Infinite Realm: Monsters & Legends

Theories

The room settled into silence, as everyone questioned all that they had learned in their lives. Zach was about to provide his own theories, when Ryun spoke up, breaking everyone out of their thoughts.

"No," he said. "We are not wrong."

Nayra raised an eyebrow and looked at him from across the table. "What does that mean?"

"These ratios of focuses have been accepted as a truth for a reason. They might not be completely right, but they do exist, perhaps the people that discovered them just misunderstood the information that they gained," he turned to look at Maleatus. "Madness is the imbalance in between the three Focuses, that much is clear. It is not an artificial limitation pushed on us by the Framework. Yet, madness is a reality, it happens, and it happens often. Imbalance. And from what Maleatus has discovered, two focuses seem to work in conjunction, building on each other, with the Skills left as an odd one out."

"Skills can cause imbalance as well," Naha interjected. "The things we put into them, the things about ourselves that we lock in can become twisted and turn us insane too."

Zach was about to say the same. "Both Naha and I had felt the effects of such madness, our Skill anchors twisting and turning us into things that we are not, or that we had never intended to be."

Ryun smiled. "Yes, that there is exactly right, intention."

Eratemus tilted his head. "Explain?"

"I think," Ryun answered slowly. "That the ratios are both real and not. I believe that there are certain cutoff points, or break points if you will. If you have only two focuses, let's say Cultivation in the Heavenly Realm and then you raise your Class to its fourth tier, you would say that that person had Focus Madness, yes? But is it because they've crossed the ratio, or because of other things?"

"Other things like what?" Eratemus asked.

"There are certain break points in tiers of power, that to me seem to happen every three tiers, the Lord Realm, the Immortal Realm, the Eternal Realm. I'm assuming that the same is true for Classes, though I admit, I don't know as much about them. Regardless, the higher you reach with your focuses, the more influence they have over you, the more you are shaped by them. I imagine that it isn't really an exact ratio and that it isn't the same for different people, though that ratio must work for most because it has stood the test of time," Ryun started to walk around the table as he spoke, forcing people to follow him with their eyes. "But there was a piece that everyone who works on this was missing, which is probably the real reason why most never discover it. I've been thinking about this for days, and I don't think that we need tailor made Classes or Paths to advance, they are a reward for those who focused on one of the two focuses, they are not a requirement."

"What makes you think that?" Maleatus asked, his tone curious.

"Because, there is something beyond these focuses and the power that we can grasp through advancing. The Ways."

"Ways?" Maleatus asked.

Zach realized that the man was the only one on the airship who probably didn't know anything about it, so he waved a hand and made his title visible to him.

"We are able to create the Ways, a Dao of an Aspect, establishing the rules and direction that it should take. In short, narrowing or widening the domain under which it can and how it can operate."

Maleatus blinked, his eyes going wide. "This is incredible. And it explains so much," he shook his head. "Someone made a Way of Space, didn't they?"

Zach inclined his head. "I believe so," he answered, then turned to Ryun. "What do you mean about the Ways?"

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Ryun continued his circling around the table. "What is the purpose of the Infinite Realm? What is the purpose of us gaining power? To create Ways? No," he shook his head. "There is something more. I have become a Sage of Two different Aspects, I believe that I could make Ways for them both. And that, alongside with everything else makes me think that you were right."

"About what?" Zach asked.

"The meaning of one's life," Ryun stopped at the head of the table, then raised both of his hands. He put one higher and spoke. "Intent," then he raised the other to be on the same level. "Meaning. All Essence has both. Intent is the effects that the Essence exerts on their environment, on other Essence. Fire wants to burn, Water makes things wet, and so on. But meaning is something deeper, a conceptual thing that every Aspect has, it is rules and boundaries by which it operates."

"That's what we influence, what we change when we make the Way," Zach added as things clicked into place for him, as he started to understand what Ryun was saying.

"Yes," Ryun nodded. "At least that is my theory, you would know better than I. But, what I believe the purpose of all of the power we are granted, all that we achieve, it is so that we can become something more. A Conceptual manifestation of our Soul's meaning. That perhaps in time we would establish authority over that concept."

"And why do you think that?" Eratemus asked.

"Based on some ways my power had developed, and because I know some of what the previous iterations of reality were. Before, every Aspect had physical manifestations of it. Being that embodied it. Some Aspects had many, for example, there were many different Fire Aspects, to account for Fire Aspects on different worlds, of different types and rules. Some overlapped, but there were ultimate Aspect for them all. I believe that this has been changed in the Infinite Realm with us in mind. We can embody these Aspects ourselves by becoming Sages, and we can do more by creating a Way, by forcing our idea of an Aspect to be brought to the forefront. Perhaps different Ways of the same Aspect might even be able to coexist, we know so little, and we probably won't know until there are enough Ways for someone to try and contest one. But ultimately, Zacharia's idea about the meaning of one's life had always struck me. I think that it is tied to everything, even madness."

Zach raised an eyebrow at that. "Madness?"

"Perhaps madness isn't imbalance between Focuses, but a dissonance between them and the Soul's meaning," Ryun said as he put his hands on the table and leaned on them. "I have had moments where I felt my own imbalance rearing its head up. It was always in the moments where I felt like I had been wronged. When I felt someone encroaching on what was mine. I believed that it came from my Skill anchors, from my Path and my Class, but now I think that I was wrong. It was the imbalance of my Focuses or rather the dissonance between what their meaning was and what my inner meaning is."

Zach tilted his head. "My Class is the Lord of Aspects, but I believe my Soul's meaning to be related to Knowledge. When my madness was at its worst, I had the Path of the Lightning Blade."

"Exactly," Ryun said. "Two focuses that were not compatible with your Soul's meaning."

"I think that they are close though," Zach added.

Ryun shook his head. "I'm sure that the Lord of Aspects has more overlap, but it sounds like a Class that is about ruling, about dominating Aspects. Knowledge is a requirement for that, so I am certain that it's easier to meld or unite with your purpose. In my mind, your meaning can be more complicated, it can encompass more things which makes me think that you don't need to have these tailor made focuses, you don't even need to have focuses that follow the same idea behind them. For example, someone whose Soul embodied the meaning of a Warrior, shouldn't need to have to have a Class and a Path of the Warrior, but things that help embody that idea, that meaning. A Swordsman has an overlap with a Warrior, a Protector, or a Berserker, they all have overlaps. Even Paths and Classes that focus on utilizing more ethereal concepts, like a Fire Mage or an Elementalist, they can all be shaped to fit that idea of a Warrior. It is how you use your focus, how you shape it to embody yourself."

Zach thought about it, and found that his logic was somewhat sound.

"What about skills?" Naha asked the question he wanted before he could.

Ryun turned to look at her. "Anchors allow us to fortify who we believe ourselves to be, or who we want to be. If you can lock in things that you aspire to, perhaps Skills are a way to mold your Soul's meaning into what you want it to be, and not just what you currently are. Perhaps Skills are a way to bridge or alter the imbalances of your Focuses to match your Soul. A Swordsman might not fully match a Warrior, but with a right Anchor, it might bend enough to fit. My theory is that Skills are a way to bridge the two focuses with your Soul."

Zach looked around the room, seeing that everyone was taking in what he had said. It was a lot of information, a lot of it built on nothing but ideas that came from the conversations Ryun and he had before. But those conversations were in turn built on the knowledge of many people that came before, on their personal experiences.

There wasn't a quick way for them to test what Ryun had put on the table. The conversation tapered off, and they all separated across the ship, contemplating things on their own.