Once their alone time together had concluded, Noah had gone off to assist Fate with her spell, leaving Mistral to bring Grey to the site of her once burned out chalet.

Mistral stepped through space halfway across the world to the wintry, alpine heights of the Aiguilles Rouges in eastern France wearing a full set of neon-green winter gear, complete with beanie sporting an absurdly large pom pom.  Such was the result of requesting winter attire from Grey, but it was indeed warm.

They stood upon a vast, snowy slope overlooking a deep valley with a town running down its center.  The snow was untouched, except where it buried a heap of blackened ruins.  Mistral turned to Grey and said with breath steaming in the cold, "This was the chalet that served as my sanctum in the years prior to our meeting.  It was a humble abode, but it is gone now.  The cultists razed it whilst we were away in Stygia, but they did not breach the hallow beneath.  You sense it, non?"  She gestured with a big, fuzzy mitten, "La Maîtresse de la Tour d'Ébène will need a proper headquarters, if she is to manage her Order, non?  A tower worthy of the name."

Mistral projected imagery to Grey of the tower she'd begun to construct via pure will on the other side of the Abyss.  She also showed what she hoped for it to become, then turned to Grey with an indulgent smile that only this silvery elfin godling could summon, "Can you help to make it a reality, ma fille?"

 Grey grinned and nodded enthusiastically. "This will be fun!"

 She ran over to the burnt ruins of the chalet, arms outstretched as she pretended to be an airplane before abruptly jumping and landing on all fours. As she touched the ground with her hands, silvery fluid flowed out of her, soaking up the snow and dissolving trees in her vicinity.


 From beneath, Mistral could hear the cracking and groaning of the earth as Gray began her ravenous consumption of all matter in the general vicinity. Then, out of the expanding pool, came vast shards of obsidian. It cracked and popped as it swirled around, twisting and rising, cemented together with an unknown adhesive as it began to rise into the sky. It swayed with the wind and the chunks of obsidian cracked from the force of the wind.

 Grey corrected, making the tower thicker and wider, more reinforced. Soon the tower resembled something a bit less of a spire reaching into the heavens and more of a second mountain top as she struggled (and failed, to some extent) to push the obsidian tower past the high altitude winds.

 She was panting as she finished and sat down near the vaulted door entrance. What she's created wasn't so much a tower as a cavernous expanse, filled with honeycombed passageways and rooms (though each room was at least as big as the original chalet and there were dozens stacked one on top of another).

 The Obsidian Tower was easily large enough to accommodate a small town despite having mostly lost the shape of a traditional tower.

 Grey seemed sad. "I'm sorry. The wind is blowing too hard to make a tower!"

OOC: Grey's construction is 3000ft tall and 7,400ft from edge to edge at the base. It is filled with hexagonal honeycombed rooms totaling 5,480,000,000,000ft in volume. It looks almost as though the entire mountaintop simply vanished and was replaced with obsidian.

 The entire structure is fixed with literal roots composed of branching Seridite veins to anchor it.
This message was last edited by the player at 03:57, Sat 14 Aug 2021.

Mistral grew increasingly alarmed as Grey set to work devouring an entire alpine massif, irreversibly altering ancient geology.  She began to weave a spell of spatial concealment, then called out to the elfin godling, “Preserve the hallow, s'il vous plaît!  It is a void some distance beneath.”  Her words of supernal power were drowned out by Grey’s cataclysmic act of creation, her spell enshrouding the entire mountain in a spatial warp that made it seem quite an unremarkable sight to onlookers, the same as it ever was.  Mistral doubted that she was capable of concealing all aspects of the construction, however.  Likely the aftershocks of this event would be felt across Europe.

When it was done, Mistral gazed awestruck up at the monolithic structure and simply tried to process what she was seeing.  She went to Grey and rested a hand upon her shoulder, noting that the elfin godling seemed to have significantly exerted herself in this effort.  Had she ever seen Grey tired, before?  “C'est magnifique, ma fille.  I hardly know what I could do with all of this, but it is truly extraordinaire.”  Mistral took the silvery child by the hand and walked through the vaulted doors into a literally cavernous chamber foyer that likely could contain the entire Empire State Building with room to spare.  She hugged the silvery elf-child for a long minute and then said to her, “You always create the most incredible things, ma fille.  You create and give wonders, but ask for nothing in return…  What is it that you want, if it were yours to choose?”

