The core balancing trials were held in a hidden chamber at the back of the meditation room.
Students were called to the test in groups, and Ari’s group consisted of Landon, Cuthbert, and another first-year student called Gloria.
They waited in the meditation room with Gloria biting her nails and uttering religious invocations, Cuthbert pacing and muttering to himself, and Arielle standing perfectly still, her mind far away.
“Ugh, I just want to get this over with,” Landon muttered within earshot, causing Arielle to turn towards him. His eyes flickered to her, doubt ruffling his face. “Right?"
Arielle nodded. She was curious about the test, but she did want to get it over with as she had better things to do with her time.
Without warning, the walls at the back of the room rumbled. A neat crack split it in the middle, and it opened up to reveal a cave-like room, covered in shiny obsidian stones.
A second year stumbled out, face blanched. He clutched his stomach and promptly vomited all over the ground.
Arielle stepped back from the spray silently, as Landon cringed.
“Gross,” Cuthbert said.
“Oh my word.” Gloria reached out to the boy. "Are you okay?"
Professor Llywyd followed him out, with her hand still on the wall, and made a face at the chunky, yellowish bile staining the floor.
“I appreciate you holding it in until you left the chamber, Marcus,” she said as she slid her wand out of her robe sleeve and made the mess vanish with a single swing. "It's a lot harder to clean it in there." She also cast a healing spell on Marcus and asked him, "Can you make it to the infirmary?"
He nodded.
She stared as the boy staggered to his feet, giving her a thumbs up, though his face still had a tinge of green.
“If it’s any consolation, you pass,” she told him. “But you do need to work on your Massa core, if that’s going to be your balancing essence.”
He nodded again and just barely stumbled out of the room as Professor Llywyd said, “Okay, that’s the last of the second years. Arielle…how about you start us off for the first years?”
Arielle accepted with a nod.
Professor Llywyd stepped aside to allow her into the chamber.
A chill traced her spine the second she walked in. The smooth black stone covered every surface and hummed with a distinct energy that Arielle thought was perhaps due to the vast amounts of Vacu buried underneath it.
The chamber smelled slightly damp and vaguely unpleasant even though she couldn’t identify the source of the tangy, metallic scent.
Professor Llywyd lifted her hand off the wall, and the cave door closed, the outer walls shifting back in place.
She gestured to a cross drawn at the center of the room, and Arielle stood on top of it.
“You might want to sit,” Llywyd said. “It can get very disorienting.”
Arielle glanced at the ground and thought about the smell she perceived. She couldn’t ignore that someone potentially urinated in here.
“I’ll stand,” she decided, even though she barely wanted to do that. The faster they could complete the trial, the better.
Llywyd smirked. “Suit yourself. Let me give you a rundown of this test. It’s in three parts. First, you will meditate and identify all your cores. I will slowly alter the perception of your cores with a single touch. You will have to tell me which of the cores I altered. Secondly, I will again pick at random a single core and alter your connection to that core. It’s your job to attempt to cast a spell anyway, regaining core connection despite mild-to-moderate resistance. Then, if you pass that, we will do a near-total core blackout, just to give you the sensation of it, and I will ask you to cast a spell. You will not be able to. I will then slowly take down the intensity of the blackout until we reach a point where you can cast the spell. Do you understand?”
She nodded, although she was curious how they were going to do all that. She'd never heard of core suppression outside of a hybrid and the High Ascendant, but apparently this room could achieve the same effect.
She wanted to observe it in action, even though Professor Llywyd told her, “You might fare better if you do this with your eyes closed.”
“I think I’ll be fine with it open,” she commented.
Llywyd raised an eyebrow. “Are you sure?”
She nodded.
Llywyd shrugged. “Suit yourself.”
Arielle stood in the place and waited as Llywyd went to touch the other side of the wall. Ari could not necessarily see what spell Llywyd was casting as it was buried in the stones, but a few orbs began to emerge.
A Vacu-Luxa ring, linked to a complex Vitae ouroborus, a structure she had never seen before.
She thought perhaps that the spell was made to bind her cores, but then she saw what actually happened as it floated towards her. It caused the other orbs in the room to shift away, somewhat slowing and controlling their movements.
It wasn’t necessarily suppressing her cores. It was simply making it a little harder for her cores to connect to any of the orbs in the room from an odd combination of altered vitality and also a strong bond between the ourobros complex and the orbs.
All the essences formed a dome around her, and the golden orbs began to move further away. She only felt a mild strain in her Luxa core, though if her core connection had been weaker, she was sure it would have had more of an effect.
“Tell me what core I just touched?" Llywyd asked.
“Luxa,” Arielle said without skipping a beat.
“Good.” The dome took on a life of its own, orbs exchanging positions. This time, as the Luxa drifted back in place, it began to exclude all the Vitae orbs within the bubble.
