Chapter 6 - Training?
Walking into the barn, Joren was excited. Today, he would learn magic! Today will start his journey to become strong! Today was the start of his increasing chances of escaping slavery. Who wouldn't be excited? Especially when the only thing close to this in his old world was movies with CGI and practical effects.
"Gramps! Gramps! When do we start? I'm ready! I've been mentally preparing myself all night! I'm ready to embrace my destiny! I can't wait to learn magic!" Joren started running around gramps while jumping with excitement.
"Woah there, slow your horses. I never said I'd teach you magic." Gramps took Joren's arm, stopping him from running around
"B-But you said you'd start training me today."
"I said I'd start training you, not that I'd teach you magic. Were you not listening to me yesterday? These collars prevent us from accessing our core. I couldn't teach you magic even If I wanted to!"
How could he forget? Of course, he can't learn magic. Stupid collars, getting in the way of his success.
"But I never said I couldn't teach you how to absorb and circulate mana." Gramps looked down at Joren with a wide grin on his face.
"But you said-" Gramps interrupted Joren before he could finish
"I said the collars prevent us from accessing mana from our core. It doesn't stop us from absorbing mana from our surroundings and circulating it in our bodies. How do you think some of those geezers can still lift heavy things while looking like they are one meal away from death? It's because they can still circulate their mana and their mana is still giving them strength."
"I-I see. That's amazing! When do we start? I'm ready!" Anticipation filled Joren. The opportunity of a lifetime was just a few seconds away. Who wouldn't be excited?
"Before we begin, let us clean up first. Best we complete our tasks right now so we can have time later."
"Okay, I'll clean up faster than you can blink!"
Three hours later, Joren and Gramps were done cleaning, not just the first half of their tasks, but all of it, and it wasn't even lunchtime yet.
*Phew* "I'm done now, Gramps. Can we get started now?" Joren asked
"Yea, yea, I can tell you can barely hold in your excitement. Come here, let's begin." He motioned to Joren to sit down.
He walked over to Gramps and sat down.
"Now before we begin, let me just affirm something. I cannot truly train you the way I want. Too many factors prevent me from teaching you the way I want to. Because of that, we will be focusing on three things. Physical training, mental training, and mana absorption. Outside of that, I will only be able to tell you what you can do with your mana. Once you're free, you'll be on your own. Take what I will be teaching you and master it."
"I understand, Master!" Joren gave Gramps a look of appreciation
"Haha, good disciple. Now here is what I want you to do. First, get in the lotus position." Gramps went on to explain what the lotus position was and taught him how to sit properly in said position.
"Good. Close your eyes. Right now, I want you to have a focused and calm mind. Focus on trying to feel the mana in the air. Clear all the unnecessary thoughts in your head and only think about feeling mana within yourself. You might also feel it or you might even see small white particles floating around." Gramps explained
'Calm mind. Focus on feeling or seeing mana' Joren, as excited as he was, did his best to clear out the unnecessary thoughts that would mess him up. Luckily, he was used to this kind of thing.
In his past life, when Joren started learning martial arts, he didn't just learn the physical aspect of it, he also learned the mental aspect. His instructor had told him "Having a strong body and good skills are great, but if you don't have a calm and sharp mind to use it, then you would be no different than a wild beast." Meditation was also a good way to clear his mind of all the bad experiences he had growing up.
Because of that, it wasn't surprising to him when he started to feel mana within the first ten minutes of focusing on it, or what he thought it was since he never felt mana before.
"I think I feel it, Gramps. No, not just feel it, I can see it as well!" Joren exclaimed
"Really? That's good. Tell me what you see and feel." 'He can already feel mana? Not just feel but SEE it as well? Clearing your mind is not an easy thing to do. It usually takes months to be able to feel mana let alone see it!'
"I feel like I'm in the water. A lake? The water is calm and I can control it. As for what I see, well, I see a lot. You said mana is white, but I'm seeing many colors." Joren explained
"What?! Many colors? What colors do you see? Quickly, tell me!"
"Umm, I see green, blue, brown, red, purple, and yellow. Oh and white as well."
'WHAT THE FUCK?! H-He can see multiple colors of mana? That's insane. Only people who have studied mana and come to their own understanding of it can see multiple colors. Are you telling me a child was able to comprehend mana to his own degree?' Gramps then said
"The next step is to absorb them. To absorb mana, try to "grab" it. That's the best way I can explain it because everyone has their own understanding of absorbing mana."
'Grab it? Hmm?' Joren tried his best to grab his mana but the term "grab" was too vague for him to understand. He tried moving his "lake" in the form of a wave to grab the particles but that only partially worked. He then tried to make a blanket over the particles but that didn't bring any lasting results.
'Come on! Think outside of the box Joren. All you need to do is grab the mana so you can absorb it.' He kept trying many different ways only for them all to fail. This continued on for thirty minutes before he started getting frustrated
'Fucking mana particles flying around like fucking bugs. I wish this was as simple as willing them to fall into my lake.' Then it hit him
'Wait! Falling into my lake. That's it! Gramps said that everyone has their own method of "grabbing mana" and if I'm to assume my lake is the mana in my body, and these particles are the mana in the air, what if I'm able to turn the particles into "rain"
As Joren was figuring out what to do next, Gramps was staring at him with a smile on his face looking forward to what he would do.
'Rain is the product of bodies of water heating up forming water vapor. Then they float and later become clouds. When the air cools, the water also cools and drops back down as rain. What if I take some of that knowledge and apply it here?'
Joren then willed his mana to form a dome. The dome would act as the "temperature". Since the dome is made out of his mana, it will want to go back to his body. Because of that, all the particles in his dome will be taken along with it, falling like rain.
He extended his dome as far as he could, and then he made it pulse in intervals so that once the dome came back to the lake, another dome would already be grabbing the next set of mana. With that, he started absorbing mana.
Twenty minutes later, he opened his eyes to see Gramps staring at him in shock.
"What the hell did you just do?" Gramps asked while pointing at him.
"What do you mean? I just grabbed the mana like you said." Joren was confused. Did he do something wrong? Did he fail?
"Y-You absorbed mana!" Gramps explained
"Isn't that what you told me to do?" Why is this old man acting like this he thought
"Yeah, I know. Ignoring the fact that you did everything on your first try when it usually takes months if not years, you absorbed a vast amount for someone who barely knew what mana was until yesterday. How did you "grab" the mana particles?" Gramps was curious not only because Joren did it on his first try, but because he had never seen anyone absorb many like that. It was like a force just sucked all the mana in this area away, instead of the usual grabbing some here and there.
"Well, at first it was difficult, but I just thought of the particles as rain." Joren explained
"Rain?" Gramps asked
"Yea. Rain comes from clouds and they fall to the ground. I made a dome of mana that covered all the particles and stretched it out as far as I could. Then I made the dome ripple so multiple domes would be created by one action. After that, I basically pulled one ripple back into my mana while the other ripples kept grabbing it. I just repeated this process until I felt like I was at my limit."
"WHAT THE FUCK!" Gramps then passed out.