Edited 05/05/2020
The library was quiet in the early hours of the morning. Takatsuki wouldn't arrive for some time. He'd pulled an out of place economics book from the engineering section. The title caught his attention, Harry sighed and checked the time. He had an hour before she arrived.
He thumbed the cover open and read through the pages. The theme of this book was the law of large numbers. Tom seemed unpredictable. One day he was shopping for eggs the next he bought a game system. By himself Tom was practically unpredictable unique even. When the supply of something increased the value of the object decreased. By comparing Tom's actions to the actions of several men his age living in his area. Actions can become predictable. Tom will buy eggs 12% of the time when he goes to the store. This is based on the sample size of men Tom's age with a similar background. The larger a test group the more predictable seemingly chaotic actions becomes. The random becomes predictable. With a large enough sample size anything could be predicted. That made him think about aura of all things.
A book written by a mortal man of all things made him question cultivation practices. Had he gone about it all wrong? Would more aura allow him to predict it and gain greater control? He almost shot it down. He had more aura than Dick with vastly less control. That was only thirty times more at this point. Richard certainly had more control. What if Harry had thousands of times more aura? Would the seemingly infinite and chaotic fluctuations of aura become predictable?
"I'm not as smart as I thought I was." Harry said to himself.
The sun was rising when he closed the book. It had left his mind reeling with possibilities. He'd been different before and stepped off the beaten path. Umbrella tower had quite a lot of human essence. If Harry took advantage of it, who knew how powerful he'd become. It was just a hypothesis, and something never tested. The body could only hold so much qi. That number was directly proportionate to the consciousness power of the individual. If Harry adjusted his refiner and foundry in a way that increased their efficiency. It would free up ram or consciousness power in use.
"Was it a good read?" Takatsuki said. He jumped when he heard her voice. His heart raced and his blood pressure skyrocketed. He turned fist raised prepared to destroy whatever interrupted him. He saw her and felt his heart beat faster. Could she hear it what did she think? All he had to do was touch her with his sixth sense and he'd have an idea. Lady ghouls didn't like it when you talked about their eating habits. What would she think if he invaded her soul? He lowered his fist. Harry smiled until his cheeks hurt. She laughed at his discomfort while he settled down.
"It wasn't that funny." Harry grumbled. She'd made a fool of him already. It was all because he refused to use his sixth sense to invade on her privacy. He wanted to show her respect.
"I don't hear your stomach grumbling. Did you eat before you arrived?" His words caught in his throat. Harry's eyes widened; he'd stepped on a land mine. "I'm sorry, your stomach was just loud."
"Oh, did I bother you? Well you should have invited me to a fancy restaurant." She narrowed her eyes. "Did you redo your hypnosis? I told you I'd teach you how to communicate with me." She said with a frown.
"Is it impossible that I'm just that good? Maybe, you should try harder." Harry said. It was his immortal physiology and a quantum database. If anything, he was a bit slow learning the language.
"Swap to English then." Takatsuki snapped.
"You're a beautiful mint haired woman and I'm going to make you love me." Harry proclaimed in his native tongue. Takatsuki hopefully didn't know English. She tilted her head to the side and fluttered her eyelashes.
"Potter Harry, I know English." Takatsuki replied. Harry froze as she laughed at him. He rolled his eyes, and relaxed. A land mine was averted.
"Don't think your job as my tutor has ended, I'm still rude and culturally illiterate." Harry said. She'd stared at him with a pained expression. Danger signs were flashing through his mind she was repairing to call it off. A though solution came to mind. If he asked her out then, what was the worst that could happen. He'd lose the pretense and take on the obligation of learning Takatsuki Sen. If he came on too strong, she'd flee. He needed to prove he was moderately human and not a threat. Being startled must have helped. Or she saw it as an outlier. She'd flee and everything becomes difficult and cruel.
"Why are you desperate for my help? Were you kicked out of a bathhouse?" Harry went quiet it was his only defense.
"Silence is golden and telling. Did you forget to put on your indoor shoes? Has your English barbarism made you an outcast?" Harry lowered his head without removing his eyes from her.
"If you help me, I'll repay your favor." Harry said. She frowned and her eyes glittered like emeralds from a king's ransom. She was the beauty and he was the ugly beast.
