Ebony's Fable

“This is a little early, but here. For your birthday.”

Ning Xin tried her best to calm down and force her hair colour to recede to black. It was a passive skill formed during her time with the heat-draining bats. She tilted her head at the large box Ebony pulled out towards her.

“What is it?” She managed to pull her mind away from the destruction of her eatery and food spoilage but fire mana continued to pulse throughout her body.

“I had Sister Jing help me but I made it. I thought we should celebrate such occasions more often. And I could count the number of gifts I gave you with the fingers on my hand.”

“Can I open it?”

Ning Xin reached out for the gift, but her fire mana fully receded before she could touch the box. It was heavily protected by Ebony’s mana. Both of them completely ignored the Tetramyths around them or the Barrier King who remained beside them.

It was a large box wrapped in coloured paper, with a string ribbon. It looked odd but she understood it was decorative. Even so, she was worried about breaking her gift. Ebony was right, they should’ve celebrated the special occasions, small or big, more often.

“Mmm. Don’t worry, it’s not fragile.”

Hearing him say that allowed her growing eagerness to be released. She untied the ribbon and ripped the decorative paper while he was holding it.

The first thing she saw was a black sheen.

“I-Its beautiful.”

“Careful, it’s heavy.”

Ning Xin gently slid her fingers under the smooth curve lump of metal.

A wok.

Her enhancement hadn’t died off so the weight of the wok didn’t trouble her. Ebony wasn’t kidding, it was a few times heavier than his sword but it shouldn’t be an issue.

Perhaps infected by him or just particular about her cooking equipment, to begin with, she eyed the dimensions of the wok and noticed she already got brainwashed by him. It was 3 cm thick. Layered, like his scaled shields or Dusk’s bark.

‘He sure loves his layered metal but what does it matter for a wok?’ There was only one handle, it was part of the wok itself. Horizontal and not perpendicular, so it would be a fist clench rather than sword grip. Just the way she liked her woks.

“Try to heat it up. Proper seasoning method.”

Navin smiled at the side and waved to us to indicate his departure but she was too entranced by the feeling of the wok in her grip. She placed it in front of her and flicked her wrist to feel its motion. It didn’t feel like it would fly off into the wall and disintegrate. Instead, the small flick-up blew up a gust of wind that rustled our robes and hair.

The metal grip made it possible for her to inject fire mana directly, telling her that the gap in the layers was for fire mana to pass through more easily. It also meant even heating to the entire wok and no open flame outside was required!

‘It’s not heating up? It can take heat! I can cook some of the monster meat that can handle more heat than my old wok now! I need to get a new blend of spices that won’t burn as well. Oh, the possibilities!’

“I love this!” Ning Xin didn’t jump straight to seasoning the new wok and flew into Ebony with open arms, her wok still in her right grip. The wind pressure shattered some of the closest frozen ants.

‘Oh no.’

She heard cracks from Ebony’s body, realising that her excitement and glee pushed her back to full combat mode. She was hardly even glad to figure out that her excited state was not limited to unadulterated bloodlust. Those bats really pissed her off.

Innate Psyche Shift (Passive) - Having awakened and developed your natural polarities to the extreme, you can shift between two general states. In your convalescence state, your Strength, Agility, Intelligence and Perception can be reduced up to a static 90%. Redistributed to enhance your Vitality, Constitution, Endurance and Wisdom. In your atrophy state, your Vitality, Constitution, Endurance and Wisdom can be reduced up to a static 90%. Redistributed to enhance your Strength, Agility, Intelligence and Perception. You have perfect control over redistribution. The burden of Innate Psyche Shift on you is reduced by 300% + 5.0% per level. The speed and fluency of psyche shift are increased by 500% + 10.0% per level.

Ning Xin did not have Ebony’s sustainability, in a survival scenario, she was far more susceptible to harm. The Tadarida Heat Sinks pushed her beyond the limits. Without her swords. Without any effective fire magic.

Her solution was always the same.

She just needed even greater firepower.

There was just one big problem.

She could never recover enough stamina or mana before her sleeping spot was disturbed. Without energy, she couldn’t fight properly or even experiment with new techniques. Day in and day out, the Tadarida treated her as prey.

It did not piss her off as much as it spat on her pride.

One day, she snapped.

And Innate Psyche Shift sat in her skill list from that day.

