Quantum Break [Yuel]

Makings solely of willpower and determination? The world was certainly a fairy tale, but there had to be a limit somewhere right? Anywhere? No? When will actions of defying reality ever have a consequence? Am I the only one to suffer them???

"Okay, sure, hit me with it."

Albeit her depressed inner monologue, Yuel reinvigorated herself at the mere mention of a challenge. Of course, Ulv may not have meant her words to be a challenge, but basically any sort of confrontation that included Yuel's confidence, or anything of herself being questioned, that in and of itself was pretty much a challenge--something the young blonde absolutely reveled in.

"Imagination and hard work are the virtues I live by, so I should have no problems there."

Reasserting herself, questions ran through Yuel's mind on the validity of this "Tulpa". They serve as enhancements, but then where do the flames come from? The power source should then be Ulv's own original techniques with spiritual energy or her inner power as the conduit, as in there had to be power to begin with for the Tulpa to enable something to take form. Ulv did say she was an elementalist, after all, but if that were the case then what could Yuel do? What power within her was there to enhance to conjure new power? Therefore, is "a powerful mind" really the only requirement? That was something the girl had in spades, and she's never come across "willpower alone made form".

"Oh--a mindscape. That's no issue--I'm perpetually living in one. The world is my mindscape."

Though it sounds a bit much, it wasn't really too much of an exaggeration. Yuel's anomalous existence visited all corners of time and space. But for as long as she's done this, for as much as she could remember of it with her twisted being and even more twisted memories, she was always the only one. Nothing around her besides herself was there in permanence, everything around her always easily being an existence as easily fleeting as it was for her to just, suddenly, pop somewhere else or lose all memory. As far as the young girl was concerned, everything around her is nothing. A hard sort of loneliness she wasn't keen on enduring, but had to nonetheless. That, and Yuel was constantly up in her own head.

Constantly, Yuel was thinking up a storm in her brain. Her dreams found this to be a much more proactive occurrence, but quite often--especially in boredom or inactivity--Yuel closed her eyes and focused on a world inside her head. Just like her dreams, it was a world of boundlessness. The sky above her was vast, endless, stars and galaxies littering about. And if she brought her eyes down and looked to the left, somewhere off in the distance was a massive ocean crashing and flowing around, more chaotic than usual surprisingly. Likely due to the rain, as parts of the sky were clouded and pouring downward, disrupting the odd but usual serenity of her 'mindscape'. On her right, a massive mountain range whose peaks were above the clouds and base likely as wide as an ocean, the look of its enormity impossible to miss.

And finally, around herself a pure realm of whiteness. Perhaps 100 metres, or a thousand if Yuel visualised it. It was always just pure white ground that extended off for a distance she couldn't see past. The girl just new it was functionally infinite, just as the rest of this world around her; if she moved in the direction of the ocean, it would never get closer, only white surrounding her. If she moved to the mountains, the same thing. If Yuel visualised any contraptions in this dream, maybe something that let her fly, no matter how high she got, it would never go high enough to be amongst the stars, never high enough to see the base or peak of the mountain, never high enough to gaze down on the endless ocean. This was the dream, the 'minscape', she always conjured for herself.

"Connect myself to it? Er, like, bind myself to it? Sure, I guess."

It was an odd request, nothing particularly out of the ordinary. In fact, connecting oneself to this 'mindscape' seemed like the obvious choice to be able to retain yourself in the world; otherwise, if your mind wandered, you wouldn't keep the mindscape stable. It was so obviously natural to do that Yuel never actively focused on the fact, since it was more or less implied and automatic. So, when Ulv made the suggestion, with eyes still closed the first thing Yuel thought of to "tether herself to the mindscape" was gravity. It was obvious. Nothing really tied you to something better and more reliably than the weight of the world. It coalesced all around her, imperceptibly, but it was definitely there.

Nothing was quite different except for Yuel now knowing that, on an ethereal level, there was this invisible force brought from the entire world pulling her down perpetually and naturally. Enough that, without even realising it, this added gravity offered this world some much needed order. The rain fell down linearly, instead of waving about in the wind chaotically, and the ocean off in the distance quieted. Things were pleasantly more serene.

