14 Experimenting with aura and semblance

After returning to his apartment from his first day as a direct disciple. Jaune immediately did exactly the opposite that Ryu-Bang has instructed him to do and started exercising and having brief meditation sessions in order to become more acostumed to now having aura.

As he exercised, he discovered that his physical attributes received a sharp improvement in all aspects testified by the ease in which he finished the training regimen as well as how little it fatigued him. That combined with how quick his tiredness goes away thanks to his aura and combined with his breathing exercises has confirmed that he will be able to have a much harsher training regimen from now on.

In his meditation, he started trying to feel and control his aura, as it was unlocked just a few hours prior he is still having issues with keeping it up consistently. But he will continue nonetheless until he can activate and deactivate it at will without any delays.

To be honest, when his master had started unlocking his aura he had managed to keep his outwards neutral expression but he had to hold himself to not start cheering and jumping around in excitement on the spot. He didn't think that he would have his aura unlocked so soon, his plans now can be be realized much sooner and his training time will grant him much better yields.

In regards to finding his semblance he has decided to delay it for now, it would be good for him to start getting the hang of it as quickly as possible but it needs to be kept in mind that semblances in their majority are fueled by aura and he currently doesn't have sufficient control of it. For that reason many people that discovered their semblance shortly after unlocking their aura tend to have problems controlling it and many times even suffer from backlash. So he has postponed the figuring out of his semblance until his aura control reaches a passable level.

After finishing his initial assessment of his abilities, quite satisfied at that, he noticed that it was already noon and his sister would arrive very soon. So he washed himself of all the sweat he accumulated throughout the day and started cooking dinner.

Not long after I started, I heard the door to the apartment open signaling that Saphron has returned from University.

"I'm back! Did you miss your older sister Jaune?" She cheerfully said as she made her way inside.

As she aproached the kitchen she said "What is this delicious smell? Are you making food? I didn't know that you were so good."

"Well, I thought that you would be tired once you arrived so I started making dinner for both of us." My cooking skills have improved a lot ever since I started taking lessons with mom and she told me many times that I had a talent for it, but it was far from being the perfect.

(AN: Should Jaune's cooking skills later on be good enough to cause foodgasms on those who eat it?)

"Oooh~ my little brother is so considerate towards his older sister! I am glad that mom has been training you to become the perfect househusband."

Hearing this I just shrug, it's not like I would rather eat her meals, my stomach wouldn't endure it.

"Soooo, you said that you were trying to join a dojo. How did it go?"

"Nothing special, I talked with the place's owner then sparred with some kids and in the end I was accepted as a student." I purposefully avoided details since she wouldn't believe that I wiped the floor with kids years older than me.

"Cool, did you make any friends along the way?"

"I don't know, but I certainly made an impression on the other students."

"And what about the sights? Mistral is certainly very different from Ansel, tell me what you think of it."

When describing the sights I was very vague since if she knew I was wandering alone on the less reputable parts of the city then she would make a fuss and demand that I have someone accompanying me.

We talked a bit more until the food was ready and then we ate it. Afterwards I made my way to my room and prepared to go to bed.

At that moment I reminded myself to tomorrow go out in town and borrow a few books since now I have access to a library unlike in Ansel. Beyond that I will also be searching for new clothes and on the lookout to buy a better Scroll with my savings in order to facilitate my hacking endeavors.

After that I finally went to sleep filled with excitement for what's to come.

...

A week has passed since Jaune has started his apprenticeship. And on this time he has been stepping up on his training and thanks to Ryu-Bang's lessons he has been improving his aura control very steadily.

He has been doing many meditation exercises and receiving one to one lessons ever since he became a direct disciple making his aura control have a great increase in this time frame.

His fighting techniques have also been improving since Master has been arranging spars between him and the old students who have aura since according to his own words: 'Making you practice normally would be very inefficient, your type learns faster when they're under pressure, so combat is the way to go.' And it has been working amazingly well as he has been polishing his techniques while fighting the senior students. The fights have for the most part ended in draws since his opponents have a hard time getting through his immense aura amount without getting exhausted.

