Gu Luo tried to calm his mind and separate fact from fiction.
Everyone here seemed convinced that ether really existed. There had to be something behind all of this. After all, every rumor, no matter what it was, had to originate from some part of the truth.
Once he had calmed down, he slowly lowered himself onto the ground, putting his hands behind him to check that he wasn't going to sit on any unfortunate vegetable.
He moved aside the few branches that were preventing him from sitting comfortably and settled cross-legged on the ground.
Leolia had told him that this exercise was meant to allow him to sense ether. In quotation marks, probably to become aware of its presence if it had always been there.
But how could he notice it if it was something so subtle?
Gu Luo tried to concentrate, attempting to empty his mind, but all he could hear was the sound of the cicadas and all he could feel was the sensation of the cool wind brushing against his face.
He thought.
*In Demonic Monarch, it really looked much easier.*
Even though Leolia had told him to sense it, this seemed really absurd to him. He tried to think once again about what she had told him.
Leolia had made him wear a blindfold over his eyes. In other words, she probably wanted him to abandon his most obvious senses and focus on ether, which had to be something much subtler in its presence.
She had also told him to sense which tomato was suffering the most to locate the key. In other words, ether was connected to the sensation of living beings and not just humans, since even a tomato plant that had no consciousness seemed to use it.
If ether was something so present in living beings, whatever they were, then it really had to be present everywhere and all the time.
In fact, Gu Luo must already be sensing it right now. Gu Luo's mind lit up.
That was it.
It wasn't that he couldn't sense it, it was that he was so used to its presence that he didn't even notice it anymore.
He took a long breath, letting the tension leave his stiff shoulders. The blindfold pressed against his eyes, but instead of feeling like an obstacle, it now seemed to him like a tool, something that forced him to look inward rather than outward.
He remembered the sensation of the wind against his skin. The warmth of the sunlight filtering through the leaves above him. The distant buzzing of the cicadas that seemed to vibrate through the air itself.
*Is this it?* he wondered. *Is this ether?*
He focused on the space around him, trying to perceive something beyond the physical. At first, nothing. Just the same sensations he had always known.
But it was at the moment when he thought about giving up that he felt something.
It was subtle, like the faintest whisper at the edge of his hearing. A slight pulse, almost like a heartbeat, that seemed to emanate from the vegetables surrounding him. He slowly turned his head, trying to locate its source.
The tomatoes. Leolia had said that the key was hidden inside a tomato.
Gu Luo cautiously extended his hand, not wanting to crush anything beneath his weight. His fingers brushed against something smooth and round, a tomato, he supposed.
When he touched the fruit, he felt a faint warmth emanating from it.
But it wasn't the warmth of the sun. No, it was something completely different. A gentle tremor, like a living being breathing to the rhythm of the world around it.
He withdrew his hand and searched for another tomato. The second one felt different to him – colder, more distant in some way. The third was barely perceptible, as if it were asleep.
He moved through the garden with extreme slowness, feeling his way forward with his hands while his feet cautiously navigated the treacherous ground. His mind focused with laser-like intensity on the subtle differences between each fruit and vegetable he encountered.
*Suffering... she said to find the tomato that was suffering the most.*
How could a tomato suffer? It was just a plant, wasn't it? But as Gu Luo continued his meticulous exploration, he began to understand what Leolia meant.
Some tomatoes seemed... abnormal to him. Their energy was weaker, more agitated. They almost seemed to be suffering.
And then, in the farthest corner of the garden, he found it.
The moment his fingers brushed against its skin, an electric shock ran through him. This tomato was truly alive, not only alive, but in distress. Its energy was chaotic, almost as if it were silently screaming into the void.
His fingers sank into its flesh, and he felt something hard inside. A key.
With trembling hands, he pulled it out of the tomato's pulp, his fingers now covered in juice and seeds. He held the key in his palm, a strange sense of accomplishment filling him.
He had succeeded. He had actually succeeded.
Gu Luo slowly got to his feet, cautiously making his way toward the garden gate. His hands found the lock, and with a satisfying click, the gate opened.
The blindfold was still over his eyes.
He hesitated for a moment, then slowly lifted it.
Leolia was standing a few meters away, a wide smile spread across her face. Several of his classmates were gathered behind her, their expressions a mixture of surprise and something that looked like respect.
"Well, well." Leolia crossed her arms. "I thought you'd take at least an hour. What was it, twenty minutes?"
Gu Luo lowered his eyes to the key in his hand, then looked back at the garden behind him. The tomato he had pulled it from was now visible, a large, ripe fruit with a small hole on the side where his fingers had sunk into it.
"I..." he began, but the words failed him.
Leolia approached him and placed a hand on his shoulder. "The first time is always overwhelming. But you did well, Gu Luo. Actually, no one has ever succeeded as quickly as you."
She turned toward the other students and laughed.
"They all took at least a week before they could sense anything hahahaha."
Leolia laughed wholeheartedly while her students pouted. Gu Luo laughed.
Leolia calmed down.
"Alright, everyone. Since Gu Luo finished so quickly, we have some extra time for aikido practice. And I expect to see progress from each and every one of you because for now, apart from Shěn Yán..."
A collective groan rose from the group, but Gu Luo barely heard it.
He was looking at his hands, these hands that had just done something he would have considered impossible yesterday.
Ether really existed.
The thought echoed in his mind, opening doors to possibilities he had never considered. If he could sense it, could he also manipulate it? Could he do the things Leolia had described?
As his classmates began training again, Gu Luo remained motionless, his mind boiling with questions and wonder. For the first time since his birth, he felt something he hadn't anticipated.
Excitement.