"And? Now what?"

"Create things. Visualise them... easy enough."

Yuel wasn't keen on visualising other creatures in her mind. Largely because they were a bit more random with their organic movement and thoughts than just standard thought experiments. But, if she were to visualise living things... well, it was her mindscape, with the only limit being her own imagination, right? So, if that's the case, as far as Yuel was concerned, there really was no limitation.

Suddenly, the world was quite literally roaring with life. The white around her expanded nigh infinitely. The memories of her past and future and alternative selves finding some physical form. There were different Yuels around her, the things they saw and experienced being created in this mindscape. Less of this was from the draws of her willpower, and instead creations of immense proportions finding form through her sheer intellect. Entire buildings were found in her mind, colossal organic beings roaming between busy streets, islands floating in the air. Each living creature, millions, billions, an incalculable number roaming about. Each one had their own thoughts, their own dreams, their own individual actions. They weren't random, they were purposeful. All the gears took in motion, as if the imagination Yuel manifested in her mindscape was the will of fate itself. And the one thing that really tied all this together, the unifying force where Yuel's willpower truly came into effect, was visualising gravity

Gravity influenced all these creatures, all these beings, and just like Yuel, they were tethered to her mindscape, now a part of its reality. The girl even visualised the beings she'd once conversed with, in the sky a monkey floating on some cloud, looking at her with a devious smile with mischief on its mind. It was a being of enormously powerful proportions, to a terrifying degree, but matched by this creature whose roar literally made the ground tremble and air shriek like a sonic boom. A massive white tiger, awoken from its slumber somewhere in the mountain range, annoyed at the new bustle from Yuel's inceptions. And in the distance, the calm of the ocean was disturbed by a grand dragon, tsunamis in the distance rushing upward from the swing of its tail as a plethora of sea life circled the divine beast.

"So... if I think of these things... and they channel this force that binds them... Well, they're all channeling it. Without even knowing. Each of them have their own weight, a gravity to them..."

It was the thought of all of them not just being individuals, not just all of them having their own thoughts and dreams and means to achieve them--it was the thought of each of the things having weight to them, that made Yuel really start to think they had weight to them in a different sense. Suddenly, this gravity meant so much more than some unifying force, a creation of hers to tether to the ground. The stable force that would be ever unchanging regardless of what the small, comparatively insignificant entities bustling around did. The only thing that could ever change the impact or existence of gravity was to change and impact the source--which was everything, or in this case, the mindscape itself. Hence, that which humbled all life within the mindscape was what Yuel manifested.

If Ulv had even so much as blinked, she would miss it, though immediately recognise it afterwards. Ulv was, after all, well-versed in the arts of the wind, and she'd certainly feel the tangible difference in the air around Yuel. It was thinner, or thicker, or blowing in chaos, like it was being played with. But it wasn't just the air; more specifically, it was the space itself which the air occupied. And on the ground beneath them, natural cracks in the ground were being sealed, then reopened, small uneven portions of the ground being ever so slightly leveled and raised. The world around the two, at least in their immediacy, was shifting about.

"Seems like you got a handle on it, kid."

The voice resounded in Yuel's mind, or more specifically her mindscape. It was a voice coming from the sky, the same sort of timbre to it that the laughing monkey from before had.

"I haven't seen you in a while."

It was a familiar voice, as Yuel's heard it on more than one occasion. Usually, it was in a mischievous tone, some food for thought that would help her, but it was always spoken in such a cryptic manner, or in such a way that they were clearly trying to entice Yuel into doing something. For their own devices, no doubt, and that fact alone was usually more than enough to subvert further conversation. If there was anything Yuel wasn't keen on, it was on not being in control, and more importantly, being manipulated. It was in a way a step on her pride, one she fully acknowledged may not be such a good thing, but a part of her she'd rather not part with.

