Chapter 316: Her Next Moves
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Chapter 316: Her Next Moves
Tala took an extra moment to consider her next moves. She needed to investigate Ios corpse, but she wanted to proceed intelligently.
-The automaton body is not really dead, so is it fair to call it a corpse?-
But she is. Therefore, it is Ios corpse, even if it isnt dead.
-Yeah thats fair.-The inaugural upload of this chapter took place via N0v3l-B1n.
Tala bit her lip in thought. You know, if I lost my head and my gate, but my body had enough latent energy to return itself to full health, I think it would be the same. I would be dead, so the body would be my corpse, but the body, itself, wouldnt be dead.
-Yeah, I regret bringing up that very remote possibility.-
She shrugged. Its an interesting comparison, if nothing else.
Tala returned her mind to the topic of Ios body.
The inactive automaton had been set aside, placed into the vat of magical liquid to finish maturing. That process had finished, and the result had been waiting for her to begin investigations into its secrets for quite a while now. Thus, it really wasnt surprising that her mind had moved back to the automaton and the need to kickstart that process.
I do think it is time.
-Really? Fine. No experiments, but you can go examine it.-
Tala quirked a smile. Thanks, Mom.
It was a funny thing, how she found herself speaking to Alat both internally and externally, depending on the circumstances. She hadnt put together a pattern, per se, but she had started to take note of the various instances.
But that was not the matter at hand.
With a thought, Tala was in her sanctums lower reaches, standing nearbut out of reach ofa tank filled with purple liquid.
The body was substantially more developed than when Tala had fought Io.
The automaton had seemed like a late teen at that time, by body size and development, but now, it was clearly meant to mimic an adult.
Armor plates with sophisticated, ingrained spell-forms covered the majority of its form.
Their configuration clearly wasnt designed like a suit of armor, so it wasnt perfectly sealed by a wide margin. Even so, it was obviously much more protective than the average persons flesh.
Under the plating, Tala could see bits of the construct poking through. Now, it looked like nothing so much as muscle of braided and interwoven precious metals, but each bunch was surrounded with an odd, semi-clear material of unknown composition, filled with natural magics that Tala could sense were meant to replenish and act upon the metals contained within.
A muscular system that can be strained and heal back stronger?
-Thats what it looks like to me.-
Io didnt have anything like that. I feel like I would have noticed.
-No, it didnt when you fought it. That is the latest development, I believe. At the very least, the magical, metal muscles werent visible when we checked last, and everything indicated it was almost complete at that time.-
And it is complete now?
-Yes. From everything we can determine.-
So, the muscles that had been there had expanded and been filled with this more biological-like, magical mechanism.
It seemed to imply that the body could train and be molded to its needed tasks.
Automata are more human-like than I had assumed.
-That seems to be true, at least if we assume that Io is actually made in their image.-
Do you doubt that fact?
-Not really? It seems odd to consider them being able to have such a profound impact from wherever they are sealed.-
Assuming they are sealed.
-Tala. If they werent-
Tala waved her off. I know, I know. If they werent contained, theyd be doing more than simply influencing a random arcane researcher or two.
-Exactly.-
She returned her focus to the automata.
If it were freed of its growth tank, the form would stand taller than her, though it had similar proportions.
The figure was designed to have feminine characteristics, for whatever reason.
Its almost scaled to be like the larger arcane species, but not quite that size.
-I agree. It seems like its as large as a being could be while still fighting a human scale with relative ease.-
Yeah I dont remember any overlarge features in the hold we took this stuff from. Maybe they just were an average sized group, so they made this creation to be powerful and overbearing, but still work within their facilities.
-Thats a pretty solid guess, actually. Certainly better than many other reasons weve considered.-
Tala smiled at that. Isnt that the truth.
They had bandied about some rather insane potential reasons for all sorts of aspects of the automata theyd fought.
Tala stepped forward and placed her hand against the side of the tank. There is so much about you that we dont know.
