The one who brought us Magic -- Kalon 1200 Form -- dnp

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The Grand Empire, formed over four hundred years ago, is the governing body of an alien race of Kalons. The Empire's territory spans over four solar systems, or sectors, in which there are seven habitable planets and moons.

Our Hero's story begins on the most populous planet in the Empire: Vuuna'a of Sector 2.



Vuuna'a is a dark planet, despite its closeness to its star, Hlio. Hlio is a white dwarf star, and while it keeps the planet warm, it provides little light. The inhabitants of Vuuna'a have evolved in an almost pitch black environment. They have four eyes to take in as much light as possible, and they see UV light better than light on the visual spectrum. They have four ears, and use a form of sonar to help them locate the objects around them. Their hair, tails, and whisker-like horns move independently, and are extremely sensitive to touch. In these ways, the Kalons on Vuuna'a have adapted to "see" in pure darkness.

Much of the other plant and animal life on the planet employ bio-luminescence; less plant diversity exists on Vuuna'a than on other habitable planets due to difficulty using photosynthesis without adequate light. The plants that do exist have giant leaves, allowing them to soak up what little light there is. Most of the animals are not very pigmented, with reddish eyes and light colored fur.

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they/them

Edits:
Standard custom shine
Common custom tail, common hair edit, common longer fur
Uncommon custom ears, uncommon custom pupil
Rare horns, rare extra ears, rare glow(tips of hair, tail, and horns)
Legendary heightened senses(hearing, feeling, sees UV light), legendary transparency(hair, horns, tail)

[migraine]

Enclosed are the logs from ship A-661, from Special Engineer Huar'vaa Tat, user number 77082. Access restricted to authorized personnel only.

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First Entry
Day One; 6:00 PM
Status: Fair

Central command told me to record my thoughts and feelings while I am out on my mission. They worry about the isolation, but I don't mind being alone. I can go into Deep Sleep whenever I get bored, and besides, I have a ton of work to do to keep me busy. But if central command wants it, central command will get it.

The planet they are sending me to is only 62 light years away. Some of the other engineers have a much longer journey than I do; Be'envet is headed to another galaxy entirely, the poor soul. He looked sick when he got the news. Desperate times call for desperate measures, however, and the war has recently become unwinnable. The cyborgs have taken two of our planets already, and they are poised to take three more before the year is out. Resources are dwindling. So, out I go, to find a technology that might tip the scales in our favor.

They assigned me a standard issue ship, cozy and pale yellow like the Empire's flag. There are no extra amenities whatsoever,
just the standard AI, a bed, wasteroom, and enough food to last me two full trips. They told me my assigned planet wasn't promising; unmanned ships in the past had detected life on the planet, but no radio signals or anything else that may have designated advanced technology. But, they said, all life-bearing planets must be researched, and because mine has little potential,
my ship has little space.

My plan is to get to my destination, observe it quickly, and head home. I would much rather be repairing ships with my uncle than going on a wild goose chase to a primitive planet.

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Second Entry
Day 16; 4:09 PM
Status: Fair

The AI tells me that the ship is already halfway to my assigned planet. Central command named the planet "Planetary Body 892"; the higher ups have never been any good at naming. I'll have to think of something that rolls off the tongue a bit better.

I have been keeping myself busy by tinkering with the AI system. It isn't very advanced, but I brought some programs with me to add to it, and it can now play games with me and clean the ship. Every now and again I have it show me video footage of Planetary Body 892 from the unmanned ship that flew past the planet years ago. It's not a big planet, but it is rather beautiful. Blue and green, as lush as home, but further from its star, allowing white ice caps to form. It is bathed in light. Its star is huge, young and yellow, unlike my home planet's star, which is small, old and dark. What kind of life inhabits this new place, I wonder? Have the creatures gained sentience yet? I see no huge terraforming stations, no whizzing satellites. Central command is wasting their time sending me here.

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Third Entry
Day 35; 3:00 AM
Status: Tired

I went into Deep Sleep for the final week of travel, and just woke up to loud alarms and a buzzing AI system. My head aches. I've reached the new planet, which I still have no good name for, and am currently in orbit. It's even more beautiful up close. Vast continents of green and brown land cover its face in between sapphire oceans. It has much more land than my planet, which is mostly water. I am feeling anxious, excited, and honestly a little awestruck. I am about to step out onto a planet that none of my species has seen in person. Sure, my people have explored vast territories of space, but for one reason or another, we haven't come to this particular spot yet. I am going to allow the AI system to scan the planet for signs of technology, anything from advanced infrared signals to plain old smelted iron. I expect to touch down in the next few days.

