Elemental Cats

Although Toz was overjoyed at Asilean telling him he might have a solution, Toz wondered why he couldn't bring it up when everyone was still around.

"Great! Let's hear it."

"Well… It's kind of–"

Since Asilean hesitated so much, Taienra interrupted and spoke for him.

"He thinks bonding with you might help you create a leg that will work. But since he just said he didn't want to establish the bond, he's embarrassed."

"How would that work? Don't you have the spatial element?"

"I do. But I also have the void element. And I don't know how much you know about the void element, but it kind of acts as an antithesis of every other element. Void magic usually works on the principle of breaking apart and dispelling other kinds of magic and objects, turning them into nothingness."

Toz was beginning to see what Azilean was getting at. If he could create a leg while combining metal and void magic, he could possibly reduce or remove the lingering metal mana that interfered with Scrael's magic.

"Are you sure?"

Since Asilean had been far from keen on establishing the bond, Toz didn't know if Asilean really wanted to go through with it for such a meager possibility.

"I'm sitting on a possible way to give Scrael a new leg. Considering she lost her leg due to us, opening up that possibility is the least I can do."

Asilean didn't mention it, but he had seen how Toz and the cats interacted over the last few days and how dedicated Toz had been to helping Scrael. Those aspects helped alleviate some of Asilean's doubts and made it easier for him to choose to establish a bond with Toz.

Most of the time he spent in deep thought was more about whether it would really work using void magic or not. Asilean realized that his previous reasons for rejecting the bond were flimsy and unfair toward Taienra.

Asilean saying that he couldn't accept the bond because of Taienra would be like blaming her for both Toz and all the cats, Asilean included, losing an opportunity to increase their talent.

Since Asilean had resolved himself to accept the bond, Toz didn't try to persuade him otherwise.

Toz reached out with his hand, his palm facing downward. The cat's paw symbol on the topside of his hand waited for Asilean's paw to make contact.

As soon as Toz displayed the symbol, Asilean instinctively knew what to do. All he had to do was reach for the symbol with his paw, touch it and if he felt like it, connect with the symbol using his mana.

Although Asilean knew what to do and that nothing special would happen to him, he still looked skeptical as he placed his paw on top of Toz's hand. However, his skepticism didn't sprout into anything, as he only felt a tingling sensation when he touched the symbol.

Asilean also felt the bond between Toz and himself, as well as the other cats. Rather than a bond, it felt like his mind had gained an awareness of Toz's existence that acted separately from what Asilean perceived with his senses. And when he tried it out, Asilean could feel the mana following his will more smoothly. It was like Toz had said, nothing truly special about it.

Toz, on the other hand, was caught up in a whirlwind of sensation.

When he bonded with Nil, a feeling of stiffness and rigidity overtook his body. With Lucy, darkness enveloped his senses.

Mindle's bond made it feel like fire spread through his body.

A current of electricity ran through Toz's body when he bonded with Scrael.

Those four elements had aspects that Toz could experience with his physical senses. They also came one at a time.

The bond with Asileand invited both the spatial element and the void element into his body at once. At first, the two elements took turns riding through his body.

Toz would feel as if his body was distorted and twisted with the space around it. He was also overwhelmed by vertigo as distance lost all meaning to him. He couldn't tell if Asilean was right in front of him or on the other side of the island, despite the picture his eyes received being the same throughout the entire experience.

Then it was as if those sensations were a distant memory, and Toz turned into nothingness. He was nothing. He was everything. He was part of everything around him.

Eventually, those sensations overlapped, and it was no longer only his body that was distorted and twisted. It was everything he could perceive. And some indistinguishable parts of his existence were impossible distances away from other parts.

Since he had been overwhelmed by those sensations, Toz had no idea how long it had taken for his body to gain an affinity to the spatial and the void elements. But it finished soon enough.

Toz spent more time recovering from the experience than he actually spent experiencing having his body adapted to the elemental attributes.

Asilean and Scrael were naturally worried when they saw Toz lie down after scrunching up his face. But he was awake enough to tell them he was fine and that he only needed a few minutes to recover.

Toz felt okay after a few moments, but he was forced to lie back down as a feeling of vertigo swept over him when he tried to sit up again.

Since none of the cats, or anyone else on the island for that matter, had experienced having their body made suitable to another couple of elements at the same time, they didn't know how to support Toz.

But their bond and Toz was telling them that he was fine, so Asilean laid down next to Toz. The other cats had felt something happen through the bond, so they went to check on Toz.

They knew it wasn't anything bad since their talent had increased, and that could only mean that Asilean had joined them. However, they still wanted to see it for themselves.

When they came upon the scene of Toz sleeping with Scrael and Asilean next to him, the only one not stunned was Lucy, who immediately joined them.