"What are you afraid of Harry?" She asked. He was lonely and hated crowds. Flying had helped but the airplane ride had been no picnic. He hated crowds but he dealt with those fears. What would fill him with terror? A vision overcame him. He was sitting on a hill overlooking mountains of corpses. Some of the faces he recognized. The sun was gone, and he was sitting on an ancient stump as the planet flew through the cold of space. He was immortal perfect and alone.
"If the people I've started to know died, they'd be gone. The real them would only exist in those short years of time in the past." He'd kill anything that threatened them. That list was small for now. It was Imo, Hermione, Nomine, and even Dick. They shined bright in his life and he didn't want them to die. Takatsuki would make the list soon enough. It was sad how little he knew about those on his list.
"You're afraid of being alone." Harry imagined himself immortal and perfect alone with no one. It terrified him in a way.
"I'm a social animal as are all humans. Could you survive being alone forever?" Harry asked. This was supposed to be a light conversation what was he doing. He cursed himself for messing up again.
"You're a fool, I'm alone and I'll always be alone." She pulled a book out of her bag and handed it to him. "It's a children's book on the etiquette and social norms of Japan. My caretaker gave it to me. Keep it and remember me. She stared into his eyes. "Don't come back here and don't look for me. You'll regret it if you do." She gathered her things and prepared to leave. What did he do? Had he set off some trip wire in her brain?
"I'm a fool, I'm sorry don't go." Harry stood up and followed her. His heart was pounding, and his emotions were out of his control. He barely concealed his aura.
"Harry, if you follow me, you'll regret it. What if I'm not what you think I am?" She said and walked at a quick pace. Harry followed barely keeping up while maintaining a mortal façade.
"If I don't follow you, I'll regret it more." Harry declared. He wanted to do something to win her over, but he floundered. The words in his database couldn't describe how he felt. That was such a mortal thing to think. What could he say? 'I know we will love each other.' That sounded like madness.
"No, you'll get over me. I'm just a summer vacation crush. You'll return to England and meet a nice British girl." Takatsuki admonished.
"None of them have your words, voice, or passion." Harry said confidently.
"You're reaching Harry. You can only guess at my passion. My words are like any other. What part of my voice is unique?" It was either a toe in the door or teasing. She didn't give him another way in.
"It stands out as more beautiful than any I've heard." She laughed at him and his words mocking him.
"Many would disagree, I've been called annoying before. Just go away. It's better for you if you go." She gave him another in and it might have been a cruel one.
"It wouldn't be better for you, would it?" She increased her speed.
"You don't know anything Potter." She said coldly. "Go away, I'm done with you." This felt like abandonment. He chased her into a dark alley. He paid little attention to the crowd of people watching him chase a girl into a dark alley.
"Are you crazy what are you doing? I told you to go away." Takatsuki yelled as Harry followed behind her. His chest heaved and his heart pounded from the emotions that took him. It was unlikely his control would last much longer.
They turned through alleys as Harry followed her. She kept looking back surprised that he was keeping up. "What are you a racehorse?" She called out.
"What's wrong are you getting tired?" You could always stop so we can talk.
"Go away, you crazy Englishman." Takatsuki yelled. "Can you even find your way out of here?"
"No, I'm lost without you." It was pathetically mortal the feelings that surged within him. He wanted this connection with her. With it he wasn't alone if he let her go then he'd lose a guiding light in the dark. Maybe it was better for him to fall into his dark bitter feelings. Did she know his words meant something more than the physical? Did this girl comprehend how alone he felt? Maybe this was his selfishness.
He fell to the ground wheezing. If he took another step his aura would tear from his control. He closed his eyes to keep her from seeing his eyes shine. Harry sucked in breath filling his lungs as he focused on taming the storm threatening to break loose. This time it wouldn't be a light glow of aura. His body was acting like a cap and pressure was building. Eventually, something would give.
"We only just met. Why are you so obsessive?" Takatsuki asked.
"The world is laid bare before my eyes and I'm disappointed. I wanted to get to know you and forget the world for a while. It seems, I'm the biggest disappointment after all." He hated his weakness, the way his voice rasped, and even how his bandages itched. It might have been an after effect of the darkness. Why did he feel such a bond? Harry knew it was his fault. He decided to take responsibility for his emotions.
"You're stupid and blind. You say the world is laid bare before you. That shows just how little you know. There is always more despair and darkness beneath the light." Takatsuki said.
"Then show me." He challenged.
