Bone Golem

As my attention was focused entirely on my true circuit, I started appreciating how perfect it was. While building it, all that I thought of was the construction. Searching for flaws. Now I could appreciate the beauty. Every face of the rune perfectly aligned with the circle. Every rune centered on their face of the circle. Each shape aligned to fit with precision that allowed no mana to escape. A beauty of perfection that left the rest of my circuitry looking like slag. A beauty so perfect that any alteration was a threat of ruin.

I'd need to understand the construction of the other nine tiers of the circle before I could make the first composite alteration. I knew that the runes in the outside circles changed into composites as well, but I wasn't sure of any of the rules. Once my primary body started learning composites I could try making my own. Learning from what already existed had limits. Circles were the wrong shape, but nothing I'd seen from anything else had taught me that. Experimentation was worth a thousand explanations.

I understood why my worshippers leaked mana, as well as my creator and Nagt's wizard, they were using circles instead of the true shape of the rune. The leak was nonexistent with basic circuits, but the larger they became and the more mana flowed through them, the weaker the circle became and the more it leaked. My creator's internal circuit was barely leaking at all while the wizard had been leaking so much it was remarkable that it didn't run dry. Though…as I reflected on my Creator's circuit, perhaps nothing in this world stockpiled mana?

My creator had merely been a channel. I was operating in a similar fashion now, but that was an exhausted state for me where it would be its peak state. Was that the norm? But Glrt's brain showed mana stockpiling was something that was understood to be real. Perhaps, did Glrt's kind not reach maturity often? Was it a rare event? Or was it that once it died the circuits would decay, stopping anything that might want to learn from doing so? With the natural defenses Glrt had, it would be very difficult to learn the circuits while it was alive. The mana concentration would also make will mobility more difficult, so those that didn't understand the interaction between will and mana would think they were blocked.

Not all questions could be answered internally. Unfortunately. While basking in the perfection of my true circuit was a p.l.e.a.s.u.r.e above any I'd experienced so far, it didn't help me progress toward true perfection. My will had recovered somewhat, so I now had enough to channel all the mana coming in toward my will-core and observe the world around me at the same time.

What I saw when I expanded my will astounded me. I was surrounded by eighty seven creatures, not including Glrt and Nagt who were grunting up a storm nearby. Most were approximately the same size as Glrt and Nagt before I'd m.a.t.u.r.ed them. My constructs were all larger as well. Especially the splooge construct. It was larger than the blood construct despite it being almost four times as large as when I'd focused inward. I understood why soon enough. Almost all of them were emulating Glrt and Nagt, though instead of discharging into their version of Glrt they pointed at the splooge construct instead. The few that weren't had advanced to the first composite level, though. That was interesting. They also carried weapons. Basic ones, but weapons nonetheless. It took me a second to recognize them from the original party Nagt and Glrt had been a part of.

"What happened? Where did these ones come from?" everyone froze when I spoke. Nagt resumed almost immediately. That seemed to put the rest of them at ease. While I appreciated Nagt's greatly reinforced intent, I didn't like that it seemed to lack control over itself. I'd liked Nagt for being more controlled than Glrt.

Seemed their intent changed in different ways. Glrt was capable of controlling its intent somewhat. "Do you…like my…babies…Mr. Golem? Glrt's…been working…hard…for Mr.…Golem! Nagt! Glrt's…trying to…talk!" While their intent being reinforced was a good thing…I needed to give them more control. I couldn't spare the mana at the moment, so I needed another option. I could force them to focus on me, but that would strain their will-core as the l.u.s.t now colored their entire will. Breaking them after what I'd spent to create them would be such a waste.

"Good job." I turned my attention to one of the first composite creatures. It seemed confused, and little else. Now I was faced with a problem I hadn't encountered before. How to make the creature know I was addressing it when I spoke? My speech didn't come from a direction as I directly imprinted my intent into the air instead of using internal organs to direct air laden with intent outward. Perhaps if I faced it with a construct. I moved my bone construct in front of the one I'd chosen. "You explain to me what's happened. Also, you seem to be different from the rest. Why?"

It reacted with extreme fear and anxiety. It then hid behind one of the others that had reached the first composite stage. That one grabbed it by the head and threw it back to where it had been. "Mgrt doesn't know! Mgrt is young. Mgrt doesn't want to get f.u.c.k.e.d, so Mgrt fights instead. Mgrt gets strong."

The first composite that Mgrt hid behind approached warily. "Mgrt doesn't know but Trgl knows." I turned my bone construct, though it was arranged in a way that it didn't have a face. Maybe if I gave it a face it would make it easier to for them to know who I was addressing. I maneuvered one of the skulls out of the center to provide a face to look at. "Master has been asleep for two months. Glrt has had two broods. Four bears wandered in. Two boars. Humans came once. Everything we killed, we fed to Master." This one had exceptional control. It also had a strong defensive tint to its intent, which surprised me. What was it defending?

I turned my attention to Glrt. Broods, huh? Was that the purpose of splooge? As I explored its body, I found forty more much less developed creatures. Another brood, then? I also noticed that Nagt was using a different orifice as Glrt's brood was in the one it usually f.u.c.k.e.d within a sack that made the hole too shallow for f.u.c.k.i.n.g. As I explored more, I found the opposite of splooge. Inactive, but I could feel the potential. If I could incorporate this into the splooge construct I could produce broods myself. The sack holding the imm.a.t.u.r.e creatures was merely filled with water for them to grow without crushing each other while mana was infused into them, draining Glrt's brain in the process. It was entirely soft now, which was irritating.

Having so little will to spare was irksome, but I still had enough to try learning the runes for this new material. It was collected into larger quantities than the splooge had been, so it was even easier to learn. I still didn't have any mana to spare, so I couldn't alter the splooge construct yet, but I had enough to complete the project.

Being so blind was annoying me, it was time to get more worshippers. It would also serve to give me a larger pool of mana that I couldn't use for refining my will-core. Once I had all of them acc.u.mulating mana, I would have a lot more to work with. Glrt was fine, but having storage with no acc.u.mulation was a bad idea. All I had to do was make sure to leave room for growth and they wouldn't be stunted like Nagt was. They'd still be held back by my level of knowledge, so I couldn't expect any of them to reach the third composite stage, but that barrier would be broken eventually.

Learning the new runes had taken some time, so Trgl had wandered off. I hunted it down with my bone construct. It was a little strange having the skull on the outside where all the straight bones were, but it wasn't difficult. I'd been appreciative of how focused it was, so I would allow it the privilege of being the first worshipper from the broods.

I grabbed Trgl's head and started trying to form the worship rune. It progressed far easier than it had with either Nagt or Glrt. Trgl was amazingly focused. It took the pain with barely a wince. Mgrt w.h.i.n.ed far more, but still much less than Glrt. All of the first composites were more controlled than both Nagt and Glrt. The imm.a.t.u.r.e ones had even less control than Nagt had and less focus than Glrt. It took me a very long time to finish making them all worshippers. A few tried to run, but Trgl brought them back.