Dicy Stone
While Minoth knows the link between Blade and Driver - not the bond, but the link - is something you're specifically not supposed to focus on, during battle, since it should be so natural that it doesn't need extra attention, he can't help but think about it, all the damn time.
On a purely mechanical level, it's amazing: Blade transferring strength to Driver, Driver providing a solid anchor for the Blade's energy and moreover ether. Regardless of all the other problems with the system, that exchange is fantastic, nearing fantastical.
On a semantic level, it translates the din of battle, with Art shouts and damage grunts flying everywhere, into a direct-plug feeling. Here is the push. There is the pull. I've taken a hit; I'm coming to support you. Let's do this, together. So more mechanics, but with words, and communication.
On an emotional, psychological, comparison-basis personal level, it drives (pun superpositionally intended) Minoth straight up the wall, by dint of the fact that it so easily removes all of the walls that had been preexisting around him, built up since the moment of awakening.
It's there. It's gold. He could swear sometimes he's reached out and touched it. That's him, vital and thriving, in the heat of battle, with a Driver who at the very least respects him, if not loves him like a friend, or a brother, or a lover, or more.
(It may very well be blatantly more, but like many other people, Minoth doesn't often allow himself to have what other people will freely read at face value. Addam, for instance, will read situations just that way. It's only with Minoth that he shies back, mute - at least, muffled.)
When he lets go of his guns, either on a flying toss or a gentle handoff, he can still feel the link burning; Addam's encouragement and gratefulness is sometimes stilted and awkward, but it's always earnest, and Minoth himself could not be more grateful.
But then, on one confounding occasion, when Addam takes Minoth's guns, his confused human hands stutter, and Minoth finds himself holding the prince's greatsword. It's better, he supposes, than standing there with nothing to do but direct his energy in Addam's direction, defenseless and unable to fully concentrate on the link, the affinity, the bond, but...shouldn't they have had a better plan for this?
An Electro Greatsword is no special contraption. It's just a hunk of metal, with a bit of elemental infusion, and maybe a special-tied grip wrap that suits the wielder especially well. Addam has told Minoth multiple times, over the handful of years they've known each other, that the swords themselves have no great value to him. They are expensive, and fine implements, so he tries his best to keep them in good repair, but he's not emotionally attached.
Minoth wonders whether he's - Blade or Driver - emotionally attached to his own weapons. He appreciates the aesthetic quality of his guns, on those same mechanical and semantic levels, and he appreciates how they very squarely do not match the aesthetic of Indol, no matter where he was originally awakened, but does he really...treasure them?
One of Addam's shots, scattered, strikes true, even through the Aspar's armored hide. Minoth feels a defined ping of pride in his Core. Measuring that against the way he feels when his own shots hit...yeah, he'd say his martial prowess and the interface by which he accomplishes the associated feats are pretty important to him.
But right now, he's got a greatsword. He's much less than nimble.
Held in front of him, flat perpendicular to the ground, maybe it can act as a defense?
And that ping...
Minoth concentrates on the bond again.
Addam is harried, and even with the lighter weapon he's not totally prepared to see the rattling telegraph and dodge the oncoming Snake Eyes.
Even in this moment, even with all his self-admonition, Minoth frames the facts in his mind, to build momentum.
Addam has his guns. Addam is in danger.
It's happened before. It'll happen again. Jin's created a wonderful beast, with this. (And Lora, too, but Jin's the one who let go.)
Minoth has Addam's sword. Minoth is tethered to the battle not just by the hands holding his guns but by the soul even capable of handling them.
Minoth doesn't want his guns back. Minoth wants to keep fighting.
"My prince!"
"Minoth?"
Yeah, verbal communication is good, especially for Addam. Especially for Minoth! Can't exactly display tender, outsize, all-but-unspoken loyalty in a mental link.
"Relax yourself" - this for the death grip - "and get behind me!"
He's no tank. Not by constitution, anyway. He's not even fully capable of a normal shield.
"I have you. We'll get through this."
But one twist, down low, to the front, dragging the midpoint of the blade up through the Aspar's soft belly as it strikes from heightened head, and Minoth thrusts his right arm out.
"I've got you, don't you worry."
There lands one gun. Without further comment, he drops the sword, sticks his left hand up to catch the knife in parabola, and slides low to gut the spilling, spraying wound again.
Alone, the beast can't rely on other forces to spare it time to regenerate. With enough smart, open teamwork and nimble, evasive swapping, there's hardly anything bog-normal that Addam and Minoth can't best.
The same thought. Two minds thinking it, as one. Two bodies, synchronized to protect one another. To exchange voices, hearts, thoughts, and even weapons, just as fluidly as they can manage it, while in the face of threats to every aspect of Alrestian life.
Well, if that was all being a Blade was, Minoth would be happy. But their hands together on two divisions of the same manifested Core feel even better than that.
"I thought they had you there, Prince."
"No you didn't! I didn't catch a whiff of uncertainty. I admire that, you know."
Minoth's not so sure he would.
"Honestly. Addam. I'm glad you're alright."