She knew that there was no consciousness to hear her, and she doubted her words would have carried through the rather thick, purple fluid regardless.
The tank was warm under her hand, both with heat and magical power. It was an impressively magically-dense construct, all things considered.
-We need to get to work on researching all the spell-forms contained within.-
Tala only paused for a moment before nodding. Lets do it.
Without further delay, she moved her bloodstars around the tank, panning her perspective over the automaton from every angle using mundane vision, magesight, and voidsight.
Her aura suffused the purple liquid, pulling all the information she could from that perception as well.
It would not be a fast process, and it would likely take many days to complete it properly, but together, she and Alat began building a comprehensive, three-dimensional understanding of the unusual creation that had fallen into their hands.
In the end, they hoped to have a map similar to what Inscriptionists used to design spell-forms for their clients.
They wanted to fully understand every aspect of the magics involved in the automatons construction.
This was a chance that they simply couldnt pass up, and truthfully, they didnt trust anyone else to do it.
They would bring in others to study what they pulled from the form, but the automaton itself? That would stay here unless someone like Master Xeel asked for it.
Despite the awkwardness, it seemed that the odd underlying tension of the topic had been thoroughly dispelled.
As such, the three settled into discussing the specifics of what it would look like for Latna to be his mageling.
He specifically offered Tala the chance to fulfill the master role for Latna, despite her sisters clear hesitation.
Tala flatly refused. Though, she did thank him for checking with her and offering her the opportunity to refuse.
Where she was going, and what she was going to be doing in the near future, was no place for a mageling.
She had no way of healing others, either, and it would be irresponsible in the extreme to bring someone unsuited to danger into it without clearly set up layers of protection and recovery.
Tala might be a bit freer with danger than most Mages, but she only really acted that way with herself, because she knew she could take the fallout.
Thankfully, she hadnt been wrong yet.
That moved them onto the topic of her future plans, and their plans, and all in all, they passed the evening in incredibly pleasant conversation.
They only paused to grab dessert, a multi-layered fluffy delicacy with just the hint of coffee.
Tala was refraining from diving back into that black hole, even though it would likely be fine for her now.
Dark, rich, amazing
-Tala!-
Hmm?! What? Tala almost jerked at Alats outburst.
-You swore off coffee for at least another two months.-
I know, but
-No coffee. This dessert is fine, but no liquid coffee.-
Fine
It was nearly midnight when the two bid Tala goodnight, and she felt surprisingly tired.
Who knew? Being social is more exhausting than fighting a Houses worth of arcanes.
-Every introvert, everywhere.-
Ahh, but how many have the actual experience to truly do the comparison?
-Yes, Tala, you are very special.-
Youre not very nice sometimes.
-Go to sleep, Tala. I was derived from you, remember? And were tired.-
She definitely was exhausted. Still, she took the time to walk to her room rather than simply cause Kit to move her. I still need to study that more.
-Not tonight!-
No, of course not tonight. Dont be silly.
-Youre not in bed yet.-
Tala huffed a laugh, pausing in the courtyard that surrounded her dais to look up at the stunning night sky for just a moment.
Beautiful. She spoke softly, so it didnt carry.
She knew it was fake, but she saw it as a sort of living painting. It didnt matter too much if a painting depicted something that actually existed or not. It just needed to evoke the emotion it was intending to bring forth.
This did that in gold.
She drew her thoughts back together and walked into her room, pushing open the massive door and letting it swing silently shut behind her.
Her usually spartan room was now a little less so.
Shed added two little shelves.
One held a slightly wonky glass vase made with off-blue and brownish-red glass.
The other held a small cross-stitch of a wolf-pack, held flat in a frame.
Dagan and Alva had insisted on giving her the gifts. They were her favorites of what theyd shown her, and she felt a smile tug at her lips as she glanced their way.