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Fourth Entry
Day 37; 5:02 AM
Status: Anxious

Okay. Okay. Huar'vaa, you can handle this. You've landed ships on planets a hundred times, what's one more? So...the AI system has targeted an area on the edge of a major landmass that seems to contain bronze. I want to land far from any intelligent life and eventually observe the planet while using camouflage. Sometimes, primitive species believe us to be Gods, but sometimes...they believe us to be enemies. I want to stay safe and don't want to hurt anyone, so stealth seems wise. I will continue recording once I touch down.

____________________________________________________________________
Fifth Entry
Day 37; 7:35 PM
Status: CRITICAL

Oh no. Oh no no no. Eauuugh...the landing went...so wrong. The AI system simply bugged out as soon as it reached the planet's inner atmosphere, and I have crashed. I cannot reach central command, and my leg...oh no...STEADY, Huar'vaa, calm down,
just record your status...

Okay. I seem to have seriously injured my leg, which is broken at the knee, and likely have damaged parts of my ribcage and possibly my liver. The AI system is on the fritz, and won't respond to my inputs; it just goes static when I turn it on. I think there is something wrong with the circuitry. Something about the atmosphere here just...burned up bits of my ship. If I can find some copper, or maybe even some silicon, I think I can fix it. No, I KNOW I can fix it. If I survive...

Don't talk like that. Stay positive. Breathe........

Okay. I am sure that my impact alerted some of the locals. From my window, I can see that I am in a wetland area, with thick trees and tall ferns. Thank the stars that the forest here is thick enough to cover some of the starlight, otherwise I'd be blinded; I'm used to much darker places than this. My portable AI seems to still work, which is key. I installed a universal language translator onto it months ago for a different mission, and it should come in handy here. If anything here is sentient...

I...I'm going to go outside now. If someone from home finds this, which is doubtful, please let my uncle know I love him.

[migraine]

Celyn had been out searching for monksbane for hours. The day was getting dark, but he knew his mother would nag and screech if he returned empty handed, so he pressed onward, grumbling as he went.

The boglands were warm and humid this time of year, buzzing with insects and bursting with plantlife. Celyn lived here with his mother during the summers, when she needed the most help gathering herbs and medicinal plants. He traveled the rest of the year,
and right now, sweating and grunting, he wished he was elsewhere.

Almost ready to give up and deal with his mother's ire, Celyn heard a noise. A voice. It sounded...strange, distorted, crackling with a consistency that reminded him of lightning magic.

"Help...please..." the strange voice moaned, and Celyn saw movement. A heap of long hair and thick whiskers lay several feet ahead of him, almost entirely obscured by leaves and ferns. He moved warily forward, wondering if this was a bandit's trap, or a shape-shifting fae.

Upon closer inspection, the creature seemed to be neither. Four dark eyes looked up at him, tired and pleading. There was blood pooled around its back legs, and it looked strangely...familiar. Like one of his own, but...different. It opened its mouth again,
but Celyn shushed it.

"Please, don't try to talk. You could be dying. There's a lot of blood here, your eyes have no water left, it seems, so you're dehydrated...your skin looks yellow, so perhaps liver damage. Lie still, and let me help you."

The creature did not attempt any protest, and instead closed its eyes. Celyn took his knapsack off and rifled through it, pulling out vials of various colors, along with some chalk and salt. He had done this a million times, and moved with confidence, drawing runes with the chalk on the creature's body and encircling them in salt. Popping open some vials, he began to chant. The chalk runes glowed softly, pulsating and contorting as the chant grew louder. Slowly, the runes disappeared, as did the wounds on the creature's skin. A long, relieved breath came from the creature. Celyn stood up.

"I only have my basic supplies with me, but that'll stop the bleeding and should be enough to help you walk. Once we get to my mother's house, I can work on any deeper, internal damage, and get you rehydrated. If you can, please follow me." Celyn held out a paw, and the creature opened its eyes.

"Thank you," it said.

[migraine]

__________________________________________


"Ah, you're awake."

Huar'vaa's eyes opened into small slits as the light from a window poured into the room. As their pupils adjusted, they saw a creature similar to themself, but with no feelers and smaller eyes.

"I am Rhiannon," the creature said. "My son brought you here four days ago, and you have been sleeping ever since. I wasn't sure you'd wake up, honestly, and was about to dump you back in the woods for the swamp to take you. But my son's got a big heart and wouldn't hear of it."

