The weight of the coins in my new purse was a solid, comforting presence, but my paranoia was a coiling snake in my gut. I needed a safe place to sleep, not just a simple room in a cheap flophouse. We headed for the city's heart, finding what I was looking for in a building that was less an inn and more a bastion of stone and thick oak: "The Stonekettle."
The common room was a chaotic symphony of life. I pushed through the crowd to the bar, behind which a stout woman with sharp, intelligent eyes was overseeing her domain. She sized me up. "Looking for a cheap bed, lad? We're full up on commons."
"I'm not looking for a cheap bed," I said, my voice trying for confidence but probably landing closer to 'constipated goat'. I placed a single, solitary silver coin on the polished bar top. "I'm looking for your best room. The one with the thickest door and the best lock."
She stared at the coin, then back at my face, her expression utterly unimpressed. "The Hearthside Suite? Top floor, private washroom, own fireplace. It's one gold per night."
'Hah! One gold!' Ronan's mental voice wasn't panicked; it was a pure, mocking laugh. 'Smooth move, you arrogant dumbass. Now what? You going to offer to pay her with your 'dignity'?'
I ignored him, holding the innkeeper's gaze. "A steep price. But perhaps we can come to a... mutually beneficial arrangement."
At the word "arrangement," two things happened at once.
In my head, a supernova of horrified indignation erupted from Ronan. 'An 'arrangement'?!' he roared. 'No! Absolutely not, Murphy! We are not selling our body for a room! We have some standards!'
Outside my head, the innkeeper looked me up and down and let out a short, harsh bark of a laugh. "Oh, I'm sure it would be 'beneficial' for you, lad. But I'm not that hard up for company. Try the docks if you're selling that kind of 'arrangement'."
"Whoa, no," I said quickly. "Not that kind of arrangement. I was talking about laundry."
She stared at me, her expression shifting to suspicion. "Laundry?"
"You run a busy inn," I continued. "Mountain of dirty laundry. I happen to possess a... unique magical item. A cleaning ward. In exchange for the suite, it will clean every piece of your laundry every night. Perfectly."
She scoffed. "A magic rock that does laundry? Show me." She slapped a disgustingly greasy dishcloth on the bar. "Clean it."
'Oh, a prop?' Ronan projected, his tone laced with mockery. 'This should be good.'
I reached into my pouch and pulled out the smooth, grey river stone, placing it on the bar. I draped the greasy cloth over it, then covered it with my hand, opening a tiny Inventory portal on my palm. With a mental tug, the dishcloth vanished. While I internally sorted the filth from the fibres, I held my hand there for a dramatic second before pushing the now-pristine cloth back out from underneath my palm. I lifted my hand with a flourish. The dishcloth sat on the bar, perfectly clean and bone-dry.
The innkeeper stared, her jaw slack. Even Ronan's heckling fell silent, replaced by a low whistle of genuine, grudging respect. 'Okay... I'll give you that one. Never doubted you for a second.'
The innkeeper's eyes, however, weren't on the cloth anymore; they were fixed on the simple grey stone. "That rock..." she said, her voice a low, hungry rasp. "It's a one-of-a-kind, isn't it? Tell you what. Forget the laundry. I'll give you the suite for a week, plus fifty gold crowns, right now. For the stone."
Fifty gold. The offer was a gut punch. Enough to solve all our immediate problems.
'Murphy, you better not,' Ronan's voice was a low, dangerous warning. 'Don't sell a lie you'll have to maintain for the rest of your life. It's not worth it.'
'Son of a bitch,' I sighed internally. 'I'm not even trying to con them at this point, it's just happening.' I pocketed the "magical" stone. "Sorry," I said. "Family heirloom. Can't sell it. The laundry deal stands."
"Pity," the innkeeper said. "This way."
She led me to a back room. 'Mountain' was an understatement. It was a veritable Himalayas of soiled linen. "I'll need the room to myself to... concentrate," I said.
She grunted and left. The moment the door closed, I sucked the entire mountain into the Inventory. For the next ten minutes, we both focused on mentally sorting, scrubbing, and folding. With a final push, the perfectly clean and folded hoard reappeared in neat stacks. I knocked on the door. When she opened it and saw the result, her eyes went wide. She just stood there, speechless.
Money was one language, but saving a mountain of labour was another, and I was clearly fluent.
The room was better than I could have imagined. Dominated by a large four-poster bed, it had a ready-made stone fireplace, a heavy oak table, and a thick oak door with an iron bolt that slid home with a satisfying thud. Security.
