So the guy with the ice power isn't using an element?

Nope. It's just a thing he can do now, like talking or running. Enkindled powers are like that.

And it wouldn't get better or worse if his personality got more or less like any element?

It might get a little better if he meditated on the nature of ice and cold? That happened with some of her trained animals. It's more like improved efficiency than an actual increase in power, though.

How would thinking about ice and cold make it more efficient?

She's seen it happen and doesn't know why. Lots of things about magic seem to be beyond anyone's understanding especially the very powerful things. And by the way it's probably time for her to go de-spring a bunch of people soon.

Okay! The author wishes her luck with that!

May you be blessed, she messages.

She asks Ruan if the statistics about simple versus complex de-springings have shown anything interesting, or if it's too soon for that?

They're not sure what the difference is yet! Guesses include it having to do with general health of a relevant gland or a vitamin deficiency but they could be on the wrong track.

I doubt it is any one thing. I could judge a thousand people in a day or more for it. In a month or two we can try hereditary ones and see if the genetic changes are comprehensible.

I think I might want to commission an artist for some illustrations in my memoir at some point and despite being reassured that you have a budget I don't wish to continually add things to it without hesitation.

"That wasn't really an anticipated expense, I'll admit. Whether it'd fit comfortably into the miscellany earmark would depend on your taste in art."

Well, I am patient. I will have money eventually. For now, work. How many people shall I see today? That green, I know how to do it for him now, and some others.

He shows her the schedule. "It's a little logistically difficult to get huge numbers of people in here just for a complexity diagnosis and then follow up on the tricky ones with a lot of questions to find out what the common factor is, so the greens are prepared to wait a bit and see if a pattern drops out naturally - it's not that hard to plan for bumping a few people to the next day each time, by comparison."

That makes sense. I do like this way of doing things, it lets me think mostly about magic. Even if it is rather impersonal.

"Specialization's the big advantage of how we have our economy set up, yes."

It's also slightly disquieting to Enkindle dozens and dozens of beings the same way, with a touch as light as a feather. I don't think anything like it has been done before. But it is for the best, yes? I will get over it.

"Disquieting how?"

Un-Traditional. Enkindling is a mighty, special, rare power shared only with the most inspiring or deserving beasts, who are to become your friends and servants. This is... Not that. It will be seen as shameful to some. I might have to bite them.

"Well. Let us know if we can usefully back you up about that."

We are not all chained to Tradition. And Tradition changes over the centuries. And an Elder supports me in this. I will be fine.

She gets to work. She rejects one purple not for being a complex case but for having a cold.

They are all very angry at the purple for showing up with a cold. She leaves in a quarantine taxi, crying.

It feels like the cold had started the afternoon before. Yes, this is the correct response.

Sick animals trigger something not entirely unlike a pollution instinct in Draak, though less severe and more to the character of anger. I think it's a culling instinct to keep one's prey healthy.

A bad-springing green in the waiting area remarks, "Some Amentan predators preferentially eat sick animals because they're easier to catch."

To me sick animals are just obviously bad and need to die on some level of my mind. It's ignorable, but irritating. And once's something is dead meat is meat, unless the disease is something like rabies or blueblight.

"Amentans don't eat sick animals," says the green. "If an animal on a farm gets sick I think it's sometimes made into pet food, but not food for people, even if we could cook the disease out."