The

Layna glanced up as a silver-haired man with a blindfold entered the library and slumped down next to her.

"Layna?" Kane sighed.

"Yes?"

"Did you do something to piss off Rick?"

"... My bad."

Kane got up with a groan, "Any books on space stuff?

Layna broke her usually monotone expression and smiled a little, "I actually picked up some for you, I'm curious to see how much further you'll go with the extra knowledge."

"Oh, thank you?" Kane raised his eyebrows in surprise as Layna set a few books down in front of him.

"I'm joking, it was actually your trainer, he told me to bring these back to you." Her face went back to its usual bored state.

"Less thanks but thanks anyway," Kane opened the books, being more curious about what Layna said to Rick than whatever the books would contain.

The first 3 books were just basic math and physics, working their way into progressively more complicated subjects until they reached modern quantum mechanics and a bunch of cutting-edge theories.

Kane used scanner to read and memorize as much as he could, with his memory even better than the last time he studied, it wasn't too bad.

Day became night as Kane finally reached the last book, this one was a personal list of moves, theories, and explanations from the only other space manalite.

The manalite immediately went to list their rank and attribute on the first page, they were at the peak of Rank-6, how close that would be to Rank-7, Kane had no clue.

The manalite was a 46-year-old woman, who had her mana capabilities awakened at age 15.

Kane wondered why it took her so long to rank up, his question being answered as he continued reading her theories and concepts.

It appeared the space attribute was wasted on someone with very little affinity.

She didn't train often, didn't care to experiment, she wasn't exceptionally sensitive to Manilium or space in the first place, and she wasn't too bright.

Almost every move listed from her 31 years of experimentation and practice had already been learned by Kane in under two weeks, he'd even figured out the basic concepts behind space usage itself.

But her 31 years weren't completely for show, not only had she learned to fly and survive the vacuum of space, but after spending years growing her strength, she began sensing anomalies in the atmosphere.

She measured out these anomalies and found that all of them pointed right to distant planets considered likely to contain alien life.

The woman was just barely lacking the mana to make it through.

Kane was struggling to wrap his head around these implications, he slapped his cheeks and refocused his attention on what could help him at the moment.

Flight would be a big one, surviving in space might save his ass someday too.

Kane laughed at the thought of him casually heading into space.

The concept behind flight seemed to be using the space under you to create lift, it was less like actually flying and more like constantly standing on an invisible moving platform.

Closing all the books, Kane stacked them next to Layna and ran off for the training center.

"Could you take care of those for me?"

Layna glanced over her shoulder as Kane left the room, "Sure."

She was just going to leave them on the table.

Kane burst into the biggest arena in the facility, having almost 100 feet of vertical space. (30 meters).

There was a lot of new manalites training there that Kane hadn't met yet.

The arena had a giant black matted floor with white markings, smooth grey walls stretched out to a roof covered in built-in lights.

A few people glanced over at Kane, probably noting the blindfold, before going back to their training.

Kane figured his body could more than handle any falls he might take if he failed, so he didn't bother with safety equipment.

He began walking his way towards an empty part of the arena way off to the side.

Kane focused on exactly what the book said to do, let the space connect with the mana under your feet, and then move it upwards.

It sounds strange, but the fabric of reality doesn't really work the same way as wind or propulsion.

Kane focused on lifting the space, and it worked quite smoothly. His control over mana was more than good enough to lift himself up, but moving was a different story.

As he began moving side to side in mid-air, much to the surprise of everyone present, Kane realized he had to actively slant the space to allow himself to lean forward and move.

If he didn't do this, he'd have to stay on a moving object while standing straight up, leaning forward was definitely the only way to maintain balance.

But if you leave the platform completely flat, then that doesn't work either, so the only option was to make small changes to the platform and constantly match his posture.

After a few minutes of barely pulling off slow, basic movements in the air, Kane had a better idea.

Instead of a box under his feet like the woman had described, he'd make it a half-circle, with his feet on the flat side.

He then let his feet sink inside the half-circle rather than just stand on top of it. Thanks to this method, his visualization was much better, Kane could now lean in all directions while rotating and moving the platform no problem.

It was such a small change and hardly used any extra mana, yet the woman didn't even think of it.

The world appears to have gotten unlucky with its space mages, first it was someone with terrible aptitude and now it's a blind kid.

"Hey, I wanna duel you!" Some guy with a wooden practice sword yelled from the ground.

Kane smirked.

"I'm down!" He said while lowering himself to the ground, his pun being missed by everyone present.

The man who looked 20-ish began telling people to back up.

"You want a weapon? I've already reached Rank-2 so you might need one."

Kane began wheezing with laughter, much to the annoyed surprise of the man.

"N-no, I think I'm... good, you come at me first."

"Alright then!" He yelled while sprinting towards Kane.

Opting to tackle him instead of using his sword, the man lowered his head and rushed in like a bull.

The moment they were about to collide, Kane teleported behind the man and gave him a light kick to the ass, sending him flying halfway across the room.

Kane began flying too, making his way over to the man at a much faster speed than he expected.

The man quickly recuperated himself and faced Kane, this time he decided to use his sword.

Kane did a front flip out of the air and landed with a roll, immediately teleporting behind the man.

With a rapid spin, Kane brought his foot around and kicked the sword out of his hand, immediately aporting it to his grasp as he suddenly turned invisible.

The man looked around, frantically trying to find where Kane had teleported to when his legs suddenly gave out.

Kane reappeared right in front of him with the wooden sword sitting on the man's neck.

Kane smiled, "I think I win, good job Mr. 'Rank-2,' you almost lasted a minute."