In their own way, the little works of art were just as lovely as the faux night sky outside. In many ways, they meant more.
The sky had been commissioned for an indentured servant and commissioned from a workman who had likely made dozens, if not hundreds. Oh, the arcane had done an excellent job, but it had been just that: a job.
The two pieces of art from her siblings were works of passion, given out of love for their big sister, and the very idea pulled at Talas heartstrings.
She wiped away a tear and chuckled ruefully. Rust, I really do need to sleep.
Alat wisely didnt comment.
Without further delay, Tala retracted her elk-leathers and glanced down at herself. Well, that was pointless. Im not going to get rid of the iron to sleep.
There was no need for it to be in place either, but it felt more normal.
-Youre sleeping, self-entombed in iron. Nothing about this is normal.-
Well, to be fair, more normal.
Tala huffed a laugh and flexed her willpower. The clothing regrew even as Tala sealed her own mouth and eyes.
She would sleep fully encased in iron, even if it wasnt reasonable to leave herself so sealed while interacting with others.
It was a bit odd, sleeping without breathing.
At first, it had harkened a bit too much to her Refining, but through careful exposure, she was getting more used to it. By this point, it only occasionally caused dreams of drowning, or being buried alive, or suffocated or
Thinking like that isnt helping
She shook her head and stopped mirroring her own perspective, letting herself be enclosed in utter darkness.
Goodnight, Alat.
-Goodnight, Tala.-
Sleep claimed her quickly.
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Chapter 316: Her Next Moves
Tala took an extra moment to consider her next moves. She needed to investigate Ios corpse, but she wanted to proceed intelligently.
-The automaton body is not really dead, so is it fair to call it a corpse?-
But she is. Therefore, it is Ios corpse, even if it isnt dead.
-Yeah thats fair.-The inaugural upload of this chapter took place via N0v3l-B1n.
Tala bit her lip in thought. You know, if I lost my head and my gate, but my body had enough latent energy to return itself to full health, I think it would be the same. I would be dead, so the body would be my corpse, but the body, itself, wouldnt be dead.
-Yeah, I regret bringing up that very remote possibility.-
She shrugged. Its an interesting comparison, if nothing else.
Tala returned her mind to the topic of Ios body.
The inactive automaton had been set aside, placed into the vat of magical liquid to finish maturing. That process had finished, and the result had been waiting for her to begin investigations into its secrets for quite a while now. Thus, it really wasnt surprising that her mind had moved back to the automaton and the need to kickstart that process.
I do think it is time.
-Really? Fine. No experiments, but you can go examine it.-
Tala quirked a smile. Thanks, Mom.
It was a funny thing, how she found herself speaking to Alat both internally and externally, depending on the circumstances. She hadnt put together a pattern, per se, but she had started to take note of the various instances.
But that was not the matter at hand.
With a thought, Tala was in her sanctums lower reaches, standing nearbut out of reach ofa tank filled with purple liquid.
The body was substantially more developed than when Tala had fought Io.
The automaton had seemed like a late teen at that time, by body size and development, but now, it was clearly meant to mimic an adult.
Armor plates with sophisticated, ingrained spell-forms covered the majority of its form.
Their configuration clearly wasnt designed like a suit of armor, so it wasnt perfectly sealed by a wide margin. Even so, it was obviously much more protective than the average persons flesh.
Under the plating, Tala could see bits of the construct poking through. Now, it looked like nothing so much as muscle of braided and interwoven precious metals, but each bunch was surrounded with an odd, semi-clear material of unknown composition, filled with natural magics that Tala could sense were meant to replenish and act upon the metals contained within.
A muscular system that can be strained and heal back stronger?
-Thats what it looks like to me.-
Io didnt have anything like that. I feel like I would have noticed.
-No, it didnt when you fought it. That is the latest development, I believe. At the very least, the magical, metal muscles werent visible when we checked last, and everything indicated it was almost complete at that time.-
And it is complete now?
