Grey Realmheart 2,6

It was a technically arduous process, and time ticked by slowly as the Imbuers labored. All together, it took hours before the last projection artifact was finally in place, the last crystal was changed, and all the mana was pushed out of the battery, leaving room for a significant deposit of aether.

Although I’d done little throughout, keeping Realmheart active for so long was taxing. It did not require a significant amount of aether to do so, but it was similar to keeping a muscle flexed for hours on end, and a dull headache was burning at the corners of my eyes.

It was with a feeling of relief that I released the godrune, feeling the energy burning up from under my skin in the shape of runes dissipating. At the same time, the visible motes of mana painting the zone in reds, yellows, greens, and blues faded away to nothing.

But something was different.

I rubbed at my sternum, feeling a tension there that I couldn’t immediately identify. Worried that I’d strained myself, I looked around at everyone else.

Cylrit’s fist was wrapped firmly around Seris’s forearm, and he eased her hand out of the battery tank, allowing the Imbuers to seal it back up. At first, Seris’s mana kept flowing in an uninterrupted loop, spilling out into the atmosphere with no effect. Slowly, her eyes fluttered open, and she looked up, confused, into Cylrit’s face.

“It’s all right. You’ve held long enough. Let go.”

The flow of mana abated, and Seris stared at her hand, which she seemed to be struggling to unclench.

Her mana, I realized with a start. Despite no longer channeling Realmheart, I could still sense her mana.

My insight into the godrune, which represented the relationship between aether and mana, had advanced without my even realizing it. I bit back a grin and closed my eyes, just feeling the mana signatures of everyone around me.