First stop was the private bathroom. A simple porcelain toilet sat against one wall, next to a shower stall lined with smooth, grey slate. I stepped in, turned a heavy bronze handle, and a moment later, steaming hot water hissed out. I could feel Ronan's own excitement bubbling up—the simple, childish glee of a man desperate to show me how amazing his world could be. As the hot water hit my skin, his voice slid into my mind, laced with a breathy, far-too-intimate wonder.
'Ooooh, that feels... good, doesn't it?'
I physically recoiled. 'Ugh, Ronan! What the fuck, man?!' I shot back, my skin crawling. 'We have rules for a reason!'
There was a beat of stunned silence. 'Right! Yes! The rule! My apologies! I just... got carried away.'
A moment later, a familiar, cheesy piano intro started playing in our shared mind. I knew the song instantly. The Kevin Costner version of Robin Hood. Ronan had been absolutely captivated. He obviously saw a kindred spirit in Robin's character—a nobleman returning from a long journey to find his home corrupted. Ever since that night, '(Everything I Do) I Do It for You' had become his personal theme song for any moment he deemed remotely significant.
'What are you doing now?' I demanded.
'Just go with it,' he projected, his voice completely earnest.
'You're making it weird again, Ronan!'
'It's relaxing! It sets a mood! Don't fight it!'
I stood there under the hot spray, my head filled with the soaring chorus. My anger just... broke. A slow grin spread across my face. Fine.
I grabbed a back-scrubbing brush and held it to my mouth like a microphone, closed my eyes, and leaned my head back dramatically. As the song hit its crescendo, I let the cynical mask drop completely, lip-syncing the words—'You can't tell me it's not worth dyin' for... You know it's true... everything I do, I do it for you'—with every ounce of genuine, heartfelt passion I possessed. Ronan was completely caught up in the song's grand, romantic declaration, a single, profound moment of peace and release. I let the brush clatter to the slate floor. And in that shared moment of calm, I finally let myself feel it too.
The feeling of the hot water... that was something else entirely. I stood under the flow, letting the heat soak deep into muscles that had been coiled with a fugitive's tension for decades. It was a luxury so profound it felt like a form of magic all on its own. The soap was a simple, rough bar, but I just held it, letting the clean, harsh smell fill the steam around me. It was the perfume of civilisation, a scent I hadn't realised I'd missed.
As the steam filled the room, my mind made the connection. The hot food. The stasis field. I held my hand under the stream of steaming water and opened a small portal on my palm, letting it vanish into the Inventory's void for a full minute. An endless supply of perfectly hot water on tap, anywhere, anytime. The idea immediately spiralled into something far more lethal. If it keeps water hot, what about molten slag? Could I just... keep a few tons of lava on hand? Ready to be spat out at anyone who gets in my way? I made a mental note: Find a forge. Test it later.
It was finally time. I pulled out the small Blue Core, its inner light pulsing gently. "Alright," I said aloud. "Let's do this magic shit."
'This is a big deal, Murphy,' Ronan's voice was solemn. 'That Blue Core is the spark we're going to use to build your own Core from scratch.'
I sat cross-legged on the floor. "So what kind of power am I about to shove into my soul? What's the blue mean, anyway? Is it like its nature or something?"
'No, the colour doesn't mean its nature, it means its rank—its raw power,' Ronan corrected. 'The hierarchy is what it has always been: pale or grey is the foundation. They're empty shells, followed by Blue, Green, Yellow, and so on. Each core also has its own affinity, or nature.'
"So how do we know the affinity?" I asked.
'We have to test it.' I pulled out the empty pale core from the fence. 'Okay, easy does it... just pull a tiny speck of energy from the Blue Core. Not the whole thing, just a whisper. Now, touch it to the grey one.'
'Whoa, hold on,' I shot back. 'What do you mean, 'pull'? How do you 'pull' a feeling?'
There was a moment of patient silence from him.
'It's not a physical thing, Murphy. It's all about will and visualisation,' Ronan explained. 'You've spent a lifetime picturing how the universe is about to kill you. This is no different. Just... picture the energy as a single thread of light. See it in your head, see it separating, and then guide it. This should feel natural to you.'
It did. I focused, and the moment the mote of blue energy touched the clear marble, it was absorbed. The grey core's round surface began to sweat with tiny beads of pure, clear water, and a soft azure glow ignited deep within its heart.
'Ah...' Ronan's voice was filled with satisfaction. 'Water affinity. Flowing, adaptable, and relentless. That's a great element to start with. Now you know what you're dealing with. Get ready. You have to consume the Core.'
"Right. So I just... bite down on it?"
'No,' Ronan corrected. 'A Core this dense is harder than crystal. Your teeth would shatter. You've got two options: draw on its power slowly, which could take days, or... You swallow it whole.'