"You're ill equipped. If I take you with me, it will only end in tragedy. In the dark there are monsters." She said.
"There are monsters in the light as well. The light blinds and tricks, it exchanges protection for obedience." Harry said. "Let me walk in your shoes." He reached out for her and he knew this was his last chance. She took him by the hand.
"You are an obsessive fool. This isn't a tale of romance. My life is a tragedy soaked in blood. This is your last stop. Just tell me to take you back to the library and I will. I'll be your friend for the rest of your time here. We can talk about books, our countries, and see a movie or two. Or you can be stubborn, and you can walk in my shoes. You won't be safe." Takatsuki said. Her words were a break in the storm. His aura calmed down as he regained control.
"We play the cards we are dealt. Its up to us what this tale become." She frowned and her lips scrunched up as if she bit into a lemon. He took her hand and she led him through the dark alleyways. His heart was beating quickly his excitement was building.
He had his bag of holding filled with weapons, his wand, twenty rolls of bandages, and two bags of blood stones. He was dress in a light coat, a pair of jeans, and a stretchy T-shirt. "Where are we going?" Harry asked.
"I smell blood, I'm hungry. Do you know what that means?" Harry shook his head in the negative.
"Have you not heard a news report since coming here?" Takatsuki asked.
"No, I had to sit in on some board meetings, vote on adding a ghoul gang to the pay roll, and go on a convoy to the countryside." Takatsuki froze for a second.
"Harry how did you vote?" Takatsuki asked.
"For the ghoul gang. You called me Harry does that mean I can call you Sen?" Harry asked.
"Call me Eto in private. I'd prefer Sen or my surname in public. What does Umbrella do?" Eto asked. Her voice took on a sing song quality.
"Normal corporate day to day stuff. We front as a pharmaceutical company, run illegal experiments, and hire any force we need. I think the execs have taken an interest in RC cells. I don't know how we're going to turn a profit on them. Its illegal to even handle them in most cases." Her eyes were growing larger with each revelation. He squeezed her hand. "A lot of this is rumor and speculation." Harry added.
"What about hiring a ghoul gang?" Eto asked.
"That's to protect our staff while they go bar hopping." Harry said.
"What if they're captured by the CCG won't they link it to Umbrella?" Eto asked.
"We'll blame it on a patsy and claim Umbrella had no idea what was going on. Then we'll bribe the prime minster and it'll be swept under the rug. The CCG will be wary of us from that point on but there have been preparations made for them. Some of our spies have begun infiltration. Just standard day to day for Umbrella." Eto's green eyes were shining at Harry eerily.
"Are you an executive and why are you so open with me?" Eto asked.
"If you ran around screaming Umbrella's crimes at the top of your lungs nothing would come of it. We've already ran the boy who cried wolf strategy in Britain. You could accuse us of every crime under the sun and no one would believe you. Japan is different for now. The Japanese are wary of our name and our growing interests. Umbrella is also wary and prepared." If they aren't then Harry would wash his hands of them. "As for your first question. I'm not an executive. I'm a shareholder and a private contractor. To be an executive you need more than stock. Each executive is personally powerful." Harry said. As he recalled the weaklings were at least stage ten now. Only Claudia and the newest CEO managed to reach foundry.
Her right green eye turned into a kagugan. From her purse she pulled out some bandages of her own. She opened a door on the side of a building, and they entered. She quickly changed in another room and emerged wearing a robe.
"Harry this is my apartment. We're in the third ward now if you're wondering. You're going to stay here while I'm gone. Don't touch anything in the fridge. I'll pick you up some British feed." She winked at him. "Do you have any allergies?" Harry shook his head. "I'll surprise you then."
Before she left, she glared at him intensely. "Don't read anything on my desk or on the table. They're not ready for the world to see." Then he'd bug her until she read it to him.
"What happened to showing me how dark the world is?" Harry asked her.
"Nope, you don't get a front row seat anymore. You've been promoted to sugar daddy and ghoul revolution wallet. Did you think I'd introduce you to my gang and let them pick on you?" Eto said.
She left through a window without a goodbye. With her gone Harry came to a revelation. Umbrella wasn't scared of him anymore. He handed them the ability to elevate from refinery to foundry.
Harry didn't know how much pull he still had with Umbrella. When he was the only foundry expert in town, he had plenty of power. That was no longer the case. They had two inexperienced foundry experts and the executive board would surely follow. Harry felt like America after the Soviet Union got the nuke. He no longer had a perfect trump card.
