>>6070268“Nobody died today,” you tell Ayla, turning way from your former shell. “That body… Without a soul, or something similar, it was doomed to die., and to stay dead, It would leave nothing behind… Just like the aura I formed into this soul would have remained shapeless and unliving, right? It was just… using resources to perform a medical procedure, to cure a congenital condition.”
Your voice sounds a little hollow even to your newly-elongated ear—a bit too clinical. But it’s true. The old you—the you with Izirina and Costella even now—might have struggled with such a dilemma. In teaching you the darker aspects of the deep arcana, however, Ayla has helped to clear your mind of elven and human prejudices that have been holding back your ability.
Even without your old form’s raw power, you can see your horizons expanding…
>REGAINED: Elemental Infusion & Energy DrainTo your frustration, pure power is not all you’re still missing. Your new spirit, being unlike any other, is most DEFINITELY not that of an elf. There is no attunement to the energies of the Bonum Chaoticum in the core of you any longer, and the arts of Feycraft still elude you. You KNOW them, you UNDERSTAND them, but every time you reach and grasp for them… You fumble, the residual anti-magic aspect of your goblin flesh serving like some spiritual buffer or barrier.
SOME spells do come naturally, though. With cosmic power drawn forth from so many sources and mixed within you, reaching out to the Elementa Planes becomes easier than ever. You can’t quite form a construct of the material you call forth, but channeling it into you to protect or power your new body proves quite doable. To your surprise, the nominally-fey <Energy Drain> also comes naturally, allowing you to take power from terrestrial sources as easily as from those planes, and without the distasteful need to suck blood. You’d have expected this to be impossible, given your utter lack of Banelight-adjacent energies and how flimsy your grasp of that particular spell already was compared to the others in your catalogue.
(Perhaps it’s because of your new nature? It’s a disquieting consideration…)
Ayla, as ever, proves an invaluable and (mostly) patient instructor. As you study under your new Master, the playful shift in your dynamic becomes fertile ground for a ripe flirtation. You already share a home, but not a bed.
You WANT to, of course—you love Ayla, and Reptilian and demonic aspects aside, her body IS the body of the first girl you ever made love to. Ayla’s body in particular is your own creation, by your own hand. It is YOUR adoring recollection of the woman you’ve loved most often and most deeply.
But you haven’t.
For many days your tormented memory of your fiancé and your other Izirina—sleeping in another bed, with another ‘you’, but forever beyond your reach now—fills you with a deep regret and sense of shame.