Journey and Simulations

A couple of days had passed since I left my town. I was nearing the end of the melting lands. I tried to track myself using the displays and the Jager itself and apparently Mama had made it untraceable, so I was pretty safe in this vehicle.

I could access the internet. And I searched for any information regarding the Melting Lands, any thing out of the ordinary. But all I could find was a couple of articles about "The new Cataclysm statues erected in towns around the Melting Lands." Not a single mention about the state of the towns. I had to assume that every town in the Melting Lands was destroyed. And it seemed that Central was the prepetrator.

I looked at the map on the GPS. The Jager would arrive at the desolate lands in a few days and I would need to stop once to replace the batteries. I couldn't instantly charge the empty batteries directly either. I had to slowly do it at a constant voltage higher than that of the battery itself. That required fine control which would also act as training for me.

Since it was on auto pilot and the self driving nature of the truck made it easy for me. I just needed to occasionally check if I was on the right track and that was about it.

Both the displays had multiple tabs open with information on lightning and its properties. My current goal was to study not only about my enemies but about me. Lightning and its derivative, electricity was extremely versatile. I could do cause a lot of damage with my abilities both toward a person and toward an entire area. If I was able to perfect my control over my abilities I might directly be able to control a person by replicating bioelectricity.

But for now, I had to take simple steps. Preparation was key here and prepared I would be. 

There was an issue at hand now, I didn't have any identification. And I could not get checked for biometrics, that would indicate that someone survived the eradication. This meant that I could not go to any major cities. My influence would only extend around the outskirts of every kingdom or nation. Proper checks only happened near major cities and I couldn't go there.

My only worry was any temporary pull over and search. It was common for children to travel in autopilot vehicles to visit relatives in other nations, so I could get away with it. Still I would prefer to avoid that situation altogether, there were too many variables that could affect the search. They might call and check with my supposed parents. They could check the travel history of the vehicle using the inbuilt display and GPS.

There were no check posts of any kind on the way. Funny how, despite having Filiurge, Millica and Farah on either side of the desolate lands, the security was extremely lax.

I pulled up a map on the display in my hands. My current position was close to the border of Filiurge with Millica being the closest to me. Farah on the other hand was on the other end of Filiurge. Farah was a beautiful land. It was where everyone wanted to live their lives. It was a place of abundance. The kingdom was ruled by the decendants of "The Zephyr" Sulaiman bin Iqraa. The Cosmic Radiance had caused the lands to develop the most physically. It was a land of deserts, now it was one large oasis. The security increased exponentially as one got closer to Farah. So, I couldn't move in that direction.

Staying close to Millica would be bad as well. Even if there were no physical checks, the entire area was constantly monitored by cameras and drones. All of this meant, this was the only one way to reach the desolate lands. 

Funnily enough, I had not encountered any beasts in my few days of travel. As much of a relief that was, I was still on high alert.

My abilites had improved my thinking capacity a lot more. I was the epitome of a multitasker. I was simultaneously keeping an eye on my surrondings, studying and planning. Another change to my body was my eyes. They had started glowing a blueish-white color whenever I used my abilities.

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At some point in time, I started to imagine facing Jackal again. This time in my full glory. 

Jackal tried to spear me with his right hand. The incoming attack looked slow, extremely slow. I side stepped it with ease. As I dodged the ability, I touched the bone spear. 

BZZZTTTT

Electricity travelled through the bone and shocked him. I didn't know if it worked since he was impervious to pain. It should have worked, bones had calcium and phosphorus, both conductive.

Then I heard a grunt and then movement.

I repeated the segment in my head. He stopped moving as I had shocked him with electricity.

Hmmm.

It seemed like I could temporarily stun him in this manner. I looked at the display in my hands and searched for a few minutes. Neuromuscular Incapacitation. The shocks could cause his muscles to tense up or contract. This would make it so they wouldn't be able to move.

I replayed the segment, and then hit him with a full blast of my lightning. His body in its normal state couldn't handle it as he died instantly, the Lichtenberg figure from the lightning tree, imprinting itself on his body. This would for sure kill him but it left behind evidence.

In the next few replays, I kept shocking him until I was next to him and then stabbed him in the neck. The heart would be ideal in most cases, but he could control bones. What was the possiblity that he would leave himself unprotected? The neck was the best spot. I could cut off his breathing and I could even damage his spinal cord. 

