I had rather quickly started work on the Demesne that we were now sitting on right after I had shaped the palace, and as such, I hadn't exactly given what he had said immediately after I shaped it too much thought. Pleasantries that usually accompanied my work that were utterly unnecessary here had left me a bit baffled, but I had more important things to work on instead of thinking too hardly about something that probably did not matter too much. After all, it was not like I could laze around, this was the bleeding edge of knowledge that we were sitting on! I needed to get everything ready so that I would have all the tools I could possibly need in order to crack open the knowledge of this realm and to turn it to my ends, so that we could get back to Creation and use what we have found here to make things right and perhaps figure out what had exactly caused things to go so terribly wrong in the first place. If I managed that, if I prevented the deaths of the other Solars and the extreme diminishment of Creation, surely that would make my survival over his worthwhile in the long run? Right? Of course it would, it would allow others to not go through the extreme heartache of having survived while their loved ones had died, and it would prevent the wonders that kept the age running from falling to ruin without the Solars, and particular the Twilight Caste, from being there to repair and provide them. Without us, Creation would be so diminished that it would make the time before the fighting of the Primordials look grand in comparison, at least that was what I assumed. After all, without the Chosen of the Most High to provide for the Mortals, who would be able to properly do it? The Dragon Blooded were functionaries at best and mere soldiers at worst. They could not rule a realm, they didn't have the tools.

In any case, after having finished off the Demesne, I decided to throw myself into working on the statues of Orichalcum that were necessary for the Solar Sanctum while I pondered a few finishing touches on the manse design. After all, while they were enormous and made of magical materials, they actually were not works of artifice, so they came much faster to me than even artifacts did. Giving a bit of a stretch I walked outside from the point I had been working on and found a nice little clearing to do my work in. I had never shifted out of my robes of Starmetal, so I fished around in it until I found what i had been looking for, an Artifact that was a bit like a Cache Egg but worked on a different principle. Instead of going to Elsewhere with it's cargo it would simply shrink while keeping the inside space the same. This did nothing to help with the weights of the objects nor storing them, but shrinking it down was more than enough for my purposes. After all, I simply needed to put it in my pockets. I pulled out five of them, each containing the materials for one of the statues that I would be working on and tossed them on the ground. Naturally, the sheer weight of them made the impacts kick up dust and cause the ground to shake, but it wasn't too much of an issue for me. After all, I had long since reinforced my ability to lift and break things to levels that were suitable to what I needed for working on large projects. 

I tapped two of them, causing them to grow to full scale and open up as I forced a mote of essence into each, spreading out to leave the necessary jewels and orichalcum plain for everyone to see. For the spell, I needed to make five statues of myself, one representing my skill in each of the domains of the Castes. A vision of conquest and martial might for Dawn, a vision of leadership and integrity for Zenith, a vision of sorcerous might for Twilight, a vision of Athletic skill for Night, and a vision of linguistic prowess for Eclipse. All of them would be jeweled with gems that represented the colors that went into the animas of the castes, diamonds and rubies for the Dawn, Topaz and Amber for the Zenith, Sapphire and Ruby for the Twilight, Diamond and Amethyst for the Night, and Diamond and Amber for the Eclipse. The two I had opened up contained the materials for the Dawn and Zenith, as I would make them in the proper order of the progression from Dawn to Night with the Eclipse reserved for last out of reverence for the conjunction of the Sun and Moon that was represented in the most sacred bond between the Lunars and Solars. Focusing my essence I activated the artifacts resting on my back had them begin to work on the Zenith while I worked on the Dawn, both empowered by my puissant solar essence that would speed up the construction of these statues immensely. After all, while they were grand and beautiful, they were ultimately mortal crafts and thus would not even require me to pull from the Excellence that I could pull from my Exaltation.

