AMBROSIAThere stood the cat. Having thoroughly prepared by not buying anything, and having sat in some circle while some guy preached to me, I knew now what I needed to do. I needed to pet its ears.

    “Mreowrrr,” the beast said, followed by a gentle purr, “rrrrrrrrrr....” I finally got the desire to pet the cat out of my system, and stopped petting. The cat suddenly stopped purring and nipped me. “That was so good, why did you stop?” I glared at the cat, and then I told it, “Well, I definitely won''t keep petting you, now that you nipped me! ...I mean, you can talk?!? How can you talk?!?”

    The cat looked at me quizzically, and then started to climb up my body while explaining. “My name is Lao Tzu. I have known you would come to seek my guidance.” I was a bit taken aback, in-between vainly trying to grab a cat as he squirmed around my back. Finally, I shrugged and gave up, letting him crawl across my shoulders or wherever else he wanted to go as we spoke. Elias spoke while I was annoyed and frustrated, “Wait, you''re the Lao Tzu? The founder of Taoism? But I thought he was... much older, with a beard and ummm... not a cat.” The cat meowed out and responded, “Humans and other creatures learn and grow throughout their lifetime, and their soul stores memories for the next reincarnation. This cat is cute, so....”

    He paused his speech to jump off my back, then pulled out a wooden staff from somewhere and spun it around. “In order to use your power, you must learn to use the Trigrams. I will instruct you. But first, I will battle you before I teach you how to defeat me.” Something about this sequence seemed strange.

    My allies joined in the battle. They had learned a few new moves as a result of meeting constant challenges along the road. Nevras leaped in the air, and brought it in a wide sweeping motion, sending an aftershock of air in a wide arc. “Jump Thrust!” he yelled. Lao Tzu jumped high in the air as well, over the shock wave created by the weapon. He did it so easily that it was clear that physical attacks wouldn''t work. Elias spoke the words, “Dark,” and sent a ball of inky blackness sailing towards the cat. After he landed, seeing a wave of umbral energy zoom towards him, he waved around his staff and it sucked in all darkness. Taking a chance, Elias switched to the Light effect, even though it usually did nothing to living creatures. The cat yawned, as he didn''t even try to block. Elias quickly adapted, and cast a volley of randomly alternating Light and Dark abilities of different powers and sizes. This cute little kitty seemed to almost dance past all of these attacks, periodically swinging his staff to knock aside something. He adjusted to the flow of combat, even using the slight amount of wind force exerted by each ball to move around it and spin past the next attack. All of a sudden, Elias created two very wide range attacks, in rapid succession. “Twilight! Sunrise!” he said. A ring of darkness pulsed through the area in a circle around Elias, only hitting desired targets but nonetheless incredibly terrifying, followed in close proximity to a ring of purest light. The feline form hunched for a second as if to brace for impact, and pointed his staff forward and slowly tilted it in a long circle, gradually moving faster as if a painter brushing over a spot. The air spun, as did the shape of the ring, coiling into the gap where the staff twirled along a central point. After there was a nice ball of darkness formed within, he began to move the staff in the opposite direction, and the darkness uncoiled, flowing outward until it hit the light, and dispersed it. Elias cried, “Now, Aqorm!” and she sent her geomancy towards him.

    Unlike Elias and Nevras, she couldn''t learn any new abilities. Such was geomancy that the caster had one spell despite its adaptability to terrain. This time, it took the form of a series of stone spikes, due to her presence on the mountain. It looked extremely massive, and there was no way he could possibly... and he blocked it without the slightest bit of effort, simply by resting his staff upright on the ground. “I thought so,” explained Elias, “he''s using the Tao. We could completely expend our mystic power here, but he''s simply redirecting our power without using any mystic power of his own. The only thing I know that doesn''t use any mystic power is prayer, and most of this is not answered against a living target. You''re expecting Ambrosia to fight you alone, are you not?” The cat purred and smiled, showing fang-like teeth. “That is correct.” Sigh... This guy was a freak, I wasn''t sure what I could do to him. I drew my dagger and lunged forward, only to have him deftly step aside, and swat it aside. I put my knife away and swung with my fishing pole. He jumped over my shoulder and pounced me from behind. I swung the rod to try to tie him up, sure that he wouldn''t be able to resist... and he somehow slipped out simply by dropping all resistance. “Grrrrr,” I said. The strange little cat said, “You won''t defeat me that way! Use the technique I''m going to teach you!”