It was more than just a stat redistribution. It was more than just a cognitive shift but a cognitive shift was the easier way to see it. In her convalescence state, she was weak but recovered much faster. In her atrophy state, she could burn out or die a lot faster. More importantly, she was dulled. Flawed in both states.

The skill description didn’t tell her a lot that she figured out.

In her convalescence state, she was caught off guard a lot more easily. Her Intuition wasn’t nearly as sharp. She was more tamed. It was harder for her to feel strong emotions. It made her wonder if this was how Ebony felt all the time but even more intensely.

In her atrophy state, she loses her mind. Only slaughter on her mind. Or so she assumed, but it was more likely that all her emotions were heightened to the extreme. Excitement was also one of them. It just so happened that ‘killing’ was on her mind most of the time she went into the atrophy state.

Stats aside, it was harder for her mana to move when she was in the convalescence state and vice versa in the atrophy state. In the atrophy state, fire and blood actually moved themselves and supported her. Burning in her veins to further blind her normal thoughts.

The key advantage was ‘up to’ and ‘perfect control’.

In either state, she could leave a certain stat alone and not redistribute them but it took her time and mental effort that was hard to drag up if she was deep in either state. Even though it was a semi-tier 4 skill, it still took her time. Seconds or even minutes depending on how deep she was in either state. The present was the most obvious example, she was having a hard time swapping back or at least going to a normal, balanced mode with no redistribution.

Physically, her hair was the most obvious indicator. Fire and blood would boil up everywhere inside her, all her enhancement spells would cast themselves. Innate Psyche Shift would take into account enhanced stats all the same.

She already had practice with the redistribution and knew how much of each stat could be reduced or increased without hurting herself by having too little of anything.

Even better, she didn’t have to sacrifice every part of 1 type of stat. Taking Wisdom, regeneration was useless for her in a battle. She couldn’t regenerate while casting. But Wisdom was still useful, to maintain the stability of high Intelligence stat and the natural mental defences the stat provides. She already tested that she could take away just regeneration and push it to another stat, Endurance or the more specific stamina regeneration.

Hence, Ning Xin was certain.

There was no chance Ebony would defeat her in a duel anymore. And she was afraid of that so they’ve been putting it off. Innate Psyche Shift was far from the only advantage she’d gained. However, she gave him the benefit of the doubt for keeping up with her for so long so she suppressed her arrogance. There was no telling what he could do now, especially with his growing ability and control over his Domain.

“I’m sorry!” Ning Xin panicked hard. She didn’t mean to crush his ribs with her hug but she was too excitable in her atrophy state.

“I’m glad you like it.”

She smiled under her mask, delighted that he wasn’t so fragile.

For once, Ebony did not lecture on the functions of his craft. It was supposed to be a surprise or an experience for the chef to discover herself.

He guided her back to the fortress while she was entranced with her new toy.

Unable to fully go back to the convalescence state, she seasoned her wok in an open area. There was no one around, unlike the crowded eatery she had moments ago.

The alloy it was made of contained Emberdium, Ning Xin was only familiar with it since her swords and the woks she had contained the same metal. Emberdium was reddish orange in colour but the wok was pitch black. However, once she fed it even heat the hexagonal plates and layers of the wok glew in response. Very tiny hexagons, it required squinting when it wasn’t heated or glowing.

She could guess that the layers were meant to hide or stack runes. Heat-related runes.

Ning Xin didn’t care about the runes. She got straight into seasoning the wok with mammoth and seal fat. She didn’t forget peanut oil. It probably didn’t need the seasoning but there was no reason not to.

The first dish she cooked on her new wok was sweet and sour pork. In her excitable state, she flew to Ebony and force-fed him. Bite by bite. Watching his every motion and sensing all he felt to fuel her excitement further. She did not know shame or embarrassment in her current state, only aggression and an ardent desire to get what she wanted.

It took 2 whole days for her to calm down and exhaust herself after a few rounds of tetramyth slaughter and cooking. Her eatery restarted but she had fewer people bringing in ingredients and eating her food. The numbers increased when she gradually fell off the atrophy state and her hair turned more black than red.

Ebony wanted to leave, to check up on his classmates, the children and his teaching assistant models.

Unaware of his experimental results with Dusk, Ning Xin’s heightened Intuition told her that Ebony was much stronger than her convalescent self believed. Rather than strong, he felt stable and infallible.