He looked around her apartment. Dishes were piled in the sink rank and unattended. Black stagnant water covered them with the barest hint of soap. The kitchen sink itself was covered in mold. It hadn't been cleaned in a long time. The ceiling fan was a centimeter thick with dust. On the yellowed walls and ceiling Harry saw the cloudy tell-tale signs of indoor smoking. There were rust colored footprints all over the carpet leading to the bathroom. Harry hovered towards the floor following a rank smell. Underneath the fridge, he saw a rotting human hand with teeth marks on the bone. Holes covered a few of the walls reminding Harry of that time he hid from Dudley's gang in a crack house.
From what he could tell the holes were made and none of the plaster or insulation was removed. Both Eto and the previous owners of this place weren't apt at cleaning. This worked in his favor. He pulled his wand out of his back of holding and paused. It might have been too soon to show off magic.
It was better to feed her a little at a time. Eto had her own secrets. "That girl is cray." Nomine said.
"Are you finally talking to me? I thought you were angry." Harry said.
"No, the eagle wounded me worse than I thought. I need more rest. Beware the fallen star Harry. It has its own agenda." Nomine said.
"Wait, what is the fallen star?" Harry asked.
"You can guess. I'm sure you're smart enough to figure it out. If you apply yourself." Nomine said. Harry frowned as she went dormant again. This was his fault. If he was stronger, he wouldn't look like a mummy.
He sat on Eto's couch and held his head in his hands. It always boiled down to power. There had to be something he could do to increase his power. He had his own quantum computer connected to his mind. There had to be a clue to the secret of foundry somewhere.
Harry thought back to his fights and his blunders. Voldemort should have been killed out of hand. He wanted to test out his aura. He let Voldemort get stronger and that decision would kill a lot of people. Aura was affected by his emotions. That was even more prevalent today. When he thought his journey with Eto was coming to an end, he couldn't handle it. Harry thought himself immune to outbursts. Harry started to laugh at himself. He laughed about the scars all over his body. Then he laughed at his inability to beat Dick like he should have.
After his laughter died down, he thought about aura. What was it, why did it emerge from qi, and why was it a constant? He'd read about it mechanically but didn't know how it worked. Harry wasn't a scientist. He did know the scientific method.
He straightened himself up on the couch. Aura won't harm something unless the wielder wants it to. It was a basic hypothesis. His toe dip into science.
Harry snatched a mouse off the floor. It struggled and bit at Harry's fingers. The mouse bit down on his skin with all its might. A smirk spread across Harry's face. This wasn't a bad feeling. He had control over this mouse. It was Harry who determined whether it lived or died. Wasn't that true for most of the world. Couldn't a grown man say that about any child he came across. Harry amended the difference was consequences. No force would revolt against Harry for killing a mouse.
He held the mouse in his hand and decided on a test for his hypothesis. He'd infuse the mouse with aura until it was harmed. He placed a second hand on the mouse and surrounded it with green aura.
Green light filled the apartment as light shined between his fingers. In moments his sixth sense detected the mouse's death. He didn't sense any malice towards the mouse. This hadn't been an attack of any time. Aura never affected Harry's body in a negative way. It was a force of Harry himself. Why did the mouse die? Harry opened his hands expecting to see the corpse of the little grey mouse.
In his hands was a dried-out skeleton of a mouse. Something glittered green. It was a tiny fleck of green. Harry touched it and knew it was solid Harry essence or his qi. This was horrible. He held the corpse in his other hand and pushed aura through it. The aura passed through the corpse as if nothing was there.
Aura when passing through something will separate the essence that make up the qi from whence it came from the object. That was his next hypothesis. It was the conclusion he received after his first theory was proved wrong by his test.
Harry reached into his bag and pulled out some blood stones. By passing aura through these beads his own qi will emerge separated from the object.
He held the bead in his hand and pushed his aura through it. In no time black dust flaked off the bead revealing a much smaller green stone. What would happen if he did this to someone? He could kill people with his aura and reduce them to food for his body. He could feed off the world around him directly and take what he needed. This was cultivation keeping what you needed and leaving the remainder.