    The technique he was going to teach? Right... and yet, somehow I remembered being taught this technique after the battle. “Yes! Yes! The power of the Oracle flows from your awareness of prophecy!” This felt different from my Predict ability, it felt like I was drawing out energy left deep within the universe. The Trigram ability was not like thaumaturgy or a prayer. It was a sort of dance. I noticed that the tattoo on my palm had changed. It now had octagon covered with broken and unbroken lines in a complex pattern surrounding the original Yin Yang design, much like the flag of South Korea. When the dance was done, I was to press my hands to the ground. It was a bit like geomancy, except for two major differences. First, the effect used nothing much. Also, it was a random chance effect. There was a one in eight chance of activating a single trigram: Heaven, Earth, Fire, Water, Wind, Thunder, Mountain, or Lake. These trigrams would temporarily place themselves on the target, and then the effect would activate. Lake would produce a pinprick that would kill someone mortally wounded but otherwise do little harm. Heaven would actually heal the person. The others all drained their life force by varying amounts, but usually left them still alive. The first time I did this, of course, I managed to pull out the one trigram that actually healed him. “That tickles,” he said, purring profusely.

    Bouncing back from the... non-attack, he lunged forward. “Remember what I am going to teach you.” Suddenly, memories of being taught defensive and evasive moves came rushing back... even though I had never actually learned anything yet. I saw the cat teaching me to feel the Tao as a force surrounding all life, which flowed from all places to all places. He showed me how everything, even the lightest breeze was part of what he called the flow, and I remembered him teaching how to move with it.

    I definitely couldn''t do anything on the level of blocking effects or returning it to its source, but I had a sense of how to feel the rhythm, the flow of the other person''s speed and strength. I was probably hopeless with regard to any kind of area attack, and someone with serious skill could probably defeat me, but by going with the flow, I was able to ease out of the way and move around his attack. I tried again to use the Trigrams as soon as I gained some breathing room. And again...

    By about the fifth try, I finally managed to defeat him. His beat-up form rose from the ground, and he let out a great bellowing meow. “Miaaaaaaaaaaaauuuuuu~~~” Finally, he bowed to me, and said, “Congratulations, now I shall train you.” Perplexed, I asked, “How is it that I was able to learn these techniques before you trained me?” The cat nodded, “Yes, I understand it would be difficult to understand. As Oracle, your memory isn''t quite normal. You past is blocked for quite a bit, some of which is to use this power. Sometimes you will be able to remember the future, like you did here. But for now, when you remember the future, the present events will be gone to you...” I blinked.

    “...Your training is now complete. Take the tent that I gave you earlier, and the ticket to Ghobli. Each trigram will need to be turned white on your Crest, before the tattoo is able to use its full power. Go and see the Oracle you meet near Zuran.” When did he give us a tent? Weird. It was snowing on the mountain. And I was wearing scarf and heavy wool pullover over my clothing... which smelled like Nevras. He smelled like strawberries~ I could swear Elias had a bit more beard and his robe looked frayed at the edges. Aqorm''s hair had grown out and she was looking peeved. Nevras looked happy to see me, but I had no idea why. It looked like all of their outfits were somewhat more scuffed up, and visible frost had grown on their clothing.

    We headed down the mountain, across the bridge of air that had troubled us before, and down the ice-covered slope. The others were still walking very slowly down the slope, even using their weapons to stabilize them. Meanwhile, I somehow understood where and how to step in order not to slide. Aqorm had her fey agility helping her some, but despite walking twice the speed of the others, she was still moving much slower than me. Elias lost his footing suddenly. He grabbed Nevras, causing both of them to slide forward. Aqorm quickly formed a solid spike wall of packed ice, stopping them from meeting their end from the cliff. Huh. I thought she already used her geomancy today. After they brushed themselves off, we carefully made it back to the cave.