Huar'vaa sat up and surveyed the room. It was small, with barely enough room for one bed and nightstand. The walls were mud,
and from the rafters of the ceiling hung dried bundles of plants. It smelled musty and damp. Realizing they felt no pain, Huar'vaa looked down at their leg, astounded. They were fully healed, from ribcage to knee. Huar'vaa flexed their legs, and shook their head.

"You said...it's been four days? Bones take weeks or even months to set and fully heal. I'm...speechless, to be honest."

"My Celyn is a bit of a prodigy." Rhiannon rolled her eyes. "Don't praise him too much, it'll go to his head. Most healers can mend bone in a week or two, but Celyn prides himself on a quick job." Rhiannon sat on the bed beside Huar'vaa, staring at their tail and horns. "I've seen a lot of weird and magical critters here in my swamp, but nothin' quite like you, my dear. You look almost like a Kalon, with a few tweaks. I'd like to know where you're from, and what you were trying to do here." She pulled out Huar'vaa's tablet from a rucksack. "Celyn found this on ya when he was healing you. Says it has a magic to it like nothin' he's ever seen before, and he's been studying the stuff for ages."

"Magic?" Huar'vaa looked at Rhiannon quizzically. "No no, just your standard circuitry and AI system, one of the less advanced tablets, honestly, central command wouldn't issue me anything on the cutting edge." Huar'vaa saw Rhiannon's eyes narrow in confusion.

"Ah, okay, well, first...I'm Huar'vaa. I want to thank you for taking me in and not...throwing me into the swamp." Huar'vaa saw Rhiannon smile. "I am from another planet, if you'll believe it. Your planet has no ships according to my AI system, so I assume your people have yet to explore spa-"

"Waaaaait wait wait wait...just how old and insane do you think I am?" Rhiannon was laughing in an eerily serious manner. "Another planet? Just admit you were running from some knights after knickin' some food, or that you're from the Fae realm, don't come in here and lie to an old woman in her own home!"

Huar'vaa stared at Rhiannon for a moment, and then shrugged. "Believe me or not, it doesn't matter to me. I'm here looking for new technologies. Whatever your son did to heal me, well...that's not something we can do on my planet, at least not nearly as quickly.
I'd like to speak with him again. Celyn, was it?" Huar'vaa stood up, gingerly putting weight on their hind legs to make sure there was no pain.

"Celyn, yeah. He should be back here soon, he went out to finish finding me a few plants. New technologies, eh? What Celyn did ain't nothin' scientific. Magic's all about...energies, and elements, and some other gobbledy-gook. I don't mess with it much myself, I stick to natural remedies." As she spoke, she pulled out a poultice. "Let me redo your bandages while you're awake. My kind of healing takes longer than Celyn's, but it's a lot easier to learn." Fastening the poultice in place over Huar'vaa's leg wound, Rhiannon gestured toward the living room. "Let's sit and chat about this....other planet."

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Huar'vaa and Rhiannon spoke with one another for about an hour. By the time Celyn returned, Rhiannon's eyebrows had vanished into her hairline.

"Ah! You're back! You ain't gonna believe where our guest is from, dearie--"

"Another world?" Celyn asked, causing Huar'vaa to blink, and Rhiannon to mumble, "know-it-all..."

"Ah, I found...your home? I think?" Celyn scratched the back of his head. "A yellow, round thing, all made of a metal I've never seen before, and pulsing with a magic I've never felt. A magic just like the kind in your tablet."

"My ship!" Huar'vaa cried, her eyes lighting up. "That's my ship, it's not my home, although I did live in it for over a month. I need to rebuild it, but that isn't my main goal right now." Huar'vaa smiled at Celyn. "I want to thank you for saving me. My plan was to stealthily observe your people, but I managed to ruin that entirely by...crash landing my ship. I want to talk to you about how you healed me."

Celyn tilted his head. "Ma'am, whatever magics your world has, from what I can tell from your ship and your tablet...they are far beyond the magics I can use. I'm not sure what I can tell you."

"No!! No, you see, my world has no...'magics'. My ship and my tablet are powered by..." Huar'vaa had to think about how to word it. "...by a force kind of like lightning, but much smaller. It's called electricity. No magic involved, just science and metal and chemicals."

Celyn and Rhiannon shared a look. "I mean, that sounds a lot like magic to me," Celyn said, "but I'll humor you."