 Grey took Mistral's hand and climbed up on her. Mistral ended up needing to cradle Grey in her arms as she seemed a bit too tired to perch atop Mistral's shoulder as she normally did. She was still weightless, however.

 The foyer was truly massive. Even though the entire structure was seemingly lit by solar energy, the top of the foyer was so high up that it was shrouded in darkness. From here, she could se layer upon layer of lit hexagonal balconies ringing the foyer itself with (also hexagonal) hallways branching off in each cardinal direction and surrounding what seemed to be a central spiral (though also hexagonal) staircase.

 Grey closed her eyes. She seemed sleepy. "I want some wine... that stuff we had at that party that one time was good."

 Her humanoid form started looking a little... drippy, like she was made of wax and melting.

OOC: yeah, it's enough to hide from casual observation from the town nearby but anyone flying over would likely notice.

Mistral was alarmed to feel Grey losing physical consistency, and was not certain that wine would suffice to fix this.  She touched her earpiece and spoke to Noah, “Bonjour, mon dragon.  Grey has over-exerted herself in the creation of perhaps the largest structure on Earth.  She asks for wine, but I suspect she may require more.  Meet me in the faboratory, immédiatement.”

Mistral continued cradling Grey in the titanic hexagonal spiral foyer of the new Ebon Tower, but those surroundings quickly changed into the laboratory upon the S.S. Grey.  If Noah hadn’t made it there yet on his own, he would suddenly find himself there, regardless of where he may have been or what he may have been doing prior.  Mistral quickly explained to Noah what happened with a brief apology, though she was confident he would appreciate the urgency.  Mistral stood with Grey and implored, “Rest yourself now, ma fille.  Help is coming.”

Meanwhile, a replica of Mistral strode into the lobby of a particular bodega winery outside the city of Mendoza in western Argentina.  A friendly-looking young sommelier offered a greeting, but she interrupted in flawless Spanish, “<The boss, founder, CEO.  Whoever is in charge of business operations.  Bring me to them.  Now.>”  Something about her tone brooked no argument, and so she was shown into a luxurious tasting room in the back, where a confused-looking manager greeted her with some hesitation.  Mistral placed a black charge card into the manager’s hand and demanded in Spanish, “<I am purchasing your entire stock of Girl and Dragon Malbec, and I require it now.  Bottles, barrels, vats. All of it.  Show me to where it is housed, and I will handle transportation.>”  Mistral glared into the sales manager’s eyes, and they discovered that they very much wished to comply, and would move heaven and earth to see it done.  If the Girl and Dragon manager thought to balk, they would quickly be made to regret it in ways that Mistral herself would normally refuse to consider inflicting upon another.

One simply does not stand between an Archmage mother and the needs of her child.

"Ill get my stuff." Noah trundled down to the lab and started stashing everything he would need for a Grey style emergency.

 Grey had closed her eyes and her consistency became difficult for one to manage with bare hands, just fluid enough to slip over and between the arms but just solid enough that juggling between both arms could keep her from slipping in between. The hospital bed proved to be not much easier. Parts of her kept wanting to ooze off of it.

 Meanwhile, Noah found himself suddenly shifted to the Faboratory. It was done in a large area around him so he felt no discomfort at the sudden movement.

 Meanwhile (again), at the winery in Argentina, there was a great deal of hustle as the transaction was made and barrels upon barrels of wine were rolled out of the distillery... as much of it as had been fermented, anyway.

 Soon, Mistral found herself with a few hundred cases and perhaps a hundred barrels of wine... easily enough to fill an 18 wheeler's trailer with (roughly 10,000 gallons in total). It would be difficult to transport this much without a lot of people noticing.

In Argentina, Mistral was pleased by the alacrity with which the winery rallied to fulfill her peculiar bulk order, but grew concerned by the number of workers involved.  After several barrels had been rolled out of the distillery, she spoke with the manager in Spanish, “Have the merchandise loaded into a shipping container, please.  The same sort used for international orders.  I will provide the transport, still.”  A truck was backed into the loading garage to offload a large cargo container, which was left behind and opened up to receive the merchandise.  Mistral paced impatiently as the barrels and pallets were moved and stacked starting at the end, gradually filling the storage space.

