Spirit's Awakening: The Path of Lightning and Water-Chapter 323: Teleportation Device

After arriving in the clearing, Lassim moved toward the outskirts, his eyes scanning for the familiar spot he sat at last time.

It didn’t take long to find it—a place beneath one of the larger Storm Leaf Trees, its roots twisted upward in a way that formed a natural seat.

The space was just far enough from the center to avoid the denser crowds but still well within the strongest flow of built up lightning mana yielding from the eye of the storm’s currents.

He settled himself down, resting his halberd against the tree beside him, its sharp, rune covered edge catching the light of the storm tree leaves filtering down from the canopy above.

He let out a slow breath, closing his eyes and beginning the steady rotation of the [Stormbringer] technique. His progenitor marks also activating now with more intensity to begin their enhanced filtration and absorption alongside the cultivation technique.

The mana in the air responded almost immediately, flowing into his halberd, skin, manatees and then eventually into his inner heart world.

Inside his inner heart world, he could feel the familiar rhythm of energy being drawn into the swirling, ethereal whirlpool below the landmass.

The landmass itself, situated in the middle between the clouds above and the whirlpool below, seemed to have a heftier density and weight to it. There was no actual weight or pressure on him, but he just instinctively knew it to be true.

The process was steady and controlled, the mana dividing itself evenly—half enriching the whirlpool’s depths, the other half drifting upward as "steam" into the clouds above. The subtle balance was satisfying, as he felt himself subtly growing stronger with each rotation.

However, much of the process felt incredibly simple by now, like he could unconsciously rotate and absorb the mana without any focus. This led to Lassim’s consciousness checking up on Mari and Zaphy, his attention drifting towards them and their minds noticed his presence.

It was Mari who broke the silence, "So, what’s today’s focus after the cultivation? Shall we write more runes, or are you planning something else for a bit?"

"Probably more runes," Zaphy energetically replied before Lassim could answer. "Can’t do anything else without them, right? Though, I’m ready for some more action! I wanna fly around and zap some baddies again!"

"Haha, I’d say you’re both right, but I’ve got another idea I’m thinking about," Lassim said, his focus steady as he maintained his cultivation. "The alphabet definitely comes first, but it’s not something I can brute-force my way through in one sitting. I’m also beginning to get a little tired of it since it’s so difficult and mentally draining. There is something else we can do in the meantime. I bought those extra materials earlier so we can also begin to focus on the next step in the process."

"And the next step is the actual teleportation device," Mari guessed.

"Exactly," Lassim replied. "I haven’t really thought about it since I started this project, but we’ll eventually need to take the time to really explore the details. It’s too early to start actually building, but that doesn’t mean I can’t brainstorm."

His mind drifted into his memories, sifting through the moments where he’d encountered the various kinds of portals he’d seen in his life so far.

Each one had a different look and method of activation, but none felt quite right for what he envisioned as a simplistic but easily producible teleportation device he could place all over the world.

The shimmering, water-like doorway to the Water Goddess Ava’s trial had been elegant, but it was inherently tied to her element and God’s Trial, too specialized to replicate for general use. Plus, it was more of a doorway to a separate dimension rather than a full-on transportation tunnel that he had in mind so far with his own understanding of space.

The Abyssal portals—chaotic, corrupted and unstable—were a cautionary example of what could happen without proper preparation and a hastily created process. He was able to easily sever the threads that bound them to their destinations, which he was admittedly thankful for to stop the invasions, but he felt he could do better once the destination device was installed.

And lastly, the Myriad Spirit Academy’s trial portal, while functional, relied on a massive array powered by multiple elders to empower it—a design far too complex and resource-intensive for his ideal vision. It also was quite similar to the God’s Trial entrance.

"None of those are exactly what I’m looking for," Lassim said aloud thoughtfully. "Ava’s portal was beautiful with its activation sequence and the whole ’using a door’ thing, but impractical. All that flair you’d expect from a Goddess, I suppose. The Abyssal portals are obviously out of the question. And the Academy’s system works, but it’s far too complicated to replicate on a smaller scale if I want to achieve a quick and easy transportation system everyone can use readily on a daily basis."

"So, what’s your preference then?" Mari asked, floating lazily through his inner heart world. "What are you trying to prioritize?"

"Simplicity, first and foremost," Lassim said. "The design has to be straightforward enough to replicate by myself hundreds or even thousands of times, but stable enough to handle the stress of a spatial connection. It also needs to be functional without relying on too rare or limited materials or a team of people to activate it. My ideal device would be something I could just create, hand to someone, and then after they place it in the ground, BAM, it’s done and can be used to connect to any other device to make a portal."

"That sounds great, but," Mari remarked, "You’ll probably need to make some compromises along the way, child. Let’s start with the basics—how are you imaging the device’s portal and gateway—if that’s even what you’re picturing—to even look like?"

Lassim leaned back slightly, letting the question settle in his mind. "At its core, I want it to establish a stable spatial bridge between two locations. I’m picturing, like, a tunnel of water or something, and it can even be a short few steps, but mostly a tunnel so you can see through to the other side. That’s the primary function. Everything else—exterior design, portability, how to power it, and safety features—are secondary, but still important. If I can’t make a stable bridge, nothing else matters."

Zaphy chimed in playfully. "Just because it’s simple doesn’t mean it has to be boring. A little flair wouldn’t hurt, would it?"

