Lightning is not unlike the element of fire in that it contains a will of its own. In its most basic form, lightning wants to destroy, and it will lend its awakened speed and destructive ability to do so. The problem lies in learning to tame and control it. For many young awakeneds, this learning process is akin to dancing the mejai in a sea of thorns.
Venerable master Orpheus.
Headmaster of the Black Forest.
Yildirim. Year 2253.
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“What am I doing wrong?” He asked himself an hour later. So far, he’d been unable to create even a single bolt of lightning, and the energy within him had remained dormant and unresponsive.
He had tried the visualization technique, trying to imagine the bolt into existence, but that had only been a waste of time.
He’d even tried using his words, calling to the lightning, like he’d futilely done with the storm, but that method had also yielded no result.
“I know I’m missing something; I just can’t figure out what.”
Frustrated, he closed his eyes and replayed the first vision in his mind once again, focusing on the part where wide beams of lightning had struck down from the sky.
As thunder boomed, the arcs of lightning almost seemed sentient as they descended to unleash their wrath on the city below.
As if in a loop, his mind continuously replayed the scene while he furiously tried to find a clue as to how the lightning bolts had been created—something, anything that could help him.
It was after he’d replayed the scene for the seventh time that he finally found something he hadn’t noticed before; it was subtle, but just a moment before the lightning beams had descended, Az’s stance had changed; his cold indifference had been replaced by what he could only describe as intense concentration.
As the beams descended, Aodhán realized that the lightning beams hadn't exactly been created; instead, they had appeared as if they had been called or summoned.
The word echoed in his mind, and he could immediately sense that he was on the right path. It was obvious now that he couldn't imagine the lightning bolts into existence, but he could summon them, either from himself or from the sky.
The moment he came to this realization, energy surged through him, and a bolt of lightning the size of a baby’s fist appeared on his palms, crackling erratically between his fingers.
Before he could celebrate his success, though, the bolt exploded, launching him several feet back and causing multiple surface wounds to appear on his hands.
If he’d had time to think about it, then he would have realized that such an explosion should have obliterated his fingers, yet they remained intact.
“What have I done wrong now?” He groaned as he slowly picked himself up from the tangle of dry weeds and sticks he found himself in.
As he rose to his feet, he saw that an area about a foot in diameter had been burned and blackened from the explosion.
“By the Maker! That could have seriously injured me,” he exclaimed quietly. Resolving to be more careful, he walked back to the center of the clearing and, with a determined expression, summoned another bolt.
Immediately it appeared, Aodhán threw it towards a tree, but it exploded before even making it halfway, causing another explosion that pushed him back several steps.
The third and fourth bolts made it past the halfway point before exploding, but the fifth exploded before it was even completely summoned, causing an explosion even larger than the first. Aodhán was blasted backwards and slammed against the rough bark of a tree trunk, causing him to spit out blood as his bones rattled painfully.
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He took a few minutes to rest before he continued, summoning one bolt after the other. His efforts were finally rewarded an hour later, when instead of exploding, the bolt smashed into a tree with the force of a bullet and left a scorch mark the size of a tennis ball on its bark.
At this time, the entire clearing was littered with small craters and blackened patches of soil, but he’d done it. After several tries, he had finally achieved a modicum of control over the erratic element.
He summoned a bolt once more, and almost immediately, a swirling bolt of golden electricity appeared on his right palm. It was now the size of his palm, and although it crackled dangerously as if its very nature fought the idea of stability, it remained on his palm.
Aodhán flicked his palms forward, and the bolt rushed out with a speed too fast for his eyes to follow and struck a tree at the edge of the circular clearing. Multiple arcs of lightning raced up the bark and to the lowest hanging branch, drying up the moisture within it.
The next moment, a smoking husk of blackened wood, all that was left of the branch, fell to the ground before scattering, releasing ash and smoke into the air.
A wide grin blossomed on his face at the damage, and he let out a loud whoop of excitement. It was then that he finally noticed that the area had darkened and night had come.
