'Wait, that's impossible…'
For Draconis descendants, it would make sense for their fire to turn hotter after absorbing more of it than what they produced themselves. After all, once their core would be created, it would turn into an entity internally separated from the rest of Draconis authority, making it either incredibly hard or even impossible for them to infuse more fire into their core.
But for him? For a descendant of the Phoenix?
To bring back the comparison that Draconis used, no matter how many buckets of water one would pour into the river, it would never increase in size! The most one could do was to paddle on it, trying to change its flow at least in a small part of the current.
"But what's more important… Why did that pebble break apart?"
As irritating as the lack of understanding of the phenomena that took place in his own body was, the fact that he didn't move forward with his mission at all was the real cause of Fen's frustration. When it came to his own situation, the young man already accepted the fact that what others could learn with just a simple hint or advice, he would have to properly study while taking his different constitution into account. But when it came to the mission, he actually did exactly as he was ordered to!
"Fuck it… I guess I will try again."
As deep in the forest as the young man already was, finding another spirit didn't pose any challenge at all. In just a few minutes of tearing himself through the thick vegetation, Fen noticed several other small beings along with one whose fire was reaching the size of an adult, rather than just a fist like all the other spirits he saw so far.
'Is this a ninth level natural monster?'
Taking the information that Mark shared into account, Fen quickly deducted. Given how there was a clear difference both in terms of size and the aura that this several times bigger flame was giving off, this spirit being on a higher level than the others was the only plausible explanation!
Yet, as curious as the young man was when seeing the slightly greater spirit, given how his mission was to bring one of the pebbles left from them after he would absorb their fire, it didn't really matter whether he would obtain one from the lowest possible spirit or an entity of the higher level. After all, what would be the point of intentionally making one's task harder?
Sadly, picking on the small spirits didn't change anything. Every time Fen would tune his own flames to perfectly match that of the spirit and then absorb it all. But right as the last bit of the flame would leave the surroundings of the red pebble, exposing it to the natural world, it would shatter away in a hot mist!
"Just what the hell am I supposed to do?"
After several failed attempts, each of which made Fen feel like if his internal flame got a bit hotter, or to put it in his own terms, started flowing a bit faster, the young man's eyes inevitably wandered over to the greater spirit.
"Maybe I will get to learn something from that one?"
Muttering to himself as his steps carried him closer to the fire entity, Fen once again repeated the same steps. Tune his fire to the spirit, mix them together and start absorbing them. With how many times he did it over the last hour, Fen didn't really need to think about each of the steps anymore, allowing his guts to guide him.
But to his surprise, right as he managed to swallow a small portion of the greater spirit fire aura, it seemed as if it changed!
'Is this thing already alive?'
That was the first notion that appeared in the young man's head. But after a moment of though, Fen only shook his head and threw this idea away. The fact that this spirit's fire changed didn't necessarily mean it was alive. While one could call this change to be its defense mechanism against someone like Fen absorbing its aura and inevitably leading to its death, a lot of plants developed certain countermeasures against different natural enemies of theirs as well, yet no one would dare to claim that plants were alive, as in, possessed consciousness!
'Should I adapt to the change then?'
Calming his worries down, Fen continued to stare at the spirit in front of him. Despite losing a huge chunk of its aura, contrary to obvious expectation, it seemed that it was even more powerful now! While its external layer of fire as cold as that of any other spirit that Fen consumed so far, what was hidden underneath was actually about as hot as the fires that burned young man's body during his execution!
'I guess I won't be able to just snatch the pebble from the inside…'
Just a single look at the fire burning in front of him was enough for the young arcanist. If he were to forcefully push his bare hand into it, then even his natural resistance to fire would be all for naugh!
"What about this, then?"
Once again covering his fist with his fire, Fen changed it to fit the now hotter flames of the spirit. Despite both of the fires reaching an astonishing level of heat, with how it was his own creation, he was completely immune to its effect. And just like that, as if the problem didn't exist in the first place, Fen managed to merge his fires with those of the spirit!
'Now… slowly…'
Rather than acting rather recklessly like he did so with the other spirits, Fen made sure that the rate at which he was absorbing the fire was slow. Slow enough for him to stop right as only an incredibly small layer of spirit's fire remained!
'Now for the hard part…'
With his next action being a completely random guess, the young man didn't have anything to lose by experimenting like that. Rather than absorbing the rest of the aura, using the fact that their fires were currently mixed, Fen actually started to slow down their flow rate!
At first, there seemed to be some kind of resistance, as if the pebble itself was attempting to keep its fires hot. Thankfully, with enough carefully increased pressure, their combined fires started to cool down, all the way to the point where they were no different from the air that was caressing Fen's face!
"Now!"
Shouting to add some courage to his actions, Fen separated the flames, leaving the pebble surrounded by an extremely thin layer of its own fires, before reaching for it with his hand!
The feeling of grasping the hard texture of the pebble was strangely familiar to the young man. While by itself, it felt as if he just grabbed a random, slightly warm stone, the fact that he finally achieved what he was sent to the forest for was enough to fill his entire soul with joy!
But instead of jumping in happiness, Fen couldn't help but reach for the token that Mark gave to him before sending the young man into the forest.
"It's actually the same?"
Muttering those words to himself, the young arcanist apprentice rubbed both of the items with the thumbs of his both hands. And just like he noticed, the feeling that those two crystals gave, was nearly the same!
Stop.
No matter how curious Fen was about the true nature of the token that his teacher gave him, in one moment, all the thoughts disappeared from his mind. The hunter's instinct that he cultivated over the long years of hunting in the forest, set of all the alarms in his head that the young man could think off!
It seemed as if something monstrous was approaching!