Ari tried not to stare at it in fascination so as not to alert Professor Llywyd regarding what she could see. Nevertheless, she enjoyed the smooth motion of the orbs. It was like a visual orchestra, like watching a dance troupe move with perfect coordination and precision.
“What did I touch now?" Llywyd asked.
“Vitae.”
"Good."
The bubble shifted again, but this time, it didn't exclude anything. Vitae moved back to its place, and the bubble got closer, orbs buzzing and reaching for her. Ari grinned in welcome.
“What about now? What essence did I touch?”
“None,” she said.
"Not bad," Professor Llywyd said, nodding briskly. "Not that I doubted it would be easy for you. But perhaps this second part might not be. Are you ready?"
“Yes,” she answered, and the professor expanded the circle she'd made, moving Calor and Massa to the edges of the room, clinging to the walls.
“Okay, now you can try to form a spell, any spell of your choosing as long as it contains Calor or Massa.”
"Okay. [Fireworks, Minor].” She waved her wand to trace the pattern as Llywyd kept talking.
“Don't worry if you don’t feel anything at first. It might take you a second to feel the cores, and you might have to strain–"
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An explosion of sparks and color interrupted her speech, celebrating Ari's victory in the air.
Llywyd's mouth slid open, but she snapped it shut before yanking her gaze back to Arielle.
“That was quick,” she said. “Was it difficult at all?”
“I suppose.” It had taken her longer than normal to establish a core connection. Almost a whole second. But they weren'tactually suppressing her cores, so it had still been relatively straightforward.
This had been nothing compared to the hybrid’s restriction. Even just the distance; those orbs had been farther away from her, and she’d had no hope of reaching them.
Not to mention, he had done something to her internally that made her cores feel like they had vanished.
She shuddered just thinking about it.
“Alright. I guess at this point I can raise the intensity.”
“Okay,” Arielle said, and Professor Llyywd whispered a spell that released more Massa and Vacu to join her spell form.
Arielle felt the barrier strengthening. It had a rebound effect on her cores, not suppressing it necessarily, but perhaps prohibiting it. It made it feel less present. Less active.
Now she finally felt the disorientation that came with it, the sick feeling of being empty where you were once full and reaching for something that had become harder to grab.
It wasn't that intense yet. It still wasn't comparable to what the hybrid had done.
But it was certainly something to note: the unpleasantness that affected everything from her breathing to her stance.
She had to hold herself differently, and nearly hunch over to cast the next spell.
But she did it. Within a few seconds, an array of colors flashed its light once more onto the dark stone.
Llywyd's expression was indecipherable, as she said, “I’m going to increase the intensity again.”
Arielle nodded. She was happy for the challenge.
This time, when the intensity went up, Arielle's stomach lurched. She breathed in through her nose, maintaining composure, remaining straight-backed. It was even harder to hold onto her orbs now. Her connection competed with the restriction of the bubble.
But she did it anyway. This time it took her three seconds to cast the spell, the longest it had ever taken.
Llywyd swallowed when Arielle completed it.
“Alright, you’ve long since passed that section,” she said, her voice slightly too high-pitched. “Most people in your situation would have already lost control of their bowels, but you’re Arielle Blacksoil after all.” Her tone was a strange combination of admiration and annoyance.
Ari nodded. She was Arielle Blacksoil.
“Now for the final section, the total blackout tolerance. This is the toughest part of the entire exam, not because it is difficult but because it feels awful. I will once again invite you to sit down for this.”
Arielle shook her head. "I can do it standing."
Llywyd hesitated, then nodded. "Okay then. Here's the blackout."
Ari felt the intensity turned up tenfold. All the orbs swept into the walls so rapidly, it literally took her breath away. There were no essences left around her, except the restriction circle at the very end that pulled at her core enough that it was almost painful.
This was the only time she finally felt something comparable to what she’d felt with the hybrid. The total bereftness, the emptiness within and without. The lack of connection to her friends. It wasn't quite the same. The hybrid had still been much, much worse.
But even just trekking alongside that horror was bad enough.
Her heart raced.
“Relax,” Professor Llywyd said, but Arielle was already suppressing her panic.
That would not help her here.
This was something that terrified her because it was an identified weakness, a problem she had to solve. She would not run away from it, as that was not what Mossbornes did.
Perhaps with enough practice, she could learn to overcome the limit that the hybrid had placed on her. She would learn to use magic despite it.
She inhaled deeply and focused, the energy humming at her from inside the walls.
She had nothing to work with on the outside, so she went inward. She went into a deep meditation, centering herself with Vittoria's bands around her neck.
I am Arielle Blacksoil, she reminded herself even as she touched the yawning abyss within.
This wasn't like the meditation that she'd done with Cornelius' diary. It wasn't as deep or as exploratory.
She wasn't looking for anything else but her cores.