    AQORM

    Six months. That''s how long we waited on that accursed island in the middle of the air. The island was originally grassy and green, unlike the mountain near it. But even that changed as we waited until summer turned into the start of winter. The cat trained her every day, showing her something that looked like tai chi, and teaching her to move differently, so she could dodge anything. The cat told her stuff that seemed silly, even in light of all that we had seen before; nonetheless, given the cat Sage''s proficiency in martial and spiritual arts, we basically listened without question. The cat also gave us a ticket to a ship which we weren''t supposed to take for quite some time, and a tent which he declared to be enchanted even though it looked like it had been patched several times. He also showed Elias how to block simple thaumaturgy with his staff.

    In the summer and fall we foraged the island for greens, and Lao Tzu caught his own fish. These were Dream Fish, mind you, so yes, they were swimming around at this high altitude. Dream Fish rode the tide of human dreams to all sorts of dimensions. To have some picture of what this looks like, think of a goldfish with extreme psychedelic coloration and body size roughly that of an elephant, coupled with innate reality warping powers and a nasty bubble attack. This tiny cat was able to take down such a creature as if it were nothing at all.

    Dream Fish tasted weird. We ate it constantly but the taste was never the same. It tasted strongly of whatever food you were thinking of right at the moment, which could be great or horrible, depending on your last thought. Given that the food always tasted different, we never got bored of the food, but we were probably malnourished.

    As time passed, we grew closer together. Elias and I began to loosen up, and just sort of talk about random stuff. It was slow, because both of us had lived too long and been so deprived of the outside world that we were awkward. Gradually though, we began to connect more and more. We still had yet to kiss or cuddle, but he had taken to patting my shoulder in a slightly patronizing way when I was upset. It was annoying, and I know I should hate it, but... I didn''t.

    Likewise, Ambrosia and Nevras became closer too. They began to cuddle with each other all the time. Nevras initially seemed to only mildly be interested in her, while Ambrosia was very much infatuated with him. But this gradually changed. They began giving each other gifts, and more frequently showing their affection. I even caught them trying to kiss one another. But they seemed uncomfortable displaying affection openly in front of us, or one of them had deep emotional insecurity and a fear of intimacy. My money was on Ambrosia. She was doing well, considering. But it also meant it might be years, or never, before either of them did anything more than kiss or cuddle.

    At some point, Nevras talked about his parents, and how he was the crown prince of the kingdom (such as it was) of Phoenix. He talked in detail, and I decided that despite being nosy thus far, I would leave them alone for a while. It was obviously important to him that she remembered this.

    Later, when it began to turn to winter, he pulled out a fur coat and put it on. But as he noticed that she had no such luxury, she ultimately gave it to her. Given his... condition, Nevras did not have that strong a scent, nor a particularly manly one, he smelled more like fresh strawberries with a hint of iron odor, and only when he really sweated (I could only smell it from here because I was an elf). Yet this odor clung to the sweater for weeks, because she refused to wash it. Not long after that, her training ended, and I saw something weird happen. I watched her eyes, and suddenly it felt like a computer rebooting itself. She was barely finished being proud of the sweater he gave her, and then all of a sudden she looked confused as to where she even got it.

    AMBROSIA

    We made it down the mountain quickly after that. Once the terrain was no longer rough, Aqorm and Nevras formed the lead. I wasn’t any faster than before, the knowledge of the Tao just made me more graceful. Since they were athletic, they made me look slow when in battle, and yet here on the snow I moved like everyone else was standing still. If anything, my speed was more steady now than before. Elias followed at my heels, ready to heal if things got bad. It was so strange, he had just been lobbing tons of energy at that cat just today, and yet he already looked fully healed. The rest of them did too. In fact, it looked like Nevras had trained. He didn’t look more muscular, just leaner. The cat had said something about not being able to remember the present in exchange for seeing the future. Had time lapsed without me? Heaven and Earth, how much had I missed? Nah, it couldn’t have been more than a few days, could it? I better not have said anything stupid. Nevras slowed until he was by my side. Maybe I should just not talk until I was sure what happened, unless I wanted to blurt something out.

    We walked down the mountain in silence, with Nevras getting grumpier by the minute. I definitely didn’t know what I might have done, so I decided not to look at him either. I slowed down, and looked at the ground instead. He went back to his position in the lead, which was probably for the best. Out of the bushes, a group of goblins popped out.

