Natasha the Halve

“How?” I asked since I have never ever flown anything.

“Falling won't kill us, so find out,” Shorvanna replied.

As soon as she finished the sentence, we started falling down.

A very long sigh left me. “Let's see,” I muttered as we slowly plunged into the clouds. “Flight. Wind. Wings. Air. Glide,” I enunciated to get ideas. “Free fall glide?” I wondered, sticking my arms to my body and closing my legs.

Air started whistling in my ears, which told me we picked up speed.

“Like a battle royale...” I chuckled and spread my limbs a bit to try and steer the fall. “Where are we dropping, Shorvanna?”

“The mountain peak, Young Halve...” she reminded me.

I nodded, then moved my body to point in the direction the Goddess told me to go towards.

Everything around me was thick white since we had entered a cloud, blocking sight of the target.

I hummed and tried injecting the Goddess with a hundred points of E'er with the intent of gaining altitude.

Nothing happened, the course the same as before.

I focused on the skill she was using and the way E'er flowed when we shot up into the sky.

It had been a very complex spiral of sorts, flowing from our back and into the wings, then into the thin film of energy surrounding us. E'er had giggled and wiggled in glee while marching to drums of War. While flying, however, it was a low hum of E'er spinning in place and maintaining the wings.

“You made it sound easy,” I commented.

We broke through the clouds, forests moving far below us at a reasonable speed, but slower than our fall.

“It is,” the Goddess pointed out. “Maybe not for you...”

I nodded in agreement, looking for the mountain we were supposed to land on. “I'm not a Wizard, after all. E'er and its manipulation are not my forte,” I reasoned, then fixed my body to glide in a different direction.

We were going extremely slow. I could run faster even without using Charge.

An idea struck me, and I tried moving our arms like wings.

Once again, nothing happened.

I let out a disappointed sigh, but didn't give up. My fear of heights had vanished under the influence of the mushroom soup and I planned on taking advantage of that. “Hmm...” I hummed while thinking, looking at the valleys below us and the falling snow.

A small black dot moved in the distant sky towards us.

I focused on it.

Pyotr was carrying an envelope with his feet. He flapped his wings a few times and reached us almost instantly. “Natasha! Falling!” He croaked, gliding next to us.

“I'm trying to fly,” I calmly explained. “Can you hear me at this speed?”

“Perfect!” he loudly replied. “No. Wing. Can. Not. Fly!”

I hummed. “Do you have any tips?”

“No!”

A defeated chuckled escaped me at having expected help from a talking raven the size of a toddler.

---

We ran out of time before touching the ground.

I am not a master of numbers, but I think Shorvanna's wings slowed the fall a lot... or Galeia's skies reach way higher than I initially thought.

Flying wasn't on my list of things to accomplish so the failure meant very little to me. What interested me more was learning Celestial.

Shorvanna flew us back to the top of the obelisk, then removed herself from me. “I'm satisfied with the progress considering you're afraid of heights,” she told me while walking to the roasting bird. “Next time will be easier as you'll face it with a clear mind.”

I shrugged. “We'll see...”

The Goddess waved a hand and the fire went out, revealing a beautifully golden brown turkey. Another wave and she moved it towards me. “Eat now,” she instructed, then produced an ornate goblet as red as the material she was made of. “And drink this.”

I accepted the refreshment. “Thanks,” I muttered and gave it a sniff.

It was the bird's blood mixed with spices. The goblet itself felt burning to the touch.

The Divine stood still, watching me.

I stretched a hand towards the floating turkey meat and pinched a bit off from the breast.

“Food!” Pyotr croaked and walked to the turkey. “Permission?”

“Denied,” I told him. “I'll give you some food after I'm done.”

“BONES!” He requested.

“Sure,” I allowed with a nod.

He raised his head and let out a loud and long laughter.

I put the meat in my mouth and chewed.

It was juicy, crispy, and tender.

A tiny moan of satisfaction escaped my throat. “I'm getting better at cooking,” I praised myself and drank a bit from the goblet.

It tasted like home-made blood sausage. Very delicious and rustic.

As I ate more of the Divine Sentinel, a slight numbness spread through my head, opening all my senses and mind to understanding function and intent.

