Presence
Status (academic)
"Neokore, Release the mana. Half of what you can hold." the hooded figure of the Theonom said. The lingering pain of scouring his own pattern for mana has subsided and the hallucinogens in the sacrament Corn has consumed right before ending the life of the drugged bear have started to kick in.
"I hope this is not a sex ritual." Corn said, not realizing in his addled state that he's voicing his inner monologue. He heard the other hooded Mystagogues chuckling but he didn't mind. He heard other things, whispers from the shadows. He heard the bear, now dead, calling him by his previous, long forgotten Shadow Name. What was hallucination and what was real? What was truth anyway?
I am a mage, I superimpose my truth to the fallen world. Or At least I try to... Corn thought to himself; the L.A. Mystagogues had to cast Grim sight on him, a moros after his magic didn't get hold. I will probably remember nothing after this anyway, Corn replied to his shadow that mocked him.
2 successes
"Neokore, Release the mana. Half of what you can hold. Release it to the tapestry, watch it disperse."
Corn didn't want to. Mana was valuable. But he had just got a lot of this valuable resource from his own life and that of the bear. So, he did release the mana. Slowly reluctantly, he left the mana leave his being and merge with.. nothing.
Pulse of the living world allowed him to see his own diminished, unhealthy pattern and that of the tiny living things all around him. The parasites eating the corpse of the bear. Grim Sight allowed him to see the death claiming the bear, the various symbiotes of the bear dying with it, slowly but surely. And Supernal vision allowed him to see how the Tapestry reacted to the mana he releases, the mana itself. How the mana interacts with life and death, how it disperses and gets absorbed by the Tapestry. The colors, the shapes, the smells, the music, the whispers... Corn loses himself in the display.
He forgets where he ends and where the mana begins. Is there even a distinction? Questions for another time. Drip, drip, drip, the blood of the bear goes. The shapes Mana seems to take as it becomes absorbed seem like clouds that become void and empty on the inside, smoke clouds that disperse from the inside, holes opening in them like fireworks.
There is wisdom in the dripping sound of the bear's death. There's wisdom in the empty patterns that appear in the mana as it disperses. He reaches out to touch it. His fingers meet the cold blood of the bear and he tastes it. It is cold already...
The hallucinogens suddenly wear off and Corn is himself again looking at the dead bear and his bloodied hands. Too sudden. Someone neutralized the drugs.
"I will explain to you what happened, what you saw, what you felt and how it made you wiser, Magus Corn. Then, you will have the honor to read from the Corpus Mysteriorum."
Corn looked at the Theonom puzzled (and still embarrassed). "The Corpus Mysteriorum? I don't recognize that name."
Corn can see the Theonom smile under her mask. It is not a nice smile.
"You were not supposed to."
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