Lux

  I absolutely could not stop smiling from ear to ear while I recalled the fact I improved upon Miril's . It was difficult to maintain the fastest variant of for long, but I was relishing in the fact that I had made the good enough to beat Miril’s time by such a margin King Ilrymax summoned her to see if she could run the lap that fast. Miril even trying her heart out couldn’t beat the time I originally ran; it took a lot of self-control not to gloat to her face once that fact came to light. She’s been nicer the last two incredibly awkward conversations we’ve had. Once I showed Miril the updated version of , she effortlessly replicated it and decimated my time. I was faster than her for a solid hour. Unfortunately, her superior maneuverability was not something I would be able to overcome so easily.

  Miril did show me this tail pattern to arc side-to-side in the air as a thank you, which I was going to practice right now; I needed to be able to maintain the faster as I was struggling to run more than three laps with it at the moment before I had to take a break. I began stretching now that I had recovered from the small demonstration, beginning to run the lap while trying to use Miril’s trick to arc in the air. It became brutally obvious as soon as I attempted it that Miril made it look much, much easier than it actually was. I mean, what was I expecting? Did I seriously expect this to be something I could do immediately with no effort? Miril could effortlessly replicate my addition of while making it look effortless. She saw the once and with no effort was able to mimic it. How do beings like Miril and Krahinn do that? I never grasped how they were capable of that.

  After maybe two more laps my body was screaming from the exertion as my was spent and my head felt like it was splitting in half. Is my stamina seriously this low? Was this draining? I wasn’t running out of stamina on the short stretches I practiced; maybe when doing the full lap, I was maintaining it for a longer distance. These are technically not that long time wise. I felt myself smile again as I remembered the fact I was so fast King Ilrymax contacted Miril out of confusion. I’m so fast! I stretched some more, knowing I needed to get back to running some more. I need to build up my stamina. What did I need to do? I needed to be able to maintain the speed for longer. Needing to take a break after running a few laps around the mountain range is not fantastic. It was numerous miles, sure, but it was maybe a few seconds of exertion in total.

  I began using some more, digging in deep to increase my stamina; unfortunately, my stamina was completely spent after completing the second lap. My breathing was labored and heavy as I made a few quick bounds over to Ikol. Seriously? This is all I can do? It was going to be baby steps. I knew I wouldn’t massively improve overnight, but was it wrong to want that to happen? Ikol was still trying to carve stones with slightly more success than before. I sighed as I knew I couldn’t explain to him how to properly form the to carve the stone or King Ilrymax would get upset. Ikol was slowly getting there with his as he kept trying to smoothly cut the rocks. I stretched behind him, waiting for him to finish his current attempt. He was not going to succeed with his current approach because the blade was a bit too thick and he wasn’t maintaining the edge well.

  When Ikol was struggling I simply just did it. Maybe that was how Miril was able to mimic the and set up as well, just having experience with similar and applying it to the current challenge that she was facing. It still was odd seeing how Miril suddenly began trying to be nice to me. What changed? I wasn’t brave enough to ask her why her behavior suddenly shifted towards me. It’s been so awkward after three years of her being awful. Miril did help me get stronger at the end of the day, but her methods were draconian at minimum. Her change was something I was struggling to process; I was skeptical if this was going to keep up. Something told me she was likely toning down her contact with me during the now that this initial growing pain was settled.

  Ikol broke the stone finally after almost finishing carving the thing into a ball. Good for him. He was mulling over his failure without noticing I was behind him. Why is so silent? That was something I didn’t overly grasp why the motion ended up being almost completely quiet in practice. There had to be something that caused it, or some underlying explanation as to why ended up not making noise. I stretched a little more, not wanting to break his concentration as he thought over his approach. Ikol made a and just stared at it, looking at the blade with such intensity. His expression made me clench my jaw as I battled the urge to laugh. How can he look so intensely at a ? Ikol kept gazing into the shining blade, looking for some arcane truth to reveal itself to him, and his eyes were laser focused on his construct as he began subtly mouthing words to himself.

  It was killing me not to burst out laughing once he began holding the blade like he was giving an offering to a Lord. He slowly lifted it up while admiring the , clearly wanting some grand revelation to occur. Do not laugh Lux. Do not distract him. Ikol was so stone faced as he kept testing and looking at the knife he made which made it so much funnier. He set the blade down on the ground so he could look at it better, slowly beginning to take small laps around it before he finally noticed me laying there. Ikol lit up with his tails wagging as he immediately hopped over to me; I definitely had a massive grin on my face as every fiber of my being wanted to laugh at Ikol’s admiration.

