Wish upon the Stars chapter 1114 (Patreon)

I sat in silence. Or almost. Drips of water, the tick of the clock, slight brushes on the ground. There was sound, but it wasn’t exclusive of quietude. It was more…encompassed. The sound was part of the silence. Like seasoning in food. It added depth. Flavor. It made the silence more complete.

Outside, people bustled, politics raged, treaties were negotiated, but I was just here, alone with the quiet. I had excused myself while my cabinet dealt with Seth and company. I had things to consider.

Power. I had ruminated on its nature so many times, and so many times I came to new conclusions, new realizations. Power was like the proverbial elephant, and I was the blind men feeling along its surface. A snake, a rope, a tree. Power was all of these things and none of them. Power encompassed the entirety of creation, but was simultaneously missing from all things.

I felt it now. That lack. I had climbed so high, reached a goal that should have been unattainable, and yet, here I was back at the bottom. Once again I numbered among the weak.

And it was…exhilirating. It felt so freeing, being unburdened of the great destiny. My responsibility was still there, but at the same time I felt so weightless. Knowing there were so many above me, that even the old man was just an ant in the grand scheme of things was a breath of fresh air.

I had become so complacent with my goals. After reaching Wishmaster status, I needed to reach godhood. And then…I’d be done. I’d have completed everything I set out to do and…what? I’d just live out forever bored. That was what happened to the old man. To Black Sorrow. I could see it clearer and clearer as I climbed. Nothing mattered to them anymore because there was nowhere else to go. They stopped dreaming. Stopped caring. Stopped living.

All this time I assumed it was the power that made them so inhuman. It wasn’t. It was its ABSENCE. They dedicated their whole lives to progress, to growth, and then, suddenly, it was gone. Like being on an endless staircase and getting to the top only to realize there’s no next floor, just a bottomless chasm and no further to climb.

It had been happening to me too. Not quickly, or even severely. But it had been happening. With my whole path mapped out and my big milestone achieved, everything seemed so monotonous. I had achieved my dream, and now all that was left was living it, and how much did THAT suck?

But now I could see further. Beyond the old man, beyond godhood. Overgod, Worldgod, maybe further, who knew?

The fire in my gut was back, ignited again by the spark of humility, and it was roaring up for nourishment. It cried out for me to swallow down adventure and danger so it could refine a destiny fit for a god. I found myself standing, moving, and I realized before long that I was practicing the Cosmic Phoenix chapter of the Nine Phoenix Reincarnation Art. The movements were almost instinctive, building off the epiphany I’d just had. Nothing spurs growth like seeing the immensity of the universe. Nothing makes you want to push yourself like seeing the gap between you and the strong,.

I withdrew the ember from my ring, not wielding it, just inserting it into the ground as I moved, letting the fire spit forth and envelop me as the pattern of the skill wound its way through my body.

Pain washed through me, but it wasn’t limiting. It was invigorating. The burn of a good workout, only very literal. As I moved, I considered my path forward. My destiny had been written before this. It wasn’t complete, but I had seen the horizon, glimpsed the shore, whatever metaphor you liked for viewing my final destination, and it had robbed me. I’d lost my drive, my need to grow. Somewhere along the way, my advancement had become an inevitability instead of a vague possibility, and I had lost my motivation to fight.

My movements became sharper. Fiercer. This template was different than the last one. The Life Nova was easy because of Archie. I could tap into his nature, and life wasn’t a tough thing to envision anyway. I had been Zagan a thousand times, I’d even incarnated him. And more than that, all things lived. The template was just kind of…neutral.

This one though, this one was different. The Cosmic Phoenix Template had a mind of its own. It had a nature, and I had stumbled ass backwards into the right mindset to pour on the gas. Fire blazed through me, consuming and expanding as it poured out of the ember. It had formed a sort of connection with my template, and the rotation was acting like a vortex, siphoning fire from the glowing blade and pulling it into my body faster and faster.

The deeper I got, the more I saw. I was glimpsing the universe through the eyes of the phoenix. I saw a million worlds like grains of sand in a vast desert, like drops of water in an endless ocean of shining stars. Cosmic waves too vast to even be perceived by the mortal mind whipped and raged across the face of reality, unseen tides that steered us all without us even knowing.

And above it all, a phoenix. A noble, majestic bird born from the first spark of creation when the universe was formed. A guardian beast that stood atop the plane and looked down on the forming universe like a proud mother.

Behind the bird, I saw another form, too vast and grand too even contemplate. All I could make out was a human shape, but I knew, knew in my BONES who it was. The Worldgod who had created this universe. The Cosmic Phoenix had been his. Not THIS Cosmic Phoenix, obviously. The one from my vision had a wingspan that stretched over galaxies. Its smallest feather would be bigger than this star system. But A Cosmic Phoenix. The first. The founder of the bloodline.