-Yes. From everything we can determine.-
So, the muscles that had been there had expanded and been filled with this more biological-like, magical mechanism.
It seemed to imply that the body could train and be molded to its needed tasks.
Automata are more human-like than I had assumed.
-That seems to be true, at least if we assume that Io is actually made in their image.-
Do you doubt that fact?
-Not really? It seems odd to consider them being able to have such a profound impact from wherever they are sealed.-
Assuming they are sealed.
-Tala. If they werent-
Tala waved her off. I know, I know. If they werent contained, theyd be doing more than simply influencing a random arcane researcher or two.
-Exactly.-
She returned her focus to the automata.
If it were freed of its growth tank, the form would stand taller than her, though it had similar proportions.
The figure was designed to have feminine characteristics, for whatever reason.
Its almost scaled to be like the larger arcane species, but not quite that size.
-I agree. It seems like its as large as a being could be while still fighting a human scale with relative ease.-
Yeah I dont remember any overlarge features in the hold we took this stuff from. Maybe they just were an average sized group, so they made this creation to be powerful and overbearing, but still work within their facilities.
-Thats a pretty solid guess, actually. Certainly better than many other reasons weve considered.-
Tala smiled at that. Isnt that the truth.
They had bandied about some rather insane potential reasons for all sorts of aspects of the automata theyd fought.
Tala stepped forward and placed her hand against the side of the tank. There is so much about you that we dont know.
She knew that there was no consciousness to hear her, and she doubted her words would have carried through the rather thick, purple fluid regardless.
The tank was warm under her hand, both with heat and magical power. It was an impressively magically-dense construct, all things considered.
-We need to get to work on researching all the spell-forms contained within.-
Tala only paused for a moment before nodding. Lets do it.
Without further delay, she moved her bloodstars around the tank, panning her perspective over the automaton from every angle using mundane vision, magesight, and voidsight.
Her aura suffused the purple liquid, pulling all the information she could from that perception as well.
It would not be a fast process, and it would likely take many days to complete it properly, but together, she and Alat began building a comprehensive, three-dimensional understanding of the unusual creation that had fallen into their hands.
In the end, they hoped to have a map similar to what Inscriptionists used to design spell-forms for their clients.
They wanted to fully understand every aspect of the magics involved in the automatons construction.
This was a chance that they simply couldnt pass up, and truthfully, they didnt trust anyone else to do it.
They would bring in others to study what they pulled from the form, but the automaton itself? That would stay here unless someone like Master Xeel asked for it.
Despite the awkwardness, it seemed that the odd underlying tension of the topic had been thoroughly dispelled.
As such, the three settled into discussing the specifics of what it would look like for Latna to be his mageling.
He specifically offered Tala the chance to fulfill the master role for Latna, despite her sisters clear hesitation.
Tala flatly refused. Though, she did thank him for checking with her and offering her the opportunity to refuse.
Where she was going, and what she was going to be doing in the near future, was no place for a mageling.
She had no way of healing others, either, and it would be irresponsible in the extreme to bring someone unsuited to danger into it without clearly set up layers of protection and recovery.
Tala might be a bit freer with danger than most Mages, but she only really acted that way with herself, because she knew she could take the fallout.
Thankfully, she hadnt been wrong yet.
That moved them onto the topic of her future plans, and their plans, and all in all, they passed the evening in incredibly pleasant conversation.
They only paused to grab dessert, a multi-layered fluffy delicacy with just the hint of coffee.
Tala was refraining from diving back into that black hole, even though it would likely be fine for her now.
Dark, rich, amazing
-Tala!-
Hmm?! What? Tala almost jerked at Alats outburst.
-You swore off coffee for at least another two months.-
I know, but
-No coffee. This dessert is fine, but no liquid coffee.-
Fine
It was nearly midnight when the two bid Tala goodnight, and she felt surprisingly tired.
