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Post by Silver on Jul 11, 2022 19:37:11 GMT -6
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Post by Noa on Jul 11, 2022 22:18:49 GMT -6
When Noa was sick of being in his study, he went to the mines. And when he was sick of being in the mines, he went out by the river. They were running a little low on fish lately anyway, and the advantage he had when he was here was that he could show up with Avander, or indeed any of his other larger companions, without the worry of causing a cave-in. Avander was even supposed to be helpful with fishing, though Noa had certainly never seen any evidence of it -- though, then again, he had never taught Avander how to fish either.
The Wiurn seemed happy enough to be out. It was a chance to stretch his wings and experience a change of scenery. Noa had less occasion lately to call on him, having been preoccupied with other matters.
And Rhys, of course, was with them. Though that was pretty much a given, considering Noa hardly ever went anywhere without Rhys in tow, both out of necessity and because Rhys was convenient to have around.
But the occasion was actually less about taking the two of them for a walk, or even seeing what he could catch, than it was about magical training.
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Post by Noa on Jul 11, 2022 22:20:14 GMT -6
The river was a nice spot to train, as it turned out. It was away from the distractions of the city park, where anyone might chance upon you and interrupt what you were doing; and there was a source of water nearby for if they ran into any fire-related accidents. Not that Noa thought they would, doing what they were doing today, but even so.
Rhys already had some idea of what Noa wanted to teach him, and even Avander was a little wise to the idea that they didn’t come here just to relax. Avander didn’t know what exactly they were doing, but he waited with an expectant air. He had been in Noa’s service a long time, and he knew if he just waited, Noa would get to the point sooner or later.
Today, Noa chose sooner.
“Avander, phase out. Rhys, pay attention.”
Noa meant that Rhys ought to pay attention to what was going on in Avander’s head when Avander turned himself invisible, which he had already explained to the Faeron earlier when he had come up with this plan. Dutifully, Rhys turned his attention to Avander, prepared to observe the Wiurn closely.
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Post by Noa on Jul 11, 2022 22:20:28 GMT -6
Avander, happily sensing that he was not the focus of today’s session and never loath to show off where he could, did as he was told. His hide shimmered for a moment, and then it was as if he was never there at all.
Rhys could still tell where he was, of course -- that would be the telepathy -- but even he had a somewhat harder time pinning down Avander’s exact location when Avander was invisible like this. That wasn’t what Rhys was paying attention to now though. The Faeron was concentrating intently, and only when Avander reappeared did he relax. {Oh, so that’s it,} he said, though he didn’t look terribly certain. {But are you sure that I can… No, never mind.}
Noa wouldn’t have asked Rhys to try something if he didn’t think Rhys could do it. “Someday we’ll go over your reading skills, and then you’ll be able to research familiar abilities for yourself,” Noa said evenly. “For now, just try it. And don’t forget -- this works off the energy of the bond, not normal mana.”
{Right… I guess I deserve that for forgetting when I was learning to blink,} Rhys said. {Okay, here I go.}
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Post by Noa on Jul 11, 2022 22:21:02 GMT -6
Noa looked on with an impassive expression, while Avander watched with mild curiosity. Avander was picking up both their thoughts, and could probably form something like a guess as to what they were doing, but it wasn’t as if Avander had ever seen anyone else pull the disappearing trick before -- except Noa, when he teleported away, though he understood that that was something different.
Noa could feel a faint sensation that might have had something to do with the bond, though since Rhys wasn’t trying to enact anything on him, it was only barely noticeable. As the two of them looked on, Rhys’s form flickered for a moment… then flickered again… But besides that, he stayed very much visible.
{... No good?} he said, opening his eyes. Noa didn’t need to say anything. Rhys could already tell that he hadn’t succeeded.
“Do you want Avander to show you again?” Noa said.
Rhys thought on it, then, said, {Maybe. I thought I had it, but it looks like I don’t have it after all.}
“Well, you heard him, Avander. Phase out,” Noa said. Avander had sat himself down, but now he rose again and shook out his mane.
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Post by Noa on Jul 11, 2022 22:21:24 GMT -6
{Pay attention,} Avander said -- for Rhys’s benefit, though Noa could hear his thoughts over their ribbon too. {I get tired if I do this too many times.}
He must have been remembering when he was first learning to do this, which was the last time Noa had asked him to perform it several times in short succession. Noa knew better than to push for that kind of thing in a real fight, where the strain would put Avander at real risk. But here, twice should be fine, especially when Avander was relaxed.
The Wiurn’s hide shimmered, and then he disappeared again.
