A Wolf's Howl, A Fairy's Wing

Chapter 485 - Elorium [2/2]

"Anyway," Elora coughed, a little embarrassed, as an excited glow hung around her expression. "Where was I?"

"My body can't handle the Elorium yet, and you turned your bond space into a fusion core to create Elorium," Erik helpfully provided, while looking at her with fond amusement. He enjoyed seeing her excited.

"R— Right," the hyped-up fairy stammered. She desperately tried to get herself under control again, but every time she heard the word 'Elorium', a shiver went through her spine.

Astrid and Emily were already looking at her with a hint of mocking, and she couldn't help but curse inwardly, 'Dammit, I need to get control of myself.'

With pure force of will, she suppressed her excitement down to manageable levels and scraped her throat again.

"Hrm, right… Your body couldn't handle both the creation and usage of… Elorium…" There was obvious strain on her face, but she managed to keep herself in check this time. "So, I used some rare sigils, techniques, and everything I knew about Elorium, to turn my bond space into a a fusion core."

Now having contained her enthusiasm, she continued with a thoughtful expression, "Then, I created some new pathways, guided the aetherium and runic power to the newly created fusion core, and you instinctively did the rest. You didn't realize it at the time, but you automatically used the road of least resistance to creating the Elorium, and that road went through the fusion core."

"Why don't you try probing it now?" she suggested cautiously. "But be careful… don't use it yet."

Erik nodded seriously, and closed his eyes. He usually tried to refrain from probing the bond space, as he considered it an invasion of privacy, so this was actually somewhat unknown to him.

He did know where it was, however, so it took him a short time to train his mental eyes on the dark-green, softly growing orb inside his soul. Within moments, he'd found the pathways of energy that could feed aetherium and runic power into it, if he chooses to do so.

Yet, he wasn't impatient, and he trusted Elora, so instead of trying it out, he opened his eyes and nodded at the fairy to indicate his success.

"Good," she nodded seriously. "Now, as I said, your body still can't handle the power of Elorium to actively enhance your body, or power your spells and skills… You'd maybe be able to pull of a single ability before you faint, just like last time, so you need to wait until your body and magic core become stronger."

"Seems like a poor trade-off for losing your bond space," Erik grumbled with a hint of frustration. He already missed Elora's presence in his soul, and he wanted to at least get something useful out of the deal. "When do you think I can use it effectively? Wouldn't it be better to just get your bond space back, and build a new fusion core when my body can handle it?"

"Absolutely not!" Elora quickly exclaimed while waving her hands, almost seeming horrified by the suggestion. "Who's to say we can even build another fusion core?! I managed to create it through a convergence of circumstances, and I have no idea if I could do so again! Your state of the mind, and the efforts you made to fuse those powers were a huge factor!"

"Alright, alright!" Erik quickly admitted defeat while releasing Emily and Astrid, so he could throw up his arms. "The fusion core stays!"

In the end, it was Elora who was giving up her space for this, so while he was going to miss her presence there, he felt like she still had a bigger vote than he did in this matter. 'At least one of us still considers the future,' he chuckled wryly in his mind. 'Although I wonder how much of her resistance comes from a desire to keep her discovery alive.'

"Good," a satisfied Elora nodded, before shrugging. "As for when you can use Elorium effectively… there's no way to say for sure. It'll probably be a gradual thing, where it becomes a little easier with every breakthrough."

Erik sighed a little dejectedly, "Right… and in the meantime it's just a burden that stops us from being together properly."

"Not exactly," Elora smirked mysteriously. "Just because you can't use the Elorium to directly power your abilities or actively enhance your body, doesn't mean you can't use it to do so passively… in very small doses."

Erik frowned as realization set in, "You mean…"

"That's right!" Elora nodded proudly. "Elorium is far more powerful than either runic power or aetherium, but it has properties of both, which means you can use it to cultivate both our aetherium storage, and your body, in a faction of the time!"

Erik blinked for a moment, but then his excitement quickly began to rise and match Elora's. He knew what she meant. From the moment he'd started down the path of both a Runebound and an Arcanist, he'd had trouble with advancement, because he had to do twice the work of others.

Arcanists had to cultivate their aetherium storage, and explore their glyphs, while Runebound had to cultivate their body, and explore their runes. But Erik had to do all four of those things, and he couldn't even focus on one over the other, because letting the two paths fall out of balance had been proven to be a bad idea.

But now, according to Elora, he could use Elorium to significantly increase the speed at which he cultivated his aetherium storage and body, while even doing it at the same time.

Suddenly, rather than having to do four things to advance in power, compared to others who had to do two, he now only had to do two and a half,

"Alright, I suppose it's a little more than just a burden…" he grinned passionately. If he could, he'd ravage his wives right here and now, excited as he felt.

Part of him wanted to try and cultivate with Elorium right now, but the fairy saw straight through him. "No experimenting with this until you've fully recovered!" she ordered with narrowed eyes. "It'll take you some time to get the proportions right, and I don't want you to worsen your condition by accidentally creating too much Elorium."

"Yes, Ma'am," Erik deflated slightly, despite his playful grin.

Elora snorted and nodded, "Good!"

Slowly, she enlarged herself again until she could hug his chest with a smile on her face. "Besides," she continued softly, "even if you can't create abilities from pure Elorium, perhaps you can find a way to use a mixture of Elorium and aetherium, or Elorium and Runic power?"

Erik raised an eyebrow, and had to admit that this fusion core thing was turning out better and better. Yet, he still didn't want to go without Elora for too long.

"Alright, but we need to find another place to put this core as soon as possible, agreed?" he told the fairy, who nodded sleepily in response.

"Already working on it…" she muttered softly. At the same time, he noticed how Astrid and Emily had fallen asleep at some point during the conversation. 'I guess the relief at seeing me awake, and our earlier tryst, tuckered them out a little,' he smiled inwardly.

Only Emma remained awake, still diligently healing his body while in bondage gear. Erik now also felt himself slowly drifting off as he yawned. His body still needed more rest, and the feeling of Emma's magic and his wives' bodies made him feel extremely comfortable.

Yet, just as he was about to drift away, the door to his room opened.