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Zeigarnik Effect
My second first lesson

My second first lesson

As I continue to slip in and out of magic sight, it is slowly becoming second nature. I no longer need to concentrate to begin the skill, simply will it and it activates. Also, when using the skill I can see the current of the ambient flow around the magic; light and wispy at first, now the weight of smoke, between the glowing specks still coiling around Y'eula. She draws magic towards her, it flows round me being siphoned vast distances from the surrounding forest, dancing through the branches. Still drifting on her tiny island, Master has me completely captivated. As my mind relaxes I lapse and before I realise I have been sat in my new ability for some time without need of reset. I feel no more strain at present. I want to tell her that I have accomplished the goal set, Y'eula however remains unresponsive. So being that she is still completely occupied with her engagement, and being given no further instruction, I begin again to concentrate on my sight once more. once the mana becomes clear I try to push my perception further, I am rather curious to find out how far I can see with the sight. As I do however, a small number of the magic embers appear to start flowing to me instead of simply passing by me, beckoned by my being. The more I try to force it however, the less it is drawn in. In a small amount of time I start to get it. I have to relax as if creating a space within me to allow room. It tingles as it wraps around me, in miniscule amounts compared to that of Master of course. Though, she is something else. I am impressed that I am getting the feel of this so easily. Because of the items she burrowed into me alone perhaps. Or maybe it is due to the same thing allowing me my strong senses of intuition already, perhaps still my intuition may increase still. Food for thought. When the Magi came for me in youth for their tests, I seemingly passed not the one. Magic has always been a distant thing to me, something that I certainly had no hope of obtaining, an impossibility. Yet here I am. My knowledge of how the magi operate in training is very limited, the one thing that I knew for sure is that women can not be selected. According to the Magi women have a weak connection and supposed lack of control of mana. An abomination is what they call a woman with magic, though supposedly only theoretical. It is said they would become a magic bomb if they could actually get strong enough. This exact thing has in fact happened to a number of Magi in my lifetime, scholarly types, squirreled away in their laboratories, attempting big magic make up the bulk of the number. Y'eula has proved that some things that are known and taught by all to be truth, are in fact lies. Some facts can be contradictory but true none the less, a man can be both a genius and a fool. But this is no small thing, she has shown me that potentially more people could have access to more than they were born with, more ability, more opportunity, more power. This has to be the best kept secret in the world, how has a lie this large been orchestrated? The ability to pull off such a feat, across kingdoms, is just so ridiculously implausible that I struggle to believe it. But it is true. I know some of what the Magi say is true, this woman is dangerous. Though, I am fairly sure she is on my side. She did save my life after all.

After some time Y'eula's communion with the air ceases and she once again descends to grace me with her presence, a slight smile worn on her face. Intersecting rays of light swimming across her cheeks, she looks gentle in this moment, as she did when when she held me in her embrace. As if to break me from the trance she holds me under, Y'eula speaks

"Ye've made it ye're own, I feel it. Ye've already started making a well as I was, that's what it's called anyway. I knew I was right not to leave you." She trails off in her statement, presenting an expression indicating that she said too much. "I did say I'm glad didn't I" Y'eula states rather than asks as once again I find myself, wearing a frown on my brow. I chuckle mentally, she at least is showing some semblance of awareness that I have feelings. I having not said much, am seeming to have an influence on her. From what she has told me and by her demeanour, I can tell she has been alone for quite a while. It is not hard to deduce really. If you take into account the mere fact that she can rarely wait for another to finish before she starts speaking again, even if you are replying to her question. That impatience alone speaks volumes of a person. However, Y'eula Sae Dost has shown me great kindness, in her own way yes. But, kindness non the less. Intervening in my misfortune seems to have been, in part, whimsy on her behalf. I am grateful no matter the reason, between whatever she did to me and teaching me how to use it, I will owe her more than I can say. All of a sudden, as I am am about to reply, my stomach starts to cramp and my head sways as I swoon slightly. I drop the sight, opening my eyes, maybe I pushed it too far or with to much haste. Although, I am constrained by the fact I am hunted. Master said three days, only three days, sunbreak to sunfall. Another pang jerks in my abdomen. I chuckle under my breath in disbelief of my own stupidity as I realise I am starving. I have not eaten in, well I cannot even recount my last meal. I do not recall eating since the morning of the attack. Had I not eaten in captivity surely I would have become bones cycles ago, and after my fall I did not have time to worry on such a thing. It is easy to overlook something so simple as hunger when you have to run for your life. Y'eula's eyes drift and set on my stomach as the complaints erupting from it increase in volume. I brush my hand through my hair and laugh in slight embarrassment.

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"I am-" My words once more become nothing more than an invitation for her to start talking, as she cuts me off immediately.

"S'pose we should eat, shouldn't we. Sorry I, forgot" her eyes lock with mine and pierce deep into me. "Right, you are doing well, I guess.. Come on!" Y'eula says as she bolts upright. Then she sets off at a blistering pace back into the trees, I honestly had only a few men under my command who could match pace with the one she sets now. I could not have if I had tried. However, as my legs lift me from my perch and start their work a find each stride easier than before our day of magic meditation. I like the way that sounds, magic meditation. In no time at all I am at her back, then by her side. She instructs me to use my sight, motioning with her hand, then without warning bursts away from me cutting to the left sharply around a great spindly tree, then I see her slip to the right through a tall thicket of reeds. Her feet leave faint residual embers of her magic behind to the forest floor. Continuing after her I leap the weeds to find a drop roughly ten times my height, my heart laughs as do I. Having survived falling from drastically more perilous hights. This occasion feels different again, I am filled with joyous reverence. I have no fear what so ever, not a trace. Hanging in the air I make a secret promise to myself to stop falling on my face. Somehow, ridiculously I stick the landing with a roll and I stand proud, to discover I am face to face with an enormous snake, with extremely long serrated teeth. Standing before it, I realise this serpent is a creature I never thought I would, nor wanted to see in my life, a slange. Slange are apex predators, serpents of the highest order, they feast for two cycles then disappear underground to hibernate for years at a time. Scales harder than stone and teeth that can pierce steel. There was a tale I heard that their eyelids can deflect arrows and spears, granted it does have ocular shutters thicker than my head. However, the thought of mere eyelids repelling such attacks make this creature truly terrifying. My eyes pin at their edges as the saliva evaporates in what seems an instant from my mouth and throat. Well, I seem to have found where I had misplaced my fear.

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