At some point, I must have fallen asleep, because I woke up and felt an unusual weight on my head. I struggled to peel my eyes open, as the dried tears had forced my eyelids to stick together. I saw a lock of silver hair out of the corner of my eye and noticed the soft sound of someone breathing. I made the association quickly, and the resulting answer forced my heart to skip a single beat.
How long have we been like this? My ass is numb, and I think that's the sun coming up, I thought as I looked out of the window above my bed.
Ysevel must have felt my movement because she shuffled ever so slightly, and, luckily, lifted her head from mine. I stood up, shaking some of the blood back into my legs, and looked at the sleeping figure. Her face was far more peaceful than it should have been for someone to be sleeping in a seated position, so I decided to pick her up and move her to my bed.
She's surprisingly light, I thought as I picked her up, feeling her head roll and lean into my shoulder.
I gently placed her on my bed, and pulled the covers up to the base of her neck. Thankfully, the naturally formed door had already grown back, so it wasn't as cold in my room as it would have been had it not. She shuffled again, pulling the blanket up a little higher as her lips smacked together as a peaceful grin grew on her face. I looked down at her, allowing myself a weak smile to see someone so blissfully unaware of her surroundings, and then proceeded to get ready for the trial ahead.
I did what I could to clear my head before making it to the training area, but that emotional wound was still far too fresh for me to suppress it entirely as the sickly feeling from the night before threatened to leer its ugly head. As the sun began to peek through the trees, I saw my mother and Bernar having a conversation with Anwill and Aurae. Vyra, Derion, and Haldir were also present, but I couldn't make out what any of them were saying.
I have to focus on this. Get your head out of your ass, I thought , giving myself a slap on both my cheeks.
Everyone, aside from my mother, looked at me curiously. "There's the shit-head," Bernar said sardonically. "Sorry I'm late," I said, rubbing the back of my neck as a weak smile awkwardly showed itself. "It's alright, son," my mother said, wrapping her arm around my shoulders. "Are you rested enough, Thoma? Your eyes look a little puffy," Aurae asked, concern evident in her tone.
"No, but I'll be alright, your majesty. I'm quite used to doing stuff sleep deprived," I replied with a bow, trying to keep my tone from betraying my actual state.
"Are you sure you want to do this today? We can always push it to tomorrow, if you want," Anwill said, having obviously seen through whatever it was I was trying to do. "Yeah, I'm fine," I said, giving him a weak smile.
Fucked-up, insecure, needy, and emotional? my brother asked, knowing exactly what my version of fine meant. I'll tell you later. I just want to focus on the test right now, I retorted, my tone carrying much more emotion than I wanted it to.
"Very well, then. Let us begin the trial," Anwill said, stepping aside. My mother and Aurae gave me reassuring nods, while Vyra and the others gave me thumbs up in support. My brother, on the other hand, slapped my back, nearly sending me tumbling forward. "You've come a long way already, you little shit. Time to go beyond that," he said with a wry grin. I allowed myself a small, genuine smile as I recalled the horse-casting test we did when he gave me Celer for my birthday.
It's been almost a year since then, but so much has happened, it feels like ten, I thought, stepping into the training ring.
Around the packed dirt area, multiple semi-translucent training dummies began to float around the arena, pushing out to various ranges. There were also a few troughs filled with three of the four basic elements. I closed my eyes, taking in a deep breath through my nose, and out through my mouth, as I did my best to calm my nerves.
"Thoma, as you well know, the third stage of mana manipulation involves the direct control over environmental elemental mana being supplemented by your own. To help guide you through this trial, you must maintain your second stage and control your emotions as you reach for the mana," he began.
"I know you can already cast some basic elemental spells, but this takes it to an entirely different level of mastery. This trial will consist of how well you can manage the elemental mana, by using it to shape projectiles and strike down the training dummies with enough force to turn them red," he continued. I nodded my acknowledgement, and loosened my shoulders as I activated my second stage. "Begin," he commanded.
Until this point in time, I had only ever commanded a little bit of elemental mana as we were trained to do so in the first stage. While most had a specific element they felt more comfortable with using when reaching the third stage, I'd dabbled in all sorts of spells, giving me a blanket understanding of all of them, though it was at the sacrifice of my control.
However, now that I could use the second stage as easily as the first, my conscious effort was now focused on pulling the tendrils of elemental mana from the troughs and molding them like I would a Kyr spell; the same one I'd used during my horse-caster certification. However, instead of only drawing from the Ethereal, I had to pull from there and whatever element's mana I wanted to use in the Between.
I began to use the mana I'd pulled and infused into my body from the Ethereal to call out to the fire mana in the trough before me. Reaching through both the Ethereal and the Between, I tugged at the violent and sporadic movements of the flame's mana, feeling it race towards my hand, and seeing it coalesce into a sphere not much bigger than my fist.
As I stared at the sphere floating just above the ring I still wore to cast normal spells, I could see the mana from both realms at the same time, reminding me vaguely of the cube and the sphere. Curiously, I tried to mold the spell into something a little more aerodynamic in hopes that it would reach the target faster.
Using what I had learned with Ysevel, I formed a cone-like structure with the fire's elemental mana, and began to swirl it in front of me. I built up as much power as I could, pushing and compressing a vast amount of mana behind it , and sent it flying with a swing of my arm. It took every ounce of concentration I had, but it worked well. Almost too well, I noticed, because the flame shot out like a spear being thrust through water, puncturing the target about fifty meters away from me.
I think I'll call that one Flamebolt, I thought in the split second of my halted concentration.
Before I began gathering mana for the next spell, I could've sworn I heard someone's jaw hit the floor, but I refused to break my concentration to look back. Moving onto the next training dummy, I shot another Flamebolt with similar effects. Ten dummies later, and Anwill signaled for me to move on to the next trough; the one filled with water.
I extended my hand once more, feeling the water mana swirl, flow, and ebb gently towards my hand. It felt easier to manipulate the water mana, as it reminded me a lot more of regular mana than the flame's did.
I probably should've started with the water. Maybe that's why someone gasped behind me, I thought.
I molded the water into a highly compressed sphere, and sent it soaring through the air, turning the target's color into a vibrant red. I repeated this process two or three more times, but noticed that water didn't really like being sent flying like that. Instead, I decided to use what I'd learned with my Whip of Doom technique, and put it into practice. While it wasn't nearly as effective as my Flamebolt or even a Kyr spell, it still landed me the remaining targets designated for the water trial.
Air mana worked much the same way, as I wanted to save the earth mana for last, though it was a little bit harder to gather since it wasn't as dense as water mana. Still, I had to figure out how to make air fly in the direction and shape I wanted it to. After a little bit of trial and error, I found out that if I manipulated the air mana around an imaginary shape, it would respond much more easily than if I had tried to condense it directly.
There's a lot of potential stuff I could do with that, I thought briefly, already growing more accustomed to using it by the ninth dummy.