[D'sP] What The Fire Doin' - Chapter 460

Doyle fell back and let his mind spread out once again, taking in the elemental realms. Fire, water, earth, air, wood, metal, and so many more. Especially if you counted the realms between realms such as ash between fire and wood or vapor between water and air.

Nevermind the intricacies where vapor can have steam, mist, fog, or clouds while between fire and water there might be a realm of steam. Or how earth had metals and then you bring up where the metal mercury goes. Which the answer seems to be earth, metal, water, and fire?

Doyle did figure that one out, eventually. Mercury is of the earth and is a metal. Simple stuff that. And of course it is a liquid and so water which seemed to also hold the concept of fluids in general. Then there was fire which connected through heat and the general concepts that metals would be solid in regular mortal realms, yet mercury has already melted at that temp.

Not that you couldn’t find basically every classical material in every elemental realm, just in small quantities and generally aligned with that realms element. This was more about finding base mercury and not water mercury or fire mercury.

Though as Doyle relaxed and spread even further, he touched upon another divide in the void. Similar to how the lower realms naturally gather and pantheons pull their universes towards each other. It seems that universes with similar base rules are also somewhat grouped.

Oh sure, not every universe with mercury actually had atoms to build the element from, but that was more like having a dairy free ice cream. Strange, but still trying to be similar. These strange universes that began to appear at the edges, which in itself is strange as in the void, distance isn’t a thing and so any reference to an “edge” loses meaning and yet there it was. They were formed in a way that defied Doyle.

Yet it differed from anything yet seen. Which was weird in and of itself. Doyle had brushed up against the Eldritch and the Elder. The void fauna defied definition. There were universes literally made of fire alone and yet looked like his own universe.

Though Doyle couldn’t help but admit, if there was something that could add edges to nothing, such a different paradigm of existence would do so. Worse, they weren’t all different in the same way. They defied even remembering and, if not for his senses being in contact with the edges, he doubted there would even be a gap in his memories for where they existed.

Yet just across the edge, Doyle felt the touch of familiarity. It seems dungeons and souls were more of a constant across the void than anything else. In fact, while rare, Doyle can sense souls slipping through the edge as if the edge wasn’t there. Though the touch of cores unknown couldn’t cross. It seemed only a soul core was unaffected. Well, and maybe True Immortals, there just weren’t any around, at least not that Doyle can sense, which meant exactly nothing.

A pattern.

The soul cores, there was a pattern.

Those crossing over to his side? Vibrant. Which was odd. A soul core stripped down to just the core is nothing more, nothing less. From a core found in the depths of a soul doldrums to one freshly out of a mortal universe, Doyle had never noticed a difference.

And then there are the soul cores leaving, which feel the opposite. Worn out. Tired.

Doyle can not feel more and once a vibrant core left his senses, there was no re-finding the soul. There is nothing else he can do here and so he turns back to his actual question. What is up with the fire souls?

The answer was, of course, to extend the life of an elemental realm of fire. That seemed to be the pattern. Inter-universe competition on this scale? All about making sure your home would last longer.

Except the elemental realms weren’t as straight about it as the lower realms. Not that they didn’t want to, it isn’t like their inhabitants care about the morals involved. Even from the outside, Doyle can tell that many of the mightiest of these realms don’t subscribe to such things. That they likely follow their own codes and some would judge them by the old trope of Blue-and-Orange morality.

Which Doyle judges as nonsense. Not that morality couldn’t be many frustrating shades of grey. However, just because you don’t subscribe to a specific system, doesn’t mean you can’t be judged by it.

But if it wasn’t morality that stopped the fire realm from eating these mortal realms wholesale, that meant there was an actual restriction and Doyle felt it made sense. What defines an elemental realm versus mortal realms, a heaven, a hell? Why, the reason was the elemental purity!

Whether it was fire or earth, metal or steam. And what Doyle had been calling mortal realms were anything but. More than that, even if you put everything to fire, it wouldn’t become a realm of fire. There would be ash left behind and so many other elements.

So instead of being able to consume other dimensions whole cloth, elemental realms infest them. A creature that is fire aligned is not automatically aligned with the nearby realm of fire. However, those who gained their alignment to fire through said realm? Well, therein lies the problem.

Even in his own dungeon, Doyle had seen enough instances of people summoning in things. Whether a wall of stone being pulled out of an earth realm or an actual creature like a daemon brought in from the local region of Hades. That doesn’t do anything. Material and monsters can be shared between realms like that as it isn’t a permanent thing.

The stone will vanish, and the creature banished. And especially with the lower realm creatures, what gets summoned tends to not be the actual thing, but rather the mind of the creature, placed within a locally formed body of ectoplasm.