He didn't know why qi produced aura. Harry turned his head. The tiny stone from the mouse was diffusing. Something about it was unbalanced. He didn't know for sure; he'd have to test it. Aura was pouring off the little stone and the stone was becoming less. The aura released flowed through objects. Instead of ripping Harry's qi out of them, they were stripped away slowly. Was it because the qi was too little or because there was no control over the qi?
There was a lot he didn't know and never asked. Now that he was alone here waiting for Eto to return he had questions. Would his own qi decrease, if he stopped passively absorbing essence and refining it? That would mean they weren't immortal by any means. To be immortal entropy could have no effect on you. Then again, they used reproduction to fight it if his hypothesis was correct.
If he stopped absorbing essence his qi would dwindle as his aura poured out of him. Qi naturally rejoined the essence of heaven and earth overtime.
Harry cut off his refinery and foundry and held his breath. His aura continued to pour out of him. He waited and aura continued to pour out of him. There was so much qi it was hard to tell. Thirty minutes passed, then an hour, and two hours. He searched through his qi blocks looking for the first ones. He found a tiny piece of one of his first blocks. He had no idea where consciousness power played on the rate of diffusion. It was much slower than the speck of his qi. It was even slower than the rate of the qi stone. Still it happened. Aura was created by diffusion. It was qi leaving the body to merge back with the essence of heaven and earth.
They were no matter the Nicolas Flamel and his elixir of life. They were dependent on consumption to sustain themselves. How could they call themselves immortals?
He sunk into meditation and looked over his refinery. It was a mess of random flames, severing magic, and attraction. With a wave of his mind he shattered the old refinery and rebuilt it. All he needed was dense aura to refine essence. His consciousness naturally consumed the essence of heaven and earth. In a sense he created a pipe that blasted newly absorbed essence as it made its way to the foundry to be compacted and folded. Harry smiled as his mind felt unburdened. The more aura he had the faster he could refine essence. His only limit was how much essence he could absorb.
He had another hypothesis to test. By absorbing vast amounts of qi and increasing aura production to a ludicrous degree, aura could be predicted and by predicting aura it could be controlled. To test his last hypothesis, he'd need to predict aura. He'd need to use the towers to test out his hypothesis or the forbidden forest at Hogwarts. It was summer and he had no idea how the diffusion would work.
A new thought ran through his mind. It should have occurred to him before but, it never occurred to him. Essence was finite. The essence that matched him was even more finite. How many ascended could the world contain? How long after the defeat of the gods before qi experts fought each other over the world's resources? Will the first to ascend turn on the other qi experts and take the world's qi for themselves?
Harry opened his eyes and placed his feet on the ground. He'd been meditating and floating for a while. His mind had been fully at work processing the situation.
With a good portion of his consciousness freed up his rate of processing essence doubled. Harry cleaned out the rest of his stash of blood stones. The laws of diffusion dictated that when he cleared an area of essence the absence should fill the hole with new essence. This naturally lowered the overall essence of heaven and earth. So long as Harry took faster than it diffused from his body, he'd gain qi.
By focusing, he summoned his aura. Green power spread around his body until it left the range of his consciousness power's control. That energy returned to the essence of the world. It was constant and there was nothing he could do about it. Instead he focused on a small area of aura and pushed it into his magic/consciousness power. Harry took hold of his wand increasing his consciousness power further and mixed the two forces. Harry used his sixth sense to observe the interaction.
Magic was consciousness power often made static in the form of a spell. That spell naturally performed the function of cultivation by gathering essence most like the spell. That did not make the spell qi. Qi was essence perfectly attuned to the consciousness of an individual. Harry wasn't sure if that was quite right either. The only way to know for sure was to test his theories.
He watched the magic fit itself with the aura. That didn't complete the spell. Instead it empowered the spell. This was why qi or aura mixed with a spell was stronger than standard magic. The spell was better with aura than without. By what percentage Harry didn't know. He could sense the spell and the aura, but he didn't know what he was looking at. He needed to understand spell creation.
For the first time in over a year Harry decided to sleep. He hadn't rested his body in a long time. There was seemingly no need for it anymore. Immortals didn't need sleep. Qi rested the mind. As he learned more, he learned how much he didn't know. Harry needed to test things for himself. That started with a mouse and resting through sleep was the next logical step. He closed his eyes and surrendered to the black.
Author's note: Hey guys, I've edited the whole story. The next two days i'm going to work on some new chapters. I plan to get at least to chapter 30 and into year 2. Review