Rhys was studying him closely, ears pricked forward; the Faeron’s head inclined to one side and then to the other. {Is it… Is it light?} he said. {No, it’s air, isn’t it?}
“It’s not a spell, or at least not for you, so I wouldn’t think of it in elemental terms,” Noa said. Now that he was seeing Rhys’s line of thought, he wondered if maybe showing him this way was a mistake. The mechanism behind Avander’s ability and Rhys’s were probably different, drawing as they did from different sources.
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Post by Noa on Jul 11, 2022 22:22:04 GMT -6
Noa had initially thought that the mental… space, or whatever it was, that Avander entered when he turned himself invisible might offer Rhys some clues, but it could very well prove not to be the case.
{Hmm,} said Rhys. {I’ll give it another try.}
“If it doesn’t work, we’ll figure something else out,” Noa said. Even if his initial instincts were wrong, they could always come up with new ideas. Besides, it wasn’t as if Noa had a lot of things riding on this. It would be a useful trick if Rhys could pick it up, but it wouldn’t impact anything too much if he couldn’t.
Rhys closed his eyes, which was a sure sign that he was concentrating on something. He did always find it easier to concentrate on something new if he had his eyes closed. Avander had shimmered back into view, and had settled down again to watch, to see if Rhys would be more successful this time.
Again, Rhys’s form flickered. That it did flicker seemed to indicate that it was working a little -- just not as much as Noa or Rhys would have liked, or at least not yet.
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Post by Noa on Jul 11, 2022 22:22:24 GMT -6
But this time, Rhys seemed to have grasped something about what he was doing, and the periods of flickering grew more frequent, and some of them lasted a little longer.
Eventually he had to give up and open his eyes, but this time he was ready to try again almost immediately. {I have it,} he said. And the third time he closed his eyes, after a little flickering, he did indeed disappear from view entirely.
One second passed, then two… then three. Rhys held it for fifteen seconds before he reappeared. {How did I do?} he asked.
Avander was certainly surprised. After Rhys reappeared, he rose to his feet and walked over, nosing at the Faeron. {Hey, stop,} Rhys said, though without enough force to make it more than a token protest. Only when he was satisfied did Avander subside, though he definitely seemed to be paying closer attention now.
“Fifteen seconds,” Noa said. “Was it hard to maintain, or are you just not used to it?”
{I don’t think it was hard. This time I’ll see how long I can hold it,} Rhys said.
“Do it, then. Vanish.” On Noa’s signal, Rhys closed his eyes and flickered out again.
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Post by Noa on Jul 11, 2022 22:22:37 GMT -6
Noa counted time in his head. Fifteen seconds. Thirty. A minute, and then two. At about the four minute mark, Rhys reappeared, though it was pretty clear he hadn’t meant to do it. {Oh, shoot. I lost focus for a second,} he said. {I do have to sort of concentrate on it.}
“We’ll practice until you don’t,” Noa said.
Rhys sighed. {More drills,} he said, resigned to his fate but still unhappy about it.
“Invisibility wouldn’t be much use if all you could do was sit there with your eyes closed,” Noa pointed out. “Now vanish again.”
Avander’s attention was thoroughly captured… for the first three or four attempts. But after it became clear that Noa and Rhys were doing the same thing over and over again, he quickly found something else to occupy himself with. Noa didn’t watch him too closely; Avander knew enough to understand what good manners were if someone else did pass by, and he wasn’t the type to cause problems out of boredom like some other creatures. In the meantime, Rhys practiced under Noa’s watchful eye, and slowly but surely he got better at controlling his invisibility.
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Post by Noa on Jul 11, 2022 22:27:50 GMT -6
First Noa asked him to do simple things while he was invisible, like walking around, or flying. Then Noa gave him things to pick up and hold. Eventually they worked their way up to Rhys casting spells while vanished. At first, he would become visible again if he lost focus, but over time he got used to holding that little bit of concentration in the back of his mind, enough to let him do other things.
Once he could cast spells without breaking his concentration, Noa was satisfied enough to let him stop.
{I don't know if you wanted to teach me anything else today,} Rhys said, {but I'm getting pretty tired. We must have tried that more than a dozen times.}
"Not a dozen," Noa said. "You aren't capable of doing it a dozen times. But I can give you some energy back. There's something else I need to teach you."
{More drills...} Rhys heaved another sigh.
From where he had settled by the water, Avander huffed his amusement. {Better you than me,} he said, with feeling. He had been on the receiving end of that treatment often enough, though in his case it hadn't made him particularly sympathetic.
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Post by Noa on Jul 11, 2022 23:18:55 GMT -6
Instead, Avander was perfectly content to watch someone else suffer, so long as it wasn’t himself. Maybe knowing how it felt made it sweeter, actually.