These fire souled? Well, that’s a different matter. They grow in power, are driven to it. Because for every drop of power they gather onto their soul, some will slip through and be stolen by the fire realm they’re attached to.

Doyle could sense that once dead, this connection is broken. So he could use one of said souls for a boss. Except he wants a goat boss and not a fire boss. Nevermind the fact that if he was to choose any element aligned soul to use, it would be air. The fire goats don’t act like goats. Their drives elemental and foreign.

This intent stained their soul core like black ink spilled on a white pearl. It would take time in the void to clean them. At which point, why would Doyle bother with them? They already lacked a certain “goat”ness to begin with. By the time the fire was gone, no chance any would remain.

Doyle settled back and let himself wander as in the void, there are no edges to bump into. As he wanders, now knowing what to look for, other elemental battlegrounds become apparent. Though such a mono-focus is rare. Mortal realms tend to be places of contradictions and so you’d find both fire and water or earth and air competing, sometimes all four or more.

And once recognized, such areas are simple enough to avoid. Though one thing does wander through Doyle’s mind. How to warn the town? Not that he can see any elemental realms actively competing for the universe he is attached to. However, he can also feel that just because an elemental realm isn’t actively consuming a place, doesn’t mean there won’t be one or two parasites kicking around. The thought slips away, for now the system should have everything under control on his world.

Doyle turns away from the mess and browses through the various universes. Goats, goats, everywhere and yet not a soul to take. At least, not enough of a goat soul, which is likely the stumbling block.

Frustrating.

Time for a different strategy.

Doyle’s senses swept out. Not to find a goat soul, but to find a universe chalked full of regular goats. This wasn’t hard, there are a few.

From there, Doyle expanded out from the close orbit of fresh souls. The goats wouldn’t be there. Goats weren’t a lonely sort. They formed herds, but what about an awakened goat?

With how souls worked, not only would a sapient goat likely never meet another, but they wouldn’t live in a herd. After all, to see the world, only to be able to see that those around you aren’t actually There? That while you are a Goat, they are just goats?

Maybe some would stay with their herd in hope of another. Maybe some would travel from herd to herd in search of others like themselves. By the nether realms, some might have gotten lucky over the time-span of this universe’s existence. But in the end, it would be a lonely life.

Yes, there would be some that manage to join in with another race. There’s magic, after all. A spell to allow a goat to speak the local language, especially when they have already learned it? Not the hardest to develop,  basically just a specialized illusion spell combined with some minor self telepathy.

But given magic? You're just going to end up with satyrs, centaurs, goatfolk, and kin. Which unsurprisingly, most universes Doyle has now focused on, happen to have large populations of said creatures.

More than that, Doyle turns back from his search and digs a bit deeper. Because there is a pattern. After all, if a goat simply wanted to talk to people? Well, there’s a reason “talking animals” is a classic trope. Changing the voice-box slightly to allow perfect human speech? There might not even need to be a physical change, just some magic to alter the air vibrations. Easy.

So no, the reason for taking on a more humanoid form was in the end a simple one. To integrate. And the more humanoid the form, the deeper the desire. Goat that evolved into centaurs simply wanted the benefits of the humanoid form. Talking, the brain, thumbs. Normal stuff like that.

Satyrs are similar, but despite the classical satyr being a woodland fae, for a goat to evolve into such, it was for living in society. After all, most humans don’t exactly build with the idea of someone having four legs. In a twist that Doyle found quite ironic, his world before the system came would have likely been more accommodating than these worlds. 

After all, they had ramps and elevators for the disabled. Maybe classical centaur would have some problems based on weighing as much as a horse? The goat centaurs, however, would have no problems if they simply wore some hoof covers to not scratch up the tile.

Last, but not least, the various folk and kin. As close to human as you can get. The kind of form you take to fully become a part of human society and leave behind your previous form as much as possible. So also the least useful goat sourced souls.

Doyle, satisfied with his generalization of these handful of universes he had found, turned back to the void and free floating soul cores. Out past the fresh souls, and between the various flows leading to other universes. He began to search within the slow-moving delta, the swamp of souls surrounding these universes where souls not heading back or anywhere else ended up.

Out in the areas of the void where things were, but only because they weren’t “not” yet, Doyle began to find what he was looking for. The lonely souls, whether because of tragedy, deformity, or simply how the being was.

Though the countless cores, Doyle senses brushed, barely a whisper of a touch. Narrowing in on his goal. A goat. And there it was.

This wasn’t the first goat soul Doyle found in this area. Rather, it was the first that felt ready for another go. 

Various Realms - Chapter 459

Stratus Cloud - Chapter 461