Although his aura control is still not enough to start learning the true aura techniques just yet, it has now reached a point where he is confident in discovering his semblance and being able to control it. So he immediately set to try and discover it.

He decided that since the original Jaune has unlocked aura amplification while trying to heal a friend that was wounded, he would have a easier time discovering it under a similar circumstance. Knowing this he already knows a place where he can start testing to see if he inherited this semblance, so that day while he was meditating at home to try and find his semblance unsuccessfully he decided to go for that aproach.

He immediately left the apartment and made his way through the streets until he reached a familiar building, once inside he made his way to the sparring grounds of the dojo in order to find some willing subjects for his experiment.

And after a bit of looking he finds his targets. Two students can be seen fighting one another in the ring, they are both senior disciples that already have their aura unlocked and their fight has reached its climax and as such they're bound to deplete their auras and sustain some wounds.

So, he decides to just remain a expectator until the fight is over. He feels a bit bad for thinking like this but he kinda wishes for one of the fighters to suffer grave wounds so he can have the ideal environment to perform his tests.

But he was bound to be disappointed as they were both older and more mature meaning that they knew when to end a fight, so the spar came to an end when one of them forfeited.

Jaune didn't waste any time and approached the loser of the fight wearing a expression of worry and concern.

"Can I see your wounds? Maybe I can help you with them."

The boy became very surprised with my sudden concern but just brushed it off and said "It's nothing, no need for you to be concerned about it."

But Jaune didn't let up and continued "But I might be able to help, I have a semblance that helps healing."

At first the older students didn't buy it since only senior students have their aura unlocked, but he remembered that a week ago there was rumors of a kid who managed to beat all the junior students and become master's direct disciple.

"No need, My aura can heal it by itself." either due to pride or to preserve his image as a senior apprentice, he still refused the help that was being offered.

"Please! I just want you to let me test my semblance on you to help you heal. As a older student you won't refuse to guide one of your juniors, will you?"

Having his weakness used against him and with his pride as a senior on the line, the older boy begrudgingly accepted in order to have the younger student stop pestering him.

With permission granted, Jaune extends his hand and grasps the boy's arm since physical contact is a requirement to activate aura amplification and then proceeded to try and see once and for all what is his semblance.

That would give him clues that would allow him to finally piece together what exactly happened during his Reincarnation. Depending if he inherited aura amplification, another semblance or two semblances he will be able to tell if his soul entered a completely empty body, his soul didn't enter the body only the memories or if both souls fused into a new one. His aura amount has been pointing him towards the last option but now he can finally confirm it.

As he was trying to activate his semblance a single question was floating on his mind:

'What feeling exactly should I be searching for?'

He didn't know exactly what he should do from that moment on as his plans stopped when he managed to convince someone to be his test subject. But he didn't let that fluster him and he started just trying to make his aura be transfered to his target through the place they're in contact. With his improved aura control moving it around his body was not a problem but on the other hand getting his aura to interact with the aura of his target proved itself to be much more troublesome.

But with some persistence and a few awkward minutes with nothing of note happening, he eventually got the hang of things and started trying to enhance the boy's aura with his own.

The boy meanwhile was already on the verge of losing his patience and yanking his arm out of Jaune's grasp. But he stopped himself when he started to feel a foreign aura poking and prodding his own in an attempt to make something happen. He decided to wait a bit longer trusting that it's just not working due to him not having aura for too long making it hard to control.

Jaune on the other hand was already about to call it quits and cross the possibility of him having aura amp off the list.

But he suddenly found himself unable to properly control it as his aura seemed to have a mind of its own as it moved around his body. But Jaune didn't try to stop the process and instead started to observe it and memorize the way the aura was moving.

