been enough; her shoulders had slowly lost much of the tension that had held them tight, though her eyes had never lost the sadness that dwelled within - it had only become a little muted. Still, it was enough that she eventually turned her attention to the tunnel around us and left me free to focus entirely on my goal.

The cavern around me fell away as I focused; it was a dangerous sort of concentration, but I trusted that the Coreless would be attacked first if anything were waiting in ambush. They would be my first line of defense - and a rather solid one, given their size.

It was enough that I felt confident in attempting what I wanted to try.

Ever since I had gained [Illusion Spark], I had been constantly aware of the way that heat and light stored within my scales. It was difficult to tell exactly how much of each I was able to hold, though I had noticed that the amount I could store and the speed at which I could store it increased every time [Illusion Spark] progressed - to a significant enough degree that I was extremely regretful that there was no time to consume more Flame Wisps.

They were some of the most defenseless of bad-things that I had ever encountered, making them an extremely tempting target. Were it not for their ability to work together and conceal dangerous terrain such as the river of fire-water, they would pose no danger whatsoever.

Still, with the Flame Formicans following behind us, I was unable to leave my perch on the female-who-was-not-Needle’s shoulder and attempt to reach the few Flame Wisps that still dotted the ceiling of the tunnel through which we traveled. If the Coreless waited, the Flame Formicans would be able to catch up. I doubted that they would fare any better than Will had - there were just too many of the tiny bad-things to easily fight with the weapons that they had on hand, not to mention the dangerous degree of small-tunnels from which they could emerge unexpectedly.

Of course, they might not even wait. I still didn’t entirely understand the minds of the Coreless. How far were they willing to go to earn the Great Core’s absolution and mercy? Would they risk death in order to earn it, or would they flee?

I didn’t know. The thought forced me to let out a frustrated hiss.

I pulled my thoughts away from that frustration, refocusing on the matter at hand.

[Illusion Spark].

So far, I had focused on the heat aspect of [Illusion Spark], using it in brief bursts to release the heat that I had absorbed into my scales. It hadn’t been difficult to notice that, while my heat stores were at less than full capacity and still absorbing heat, the air around me became noticeably cooler.

I had been too distracted to pay much attention to it earlier, but the same thing had happened with light after I had released my stores in a burst to alert the-female-who-was-not-Needle previously. A brief space that extended ever-so-slightly from my scales had dimmed as my reservoir of light recharged. It wasn’t enough to hide myself in artificial shadows, not even close. It was just a slight dimming, not nearly powerful enough to achieve a satisfactory effect.

Not to mention, the effect would stop as soon as my scales filled their stores. At that point, I would be forced to release light in order to gather more - and that would defeat any hope of concealment that I had, as the light that I spread out would cause me to glow like a beacon for at least a brief moment.

The Flame Wisps had a similar issue, though they also released heat more frequently and powerfully than I did. Either way, they were easy to see, becoming beacons of flame and light.

And yet, they had been able to hide the flame-water.

How did they do that?

That was the key, I knew. There was an answer there that could be of use. It had taken many of them in order to hide the flame-water, but the fact that it had happened was more important than what it had required. I didn’t need to do something so difficult.

I only needed to be able to hide myself.

I wouldn’t be able to do it with shadows, but the Flame Wisps had not used shadows to hide the flame-water. Before they had been scattered away from the flame-water, it had appeared differently. It had looked like stone.

That wasn’t shadows.

That was illusion, the key to [Illusion Spark] that I had been ignoring. The ability to make something appear as it was not.

The thought made my mouth water in anticipation. I knew that I had my strengths, even as I had my weaknesses. And yet, the Great Core had provided in a way that once again astounded me.

I hissed a brief prayer of thanks toward my creator.

With my venom, both deathly and slow, I was created with ambushes in mind. I wasn’t built with a massive size like the Coreless or other bad-things, intended to weather blows and injuries and just keep going.

I had to face the truth.

I was tiny.

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Despite that, my size could also be a strength. The Coreless could not fit through the wall-cracks and small-tunnels like I could. They could not hide under debris and corpses. They could not strike in ambush.

I could do all of those.

And with a greater grasp on [Illusion Spark], I would be able to do them even better.

I could see the path before me now, the one that the Great Core had laid out for me. Over time, I would be able to increase the strength of my venom further, potentially gaining new ones as well. I would conceal myself, striking only when the moment was right and quickly subdue my prey. I would reach the potential that the thought-light had revealed to me.

I would make the Great Core proud of me.

My scale-flesh warmed at the thought, and I reflexively released another gout of flame.

I pushed against my stored light, attempting to bend it to my will, focusing on the idea of concealment.

A flash of light flared powerfully from my scales, nearly blinding in intensity.

That was not concealment.

Unfortunately, it seemed that I couldn’t just want [Illusion Spark] to work in the way that the Flame-Wisps had shown me was possible. I had to actually figure things out. That was disappointing.

Still, I was nothing if not determined.

The Great Core had expectations of me, and I would do anything it took to meet them.

It only took a few brief moments for me to restore the light that I had lost. I knew that things might be more difficult in other places of the World Dungeon. The domain of the lesser Core nearby meant the tunnels were far brighter than they normally would be, whereas the majority of the World Dungeon was only lit by glow-caps, mana-water, and other mana-infused materials.

That only meant that this was the best place to learn.

I tried again. This time, I was more careful. Rather than simply releasing the light and hoping that it would work, I looked more carefully at what [Illusion Spark] had stored within my scales.

I poked and prodded at it with my mind, exerting the strange ability that [Illusion Spark] had gifted me to manipulate the light and heat that it stored.

Again and again, it failed to do what I wanted.

I failed to accomplish what I wanted.

Frustrated, I smashed the two stores of energy together, both heat and light, mixing them together in a slurry before releasing them in a wave.

A gout of flame and light burst from my scales, nearly singing the female-who-was-not-Needle with the loss of precision that my frustration created.

She jumped, startling with a high pitched noise, before turning her head towards me and jabbering angrily.

I ignored it.

There was something more important to focus on.

The light had been blue that time.

In my frustration, I might have found the key.

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