Who knew? Being social is more exhausting than fighting a Houses worth of arcanes.
-Every introvert, everywhere.-
Ahh, but how many have the actual experience to truly do the comparison?
-Yes, Tala, you are very special.-
Youre not very nice sometimes.
-Go to sleep, Tala. I was derived from you, remember? And were tired.-
She definitely was exhausted. Still, she took the time to walk to her room rather than simply cause Kit to move her. I still need to study that more.
-Not tonight!-
No, of course not tonight. Dont be silly.
-Youre not in bed yet.-
Tala huffed a laugh, pausing in the courtyard that surrounded her dais to look up at the stunning night sky for just a moment.
Beautiful. She spoke softly, so it didnt carry.
She knew it was fake, but she saw it as a sort of living painting. It didnt matter too much if a painting depicted something that actually existed or not. It just needed to evoke the emotion it was intending to bring forth.
This did that in gold.
She drew her thoughts back together and walked into her room, pushing open the massive door and letting it swing silently shut behind her.
Her usually spartan room was now a little less so.
Shed added two little shelves.
One held a slightly wonky glass vase made with off-blue and brownish-red glass.
The other held a small cross-stitch of a wolf-pack, held flat in a frame.
Dagan and Alva had insisted on giving her the gifts. They were her favorites of what theyd shown her, and she felt a smile tug at her lips as she glanced their way.
In their own way, the little works of art were just as lovely as the faux night sky outside. In many ways, they meant more.
The sky had been commissioned for an indentured servant and commissioned from a workman who had likely made dozens, if not hundreds. Oh, the arcane had done an excellent job, but it had been just that: a job.
The two pieces of art from her siblings were works of passion, given out of love for their big sister, and the very idea pulled at Talas heartstrings.
She wiped away a tear and chuckled ruefully. Rust, I really do need to sleep.
Alat wisely didnt comment.
Without further delay, Tala retracted her elk-leathers and glanced down at herself. Well, that was pointless. Im not going to get rid of the iron to sleep.
There was no need for it to be in place either, but it felt more normal.
-Youre sleeping, self-entombed in iron. Nothing about this is normal.-
Well, to be fair, more normal.
Tala huffed a laugh and flexed her willpower. The clothing regrew even as Tala sealed her own mouth and eyes.
She would sleep fully encased in iron, even if it wasnt reasonable to leave herself so sealed while interacting with others.
It was a bit odd, sleeping without breathing.
At first, it had harkened a bit too much to her Refining, but through careful exposure, she was getting more used to it. By this point, it only occasionally caused dreams of drowning, or being buried alive, or suffocated or
Thinking like that isnt helping
She shook her head and stopped mirroring her own perspective, letting herself be enclosed in utter darkness.
Goodnight, Alat.
-Goodnight, Tala.-
Sleep claimed her quickly.
