Chapter 127 The Ascension

Evernya’s tear crusted eyes fluttered open to find herself once again in her black void. In an instant, she curled into a ball, shivering as her mind involuntarily flashed back the memories of many millennia floating as a soul.

A pair of arms wrapped around her fetal body providing comforting warmth.

Unconsciously, Evernya leaned back into the person holding her, grasping on to the lifeline. “It’s okay, my little princess. I’ll never let you go again. You are safe now and forever.”

Tears flowed from her blinding bright sapphire eyes at the familiar voice from her memories, only to stiffen a moment later. Evernya pulled herself free, doing to quick swipes with her hands to clear her tears before drilling her attention into the source of the voice while trying her best to ignore the all-encompassing black void.

“I’m sure you have questions, but first a change of scenery is an ordered don’t you think?”

Still at war with her memories, Evernya only nodded.

The woman who was an almost mirror image to Evernya, aside from green horns and eyes, send a powerful wave of mana outward. Contrary to the woman’s expectations, her mana simply sucked into Evernya before it could do anything.

A proud smile formed on the woman’s face as she gazed at Evernya, who was still staring at her with an expression warring between suspicion and loving.

“As expected of my daughter. Just ascended and already has a powerful domain.”

“Domain?”

“I suppose it would be hard to tell in the void, but focus on the surrounding area with your mana sense.”

Despite her distrust, Evernya complied, letting out a gasp as her senses flooded with mana around her. The mana had a familiar feeling to it, but that only added confusion. “Is this my mana? But I thought my mana was hard to sense.”

“It is, and still is. I can barely feel it and I’m your mother. I think it’s pretty safe to say your aspect has something to do with mana. It’s a shame you didn’t inherit my aspect, but how your ascension happened it makes sense.”

Annoyance flashed across Evernya’s face as she glared at who she assumed was her mother’s arms folded under her breasts. “Will you quit being vague and tell me what’s going on!? I just had a bunch of memories pounded into my head. I’m due for some answers.”

Her mother gave her a warm smile. “And as your mother, I would be happy to answer any of your questions, but first, could you allow me to teleport us?”

Evernya’s eyes narrowed in suspicion, unable to trust quite yet despite her memories screaming at her to crush the woman with a hug. “Where?”

“My home and yours if you desire, though I’d prefer you to create your own sanctuary dimension.”

Preferring anything over the void still causing her hands to tremble, Evernya nodded her head in assent. “Thank you for the trust, my little princess.”

Evernya opened her mouth to complete at the name but no words came out as her newly integrated memories send a wave of loving warmth through her body at the nickname. To take her mind off the annoying war within her mind, Evernya asked, “so how do I not resist your teleport?”

“Allow my mana into your domain. You should instinctively know how to similar to our shifting.”

After receiving another nod, Avonya released another wave of mana, this time extra slow to give her daughter time to figure things out.

The moment the mana touched her domain, which appeared to be at almost exactly five meters from her, she felt the intruding mana. A primal need to absorb the mana pushed forward, but she squashed it as she cleared a tunnel in her domain as she reached out with her right hand.

Upon making contact with the mana, the black void vanished, replaced with a beautifully decorated room filled with plants of all shades of green providing color to the mostly black and gray sitting room.

Avonya waved her hand to the only chair not matching the color scheme. While black, it had blue highlights giving away who the chair was for.

See no reason to reject, Evernya flopped on the chair, instantly purring as her skin made contact with exquisitely smooth and soft fabric. It instant she recognized the fabric, giving her mother a thankful smile.

Avonya glanced upward with a cheery smile as she muttered, “Some things never change. Our little Princess still loves our mana weave recipe.”

After a stealthy wipe of her tears, Avonya sat in a similar chair with green highlights directly across from her daughter before beginning to speak. “There is much to explain. What would you like to know first? We are in no rush to leave, so take your time.”

A million questions flowed through Evernya’s mind being causing her to remain silent for several minutes. Finally, after filtering through the questions, she began. “What happened to me? Everything since killing that noble is blurry until I ended up in the void.”

Avonya scowled for a flash, but schooled her expression as she answered. “I had to obscure your memories of that time to help with your ascension. When you are ready, break the barrier in your mind. No matter what you decide to do with the memories, I’ll support you.”

As with everything since she woke up, a war played out through her mind between curiosity, repulsion and again loving warmth toward the woman in front of her.

Evernya pushed down all three in favor of asking her next question, “What’s with all these jumbled feelings?”

A sympathetic expression flashed across Avonya’s face, hands twitching to engulf her daughter in a hug. With a supreme force of will, she held herself back. “That’s a side effect of the ascension. When one ascends, they receive the memories of every previous life. I was fortunate to ascend my first life, but I’ve heard some have hundreds of lives to integrate.”

“I have two well three if you include my second Evernya life as separate from my human life.”

