A New World Revealed : Part 1

"I apologise, so please give me my phone back". (Lia)

"You think I am going to let you go that easily. He-he let me see what secrets are hidden inside your device....Ooh what do we have here". (Lyle)

I showed her some of her embarrassing photos. I had snatched her phone from her hand before it got locked after a certain recorded explosion incident. On seeing the screen the culprit..

"NO...YOU DEMON. Please I will do anything..(sob)..give it back..(sob)".

No, she is starting to cry. I quickly gave her back her phone and the moment she got it back..

"Fooled you didn't I. How was my acting skills. He-he". She was back to her usual self in a flash.

"What kind of talent is that? How did you end working as a data tester here?" I actually thought she was really upset and going to cry.

The mood seems to have changed.

"I am really sorry for scaring you like that. About what you asked.. well... Even if you are talented, had perfect results for everything you did and even worked yourself to death for something you love. There can be many times when luck, status, background and opportunities comes out on top. Eventually you start to feel that destiny has played against you and you are not getting anywhere. Then there will be limits like family, age, expectations, responsibilities and other things you will see approaching you much faster than you thought. Finally you just give up the hard road and pick the shorter one." I could see that she was extremely upset when she said this.

I thought about what to say as I could not find a proper reply. But words I did not expect started coming from my mouth. I was going to tell her it will be alright but at the last moment I felt that I should say something else.

"Well, I was not particularly gifted, I was lazy and I even avoided people. So I don't know what to feel like after listening to what you just said. But I also had something I desired to do since I was young. This was something I never gave up on and even if I did try to leave it behind I would eventually come back to it. I thought I would forget about it and become realistic with the passage of time but that didn't happen. I never told my impossible desires to anyone expect some rare few people who I knew for quite a long time. My life was pretty much uneventful till now and it could remain that way for the future as well. The reason why I couldn't achieve my desires till this day was because not even a single path to achieve them existed. I kept searching but ended up fruitless. But I never stopped thinking about it no matter how much time had passed. Someone who managed to find out about my dreams told me I will regret my life in the end. Well even if my childish dreams and desires made me happy, considering what he said, there actually exists some truth. But even if I die I definitely won't regret anything I did and if I ever had received a second chance I would still have repeated myself. I would follow my desires even after my death to the afterlife."

Lia remained stunned and speechless for a while hearing me. Finally a few seconds later she responded.

"I think you should write a book on this. It's bound to become famous".

"Stop joking will you. I was just trying to cheer you up".

"Well then I guess I should say you did a pretty good job. Oh look at the time I forgot that I came here late so I didn't notice. Hey I heard you are going home in a month or two. Let's go together then".

"Sure. Well I also have to get going. See you".

I ran back to my apartment room.

-- Lia's POV --

It felt great to talk to him about my worries. I wonder what he sees me as, a friend or..... Sigh..... What use is thinking about it? Lets just take our time on this one. But what was that he said at the end? He said that he was just trying to cheer me up. Although it did cheer me up, what was that pressure I felt. It felt like.... I can't even explain what it felt like but one thing is for sure, he may seem lazy and simple but there is a fire inside him. One that looks simple and weak, a common flame just like any other trying to survive an endless rain. But if you look at it closely you may be able to find out that the rain had no effect on it. It has been reinforcing itself little by little over a long time from resisting the constant downpour and is slowly but surely getting stronger, changing itself into a unique type of flame. It does not reveal itself and hides it's power waiting for the day to lash out against the world that tried to suppress it.

-- Lyle's POV --

Inside my room I was remembering what I just said to Lia. My face got red with embarrassment so I hid it with a pillow.

"Ahh... What kind of anime, novel or manga did I read or watch to spit out cringey lines like that. I wonder what she really thought at that time. Was she laughing at me? Uwaah... This is the greatest shame of my life".

I never really noticed it before but Lia is actually quite pretty. I don't know why I realised this only now as I had known her for the past 2 years. It felt really good talking to her. There were many who had a crush on her based on the rumours I heard. I have never talked to anyone that much especially females. Well let's leave these thoughts for later, what's done is done. I have something else I need to do now.