Chapter 316: Her Next MovesTala took an extra moment to consider her next moves. She needed to investigate Ios corpse, but she wanted to proceed intelligently.-The automaton body is not really dead, so is it fair to call it a corpse?-But she is. Therefore, it is Ios corpse, even if it isnt dead.-Yeah thats fair.-The inaugural upload of this chapter took place via N0v3l-B1n.Tala bit her lip in thought. You know, if I lost my head and my gate, but my body had enough latent energy to return itself to full health, I think it would be the same. I would be dead, so the body would be my corpse, but the body, itself, wouldnt be dead.-Yeah, I regret bringing up that very remote possibility.-She shrugged. Its an interesting comparison, if nothing else.Tala returned her mind to the topic of Ios body.The inactive automaton had been set aside, placed into the vat of magical liquid to finish maturing. That process had finished, and the result had been waiting for her to begin investigations into its secrets for quite a while now. Thus, it really wasnt surprising that her mind had moved back to the automaton and the need to kickstart that process.I do think it is time.-Really? Fine. No experiments, but you can go examine it.-Tala quirked a smile. Thanks, Mom.It was a funny thing, how she found herself speaking to Alat both internally and externally, depending on the circumstances. She hadnt put together a pattern, per se, but she had started to take note of the various instances.But that was not the matter at hand.With a thought, Tala was in her sanctums lower reaches, standing nearbut out of reach ofa tank filled with purple liquid.The body was substantially more developed than when Tala had fought Io.The automaton had seemed like a late teen at that time, by body size and development, but now, it was clearly meant to mimic an adult.Armor plates with sophisticated, ingrained spell-forms covered the majority of its form.Their configuration clearly wasnt designed like a suit of armor, so it wasnt perfectly sealed by a wide margin. Even so, it was obviously much more protective than the average persons flesh.Under the plating, Tala could see bits of the construct poking through. Now, it looked like nothing so much as muscle of braided and interwoven precious metals, but each bunch was surrounded with an odd, semi-clear material of unknown composition, filled with natural magics that Tala could sense were meant to replenish and act upon the metals contained within.A muscular system that can be strained and heal back stronger?-Thats what it looks like to me.-Io didnt have anything like that. I feel like I would have noticed.-No, it didnt when you fought it. That is the latest development, I believe. At the very least, the magical, metal muscles werent visible when we checked last, and everything indicated it was almost complete at that time.-And it is complete now?-Yes. From everything we can determine.-So, the muscles that had been there had expanded and been filled with this more biological-like, magical mechanism.It seemed to imply that the body could train and be molded to its needed tasks.Automata are more human-like than I had assumed.-That seems to be true, at least if we assume that Io is actually made in their image.-Do you doubt that fact?-Not really? It seems odd to consider them being able to have such a profound impact from wherever they are sealed.-Assuming they are sealed.-Tala. If they werent-Tala waved her off. I know, I know. If they werent contained, theyd be doing more than simply influencing a random arcane researcher or two.-Exactly.-She returned her focus to the automata.If it were freed of its growth tank, the form would stand taller than her, though it had similar proportions.The figure was designed to have feminine characteristics, for whatever reason.Its almost scaled to be like the larger arcane species, but not quite that size.-I agree. It seems like its as large as a being could be while still fighting a human scale with relative ease.-Yeah I dont remember any overlarge features in the hold we took this stuff from. Maybe they just were an average sized group, so they made this creation to be powerful and overbearing, but still work within their facilities.-Thats a pretty solid guess, actually. Certainly better than many other reasons weve considered.-Tala smiled at that. Isnt that the truth.They had bandied about some rather insane potential reasons for all sorts of aspects of the automata theyd fought.Tala stepped forward and placed her hand against the side of the tank. There is so much about you that we dont know.She knew that there was no consciousness to hear her, and she doubted her words would have carried through the rather thick, purple fluid regardless.The tank was warm under her hand, both with heat and magical power. It was an impressively magically-dense construct, all things considered.-We need to get to work on researching all the spell-forms contained within.