He had enough wood to make a fire as well as a place to sleep, but the sudden grumble of his stomach reminded him that he hadn’t eaten anything in hours. Days? He had no idea how long his awakening had lasted, but he was ravenous enough to know that it had been a long while since his last meal.
With a sigh, he made his way deeper into the forest in search of food, most preferably meat, and marked the trees with ash that he took from the burnt branch.
Half an hour later, as Aodhán walked through the forest, he suddenly realized that the chirping of birds had ceased. Now that night had come, all he could hear was the occasional call of owls and other night avians peculiar to this world.
The chittering of insects had gotten louder, though, and he could hear the distant croaking of what he hoped were frogs or toads.
He had no lessons or experience as a hunter, so his movements were loud and clumsy at best, scaring away any animal before he could even lay eyes on them.
Slowly, Aodhán managed to reduce the amount of noise he made, yet, two hours later, he still hadn't found any prey he was willing to eat.
So far, he had seen various sorts of creatures, but none he was willing to risk food poisoning for, at least not without great urging and persuasion.
He’d almost given up on the hunt when he suddenly heard a squeaking sound similar to that of a squirrel. He halted his movements immediately, so he wouldn’t scare the animal away, and slowly looked in the direction the sound had come from.
On the branch of the tree not too far from him, he saw one of the cutest creatures he’d ever seen. It looked and even acted like a squirrel, but its fur was snow white, and it seemed to shed glittery dust with every movement.
It was also double the size of an adult squirrel, and floating above its head was a line of text that read: [Rizzel-Tier 2].
The creature remained oblivious to his presence while he contemplated attacking it. His only attack skill was a bolt of lightning, and although it was fairly powerful, he was still at Tier 0, albeit an evolved one, while the Rizzel was a mundane Tier 2 monster.
He only spent a second thinking before his stomach rumbled again, and with little hesitation, he summoned a lightning bolt and threw it at the Rizzel.
The Rizzel turned immediately, revealing razor-sharp canines, but it was unable to react fast enough to avoid the attack.
The bolt exploded on contact, throwing the Rizzel to the ground and shattering the thin branch it stood on.
Aodhán ran towards the fallen creature, afraid he’d turned his dinner into bloody paste, but was pleasantly surprised to see that although most of its ribs were shattered and its white fur was stained with blood, it remained intact.
The light in its eyes faded a moment later, and with a sigh of relief, Aodhán picked it up. Rather than return to the clearing and waste another two hours, he decided to make camp exactly where he was.
He gathered the shattered branch, as well as a bunch of dry leaves, and placed them in the center of the small space.
With careful concentration, he summoned another bolt of lightning, just enough to set the branch on fire. He added more dried wood to keep the fire going and then visualized a small stormcloud, but without the rain.
The dark cloud materialized above the flames, and immediately the wind picked up, swirling gently around the flames until it roared so high that it almost reached his knees in height.
As the fire crackled merrily, Aodhán turned to the dead Rizzel, dug his fingers into the largest wound he could find on its body, and forcefully tried to separate the fur from the bloody meat.
It was an extremely messy and wasteful process, but it was the best he could do considering his lack of experience, as well as a knife.
As he separated the abdominal fur from the body, a small glowing gem revealed itself. It shone with a dusty white light, and with gentle fingers, he pulled it out of the carcass.
Energy swirled within it, and as he clasped the gem in his palms, his cells seemed to come alive, roaring for the energy, and unconsciously, he willed it into himself.
The energy rushed into him, moving through his body and flowing through pathways he could not discern. It settled in his abdomen for a second before it burst out again, surging through his entire body and filling him with vigor; it healed his wounds before returning back to his abdomen, where it settled again, leaving him refreshed and more energized than before.
He marveled at this strange occurrence, and with a thought, he reviewed his status screen.
……
[STATUS]
Name: Aodhán Ashoka
Title: N/A
Class: Evolved storm awakened: 1%
Tier: 1-0%
Skills {Innate}: [Storm creation and manipulation] [Lightning creation and manipulation]
Bloodline: Nil
…