Ezekiel sat in the center of the room with his mother and Reya comforting him as best they could.
Whilst not life ending, Ezekiel still couldn’t help but feel like his work until this point was all worthless. No matter how many steps he had taken, or how many discoveries he had made, he still hadn’t changed the fact that, apparently, Void Mages apparently couldn’t break through naturally.
“I’m sorry. I should be focusing on breaking through right now.” Ezekiel said he tried to push his mother away so he could absorb the mana from the pure crystals he had set aside.
“... Yes. You should.” Evelyn said, grabbing the pure crystals from where Ezekiel had set them aside, but she didn’t hand them over. Instead, she got up and placed them back in the bow. “But we still have the rest of the day for you to do so.”
“Mom?” Ezekiel was shocked. He was certain that his mother would insist he break through as soon as possible, as it would mean he could better defend himself.
“You will break through, and it will be today.” Evelyn stated. “But you’ve worked really hard on this, and you’ve done more for Void Mages than many have in centuries. So, you can’t give up after your first major setback.”
Sitting down in front of the door, Evelyn held onto the box as she watched Ezekiel from further away.
“You will break through by the end of the day. We have a few hours until I need to pick up you sisters. At which point the choice will be entirely yours. But for now, I won’t let you use these until you break through on your own.” Evelyn explained. “That way, these remaining crystals will lay the foundation for your Tier one starting point. You should be able to reach Step three if you use all of them.”
Hearing his mother’s confidence in him, and her insistence that he continue trying to break through on his own, Ezekiel wiped his eyes before firming his resolve. He was going to break through, even if he had to use entirely new tricks based on random guesses.
“Okay.” Ezekiel stated as he started meditating once again.
“But Ezekiel!” Evelyn interjected. “Please be careful. We don’t have a Life mage here right now, so there won’t be any healing if you injure yourself.”
Ezekiel nodded his head slowly, calming himself down so he could focus, reassuring his mother that he would be careful.
So, he began experimenting in earnest, taking breaks and expelling the elemental mana he had absorbed in an attempt to circumvent the one hundred motes limit.
He tried altering the images of the elements he was trying to absorb, but that didn’t work. He tried altering the shape of the mana within himself. He tried imagining a void where there was nothing there, to try and trick his body into believing it didn’t have enough mana so he could force himself over the limit. He even tried visualizing celestial bodies like stars and black holes to use the ideas of gravity to further absorb mana, but the pulling force didn’t resonate with the image he was visualizing.
He even tried moving the Void mana inside himself in a spiraling shape to emulate a galaxy, much like the eyes of the Ancient Void that he could recall.
He tried numerous tricks over the course of an hour, taking several breaks as his mind exhausted its stamina, but nothing seemed to work.
“Damn it... '' Ezekiel couldn’t help but mutter as he fell backwards with an exasperated sigh.
Sweat was dripping down his brow, and he truly felt so mentally exhausted that it was reflected in his physical state as he could barely keep himself awake.
“Ezekiel,” Evelyn spoke up after seeing her son tiring out, “how did you figure out how to expel mana without loving Void mana when gathering it?”
“...Why does that matter?” Ezekiel asked. “I’m trying to gather mana, not expel it.”
“I’m trying to help you figure out different methods, because it seems to me, you’re just trying different ways to gather mana beyond your limit, when you should be figuring out how to use the mana inside yourself to do something that only Void mana can do.” Evelyn explained. “No other element of mana can be used in the way that you use Void mana, so perhaps you should focus on trying something like what you did when you figured out how to safely expel other type of mana from your body and use that as inspiration.”
Knowing that he didn’t have anything to lose, Ezekiel explained the idea of a newton’s cradle that he remembered from his past life. He wrote it off as being part of the message and information provided by the Void Relic.
He could tell that Evelyn was nervous when he mentioned the Void Relic but wrote off his mother’s worries as concern regarding the problems that the Relic had caused to this point, rather than her fears regarding the knowledge Naeri had provided regarding Void Mages and their memories.
“Perhaps that’s what you should try doing instead?” Evelyn pondered. “Instead of using natural phenomena, you should use a mechanical image to naturally cause your mana to move, rather than forcibly moving it in a way that isn’t working.”
Ezekiel thought about his mother’s suggestion for a minute before deciding that it probably wouldn’t hurt to at least try.
So, as he was recovering his mental stamina before making another attempt, he went over the different machines that he could remember existed in his old life. Trying to connect whatever image he could to the images of the Ancient Void that he could remember.
‘That could work.’ Ezekiel suddenly thought as he recalled something that was specifically used for increasing pressure by forcing large amounts of gas into smaller spaces.