-Tala only paused for a moment before nodding. Lets do it.Without further delay, she moved her bloodstars around the tank, panning her perspective over the automaton from every angle using mundane vision, magesight, and voidsight.Her aura suffused the purple liquid, pulling all the information she could from that perception as well.It would not be a fast process, and it would likely take many days to complete it properly, but together, she and Alat began building a comprehensive, three-dimensional understanding of the unusual creation that had fallen into their hands.In the end, they hoped to have a map similar to what Inscriptionists used to design spell-forms for their clients.They wanted to fully understand every aspect of the magics involved in the automatons construction.This was a chance that they simply couldnt pass up, and truthfully, they didnt trust anyone else to do it.They would bring in others to study what they pulled from the form, but the automaton itself? That would stay here unless someone like Master Xeel asked for it.Despite the awkwardness, it seemed that the odd underlying tension of the topic had been thoroughly dispelled.As such, the three settled into discussing the specifics of what it would look like for Latna to be his mageling.He specifically offered Tala the chance to fulfill the master role for Latna, despite her sisters clear hesitation.Tala flatly refused. Though, she did thank him for checking with her and offering her the opportunity to refuse.Where she was going, and what she was going to be doing in the near future, was no place for a mageling.She had no way of healing others, either, and it would be irresponsible in the extreme to bring someone unsuited to danger into it without clearly set up layers of protection and recovery.Tala might be a bit freer with danger than most Mages, but she only really acted that way with herself, because she knew she could take the fallout.Thankfully, she hadnt been wrong yet.That moved them onto the topic of her future plans, and their plans, and all in all, they passed the evening in incredibly pleasant conversation.They only paused to grab dessert, a multi-layered fluffy delicacy with just the hint of coffee.Tala was refraining from diving back into that black hole, even though it would likely be fine for her now.Dark, rich, amazing-Tala!-Hmm?! What? Tala almost jerked at Alats outburst.-You swore off coffee for at least another two months.-I know, but-No coffee. This dessert is fine, but no liquid coffee.-FineIt was nearly midnight when the two bid Tala goodnight, and she felt surprisingly tired.Who knew? Being social is more exhausting than fighting a Houses worth of arcanes.-Every introvert, everywhere.-Ahh, but how many have the actual experience to truly do the comparison?-Yes, Tala, you are very special.-Youre not very nice sometimes.-Go to sleep, Tala. I was derived from you, remember? And were tired.-She definitely was exhausted. Still, she took the time to walk to her room rather than simply cause Kit to move her. I still need to study that more.-Not tonight!-No, of course not tonight. Dont be silly.-Youre not in bed yet.-Tala huffed a laugh, pausing in the courtyard that surrounded her dais to look up at the stunning night sky for just a moment.Beautiful. She spoke softly, so it didnt carry.She knew it was fake, but she saw it as a sort of living painting. It didnt matter too much if a painting depicted something that actually existed or not. It just needed to evoke the emotion it was intending to bring forth.This did that in gold.She drew her thoughts back together and walked into her room, pushing open the massive door and letting it swing silently shut behind her.Her usually spartan room was now a little less so.Shed added two little shelves.One held a slightly wonky glass vase made with off-blue and brownish-red glass.The other held a small cross-stitch of a wolf-pack, held flat in a frame.Dagan and Alva had insisted on giving her the gifts. They were her favorites of what theyd shown her, and she felt a smile tug at her lips as she glanced their way.In their own way, the little works of art were just as lovely as the faux night sky outside. In many ways, they meant more.The sky had been commissioned for an indentured servant and commissioned from a workman who had likely made dozens, if not hundreds. Oh, the arcane had done an excellent job, but it had been just that: a job.The two pieces of art from her siblings were works of passion, given out of love for their big sister, and the very idea pulled at Talas heartstrings.She wiped away a tear and chuckled ruefully. Rust, I really do need to sleep.Alat wisely didnt comment.Without further delay, Tala retracted her elk-leathers and glanced down at herself. Well, that was pointless. Im not going to get rid of the iron to sleep.There was no need for it to be in place either, but it felt more normal.-Youre sleeping, self-entombed in iron. Nothing about this is normal.-Well, to be fair, more normal.Tala huffed a laugh and flexed her willpower. The clothing regrew even as Tala sealed her own mouth and eyes.She would sleep fully encased in iron, even if it wasnt reasonable to leave herself so sealed while interacting with others.It was a bit odd, sleeping without breathing.At first, it had harkened a bit too much to her Refining, but through careful exposure, she was getting more used to it. By this point, it only occasionally caused dreams of drowning, or being buried alive, or suffocated orThinking like that isnt helpingShe shook her head and stopped mirroring her own perspective, letting herself be enclosed in utter darkness.Goodnight, Alat.-Goodnight, Tala.-Sleep claimed her quickly.
