Essentia Animus

56-Swift Ascent

None of the three girls would awaken until the next day, not until the morning had almost concluded. Even Riyxia's spectre made no appearance, simply left to ponder thoughts in an unmoving state.

Riyxia was pretty sure that this is what it felt like to be exhausted spectrally, a feeling and concept that wouldn't even make sense to anyone else. It was a feeling she wasn't even familiar with for herself, though she suspected her essence had experienced the same thing in a time before her own memories. It would have thus even then been true of both Sryine and Vwyx, the new versions of them both. However, essences do not transcend memory, so none of that would count. On the same subject though, was their old essences then possibly in a state of sleep too, if they still even existed enough for such a thing? When she personally split her will between her body and essence, it felt like there had to be two beings that drove her working in tandem. She wondered if Sryine or Vwyx ever got the same impression, working and meshing their twin gifts into one. She had been able to watch Sryine in her dramatic escape, from calming down an entire traffic jam to creating a lightning-fast exit, both things they would have to talk about further later.

Talk was ablaze among the hunters about the capture of a serious criminal group that had terrorized the city for ages now, something Riyxia had been able to listen to for a time as well as the three girls had been shuffled off to a medical bed. It seemed Vwyx had been responsible for the entire thing, another topic for future conversation. Somehow, she had managed to not only capture the entire collective, but also ensure the safety of a number of innocents that had still been in their clutches at the time. Riyxia couldn't even imagine how a feat like that would have been possible with Vwyx's resources, but it was at around the same time as Sryine had overcome her own limitations. The timing wasn't even a coincidence either, she could tell they were progressing in the footsteps of an influential role model, herself. She didn't just return someone else from the claws of death, she had done so long after the jaws of death should have secured their victory. In fact, her hesitation was probably why she felt so drained, the extra delays had only demanded even more from her as a result. The fact she had never done that before probably didn't help either. The most amazing part remained that what she had achieved had nothing to do with the gift at all, she had brought someone back to life without the gift, she had done so with the astral flame itself. After all, in the light of the gift, her actions would have been impossible. In a society that had never found a power other than the gift, she was effectively doing the impossible every time her essence used its own power.

Riyxia noticed even Ayzherie was up and about, herself having spent the night in a nearby medical bed too. It was probably the greatest relief of the moment, that Ayzherie was indeed going to be fine. Ayzherie on the other hand appeared concerned in reverse, worried that all three girls were still out, most especially Riyxia herself. Being aware that dealing with the medical needs of the three girls relied on tracking the stability of their astral flame traces, she had managed to ensure that there were a few of the instruments left around the room, with readings compared to past records to identify if there were any strange fluctuations. That actually led to even more concern, as such instruments not only clarified that Riyxia's essence had remained within her body the entire time, but also that related measurements were notably weaker than normal. Records have told that such fluctuations had never happened before, not even in the other two. Ayzherie didn't need anything else to understand that Riyxia's current state was a price paid for saving Ayzherie's life. Being aware of this detail, Ayzherie had thus far spent the morning ensuring the wellbeing of her saviour, to the best of her abilities.

Vwyx was the first to wake up, most of her exhaustion having been due to pushing herself to limits that compared to the capacity of two elves. That, and she had basically spent the entire trip running on foot, something neither of the other elves would have found as easy while simultaneously pumping out their stamina even while augmented. Her landscape manipulation had honestly taken the most out of her, including when she had attempted to form a wide-area defense in the pedway. Even her field-crafting of weaponized instruments had been far easier than she might have expected, leaving her to consider the idea of producing a few extra grenades for herself.. maybe even finding out where Sryine kept her supply of arrows. In that moment, she took notice of her surroundings, finding herself in a medical bed, finding her two friends sleeping in other beds nearby. The most alarming part was seeing Riyxia's spectre even resting in bed, its shimmer fainter than normal. She also noticed Ayzherie nearby and identified the instrument Ayzherie carried. Vwyx quietly got out of bed and took an opportunity to look over all the medical notes, to catch up on all of the circumstances. Ayzherie had even ensured a breakfast was brought over for Vwyx in the process, though they both held fast to a state of silence for the patients still trying to recover.