Tracing the five threads with his eyes, at least he thought he did so, at the same time, sensing them with far more than they could ever perceive. Feeling them connect to his mortal shell with an endless ocean, creating a bond, a clarity stronger than he had ever experienced.
It was a bizarre experience that overwhelmed him instantaneously.
Experiencing all happenings within the entire Soulsea at once was too much, only contained by its everlasting tranquillity, brought about by Nox himself being in it, with his body not taking in any stimuli.
A new world opened itself before him, a state of existence so alien that he had difficulty putting it into words.
Humans were not supposed to, or able to, fathom such depth—such greatness was simply too much for the human mind to endure.
Nox's body fell forward into the soulsea, or had he already fallen long ago?
He was confused and disoriented by the influx of information and sensations. Colliding with the surface of his entire being created ripples in the tranquillity of its endlessness, intensifying the sensations.
"Argh"
Letting out a startled scream or trying to do so, the sea released a few bubbles, popping the moment they left its expanse, as the overwhelming sensation intensified and pressure began to accumulate.
Just as he felt his mind about to crack, slowly formed on his motionless body, something changed.
One of his now golden threads, one of the connections to the soulsea… snapped? Sensations lessened.
It was still too much. Another crack appeared around his eye, which quickly prompted Noctis to release two more... and then a fourth.
Lying there motionless, Nox would have let out a breath of relief if he were in full control of his body.
Attempting to move, seemingly random occurrences happened from time to time.
Some attempts led to movements of his body, while others ended in movements of the sea surrounding it, with nothing truly making sense.
If his body needed air, it would have suffocated long ago.
This, however, was not the case. Luckily, he was in his soulsea.
The body he had projected into it was nothing more than a projection. It needed neither to breathe nor eat and was just his subconscious creating a vessel for him to traverse the realm of souls.
If it broke, however, that would have carried consequences, he himself could not have favoured.
Theoretically, if he could control his subconscious impression of himself, he could change his appearance here. At last, this was impossible for the mind of a mere mortal.
If he could do so, something would have been seriously wrong with him.
Engulfed by the myriad of sensations a fifth of the soulsea revealed, Nox explored with eagerness and excitement. He had always found his life predictable, boring, and, above all, dreary.
This new and interesting experience truly opened up a world of inexplicable, mysterious, and unknown things, even if it carried its own dangers.
Most found the unknown scary, and Nox was no exception, but Nox found the idea of living out the rest of his days as a slave, slowly driven to his death, much scarier than the unknown ever could be.
What am I at this moment? A body of water, a person, both, neither?
Nox did not truly know. He was aware of so much and so little at once, feeling that he was part of a greater whole and, at the same time, a singular organism.
Trying to lift his arm, a small body of water began to rise instead.
Trying to lift his head, the water started to breach out seemingly at random. Frowning slightly, Nox attempted to trace the feeling emanating from the singular remaining thread. Feeling his consciousness drift along with the thread, he quickly reached the motionless body lying on the surface of the sea, covered halfway in the water.
His hand slightly twitching, a moment later, he attempted to stand up. Shakily, he moved his one foot forward as he stood on one knee. Trying to erect fully, he faceplanted the next instance.
Nox had regained control of his sight, finally seeing with his own eyes, while at the same time taking in his surroundings through the part of the soulsea. The result was that his control was clumsy at best, not able to control either part skillfully.
A bit disoriented once more, but much more stable than before, Nox slowly acclimated to the weird way of taking in the world, realising he was experiencing it from two perspectives at once: that of his physical self and his Soulsea.
He took in the world from two points of view at the same time.
As he slowly sat up once more, a dazed look in his eyes, he was simply waiting and getting used to the sensation.
Below, I feel my body move slowly as I sit up, creating small ripples in me.
After a while in this state of mind, Nox slowly stood and unsteadily walked forward, the consciousness below following, the white thread leaving a golden shimmer behind with each step.
With each step forward, Nox felt safer in his movements and in his control. Willing the water before him to rise, it slowly did. Watching as it erected a staircase, Nox took one step at a time in his attempt to reach higher, first ten, then twenty, then thirty, then forty. Looking down at no more steps ahead, Nox let out an audible sigh.
"So this is my limit."
Nox had indeed hit his limit, no longer able to continue. He did not have enough control over this space to reach the web above. More precisely, his mind wasn't strong enough to fully control this space.
But at least he had come closer to his goal. He could see now, far more clearly, that the centre of the web was being dragged downward.
Was this a result of the assimilation?
He had yet to start, even to quicken the progression. Why was it so fast?
Shaking his head in regret as he watched the web above, still hundreds of steps away. He took one more step forward.
Nox let himself fall, reaching the ground in the blink of an eye.
I feel the return of my body as little more than a ripple in a vast ocean.
Focusing his mind, no longer following random chaotic desires, Nox decided to go after his original goal before he lost track somewhat.
Thinking about it, how much time had passed?
This place made it quite easy to lose track of it. He had arranged a meeting with Trisha the following day.
This shouldn't become a problem.
Feeling that it couldn't have been more than an hour or two, Nox concentrated on his actual reason for coming.
The way he would further his soul's assimilation was simple yet effective: manually helping the soul fuse with the fragment hanging above.
For this, Nox first had to deepen his control over his soul, which he had achieved.
While even normal people could enter their Soulsea with the right instructions, it would not help them in any meaningful way, making it a little acquired skill and not spread among the general public.
After first entering the soulsea and having such a magical experience, he would have expected this practice to be more widely spread, even if it was only to experience it at least once.
It was so sparse that Nox had never heard of it in the first place.
For Authority Wealders, however, it was different. The Soulsea was essential, as the soul was a major part of their being, with which they would have to actively interact regularly.
