Awakening The Harmony

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Sweat drenched Thane's body as his tired muscles protested with aches and spasms. Ignoring the pain and discomfort, Thane continued with grim determination and clenched jaw as he pulled his tongs from the bucket of quenching oil that held his latest attempt. 

Presenting his work on the anvil, Thane stared at the silver base plate that he had painstakingly shaped into a square one foot wide, one foot long, and a quarter-inch thick. Even though, on the surface, Thane's work possessed no flaws, he knew that it wasn't enough.

Wordlessly, Elara strode over to the anvil and placed her hand on the silver square before infusing her mana into the metal. The plate seemed to hold for a moment, but then a sharp crack echoed through the forge. A network of thin, spindly cracks shattered the metal into countless fragments, and a fine blue mist vaporized from the broken plate. 

"Again," Elara replied coldly before turning away. 

Thane stifled a frustrated growl as he swept up the pieces and carried them to the furnace, still blazing with his silver flames. Throwing the pieces in, Thane waited for the metal to heat so he could forge them together and start the process over. 

'What am I missing,' Thane asked himself as he stared into the silver flames, watching the piece of silver with an attentive gaze, 'I've tried everything I can think of: different temperatures, hammering patterns, folding the metal, and driving out any impurities. But no matter what, it always shatters.' 

Stepping forward as the pieces of metal started to glow cherry red, with familiarity and ease, Thane retrieved the individual fragments using his tongs and placed them on the anvil. Bunching the fragments together, Thane reached down by his side, retrieving the hammer held in the loop of his apron. Thane's arm trembled at the hefty weight of the solid-faced tool, but he lifted it into the air nonetheless and brought it back down with a clang. The softened pieces of metal warped, flattening and melding together as they started to become one. 

With a grunt, Thane raised his hammer again, 'Am I doing all this just to fail again.' 

CLANG!

The fragments yielded again as the lines separating the once individual pieces started to disappear, 'I should stop this foolishness and think everything over. Fixating and being stubborn won't make the solution suddenly reveal itself.' 

CLANG!

Despite his inner turmoil, Thane's hammer rose and fell like a well-oiled machine, striking the metal with precision as his heart hammered along in synch, pumping boiling blood through Thane's veins. 

CLANG!

As Thane brought the hammer down for what felt like the hundredth time, a bead of sweat rolled into his eye. Thane blinked, and his swing deviated, clipping the anvil and causing the piece of metal to ring out like a tuning fork. The impact and furious tremors stung Thane's palm like a nest of angry hornets. But as the vibrations passed through his flesh, Thane felt something inside him reach out and resonate with the vibrato singing harmoniously. 

The vibrations were so powerful that Thane felt his entire body freeze as harmony overwhelmed him. 

'What's happening to me?!' Thane's jaw clenched so hard that his teeth threatened to shatter as he tried to muscle through the mysterious force locking down his movements. 

As Thane pushed against the harmony, it grew distorted and out of tune. Pain blossomed across Thane's entire being as the harmony turned into a chaotic tangle of frequencies and sounds that cut into him like knives. 

Thane's first instinct was to fight against the harmonious discord, but before he could, a consciousness rose from his mind. 

"Why do you fight...harmony?" 

So stunned by the deep, growling voice whispering in the back of his mind, Thane momentarily forgot his pain and agony. 

'W-who are you? Why are you in my head?!' 

"Hmm...the harmony called to me...it calls to us..." 

'What are you talking about?' Thane replied as he resumed his struggle against the vibrations holding his body hostage, causing another wave of pain to wash over him. 

"You must answer the call...answer the harmony..." 

The growling voice faded, quieting before a deep baritone note rose from Thane's chest, joining the harmony that surged in intensity. 

Thane felt his footing slip as the harmony threatened to sweep him away. His alone body wasn't enough to resist, so Thane reached for his magic, sending mana surging through his pathways in a last-ditch effort. 

But the moment Thane's body swelled with the magical energy, his mana began to vibrate, quickly crescendoing before singing out with its own chord. 

Suddenly, the pressure and pain afflicting his body lessened. Instinctively, Thane reached out, assuming the role of a conductor leading an orchestra through a scale. 

It was something Thane had never experienced before as, through trial and error, the frequency of his mana shifted, causing a new note to ring out. 

The slightest shift would either cause the pain assaulting Thane to lessen or intensify. But with each subsequent success, Thane found it easier and easier to attune his mana to the harmony resonating through his body. 

Then, in a single breath, everything aligned. 

Thane gasped as his body, mana, and soul sang out, joining the harmony, becoming a part of it and it a part of him. The hidden tattoos across his body illuminated with silver light while his ears gained a pointed tip, and his hair exploded with newfound growth and shifted in hue before settling on a dark, vibrant green. Suddenly, Thane could hear the harmony all around him. Everything seemed to sing out with a unique pitch and sound. Some notes were harder to hear, faint, and barely audible at the very fringes of Thane's range. 

But others practically screamed out, such as the blackened stone bricks of the forge, the silver fire burning in the furnace, and above all else, the flattened metal square resting on the anvil. 

With his mobility restored, Thane let go of the hammer that was once so tightly grasped in his hand. With an almost tender touch, Thane's fingers grazed the silver, and he let out a held breath as the metal's frequency traveled through his flesh. 

With ease, Thane tuned his mana, matching the metal's resonance, and with a satisfying click, he felt his control over the silver settle into place. Thane lifted his hand from the anvil, and the silver square followed, levitating to hover just below his palm. 

Even when Thane turned his palm over, the metal followed, attracted to his skin as if it was magnetized. With a slight thought, Thane gently nudged the harmony between him and the silver and watched as the metallic square that had cooled long ago liquified in mid-air. 

A broad grin spread across Thane's face as he began to experiment with his newfound magic. He changed the shape and form of the silver, first starting with rudimentary shapes before slowly increasing in complexity. Thane also changed the metal's state of matter cycling through liquid, gas, and plasma. Each variation and combination caused the harmony to shift in pitch and frequency. Sometimes, the change was barely noticeable, but some were so impactful it threatened to break the chord altogether. 

Thane stood utterly transfixed as the harmony continued to resonate around him. At that moment, Thane understood that he had touched upon the true nature of magic. A cliff stood before him, one that stretched into the very heavens, atop which sat boundless, unlimited potential. This cliff Thane would scale, carving out a path foothold by foothold with knowledge as his tool, never stopping until he reached the precipice and finally laid eyes on the ultimate prize. 

An intense wave of nausea and lightheadedness interrupted Thane's euphoria and serendipity as his mana suddenly muted and stilled within his pathways. The chord between him and the silver died, and the metal suddenly dropped out of the air as an aimless blob that clattered to the ground. The constant harmony of the world quieted as well, leaving an almost eerie silence. 

Thane stumbled before catching himself on the anvil, and an intense headache suddenly assaulted his mind from the fierce mana exhaustion afflicting him. 

After a moment of gathering his breath, Thane managed to stand upright. While his head was pounding and his pathways were parched, Thane's eyes had never shone brighter.