“I thought you said you didn’t want to close your eyes.” Llywyd's voice came from far away, distracting her for a second.
“I changed my mind," Arielle said, and she hoped that Llywyd would be quiet for the rest of the session so she could focus on emptying the rest of her senses.
"Okay, I'm going to reduce the intensity–"
"Not yet," Arielle said quickly. "Wait."
Llywyd fell silent, and Arielle sank deeper into herself, investigating what was happening to her cores.
When she finally felt them, the only way to describe it was that they were being silenced. They felt sluggish and quiet, and because interaction was a huge part of what made them work, their silence was more than a little depressing.
It affected everything except the tiny new core she was building, which was just as active as it always was.
And Vacu, strangely enough, who seemed the most content with it.
Her vacu core, like its orbs, was usually the most anxious, constantly bouncing around, unsure, waiting to disappear. But now its core was floating and exuding calmness and centeredness.
Almost like it was totally happy with everything that was happening. It enjoyed the feeling of emptiness.
It thrived in the dead space.
“Okay, now try and cast a spell.”
The voice echoed in the hollow air, taking its time to reach her. Ari exhaled and attempted to obey, but though she had managed to feel her cores, the connection to the other orbs was too thin. If she pulled, it would snap like a weak thread.
However, she could sense the orbs. More importantly, she could sense what was at the other end of the thread, not the mini-orbs but the powerful force of the orb’s central cores pulling at her.
She could sense its movement, a strange, eerie force that she could only feel because for the first time, its pull was stronger than hers.
Llywyd reduced the intensity of the restriction, and the connection got stronger. In her meditative state, she grew more aware of the core.
"You can start attempting to cast spells now."
"[Sensate Combo]," Arielle cast aloud because she knew Llywyd would know if she cast it silently. It was a fake name, but the spell allowed her to intensify her focus on the cores at the end of the thread, particularly the strongest, which was Vacu.
Strangely, its core wasn't exerting the same force on each of the mini-orbs, even those in the same inner ring. Vacu'scentral core was less of an even circle and more of a mutating blob that showed preferential treatment, sampling each mini-orb for a few moments before moving on to the next. Even the Vacu cores were unsure of what it wanted.
She wondered if that had anything to do with its strange intraisotope differences.
Arielle began to make the shape of one of the abyssal spells and noted the shift of the core and the force it exerted on the mini-orbs. She tried another abyssal structure and observed as well.
The first thing she recorded was that the shift of the blob was similar, though not the same. It pushed the inner orbs in a pattern that had them moving away from each other before finally finding their place.
At first, she noted with disappointment that both spells still gave her a different number of orbs in each ring. There was seemingly no other similarity between the activity of Vacu in both.
Right before she stopped, it hit her.
She finally saw it. The pattern.
"Arielle."
She awakened with a rush, noting that Professor Llywyd was staring at her with some concern. “Are you okay?
"Yes." She only realized belatedly that she was grinning from ear to ear. "I'm perfectly fine."
Llyywd scanned her with a glance. “You don’t look fine, although you don’t look ill either.”
She shook her head. All her sickness seemed to have vanished now, and she was excited to go and tell Valeria what she had learned.
It could potentially change everything.
"Did I pass?" she asked.
Llywyd gave her an incredulous look and laughed. "You more than passed. That was the senior-level test you were just given."
“It was?”
“Yes. Because the junior ones didn’t work on you.” She shook her head. "You aced it, of course. What was that spell you used? I've never seen anything like it. Did you make it?"
She nodded. She assumed that Llywyd had conflated all her abyssal experimentation into one spell.
"You really are something else, Arielle."
"Yes," she said, and Professor Llywyd chuckled as she opened the door of the chamber. Ari practically skipped out, only pausing for Landon when he asked her how she felt.
"Good," she responded, beaming at his confused face.
She went straight to Valeria's office and bounced on her heels as she waited for the professor to be done with her meeting.
She counted the seconds–all five hundred and thirty of them–until the door opened and a student walked out, giving Arielle a curious look,
Arielle knocked on the door and barely waited for the 'come in' before she entered.
Professor Valeria looked to be marking up a paper until she looked up. "Arielle. I didn't know we–"
"It's deadspace," she announced instantly.
"What?"
"Vacu thrives in deadspace," she said. "Vacu is different from the other essences, because it is identified by what's not there rather than what's there. So with abyssal spells, it's not about the number of mini-orbs in any of the circles or the size of the core. It's the pattern the core creates using the absence of mini-orbs. It's similar amongst the abyssal spells, and that's what gives it its property depending on–"
"Arielle, slow down." Valeria put a hand up. "You're saying a lot of things. Explain to me from the beginning. You found something."
"Yes." She squeezed her fists in a futile attempt to contain her excitement and tried to figure out how to tell her that she'dbroken the code. "Let's cast an abyssal practice spell, and I'll show you what I mean."
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