Dawn on Mount Aeryon arrived as a pane of pale light between the fog. The wind, heavy with Astral, scraped the lungs with every inhale. Asori rose without hesitation: he triggered his transformation and let the white aura lick across his skin until his eyes lit blue. There would be no breaks today; Eryndor had been clear: remain transformed all day.
The weighted sleeves cracked into place on his forearms. They felt heavier than yesterday. That cursed "kindness" of Astral-bound weave: the stronger he grew, the deeper they dragged him.
Eryndor waited standing, holding the old parchment like a sheathed sword.
—Begin, —he said, without preamble—. Aetherion. I want you to call it until the wind answers to your name.
Asori nodded and set himself before the chosen boulder—both executioner and victim. He spread his feet, rooted them; arms hanging heavy, shoulders relaxed. He brought his right hand to the center of his chest, exhaled long, shut off anger, haste, shame. Silence. Air began to swirl, obedient, in the invisible hollow of his palm.
The vortex grew—compact, vibrant. Astral braided with air as if twining rope.
—Aetherion… —he whispered.
He drove the sphere forward.
The blast blew his forearm; the sphere collapsed before leaving him, and the pressure wave bit his knuckles. The rock showed a scratch and the pain climbed to his shoulder. Asori clenched his teeth.
—Again.
The second attempt shot off, but malformed—a hollow whirl that unraveled into dust-sparks halfway. The third vibrated right… and exploded in his hand. Thin red lines opened across the skin of his fingers.
Eryndor spoke without approaching:
—Stop shoving the wind. Invite it. Air doesn't understand orders; it understands routes. Give it a channel, not a wall.
Asori tried again. And again. And again, until the Astral pulse in his wrist was a dull drum. The boulder, unmoving, seemed to mock him.
—Good, —Eryndor said at last, rolling up the parchment—. Enough demolition of your hands for now. We move to control.
The sage drew out a leather strap and, before Asori could ask, tied his left hand behind his back.
—Today you're right-handed. Your left doesn't exist. Feet apart, low center. I want you to sit on the air.
Asori sank into a horse stance, thighs burning with tension. Eryndor set an oval rock in his right hand, melon-sized.
—You will sheath it in Astral and air, —the master explained—. I will try to destroy it. Your task is to prevent that by creating pressure equal to mine. If you fall short, it breaks. Overshoot, it also breaks from imbalance. Wind is balance—or it is blade. Decide.
Asori swallowed. Exact balance. The trial wasn't strength; it was measure.
He closed his eyes, let Astral flow through his arm, seep through his pores like cold mist, and embrace the stone. He didn't squeeze; he wrapped.
Eryndor raised two fingers. The air around him changed pitch; a deep murmur, like a distant tide. Then, with a snap, he unleashed invisible pressure toward the rock.
The stone screeched. A fine crack traced its surface.
—Focus, Asori! —Eryndor didn't raise his voice; the wind did it for him.
Asori fed the halo around the pebble, trying to match. The crack halted. Another shove from Eryndor—harsher. Asori rose too… too much.
The rock burst like a dried fruit.
He cursed under his breath, almost dropping the stance as a lash of pain hit his thighs.
—I ruined it…
—You learned it, —Eryndor corrected—. Air isn't a wall; it's a buffer. Neither lack nor excess. Equivalence. Again.
He set another stone. The stance burned. His bound hand went numb; cold sweat ran down his back under the sun. Eryndor pushed; Asori fitted the aura like a glove.
The stone vibrated… held.
—Better, —said the sage—. Now with small variations.
The sets turned into an infernal metronome: push, adjust, push, adjust. For the first time Asori felt the true weight of Aetherion: it wasn't only about striking, but about measuring—hearing the difference between breaking and supporting.
After a stretch that felt like an hour, Eryndor dumped air all at once. Asori corrected in time. The stone sang but did not split. When the master withdrew the force, Asori let the pebble drop to the ground and nearly collapsed with it.
—Shaky leg, —Eryndor diagnosed, half amused—. Good sign. Another round.
They went on until his right thigh was fire and the left, glass. When Eryndor finally cut the exercise, Asori's hands were burning, the backs of them lit with micro-cuts, and the sleeves weighed like soaked rubble.
—Now, —the sage announced, smiling with that pedagogical cruelty that had become affection—, climb the wall by the waterfall.
—What? —Asori blinked.
—With your hand tied. Up to Aeryon's ridge. If you fall, I won't let you eat today.
