The Ogre Strength Fairy and the Eldest 'Son'-Chapter 537 - Different Kinds Of Light That Pale Next To Master/Student Friendship

Chapter 537: Chapter 537 - Different Kinds Of Light That Pale Next To Master/Student Friendship

Laughing about tricking her disciple years ago devolved into a sudden spar - which to El felt like dodging a kitten that had finally decided to try its claws against its master without backup. Eventually Nohre would give up again when it was clear the infuriating little Ogre would remain dancing out on the lake, avoiding the Mend user’s ’just a hug’.

For while she could imitate something sort of like standing on Water - similar to how the heiress had begun doing it with Gaseous panels - full speed chasing was out of her mastery. Walking was the best she could do safely, which was still more than anyone else her age was usually capable of.

...At least, it was the best she could do so long as Elua er Goltbred had the capability to Stomp on the water. Which was one of the scarier things she’d seen the incomprehensible reincarnator do, including the vastly prepared Starlance that the disciple had learned all about. Because she could ’feel’ the effect with her spiritual sense and field receptivity to the changes in the nearby Water, unlike the distant mechanics of the plasma.

The moment the foot came down, energy transferred and the water had nowhere to go but *away* as best it could. It traveled so fast... at the speed of sound in water... that it created a cavity of air in the liquid. One which was slammed shut just as instantly and the implosion made a secondary shockwave.

Both released *numerous* pulse of light which felt over before they began. Sonoluminescence, caused by sound waves passing through the cavitation and producing a temporary bead of plasma within the bubbles. A fact which sat more strongly in the cultivator that caused it than the overwhelmed water-deer.

A concussive boom rounded out the near surface depth charge... like a crack of thunder that Nohre could feel *whump* through her body even as she saw a steamy geyser climb vertically in the air. Right around the already high-pressure gas sheathed brunette. Hot vapor became a fog bank dispersing in all directions to hide the movements she’d make without any illusions.

All before the startled cultivator ever caught her breath.

Of course, the green eyed young woman also lost her ’footing’ shortly after that, because of the ship capsizing sort of circular wave that rippled out from the foot-caused phenomena. Keeping an area of water static nearby was easy enough - at least when the water underneath of it was doing the bulk of the work as immovable weight. Yet, her control with things like that was nowhere as effective as the ancient cultivator.

A woman who, even as the young Talcres daughter-in-law busily refilled the bubble staff’s reservoir with lots of glares in her direction, leapt off of temporary but timely placed steps of air... before dropping into a dive down into the water and shooting back out into the air at a different location, like a dolphin. Acting for all the world like she could choose where natural laws applied and where they did not.

Which was true, if you accepted the realistic definition of the widely useful manipulation of her Gaseous Element. An ability which no one in their right mind would actually hand over to someone with anything close to full understanding of its potency. And that was why El was sure that whoever was responsible for insinuating the idea of reincarnation into the world - be it a Divinity or some other supreme existence - did not hand pick every Aspect or combination of the Trinity.

’If they did, they at least should have given it more thought and gave it to someone without all their memories. The things I can do, the substances I can make, it’s almost like someone wanted me to burn the world down... or be right at a throne on top of the the entirety of it.’

Truly, if that were the case, the illusionist could only sigh at how little they knew the person they were dealing with. Because of course, if there *was* some sort of ’top’ awaiting them? That place only ever belonged to her one and only Qatrand. A sword, a step, a seat, or a snake - she was willing to be anything for the person she loved. Though she wasn’t sure she could deal with being ’absent’ ever again.

"Master, what the heck is this?!"

Nohre had reached out and felt the rapid emulsion of micro-capsule oxidizer beads in the suddenly milky looking soapwater. And a little squeeze of pressure had burst many of them, mixing into chemistry with the nearby luminol that had been inside the gel. They lit up instantly like something living had woken, the chemiluminescence of soft blue-violet glow as the liquid wicked along the Silver.

"Temperature also affects the intensity and duration. Cool it and they’ll dim but last for hours more. Heat them and they’ll brighten - but burn through the urea peroxide faster."

"Hot and cold... okay, that was what those words were. Why did you have to write the additional instructions in the Old Tongue?"

The woman looked up panning her face around the area behind her rather than the lake. Elua smiled and dropped her illusion, the attempt to sneak up behind her finally snagging on the cultivator’s ’warning’ system of small water drops. A tactic that she had been taught last time she was in the Exclave, but seemed to have kept up practicing all this time.

Which was why the heiress let her ’win’ one, instead of billowing air from the other directions and overloading that method all at once.

"Because you should know enough of it from our lessons. I’m not going to translate every text I have in my library just for... well, if Qat decided she didn’t want to learn to be fluent in it, then I guess I would."

"Yes, yes, but I’m not your beloved. The two of you really deserve each other."

"Thank you. I knew I would like you for a reason the day I met you, it must have been because I was sure that you would approve of our obsession with each other. After all, I approved of yours with the boy back then at your side."

Swinging slowly and forming another giant bubble, this time glowing dimly with chemical reactions, Nohre watched it with a smile before turning to the person who’d given this thing to her. The heiress who had given her something she could ’give’ to others with. Something she could use for lots of reasons, but was sure to be helpful to those witnessing them - whether just for their beauty or their utility.

"...And thank you again, for the wedding gift. We still watch it once a month. You could probably make a fortune on them."

