Zig noticed that it was dark outside when he left the dorm building. Looking around he found lanterns hanging from each building letting out a soft glow. Wandering the the paths he found a building with a sign indicating it was the mess hall with some robe wearing teens stood chatting.
Waking up Zig introduced himself and asked if the mess hall was open. "Is it initiation day already " the taller of the teens said lazily. "Yeah but I heard this month we only got one new apprentice." Looking at Zig the shorter of the two said "I'm Daz and this genius is Ken, we've both been here for just over two years". "If your looking for foundation tutoring I follow a soul path and little Daz here focuses on mind techniques. It's a lot cheaper than getting lessons from the elders or other instructors" Ken added. "Thanks fellas but right now I'm more interested in grabbing something to eat so is it open or not? " Zig said a little impatiently. "Haha yeah kid food is available at all times but only breakfast is free" Daz answered amused. With a nod of Thanks Zig walked past the pair of teens and entered the the mess hall doors.
Inside the building a large dining room with rows of tables were mostly empty at this late hour. Some older apprentices and some higher ranked pavilion members ate and chatted quietly. Seeing a row of trays and a buffet set out Zig walked over. Noticing the prices on most of the rich meats and other dishes Zig settled for some simple rice and soup that only cost a few tokens. Looking around on how to pay he noticed his sect badge vibrate. Inspection showed that it automatically took the needed amount from him. "Neet!" With a smile Zig found a table and dug into his food.
Going over his practice in his head Zig sat at the table with an empty bowl and thought he might know what he had been doing wrong. "If it keeps falling apart maybe I need a denser thread?" Zig muttered to himself. "Or maybe I need to focus harder on the earth aspect?" Zig honestly didn't know where to start. Thinking about what Daz and ken said Zig would take them up on the offer of tutoring if he couldn't figure it out in the next couple days.
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Putting away his dishes he headed back to his room not see the teens waiting outside. Passing a few other pavilion members that looked much older he avoided them and headed straight to his dorm. Getting back into mediation Zig first tried making his thread denser but noticed that it made this much more difficult to control. It flowed faster and instead of slow leading it down his arm he lost control and dirt shot out of his elbow. Shocked and dizzy from losing the power all at once Zig watched the dirt slowly desolve on the floor.
"Is that what they mean by mind path?" Zig said somewhat confused. "If my first experiment reinforced my body with earth and shooting my energy out must be the mind path" Zig muttered to himself before checking his core. Looking inside it seemed to take a lot more energy to shoot out the energy like that since his energy was almost completely empty after a single attempt. "I guess I'll try focusing on the earth aspect harder since controlling denser energy hasn't worked". Focusing his will on converting the energy to earth aspect he noticed that the longer he focused the richer the colors became. Working this energy into a thread seemed a lot easier and Zig was able to guide it into his arm and back to his core in a single attempt.
Opening his eyes in excitement he noticed the arm change color becoming darker and feeling more powerful. It was at that moment Zig lost consideration breaking the thread and causing a spike of pain to shoot through him."ahhhh I almost had it" Zig shouted in frustration. "I'll try again in the morning" he said with a yawn before crawling into bed.