And then the vision ended, and I collapsed. I was on the ground, wheezing, blood leaking from my eyes, ears, nose, and mouth. I coughed wetly, and I was pretty sure my lungs had collapsed. My bones felt broken, my brain scoured nearly clean. My soul was strained, though not too severely. My Domain was covered in cracks that I hadn’t even felt happening.

But my lips were peeled back in a triumphant smile. I needed to keep that. Needed to nurture it. That experience was foundational to my path forward. And I knew an easy way to do that. I closed my eyes and focused into my Domain, into the castle and into my throne room where my Chronicle sat on a pedestal.

Focusing on the experience I just had, I started to inscribe it. Binding the visions to a page would keep them accessible and fresh, and HAVING them was a huge and earthshaking achievement in itself. It was the perfect solution. I described it all, pouring not just words but images and sounds and emotion into the binding. One page. Two. They kept filling, and I was starting to get worried about whether I could actually DO this. If I tried to bind too many at once it could backlash and hurt me.

Finally, it stopped at eight. Eight pages bound into my Chronicle, all of them anchored to the Nine Phoenix Reincarnation Art.

Beyond that, I saw that the art itself was up to EIGHT drops. I was only one away from completing the template. I grinned weakly. That was a staggering amount of progress for one training session. And I knew it wasn’t over. I could refer back to my Chronicle and read those pages for inspiration. The last drop wouldn’t be EASY, but it wouldn’t take months like they had been.

Next came the rough part. I pushed my consciousness into my Domain, manifesting inside to check on my demons and assess the damage. The palace was fine. Still in one piece if a little banged up. Cracks covered the ground across the plains and the walls of the building. Deep inside them though, I could see something new when I knelt down to check. Fire. A very special and familiar type of fire.

The vision had deeply injured my body and soul, but it also carried little bits of Cosmic Phoenix fire deeper within me. I realized that this was a test. Destruction preceded creation. The advancement of my skill and the power seeping into my Domain wouldn’t be possible without the damage that had happened. The phoenix was a creature of rebirth, and that carried certain meaning, especially for someone like me who had already condensed one of the nine templates.

I checked on my demons, and they all seemed perfectly fine, if somewhat disgruntled. Apparently there had been an earthquake in the Domain, and since there was no EARTH in here to quake, they hadn’t been prepared for that. Which was fair.

As I emerged from the Domain, I reached out to pull myself up, forcing my body upright to a sitting position. I had just made it when the door to my room burst open and a terrified Callie blurred inside, eyes raking over the room to find me. “SHANE!” she screamed when she saw me.

I realized a bit late that I was leaning tiredly against a wall in a sitting position in my room, covered in blood that had been pouring out of my head. “Hey Cal,” I croaked sheepishly. “I did a thing.”

She hit me like a bulldozer, shoulder crashing into me as she wrapped her arms tight around my body. “You absolute moron!” she sobbed. “I felt like you were dying. It was like something…ate you. The other end of the bond went completely dead. What the hell were you thinking? I’m so glad you’re ok.”

“Alright, this one wasn’t my fault,” I argued. “It was an epiphany. Like the one you had about the abyss back in the day. I was training and I just…saw. I can’t explain it. Even if I could I probably wouldn’t because I’m afraid your brain might leak out your ears. Still, I’m fine, and the results were great.” I tried to give her a reassuring smile, and realized that my mask was in the way. I took it off so she could see, but I’d forgotten all the blood on my face, and that kind of just made it worse.

I didn’t try to explain further, or talk her out of her panic. I understood how upset she was, and I knew it wouldn’t go away just because I said so. I just held her and let her cling to me like I might vanish if she let go. I just lay there and let her feel my presence. I knew that was what she needed most right then, and honestly, it wasn’t exactly hurting my state of mind either.

Once she was feeling centered we got up and walked to the bed. My triple Vitality and regeneration fixed up the physical injuries easy enough, even if the soul damage would probably take all night. I pulled off my armor and slumped into my bed, and she covered me with a blanket. As I fell asleep, I saw her between my fluttering eyelids, sitting in a chair beside the bed, watching over me, and I couldn’t help but smile.

I drifted off, and my dreams were full of huge majestic birds and a sea of endless planets. It was funny, seeing that unceasing horizon would have terrified me before, back when I had no dreams left to push me onwards. Now though, all I could see in the neverending universe was an endless expanse of possibility. It was one of the best dreams I’d ever had.