The Pillar of Enera

[Chapter 10] Light - Shinobi Training

Before him were two grey bags. The left one contained everything he owned. It wasn't much, some clothing and personal effects. It's Free and Hope who have many possessions. The right one contained his treasured literature. The library will be incomplete without them. While they ought to be simple to reacquire, he was taking them to be safe.

Grabbing his luggage, he glanced around. The room looked identical to the others on the second floor. So empty...

Exiting, he heard a thud. Silver had jumped down and was racing across the dome. Excitement is overwhelming sadness. It'd hit him later. Light took the stairs. My books don't have special durability.

Free passed below carrying an enormous ball of roots. It's a pity Wise and Hope haven't properly experienced super strength. Examining his sister's package, he frowned. Why doesn't she roll it? Pondering, he shivered as intuition kicked in. Maybe there's a reason she can't.

"There's a bug crawling on those." He said, catching up.

"What? Where?" Free whirled the mass around. After a moment, she shot him a reproachful look. "That wasn't nice."

"What's in the ball?" he asked.

Free stared back impassively, "More roots."

That's a lie. Not that he cared to press the issue. He'd seen normal insects in books, and some looked cool. What Free made were malformed mockeries. Which are surprisingly adept at wriggling through tight spaces. Tragically, his room had been right above her experimental area.

"How many are you taking?" He asked.

"Only this one." Free sighed. "The others wouldn't make it." Thank god. There were six more behind.

"It's sealed tight?" Light confirmed.

"Of course." Free scoffed. "Unless the ship crashes, it'll be fine."

Relaxing, he switched topics, "Are you bringing other plants?"

"Yes, all the cold resistant ones. It'll be hard leaving the rest..." Free said melancholically. He sympathized. This place had been their home for fifteen years, with so many memories... I wish we'd had more warning. If not for the anticipation of the Isle, it'd be crushing.

Light watched Free store her bundle and dropped his bags at the opposite end. Waving farewell, he took off through the fortress. Reaching the longest vertical stretch, he ran strait up. Two, three, ten stories... Pausing near the top, he stood enjoying the breeze. Marvelous.

When he'd set out to master wall-running, he'd envied Silver's aura. His brother had been scaling structures from the time he could walk. Luckily, he felt fear back then. Sadly, the adhesives he'd summoned had failed to reproduce this dexterity.

His next approach had been to levitate himself. All magic had a built-in telekinesis component. Ice magic moved ice and so on. It hadn't worked. For every action, there's an equal and opposite reaction. When he lifted sand under him, a downward force was exerted on himself.

Not discouraged, he'd seen the solution. If raising something makes me heavier, then the reverse must hold true. One of his affinities was air, and there was an endless supply to manipulate. He'd walked up unleashing a gale behind him. It was incredible. He'd collapsed in exhaustion shortly afterwards.

Light observed the nicks on the wall below. They were concentrated at the base, but some reached where he was standing. They're proof of my progress. While his earliest attempts had been mediocre, he'd tirelessly ascended further and further. That's when The HEAVENLY DAO lent its assistance. Two months into his training, it'd grown inexplicably easier. He'd generate more lift with less exertion. A small exception to the laws of physics.