That said, things were a bit different this time. With Ulv's help in describing what to do with the mindscape, Yuel felt that most of the cards available were now in her hands. She still didn't quite understand who the voice was, or why they were in her head. The girl knew that Shadin had an idea, but she'd never get a clear answer. Given that, she figured some sort of demon, maybe a ziamichi spirit within. It couldn't be a zanpakuto spirit--the Duulheim was clear that of the hyperambiguous entities within, it'd either be the beast in the mountains or serpent in the seas. So, it was time to be more on the offensive.

"So? Who are you? Shadin wouldn't tell me, and the other two are just as hard to talk to as you. Time's up and rent is due, Saru."

She couldn't see it clearly--after all, this creature was high up in the sky, usually in his own domain, though the 'tether' made things a bit different this time around--but Yuel felt like they were frowning.

"You're getting a lil' cocky now, aren'tcha?"

"Nah. Maybe. A little; but if you don't answer me now, I'll just keep pestering you, and now you can't run away from me."

This time, Yuel held the mischievous smile, a grin that split her cheeks like Moses.

"Nah. I don't feel like it. But ask the lady with you, she'll do some explainin'. She should tell you what you want to know, and after that, go bother the others instead."

The voice faded off towards the end, but Yuel managed to make out the last bit. And from there, Yuel pulled her conscience out from her mindscape and opened her eyes, returning to reality. Before her was Ulv, though in Yuel's eyes, she looked more like a golden gate to a wealth of information. Stars sparkled a tad in the girl's eyes, a bit of her thirst coming out.

"Ulv, random question, if you don't mind me answering--ah, by the way, I think I got the mindscape thing down, though I have a few more questions to ask on it so I know it more precisely--but anyways, I had friend tell me to ask you, do you know this guy--arrogant, troublesome kinda person, er, monkey actually, i think? Anyways, do you know someone named Goku? He said you might know him by a different name or something."

Yuel took a minute to process what Ulv was saying. The "mindscape" she was describing had a few discrepancies with the usual meditative 'world' Yuel often entered, but the wolf woman's instructions worked, so there must be some sort of connection between the two. As far as the young girl could discern, there were three possibilities for her to consider; one, that the planes they both experienced were different entirely, and that it was more or less a coincidence that Ulv's methods worked in Yuel's "mindscape"; two, that there really was some sort of magical thing going on, and since Yuel's spiritual ineptitude made her incapable of being certain, this creature within was an intruder, alongside the other two beasts she knew to exist; three, that Goku was was someone she did know, from a future or past self, whose details she couldn't entirely recall. To some degree, he still was, in the state presented to her, entirely of her own creation and memory, shaped up in the way she subconsciously remembered. Either way, there were only a few ways to move forward on the subject.

Other than that, it was time to revel in the experience of finally having some sort of "ability" derived from herself alone. Renkinjutsu was her machination, but it was an entirely exterior system that she just manipulated. Anyone could do it, frankly. Her "singularity existence" issue was an entirely separate matter, and one that she couldn't freely manipulate anyways. This "willpower" ability was truly, truly her very own, and it was magnificent.

Yuel looked into her palm, closed her eyes for a moment, and focused. In the back of her mind, she thought of the experience, her mindscape, and drawing that tethering sensation out once more. The young Duulheim opened one her eyes and looked at ground beneath her and drew out that power. Once again, cracks formed beneath her feet, opening and closing as if spaces between the matter was expanding and contracting, nothing but an abyssal vacuum occupying the area of this expanded space, before it collapsed and sealed the cracks thoroughly. Yuel smiled wide, genuinely thrilled from this experience.

"Thanks for the advice, Ulv; I really do appreciate it. What do you call it, by the way? The whole technique? Oh! Also, I have a few theories as to who this Goku--er, actually maybe he meant Wukong, but whatever; I have a few theories as to what was going on there, but I really don't know how to ascertain it. After all, as you know, this is all going on within my mind. Unfortunately, since I'm unable to use spiritual energy, or any sort of energy resource in general, I don't have any methods to confirm without bringing something from the physical realm; do you have any ideas? You're a vizard, so you should know how to handle things like this hopefully?"