“Only three?” Avonya’s eyes widened before tearing up as she came to a horrifying realization. Unable to control herself any longer, Avonya blurred forward, engulfing her daughter in a hug.

Evernya stiffened but gave into the warm feelings fluttering her chest as she returned the hug with her arms and tail.

They remained in a silent embrace for several minutes before Avonya disengaged and returned to her seat with a content smile.

Still annoyed by the conflicting feelings, Evernya broke the silence. “Is there a way to balance my emotions? It’s really confusing feeling multiple emotions at once.”

“It’s different for everyone. Ironically, those with more lives to integrate having easier time.” Avonya pouted for a moment as she added, “don’t worry, the life when you ascended will always be the primary life. Think of the other ones as filling in any imperfections to form a perfect soul.”

“While that’s nice to know you didn’t tell me how to fix this.” Grumbled Evernya.

Avonya smiled fondly toward her daughter, letting her stew in silence.

A freshly relived memory flashed through Evernya’s mind, causing her to glare at her supposed and mother. “Spit it out. I know you’re stalling on purpose.”

“Fine, have it your way. The most common method is to accept every memory as part of yourself.” Avonya paused, giving a sympathetic smile before continuing, “including the memories I blocked to protect you.”

Curious and desiring to feel whole once more, Evernya focused inward at the block in her mind. Like she created when she unlocked her bloodline, a barrier encircled a section of her memories. She prodded it, finding it quite solid, but breakable.

After taking a deep breath having a vague idea what was behind the wall, Evernya send a mental pulse shattering it.

In an instant, memories played through her mind with crystal clear clarity. First she woke up trapped in a cell living off mana from and tank, then it moved on to her near execution. Unlike her original viewpoint, she saw the fence from all directions, giving her a view of Aya standing behind her as she stopped her execution. With her mental eye, she stared at Aya as she raised the collar to her neck. She focused in on the Kitsune’s face, showing very little emotion except for slight moisture in her eyes as she mouthed I’m sorry.

The moment the collar clicked closed, a sharp pain shot through her mind, sending her memories into a tailspin. Blurry events played through her mind, thankfully distant as her body disintegrated under the force of mana far beyond anything it could handle.

Everything went black for a few seconds before the next memory sequence begin playing, showing her floating in a massive lake of mana then her breaking the crystal.

Following the shattering of the crystal, everything went blank before returning her awareness to the present.

A growl rumbled in her throat as the image of Arthur coupled with the Sespina family burned itself in her mind. Her mind flashed back to Aya, sending a pang of sadness through her heart, but it solidified a moment later as revenge took center stage.

Predicting her daughter’s train of thought, Avonya gave a blood thirsty smile as she spoke. “Those who dared to harm my family shall regret their actions soon. After all these years, I can finally end that disgusting family line.”

Evernya stood ready to go with the expression mirroring her mother, only for her mother to turn remorseful. “Not yet, my little princess. You must solidify your power before descending.”

A pout formed, but she complied, dropping back onto her chair as she questioned, “so what happened to me? I’m assuming whatever happened after I broke the crystal caused some drastic changes.”

With a proud smile and a tone dripping with love, Avonya spoke. “You joined our distinguished group of ascended beings, or what the primitives on Sespina call Old Ones. Your soul was close to ascending even before the chain reaction you caused, but it needed an extra nudge. When two opposite types of mana clashed, you became a container for the volatile combination. Normally this would kill anyone in an instant, including someone of my stature, but instead of dying, the new type of mana started your ascension and remade your body.”

“So what am I, some goddess of mana?”

While still smiling proudly at her daughter, Avonya shrugs her shoulders. “If you want to call it that sure, though, we aren’t really gods and goddesses per se, only a higher echelon of beings. We don’t need worshipers for power, if that’s what you’re thinking. All powers we have are from our previous lives or our aspect, which in my case is Psionic Magic. For me, I’ll have an advantage over other ascended beings in psionic magic.” Avonya scowled as she added with a slight pout in her tone, “however if that pesky Maximus came wandering around with his aspect of space, he would overshadow me and spatial magic.”

Avonya turned serious before instructing, “In order to solidify your power you must find your aspect, otherwise you will do more harm than good trying to use magic.”

With a serious nod Evernya showed she understood before asking, “how do I find my aspect?”

“For once, that’s pretty easy. It should be already engraved in your mind.”

Like when she broke the memory barrier, Evernya delved back into her mind, searching for anything to point her in the direction she but found nothing. She opened her eyes, staring at her mother in confusion, only for a sudden burst of power within her body to elicit a gasp. The very air rippled with power as her eyes shined bright.

A smile bloomed as every inch of her body hummed, primed to release devastating magic at a moment’s notice.

Instantly recognizing her daughter’s aspect, Avonya’s smile widened as she commented, “That stuck up ancient council won’t be happy, but there’s nothing they can do about it now. I can’t wait to see their reactions when they find out a new prime ascended.”