After a seemingly interminable delay the shipping container was fully loaded, and the manager of the Girl and Dragon winery as well as many of the workmen looked uncertainly to Mistral.  She said simply, “Seal it up now, if you would.”  Mistral circled the container as the metal doors were slammed shut and latched.  Once she had verified that it was sealed on every side, she made a faint gesture and whispered something beneath her breath, and there came a metallic groan from within the container.  Mistral inclined her head to the manager and said in Spanish that slipped into French, “Our transaction is concluded, and you may keep the container.  Au revoir.”  Mistral walked away and answered no questions, stepped into a restroom, and then was gone.  When the shipping container was reopened after her departure, they would find it entirely empty.

Back on the S.S. Grey, Mistral looked on as Noah tended to Grey, tears falling down her pale cheeks unnoticed.  There was a shifting of air from outside the Faboratory door and a groan of a sudden weight added to the deck.  Mistral made a gesture that refracted into existence a 60-gallon oaken barrel emblazoned with the Girl and Dragon logo next to where Grey lay.  She said to Noah, “I am uncertain if this will help, but it is what she asked for prior to becoming indisposée.  There are one hundred and sixty-seven more of these in the cafeteria across the corridor.  I… merdasse.”  Mistral looked helplessly around the lab and then confessed despairingly, “I haven’t a tap for the barrels…. I do not know.  Please save her, mon dragon.”  Overwhelmed, Mistral pressed her hands against her face, fell into a chair, and began to silently cry.
This message was last edited by the player at 09:15, Mon 23 Aug 2021.

Noah tilted a bit with shift before he got to work. He scooched Mistral outside of a ring around the bed. Once the vaccum sealed around the bed a display moved over near by her. _she dropped into minimal lower mode. The vaccum is for an unstable element I will be giving her. I've got your back. She did this before when we made the boat._the text scrolled out on the screen as Noah worked inside the empty space with Grey.

He pulled out a canister that started unlocking itself. _Dont worry, a phlogiston and the mana star will do her good._

Once the canister finished its seal breach Noah pulled out a pair of tongs one would use to handle uranium rods and pulled free a quarter of a marble encased in acrylic. That got set ontop a chunk of solid Grey. Ontop of that was set the hyper condensed mana stone from Noah's cane. The whole lot was then set just in range of Grey's central mass.

_It will take just a moment for her to register it's there. Once she gets ahold of it she will know what to do._

Still, he was ready to step in if the phlogiston started reacting with other things.
This message was last edited by the player at 17:27, Mon 23 Aug 2021.

 Noah remained within the vacuum tube with Grey as he handled the marble of raw energy with such care that made it obvious that he believed it to be incredibly dangerous, adding to it the culmination of all of the excess mana that he had collected during the ritual with Talion.

 For almost a minute, there was no reaction from Grey. However, she then reached up with one of her now formless appendages and took hold of the collection of material. The moment she did, there was a brilliant flash of light and the temperature in the immediate vicinity began to rise rapidly.

 The light quickly vanished but her physical form had turned the color of molten metal as her tiny body curled up in the fetal position around the miniature star that had now formed in between her hands.

The moment the reaction took place Noah spread his wings to block the flash from Mistral. There was no need to burn her eyes out.

_Fusion is successful. Her battery is already at ten percent._

He leaned close to give Grey a good inspection.

_We have to maintain the vacuum. Her surface temp is about a quarter that of the sun. She just needs time to charge now._
This message was last edited by the player at 00:00, Tue 24 Aug 2021.

 As quickly as the reaction had started, it faded, leaving Grey sitting on the hospital bed glowing red like molten metal.

 The inside half of the acrylic dome surrounding Noah and Grey had begun to melt into slag, highly distorting the image of the two from the outside.
This message was last edited by the player at 00:14, Tue 24 Aug 2021.

Noah kept on typing to Mistral, _"Right, we may need to get out of here. The ship is made out of Grey so she can just turn the thermal heat into more power. The viewing window won't last much longer."_

_"She is in power recovery and will be right as rain once she cools down. If you like we can set her up so she can tap the leylines near where you had been. But once she cools down a bit of wine will be a nice treat. No more than a keg at a time even if she could drink the ocean."