A centrifugal compressor. Not only was the whole purpose of this device to move gas from point A to point B, regardless of available space, to an extent, it also used a spiral shape which would resonate with the image of the Ancient Void whose spiraling star filled eyes would never be forgotten by Ezekiel.
Sitting up again, Ezekiel gently clapped his hands against his face to psyche himself up.
“Alright, let’s do this.” Ezekiel said before falling into a meditative trance once again.
Only visualizing the image of a centrifugal compressor, and not even trying to move his mana, immediately had some effects. As he visualized the image of the compressor sitting on top of the center of his mana pool, the mana inside of him immediately started moving without his direct input.
The mana inside of him was pulled inward and forced into the center of the compressor that he was visualizing.
He wanted to feel happy for what was happening as he saw his mana focusing inwards, but as it moved inward, he felt a sharp pain in his head as he felt an immense pressure pushing down on his mind.
It was so intense that he nearly fell out of his trance, but he held on as best he could as he saw that this wasn’t enough. The image he was using was manipulating the Void mana inside him, but the effects didn’t seem to be going beyond the boundary of his body. The mana outside his body wasn’t moving.
So, he forced himself to visualize a whirlwind of fire and ice, just above the image of the centrifugal compressor, in order to gather the needed flame and glacial mana.
As the mana approached his body, the first mote of Flame mana entered his body. As did a second, followed by a mote of Glacial mana.
He had done it. He had successfully broken past the one hundred mote limit, and even better, the Flame and Glacial mana he had absorbed were directly pulled toward his mana due to the visualized compressor.
The flame and Glacial motes of mana directly canceled out and formed a mote of Void mana, but he still had one problem. There was still a mote of Flame mana inside him, and something told him that releasing the image of the compressor would be bad, as he was still over the limit of the amount of mana his body could naturally contain. Worse yet, he could feel his mind starting to fail as his mental strength was being strained.
Having little choice in the matter, Ezekiel chose to directly try opening his first Chakra.
Using the momentum from the centrifugal compressor, Ezekiel directly forced all his Void mana into the metaphorical core of his body, where everybody’s first Chakra was located.
He was expecting to feel a bit of push back as his mana was forcefully pushed towards his Chakra. But the moment his mana made contact, his Chakra was immediately blown open, and his mind was filled with an earth shattering ‘BOOM.’
For a brief moment, Ezekiel thought he saw a galaxy appear within his mind, the center of which was a humanoid figure. However, it was not the Ancient Void. This figure was not featureless.
It was himself, at the center of a galaxy. One that he was slowly creating with his own two hands. Only for the essence that he held within himself to fall apart, not yet strong enough to support it.
Ezekiel was immediately thrown out of his meditative trance, having no chance to force the remaining mote of Flame mana within his body. But just before he was forcefully expelled from his own mind, he saw his mana condense within the newly opened Chakra, surrounding the singular mote of flame mana in such a way that it couldn’t move, trapped within a bubble of Void.
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With this last image in mind, Ezekiel opened his eyes, seeing his mother directly in front of him with a worried expression on her face.
He tried to reassure her that he was fine, and that he’d succeeded, but his vision faded to black as his consciousness faded away before he could.
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When Ezekiel regained consciousness, he realized that he was lying on a well cushioned sofa in a different room than the one he had been in before.
Judging from the brightness that he could only just make out from the window; he could see that it was much later in the day than it had been. He must have been asleep for several hours by this point.
Taking a moment to recall what had happened, Ezekiel tried to focus inward and visualize his mana so he could enter into a meditative state once again, only to wince a sharp pain went lancing through his skull.
Holding his head in his hands, he realized that he must have fully exhausted his mind. Something that he hadn’t done since he was five, but it seemed to be much worse this time. He would likely have to wait another hour or so at least before he could properly examine his mana.
But as he sat up and looked over himself, he noticed that there didn’t seem to be anything wrong with his body, so he felt that he was safe, and healthy, at least for now.
‘Click’
Hearing the door to the room opening, Ezekiel turned to see who had come to visit.
Walking through the door was Shari, who looked incredibly downtrodden as she entered the room. She held a tray with a soaked cloth on it, as well as a plate with some food.
“Hey.” Ezekiel called out as he saw that Shari hadn’t noticed he was up yet.
Flinching at the sudden greeting, Shari’s eye widened as she finally noticed Ezekiel sitting up on the sofa. She dashed forward, nearly dropping the tray as she moved towards Ezekiel, roughly placing the tray next to Ezekiel on the sofa.
“Ezekiel! Are you okay?” Shari asked. “Rodney, go let my parents know Ezekiel is awake!”