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  “Chef!” Ikol chimed happily, bobbing happily in front of me.

  “Ikol.” I replied as I waited to see what he was up to.

  “The blade is arpa arpa now! I think I need to make the arpa arpa a little better and more onis onis.” Ikol explained to me excitedly.

  “That’s good. I’m glad it is improving.” I told him politely. Ikol looked over the moon as he was excited.

  “I’m going to efe efe some more!” Ikol exclaimed as he resumed trying to carve the rocks.

  Given how much Ikol speech was slipping in I was sure that it was going to be soon when he figured out how to make the sharp and stable enough to carve the rock. It was oddly enjoyable seeing Ikol work on carving the stones. This should be objectively boring, why am I not bored to tears? That was an odd realization to me; maybe it was because I was tired from practicing and needed the mental break. It’s irritating to practice because technically lasts for less than a few minutes, but that extended usage is draining. Was there a better way to build my stamina for using it? I guess when I was attempting smaller pieces I took small breaks between attempts to think of how to improve it.

  We both continued practicing our respective tasks. I hope Ikol passes his trial soon. Unfortunately, it was roughly two minutes of using straight followed by about fifteen minutes of recovering from the exertion. Ikol seemed happy I was recovering and stretching between runs by him currently. King Ilrymax occasionally flew by, but I imagined that was more for show. He had some method of long distance hearing and watching that I knew he was capable of I kind of wish I knew how to do. Actually, could I just ask him? He might simply tell me if I asked now that I was thinking about it. I’m trying to learn , would spreading my effort be bad? At least something to distract myself while I was building up the endurance for using may be good. With that in mind, I launched a small into the air which got King Ilrymax to arrive in moments.

  “Lux, what did you need?” King Ilrymax checked, seeming a bit confused why I summoned him.

  “King Ilrymax, how do you do that long range vision and hearing of yours?” I inquired. It would be a useful thing to learn, even if I didn’t perfect it immediately.

  “First, it is called . Second, did you think I would just tell you one of my best ?” King Ilrymax probed in a difficult to decipher tone.

  “I mean, I was hoping you would.” I confessed. King Ilrymax let out a surprised snort as he clearly fought the urge to laugh.

  “You are direct and bold; I’ll give that to you.” King Ilrymax told me between laughs.

  “So, that’s a yes?” I tried which only made him laugh harder in response.

  “I have not decided yet.” King Ilrymax informed me as he kept laughing. He’s at least amused by my request.

  “Have I ever mentioned how fair and reasonable you are?” I continued as King Ilrymax nearly fell over from how hard he was laughing now.

  “You are utterly shameless, you know that?” King Ilrymax checked while he was struggling to even breathe.

  “I really want to know the .” I admitted. I am not as invested in this as , but I imagine it is incredibly useful.

  “All I will tell you is, reinforce the desired sense with and extend a line.” King Ilrymax explained. That was a starting point! I'd take it!

  “Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!” I chimed happily.

  “Good luck, Lux. See what you can do with that.” King Ilrymax said as he took off and left me.

  So, reinforce the desired sense and extend a line? That seemed straightforward at least from his explanation. I imagine the string is similar to . I reinforced my eyes with , not feeling a large difference from it. I extended a line of from it, quickly learning a harsh lesson in how it worked. I was clutching my head as I rolled on the ground from the massive amount of information overloading my brain. Okay, at least in theory that worked. I at least got the theory down, now I just needed some finite control. Maybe it was not the best idea to blindly extend the line of and assume that it would work out. In the distance I could hear King Ilrymax cackling at me. He knew I was going to do that. Fair enough if the rest of it was truthful on the underlying principle of how it worked.

  After reeling on the ground for a few minutes the pain finally subsided. I slowly got back to my feet as I shook my head. That was not correct, but it might have at least been close to the correct . I tried reinforcing my eyes again, this time barely extending the line out to see what happened. It was disorienting to see the zoomed out view of what was around me. Okay, this is disorienting beyond belief. I retracted the lines as I knew I needed to practice that a bit better. With some apprehension, I reinforced my ears a bit, realizing my hearing got a bit sharper. Okay, small string. I as carefully as I could extended a tiny little string as my sense of hearing seemed to improve and pick up smaller things swaying and moving; I could hear each blade of grass shift softly in the wind. I sighed as I knew this was yet another I was going to need to practice. Slowly but surely, I will learn and master all of these.