Kong Jing sent them up. Ignoring all the spatial protection that had been in place. It seemed like she already found a way to bypass them or force her way past them. Not all the way, but above the elevator shaft they took on the way down. That was good enough.

‘I want to sleep on my bed anyway,’ with that thought, Ning Xin happily faded into her convalescent state as they climbed up and returned home.

The trip down and up was a huge matter for the combatants below but not so much for them. It felt like they were returning home after a hunt or job.

And when they got home, Ning Xin flared back up into atrophy. Almost diving as deep as she could in an instant. It was beyond her control. She did not expect to arrive home to see their walls broken down. Frozen ground, flattened garden and shattered chunks of ice.

“Ebony! You’re alright!” An old lady she smelled before on Ebony called out. She zapped into their range in a split second but Ning Xin wasn’t fully present. Everything else was perceived as a threat. Her sword swung before her mind raced.

Ebony’s mana flooded her and her sword struck an unwavering solid that didn’t melt or budge under her swing.

“I am. One moment.” Ebony swept around the shattered chunks of ice until a pig-sized block floated into his hands.

She felt something from the chunk. Tiny bits of someone familiar.

‘Just like the special model…there’s another? Since when? There’s heat under the ground? A person.’

Ebony’s calming mana was intense but it was the first time she felt it at full force. He could control it and he was suppressing her excitable nature. There was no reason to be mindless now, there was no threat around. Or so she thought the mana was telling her. He managed to snap her back to convalescence but she wasn’t concerned about this ability at all. It only worked because she allowed it.

She walked to the spot in the garden where the large chunk was lying. At the same time, so did Ebony.

He gently stomped the ground to reveal a mostly naked woman with bits of metal covering her vitals and privates.

‘The secretly a metal mage girl who works in the Quest Hall. She's low on blood, the healing wouldn’t save her until she gets some food in her system. Wait…nevermind, her blood is being replenished. I forgot Yvette can also use blood magic. But she still needs food.’

Ning Xin could feel another person’s hunger. Hunger was an emotion. It was annoying and she did not like it. It made her desire to feed people in her surroundings grow. Just to get the feeling of hunger to go away.

Despite the damage to the fence walls, garden and Ebony’s Models, the house was undamaged.

Removing the source of hunger came first, she left the rest to the man of the house who knew more about the situation.

“I’ll make some grub. And tea, please come in, madam.” She forgot the old lady’s name that Ebony mentioned but she could recognize a friend from foe right now. Serving tea to the elderly who visited was only natural.

The old lady helped cover the frozen metal mage with her robe which saved Ning Xin some effort.

“Xin, I’ll be out. I’ll clean up when I get back.”

“Don’t take too long.”

“Mm. Wilcox, thank you for protecting my house.”

“It was no trouble. I was too late to protect your moving sculptures. Please tell the kids why you didn’t come yourself.”

“Okay, why don’t you join us for dinner tonight? I’ll try to be back by then.”

“It is my misfortune to miss it but my fortune to have dinner with my grandkids. Sorry, I’m already booked for dinner.”

Ning Xin heard the exchange from the kitchen, she served the old lady tea and found Ebony to have left.

“Thank you, let me get some clothes.” She did not want to give any clothes to this random woman but she could spare a set that no longer fit her. It was worse if she was still naked when Ebony got back.

“What are you going to do about her? It doesn’t look like you know her well.” Old ladies had a special ability, they tended to be able to make themselves feel familiar. That was how Ning Xin felt for the stranger.

“Feed her. Then, keep her around I suppose. I don’t know what Ebony needs her for but she was in our house so I guess he wants to shelter her for now.”

“Ebony left too fast, I didn’t get to share what I know about the situation.” Wilcox was an impatient drinker, just gulping away. Ning Xin could feel the lightning dance around her.

“He probably knows enough, his models can store memory.” It was rude but she left the old lady with the unconscious metal mage on the floor while she searched for one of her childhood clothes. That was the only point in time that she was so small in stature.

“Aren’t you interested in what attacked your property?”

“Don’t tell me, I don’t want to melt my house down.”

“Hm? Well, it looks like you kids have a handle on it so I’ll get out of your hair. Thank you for the tea, it’s delicious.”

Spontaneity wasn’t an odd trait amongst great lightning mana users so she wasn’t so surprised at the hurried departure.

Ning Xin was more distracted by the hunger she was feeling. It had to go.