I sat cross-legged on my bed and started meditating. As I expected it's hard. Emptying the mind was easy as I had years of practice from before. But trying grasp my essence is extremely difficult. My preconceptions are getting in the way. Emptying the mind is actually not required but it is much easier to grab the essence when there are no distracting thoughts, but the moment I try to reach for my core the thoughts comes back like a flood. I tried and failed for hours until I almost fell asleep as it was getting late, luckily I woke up in an instant. But just at that moment something incredible happened. The moment between I was active and almost fell asleep, I felt wondrous sensation. I was grateful to almost fall asleep because it helped realise what I needed to do. It was only for a moment but I clearly remember it. I tried replicate that sensation. This time also I failed but compared to previous times it was easier. After 50 minutes I found it again. This time I could maintain it for a few moments longer. It was mysterious, when I was in that state I felt that eternity could pass by in an instant. My emotions, my worries I was in control of them. My body felt a little seperated and I could feel it a bit more clearer. My mind immediately calmed down a lot. The joy of experiencing such a thing I couldn't express it. I tried again and again until 2 hours had gone. Each time I entered that state I familiarised myself with it maintaining it longer than before.

Finally after another hour passed, I manged to maintain the state without any fall outs. I took it further and after some more time had passed, I perfected the state I was in to a certain degree. Happiness filled me to my core because even though I can't see, hear or touch this state, I could sense and feel it in my soul. This feeling and sense was unlike my primary senses and I didn't know how to explain it. It drew a small world which I could comprehend. I felt a black space with a white sphere in the middle and it was generating a translucent blue aura around itself. That white sphere was myself, it was my soul and it's surroundings. I could feel my attachment to my body. My soul was using my body in a peculiar way. I could feel that the aura generated from my soul was connected to the body. The aura was having an extremely strong connection to my head it seems. Let's called this aura 'spirit'. I find them matching when I considered the word's meaning and from what my senses tells me.

Hours passed in the blink of an eye. I did not realise that tomorrow had arrived. I can enter this state without any particular posture now. I was still sleeping, that's what it may look like but I was aware of myself in the soul state. My body is actually properly sleeping while I continued to explore and perfect my black space world in my soul state. I had found out some interesting things. With comprehension and practice I can increase and control of the spirit I generate. I tried to connect more spirit with my body as I instinctly thought that I would gain something incredible. It's going to be a long process and could take 10 or more days. The reasons are because the maximum spirit I generate is limited and too much spirit generation leaves me feeling weak. Weak as in the soul state becomes unable to generate spirit for some time. Too much can even distort the picture I sense. Also a feeling of pain wells up, one different from when I get hurt physically. It feels similar to mental tension, mental pressure or something along those lines but different at the same time. To recover my soul by instinct does something interesting. Blood flow, oxygen and energy activities for the brain is increased. I could sense this as I managed to comprehend my body more clearly after connecting more of my unused spirit with my body. My spirit which has a strong connection to my head it converts the excess energy into some kind of green particles. It is channeled through my spirit into my soul. The mental pressure I experience (lets call it soul pain for now until I find a cooler word for it) gradually dissipates. The green particles were present from the very beginning constantly being chanelled and nourishing my soul but I could only sense it a while ago when my soul state picture and senses improved further and the healing process of my soul started increasing the count of particles being chanelled. I also noticed a small change, my soul became a tiny bit larger than before. I was surprised it was just like muscle training. It's inconvenient to keep calling green particle so lets call it 'soul essence' or 'essence' for short as it is a type of food source for my soul. I also noticed after the healing that I could generate a little bit more spirit. I immediately connected the excess spirit with my body. The whole process was repeated to increase my soul power and spirit capacity. The more my soul was exhausted generating and connecting spirit to my body, the more it absorbed essence, became stronger and generated more spirit. I call it Soul-Body training.