While Jaune was occupied with what was happening inside him, the Boy along with all those around him were in awe as the hand that was grasping the arm started to glow and the many bruises that were on the disciple's body started to disappear. But more than that the boy started to feel even better than before, if he was to fight the last match again right now he is sure that he would be able to win.

"So you said the truth afterall!" The senior disciple says in awe of how powerful he feels right now. He than snorts and continues "Heal? your semblance seems to do much more than just heal."

Jaune then snaps out of his trance and shows a smug grin "I seem to just be full of surprises, don't I?" He seems to come to a realization not long after and hurriedly says: "I haven't introduced myself all this time! Let me rectify that."

Jaune than performs a respectful bow as his master has taught him and then introduced himself "I'm direct disciple Jaune Arc, greetings."

The boy than reciprocated the gesture "I'm senior disciple Buck, it's my pleasure."

With both aura and semblance at his disposal, Jaune's training has just become a bit more interesting.

...

Now, a month has passed since the begining of my training after getting my semblance and the progress that I made in this month has already surpassed all the progress he has made to that day in raw combat power by far.

Firstly, in regards to his semblance, I have discovered many things about it in all this time I had to practice it both in himself as well as in other students. The effect of aura amp allows one to amplify the effects of one's aura giving them a quicker healing, restoring their aura reserves and strengthening their semblances. Just that alone would make this semblance very strong and versatile but I also discovered a few things beyond that.

Aura amp doesn't really instantly generates aura, it can boost aura replenishment rate but the immediate recovery of aura isn't one of its functions. My semblance can't generate aura out of nowhere, especially considering that Aura is necessary to activate it. What is really happening is that my semblance is allowing for me to get more mileage of the aura that I posses making that I can get more use of the same amount of aura and creating the illusion that it recovered.

Currently, I can inflate my aura amount by roughly 70% with bigger numbers being possible in the future. And since the amount amplified is dependant on my current amount, I discovered that is better to use it before taking damage rather than after to 'recover' my aura in order to get its maximum use.

And amplified aura when used on aura attacks carry greater destructive power than regular aura.

And yes, he did learn a few aura techniques on this one month time-frame which would be ludicrous for anyone else since aura techniques, especially aura fighting techniques which are extremely hard to master and require a lot of time, but thanks to his enormous aura reserves and a semblance that allows him to regain aura much faster than others, he has been allowed to train for much longer in each day than others are capable of with their limited amount of aura they can use each day.

Though the methods that were used when Ryu-Bang was teaching me were less than pleasant. For example the move shatter bone which is a overhead chop with high likelihood to bypass defences, when combined with aura manipulation to become the true technique it has the property of not requiring physical contact and instead dealing damage through an perfectly timed aura detonation right before contact which allows the technique to be used to break weapons and heavy armor without fearing damaging your hand in the process. The method that he used to teach it to me is to constantly use it against me in spars until I got the hang of it.

Suffice it to say that I'm glad that I have aura and a semblance to heal after having my bones being brought in the verge of shattering multiple times and that is with my perverse amount of aura. And worst of all? He has a point since my growth is solid proof that his methods are effective. Maybe not morally right as beating a 6 year old shouldn't be but effective nonetheless.

But that is not to say that I've not hit a few brick walls along the way, such as the one I'm facing right now.

I'm currently sitting inside a empty training room in the dojo and pondering upon a problem that I'm having with one of my Aura techniques, Aura reinforcement is a basic technique that allows one to gather aura in a place so that place has increased defense and offense. The problem that I'm having is that even if I can perform the technique without issue, everytime I try to use it to attack it dissipates or loses power suddenly. And I don't think it needs to be said why this is very bad.

When it first happened Master just attributed it to a lack of focus, but even when I focus solely on the technique to the point I can't focus on anything else in the battle the problem still persisted, I tried reading the original slip with the technique and have master explain it to me but I couldn't find any obvious problems.

'What is the issue then? Master has said that my form is perfect so it that couldn't be the problem.'