After a few hours had passed I managed to get the first two statues done and was about to start work on the others when Shinzo came by and dropped in to say hello. My arms were still floating around behind me so I quickly dismissed them, removing their ghostly presence so that I could focus a little bit more on talking with him instead of putting them to use to work further, after all, I could give him a few minutes of undivided attention since he came out to see me, or at least attempt to before my mind wandered off as it usually did. I sighed and shrugged at what he said about getting the work done and said, "Work is never done, Shinzo. There is always something more to do. But if you are just referring to the Demesne, then yes. Currently I am working on some statues for a Solar Circle Sorcery that should let me erect all of the manses I have in mind immediately along with give several other benefits, it requires two more of these rather giant statues in order for it to function," I said, waving at them before continuing, "I'll need to shape some mortals to pray to establish it and wait for a sunny day, but as I still have to perform the shinmaic calibration in the area and the act of forging that Demesne left me with enough left over potential to make enough mortals to do it, it shouldn't be more than a day or two before everything is ready. The most time would be waiting for the weather, which shouldn't be too hard, as well as the twenty five hour period required to reshape the relationship of this area to the Shinma." I believe I answered his question as thoroughly as possible, it probably would take me another four to five hours to get the rest of the statues done, but after that I would just need to spend a day in meditation to reshape the Shinma. I could sleep after I got that done, and then wake up and put that willpower I had gained to use to establish the Sanctuary. "I am glad you enjoyed your sleep, Shinzo. It is always nice to see someone finding use of the Sorcery that I learned. It makes it feel at least somewhat worthwhile as something other than being a tool to futher my knowledge," I say, giving him a bit of a smile as I did so. 

I heard what he had to say on my attitude, and all I could really muster was a shrug. That sounded nice and all, but there really was far too much for me to do before I could take a break. So many things, so much to know, so much to do, so much to save. It had been mostly that way even before I came here, after all, it wasn't as if all the secrets of Creation had been discovered. But at least there it was shared between the sixty twilight castes of Creation, we all did our part to unravel the secrets of the cosmos, even if we had our squabbles and disputes we knew that we contributed to each other's work in immense ways. Whereas here it was just me working alone for the most part, with some help from Shinzo who was less skilled than myself in a great deal of fields. So I had to take up the slack and make sure that everything got done. "That sounds good and all, but breaks should be kept to a minimum when there is so much to do, and I have found enjoyment in my work so I personally don't have too much of an issue with just working," I said, giving him a smile as I tinkered with a scale model of the Twilight Caste statue that I was going to work on next, pressing bits of the scrap metal here and there with my fingers to sculpt it into place to provide a good idea for the design of the next statue, which had me in the process of casting Solar Circle Sorcery, the cracking of reality and white essence represented by diamonds heavily encrusted into thin tendrils of orichalcum. 

I sighed as he said that and shrugged, it was late afternoon at the moment, not even the hour of twilight had come so I had quite a few more hours of work before I would have to sleep. After all, I had gotten my sleep the night before so it wasn't too much of an issue to just push myself throughout the entire day as I went about my work. "Yes yes, I will make sure to get my sleep in as well. It's not even evening yet though so it's not too big of a deal if I continue on, physical fatigue isn't too much of an issue for me so long as I don't spend over ten hours doing grueling heavy lifting, sprinting, or something similar. Mental fatigue doesn't set in for me for a few days of work with how often I spend a great deal of time dedicated to a piece," I said, giving him a bit of a rundown on my limits. Perhaps I was ignoring other, less detrimental signs that didn't affect my working speed or ability, but those were not important to me. It was only when my fatigue started to be an issue to getting things done or I lost out on chances to regain willpower so that I could do my work more effectively that it really mattered. "I appreciate the thought, however, Shinzo. I am glad you care enough to point things like that out to me, but I am fine really. I can continue working at optimal capacity without mental or physical limitations from it," I said, smiling at him as I explained my position on this to him. I was fine, there was nothing wrong. I could continue working, I had to continue working towards my goal. If I stopped, then it might get away from me after all.

I nodded at what he said about smoothing out the wrinkles in causality and said, "Very well, though I am unsure of exactly how much of an issue the redefining of this area's relationship to the Shinma might pose, though I do think due to the way this area is now essentially an Exclave of Creation Enclaved in this land it shouldn't affect the outside too much. It is a completely localized effect after all. Things inside here should likely be contained by the physics of Creation so long as the radius doesn't exceed this place's size." Hopefully that would come as some good news for him, it would let him not have to worry so much about cascade reality failures due to fate knots or similar things. I could always get around to learning that spell that would let me turn off the natural processes of an area so that high energy experiments could be done in it...but I was unsure of how that would affect this place and this land so perhaps that would be a bad idea. Maybe after I have some sort of a safeguard artifact. Things for later, I supposed. 