Before the suffering could begin again in earnest though, Noa did have to spend time with Rhys for an hour. They didn’t exactly have to meditate or anything, but close contact helped, so Rhys draped himself over Noa’s shoulders like a scarf -- which wasn’t terribly comfortable in the summer heat, but couldn’t be helped in this case. The time passed slowly and lazily by, with Noa and Avander both trying their luck in the river, though Noa with his fishing pole and Avander with his claws. Avander didn’t have much luck, and his efforts were probably scaring off any fish Noa might otherwise have caught, but at least it provided a distraction.
Eventually Rhys got his energy back, and Noa could start working with him again. “Last time we simply couldn’t see you. You were still tangible,” Noa said. He had been able to interact with objects without resorting to his telekinesis, so Rhys had definitely still been tangible. “This time we’ll try having you becoming intangible and staying visible.”
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Post by Noa on Jul 11, 2022 23:19:32 GMT -6
{... How does that work?} Rhys said. He didn’t ask whether he could really do it this time, but Noa didn’t blame him for questioning the mechanics of how it would happen.
Unfortunately, Noa didn’t have a lot of answers for Rhys. “There isn’t much written about it from the perspective of a familiar,” he said. “Many familiars aren’t smart enough to properly articulate their experiences, and if there has been one that put their memoirs to paper, I don’t have anything like that in the library. But from the mage’s perspective, the literature says something about the familiar entering the spirit plane.”
{I… become a ghost?} Rhys went through a series of emotions almost as if he was trying them out, before settling on something like amusement -- though Noa detected a hint of genuine fear for a moment. {I won’t have to die, will I?}
{I can kill him if we need to,} Avander offered, and Rhys made a sharp, indignant noise, though it was clear that Avander was only joking.
“Thank you for the offer, Avander, but no. If I had to hazard a guess, maybe I would envision your body being… elsewhere,” Noa offered.
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Post by Noa on Jul 11, 2022 23:19:44 GMT -6
It wasn’t as much guidance as he would have liked to give, but if he didn’t know, he didn’t know. “You picture me when you blink, right? That’s moving your body through space. It might be a little similar to that.”
With these dubious hints, Rhys buckled down to make his first attempt.
They soon discovered that it was a little harder to tell whether he was succeeding. With becoming invisible, there was a clear visual indicator of whether he was managing to do it or not. With becoming intangible, well… Noa had to settle for trying to touch Rhys while Rhys tried to become untouchable. And when it didn’t work, it felt remarkably silly for Noa to poke and prod at Rhys. Not to mention how distracting it was.
But to Noa’s pleasant surprise, Rhys’s efforts weren’t entirely fruitless even early on. At one point not long after they started, he really did feel his hand sort of… sink in. Rhys wasn’t completely intangible, but for a moment he had definitely been less there than he had been before.
“That’s something,” Noa said. “Did it feel different that time?”
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Post by Noa on Jul 11, 2022 23:20:03 GMT -6
{Sort of… It’s hard to put into words, but it was like I wanted me and your hand to be in two different places. I could feel the energy moving through me, a little.} Rhys spoke slowly, puzzling through the experience himself.
“Lean into that more,” Noa said, “and try to phase out again.”
Rhys tried a second time, and this time it held. Noa’s hand couldn’t pass all the way through, but once again, Rhys had less substance. And this time it lasted longer than a few seconds, which was something.
{I think I’m starting to get a hang for how it feels,} Rhys said.
“Hold that thought. You said before that you could feel the energy moving,” Noa said.
{Right… It’s like I’m pulling it out of somewhere, and it’s spreading through my body. Actually, something similar happens when I go invisible, but for that one it sort of settles on my skin, or just outside it,} Rhys explained.
“What if you poured more power into it? Right now you’re sort of half there and half not,” Noa pointed out. “Which is a skill of its own. But you should be able to phase out all the way.”
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Post by Noa on Jul 11, 2022 23:20:32 GMT -6
{I’ll try it,} Rhys said. {It can’t be harder than trying to figure it out without knowing anything about what I’m supposed to do.} He closed his eyes and concentrated, while Noa gave him a long moment before he tried to pass his hand through again. There was a little initial resistance this time too, but as soon as Rhys felt Noa make contact, he shifted himself slightly, tensed, and Noa’s hand passed straight through.
“Nicely done,” Noa said.
{It worked!} Rhys seemed pleased with himself too. {If I can hold this, nothing can hit me! That’s really something, isn’t it?}
Noa allowed himself a small smile. Rhys wasn’t wrong. One of the biggest problems small creatures faced was how easily they could be flattened by almost anything else. A mage could do some things to enhance their familiar’s survivability, but being able to become completely intangible, even for a little while, definitely helped their odds.
{Let’s keep practicing! I want to see how long I can hold it,} Rhys said. There was nothing like a taste of success to fire up his enthusiasm, apparently.
“Alright, phase,” Noa said, and Rhys concentrated once more.
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