[center][img]https://i.imgur.com/7oQVf7m.png[/img][/center] Luis soared through the Blue with Bruna on his back, the two getting having spent some time getting used to working with one another. They were above the north pole, where a number of peaks of the the Broken Crown Mountain Range poked up into Azura’s sphere from the Isle of Twilight down below. The soaring knight had weaved in and around these peaks, while engaging in a spot of target practice. Targets had been carefully carved in stone and they had then been subjected to the concentrated wind blasts fired from Bruna’s horn like soul gem, resulting in craters, gashes and bored holes littering the area. [color=RoyalBlue]Well this was productive[/color] he thought as he examined his gradual improvements in accuracy [color=RoyalBlue]But I wonder if Azura is done making her soul collectors yet?[/color] [color=Silver]Bruna acknowledges your progress. Bruna does not know. Current location does not allow for estimating the number of days cycles that have occured since arrival.[/color] Bruna responded unhelpful. Deciding that now was as good a time to check in as any the whale left behind his impromptu self made training ground and headed the short distance towards the Sky Bastion, where Azura had set up shop upon their arrival. A number of temples had ended up in the area, some of which were covered in veritable gardens of greenery thanks to the occasional arrival of rain clouds from the Gateway to Galbar found below. Apparently this had not been the case before, but now that Azura had properly linked her sphere to the world below there was a lot more greenery to be found up in the Blue, much to the delight of the Grazer Drakes. Azura could be found inside one of the hangers of the Sky Bastion working on her soul saving constructs. The doors of it were flung open and as a result the pair could see one another and speak, or rather shout, too one another. The occasional sky slug flitted in and out of the hanger in search of food where none could be found. [color=RoyalBlue]”Hello Azura, how are things going? You free to talk now?”[/color] Luis asked her once he came up to the bastion, parking himself alongside it. Bruna actually had corridors specifically meant for docking up with the building’s hangers, but Luis instead chose to move an eye in front of the doorway, peering in at Azura while she worked. [color=lightblue]“I’ve got the core design down and getting close to the end of putting the instructions in now, so yes, I’m free now. Thank you for giving me the space to do this, I think it’s going to turn out wonderfully.”[/color] she responded [color=lightblue]“OH. Did you think of any suggestions while you were out practicing? How did that go by the way”[/color] [color=RoyalBlue]”It went well. Think I’m getting the hang of this whole fighting thing perhaps?”[/color] he answered before suggesting that [color=RoyalBlue]”Maybe you could make them not do the ‘this one will’ thing? I told mine to just use its name instead but it’s still a bit awkward to hear ‘Bruna will this’ and ‘Bruna will that’”[/color] [color=lightblue]“You gave it a name. A person name? No no no, they aren't supposed to have people names”[/color] she said a touch incredulously [color=RoyalBlue]”Why not? Its convenient. And less of a mouthful than the name you gave it. No offence.”[/color] [color=lightblue]“Because I specifically made them to be as un-person like as possible. They don’t think, they don’t feel, they have no dreams or ambitions and certainly no feelings. I want a clear line between people and tools and naming them blurs that distinction. It’s why I don’t want them using ‘I’ because they have no self. Machines are their purpose and function and nothing more, which makes it ok to use them as tools.”[/color] she responded, getting a little worked up over this as she did with a lot of things. [color=RoyalBlue]”Why is this so important to you”[/color] he asked, his tone curios rather than dismissive [color=lightblue]“Because I need to be good person! But there isn't time to reflect or build some kind of ethics system. There isn't time to try and plumb the depths of my smothered mind in the hopes that I can fine done their either and the Void only knows if I’d like what I found. So I’m just winging it and making this massive teetering tower of decisions which i don’t know if their the right ones and one day it's all going to come crashing down anyway and gah.”