I sigh as he tries to force me away from my work, and given what he brought up it wasn't exactly something I could say no to. I didn't exactly need a break just yet, at least it didn't seem that way to me as this much work was completely normal for me. I did need to clear up a misconception though, and I began to do so as I stood up and flared my clothing, removing any dust or particulates from my work that had gotten on me as I did so. "I didn't forget about that meditation I put you under, I simply trusted you to come to me when you were ready to talk or that it would be unnecessary as there was nothing there to talk about. Given the fact you brought it up, I shall assume it is the former and that is definitely something that is worth taking a break from my work to discuss," I said, giving him a nod as I began to walk back to the palace. It didn't take long to make it back inside and to a parlor that would serve as an excellent place to discuss it, and I took the opportunity to pull out one of the fruits I had grown accustomed to eating and taking the time to feed myself to make the break seem at least somewhat useful beyond the discussion before saying, "So then, what did you find? Anything of note that we can work with?" I was very curious as to what could have influenced all of the Sidereals as he seemed to imply had happened, so that I could come up with countermeasures should the need arise to counter it when we returned. 

I sigh and shrug at what he said, it wasn't exactly wrong, but it wasn't exactly right either. "Possible, yes. Efficient and wise, no. I didn't want to take a break until the Manses were done at least so that I could leave some automated processes to the artificial intelligence that would be created in order for some work to get done at least while I was taking some sort of break to read or spend time on a more lavish meal. At least that way it wouldn't seem like it was a bit of a waste of time," I said with a shrug before pre-empting his response to it by saying, "I still get my sleep as that isn't a waste since it gives me back my willpower and helps with reducing mental fatigue after a point, but general leisure is less important since all it does is slightly increase my mote restoration since I already restore so much more than that with these." I said, gesturing at one of my protoshinmaic vortices that were embedded in my skin to illustrate my example. That was my thinking on it at least, the ways I gained Essence beyond just simple relaxation were far more bountiful than just relaxation, so it was just sort of a waste of time to do that when I didn't have something else going on in the background to at least do some of the planning for me to make things easier. 

I knew what he was saying, I guess he simply misinterpreted what I meant so it was up to me to clarify what I meant by that and as such I prepared to give a bit of a lecture on the subject matter. "Oh, I am aware that there likely is a void in fate, but that works to our advantage more than likely. What I meant was that now that this area is for all intents and purposes an area outside the normal fate of this world, the effects of what we do in here only affect the closed system of more creation-esque fate that we have constructed within, creating far fewer issues once it is finally all settled. Our connection to the rest of the world is only on the physical, on a metaphysical level this might as well be an alien realm whose borders are dark to the rest of the world. So unless one is observing it through means that are not that of the fate of this area, it would be likely impossible to see inside as well due to this," I said, nodding along to my own dissertation on the matter before replying to what he said at the end, "I appreciate your effort at working out the issues caused by this, and at least going by what would be less work in the long run based on the portal among other things, I would recommend making fate sidestep this area, finalizing it's metaphysical 'separation' if you will, much like this was a place of the Wyld or Malfeas to this world. Able to be interacted with, but of a totally different fate. If there is anything I can do to help make this transition easier, please do let me know. I would be more than willing to help share the burden."

I nodded as I listened to him speak on that matter, the very fact that he saw two visions spoke of some unnatural influence upon them, even if the source was utterly unknown. It was good that I had suggested this, it gave significant results even if we did not manage to tack down the source from this. I stayed silent on the matter as he paused, as I figured it would be a wiser idea to address it all at once instead of taking things piecemeal. This was something I would need to analyze heavily, it was work that made this break worthwhile even if it distracted from the main discussion here. I listened to his breakdown of what could have possibly caused it, and I agreed that normally that they should have been able to notice something, that the use of this charm couldn't have been the only way to detect it. They likely had something to show them that mental influence was at work. The lack of Astrological Charms and likely no Sidereal Art that could do such a thing left very few options. With an effort of Will and expenditure of Essence, my mind reached for both supreme excellence in Lore and the Occult, pushing my mind to extremes that none could fathom unless they were to do the same, causing my anima to flare straight to the iconic as I pondered this.

"I agree, your assessment is likely correct in regards to it not being Kejak at least from what you have said. I also agree that outside mental influence is unlikely except from the most powerful sources. It is a possibility that this might have been the work of the Maidens themselves, but I do not find this likely as there was something unclear in the prophecy. Not only that, but it seems extremely odd to me that it would manifest in the way you have described if it was their influence, it seems so base and inelegant. So while this is a possibility for the source, I consider it extremely unlikely and a source of last resort," I said, bringing up the possibility and then dismissing it, "For other sources it could have been something done by one of the Yozi, but again, it seems odd that such a thing would not have been detected by heaven if it was done right then." I think a little on it before answering, "The last possibility, and the one that seems rather out there but the most likely of the things that I can even think of is some imperfection or lasting curse upon the Exaltation. It would require further corroboration with other instances of oddities occurring within the Chosen as a whole and looking deep into the Exaltations themselves, but it is a possibility. If it is a Curse, it must have lingered for an extremely long time, the aftershock war at the very least. Something that could affect the Exaltations would have to come from Autochthon himself, or the power of multiple unrestrained primordials, perhaps using the last bits of their power to do it. What they could have done is beyond what I can say at the moment given my limited information, as well as how it might be fixed or how it might manifest for others, but if this is the case, it is highly unlikely that it is just the Chosen of the Maidens who are effected," I said, giving the last bits of my summation before coming out of the trance, letting the essence stay but not actively drawing upon that and asking, "Do you have anything else on the matter that I can work from? Anything at all would be very helpful in spotting other possibilities I might have missed or confirming these."

