The Stubborn Light of a Dying Flame [Isekai - LitRPG]

Harry rubbed his chin thoughtfully, going over everything Din had said. "Let me see if I'm understanding this all correctly. You're a Corvi—that much is fairly well established at this point—but you were born on Ember to parents who were born on Ember, going back several generations."

Din nodded.

"Right, and the lot of you have just been hiding your entire lives; blending in with the Azuranians?"

"Not all of us chose to be Azuranians," Din said. "My mother chose Azuranian because she liked the feathers. My grandmother is a luprin, but we just say she's an adopted family member. I have an uncle who's a Telibran, but I don't get to see him often, he lives in western Brath."

Harry held up a hand to stop the string of words that was quickly turning into a nervous ramble. "You just named two different species that I've never encountered. I'll amend my statement to 'blending in with the Emberians', since that much is true no matter what species you choose."

Din acknowledged the statement with another nod.

"Good," Harry said. "Then continuing on, you and your family have been in hiding ever since your many-times-great grandmother was dragged here through something called a boundary crack and you have no way to get back to Ashen."

Din's explanation wasn't that difficult to follow, but it was a bit difficult to believe. Harry couldn't even imagine the concept of a whole underground society having not been caught for that many generations. Myre's group seemed to have done so as well, but they had the benefit of bodysnatching to help them hide. The Corvi were just faking their entire biological makeup.

"How many of you are there at this point?" he asked. "On Ember, I mean."

Din shook her head. "Even if I knew the number, it wouldn't be my place to say. The Corvi are all in hiding, remember? Giving a number would be giving out too much information to someone who might wish us harm."

Harry raised an eyebrow.

"I don't think that you would," Din rushed to clarify. "But my personal feelings aren't relevant here. Just because I trust you doesn't mean I can go spilling secrets that aren't really mine to tell."

Harry nodded. "True enough. Honestly, the one thing I still don't get about all this: why on Earth did you think that I was a Corvi?"

Din frowned. "That part is a little harder to explain."

"More secrets?" Harry asked.

"No, I just don't have a proper explanation yet. You know what Miasma is, yes?"

Harry raised his hand and tilted it side to side.

Din's frown deepened. "What is that? What does that mean?"

"It means sort of," Harry explained, noting it as a hand gesture that Emberians might not know. "I understand that it's a type of energy like Essence and Mana are types of energy, but that's about all I got from the Myres' stories—oh, and the fact that Essence and Miasma don't play nice together."

Din shook her head. "Mana isn't technically a type of energy; it's just a way of classifying and quantifying the energy you already have. The energy inside a person, be it Essence, Miasma, or some other type of energy that we have yet to discover, can be described as their Mana. In a word: it's their life force.

"For a Lerian, their life force and their energy are one and the same and both can be used for magic. To be drained completely is to be dead. For a Corvi, it's a bit more complicated. We don't have an accessible Miasma pool in the same way that the Lerians have an Essence pool. Rather than using our internal Miasma, which me need to survive, we harness the Miasma in the air. To cast magic, we have to gather the energy first.

"For larger spells, a Corvi might spend weeks, months or even years gathering enough Miasma from the air. There is a capacity limit at which they won't be able to take in more energy, but the strongest mages never reach that limit. In any case, the more Miasma you've gathered, the bigger the spell you can cast."

"Then why wait until you're planning a spell to gather it?" Harry asked, intrigued by the explanation. "Why not just gather Miasma all the time, stop when you hit capacity and then use a bunch before going back for a refill? That seems more efficient than spending several years working on the same spell."

"Holding Miasma isn't as simple as pulling it in and letting it sit," Din said. "The energy has to be constantly channeled through our magic pathways, or it will leak back into the air. If you take it in too fast, it can make you sick as well."

"So, you thought I was a Corvi because I'm affecting the Miasma in some way," Harry said. "And you were going to beat the truth out of me because…?"

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"You've gathered enough energy to blow up half the city," Din said. "I thought for sure you were going to take on the Myres back there. When you didn't start a fight, I thought you were planning to hijack the boat on the way back. When that didn't happen either, I got impatient."

Harry snorted. "That's one way to put it."

Din shook her head. "But you're still gathering Miasma even now. You really can't feel it?"

"Not at all."

Din sighed. "We'll just have to chock it up to a biological quirk for now."

"Biological quirk?" Harry asked. "That sounds concerning."

"It is," Din said. "Because from what I could tell, the other four humans weren't constantly drawing in Miasma. Or if they were, it was less noticeable. On the other hand, it was impossible to miss the amount of Miasma you were gathering. When we get off this island, we're bound to run into a Corvi—we may have met one already—and if you can't control this, it won't make a good first impression."

Just what Harry needed, an uncontrollable power that might turn half the population of Ember against him.

