PART I - ZEN AND THE ART OF FLYING … POORLY
“I think this is one of my dumber ideas,” Lena called out, a grin trying to cover the look of apprehension on her face. She was standing on top of the shelter next to where the Bladedancers usually trained.
“You can,” Koka began to call out.
“...do it!” Moka completed with encouragement.
“We’re ready if you need us,” Ambria confirmed, twiddling her fingers in the air. Lhawni was standing next to her and did the same.
“Just don’t break your neck,” Major Celeste warned. “We can repair everything else. If you fall, try to roll through it with your Acrobatics.”
Lena frowned, looking past the other Bladedancers and the two Healers, to see a small crowd that had formed, which included both the Commandant and that Arkan guy. The latter had been down at Medical with Jesca, and just arrived on the field a few minutes ago before being drawn here by the commotion. She didn’t need the additional pressure.
“I don’t want anyone laughing if I fall on my face!” Lena called out in warning, holding a pointed finger up to everyone. “It’s my first time!” There were still a few pre-chuckles from the onlookers.
That morning, Lena reached Silver, and among all the upgrades and enhancements to her current perks and skills, and a couple expected new ones, she received two new melded skills, along with an off-class one. She’d tried out one of the melded ones a few times without using its second effect, just to get a feel for it, but this was her first attempt to really use it properly. She looked down. It couldn’t be more than three meters to the ground, right? She wouldn’t have to fall very far … right?
Lena moved to the back of the roof in order to get a bit of a running start, and maybe work up her nerve a little more. Turning, she stared ahead, ignoring the crowd and her fellow classmates, focusing on the distant horizon as Xera had suggested she do while still learning. She pulled her helmet on tight, it fitting loosely with no hair underneath any more. "You can do this," she whispered to herself, trying to boost her confidence, “and if you fail, at least you'll probably only kill yourself. Nothing too serious, right?” She added a couple quick meditative breathing exercises that Callie was so fond of to help calm herself, but they didn’t really help in the slightest.
Turning her back to the crowd, she tried one last round of self-encouraging words. “Lenora, you’re an idiot," the words said. Nope, not encouraging in the slightest. Sighing deeply, Lena screwed up her courage, spun around and rushed forward, calling forth her new skill.
WINGS OF GLORY
As she reached the edge of the roof, a pair of bright, golden wings sprouted from Lena’s back, spreading out to catch the air. They were made up of a vaguely hazy, semi-transparent ghostly glow, and with a wingspan much wider than you’d expect, at least compared to wings on the winged Fae. Leaping off the roof, she invoked the second part of the new skill, pushing off the shelter roof telekinetically to get a brief boost of speed and power, which in turn resulted in height.
“Extraordinary!” Arkan Pelidri exclaimed, while a series of ‘oooooo’ noises went up from the crowd as Lena shot upwards, the wings leaving little trails of bright particles fading in the air.
Lena’s next goal was to start on a forward glide. The wings couldn’t really flap with much strength, as they weren’t designed to get additional altitude, but Lena could change their position and shape to help control said glide. The skill also gave her two more boosts that she could use to propel herself forward or higher. Right now, though, her only focus was maintaining some semblance of control and maybe not looking like a complete fool in front of the senior officers, as the panic started to overtake her.
Lena got plenty of height, more than she probably should have, shooting upwards about five meters, but forwards only about two. At apogee, she instinctively cupped her wings to catch the air, but the angle was bad. This had the effect of almost instantly slowing any forward momentum, resulting in an immediate stall. She knew she was supposed to be watching the horizon, so she could focus on moving forward in the glide, but after a couple moments, ground below her loomed awfully large. She pitched forward and fell into an uncontrolled dive, wings flippy-flapping madly to try to at first maintain some kind of control, and then at least to slow herself down. Maybe calling it a dive was a bit generous.
At the last moment, the wings somehow managed to catch the air, turning a little of Lena’s falling into a bit of forward speed so that she didn’t plow into the ground head first. But the ground was still there, and while she had growing forward momentum, she still smashed into it. Lena instinctively tried to tumble through, using Acrobatics as the Major had suggested, but only got one somersault in before finishing a long slide on her chest, her hands and face scraping against the ground for almost three meters.