He sat down next to his mother, and began speaking. "Magic, as I understand the word, means tapping into your inner pool of energy and directing it outward so that it affects the world around you. It's a skill that's difficult to use, and involves a lot of meditation and practice. Because of this, most magic users that I know of focus on learning one type of magic, and I decided on healing. I...feel my inner energies, my inner warmth, and I push that power out into a broken limb, or a damaged organ. I can almost feel the tissue knitting itself when I do this, and there's a lot of beauty to it..." Celyn looked a little embarrassed.

Huar'vaa was staring at Celyn with their mouth agape. They urged him to continue, stunned by what they were hearing. He sighed,
and grabbed one of the many potted plants in the room.

"Here, let me show you." He took the stem of the leafy plant and snapped it in half, causing Rhiannon to make a sour face. Celyn then began a similar ritual to the one he went through to heal Huar'vaa, pulling out chalk and salt and vials, drawing patterns and runes on the floor. He closed his eyes, and, both palms facing the broken plant, began a low chant. As his voice grew louder, a faint light began to shine from his palms, yellowish and dazzling. The chant got even louder, and faster, and the light grew brighter,
and the plant began to mend itself.

Before Huar'vaa could even gasp, the ritual was over, and Celyn held an intact plant in his hands. Rhiannon quickly snatched the plant from him, grumbling as she put it back in its place.

"Mom, hey, you know I didn't mean any harm, I jus-"

"Teach me."

Celyn turned back around to stare at Huar'vaa. "Teach you?"

"Teach me this magic. You said it could be used for things other than healing, correct? I am here to find something to help my people win a devastating war against a brutal, unyielding foe. If you can teach me this magic...maybe it would be enough to bring us our victory."

[migraine]

It had taken some time to convince Rhiannon and Celyn of a few things.

1. Huar'vaa was an alien, one hundred percent.
2. The alien race were the "good guys", and helping them win would not cause undue suffering.
3. Electricity and rocket fuel were not magic.

Huar'vaa spent several days with Rhiannon and Celyn. During this time, they found their ship, figured out exactly what went wrong with it, and learned from Celyn that things like copper and steel could be purchased in the largest city on the continent, The Capital.

Huar'vaa also now had a name for this planet: Brynmor. From what they could deduce, the planet had not progressed technologically past printing presses, simple plows, and blacksmithing. Even steam engines had yet to be invented. Whenever Huar'vaa tried to explain how the tablet worked, or the ship, or the universal translation device, Rhiannon and Celyn looked stumped. To them, Huar'vaa thought, things like circuitry and rocket science were magic. And little wonder that this planet hadn't progressed technologically; with magic, there was no need for electricity or internal combustion engines.

After about a week of getting to know their two new compatriots, Huar'vaa took Celyn aside.

"Listen, I really appreciate the things you and your mother have done for me. But, I need to get home with an understanding of magic as soon as possible. Every day I spend here is another day that the Cyborgs move closer to annihilating my people. When can we head to The Capital?"

Celyn sighed, rubbing his forehead. "I figured you'd be asking about leaving soon enough. We like havin' you around, you know. I actually sent a letter to the Magical Academy a few days ago, letting them know I'd be making a visit. It's also in the Capital, it's the largest school of magic in the country, and it's where I learned how to use healing magic."

Huar'vaa's face lit up, and they hugged Celyn, twisting him back and forth. "Yes, yes, yes, thank you!! When do we leave?"

Celyn made a pained squelching noise as Huar'vaa's hug squeezed the breath out of him. "WE...GO.....we go tomorrow," he said, his words falling out of his mouth as Huar'vaa put him down. "I even...well...let me know if I've gone too far, but..."

Celyn sat down on the living room couch, and patted the seat next to him, where Huar'vaa plopped down. He pulled out a colorful pamphlet covered in images of maces, shields and swords, all glowing with a blue light.

"All of the schools of magic advertise a lot, trying to grab students where they can. This is the flyer that the enchantment school is currently putting out. I was trying to think of what kind of magics would help a race as advanced as yours, and...well...even an advanced weapon can be enchanted. You might even be able to enchant things like your ships, or your communication systems. I think, for you, enchantment magic is the way to go."

Huar'vaa was already flipping through the pamphlet, their four eyes widening with each page. The possibilities seemed endless. They looked over at Celyn, an eager smile on their face, and before Celyn could yell "NOT ANOTHER HUG-", Huar'vaa was squeezing the life out of him again.

Their species now had a chance.