It drifted across the lake surface nearby as Elua’s thoughts went with it. Away from herself *now*, towards the depths of the doctoring past. Eyelids fell just slightly as she put herself in the metaphorical shoes of the other girl. Uvraneht had tried for a long time to only give what she could afford, but it never felt like enough.

"You should remember what you just said. When you are pouring everything into keeping someone alive. You can look at things from that slightly material perspective and you wouldn’t be wrong to do so, it’s not as selfish as it might feel. You need to charge enough for your services not to work in a deficit or you end up causing more hurt to a larger number of people than the one who might be unable to afford some luxury later in life."

"I know myself well enough to keep myself from being in charge of things like that, Master."

Not losing her smile, the green-eyed cultivator stepped closer and put her arm around the mint-eyed one. She’d been given so many lectures over the years by her friend... but also so many experiences that allowed her to come to her own conclusions about herself. Decisions with money could be left to Fusand for private matters or Zyris for public ones.

’Unless it has to do with crabs, then it comes through me. That’s our deal. Compromise makes a marriage work!’

Soft light painted the dusk-time lakeshore in a blue-violet, the big bubble reflecting off the ripples still bounding in and out from the earlier stomp. All of it reminded Elua of a festival night tradition held on an island nation that she had lived in seclusion with for half a century.

The people there raised a kind of jellyfish for both a venom extract and a food source... but also had a different species that was sent out into the ocean, from ritually maintained holding areas once a year - when a special bloom of algae moved in from sea currents like clockwork. They would feast on that food source and turn into underwater lanterns that lit up a whole week of nights in a seafoam-green glow.

’Well, then they would kill and harvest them for components afterwards. But it was still pretty while it lasted.’

"Good. I know you intend to throw yourself into your work with the Clearer Skies Society. I know that people will need your skills constantly and that you will provide those skills without hesitation or complaint. This is who you are and I will never tell you to be something different. Keep your light still for me and increase its brightness."

Nohre blinked at the instruction but complied, steadying the luminol bubble with her Element while the smaller woman took a step away. The ancient cultivator had never been good at letting ’pretty’ stand uncontested when she could use Illusions to top them... and if she could do it with something real, all the better.

What followed from the spiritual and essence Breacher required the kind of concentration that few new Defier’s held - and that most Primalists on the content would therefore never achieve in their lifetime. But it also required the preparations of someone with more knowledge and time on her hands than blissful ignorance and waiting duties.

Isolation and compression of trace atmospheric gases had been a checkmark on her list of goals since she decided to stay. Most existed in quantities so small that it required her to filter many millions of liters of air. Some were functionally theoretical to anyone without the chemistry knowledge she had obtained through visits to other scholar focused Astral Exclaves formed by groups of allied Demi-Gods.

’All those academy lessons weren’t entirely useful back then, but they are now. Life is a strange thing.’

Her hand moved out to a bandolier of pressurized cartridges, using her spirit to unseal four of them in succession while taking control of a certain volume of elemental gas that each released before passing them through another tool that held a copper dust to pull into aerosolized suspension. Particles so fine they were almost invisible by themselves.

The young Lightning user in her care had caused her to look into all kinds of methods of channeling an arc. Both to mimic the ability herself and to *take control* of such an Element if used against her, using natural properties that other cultivators might underestimate. Most could not adjust their control for unknown situations on the fly as well as the reincarnator could.

Rings began to form around the stabilized soap-sphere, halos that spun at a circular speed which caused the gas to generate friction against the conductive metal. The triboelectric effect built as she rotated them all. Working into a charge that eventually arced, causing the focused outermost ring to erupt into a deep violet as the Xenon ionized in her containment.

Argon answered next in a pale lavender, Krypton in its contrasting ghostly green, and the innermost ring of orange-red blaze that her Neon produced around the glowing bubble blazed out in an orange-red. It was the most eager to join the display... but she wanted to start with the colors she found prettier herself and sandwich it between the luminol’s distinct blue glow out of the pearlescent bubble.

"Are you trying to show off?"

"Hush. Watch."

Elua held the configuration for a whole minute, waiting for her disciple to tire of keeping the bubble still herself. The moment it slipped and twitched away, she ’let go’ herself. The rings burst outward in every direction - as intentional dispersal of hundreds of small motes of glowing gas. Skittering through the air and off the surface of the lake, like a firework of fireflies that swirled in insectile swarm patterns as the copper burned what charge remained.

Tiny sparks winked out one by one, the ’rare’ gases being brought back nearby for the little cultivator to store back away at her leisure. By the end, only Nohre’s chemiluminescent bubble sat on the water like a surfaced jellyfish. Looking much, much more boring than the other display.

"...Was that necessary?"

"Absolutely not. But it was still a good lesson, I think. The crowd always wants the next big thing. Hook them at the start, but never show your best until the finale... and always hold *something* back."

Resealing her cartridges and setting the bandolier back into Adhesion, the brunette... turned around and held nothing back. She hugged fiercely the person who would be leaving the next day. There were still a few months to go and each minute was feeling like it was pressurizing her and building a charge, just like her glowing gases.

"So. Don’t forget that. When performing for people who will never know the amazing spectacle I just shared with you. Or how amazing my dear friend truly is."

"I love you too, Elua."

"Be safe. Or I’ll have to console your husband with all kinds of crab-related things."

"I’ll haunt you. I’ll figure out how to reincarnate like you did and get my revenge."

The brunette giggled first - but her taller friend was not far behind.