"Swallow it? What happens when... You know... it comes out the other end?"
'You won't digest it,' Ronan explained. 'By putting it inside your body, you bring it right up against your own Core's furnace. You can draw on its full power directly before... it finishes its journey.'
"So, how many can I swallow at once?"
'Just one at a time. The rich and impatient might try to match the speed by drawing on a hundred cores externally, but the cost is astronomical. This is the way of the desperate and the bold.'
Desperate and bold. That summed us up perfectly. I tilted my head back and swallowed the core. It went down like a heavy, smooth rock.
'Alright, Murphy,' Ronan's voice was urgent. 'Focus. Reach out with your mind. Picture your centre as a hungry vortex. Find the Core inside you, latch on, and drain it!'
I focused, and the world exploded into a high-pressure jet of pure Water mana, threatening to tear my spirit apart.
'Don't let it break you!' Ronan's voice was a desperate roar in my head. 'Fight it! Control it! Gather all that energy and drive it to the centre of your spirit! Squeeze it!'
I tried, my mind screaming as I fought the raging energy. But it was too much. This body was too weak. The energy wasn't coalescing; it was shredding me.
'Ronan! I can't hold it!' I screamed into our shared mind. 'It's breaking me apart!'
There was no answer. His voice, which had been a constant barrage of commands, suddenly went utterly silent. All is lost. But in that exact moment of despair, something changed. A second will, ancient and impossibly skilled, wrapped around my own frantic efforts, guiding and steadying me. It didn't do the work for me, but it held me together while I fought. With this silent, powerful assistance, I gathered the streams, drove them to that single point, and with a final, desperate, shared exertion, slammed the torrent together.
SNAP.
The storm in my soul ceased. A tiny, impossibly dense point of dull, leaden grey had formed.
'The foundation's laid,' Ronan breathed, his voice returning, strained but triumphant. 'You've got your own Grey Core.'
'Don't stop!' he urged, his voice filled with a new, fierce energy. 'The core's not empty yet! That was just to get the engine built. Now, for my trick to make sure it's not a piece of junk. We temper it. Get ready for the Solar Crucible Technique!'
He guided me through the ancient, rhythmic cycle. I drew the raw Water energy into my new Grey Core, purifying it with his perfect technique, then expelled the refined essence into my own body, tempering my bones and muscles. Over and over, the Grey Core changed. The dull, leaden colour flaked away, revealing a cloudy, milky white. Then, as the final dregs of power surged into me, Ronan gave one last command. 'Ignite it!'
I focused my will. The orb at my centre flickered, and a tiny, sky-blue spark appeared within it, growing until the entire Core blazed with a steady, stable Light Blue glow.
I opened my eyes, drenched in sweat, feeling an immense, bone-deep exhaustion. I stumbled into the bathroom, braced my hand on the basin, and looked in the mirror. And froze.
The gaunt teenager was gone. In his place was a young man with a lean strength, broader shoulders, and corded muscle. He looked... healthy. Whole.
'What the hell?' I thought. 'I look... different. This is new.'
'That's the first big perk of Awakening,' Ronan's voice resonated, filled with satisfaction. 'The body is just a vessel for the Core. When you forge the Core, you reforge the body too. The Aether basically flushes out the crap and reinforces everything.'
I took in the reflection again. Sharper jawline, clearer eyes, a look of vitality I hadn't seen in a thousand lifetimes.
'So a legendary White Core turns you into a supermodel?' I shot back. 'Great. Another thing to look forward to.'
I stepped back from the mirror. I was stronger. Healthier. And a complete stranger to myself.
'It's done,' Ronan said. 'You're Awakened, Murphy. Truly Awakened. And you're starting with the nature of Water.'
As he said it, I felt it: an unused circuit my Awakening had just brought online. My Art. My own power. After all that pain, what had I earned?
I stood in the centre of the room and gently pushed a stream of my new Water-aspected mana down that dormant path. It trickled. A small puddle of water seeped out of the floorboards. Then, the water stirred, rising into a shimmering, semi-transparent figure. It had my new shape but no details—just a wobbly, vaguely Murphy-shaped water sculpture. It tried to take a step, and its leg dissolved back into the puddle.
I stared at it. My great Art was the ability to make a wobbly, unstable, puddle-bound water-me.
'An interesting result!' Ronan's voice chimed in, trying his best to be optimistic. 'A water-clone, of sorts! Its potential for distraction is... well, it's definitely... new.' Even he couldn't sell it. The silence that followed was heavy with our shared, profound disappointment.
Great. My superpower is making puddles that look like me. The world's villains will be terrified.