"You ok Mist?"_

Mistral hung back to observe in silence as Noah worked.  She took comfort in his quick and decisive action to feed Grey the mana she needed, although she now felt foolish for not having thought to offer her own mana.  She didn’t have ready access to nearly this quantity, but she would have given it even so.  She answered the text message from Noah, _I am now.  Merci, mon dragon._

After the flash but before the shielding began to melt, Mistral approached to watch Grey reconstituting herself.  As the molten metal child took shape curled about the bright energy source, she spoke, “Grey, ma fille…  You needn’t have exhausted yourself so on my account.  Your creation was magnifique, but not at the cost of your well-being.”  She couldn’t help but worry that Grey had gone this far to impress her, or live up to some imagined motherly expectations.  Did she come across so dictatorial as to expect instantaneous creation at impossible scales?  Quite possibly.

Mistral looked in as the translucent shield began to warp, then added, “Mes excuses for demanding too much.  Rest now, wine later.”  The heat was rapidly increasing to the point that Mistral was forced to back away to avoid being burned.  Still she watched in case Grey had anything to say, until the heat forced her to vacate the area entirely.

 Grey slowly uncurled from around the reaction, having absorbed a tremendous quantity of mana and energy. She still glowed as though she were made of molten steel.

 She sat upon the medical bed and it began to glow red as well. The inside of the near-vacuum was distorted as well by the sheer heat she was giving off. She tried to speak but words would not form properly in the high energy low atmosphere.

 She lay on the bed as it continued to turn red along with her and the acrylic continued to melt. Mistral was forced to evacuate first and then, once the acrylic had turned to slag, Noah made his way out too.

 At first, he too was too hot to touch... but his scales dispersed heat quite rapidly.

 The door to the entry of the med-bay was now hot to the touch and sealed tightly. Apparently the energy released from the phlogiston took some time for even Grey to fully absorb.

Once Noah had made his escape he put a hand to the wall and tapped into the local network.

Every slate beeped out a small warning. *Medical is off-limits until further notice. Thermal issues.*

He inclined his head to Mistral still in full dragon form just to keep venting the excess heat. "Grey operates around one percent of her max power. The surface of the ship normally acts as a solar panel for her, I did not expect she would go into low power mode."

"Last time she went low power was when she made the boat. It takes a fair bit to jump-start her but a dose of mana keeps her going. The lasting fix is to hook her up to the leylines." Last time he had chugged a whole bottle of wine as a sacrament and the steam was tied to Grey's finger.

He nodded once as his scales rattled, "You had no way of knowing her power levels. And her nature is to go full force at all times. To fix that, the password to the fabratory computer is 'Sugar God'. It has a direct connection to her with your slate. You'll be able to message her and she can give you a read-out."

Mistral waved to Grey before getting clear of the molten region to allow the elfin godling to rest and recover.  She went to the prow of the S.S. Grey and took a seat on an outsized neon deck chair.  She looked out over the sea as Noah explained the power issue, and she nodded in understanding.  At length she said, “My apologies for dragging you away with such little warning.  I had never seen her in such a state of depletion, and I was… concerned.”  That was an understatement, but she didn’t quite know how to articulate the panic she’d felt at the possibility of Grey coming to harm.  In actuality it could be rather simply explained as motherly love, and the worry that comes with it.  It was only difficult is because it was such a foreign concept to Mistral.  She would have to come to terms with it somehow, because there would be no putting that genie back in its bottle.

The suggestion to fix Grey via a slate interface earned Noah a scowl, and she said, “Her nature does not require ‘fixing.’”  She simply needs to learn the concept of moderation.”  Mistral sighed and said, “Where the ruins of my chalet once were, now stands a structure consisting of hundreds of meters of obsidian dredged up from Earth’s mantle that could comfortably house thousands.  Hundreds of thousands, perhaps.  The foyer is spacious enough for you to fly in with room to spare.  It is incredible, but I do not know what to do with it…”

Noah poked Mistral in the rib when she scowled at him. "To fix the situation, not Grey. The only change for her is educational, you're too right there. But she has a load out and reporting screen. It's an offer to let you see shat she displays in my vision all the time. It's how I know shed close to eleven percent battery now."

Noah smiled, "A lioness and her cub it seems."

He hunkered down next to her. "A large phantasm to hide it, some prime work to provide electricity to the building, I could activate a few new hallows around the place, and a portal for your new army."

"More than just you changed. There are a number of ebon tower mages already just trying to get on their feet. Before too long they will seek you out and a home. You're already ahead of the game. From the demon made ashes of your home, you've made something grand."

"Ah! That's something else to set up. Bans on demons and demon infused."