Lira’s room smelt like nothing. It was a strange experience. One could always smell something in the air. If there was nothing in particular, it was one’s body odor that was placed.
The air in her room was being circulated from the glyph beneath her. It didn’t smell fresh, it was just distilled at a constant rate, giving the room that nothingness.
She cleaned out her mind, trying to keep herself from studying the ryu glyph her professor had drawn for her. She took in another breath, then let it out. It was calming at the very least, and she struggled to keep herself from nodding off like she had the past few days.
She woke up on the floor yet again. Her mind refreshed, but her body near to numbness. The glyph had taken nearly all the mana from her while she slept. Hopefully she wouldn’t need a mana purifier.
I have to record this, she thought, struggling to crawl to her desk. She reached up a numb hand, then let it fall on her note book. It fell on her head, plopping in front of her. She reached, managing to get the pen from the side and began to write:
With the first signs of freeze pool evident in my body my apparent consciousness gives me insider knowledge. The following symptoms are yet still clear and continuing:
Numbness: my whole body, including my arms tingle with an uncomfortable numb sensation following. It is not painless.
Light headed: my mind feels like it is mostly a fog, though my writing seems to be consistent with my earlier notes. Could this be contributed to muscle memory? Or are different parts of my brain affected more than others?
Coldness: my hands have become more pale, or even blue.
These among others I cannot pick out are the symptoms of freeze pole. It is as if I’m dying.
She began to move. I need to get medical help, she thought. I need to call for help.
Yet her life felt fleeting, her surrounding area was blurring, and her breath was leaving her body. She was almost to the door. It opened.
She didn’t have the strength to look up at whoever opened it, but a comfort washed over her. Like every question would soon be answered.
Lira woke up with light right above her. So she had died.
No, she thought, those are electric lights. They were shown with a surprisingly powerful light. They didn’t flicker, nor did they seem to run out as she laid there. Her eyes hurt after looking at it, however, so she turned to the side.
There she was surprised to find one of her old classmates sitting next to her.
“Misha,” Lira said. “What are you doing here?”
“Saving your life apparently,” she responded. “I found you pale as can be on the floor of your room. I’d thought you probably hadn’t eaten for weeks again.”
“No, I’ve been eating. I was just experiencing the symptoms of freeze pool.”
“Freeze pool? Are you stupid!? Why would you want to experiment with freeze pool? You have a death wish?”
Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.
“You’re shouting Misha.”
“That’s the point. Last time I brought you to the hospital it was because you wanted to know how mana would affect the body while in a starved state.”
“I know, who would have thought that your mana would stay the same. I wonder if you could transfer mana into calories?”
“Lira” Misha growled.
Lira backed up, “I’m sorry.”
Misha stared for a moment, and finally just sighed. “Just don’t get yourself killed. The doctor says your mana pool will recover, but it won't be as big as it used to. You’ll have to go through re-hab to rebuild it. Something that will take you a few months at least.”
Lira nodded, “thank you Misha. You’re a good friend.”
“Don’t say cringy stuff like that. I told you to stop basing your real life on those books.”
Lira shrugged. “For your information, I wasn’t trying to study freeze pool. I was trying to enter the mind. The glyph below me just kept sucking away my mana while I slept.”
“You slept on a glyph?”
“Not on purpose. It just sort of happened.”
“Rrright, anyway; what’s this mind thing?”
A sparkle crossed Lira’s eyes, as she reached for her notes, only to realize it wasn’t there. Misha held it up a moment later, smiling. Lira took it gratefully, then began flipping pages.
Finally she got to the plurimus chapter. Inside was a detailed description of the mind. Or at least the most detailed description ever recorded. She handed it to Misha, who started reading.
“Oookay. What is this?”
“The mind,” Lira responded. “It’s what’s inside the consciousness of every person. Lock says the mind is what connects someone to the purest form of all spiritual things.” She paused. “I’m not exactly sure what he means, but he said you have to accept the world around you before letting your mind become part of it. I was meditating in my room before I fell asleep. It thought that would help me enter the mind.”
“Enter your mind? That sounds dumb, how would you enter your mind? Would your body just be sucked into your brain?”
“No. Lock said that you don’t go in your brain physically. It’s more like your spirit goes in… I just can’t understand how he does it.”
They sat there silently for a while, Lira thinking. It wasn’t until the clock hit seven that Misha stood up.
“Flame it, I’m going to be late.” She grabbed her coat, and made her way to the door. “And by the way. I think you should stop thinking about it.” Lira tilted her head. “He said to accept everything, so stop thinking and just be part of everything. That makes more sense then meditating I think.”
With that, she left, leaving more questions with Lira than what she started with. She always does that to me.
To stop thinking was impossible. But Misha’s words did seem to match Lock’s more than Lira’s guesses.
So while laying in bed, she didn’t try to stop her mind from wondering. Instead of topics, however, Lira started thinking about the bed, how soft it is.
The air, how it smelled in a hospital.
How tired she was from her drained mana.
How she was falling asleep again.
How the black mist in front of her seemed a little too playful.
How drained mana made you tired, yet drain caloric intake didn’t affect mana at all.
Her eyes opened sharply. What was that? She thought.
She glanced around, looking for the black mist she’d seen. Had she imagined it? No, black mist is in Lock’s notes. She looked where she’d showed Misha. It explained how the mind was filled with black mist, making it hard to see.
How anticlimactic. She flipped to a new page:
I had seen the mist described in Lock’s notes right before falling asleep. I believe I was about to enter the mind, but my thoughts on topics seemed to have snapped me out of the mind before I could enter.
Q: Does this mean only men are able to enter the mind?
Do Interlude chapters help you understand this world a little better?