    Now, goblins are bad to start with, since they are stinky, aggressive, and usually pretty stupid. As a result of their curse, they stopped being human, they became a race of insane cultists who were about three feet tall, hunched over, and typically grossly deformed with some having extra limbs or even heads. Sёar?h the N?vel(F)ire.nёt website on Google to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality.

    I used my new ability to evade attacks, but it was harder than it should be. The goblins had such a random pattern of movement that no sooner did I avoid one attack, then they would double back or leap in some random direction. I hate goblins. I managed to avoid them enough to not get sliced through the gut, but I just barely dodged out of the way in time. Normally, I could read the flow of motion for any natural creature, but perhaps goblins weren’t natural. Despite my dodging, they had managed to fan out around me. Even if I could manage to do my dance routine, it would only drain them, not kill them. Urgh... Aside from Elias, the others had yet to notice the ambush and were continuing to move farther away.

    NEVRAS

    Ambrosia and I had spent the last six months together, yet today there was a marked change in her. I had taken the lead once the terrain eased off, since I hadn''t been particularly sure-footed in the snow before, and had almost lost my life. Now that the mountain was largely dry and a relatively easy climb, however, I decided to scout ahead for the time being, but after seeing that Aqorm largely had it under control, I wanted to talk to Ambrosia. I quickly found, though, that she was giving me the silent treatment. She also wouldn''t meet my gaze. Had I done something wrong?

    She probably wanted to be left alone, so I crept up to the front of the pack again. Aqorm signaled for my attention, “Shh, keep walking what we talk,” and so we did. “There is something hiding in these bushes. We could attack it now, but we risk running into a double ambush if we don''t know their numbers. Let''s walk ahead and make them think we''re out of sight, then double back around.” I was curious, so I asked, “What is it? How can you be sure it''s not an animal?” Aqorm shrugged, “It doesn''t smell like deer or any wild game. Definitely an ambush, though I''m not that good at telling scents apart.” Hopefully, it wasn''t an orc.

    As per plan, we pretended to continue moving until we were certain that all of the goblins had revealed themselves. Even despite having no geomancy now, Aqorm was an above-average fighter. She managed to take down one of the goblins by lunging on top of one and burying a pair of daggers in its chest. She didn''t bother to collect her weapons just yet, instead focusing on robbing the nearby two adjacent to the original. Unfortunately, this turned out to a mistake, as this immediately annoyed the goblins. The others each finished off one goblin. Elias blasted one with darkness, turning it into bones.

    Ambrosia skirted around another, finally managing to draw her knife and cut one of these goblins down. She didn''t seem to have a strong desire to kill it, only to take it out of commission for the battle. Still, her knife skill was impressive, it must''ve been one of the things Lao Tzu trained her for, because she managed to slice several non-vital areas. The goblin was alive, but would be unable to move. It was time for me to show that I could be helpful too.

    GOD

    There are many races occupying this earth. There are the humans, those with normal everything, including average talent for thaumaturgy. There are the elves, divided into several distinct groups. Then there were the dwarves, a race of short and stout humanoids who vaguely resembled Germanic people. The men were very burly and all had heavy beards, while the women were simply small pear-shaped women. And yet, the dwarves were extremely strong, with dwarf women able to lift over 500 lb and fight almost as well as their men. They were also resistant to magic on account of their thick skin, and had stomachs strong enough to digest poisons. Next, came the angels, a race blessed by protection against mortal weapons and with the Script, the ability to basically make almost any concept they want exist simply by speaking of it. These were related to the demons, a race not blessed by the use of thaumaturgy (Fallen, strictly speaking are not true demons but corrupted seraphim) yet immune to most of it besides holy energy, with natural abilities of dark and fire. Angels and demons collectively were called the Nephilim, and were once one race until I separated them. Next were merfolk, those who could swim deep underwater or sprout legs to walk on land. Along with elves and angels, these were the immortal races, though merfolk could only stay immortal by a ritual of periodically sloughing away old skin. This is distinct from immortals themselves, those who achieved immortality through effort. These main races were known as the Five Tribes, with the minor races largely being unknown by most. Of course, unless you were underwater or in a cave somewhere, you wouldn''t see dwarves or merfolk, and Nephilim stuck to Heaven or Hell. Even elves weren''t that common outside their lands, so humans often acted as if they were the only people.