I thought about what he said, turning it over and over again in my head, thinking about all the permutations of what was possible before realizing that something was wrong with what he said, at least when it came to the Maidens. There wasn't any way they would not have a clear way to stitch if they were truly involved, after all, they dictated fate from something else, something that I had come across in my deep study of the Wyld and the nature of the Shinma themselves, that which governed causality and the flow of events when Fate was not involved. Thinking on it more, it once again became a possibility as their motivations all differed, so it could all come from how the future would unfold best for their plans to come about, however for that to be true then at least the Prophecy of Darkness that foretold the very destruction of Creation itself likely would have to be false. After all, the maidens would not be in disagreement on something as basic as if Creation would be destroyed or not based on Samsara more than likely. Even at this stage, Samsara as a whole was something I could touch upon without knowing the contents, knowing only the form and theory of it so I could never truly know what they may or may not have seen, I could only guess from their actions. Not only that, but it was entirely possible it did not contain the knowledge of all the future, so I would ignore it for now and focus more on the potential motives for the weaving of this future.

"Perhaps that might be true...but in that case the Vision of Darkness would likely be a fabrication, at least insofar as the destruction of Creation as a whole being a result of it is, and the specifics might be false in the prophecy, but rather consider the motives of each of the Maidens and what would be brought about by each prophecy" I said, channeling the Essence running through my mind, expanding it astronomically, "Mercury wishes to make things progress, which naturally goes with the Vision of Gold. Venus wishes for people to be happy, which looks at first to be part of the Vision of Gold, but considering the possible drawbacks might be Bronze, hence the indecision. Mars wishes for conflict, and the usurpation and fall of civilized society benefits that. Jupiter wishes for secrets, and the fall of the Solars would ensure the continued existence of them. Saturn wishes for endings, and this would be an ending of an era. So it does make sense that they would try to enact such a thing through each of their respective groups of Chosen. However I do see some potential hiccups in this." I sighed and shook my head as I said that before continuing, "If there was influence from them, then I am unsure if even this charm could notice it. They are the masters of Fate, and it would make sense that it would be insanely difficult to detect their hand, especially with something of the same source if they wanted it hidden. Furthermore, the way you described them being animalistic almost seems quite out of touch at least for those not of Mars when it comes to the influence. It is not an impossibility, but again I say this is merely a possibility and a not very likely one."

I nod at what he says, indeed I can think of the perfect time for them to have done something such as this. "Indeed, during the final stages of the Primordial War. That is the most likely place that this could have occurred, when we condemned those that would become the Neverborn to death. Perhaps during the extreme disruptions caused by their death on Creation, or even during the Three Spheres Cataclysm. Those opportunities could have provided enough power to do something horrendous to the Exaltations that we could not even know of. Indeed, it could have happened before the Cataclysm and we could have even known about it, but that knowledge could have been destroyed in it. We shall never know if that was the case however, after all, that Cataclysm destroyed so much. It isn't even incompatible with the flaw theory, indeed, if there was a flaw in the Exaltation they could have exploited it without Autochthon's knowledge," I said, giving my ideas to him to ponder before addressing what he said at the end. "Indeed, and I agree that the latter is what we should likely focus on. It would require time and effort to test here, but not theoretically beyond my abilities. It would have made things much easier if we were in creation and had access to Lytek and his tools, but that is impossible for now. I could lengthen our stay and focus on creating something that could view an Exaltation in enough detail to search for that sort of thing, we could attempt to look for outward symptoms of the curse in either of us, which might be easier since I happen to know of a Solar Charm that activates when we are under unnatural mental influence, or we could wait until we get back and I can focus on the materials here to speed things up. I think the second option is probably the wisest one, as if we can find those symptoms we can shift to the first one for more information if it bears fruit and is pressing enough to be willing to wait," I said, laying out the options we have before us for consideration and asking his opinion on the matter.