—That's blackmail.
—That's training.
The wall was a mosaic of wet slabs, tiny saving ledges, and hollows that lied to rip your fingers free. Asori set his stance, tested holds with only his right hand, searched for footholds. The transformation held him, but his pulse already raced; his energy oozed like sweat.
Three body-lengths up, he slipped. He fell with a strangled grunt and the wind ripped the breath from him.
Ground never came. A soft pressure, like invisible hands, caught him and set him back on the wall with the care of placing a cup.
Asori looked up. Eryndor hovered a few meters away, robe folds dancing, white hair docile to the gale.
—Is he… flying?
—Sky Step. Another technique only those who can handle Astral may perform; it's walking on gradients of air. —He winked—. You'll do it too… when your Astral obeys without being asked.
—Great, —Asori panted—. Then… again.
He climbed. He fell. Climbed again. He discovered the secret wasn't strength but rhythm: breath set the moment to let go, the foot the instant to drive. He learned to feel rock edges with his fingertips, to let the wind tell him where tension was and where rest.
Halfway up, a chunk broke away; his body reacted alone: twist, toe into a crack, fingers to a lip, load the knee, extend. He didn't fall.
—Better. —Eryndor's voice came from somewhere in the air—. Shut off complaint; switch on calculus.
A Megalo's growl rolled through the valley. Asori didn't see it, but the wind carried its sour scent. It didn't matter. One more hold. One more band. One measured jump. Summit.
When at last he hauled himself over the ridge—with his hand still bound, chest hammering ribs, sleeves heavy as lead—Asori let his forehead drop to the stone and laughed, wrecked and happy.
Eryndor touched down beside him without a sound.
—Too late to collapse, —he announced—. We still have Aetherion.
—Seriously? —Asori wanted to cry or laugh; he chose to breathe. He stood.
The sage untied his left hand.
—Now—form. Remember the stone drill: matched pressure. Aetherion isn't just a shove; it's an embrace before the shove. Wrap the air, then release.
Asori brought his palm to his chest. He felt Astral enter with the inhale like a cold current, sink along collarbone, down the arm's valley—ulna, wrist. The vortex was born small and stable. He fed it without hurry… and when it hummed at the right pitch, he let it go.
The sphere left well-formed… and on contact with the boulder it left only a shallow crater. No deep crack; no melodrama.
—You didn't hurt yourself, —Eryndor observed.
—I barely broke anything. I'm starting to think you're reinforcing that stone, Master!
—You broke the right thing: your stubbornness. Today you learned not to break yourself. That's worth more.
Asori let his arms drop. The transformation buzzed like a hive; he had held the state almost without thinking—all day. The bill came suddenly: pinpricks of white filled his vision; his head turned to cotton.
The world yawed. Dark.
Hundreds of leagues away, Blair bolted upright in bed, hand to chest, the Sweet Kiss beating strange. Mikan cracked an eye.
—Did your boyfriend fall?
—He fainted, —Blair whispered, thread-voiced. She closed her eyes and breathed deep—. He's alive. And… he's okay.
—Then sleep, —Mikan muttered, rolling over—. Tomorrow you can suffer with style again.
Blair smiled, tired, and rested her forehead against the window. Come back soon.
Night on Aeryon had a silence that bit. Asori woke on a rough blanket; a few steps away, Eryndor slept seated, back to a rock, the parchment in his lap, head tilted in that old-warrior posture that grants sleep only a meager truce.
Asori looked at his bandaged hands, knuckles etched, sleeves breathing weight like living things. He stood without dropping the transformation. His body protested; he dimmed the protest. He walked to the training wall.
He tied his left hand behind his back and climbed to the top; then he found a stone of the right size and set it in his right hand. He sank into a low stance.
—Once more, —he murmured.
He began to replicate the drill his master had imposed, but now it was Asori who protected the stone with his right hand, while his left tried to destroy it.
The night swallowed him into its metronome: push, adjust, push, adjust. Every so often, he glanced up: Eryndor still slept… or seemed to.
When he attempted an Aetherion, he formed it small and clean—just a sigh of a sphere. He pressed it into a rock, dimpling it with a perfect little hollow, without harming himself. It wasn't power. It was promise.
At a distance, without fully opening his eyes, Eryndor let slip the tiniest smile.
—That's it, boy, —he whispered to the wind, barely audible—. Forge the one who strikes first. The strike comes after.
Satisfied, the air slid over the mountain like a hand in approval.