Return of the Runebound Professor

Chapter 529: Jalen's Teachings

“A Fragment of Self.” Lee turned the word over in her mouth like it was a fine wine, then nodded slowly. “So all I’ve got to do is make one of those?”

“Yes, exactly. Making a Fragment of Self is the first step. I don’ t know if that’ll solve everything, but I’m pretty sure it’ll be a move in the right direction. Right now, you’ve got somebody else’s intent mixed in with your own. I can’t even begin to imagine how much that’s screwing things up. There are so many potential problems it could cause.”

“That makes a lot of sense. The only way to find out what’s wrong with me would be to have something we can compare it against.” Lee nodded sagely and crossed her arms in front of her chest. “I’ll make a Fragment of Self.”

“Don’t worry. I don’t think it should be too dangerous,” Noah said with what he hoped to be a comforting smile. “It’s just a representation of you.”

“That’s good.” Lee was silent for a moment. Then she cleared her throat. “Noah?”

“Yes?”

“How do I make a Fragment of Self?”

Noah opened his mouth and raised a hand. Then he paused. His finger lowered. He’d made his Fragment of Self by, well, killing himself. That was generally how he made most of his strongest runes.

Lee — obviously — couldn’t do that.

“That… is a good question,” Noah said slowly. A frown crossed his lips and his brow furrowed in thought. He braced his elbows against his knees and interlaced his fingers, resting his chin upon them. “My Fragment of Self formed when I drew on the energy that comes out of my gourd to create my new body. It got caught up in the Warped Matter Rune I was trying to make.”

Lee looked down at herself. She pinched the skin on her arm and pulled at it slightly. “Maybe I could cut it out of myself.”

“No!” Noah exclaimed. “God, Lee. That is fucking horrifying. You are not carving a rune out of flesh.”

“Isn’t that basically what you did?”

Noah paused for a second. If they were going to get really abstract, Lee wasn’t exactly wrong. The smoke turned into his flesh. But it was energy, and that was the difference. He also wasn’t about to let Lee start stabbing herself willy-nilly.

“Not really. I am going to very hesitantly agree that you’ve got the right concept, but the execution is absolutely wrong,” Noah said. He uncrossed his hands and rose to his feet, shaking his head firmly. “You’re not cutting chunks of yourself out to do this. It wouldn’t help. Making a Rune from scratch needs three elements. Intent, power, and an inciting energy.”

“Intent is easy if it’s just a rune that represents me. It’s the other two things that are the problem. What if I cut a piece of myself off and set it on fire? That would make energy.”

“You are not mutilating yourself!” Noah snapped. He was starting to get an idea of how Moxie felt when she saw him coming up with a plan, and he wasn’t so sure he liked the forced self-reflection.

“I have to do something! You found a way for me to change my runes! I have to take it!” Lee protested, her hands clenching at her sides and shoulders stiffening.

Noah stepped forward and set a hand on her head. Lee’s gaze broke from his and dropped to the floor as her shoulders slumped.

“It’s okay, Lee,” Noah said. “We’re going to find a way to do this. Just because you can’t do horrible things to yourself doesn’t mean there isn’t a path forward.”

Lee wiped at her nose with the back of a hand. “What if it doesn’t work?”

“Then we’ll find some healing potions and you can give that idea of yours a try,” Noah said with a heavy sigh, swearing to himself that he would absolutely never let that opportunity come to pass.

“Really?”

How did my life get to this point? Why are you excited to stab yourself?

“Let’s just focus on the other options first, shall we?” Noah suggested, ruffling Lee’s hair.

“Kay!” Lee said, looking up at him from beneath his hand and grinning. “So what else can we try?”

“Well, you can get the energy you need from breaking a bunch of Runes,” Noah mused. “That’s not really a roadblock. It’s easy enough to get those. We can just kill a bunch of demons in the Wastes or buy some trash off someone. The conversion rate might not be great, but it’s fine.”

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“So the big problem is the inciting energy thing?”

“Yeah. Using the energy that came from my body re-forming worked really well for me, even though it was completely unintentional. If we could somehow harness something similar for you, maybe it would work.”

“Would that even work for me? It’s your energy. If I was somehow able to use it to form a rune, wouldn’t it just have the same issues that my runes currently do?”

Noah pursed his lips. Lee had a point. His energy had come from the gourd reforming his body. It was too specific to him. There was a chance Lee could commandeer it, but it would probably end up just replacing Decras’ rune with one of his own. Lee needed something that was completely beyond anyone’s influence other than her own.

“Using my energy may not be the best solution,” Noah allowed. “I think it’s a possibility. Any improvement is better than what you’ve got right now — but there’s got to be something else that can replace it. Something more unique to a demon, or to you.”

“Eating?” Lee asked hopefully.

