"You have judgement that befits any great warrior, but your strength and stamina could serve you more, Nox." Yaga pointed out. "Fortunately, I have little to teach you in respects to hand-to-hand combat, only lay the basics which you should have figured out anyway."
The Augur spirit lectured, sitting comfortably on Ikky's back. The winds swayed her already flying hair, thunder rumbling in the distance as the waves crashed onto the small island. Night was above, and the deep black endless ocean below.
"Focus your energy... all of what you are into what you need, split into fractions of how much you need and where the energy is required. Waste not a single effort and let the essence in you flow into your strikes, while the essence out of you condenses in tandem. Form a skeleton, and an exoskeleton. Make your technique the foundation of your strength, as well as what guides it, what adorns it, what beautifies it. Because, at the end of the day, you're only worth as much as what you have managed to do with what you've been given."
Ikky pressed his hands against the ground, struggling to get the heavy spirit off his back. "Why the heck do you weigh like a million tones right now?! Argh!" He fell back down, exhausted. "Heh. You're not so heavy when I stop struggling. Guess it's better I just lay here till you're bored enough to get off."
Yaga inhaled the cold breeze. "The answer to what I'm trying to tell you is the same reason why I only feel heavy when you struggle. So shut up and ponder for a moment."
Ikky rolled his eyes. "Oh please, how's clenching my ass at impossible speeds supposed to help in fighting."
The roaring skies and crashing waves were all that could be heard for a while until, "I am not clenching!" Yaga retorted.
———
The landscape stretched for thousands of miles, trees and eerie grass shaking violently as if experiencing an earthquake. Fingers appeared from beyond the horizon, folding everything into one horizontal pole. Ikky grasped this pole, the weapon struggling to maintain a consistent shape. However, it took only a second to bring it to harmony. The young man looked at the long night pole, spinning it around with his hands, He tossed it into the air, and an entire plain of land appeared overhead, like an ocean floating above a single insignificant needle. At this 'needle's' touch however, the plain of land immediately shrunk down into a single pole.
'That was a lot faster than I expected.' Since a person's Virtue is the manifestation of themselves and habits, when the prophet finally translates those habits into their powers, using them was a lot simpler and even instinctive. Controlling essence, however, was a whole different trouble.
As Yaga had established while teaching Ikky on efficient use of his spiritual essence,
"Spiritual essence isn't a type of energy, it's more of a state of existence. Humans and tactile spirits exist in the physical state with bodies of flesh, scale and hide that interact with each other. Spiritual essence, however, is how a prophet manifests in the metaphysical state of existence and interacts with it. Think of it as possessing two bodies, one allowing you to touch the tangible and use tools, while the other allowing you to touch the intangible and manipulate supernatural phenomenon. So, you see, you don't actually 'run out of essence', even though that is the term used to express spiritual exhaustion. And the amount of spiritual essence a person has is just a way to express how well they can interact with the metaphysical. Essence capacity is mostly determined by the time that prophet has spent as a normal human, and how devoted they were to their virtues... all up to the fourth grade that is. From the third to the first, their abilities to interact with the metaphysical are based off actual experience with the metaphysical. It's often why..."
"They're called madmen." Ikky muttered. Even he knew. There was always talk about the world of the prophets in Svarga. Prophets are revered in the first Lokah where ordinary people resided, and to create those that would bring great honor and prestige to their various households, some would go to extreme ends to raise a house of high virtues. Those extremes would often leave children and adults alike as vessels for strict gimmicks, and exposure to things they are not supposed to interact with. They are called mentally deranged, because they more often than not, are. And even though the official grade title of the First grade is called Mythical the more widespread term was the Delusional grade, or tamer— the Dream grade.
"Good thing I'm still sane in the head, right Yaga. Plus, the first spirit I got to have a run-in with is that spider lady." He shivered at the painful memories. "That sick animal."
"Uh huh." Yaga rolled her eyes.
After teaching him about the nature of spiritual essence, she explained that what she had intended was for him to use his essence not loosely as he normally would, but to focus it into precise portions, allocating strength to where it needs to be. Kind of like using proper techniques to lift weights with the human body, rather than simply relying on brute strength alone. But realistically, what would this achieve? Ikky's essence capacity was already so massive, he could go days pouring out essence recklessly without running out. Well, there are two reasons why having control is better, the first one being that he could condense his untamable essence to occupy a smaller range around his body, preventing his foes from easily coming into contact with his essence and being fed information about every little thing he was doing.
Ikky swung the large pole around freely, finding it easier and easier to maintain its shape and even shrink it. 'She can't have meant for me to learn this if her idea was to shorten my essence use. This is about as much essence as I can muster, and some more. I'm never going to use nearly as much as this in one go in any fight... hopefully. Hmm... maybe it's just so I can get used to controlling essence better.' He shrugged, "Meh, not like this was going to be hard at all considering the fact that I already learnt condensing eternity in the first place."
The second reason Yaga had in mind for this lesson... "You disappoint me, Nox. With the power to write of tales of anything anywhere, your first implementation of that was to create a sword. Even when you had access to the powers of the canvas of light, you wrote the tale of the worm at the roots of Yggdrasil, and all the powers you could give amounts to... biting. Your applications are far too insipid than befits one who should wield this Virtue."
Ikky shrugged.
His Augur spirit continued, "Swordplay won't do you any good. A sword is an archaic weapon that takes far too much time and effort to use efficiently in a world like this. I say, you could learn how to use one as a hobby, but not in battle... not for you." She grabbed onto the pole in his hand to stop him from swinging for a few seconds.
"I already told you, didn't I. You lack proper discipline in combat. Still, I won't say your instincts are misguided. Since you couldn't be bothered sitting around and listening to me yap, how about you learn to hone the already reckless styles you have. If you simply implement said styles into your Virtues, your capabilities can improve, exponentially, not in months, but in mere hours. It takes only one moment of enlightenment to breach the gap between you and everyone else."
Ikky scoffed, "You look like you've got a lot of things you could do with the Night Chant, so why not lead by example?"
"I would if you simply agree to delve into the realm of blasphemy. No prophet's path should be influenced by their spirit's choices... that's the simplest form of blasphemy. I can only elaborate on what you know, and on things that won't influence your fate, lest your choices be as a result of manipulation from an ancient entity such as myself."
Ikky rose a brow in doubt, "Girl, what are you talking about? You're like one month old." Yaga was created the moment he became a prophet, so why was she calling herself ancient?
"Ugh!" She exclaimed in annoyance. 'Well, at the very least I've dropped enough hints on how to use his spiritual essence like his physical body. All he has to do is figure out how by himself.'
Ikky ripped the staff from Yaga's hand and stuck out his tongue to mock her. An entirely different scenario was playing in his mind, however. 'Why am I condensing this much spiritual essence? I really can't figure this lady out. At the very least, she could try sparring on my level, but this bully just flips my junk in seconds!'
An idea suddenly popped up in his head. He flew into the air and threw the night mist pole in front of him. With his hands outstretched, he focused on its shape, reconstructing it into the shape of a spirit, the Jorogumo. The spirit's hollow eyes stared into his own, her shadowy mouth curving into a grotesque grin. He clenched his hands, feeling his essence reserves go from zero to a hundred instantly. He and the spirit now stood face to face on top of a cloud.
"These lucid dreams have been feeling more and more realistic after coming back to life. But fighting myself like I did before didn't really help. Hopefully this works better."
The Mortal fear spirit gave him no more time to warm up, instantly jumping towards him with its scythes raised.