When he first began to understand it, the very concept of multiple planes
fascinated him. His fascination was the fascination of one who has never seen
much of the world beyond the boundaries of the family farm and whose greatest
ambition was to one day beat his brother in the (so it seemed) fine art of
tumble-racing. When I saw him, the boy was a freshling novice in the
Celestines, a Child of Light, as they are called. As novices are wont to do, he
asked a great many questions, which I took it upon myself to gladly answer.
Magnagora had gone without raiding Celest for a while, and I was bored. My
Aslaran blood begged for combat; to feel my fast and lithe body cutting through
air and delivering blows unto my opponents was a veritably divine thing.

Lacking the entertainment of combat, though, I deigned to help the young novice
who had bumbled his way past the Portal of Fate. I asked to meet him at the Pool
of Stars, the nexus of our city. It took him half a day to find it. I stared
into the depths of the Pool and contemplated cosmic matters. It hurt my head
and I presently began to doze near the pool. At last the lad came. He looked to
be no more than sixteen, a gangly human youth with messy, cropped blond hair and
a nervous grin. I gave him an encouraging smile, but I may have bared a few more
Aslaran teeth than would be prudent, as he shrank from my smile like a mouse
from a cat. Already I was feeling taxed with frustration at the youth. Leave
the teaching and proselytizing to those senior Celestines! I was in the
business of sunbathing.

"Planes!"

I opened one eye. "Planes?"

"Yes, planes! I've never heard of them until now… someone told me!" The boy was
veritably jumping out of his sandals with excitement.

"Yes, well there are planes. You see, the universe is layered, much like an
onion, with different planes being as layers of that onion. It takes mystical
skill to open up gates to planes, and usually we must cross them in order of
ascendancy – Prime, Ethereal, Elemental, Cosmic, and Astral. The Astral plane
is the highest, and thus the hardest to transverse…."

And so the lesson went on. The knowledge was secondhand to me; many long hours
spent listening to Torili in the guildhall had nailed Planar knowledge into my
mind so that I couldn't do something mundane as sitting in the bath without my
thoughts turning towards Aethereal matters. Much as I could teach the novice
about the planes and their workings, he hungered for more, and at long last he
seemed exhausted, if ecstatic with knowledge, and unable to learn more.

"There," I said, dismissing the novice, "That's about all you can learn right
now. Interesting, hmm?"

"I should say, ‘interesting'! I've never heard of this stuff before! On the
farm we talked mostly about cows. And chickens. We had a prize bull, once, and
he bred better than any bull you've ever seen! He was a wild one, I'll tell
you. Some bulls you have to coax or they won't mate, no drive in them at all,
but this one, I mean, such a bull! Would see to those cows like there was no
tommorow!" The novice was like a veritable stream of run-on sentences, half of
which were garbled midway and half of which meant no sense at all. Praying to
the Supernals for patience, I smiled and nodded and waited for the novice to
depart so that I could hopefully continue my sunbathing.

The novice wouldn't leave. He looked at me expectantly. I looked at him
curiously.

"What do you want now?" I asked.

"Well, I've never been onto another plane before, I've never seen much of
anything, really, outside of the cows and the chickens… I was wondering if
maybe you could take me?

In truth, I really didn't want to. By this point I'd spent the better part of
half a day with the boy, and I truly wished to buy a nice sandwich from the
General Store, maybe catch a nap. Yet I couldn't deny a novice the opportunity
to witness something as spectacular as the sight of another plane. I remembered
myself as a novice, waiting for my first glimpse of another world and nearly
having my eyes fall out of their sockets as a result. The boy had such kind
blue eyes, I felt obligated to take him, though it would be a pain and taxing
on my magical energies.

"Alright. I taught you about the plane of Celestia, right? Well, I'll take you
there – the Pool of Stars serves as a direct gateway. But understand I'm doing
you a favor – I've no obligation to be carting around novices." The novice
nodded, a curious twinkle in his eye. I placed a hand on the Pool and beckoned
the boy.

"Take my hand." I said.

In my mind I imagined the universe, the onion layers that make up the planes,
and a rift, a gateway between them. In a moment, Prime and Celestial were one.
In that moment, I grasped an Aether strand with my mind, tugged, and then felt
the familiar disorientation as I fell into the loops and sinkholes of Aether.

When I opened my eyes, I was at the Pool of Stars – on Celestia. The blue sky
was utterly clear, the air pure. Winged Cherubs floated in the breeze; the wind
slightly rustled the green grass beneath me. I turned to say something to the
novice – and stopped.

Where I had thought to see a gangly blond youth of sixteen, I beheld an
incredible sight that still stuns me at its memory, to this very day. The young
novice was no longer clad in a gray tunic and trousers but was surrounded in
unearthly blue light. The boy's hair, once blond, slowly began to turn white.
His face, once youthful, began to turn old, wise with experience. I watched in
amazement as he began to grow a beard, dignified robes miraculously appeared
about him, and a complex knotted golden belt wove itself about him. Only one
thing remained unchanged – the boy's eyes, mischievous, kind, and
compassionate.

I knelt on one knee before the miraculous sight. The old man turned to me, the
holy blue light receding, and smiled calmly. When he spoke, it was with the
voice of a thousand ocean waves breaking on the sands of infinity.

"None of us are too old or experienced to teach something to another, young
Parallax."

And as I knelt in awe, the Holy Supernal Japhiel stopped, gave me a pardoning
look and a wink, and slowly walked off into the eternity of Celestia.