One of the guards standing outside rushed off to inform Sherra and Allon that Ezekiel had woken up. Turning her focus back to Ezekiel, Shari wasn’t sure what to do as she didn’t want to do anything to exacerbate Ezekiel’s possible injuries.
“I’m not a piece of glass you know. I just have a headache.” Ezekiel said as he reached for the try beside him. “Is this for me, or for you?”
“Ah... It’s for me. I wanted to eat with you, even if you weren’t awake to eat with me.” Shari explained. “You can have it if you want. I don’t think you’ve eaten today.”
“Thank you.” Ezekiel muttered, trying to be quiet as his head still hurt slightly. “Were you watching over me the whole time?”
Shari nodded affirmatively as Ezekiel started eating while he talked with Shari. She was obviously still concerned, but Ezekiel didn’t want to remain quiet. He really wanted to talk to someone right now. He wasn’t sure why, but he felt like he had really cut it close today.
“So, what happened at your trials today?” Ezekiel asked. “Did you pass? It was only physical tests today, right? I can’t imagine you or anyone else we know would’ve had issues.”
“Right. Me, Riley, Yennifrey, and Drew, all passed our trials today. I was kind of surprised at how many failed, honestly.” Shari said as she started to describe the trials she and their friends had gone through. “They weren’t even that hard, but I guess it was mostly because lots of kids defaulted to using their mana by accident. There were a number of burned and frozen testing devices.”
“Are you looking forward to the battle trials tomorrow?” Ezekiel asked. “I doubt that they’ll be much harder for you guys.”
“Yeah... probably not.” Shari seemed quiet as she thought about the trials tomorrow.
Before he could ask what was wrong, Sherra arrived at the room and poked her head in.
“Hey kids. Are you doing alright?” Sherra asked as she entered the room, a guard with a blank green armband with white leaf on it entered behind her. “Shari, do you think you could move over for a second? I’d like to have Ezekiel checked over before his mother gets back to pick him up.”
“Gets back?” Ezekiel questioned as the Life mage behind Sherry stepped forward and began running green glowing hands up and down his body. “I guess she would’ve needed to pick up my sisters, but wouldn’t they have just stayed here until I woke up?”
Shari and Sherra shared a regretful look before turning back to Ezekiel.
“Your mother stayed for a while with your sisters, yes, but after you got checked over the first time by a Life mage, it was decided that you shouldn’t be moved until after you woke up.” Sherra explained.
“Okay, but it’s only the evening, right? How long was I asleep for?” Ezekiel asked, growing worried as his mind started to clear in worry.
“Twelve hours. It’s not the evening, Ezekiel, it’s the morning after the first Trial. Shari was coming to have breakfast with you before heading off to the second day of the Guild trials.” Sherra stated as she broke the news to Ezekiel. “We would’ve moved you to a bed, but as this was the first placed you were laid down at, the healers said you’d have to stay here, else any movements might stress the strains they had spent so much time healing.
Ezekiel was shocked as he realized how long he had been unconscious. Only severe soul injuries resulted in such long periods of unconsciousness. Usually, they only happened as a result of an attack, or a fault in a person's meditation as they accidentally took one mana of a different affinity. The worst were Cruor attacks, but Ezekiel had suffered none of these. He honestly felt fine, physically at least.
At that moment the Life mage that was examining him finished and stepped back.
“Miss.” she addressed Sherra, who nodded to have her proceed. “From what I can tell, Ezekiel is doing just fine, at least at the moment. The physical exhaustion and strain have been mostly recovered from, and besides some mental stress he should be able to recover fully in a couple of days. However, he shouldn’t even try to meditate until tomorrow at the earliest.”
The Life mage then left the room, as there was little else for her to do then and there.
Ezekiel was still shaken from just how badly he had strained himself. The fact that he was being forbidden from meditating meant that his mind had been pushed well beyond the natural limit that he should have been restricted to.
‘Although, I did use an image with the express purpose of pushing past my body’s limit when it comes to mana capacity.’ Ezekiel thought to himself as he considered just what he had put himself through.
“Alright then. Shari, you need to get ready. The Trials were held later yesterday because people needed time to get to where they needed to. Now that everyone knows where to go, they’ll be starting the trials earlier, which makes sense since you’ll be doing a bit more than you did yesterday.” Sherra said as she pulled Shari up off the sofa.
Ezekiel just continued to think about what he had done, and whether or not there were any other means that he could try to do things safer in the future. It wouldn’t be any time soon, but he did need to break through to the next Tier one day.
“Ezekiel.” Sherra called out, pulling Ezekiel from his thoughts.
“Yes?” Ezekiel asked.
“We’ll be headed out, and Allon will be busy with business for a while, but your mother should be here soon. So don’t go anywhere, alright?” Sherra told him as she and Shari stood by the door.