“I think you might need a bit more than that. It has to have energy you can draw from,” Noah said.

Lee’s face fell. “Okay. Let me think.”

“Take all the time you need. We don’t have to find a solution immediately. Just having a path forward means a lot. We can keep an eye out for—”

“I’m done thinking.”

“That fast?” Noah’s eyes widened and he rose from his chair slightly. “You figured something out?”

“No. I couldn’t think of anything. Demons don’t use external sources of energy. I don’t know what to think about. We don’t even really start using external magic until around Rank 5. What should I be looking for?”

Noah let out a sigh and shook his head. He sank back into the chair. “I don’t know that part yet, Lee. The energy doesn’t have to come from you. It just has to be something we can harness. Death was just the easiest way to access it for me. Is there some location in the Damned Plains that might somehow lend itself toward helping you… get more you?”

“What does that even mean?”

“I’m not really sure,” Noah admitted sheepishly. “Is there some demon of meditation or something like that? Someone who’s really in touch with themselves.”

“You want to kill them and take their power?”

“I was more thinking to ask them for advice. Maybe there are some enlightened mountains full of peace energy that helps you connect with your deeper self somewhere down here.”

“Someone definitely would have attacked something like that if it existed. I doubt it would still be around. If it was, it would probably be incredibly difficult to find.”

“Can’t have shit in the Damned Plains,” Noah muttered.

“Don’t be sad. It’s okay.” Lee gave Noah an optimistic smile. “You’re right. We’ll find something. Maybe there’s an artifact full of magic I can use. If not, I’ll just fix everything up back in the mortal realm. There’s definitely something up there that can help me. We can just keep an eye out.”

Aren’t I the one supposed to be reassuring her? Why is it other way around?

“Something seems like it got mixed up here,” Noah said, chuckling as he rose to his feet. “But that’s the attitude we need. We know so little about the world. About how everything works. That’s not entirely bad. We might be in the dark, but that just means we have a lot to discover. We can find a way forward. It might be this. It might be something else. I don’t know what it is, but we’ll find it.”

“Yeah.” Lee nodded. They were both silent for a few moments. Then Lee cleared her throat. “Are you sure you can’t give me a piece of your runes?”

Noah chuckled. “Even if I could, I don’t think it would really help you. I don’t want to replace Decras’ influence with my own. Who knows what that could cause. You might start killing yourself. But there is one thing…”

He lifted his hand and drew on his energy, tracing a glowing purple line through the air with a finger. Lee watched with rapt attention as Noah drew the shape of the Fragment of Self before her.

“What is that?” Lee asked.

“My Rune,” Noah replied, taking a step back to let Lee take in the glimmering magic before it faded away. “Can you read it?”

“Fragment of Noah Vines.”

Noah grimaced. “I thought as much. It reads differently to everyone who sees it. To me, this says Fragment of Self.”

“I can’t use it, then.”

“Probably not,” Noah said. He waved a hand through the glowing lines and they curled around his fingertips, blowing away like smoke. “But it’s okay. It answers one more question. Decras’ runes function the same way, and the Minuscule Fragment of Decras is just a really small Fragment of Self. It means you don’t have to do anything different than I did to make my rune. I didn’t stumble into it completely on accident. Once we find that inciting energy, you’ll be able to make your rune. Until then, you’ve got something else to prepare.”

“I do?”

Noah nodded. “You need to really look into yourself and figure out what makes you, you. The Fragment of Self is literally a representation of you as a pattern. No point finding inciting energy if you haven’t determined who you really are. Not your emotions. Not your desires or what you like doing. You.”

Lee looked down at herself, then scratched at her leg. “I’m going to need a mirror and some advanced stretching techniques.”

Noah sighed. “Not literally, Lee. Figuratively.”

She grinned. “I know. I’ll think on it. Thanks, Noah. For doing all of this. You didn’t have to.”

“I did. We’re friends, and I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if I didn’t,” Noah said with a firm shake of his head. “Thank me by finding a way to pull this off.”

“I will,” Lee promised.

“Good. I’ll hold you to that.” Noah returned Lee’s smile. “I’m not sure how much I’ll be able to help you figure yourself out, but if there’s anything I can do—”

“It’s fine. That’s something I need to do myself. I’ve already been thinking on it anyway. Now isn’t the time.” Lee shook her head, then fanned her hands out. The air shimmered and a deck of cards took form in her grip. “There’s some time left in the potion.”

“You know how to play cards?” Noah asked, blinking in surprise.

“Jalen taught me.”

“When did — oh, never mind.” Noah laughed as a table took form between them and his chair pushed into the backs of his legs. He sat down across from Lee. She deserved a break. There were much worse things to spend the last few minutes of a Mind Meld potion doing than relaxing. “Let’s see what you’ve got.”

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