The Answer

2 months of failing. 2 months of flying. 2 months of pain. They had all culminated in this moment.

For the past week, Lance had been feeling the signs of a breakthrough. Unlike his previous one, this one was related more the mind.

"Mind and Body As One". Lance had often ruminated on what this meant. According to Attok, he had not reached that realm yet.

What he did have was a momentary glance into this mystery. This was Lance's weapon.

After many many failed hypotheses and attempts, Lance had finally found one which worked: Power was control.

It was akin to the case of a laborer who needs to carry 50 water buckets at the same time. He has the buckets, but he has no way to hold them all at the same time. But if he had a wooden stick. he could dangle 25 on each end after placing the log on his shoulder. This way, he could get the job done.

Lance was the same. The power was present in his cells which were constantly being bathed in the field of his energy construct. He only needed to find that log which would enable him to control them.

After revising everything in his head, Lance jumped into the water.

The instant where inertia enabled him to stay stationary in the water in the most important.

Lance immediately flung his hand out over the water from where he had gone under. He concentrated and commanded each and every muscle and fiber present in that arm to output energy at maximum potential.

As the arm broke the water, a "SPLASH" was heard as water shot up. The hand emerged and force exerted from a thousand kilos of weight pushed the water backwards.

Lance's body was jolted up. This was one of the trickiest moments: to analyze the flow and align the body so as to generate maximum momentum forward.

Numerous painful failures had taught him everything he needed to look out for. In a smooth movement, his whole body aligned diagonally with the current, going forward but also not completely being pushed back.

In each and every second, Lance needed to shift and focus his attention on different parts of his body. From each leg back to his arms and then back to his legs again, each change in focus was accompanied by minute adjustments needed which made the whole thing all the more complicated.

After reaching one side of the pool, Lance kicked off with all his strength to repeat the same towards the other side.

In the past week, he had come upon this method to not go completely against the flow. The rest had been in refinement since the beginning. He was truly grateful to the previous experience which had given the hint to go forward.

After 2 more jumps, Lance finally made it to the other side. Getting out, he jumped in the air.

"YEAAHHHH!", he shouted, jubilant. In that moment, the joy of achievement eclipsed all other feelings.

Clapping was heard as the Castellan appeared in front of him, laughing softly.

"Good job! You broke your ancestor's record! If I didn't know better, I would think you were born with the Power IN. Do you want to take the daily test now? I daresay it will be a piece of cake compared to what you just accomplished."

Lance nodded and rubbed his hands. It was finally time to beat those pesky gloves into the ground.