My skin and hair absorbed E'er, oxygen, and sunlight. The three united into one through a complex process with a massive net gain of energy in each and every cell on my skin. An almost negligible margin of it was sent outwards. The rest of it was sent inwards to sustain myself. Thick, viscous blood coursed though my bloodstream, picking up said energy and sending it all over my body. My lungs did not absorb oxygen and instead functioned purely to facilitate speech, smelling, and store E'er-rich air, making blood vessel presence minimal.

There was no biological need to cough, sneeze, or yawn. The few times I had coughed had been out of reflex instead of serving any purpose, and I had never sneezed or yawned so far. Breathing to absorb E'er was unnecessary as well since the simple thought to do so amped the cells on my skin and hair to absorb more of it.

A big heart pumped thick blood with a strength no other life form possessed, separating energy-rich blood from its counterpart. Interlocking boneplates of incredible density protected the crucial organ, allowing flexible mobility.

Most of the energy my skin and hair produced went to my muscles, denser and more flexible than any other life form, with perfect pathways to channel pure E'er and activate skills.

My nervous system was complex beyond what I could have imagined, capable of conveying emotion through my skin's glow to other Halves. Each and every synapse connection made itself visible to me, displaying incredibly effective neurons and brain composition with a hard lock of sorts that prevented addiction, obsession, crippling fear, depression, and any other detrimental mental states or conditions that could prevent me from accomplishing my purpose as a Protector. Delay was possible, but not total interference. I was made aware of every crease, fold, wrinkle, and groove on my brain. I felt it float in my skull.

A strong spine traveled down my back, capable of transferring signals instantaneously to the rest of my body.

My digestive system was built to digest everything on Galeia if I grew powerful enough to survive it, taking longer with metals due to their nature, but ultimately incorporated nonetheless. The more I ate, the longer it would take me to defecate since my skin alone produced massive amounts of energy to sustain me. Instead, I would urinate the excess.

My genitals were reactive, triggering gametogenesis only when a Bonded Partner had met a certain set of conditions, like entering their fertile cycle, or their seed being capable of impregnating me. All to not waste energy. Pheromones had no effect on me since my body reacted to information through the Bond, and I produced no pheromone. I then understood that Alyssa simply had a sweat kink, as opposed to her assuming my sweat had a sweet fragrance to attract potential mates.

My immune system had no flaws to the point of being yet another digestive system, 'eating' pathogens and such and transforming them into energy, plus the survival conditions for most were nonexistent in my body due to the lack of oxygen.

I was, in many ways, the perfect life form.

People and Gods had told me, but only then did I truly understand.

And then.

Celestial started to make sense.

Understanding. Propagation. Order in Chaos. Purpose. Intent.

A higher form of speech similar to Abyssal, but while Abyssal felt like a pool of oil full of degradation, depravity, and mind-breaking power that sought to taint the mind, soul, and spirit, making it fester instantaneously, Celestial was a cozy sunny day laying down in a vast grass plain while giggling with a lover with whom a long life of mutual achievement and personal growth laid ahead, and loving parents waited home with warm food on the table, ready to call friends over and make memories that would last until old age.

One forced beings to stop in horrifying visions while the other urged them to reach their full potential.

Halve. Protector. Guardian. Watcher. Authority.

Galeia. Planet. Parent. Caretaker. Origin.

God. Guide. Mentor. Teacher. Assistant.

Words filled my mind, along with their meaning, and ways to charge my voice with E'er since the language required no mouth to speak it.

With that came the knowledge of Language.

All of them on Galeia.

A deafening and blinding headache formed with a strength that rivaled mine.

I squinted my eyes to fight the strongest pain I have endured as a Halve, but whimpers and moans left my throat against my will.

Thousands of languages over the course of three and a half million years of Mortal history made their way into my mind.

I slowly laid down and curled into a ball. “Nnnggghhhh!!” I whimpered and clutched my head.

“Commendable control,” Shorvanna praised in Celestial. “It will pass, young Protector.”

“Grrrrr!” I growled, and headbutted the ground in the hopes to make the pain go away.

The obelisk shook a little.

My head throbbed for a long while.

One thing was clear, though: Despite having learned a third Power Tongue, no greater wisdom was revealed to me.