Tarragon

Chapter Twelve: Gaea's Source

-Net

"You're... Gaea." I realized, shocked, "But you're dead, you died hundreds of years ago!"

"I did die. I was nearly killed in my sleep. The assassins were inches from hitting one of the arteries in my neck, but even though I survived, it sentenced me to death. In the last year of my life, I left my duties to Defrathyst, and looked inwards. I found this Spatial Defiance Zone, and this hollow." she gestured to the pit she was in, with four waterfalls running down the sides, "I shaped the path of the water, creating this oasis. Eventually, I met the end of my life," she sighed, and looked at the ground, "But, I was strong enough to persist despite death. My Energy pooled, and twisted itself into a spirit. I can still interact with the world, though I am bound to this place."

"So, what about the healing spring? Is that why you chose this place?" Amnoia asked her.

She laughed, "The healing spring wasn't here when I came here. Do you know nothing about how they are made?"

"Not... not really," Amnoia answered, "Do you know how?"

Gaea began sketching something in the dirt, "When a Titan dies, something... a factor of Energy, I'm not quite sure what it is... I've been calling it Essence in my mind. This Essence splits off from the rest of the energy, and influences the environment. If it pools in a forest, an incredible tree could grow that could live for millions of years. If it pools in the ocean, that part of the ocean will become incredibly fertile. It's how the Deeptrench dragons came to be. They were just regular Pressurized dragons, capable of withstanding the ocean's pressure, and as they were led into the trenches by the allure of the Essence, and changed. They adapted to the deep, surviving off the Essence, and the little life that persisted in the deep." Gaea explained, "Essence is the part of Energy that makes life stronger. Now, of course, different people will have different strengths of Energy, because of tune, but that's a whole different thing to explain."

(Writer's note: This is long. If you want to read it, go ahead. The next paragraph is a summary.) I had heard the word tune before in a magical context, but didn't quite know what it meant. I asked her to explain it to me. What I got was this: Your brain, and whatever makes Energy are initially completely out of tune. The baseline that both humans and dragons almost always fall on is a tune designated 1. If your mind and Energy organ are perfectly tuned, it would be considered a tune of 100. As they get closer and closer, your Essence becomes more and more potent, allowing you to get significantly more output from your Essence with way less Energy. However, most methods of training tune, either written or kept in someone's mind have been: Burnt, crushed, shredded, destroyed, killed, or removed. For some reason, whenever a group comes to absolute power, they don't want the civilians getting the ability to fight back. I know there's a reason, I just can't quite put my talon on it...

To sum it up, tune affects the quality of your Essence; Essence affects the quality of your healing, physical empowerments, and any geological marvels you leave behind postmortem. Tune makes your essence stronger.

"So, this is your grave?" Amnoia asked Gaea. She nodded in response. Amnoia continued, "Was it this beautiful before you died, or is the beauty a side effect of the essence?"

"I found this place a husk of what it is now. It was a small spring, with barren tunnels, and not much plant life. Before I died, I overhauled it, creating the waterfalls, filling the tunnels with rivers, and making it what it is now. Then, I died, and the Essence- and my persistent nature as a spirit- continued to improve this wonder of the world."

I took it all in. I was face to face with the spirit of the former queen of the Republic of the Equatorial West I was a part of. She was the mother of Defrathyst, and was collectively known as the, "Queen of the People," because she helped raise up regular people, giving them the legal ability to revolt, given some set of circumstances. She helped build the infrastructure, maintained peace with humans, and was all-round an extremely well-liked queen.