“Awake and aware? Good, because it turns out we’re encroaching on a local martial society’s scheduled time, so it would be best to go over this quickly. I’ll start with your movement technique, since it’s the easiest one,” Favonia said, wasting no time from the moment she saw Krahe awake.

  Krahe slowly sat up, stretching in place and hissing when she came upon a particularly sore spot. She glanced at Favonia sideways and raised an eyebrow, waiting for her to continue as she began rubbing one of the remedies the saintess had provided on one of her many bleeding bruises. It was a sort of translucent-orange gel, one that burned and thrummed at first, but then numbed the pain and soon enough made the bruise start shifting colour as if on fast-forward.

  “It’s good for what it is,” Favonia said frankly. “I can’t find any real issues with it that aren’t obviously a result of your inability to use the method to its full extent. I liked what you showed me towards the very end. If you can pull off that kind of manoeuvering more consistently, that alone will place you a cut above. The name doesn’t make much sense to me, but I don’t know what it refers to, so…” She shrugged.

  Krahe nodded, “That’s why I’m chasing after a soulbeast, a graft to help me more easily slip into the mental state that Afterburner requires without having to put my neck on the line. My real issue are my thaumaturgies, anything that fully relies on implosion-burning has one crippling flaw or another, and no matter how much I try to solve the issue, I can never find the right equilibrium. They vary too much from cast to cast, even within the same cast the power output will fluctuate wildly.”

  After thinking for a few moments, Favonia spoke. “I will not go on at length explaining the intricacies and history of the matter, you can research them on your own time. What matters here is the reason your thaumaturgy behaves as it does, which is the same reason both anathemism and advanced thauma-burning methods are desirable. They both permit the elevation of base thaumaturgy by way of further refinement prior to use — the raw thauma is not only further transformed, but also imbued with stronger intent and perhaps even the caster’s own gnosis, that is to say profound understanding. Thus, it allows thaumaturgy to more effectively fulfill its purpose. This refinement and transformation of thauma is “mutandis.” Anathemism carries it out through brute force, allowing anyone to achieve the heightened state of thaumaturgy, while advanced burning methods achieve it through training, modification of the Soul Furnace, or both, or even other, more obscure methods. Anathemism is a parallel path, given your Solomon Howitzer you must’ve already noticed that anathemism benefits from your skill in its sister discipline, as well as from the modified state of your Soul Furnace. The two can coexist, as they do within your Solomon Howitzer, but it requires meticulous balance to make them work together, else anathema will readily overpower thauma and drown out any profundity, no matter how refined. I could go on at length using counterparts of drive and form, light and dark, yin and yang, but it would be pointless, you already understand. You would likely only grow frustrated and shoot me again.”

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  “You said you wouldn’t go on at length,” Krahe noted, though she didn’t mind.

  Favonia smirked. “Even the shortest path to the summit is one of a thousand steps. Trust me, this is the shortened version. As I was saying… Actually, that was almost everything. Why do you think the thauma refined through your implosion-burning is unstable?”

  “The only possible reason that comes to mind is that, out of six possible “control rods,” I have only formed four. But it feels almost too obvious of an answer, or maybe like an answer that sounds obvious but is in fact absurdly difficult,” Krahe said.

  “You’re using Dao Pillars to perform multi-layered mutandis very quickly, of course an incomplete set would cause instability. Other methods could be fine, but the method you’ve described is obviously set up so that it requires all six pillars to function properly, just as a furnace can’t stand only on two legs. This is likely also the reason the internal injuries you sustained during the raid were as severe as they were. The higher you climb, the more perilous the fall. The danger of clawing for more strength only grows from here on out.”

  “Dao Pillars? I’m not exactly well versed in daoism, I’ll have to disappoint you,” Krahe admitted.

  For once, Favonia was the one growing frustrated, and Krahe had to admit she took some measure of joy in this.

  With a huff, she shook her head, and began gesturing as she spoke. “It was the most suitable descriptor that came to mind. These control rods of yours are formed from intrinsic truths of who and what you are, or perhaps from some profound beliefs you hold, yes? Then just reflect on yourself and finish the last two. It couldn’t be a simpler thing. Those you have already completed ought to point the way. If you find yourself struggling for direction, consider trying to write a poem based on your existing pillars and then complete it. The only roadblocks are not knowing yourself and lacking the mental strength to condense the pillar, neither of which is an issue from which you suffer.”

  “There might be a small issue with that,” Krahe said. “Of the four control rods I’ve completed, I can only define three.”

  “In words? That is… Hm. Not better than most, but higher than most. It doesn’t matter if you can define it in words, if you have succeeded in solidifying it, then you understand it. There are some things that, no matter how complete one’s understanding of them, cannot be directly expressed in words. Teaching these things is insufferable, since you must write around what you wish to teach, sort of cage it in with mental exercises and metaphor.”

  “I don’t want to seem unthankful, but-” Krahe began, only for the damned saintess to interrupt her again.

  “-my advice sounds obvious, I know. But how long would it have taken you to consider these options, left to your own devices? You would have kept hyperfocusing on one thing or another instead of trying the simplest solution. Tell me I am wrong, go on. I know this is true because I have also met with these pitfalls. You overthink and become paralyzed with choices.”

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