I nodded as he said that, "Very well, I shall do that. I can try to create something that will let you record your memories in some fashion and analyze them with the artificial intelligence as well if you would like in order to make it easier. It shouldn't be too hard considering that the concept of Dreamstones already exists. I would simply need something to record it and deal with the compression issue, nothing I shouldn't be able to come up with or work around with the power of a networked intelligence like what the central manse will have," I said with a shrug as I continued, "I shall keep that under advisement. I will say you can probably search for that sort of influence with this as well, and probably disprove it. I am going to move under the theory that it is likely the Exaltation Curse/Flaw and work from there. It makes the most sense at least from my perspective, and is the only one we can actively test at the moment beyond a dream analysis that might be able to be altered," I said with a shrug. "In any case if that is all I think I am going to head out to continue my wor--" I started to say before I missed a step and snagged myself on the carpet, landing face firms. Luckily, it didn't cause any harm, but it was obvious that I had exhausted myself far more than I had thought with that channelling of knowledge, "Or I would have if I wasn't obviously more exhausted than I thought I was. That exercise must have taken it's toll on me more than I had anticipated. I very rarely use both of those at the same time..."

As he helped me up, I sighed and shook my head, weary from the intense mental strain that had come from coming to grasp with that much knowledge after having had pushed myself more than a little bit earlier on in the day. The acute fatigue had already begun to wear off rather quickly, and I knew that if I really wanted to I could easily push myself into working on the projects I had to do without much issue. However, those projects would also put a drain on my willpower enough that I likely would either be unable to bring my most powerful sorcery to bear without relying on my Phylactery, or if I could it would leave me dangerously drained of will. As such, I decided it would be a wise decision to focus my attention elsewhere for now, on plans and other things that did not require me to expend my force of will in order to make them work. That would be the best idea, and while I could not do such things in my sleep...though that might be a good charm idea for later, I could work on some of them while he was giving me a massage, so that would be a decent enough way to come to a middle ground here. He likely had some way of helping me recover my will anyway, which would likely have far fewer side effects than my solution to the issue, after all, necrotic energy had all sorts of side effects when channeled directly through my charms rather than through my necromancy. "I suppose I can take you up on that massage then Shinzo," I said as I started to walk over to the backless couch that was in the lounge before flopping down on it. 

As I relaxed on it, I pondered what else he had said, and tried to come up with responses to it. The bit about the prophecies I didn't really have anything to say that hadn't been said, so I decided to let that lie. However, I could work with what he had said about the first option that we had, after all, it was far more involved than it might seem on it's face to an outsider who didn't specialize in the kinds of crafts that I did. "The main issue is not wanting to start work on something of that magnitude without other evidence that it might be the case. In Creation, access to Lytek's tools would provide an easy way to do it without having to worry about creating the tools, but each of the tools necessary would likely be a creation on par with the portal to leave this place, and unlike the portal, I do not have as solid of an idea of the plans for it or how the internal mechanics might even work, let alone what kinds of exotic materials I would need to work with them," I said, sighing as i did so before continuing, "I am not even sure if this realm has the right kinds of materials or enough to work with such things, and while I am sure I have the right kinds of materials with me for the portal, at least so long as the design isn't radically different to get back, I cannot be sure of whether or not I have what I need for those tools. As such, I would really rather save the creation of such things for after it becomes obvious that they would be useful and after seeing if I can find suitable materials in this realm to use." I hoped I had gotten across my point like I had wanted, after all, the colossal undertaking that these tools represented was on the scale of works left behind by the Great Maker. It was only through the fact I was one of the greatest of the Twilight Caste that such a thing was within the realm of plausibility.

I tilt my head, obviously a bit confused at his reaction to my offer of help in the matter of analyzing the dreams, but end up shrugging and deciding to clarify as he seemed to think it would be an invasion of his privacy. "Well, I would of course be building in provisions so that any data would be able to be protected from anyone's access, even my own, and since you would be a root administrator registered with the Sentience at the same level as myself, I would not be able to override this without noticeably re-configuring the manse on a physical level. I simply was offering you access to an intelligence that could sift through it systematically while referencing the archives that I was going to install with my knowledge of the occult, specifically of Essence Theory, Charms, and Sorcery, along with knowledge of the principles of the Perfected Lotus so that it could scan for you. But if you do not wish for anything to look into your memories at all, then I will respect that," I said with a shrug and a sigh, "I just hope that you will be able to find something so that we can have some more leads." After saying that, I simply rested on the couch belly down and drew a pillow under my head as I waited for him to make good on his offer of a massage.