"What if you're wrong about this?" Harry asked. "Maybe it's not that I'm pulling in Miasma, but that the Miasma is attracted to me somehow."

"Maybe," Din said skeptically. "It would explain one mystery: if you're gathering the Miasma, there would have to be somewhere for the energy to go. You would need a place to store it, like a pool or a Core…" She looked him up and down. "No offense, but I don't think you have either of those things."

"Offense taken and filed away for later revenge," Harry said dryly. "In the meantime, how about we focus on making the Miasma less clingy. What do you think?"

"I have no idea," Din admitted. "I've never encountered someone like you before. Miasma, as far as I can tell, is only toxic to Lerians, but that doesn't mean other species are using it in any way. Your ability to use magic inside my wards implies that you're somehow harnessing the Miasma, even if you don't realize it. It's likely replacing the Mana in your pool when the System is blocked."

That much sounded like a good thing. Being able to use magic within magic-blocking wards sounded like a superpower, but it was way too conspicuous a superpower for Harry's liking.

"Have you noticed any patterns?" he asked. "Times when I was taking in more Miasma than normal?" Harry's peace after leaving Lapis might hinge on him controlling this phenomenon. He wasn't completely convinced yet, but Din didn't strike him as someone who would come up with a lie this extensive, so he was playing along for now.

"You pulled in more on the other island," Din said. "It might be linked to stress, or it might have something to do with the fact that there was more Miasma on that island than there is inside the city. I specifically put up Miasma filtering wards to keep the energy inside from becoming unstable."

"Don't you need Miasma to live?" Harry asked. "I could have sworn that was somewhere in the explanation."

"I leave the city once a day to recharge, and I have a few Miasma canisters for emergencies. I'll do a lot better in a zone without Miasma than I will in the middle of a mine field."

"Fair enough. I think you might be on to something with the stress thing. Ember has been nothing by stressful since the day I got here, but I don't see my stress level going down any time soon."

"Is there something we could to do lower it?" Din asked. "Eating, maybe? Or personal grooming? What do humans do to reduce stress?"

Harry raised an eyebrow. "Not taking me to the middle of a monster-infested forest would be a start."

Din looked embarrassed. "Yeah… true…"

"Why don't we head back then," Harry suggested, getting to his feet. "I don't know about you, but I'm tired of the sound of crickets, or whatever alien hell-bugs you have here on Ember. How do we tell Nali that she doesn't have to come meet us out here?"

"She's not coming," Din said. "Sorry, that was a lie to get you to come with me. Nali was going to the town hall to inform Lapis' leadership of our plans to evacuate the island."

"They're closed," Harry said. "I wouldn't be stomping through this god-forsaken forest if there was someone in today that I could yell at about the privileges reset debacle."

Din froze, real fear crossing her face; the kind Harry hadn't seen, even as she mowed down giant creatures and set up wards in the middle of monster fights.

"What is it?" Harry asked, steeling himself for the worst. "Is there a monster behind me?"

Din shook her head. "If they're closed, what's taking Nali so long? She should have finished hours ago."

"Maybe she's having trouble finding us?" Harry suggested, relaxing at the far less deadly anxiety.

"Nali could run around this island in fifteen minutes flat," Dins said. "She wouldn't have any trouble locating us."

She looked around as if expecting Nali to pop out of a nearby bush.

"Maybe she got a hold of someone after all," Harry suggested. "Why don't we go back and see?"

Din nodded hesitantly. "Let's do that…"

* * *

Nali waited for both of them to leave the clearing before she dropped her invisibility spell. The forest was starting to get dark with the setting sun and the wards that Din had erected still hung over the area, keeping Nali from entering the clearing.

She was a little hurt that Din thought so little of her, considering how long they had been working together. Din's story wasn't a revelation. Nali had known for quite some time about Din's true race and about the existence of the Corvi settlement in Kelinar. She assumed that there must be other settlements in Ember as well, but she had decided not to seek them out. Every time she discovered one of them would be a chance that someone might intercept the information. She wasn't trying to endanger the Corvi with her meddling.

The world was seldom kind to shape-shifters, even those that weren't part of the race that may have caused the Cataclysm.

Nali was still skeptical about that part. The mentioned vision was never fully explained, and she didn't think Silka was a reliable source of information. Even if she wasn't a child at the time of the Cataclysm, she had been extremely upset and that could have led to a misinterpretation of what she was seeing.

Nali would have to do her own investigation into the matter, though she wasn't sure if she could find anything after six thousand years. For now, she planned on taking everything Lord Myre and Queen Naomi said with a grain of salt. She still had to hear Hinesh's side of the story, as well.

Nali made her way back to town, circling around the path so she could meet Din and Harry while traveling in the other direction. She would eventually have to tell Din that she already knew her secret, but Nali would let her keep it until it was relevant to the situation. There were plenty of other Corvi that Nali could seek out for information without destroying Din's peace.

* * *