The next step was fighting him in his full bone armor. If I didn't have a weapon, I could just keep shocking him until he went into a cardiac arrest. That would probably be the easiest way to kill him. It was practically untraceable assassination. I tried blasting him with lightning continously. That did the trick. His bones melted from the temperature and a charred corpse was all that was left.

I then thought of ways I could evade the bone shrapnel from the dome breaking. I instantly dodged them all as my body shifted into lightning. But that was the issue. It was extremely draining. My previous usage against the energy wave proved that, my adrenaline kept me awake. Then I started manually dodging every single bone fragment. I restarted the dodging if I was hit by any of the shooting bone shards. I was fast. Not only physically but mentally as well. Which explained the slowing down of the incoming projectiles. But even with this extreme speed I couldn't avoid all the projectiles. That was the nature of scattershot weapons or abilities. I couldn't predict what was random.

I guess that would be the limits of a simulation. I couldn't factor in the unpredictable human element to any fight as well. I couldn't predict how I would act in the same situation again, in the same way Jackal couldn't predict how much of a hindrance James and I would be to his entire operation. 

Despite knowing the shortcomings of this method of thinking and metally training, I kept at it. There was only so much I could do right now and this kept my mind occupied. I did not want to get lost in my thoughts. I knew that I would do more damage to myself mentally if I was left alone with my thoughts.

Though this wouldn't help me train physically, it could at least let me mentally test out and improve the usage of my own abilities.

I decided to do something better. I didn't know the full extent of Jackal's abilities, but I did know the full extent of everyone else's. I put myself in Jackal's spot. Now my enemies were, Mama, James and the Physical me.

I started off with a few blasts of lightning, which Mama shielded. Lightning was fickle. In most of my mental trials, it rarely went where I wanted it to. So most of the blasts of lightning branched out in different directions. Whatever reached Mama wouldn't get past her telekenesis. She instantly brought up materials to block the branching lightning. I couldn't change targets easily. Mama had enough fire power to keep me in check. I knew that "I" would wait and see how the fight went to interfere, "I" as probably planning from a safer spot with full vision of the battlefield. And James would probably be too shocked to actually initiate the fight.

Mama shot a few materials at me, which I melted as it got close to me. I couldn't waste my time individually dodging everything flying at me. If lightning didn't work I used the next best thing. My speed. I needed to get close to incapacitate Mama. So I dashed toward her. I had my senses pushed to the max. I had to instantly react to anything James might put in my way.

I raised my fist as I treid to punch Mama, but I stopped before actually landing my punch. I couldn't bring myself to harm her.

I hear a yell from behind me. Which I turned to face.

But I couldn't turn fully. A green barrier was blocking me from fully turning. Interesting, even I didn't know that the ability could be used like that.

I felt a punch land on the other side of my body, as I hit the barrier which was blocking my range of motion. I was left rattled and breathless after that punch. I forced myself to intercept the next punch. My body was stronger than before now. I caught the punch "I" threw and immediately threw one back.

My punch hit "me" square in the jaw. "My" head turned in the direction of the punch as "I" fell to the ground out cold, like a puppet with its strings cut.

I had to eliminate "me" first. That would leave the others open for damage. 

WOOOSH

Mama's needles flew at me. I let out an explanding dome of lightning around me, using both the bone dome and energy wave as references. The incoming needles just melted. I could use my abilities to replicate scattershot as well. I raised my fist and punched the "me" on the ground. A barrier appeared in front of me and my punch shattered it the same instant. "My" head caved in and "I" was dead.

The hesitation that was present when I tried to kill Mama was not there when it came to "me". My weakness was something I despised and I would kill it as many times as it took. 

I repeated the same thing as before, this time steeling myself to finish the job as I shot a burst of lightning at James first. Another yell from "me". I didn't need to turn and look. I would turn to lightning to avoid the punch coming at me. But the punch never came. The lightning that was rushing toward James turned to the left and hit a black coin.

"I" hadn't aimed to punch me but had thrown the pendant in the same direction as James. The coin was surprisingly conductive, something I had checked as I was travelling to the desolate lands. "I" probably used it as a last ditch effort.

BUMP

My focus broke. I got up to check if the Jager was moving in the right path. It had just hit a rock on the road. My paranoia of something bad happening was too high at the moment. Every little thing had to be double..... no triple-checked. 

After ensuring everything was fine, I started trying to simulate fights again, this time with the other Waking and their powers involved as well. I knew them more than I knew about myself. 

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