A hush fell over the crowd, several people instinctively making wincing faces and noises in sympathy.
“I’m alive,” Lena called, still facing down into the dirt, as she raised her arm high to prove it. “Owwww!” she groaned slowly. The palm of her raised hand was covered in dirt, grass, scrapes and cuts from the slide, just beginning to turn a little red with small amounts of blood. The wings on her back seemed to flicker, before disappearing into a small cloud of golden mist.
Now knowing she wasn’t dead, a few scattered applause for being alive, and more likely for crashing so spectacularly, came from the crowd as Ambria and Lhawni rushed forward. Xera held up their hand to the two Healers. “Hold a moment,” they said.
Still groaning, Lena rolled to her back, showing similar injuries on both her other hand and on one side of her face. They weren’t serious, but were at least a minor case of road-rash, and it had to be painful. With a colorful expletive, she forced herself to sit up, looked at her bleeding hands, and made a wincing face as she spat some grass and dirt out of her mouth. “Owwww!” Lena groaned again, now with a little fake sobbing mixed in.
“If you have the mana, try that other new melded skill,” Xera suggested.
“Make sure you have the mana,” Major Celeste warned quickly, as she took up a spot next to the two healers. “The last thing we need is you joining Jesca down at Medical.”
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“I should be okay,” Lena said, still a tinge of whining in her voice. “It was good I tried the wings out a couple times to get used to that spell, so the mana cost wasn’t that bad any more. Give me a moment on the other one.” Working to ignore the pain, she focused, and then had to focus harder and past the distractions, before managing to call forth her second new melded skill.
BATTLE HEAL
A warm feeling began to pass through Lena as the magic came to life. The description of the effect stated it was somewhat similar to a Shaman’s Healing Pulse from their Totems, in that it functioned primarily to dull some pain and heal simple wounds. Unlike many healing spells, though, Lena’s new skill did not require concentration once it was used. Instead, after casting, it would run its course over thirty seconds by itself, working to heal any existing wounds, as well as new ones that might be sustained, while likewise addressing some of the pain. All this without needing any channeling or other focus. Battle Heal wasn’t something that would address anything serious, likely only to help stem some bleeding for a major injury, but for all the common nicks, bruises, scratches and light cuts that might be received as a lightly-armored Guardian, it was perfect.
The light tingling sensation continued, and the scrapes on Lena’s hands and face began to knit themselves together, the stinging pain immediately evaporating as a few pebbles of dirt, grass and sand were pushed out of the wounds. It only took a few seconds, perhaps ten or so, before Lena’s hands were healed. After a few more, so was her face.
“Very good!” Xera said as Lena got to her knees so Lhawni could clean her up and verify everything was healed properly. Around them, a few more applause came from the crowd at seeing the second spell doing its thing.
Lhawni quickly pushed a Rejuvenation into Lena, on the chance her mana had become low. Then, using a damp cloth, she wiped Lena’s face before inspecting it closely, both visually and using her Diagnose spell. The wounds were gone, with not even a mark remaining to show they had ever existed, just a very light bruise that would likely fade by the end of the day. “It did a good job,” the Goblin said, glancing up to Xera and nodding. “Really good, in fact.” Ambria quickly stepped in, confirming the same after her own inspection.
“You can’t cast that on others, correct?” the Arkan asked.
Lena shook her head. “It’s self-only, Arkan, and it doesn’t look like the future tiers changes that, based on the description. At later tiers, it’s also supposed to be able to remove poisons, which I could certainly see as useful if fighting someone that poisons their blades or a venomous monster,” Then, remembering back to when Pixyl and Bratig had their drinking contest, Lena added, “Or, I suppose, if I need to sober up quickly.”
“How often are you able to use it?” Xera asked.
“Right now, I only have a single charge, and there’s a three-minute cooldown.”
Xera frowned. “That’s a pretty lengthy recharge time in the midsts of battle, but I’m sure that will decrease as you rank it up. You’ll need to balance its usefulness against that limitation.”
