Chương 24: Pain

The commotion a few nights ago had broken Blick from his focus, so he wondered off for his nightly reinforcement practice. The camp was calm again when he returned and so he just carried on with his normal routine. Eat, walk, train and sleep. It would have been boring for most people, but for Blick it was filled with experimentation and new ideas. At some point two more yellow and blue birds joined them on their trip and Blick happily fed them both food and mana.

He almost enjoyed the birds company more than these people surrounding him. Nobody aside from Artemis had spent much time with him, and he hadn't seen that odd sounding man in a while. Spinning his staff in a lazy circle around his body and over his head he contemplated today's trial. If he could add mana to his own body and others. Couldn't he also pull mana from another into his own?

He had been putting off an attempt at liquid drops for a while to focus on his meridians, but that wasn't a viable long term option. This trip was on its last leg and his home was a violent place. He hadn't been there long enough to truly know what they were about to walk into. So he needed to grow. The next step in this grand plan was to figure out how to condense a drop. The idea was simple. Gather as much mana as possible to pack the core.

From what others told him it was a long process that took weeks under the best conditions. After figuring out the new cycle to push his meridians faster, he assumed there were gaps in the city people's understanding. Blick is not an expert on people so he shrugged and started trying his next idea. Plants first. That's how the push lesson was learned. So Blick simply walked over to a tree and placed two hands on it… he pulled… and pulled. Something was happening but it was slow. Did trees have meridian?

If trees breathed it would either be from the branches or the roots right? Digging up a root he traced it to near the end. About 4 feet away from the actual tree it tapered off into a web of smaller roots and he gripped it with a reinforced claw and ripped it from the ground. Placing his palm directly on the end of the tree root he pulled. This was way better than the ambient mana floating around out here. With the theory proven he looked around.

A small tree no wider than himself probably didn't hold near as much mana as one of the colossal ones near the river. He climbed to the top of this tree to see if one was close.

"Sir, a scout returned with contact. We have Versale kingdom scouts near the Zipan river. It looks like they are holding a steady patrol about a mile out on our side of the river bank. Nothing more than a handful of scouts have been spotted. And our scout couldn't be sure if he was spotted or not." Fitz froze for a second.

"Have the scouts close in tighter. We are traveling south beyond some huge cliff. Should be near enough to see within a couple of days. If we can swing wide enough we should be able to miss whatever sneaky shit they are up to." The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon. After a brief nod and salute the soldier left his tent and Fitz opened one of the scrolls to report back to the capital. The message was short. Not a lot worth saying.

Just a potential for war with an enemy nobody planned on fighting. A dangerous twist in an already sketchy fucking mission. This is about to get complicated. Stepping out of his tent he asks the nearest soldier for an update on Artemis and another for the same on Blick. Hopefully his suspicions about the furry man weren't true and he could focus on the other potential dangers.

About an hour later Fitz was thanking the soldier for the news that Artemis had woken up this morning and was well enough to talk with him when another soldier approached and broke the bad news.

"Sir, last reports had Blick climbing a tree nearby, then he sprinted off toward the river. Nobody has seen him in a couple of hours."

"Suspicious timing. Have the soldiers prepare for a fight. Tell the scouts to look for ambush points. Expect a fight. The mission is priority. Locating the gate is the goal. We move through the night. Pack it up."

"Sir, what about Blick?"

"Assume he's a spy, he's not enough alone to threaten five entire companies. If we do see him again we will take him in with force if necessary."

Blick was focused. This tree was absolutely massive. It had taken him nearly an hour of reinforced digging to reach the end of the thick root. The hole he dug was over his head and the root reached farther than Blick ever thought a root could. Without causing bunch of damage to the actual root he dug around it and placed his hands against its narrowest point. This time when Blick focused and pulled he felt a thick line of pressure running through his arms.

So much like the burn during that rain storm just body lit up with burning all the way to his core. This has to be enough. He focused past the pain and stuffed as much mana into his core as possible. It felt like forever. Pull it in, press it tight, pull more in. It felt like he was breathing in then holding it just to breath in again without letting a breath out. The pain grew intense and the pressure steadily ramped up. When the flow slowed to a trickle he looked up.

The tree had shed half its leaves but otherwise looked fine. The search for another similar tree wasn't long and he got to work as soon as he could. Not much longer into pulling from this tree he felt the pressure snap away and his core felt nearly empty in an instant. How would I know if I made a drop? I never asked. If mist and liquid are descriptive names then enough mist would create a drop and then I would need more mist to refill the leftover space and so on. But what's the difference in mist and drops?

Testing a reinforced punch he could feel it. Much stronger. Not double or anything too crazy. But one drop definitely helped. With more potent mana I could force the meridians faster right? At that inspiration he sat in his circle technique and pushed his mana into the patter. It was fire.. his palms and feet hurt like they had been put against a hot piece of iron. Nearly in tears he pushed and pushed until he couldn't stand it and rolled onto his back panting.

Eyes wide he tried to push out mana the old fashioned way and could feel a difference. Time for new experiments!