[/color] she groaned at the ceiling [color=lightblue]“People’s free will is important. I can’t make people who want to do what I want, because then they aren't free they are slaves to my and my mission. I can’t make people who I then convince some of to do what I want because there is no way of stopping me from making their minds predisposed to agreeing with me because when it comes down to it their minds are built out of mine. So I make things that aren't people but still feels wrong in a way. Like I could make them people if I wanted and that I am technically stealing their person-hood from them? Which is why I want to make sure I can’t mistake them for people.”[/color] she finished before asking [color=lightblue]“Sorry for rambling again, but does that make sense?”[/color] [color=RoyalBlue]”I don't think that is how that works? People aren't people until they are people I think. Otherwise everything that could be people, the rocks. The air. Those tiny things in the ocean I eat would be people and that is a touch… excessive? I think we should worry more about the people who are people rather than the things that could be people?”[/color] [color=lightblue]“You are right.”[/color] she agreed after a brief silence. [color=lightblue]“I told myself I would focus on helping people first and foremost. Thank you for reminding me.”[/color] [color=RoyalBlue]”Speaking of people, if it’s not ok to make people to convince to help you, isn’t it ok to convince people who already exist to help you?”[/color] he asked, trying to direct the conversation towards more a more productive/optimistic area. [color=lightblue]“Well yes. I’ve already got two gods helping me. There’s the void souls as well but that’s putting the cart before the horse.”[/color] [color=RoyalBlue]”Maybe the other gods made people like me?”[/color] he asked, a touch hopefully. [color=lightblue]“Perhaps. Those would also be ok to recruit I suppose. Freeing them from servitude would also a good thing I think? People would prefer to be free, where as my machines would not care if they had no one instructing them. Which makes how I am making them a better way of doing things.”[/color] she concluded, putting a final stamp on her logic. [color=RoyalBlue]”I agree. It would be nice to meet new people and help them.”[/color] He responded. He like the idea of having friends who where like him, creations not creators. As much as Azura tried to avoid acknowledging her god/parenthood in their conversations it was always there, lingering in the background unsaid. Literally in this case as she tinkered away, writing instructions into the very soul of the new life she was in the process of creating. That life it seemed, had finally reached completion. It was a bird, roughly crow shaped but scaled up to about the size of a vulture, one with spectacular feathers like Azuras and the Gardeners. The feathers of this first one where shades of orange, red and purple but as Azura began to replicate it there came others, with feathers of blue and turquoise others with green and yellow and so on. Small spectrum of shades rather than the set colors of the Gardeners. All of these had long flowing tail feathers that trailed behind them on the ground as they stood motionlessly, awaiting activation. The source of this stillness was the additions of non living parts to the creatures. They had metallic braces along their wings that held a single soul gem each as well as numerous slots to store numerous soul crystals, much like the one found inside Bruna. On their heads they wore pointed masks of Luftstone as white as polished marble into which where set three soul gems, one above the forehead and one over each eye. [color=lightblue]“They are inspired by you and your armor”[/color] Azura explained [color=lightblue]“although functionally they work the other way round. The birds are very simple, a bundle of instincts and little else while the crystals do most of the task related decision making. They can sense the dying and recently dead and can also infer the intelligence level of a being’s soul. They can also crystallize souls like I can and can store them like your armor can. All these abilities together mean they can go out into the world in my place to save people from Katharsos’s flames. Then they will bring the souls to the vault for safekeeping. They’ll also be super useful for when we assault the pyres, helping to pick out the people from the trees. Also you can control them like your armor and the curators. Take a couple dozen for yourself before I release the rest for testing purposes.”[/color] [color=RoyalBlue]”I see.”