“Still, this is a wonderful new skill,” Pelidri beamed as he clapped his hands together a few times, before quickly adding, “Your wings are quite stupendous, as well. Congratulations on reaching Silver.”
“Thank you,” Lena replied, groaning a little as she rose to her feet. “I think those wings will be really useful to get to new spots if I don’t have a clear Flashstep, or if there’s a height difference to deal with.”
“Exactly that,” Xera said. “I used my ability to fly extensively in combat for just those reasons. As a fellow Bladedancer, I know full well you will find the skill invaluable.”
“I just need to learn how to use it,” Lena groused, looking at her now-healed hands. “I don’t know how you winged Fae do it so casually.”
“We start flying practically as toddlers,” Xera laughed, “almost before we can walk. It’s essentially an instinct for us. You’ll get it. Just remember, focus on the destination, or failing that, the horizon. If anything, that will help to stem any panic. You’ll fall as you learn, but you have your skills to tumble or heal through that. Don’t worry, it won’t take long to become proficient.”
“Thanks,” Lena said, blushing again as she surveyed the trench her body had torn in the ground.
“Did you receive any other melded skills,” Xera asked as follow up.
“No, just those two. However, I also received an off-class skill, Sigil of Shielding.”
“A Sigil spell?” Xera asked, raising an eyebrow and instinctively turning to see if Natala was around.
Lena could only shrug. “It’s only Iron, though, so I don’t think it will be very powerful at first. Like Callie did for her Sigil of Amplification, should I ask the Sergeant–Major for assistance?”
“Absolutely,” Xera said with a nod. “I know she possesses the same skill, too. That is definitely an excellent one for a Guardian, and she’s one of the finest Sigilists in the kingdom. I’ll let her know, but she may not have time until after Midsummer. She has duties, and her husband is here for the holiday as well.”
“I can help a little bit, too,” came a small voice, and everyone looked down to see Callie had apparently been part of the crowd. “I mean, I know I just learned mine, but the basic stuff is pretty easy.”
There were dubious looks on the faces of Xera and Lena. “Maybe you let the Sergeant-Major do it her way, recruit,” Xera said slowly, her look and tone making it pretty obvious this wasn’t really a suggestion.
“Sure,” Callie replied, either not picking up on the incredulousness of the Commandant, or just taking it in stride. “However I can help … or not help, for that matter.” She looked at Lena before gushing, “Your new wings are amazing, by the way!”
“Uh, thanks,” Lena said, a little embarrassed at all the praise while at the same time still recovering from Callie’s terrorizing offer of assistance. She would have turned her down, honestly, but Xera took care of needing to be rude to her friend. “Shouldn’t you be with your class?”
“With Jesca down for the day and me already at Silver, Vonn is working directly with the other two on a couple things for a bit, rather than the normal lesson plan, so I had time to watch you faceplant. That healing spell is really cool, too!”
“Cool?” Pelidri asked, having not heard the word used in that context before.
“It means ‘very interesting’ in crazy-Gnome-speak,” Xera replied, giving Callie a wink. “It’s become used quite frequently around here this term.” Xera then looked up. “Arkan, should we continue on? I believe the Shamans would be next. One of them reached Silver this morning as well.”
“Oh, yeah!” Callie bounced. “Xin got it, too! She’s got a flight form now that looks like a miniature pterodactyl, and a new melded skill.”
“A ptero-what?” Pelidri asked.
“It’s like a lizard-bird with long leathery wings they walk on, about this big,” Callie held her arms a good ways apart. “She hasn’t tried flying yet, I don’t think. Trainer Maugra wanted to wait and focus on it when they had some one-on-one time.”
“Recruit Callie?” Xera asked, raising an eyebrow and projecting fake politeness.
“Hmm?”
“Go be elsewhere!”
Callie looked up at the Commandant, and then at Arkan Pelidri, and then finally got the hint. “Right,” she said slowly, backing away. “I’ll, uh, just … go … not here … away.” As she scampered off, she looked back once, adding a wincing, “Sorry.”
“She seems quite the handful,” Pelidri said with a chuckle. “Young Gnomes tend to be that way. Older ones, too, for that matter.”
“Oh, you have no idea,” Xera replied, rolling their eyes, but actually smiling.