“Ah. Right. I’ll stay here. Maybe try to nap a bit more.” Ezekiel said back. “Thank you for your hospitality, and I’m sorry for the trouble.”
“No worries kiddo. We’re just glad that you’re alright.” Sherra said.
“Shari!” Ezekiel suddenly called out. “I’m awake now, so don’t worry about me during your trials today. I really want to see you get your chance to bond with a Spirit later!”
Ezekiel threw on a great big smile as he waved a hand at Shari, who did her best to psyche herself up as she nodded in agreement. She wanted to do her best as well, so she wouldn’t allow herself to let either of them down.
As Shari and Sherra left the room, Ezekiel remained alone with his own thoughts. He tried to remember what he had seen before he was thrown out of his trance. He could recall the steps he took quite clearly, but it was what happened after he had apparently opened his first Chakra that had confused him. Why had he seen an image of himself in the center of a galaxy? In the place where the Ancient Void should have stood.
Did this mean that he was becoming closer to the Ancient Void? Was he ultimately taking the right steps? What did the Ancient Void really want him to do? He knew he was supposed to save the world, but save it from what? The Cruor? Humanity seemed to be doing just fine right now, so what exactly did he need to do?
All these questions and more bounced around in Ezekiel’s mind. Other than having to save the world from something he wasn’t aware of, Ezekiel only knew that he needed to grow stronger, as that would be the only way he’d be able to face whatever enemies he was ultimately going to face.
After coming to that conclusion, he decided that it was time to finish eating. So, he did. Then he decided to rest up, as he figured that that was the best way to recover more quickly.
It didn’t even feel like he’d closed his eyes for five minutes before he heard the door to the room, he was in slam open. His mother was standing in the doorway with Reya perched upon her shoulder.
“Hi mom-”
Ezekiel’s greeting was cut off as his mother charged forward and pulled him into a great big hug. Tears in her eyes as she held Ezekiel close to her.
“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have insisted you try to break through naturally. I should’ve insisted you break through safely.” Evelyn muttered as she held onto Ezekiel.
“No, mom. Thank you. I’m sorry for worrying you but thank you.” Ezekiel said, causing his mother to push him back to look him in the face. “I needed to overcome this mom. You were right. I couldn’t let myself stop after meeting the first hurdle I thought I couldn’t just jump over.”
Regardless of the danger, Ezekiel was quite happy that his mother had pushed him like she had. He likely would’ve continued with the pure crystals instead of figuring out what he had, thus furthering his discoveries with Void mana and magic.
“I think that we’ll need to take our time moving forward, but I understand why we had needed to rush this time. We only have just under three weeks left to prepare after all.” Ezekiel said in order to reassure his mother.
It was true, after all. If he had more than a couple of hours to break through, then he might not have passed out. He had already strained his mind quite a bit by the time he had visualized the centrifugal compressor, but he felt that, if he had been fresh, then the strain his mind was forced to endure would’ve been much more manageable.
The strain of forcing his body to contain more mana than it should have been able to would still have likely required some time to recover from, but he didn’t think it would be impossible.
Evelyn just continued to look sad at what Ezekiel had forced himself to go through again.
“Even so. Just like you said. If I hadn’t forced you to go too fast, you wouldn’t have been hurt.” Evelyn said as she expressed her guilt at what had happened. “All I want to do is keep you safe, but I also want to help you move forward. But the moment I encourage one of those two things, the other is in jeopardy of being destroyed.”
“Isn’t that life? Isn’t that freedom?” Ezekiel asked with a confused tone. “The fact that you care about both of these things, means that you care about me, and what I want, in full, doesn’t it?
Evelyn just chuckled at Ezekiel’s questions. They seemed so simple, but they were so incredibly difficult to deal with. Ultimately, she decided that her son was okay, for the most part, and the thing he needed was some rest before he restarted his preparations and training.
“Maybe you’re right. When did you get so wise?” Evelyn asked, ignoring the nagging feeling she felt in the back of her head as she pondered her son’s wisdom.
“Not sure.” Ezekiel said, ignoring the guilt he felt at keeping secrets from his family once again.
“Well, why don’t we get out of here for now. You can rest at home. I know you were told not to do any meditating until tomorrow at the earliest, so you can help me out in the store for now.” Evelyn stated.
Ezekiel nodded in agreement as he and his mother headed out to leave the manor.
He may have run into another bump in the road for his magic, but he had overcome it, and he would do his best to continue overcoming any and all problems he faced in the future.
The door had been successfully opened. He finally had a chance at facing the trials the Ancient Void had told him were coming for him. Now all he had to do was keep moving forwards and face the challenges that were soon to arrive.