    Aside from these main races, there are the changelings, a race most people do not know exists, that have the natural ability to change their form and they can use telepathy by touch. Natural abilities are abilities that are part of the race itself and can function even in areas of antimagic. Then there were the halflings, a race that simply looked like half-pint humans with arms and legs at normal length and width for their size, and with a talent for thievery. Shortest of all were the gnomes, a people gifted with several odd powers such as abilities of illusion and natural ability of talking to animals. Very little is known about them. Some say they are tinkerers, sort of like the dwarves with metalworking, though their inventions don''t turn out normally. Others say they are a race of healers. And some people think they are fey or relatives of goblins. Then, there were the djinn, remnants of those from an ancient religion bound to common objects such as rings or lamps with natural ability to grant wishes. There were also the Nezumi who were rat people with strong Exorcism ability, trolls with the natural ability of regeneration, dryads and half-dryads who were tree people with nature powers and a strong connection to a bonded tree, and finally the Yuki-Onna, the ice people. Most of these formed such a minority population that one was unlikely to see one per town.

    Oh yes, mustn''t forget the hengeyokai and the many varieties of the Fey either. The hengeyokai were beast people, but it wasn''t actually clear to most people whether they were these were animal spirits, the results of a genetic experiment, or the natural evolution of animals. I knew the answer, but I wasn''t about to tell you readers. In any case, such beings were often able to transform into animals, humans, and had a hybrid default form.

    Aside from races, there were the creatures, beasts of the natural world like medusas, owlbears, and trolls. Creatures refers to created species, which is why it was bad form to call a medusa a “monster”, they are hatched from eggs like all snakes, it''s not their fault they look as they do. Medusas have families, carry out fairly normal lives, and occasionally date humans provided they wear glasses and such. It is important to remember that while not all creatures earn respect, all creatures are capable of decent lives, so they must be treated according to how they as a people act. The orcs, for instance have never acted as anything but brutal savages, so fuck them.

    Other than the races and the creatures, there are those known as Monsters. These were false creations, imaginary beings formed by that other than me. The older and more well-known they got, the greater the chance of becoming Elder Formless. Urgh, the thought disgusts me. Such things could not even be called Elder Beings (though humans did), for they were not alive. Most of these had a form only by possessing living things, and until then, mostly existed as Shadows. Should they manage to touch a living thing, even a goldfish, well... there is a reason they are called Monsters. That tiny goldfish would become enormous, and resemble something out of a Vladimir Kush painting. The Elder Formless and the Monsters had a strong aversion to my Creation, so any First Material, even something innocuous like First Milk, were like deadly poison to them. These beings were dangerous precisely because of the belief of living things. They saw them and immediately believed in a Rival Power, a force that filled them with fear, and made them believe they were outside of the territory of God. Such a thing is impossible, mind you, for such things as Elder Formless or Monsters have no real presence in this universe, yet it was a persistent feeling of fear. In fact, such fear is real enough to physically destroy the weak-hearted.

    In actual fact, Elder Formless and Monsters were not real at all, but the product of runaway imagination. When humans wanted a balanced world rather than a perfect one, I gave them thaumaturgy, but along with this came fears sometimes taking form as Shadows. Left alone, these Shadows became Monsters, and Elder Formless were simply Monsters from old legends. Yog Sothoth and Cthulhu had been read about in so many books, there were people who believed them to be real. Of course, anyone with a strong amount of faith could simply disbelieve in them.

    Likewise, some creatures like orcs, ghouls, and goblins, were dangerous because they had a minor Rival Power. The orcs were creatures manufactured by science as soldiers. The Rival Power of orcs was Rage, they could increase their strength to a frightening degree, and the more afraid people were of them, the bigger and stronger they got. The ghouls were a symbol of the frightening nature of the Void itself, and possessed the Rival Power of Rejuvenation, allowing them to come back again and again. Goblins were descendants of those who had followed Ungorr and had been cursed by me. Although I had destroyed many of the followers of Ungorr, and had taken away their immortality, that such beings continued to exist at all created a Rival Power of Doubt. The greatest ability of a goblin was its ability to cause humans to lose faith in their own abilities. All it had to do was speak, and the person could be completely demoralized.