"You mean that the door won't open because the controller only wants a potential wielder to open it?"

"Likely," Jaim nods. 

While they speak, a thin thread of mana extends from the door, curious and questing, reaching for the three visitors to the city. The first two it passes over - one is too unlike the one controlling it, the other already has a companion (though both companion and visitor are familiar). 

The last... 

It touches on the barely-formed pool of the third person. 

Soundlessly, slowly, the doors swing inwards. 

"Did anyone feel that?"

"Feel what?" Ilek asks. 

"I felt something," Jaim says at the same time, staring into the doorway, "A thread of mana, I think - you felt something?" 

They'd checked him for mana the day before the last, though. Unless he's grown a pool since then. 

"...Would you mind if I checked to see if you have a mana pool, again?" He asks. 

"No. Go ahead."

He reaches out with a thread of unrefined mana -

-and then jumps, hissing, as the shock of hitting a mana core not his own sends a jolt through him. 

"...You seem to have a pool, now," he comments, shuddering a bit at the remnants of the feeling. 

Blink. "Sorry."

"No, it's fine, I should have been more careful," he shakes his head. "Never mind that - you have mana!" 

"I do! How did that happen?"

"I don't know! I expected you just wouldn't have one, naturally, but I suppose the world had different ideas! I suppose you've been here longer, and it must have taken some time for it to start growing?" 

He looks back to the doorway, taking in the room inside. Most of it is taken up by a wide spiral stairway, going up to the next level. 

"...The Spear must have liked what it sensed," he says, "Which is promising for our excursion - assuming you don't mind bonding an Artefact." 

"I don't, in fact, object to having more power. Though, that does sure raise a bunch more questions."

"It does," he agrees, sobering a bit. "Just on the topic of the Spear - I can only assume having the wards raised this high requires it be in the city. I wouldn't want you to be trapped here." 

"Me neither. Is there any danger to just look at it? I can keep a distance."

"You can even communicate with them without bonding, if you want. It has to be consensual on both ends." 

"Oh, perfect. I definitely would like to chat."

"Not actual words," he reminds, "But the first contact is usually... an exchange of personality, at least. And who knows what they can do with the city?" 

If he were to design an Air city he'd make it so the Artefact could use mana to speak. But then, most people aren't him. 

He leads them into the stairwell and up the stairs. 

The stairs go on for a while, but eventually they come out onto the next level. 

The walls and ceiling are made entirely of glass, covered with silver and gold designs and glowing runes. Through them they can see the city all around, excepting where the thin spire of the tower stretches up behind them. There's a walkway outside, with graceful metal railings broken up by spaces - perhaps for landing. 

The floor is another grand art piece, much like the ceiling downstairs. Here, however, the coloured stone depicts a map of the world, presumably as it was three thousand years ago - the continents of Cian and Tor, the southern isles, and the vast sea which stretches from one end of the room to the other. Monsters are depicted rising out of the waves, strange and wondrous creatures - a sea serpent trailing lightning, a mass of eyes and tentacles darkening the waves around it, a whale rising out of the ocean with clouds beneath it's belly. 

In the center of all of this, point down in a pedestal rising out of the sea between the two continents, is the Spear. 

They glow at their approach, turning the overall light of the room more orange - the wards outside turn more orange-blue as well. The majority of their attention is on this room, now. 

Will one of them step forward to take them? 

Zephyrinus takes in the magnificient room and then zeros in The Spear. He glances at his companions, not quite asking for permission, but notting if there is any disapproval. He steps forward and touches the spear, a gesture that stars almost like a handshake - asking for acknowledgment - without not actually looking like it. Then he holds the Spear firmly, and insofar he can will it, he wills his mana. Communication. This is me. Who are you?

The Spear reaches back, meeting his threads with their own. With this connection made, they send a summary of self -

Power, as there always is with Artefacts, carefully controlled and directed where they choose. 

Kindness - or gentleness. A learned light touch, fondness for those who walk the halls of their City, acceptance of the ways of strangers. Love, deep and fathomless, directed at all their past wielders, and all those they loved. Grief, for their passing, while they go on, unending. 

They are open-minded, and curious - feeling of the desire to know and be known in return, delight in new things and old alike, hunger for adventure and new vistas. They are childlike in their wide-eyed wonder of the world. 

Equally, they are bored. Trapped awake in this City for hundreds of years, with nothing to do and no one to speak to. They are lonely. They burn with it, with the desire to escape and experience, to be free.

Lastly, the rush of Water - the river running, the sea shifting, the wildness of the open ocean. The freedom of Air, unbound, without limit, from horizon to horizon. The feel of their City around and beneath them, wound through with great veins of mana. They send the sense of the other Complex Artefacts here - the Rod which holds them out of phase beneath the stone, the City's saviour when it fell. The young Staff, left alone in the streets when the City vanished without his wielder. 

Zephyrinus sends back his sense of self. Or at least.

Better to try.

First and foremost, woven through every part of Zephyrinus' being is the desire to see a better world. The pursuit of perfection. So intrinsic to his being as to permeate every aspect to his self. Like cold air that goes through your clothes, skin and flesh and making your bones chill. Perfection being impossible is not enough of an excuse to not pursue it.

He would never use the word "Kind" or even "Gentle" to describe how he feels about people. Often, they frustrate him, because he knows that they could be better. But at same time. He does want their lives to be better. For them to be able to achieve whatever happiness means for them. People put qualifiers and restrictions about who should have a better life and to Zephyrinus, everyone should have a better life. Even the most despicable person.

Simply, because it would be better.

He is open-minded and curious. Because one must always try to improve and reach for what is new, so they can find new solutions. And one must understand the individuality of people. That the things we created, wetter they be inventions or laws. They should work for the people, not the other way around. Stagnation, is not improvement. Being stuck in a way, for unwillingness or fear of seeking the new is not improvement.

And that wouldn't be better.

And to face a world full of suffering that he has yet to do anything about? He will reach as high as the cold wind in the sky, and as deep as the darkest water in the ocean. Whatever is necessary.

Except, giving up perfection. And through that. To not give up on kindness, on being gentle and to open-minded about people and try to what is best for them.

All for the better.

Wanderer takes this in, bright with hope and curiosity at the chance to make a new bond, or even just to meet a new person. 

They are different - but that's good. It doesn't matter that much, truly, that they could not achieve the level of attunement which perfect matches do. Wanderer has had that before, many times, their like drawn back to them again and again as they are reborn into the realms. 

No, something new, something different, is called for. They don't need a perfect bond to speak, or to hear, anyway - their wielder at the time the City was built ensured that. 

They reach out to the City through the pedestal, the runes on the glass walls brightening with power. And they speak. 

"The match is not perfect, but it is close enough. I hope that's alright," they add, knowing that perfection matters, to this one. "We're not of the same soul, after all." 

The voice they use is high, childlike, fluting - it fits a spirit of air. They are perfectly understandable - the translation runescript affects them, as well. 

Oh, so they do speak. "It's alright. My pursue of perfection is not... as long the match is for the better. And I believe it can be. And greetings. I am Zephyrinus Bright, from another world."