"Flair is fine," Lassim said, chuckling softly. "But it can’t come at the expense of functionality. If there’s room for refinement later, I won’t ignore it. For now, practicality comes first."

He began planning and mentally sketching ideas in his mind as he cultivated, visualizing the structure piece by piece. An archway seemed like the most logical starting point. It was a simple design—sturdy, potentially modular, and easy to replicate. The frame could have a node or lock at the top or even along the edges to support the spatial runes that dictated the location. Possibly even other default locations as well, anchoring the connection points on either side of the portal more easily. Plus, the nodes or locks could have some embellishments or "Flair" to satisfy Zaphy.

"It needs to be made with materials that are durable but hopefully not too prohibitively so," Lassim said mentally to Mari and Zaphy. "Just enough to handle the stress of repeated activation and use without collapsing under the stress of that. It’d be a huge pain to have to replace the gateway if it broke after every 100 activations, so that’s something we need to keep in mind. Well, I can look into seeing if there’s a material that is strong against the spatial element, right? I can probably ask Eno for some help on this since both him and Rlyis are already aware I’m a bit special. Surprising them with the fact that I have another element shouldn’t be too ridiculous. I can message him later."

"What about the power? Are we gonna go all zippy zappy with a HUGE lightning bolt or what?" Zaphy asked with a chirp.

"That’s going to be tricky," Lassim admitted. "I’m currently the only one that has access to the spatial element. I’m sure Khaalseru will eventually, possibly, add new kids with their own elemental companions in the future, but so far there hasn’t been any bards tales or stories of that kind of news spreading. I’m sure it’ll be a huge deal when it happens, but I wonder what she’s waiting for.

Since that’s the case, it’s going to have to be made with some sort of method where I create a filter rune that can absorb the local mana at the installation site, and be converted into powering the device. It can’t rely too heavily on my mana since I won’t be there to power it. If we go this way, then maybe adding some sort of storage container that can slowly fill it up over time would be good. That way it won’t be too resource-intensive. I guess I’ll add the word [Filter] to the alphabet as well later."

The brainstorming continued, with Lassim refining and discarding ideas as he went. He considered the activation process next, picturing how the device would function in practice.

"The connection has to be stable from the start," he murmured. "Having default locations already installed, like a sort of "Home" destination, would probably make centralizing the teleportation great too. Imagine being able to just press a button and anyone using the device from literally anywhere would instantly have access to the greatest marketplace ever. It’d revolutionize and probably eradicate the need for shipping materials such long distances if there was a central market in some nation or sect’s city. But, this just means the spatial runes need to carry most of the workload and I’ll need to really refine the alphabet for something like that. I should probably add more [Destination], [Home] and [Location] type words to the alphabet’s lexicon too."

"You’re probably overthinking it, but I like the direction." Mari said teasingly. "You don’t need more complexity yet though. You need smarter design. Fewer runes doing more work to at least get started with, right?"

"That’s a fair point," Lassim said, nodding to himself. "If I can streamline the design, it’ll be easier to replicate and less prone to failure since I’ll have to make so many of them eventually. I wonder if the sect’s mass production warehouse could even make these too. Ah, man, if I didn’t need to keep cultivating and increasing my power, it would’ve been nice to do all this brainstorm and thinking back with Rlyis and Eno at their outpost. It’d have been easier. Oh well…"

Zaphy’s chirping cut in, "And you said safety? We can add a pad of feathers around the edges in case someone falls towards the edges and hit their head?"

Lassim exhaled through his nose, containing the chuckle at her idea of what kind of failure might occur "Uh, I was thinking more along the lines of a failsafe… maybe an emergency shutdown sequence built into the power core. If the connection falters and someone is at risk of just being sent to the void and eaten by a void beast, it should cut the flow of energy immediately to prevent further damage. Something like that, but I’ll see what we can do about maybe adding some sort of feathers and scales to the design to represent both of you. I’ll make sure everyone knows they’re protected by Zaphy’s wings whenever they step through the portal!"

"Oooo, like some clutchmates! Birds a feather stick together, and It’d be like a bunch of little brothers and sisters staying underneath my wings. Great idea brother!" She replied enthusiastically.

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The conversation continued, but he spent most of the day, hour-after-hour, cultivating the steady flow of mana that sharpened his focus and strengthened his level. His inner heart world continued to rise in power density, the whirlpool’s currents flowing smoothly and the clouds growing in thickness as Mari and Zaphy helped balance the fused mana’s energy.

As the ideas began to settle, Lassim felt a sense of clarity. The teleportation device was far from complete, but the foundation was pretty much there and he had immediate plans to try and figure out some of the biggest issues. The conversation has also been a good distraction from the runes, but also gave him some additional rune concepts he needed to add to the list as well.

The design took shape in his mind: a sturdy archway reinforced with spatial runes, an easy to understand control system with simple buttons for home and other default locations, a power source that filtered ambient mana into a self-contained core storage tank, and a failsafe system to ensure stability and that people weren’t ripped to bits. Each piece felt like a step in the right direction, despite knowing there was still much more that needed to be resolved.

When Lassim finally opened his eyes, the clearing was quieter, the day edging toward evening. He stretched, rolling his shoulders to ease the stiffness from hours of meditation, and rose to his feet. The brainstorming session had been productive, giving him a clearer sense of direction for the work ahead and he realized he’d finally hit Spirit Ascension stage, level 3.