Authority Wealders could influence their souls in differing ways. This was done through many means, with the most essential of all being the fusion of soul and mind.
This was what Nox had done through the medium of his symbolism: he had fused his mind and soul, to a certain extent, to gain power over the space called his Soulsea. As it was, HIS soul fusing with the space was not a problem. However, taking in all that the soul would take in was a big one.
This space, called the soulsea, would subconsciously interact with other nearby soulseas, the mind and body and vice versa, creating tiny ripples.
Normally, the soul would automatically take in all this information, then have it sorted out instinctively, discarding bits and pieces, sending the rest to the subconscious mind, leading to sudden epiphanies or thoughts.
So what Nox was doing was comparable to manually breathing or pumping his blood through his veins by thought, just on a much larger scale.
He was not yet able to take full control of his soulsea, so he limited himself to a fifth of the soul. This would slow assimilation somewhat, but given the current speed, it wouldn't be a problem.
Taking a deep breath, Nox focused most of his attention on the part of his consciousness fused with the water. Moving his control towards the edge of the soul, until he reached a few golden threads that stood there isolatedly.
Staring at them for a moment or two from the perspective of his soul, he quickly caught himself again and started moving his body above the surface towards the edge, following the trajectory his other consciousness had taken.
He could not fully split his consciousness, but leaving behind simple commands for what essentially symbolised his body was no problem; it seemed he simply let it follow like a puppet.
As it moved towards him, the location was marked by the streak of ripples left behind with each step. He felt the golden threads descended from above pierce his body, sprouting roots and pulling the mass above down towards the sea, as a droplet at a time travelled up each thread, slowly travelling to the centre.
It hurt a bit, but somehow different from when the hollow tooth bit off his finger, it felt more real, more primal, more personal.
Was this a form of damage to his soul?
The thought of travelling up the threads, as a liquid came to him shortly, yet was quickly disproven, since he could not distance himself too far from the Soulsea or he would lose control over the mass of water.
Slowly letting some of the water of the soulsea flow up the threads, as Nox's main body, if one could call it that, arrived.
Not hesitating in the slightest, Nox brought both hands together, his right index finger still bearing a thread of golden light, now quite long, illuminating the travelled path.
He placed his two middle fingers together. Then Nox slowly pulled some distance between the two, a pure white thread now connecting the two fingers.
Looking at it with a solemn expression, he crouched down near a golden, thin thread that was connecting his soul with the tapestry above. Touching the surface of the lake with his right middle finger and now hurrying, not wanting to connect to a bigger part of the soul, he touched the golden thread, which had a light layer of water upon it, breaking through without resistance.
Breaking his connection on both sides instantly, Nox held the threads in place through the water, letting them slowly connect to the gretar tapestry above, as his hands distanced themselves from their creation.
The white, colourless thread, slowly illuminated with a golden lustre, streaming from the golden thread to Nox's own white one, and then connected to the soulsea. A new golden bridge connecting the above with the soul had been created.
Taking a step back in satisfaction, Nox looked at his work with a brilliant smile.
Noticing some mental fatigue, he staggered lightly. Nox estimated he could create nine more threads if he pushed himself. Deciding to create just a few more, not wanting to overexert himself.
As he began repeating the process from before, Nox suppressed a shudder deep within him.
He had to fully concentrate on this process. Any mistakes could have catastrophic consequences.
What Nox was doing was quite simple in essence, yet had a certain brilliance.
Using the symbolism of threads, he slowly strengthened and deepened the connection between the soul and the fragment of fate. This was an arduous and tedious process, in which he would slowly strengthen the preexisting connections between the two, letting them then naturally speed up the fusion process.
This was the most fundamental way of progression in the first rank. It might have been simple in concept, but overall, it posed many difficulties and dangers.
Most of these dangers would not be life-threatening, but they could not be ignored.
The most imminent danger would be when connecting the symbolism and the tapestry above, which is why Nox always started by connecting to the soulsea, as the biggest consequence that could occur would be him being shaken.
On the other hand, he was unaware of what would happen if he let the connection with the fate fragment solidify. If he let it happen, things spanning across the spectrum could happen, with his personal theory being that he'd simply fry his brain in seconds.
What kind of moron would stare into the vast expanses of fate? Only someone with a death wish who plans to become a dullard would do such things.
Chukeling slightly as he placed down the fifth thread, he stood up and started walking towards another golden thread that lonsomly stood there.
He was unsure if it made a difference or if he should simply place all threads on the same golden thread, but he was quite sure that every thread had a limit, as the thin thread he had just placed the fifth thread on had started trembling slightly.
Five should be the maximum for a thread of this size. Was the size even of importance?
The thread he was now standing before was slightly thinner, feeling his mind flare up with enthusiasm and an exploratory spirit. Nox wanted to find out whether the thread's size was important or whether the rules were of a different nature. In the process, he forgot all caution and his previous concessions.
Comparing the thread size before him to the one before, it should be able to take around three threads.
Placing one thread carefully, mimicking the way he had done it before, nothing of note happened. Placing the second in a similar fashion, the golden thread in the middle seemed a bit strained.
Should I continue?
He was unsure, but in the end, his craving for answers overruled his common sense.
Carefully connecting a third thread, it slowly began to glow in a golden shine like the others.
Taking a step back, he saw the pillar, which now had three branches, tremble, and tremble, and...
"snap"
A sound of tearing could be heard. As the thread before him suddenly tore, first slow, then quicker, and then the lower part fell into the water, cut cleanly by the highest connection that Nox had made. The upper part now motionlessly sways, without aim or direction.
"Interesting"
Did I just slow down the rate of assimilation? A bit of a weird expression bloomed on his face as his thoughts drifted off in a joking manner.
Well, this might have destroyed most of today's progress, but at least I got an answer to the age-old question: Did size matter?