[/color] he said simply, before reaching out and doing just that. At his behest a flock of the creatures, who now filled many of the rooms of the surface of the Sky bastion as Azara kept replicating them, flew out to meet him. [silver]Coming to you[/silver] they told him as they did so. Azura had apparently listened to his suggestion, removing the rpetive ‘This one will’ out of their speaking pattern, rather than it being lost in her ramblings, which was nice. Despite their heavy mechanical additions they flew swifty, aided by Azura’s blessed wind. He noted, as he trolled through these creatures crystals, that they too had the capacity for violence like Bruna, namely wind beams and shielding. They also had the ability to manipulate things with wind based phantom limbs, an ability he got Bruna to replicate right away. Once the flock had landed on his back and took up roosts in Bruna’s many halls Azura told him that [color=lightblue]“That's about enough of them I think. Now we test them”[/color] before turning to the rows and rows of motionless birds and announcing. [color=lightblue]“Awaken my soul collector birds, and go fulfill your purpose!”[/color] she instructed, at which point the hundreds of birds awoke and began to make their way past her. Luis backed out the way as the colorful swarm burst up and out of the way as they began launching themselves out of the hangerbay and flying up into the Blue. [color=RoyalBlue]”Can I suggest something a touch shorter? For the name?”[/color] he said tentatively. [color=lightblue]“How about Reaper Birds? Soul Takers? hmmm”[/color] she suggested, seemingly not perturbed by his suggestion [color=RoyalBlue]”How about Alma?”[/color] he said [color=lightblue]“It’s not very descriptive.”[/color] she complained [color=RoyalBlue]”Most names aren't”[/color] he said [color=lightblue]“... I suppose not. It is a nice name. Ok then. Alma they are.”[/color] Azura said as she followed the last of them out. The birds where ascending now, having been programmed with an inherent understanding of the Blue’s strange geometry and how to use it to travel faster. Once they were high enough almost all of them headed off in one direction, rocketing south as fast as they could. [color=lightblue]“That’s odd. I thought they would spread out to go find the gardeners?”[/color] Azura commented as they all raced off. [color=RoyalBlue]”Maybe someone made something else smarter?”[/color] he said. [color=lightblue]“No. No surly not… If they have... We should follow them!”[/color] shouted as she took off after them without explaining her logic.Thus began a relatively short chase during which Luis got to see traverse roughly half of the blue in a rather short amount of time. Rising high into the air he encountered its shrinking geometry, then flew after the birds, watching as the flat representation of the world below raced by below him. Eventually he caught up with Azura on the southern continent, the one he did not know was called Atokhekwol. There he saw what the Alma had found. [color=RoyalBlue]”So. What are they”[/color] [color=lightblue]“People.”[/color] she explained. [color=lightblue]“It looks like made the Alma just in time.”[/color] [hider=summary] Luis does some time at the range shooting targets Azura and Luis talk a bit about things while she finishes the soul collecting birds she is making In short, Azura is still putting herself under a lot of pressure and also does not have a real reason to do good other than an innate desire to do so which makes her worry that her actions might not be truly. Recruiting other god’s creations to their cause and/or freeing them from servitude is also discussed as a alternative to making servants/soldiers and as a generally good thing to do. Azura finishes the soul collecting birds. Luis takes a few to keep as a fighter complement while the rest are released to test their mortal finding abilities. Luis suggests naming them Alma instead of using another one of Azura’s word vomit names The birds all go down to Atokhekwoi and find the Ihokhetlani. Azura and Luis follow them and thus become the first to witness Ohannakeloi’s masterwork. Linguistic not:construct soul crystals are now referred to as soul gems just to make a distinction between artificial and natural soul crystals. [/hider] [hider=might summary] Start: 6 fp, 0 mp Alma (reaper birds) 3 mp empowered by soul crystal port. 0mp blessing discounted by wind, Alma are assisted by the wind in their flight. 0mp blessing discounted by soul crystal port to allow Bruna to copy the powers of other soul crystals. End: 3 fp, 0 mp Portfolio progress: Tonnikala (7/10) Birds (6/10 [/hider] [hider=creation summary] Alma (reaper birds) [img]https://i.imgur.com/op4MnUi.png[/img] Vulture sized constructs that can: Detect souls at long distances and judge their intelligence level Crystalise souls Transport souls and gain power from them to offset their weight and help them defend their precious cargo Shoot wind beams, create wind shields and create wind based elemental limb to manipulate objects [/hider]