This entire chp is basicilly me nerding my way through a magic system, and if you haven't read lotm you probably won't understand half of it. But as I asked myself questions like this, I got really excited, so I'm keeping it.
Also, I'm trying to give Keter more personality than suffering because he feels dull to me right now.
Also, for explanation, because I can already see people complaining. Runes are a language, a written variant of shaping. And just like other languages, there are laws to it, and thus you can make a new word as long as you understand those laws well enough.
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'Unity, just what is it?' Keter pondered the question as his fist made contact with the runic circle for what felt like the hundredth time. 'It feels like in a world like this one, that unity has lost all meaning.' The magic circle failed once more as the rune for meaning unity folded in on itself, with the collapse of the entire circle following. 'Runes and True Names, their true power only comes when you understand what you're doing, when you understand just what your calling upon. I understand what unity is, well, I know its exact definition.' For the 50th time, he pushed soul essence into the etched circle.
'The state of being united or joined as a whole. That is Unity's definition. But what does that really mean in the context of a unity between souls? Which parts of the soul would be united? What about the difference in aspect, would that not cause problems when united? Did thoughts, opinions, or goals matter? Would the process just not work if the people were too different? How deep would two people have to be united for it to truly be called a unity of souls? Would only the Spirit Body count? The Astral Projection? The Body of Heart and Mind? What about the Ether Body? Could you unite the ether body but not the ones below it? Would such a connection be permanent? Could you only target the aspects? What would that even cause? Would you get some merged freakish aspect, or would it instead merge your achievements as [Usurper] did? Could the two parties share soul essence? Would they even count as two separate entities at that point? Hell, what about the soul sea? It's the bridge between the Body of Heart and Mind and the Ether Body: connecting the physical with the more spiritual aspects of one's self.'
'Ok, maybe he was getting too far ahead of himself since at current he was only trying to produce a unity between two barriers. Well, I mean that was the goal of this entire experiment anyway. To produce a minor unity of souls between him and Nephis in order to enhance her flames enough to deal with the lord of the dead without the death of tens of their soldiers. And he only really had a few hours left to finish the experiment, so that wasn't inspiring much confidence. Especially considering he has been working on this for about a month straight and only recently got far enough not to need the nightmare spells assistance to make something that works. (Even if that is only two balls that spin in unity)'
'Wait, what if the problem wasn't coming from his amount of understanding but more so from the things he was trying to unite? Barriers are meant to either keep things in, which in most cases it would then be called a seal. Or they would be used to keep things out. Barriers weren't exactly meant to come together or to act as one; at least in the way he was currently doing it.' Keter immediately starts engraving a new circle. 'Now this one, instead of trying to merge two barriers into one like the last one did, it uses the output that they both naturally put off as well as the soul essence that comes off when they are damaged, and makes an entire new barrier with it if they break.' Keter's hand soon slammed down on top of both barriers as they activated, and they both soon buckled under the pressure, and just like the circle was meant to do, their broken pieces came together to form an even stronger barrier. A bright smile formed on Keter's face as he registered his success.
'IT WORKED!'
Keter soon lifted his hand and scraped the circle. 'Well, no matter my own feelings on the matter, I need to abandon the unity project. It took me months to get this far, while, of course, it was not all dedicated to barriers, since this was rather recent. It is still nowhere close to the original goal of a unity between souls.' Keter stood up and walked over to his desk, pushing the Record of Our Salvation aside as he sat down. A sigh escaped his lips as he looked at the Record of Our Salvation. 'That's another project I have to finish, there is still another 420 people I need to record within it. Thank god for Cassie, honestly. I wouldn't have been able to even make the record without her. And she's just about half the reason things are going semi-smoothly.' Keter's eyes froze on Cassie's name.
'Wait- Cassie?' Keter's eyes sharpened. 'Cassie, the Song of the Fallen. That's it, isn't it? Harmony, that's the key to everything! A harmony of souls would be less permanent and could be used in a far more temporary way than something like unity could.' As quickly as the excitement came, it left as Keter realized a fatal flaw. 'It's too late, far too late. If I had a few more weeks, or even just days, I might be able to make something of it.
Keter's hand grasped a stray piece of paper and a pencil and began writing. 'What if I use the harmony within a song? That way, I can use Shaping instead of runes! While yes, finding the true name is inherently harder than creating a rune for it, so I would still have to use the rune to find out its true name. Otherwise, it might take a month to find out the true name.' Keter leans his head onto his hand as he rubs his temples. 'While yes, it progress, I still won't have anything to show for all my research during the fight.' Keter looks through the open window, giving the setting sun a brief glance.
'Anyway, I should go back to working on Unity. That way I might find a few other ways to utilize it.'
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I wrote this chapter, then I really didn't know how to handle the last part, so I'm stopping here. Actual fight next chapter tho!
I originally planned to have Adam show up again and for Keter to go and grab Weaver's Mask, but I couldn't get it in anyway that I thought was decent, so I decided to go with this.
Also, I'm applying for jobs, and it sucks.