Aura

That night, Rumius was once again awake and deeply focused. Beads of sweat trickled down his forehead, leaving damp trails that streaked down his face and wet the sheets on which he sat. His eyes were closed in concentration.

Deep in mindscape, Rumius gazed at the faint outline of a human body. Where his skin, nose, eyes should be, there was only darkness. 

In the center abdomen of his body pulsed a fiery white orb, it's surface now long evolved from the the smooth but misty outline that he'd once saw it as but now, an intense aura covered it's surface.

From the ball wafted white trails that stretched from the orb to the very outline of the human figure.

The trails were ubiquitous, wisps that extended from their common source to very orifice in the body. 

Rumius's frown deepened and the human figure's outline began to distort and tremble. His sweat fell like rain and his breathing quickly became ragged. His face scrunched from the effort. The mana source glowed, shining like a bulb. Its newfound strength stretched to its misty brethren, causing the trails to gradually light up as well, engulfing Rumius's vision with light.

Yet Rumius could still see that although the inside of the human figure was becoming increasingly harder to look at, the outside remained in darkness, as if the very human frame prevented the light from escaping.

Rumius gritted his teeth and pushed, causing the mana source to shine even brighter, its light becoming akin to a burning star in the empty backdrop of the universe.

The human frame shook violently and outside, his Rumius could feel his skin burning so bad it felt as if he was being burned. Rumius simply bit down pushed on. His mouth tasted of blood but he didn't notice. 

But it still wasn't enough. He could feel his strength dwindling away by the moment. He couldn't keep this state for much longer. But this was his first trail as he saw it. His first bottleneck. If he couldn't do something about that then what did that say about what he would be able to do in the future?

' What does that say!! Don't give up! PUSH!! PUSH!!!' Rumius screamed at himself.

But alas, it did little to help. The vibrations slowed. The light dwindled.

' This won't work.' Rumius thought suddenly, and in good time as well.

' This won't work. Simply pushing won't work.'

Rumius thought to analyse the human silhouette for the first time. The frame that separated the internal light from the darkness outside the was made of a thin wall of white. It was all of relatively uniform thickness....except for one point that was in the centre of his back. There, the white line thinned out ever so slightly. 

Rumius moved quickly, and without conscious thought and quickly diverted his efforts. The frame stopped shaking and in the next instant, the area around the caved in spot on the back exploded with movement and in the very next instant…..

" CR-CRRRAAAAAACCKKKK!!!"

The mana source exploded with light and Rumius could hear, and feel the sound and vibrations of something snapping.

The light quickly died down. Rumius sat hunched , sweat dripping and breathing labored. He took a few moments to catch his breath before looking back inside to observe his mana source. He was almost afraid of what he would see.

The source pulsed weakly, it's light but a dim afterglow of what it once was. The trails it left were the same as well, mere shadows of their former selves. Rumius's heart fell when he saw that there was no big change to his source. Yet something told him that there was indeed something different.

Rumius scanned his body for a long time before he noticed it. On his skin, traces mana flow formed a white outline, pealing off in some sections to form a sort of glow that encompassed the outside of his body.

Rumius sucked in a sharp breath of air, not daring to believe his eyes.

He'd done it.

On the night just before he turned a full year old, Rumius had achieved the most basic form of 'Aura'.