'That only leaves the problem to be in the aura itself or in my mind, but that doesn't help me pinpoint it.'

'Hmmm....'

'...Let's try to rewind this a bit and tackle the problem in smaller parts in order to make things easier to digest.'

'What is the problem?'

'My aura or conciousness.'

'What is aura?'

'The physical manifestation of the soul.'

'What is the soul?

'...It's one of the parts that make up a person, it's the entity that is responsible for giving us a sense of self and the only part of our being that never changes. The body degrades with time, ones mind changes constantly as time passes but only the soul is immortal. And as my Reincarnation has proven, the soul is also capable of carrying memories.'

'The performing of any aura technique needs for the three entities that make up a person to work: body(vessel), mind(guide) And soul (fuel). My body is good enough to perform the techniques and there is no obvious problem with my aura since I can use it for my semblance just fine which leaves only my mind as a possible cause.

'Wait! Could it be...'

'Every person on this world accepts their aura as something natural and because of this they can use it normally, but as someone that's not native to this world and having lived in a world without aura I unconsciously treat it as something foreign, and when I'm wielding it I try to control and suppress when I should just guide and let it work uninhibited since it is a part of me afterall.'

'Furthermore, whenever I'm using the aura enforcement to strike Master or one of the students, I never truly wish to harm them so since aura operates on intent, whenever it detects that I have no intention of harming the person in front of me then it disperses as a response to that.'

'I need to find within myself the resolve to strike down my opponents, the will to cause harm against those I'm fighting against, I must have a strong wish to achieve victory against all odds and my aura will them listen to my will and give me the strength to achieve it.'

Having found my resolve I rise from my Lotus position and start to once again follow the steps to execute the aura enhancement technique, but this time I can feel that my aura is moving much more smoothly thanks to my newfound efforts to accept my aura as a part of me.

Very quickly, my right arm becomes completely coated in aura and so, I aproach one of the dummies and execute one of the techniques I've learned while having my eyes closed and imagining that in front of me is my master.

'Dragon's claw!'

The technique goes off, and when I open my eyes to access the damage I can clearly see three holes have been made that go through the wooden dummy. Showing that I was successful in maintaining the aura enhancement on the attack and showing that I finally have overcome this obstacle.

By the way the technique that I used just now is not part of the crushing fist technique but another called Dragon Fist that I learnt in my free time. When I became a direct disciple Master has granted unrestricted access to his private library, but he became quite angry when I tried to take half of the techniques there with me, so after a scolding and a lesson on the importance of focus, he only permitted me to learn two techniques from the library for now and I chose 'dragon fist' and 'water flow destroys rock'.

Dragon Fist had moves that caused more individual damage and were proficient in dealing with heavy armor and Water flow destroys rock provided much needed defensive options such as the move: Whirlpool that can deflect attacks and projectiles.

With his new found discoveries, Jaune continues his training now more determined than ever.

...

One day after his training in the dojo takes longer than normal extends till the sky is dark, Jaune makes his way through the dark streets of the lower levels of Mistral intent on reaching home as fast as possible in order to avoid trouble from his probably worried sister.

As he is passing through one of the many dark alleyways, he hears sounds coming from inside the alleyway and despite he telling himself that it's probably nothing, his delay will leave his sister even more worried and curiosity will only bring him trouble he still ends up following the noise.

After getting closer, the noises prove to be coming from three man that have cornered a little girl that from the torn clothes and dirty skin it's obvious to see that she is a Street kid. And the three man by their expression seem to be ready to start beating the kid until she can't move. Probably an failed pickpocket attempt, this scene is not exactly rare in this parts of Mistral.

But what caught Jaune's attention wasn't the scene itself which isn't the first of its kind he has seen. In this whole time, what he has instead been looking at is the girl with a look of recognition. And what has allowed him to identify this dirty, starved and covered in rags orphan?

She has heterochromatic eyes.