A strange feeling rose within me, like I could touch it.
Without thinking further, I stepped closer and raised my hand. My fingers moved toward the lotus, and as they did, the space around me shifted slightly.
My fingers brushed against it. The texture was distinct, the contrast between the two halves clear beneath my touch. One carried a smooth, almost warm sensation, while the other felt cooler, denser, yet equally stable.
I exhaled slowly, taking it in.
Then, almost instinctively, I moved my hand. The moment I did, the world shifted.
My perspective snapped back. In the next instant, I was no longer inside the Star of Origin.
I was back on Abor and in my hand was the lotus. For a brief moment, I simply stared at it. My eyes widened slightly.
"Did I just create real matter?" I asked loudly.
From something.... yet not from nothing.
A slow realization settled in as I looked at the lotus again. This was the new function of the talent. I decided to check it again, but before I could act, the Generator Core thundered once more, and my perception shifted again.
I found myself within my soul space.
The transition was seamless. One moment I stood within Abor, and the next I found myself suspended above the vast expanse of my soul ocean. It stretched endlessly beneath me. At its center stood my giant soul.
For a brief moment, nothing changed.
Then the space above the ocean began to shift.
Runes appeared once again.
They formed slowly at first, faint outlines taking shape in the air before solidifying into something far more defined. The same pattern I had just seen within the Star of Origin emerged here as well, each marking precise, familiar, and unmistakably tied to the Generator Core.
The runes expanded and locked into place, forming a platform that hovered just above the surface of the soul ocean. It was identical in structure to the one within the Star, yet it carried a different aura, one that resonated directly with my soul rather than my essence.
The moment it stabilized, another connection formed.
The Null Core responded.
A faint thread extended from it, linking directly to the runic platform. The connection strengthened instantly, and with it, a soft white mist began to emerge. It flowed outward from the Null Core, gathering above the platform in slow stream.
At the same time, the soul ocean reacted.
Its surface rippled gently, and from its depths, strands of soul energy began to rise. They moved upward like currents, drawn toward the platform, responding to the same pull that guided the white mist.
The two met above the runic surface. The white mist wrapped around the rising soul energy, binding it, shaping it, holding it together as both continued to condense. The process was slow, as if something far more complex was being formed than simple energy.
Gradually, a shape emerged.
A sphere.
A glowing white orb, suspended just above the platform, glowing faintly. It carried a presence unlike anything I had felt before. I watched in silence as it continued to form, the connection between the Null Core and the soul ocean maintaining its balance perfectly.
Then, something else happened, the lotus that I was holding outside in the real world, the same lotus I had created within the Star of Origin manifested above the platform, its dual nature intact. One half radiated with the calm flow of essence, while the other carried the depth of deathmist.
It hovered just above the white orb. For a moment, both remained separate. Then the orb rose slightly, while the lotus descended, and as the two touched, they began to merge.
There was no explosion, no surge of uncontrolled energy. Instead, the process was smooth, almost gentle. The light from the orb seeped into the lotus, spreading through its petals, filling both halves equally despite their difference in nature.
The green and black did not resist and simply accepted. As the last traces of the white light settled into it, the lotus changed.
A presence spread from it spreading outward. The petals shifted slightly and the energy within it stabilized into a rhythm, one that felt... alive.
As I watched, it began to move. The lotus lifted itself from its position above the platform and drifted upward, leaving behind the space where it had been formed. Its ascent was smooth, almost careful, as if it was aware of its own movement and adjusting to it with each passing moment.
It stopped a short distance in front of me.
For a brief moment, it hovered there, completely still, and then it tilted slightly, its petals shifting just enough to face me more directly. The motion was small, but it carried meaning. It wasn’t random or mechanical.
It was directed.
I felt a connection to the lotus, the same connection that I had felt before with my summons. It was faint, but clear enough to recognize. Something from the lotus reached out to me.
Acknowledgment.
It knew I was there.
And more than that... it responded to me.
The structure of the soul I had just witnessed being formed, the merging of energy, the binding through the Null Core, all of it led to this moment.
"You carry a soul." I muttered.
I looked at it closely as it continued to float before me. There was no instability in it, no sign that it would collapse or fade away.
A faint sense of recognition passed through the connection again, subtle but clear, as if it understood that I had understood it.
This lotus... was alive.
In the next instant, I willed it and my perception slipped out of the soul space, returning to the outside world as smoothly as it had left.
The lotus was still in my hand.
I lifted my hand slightly, bringing it closer to my gaze.
"Can you change your color?" I said aloud, more out of curiosity than expectation.
For a brief moment, nothing happened, and then the lotus responded.
The shift was gradual. The soft white and pink shades that defined its petals began to change, the color flowing across its surface as if it were being repainted from within. The transformation moved smoothly from one petal to the next, until the entire flower settled into a new hue.
Light violet.
It matched my essence almost perfectly.
I watched it for a second, taking in the change, before a small chuckle escaped me.
"Wow... are you choosing violet just to butter me up?"