Chapter Nineteen - A Possible Solution

After Noah had managed to stealthily hunt down to squirrels with the knife that he had taken with him. He skinned and cooked them before devouring them. When he returned his master was drifting in and out of sleep on the wooden couch.

Taking a seat opposite of him Noah, wrapped a blanket around himself thinking of the cold night to come. Instead of suffering through it again he wanted to make sure he stayed nice and cosy through leaving the fire on all night.

Knowing that he would need some firewood he took the axe and left to go gather what he could. He mainly aimed at trees that had already fallen; which he could cut large branches or the main tree itself into some fire kindling.

While Noah had left to do this his master that was supposedly drifting in and out sleep was actually trying to think of a way to safely increase Noah's reactions with magic. Reflecting on all the times passed and all the dragon riders and magicians he had met he still found it difficult to come up with a way for Noah to train in magic.

He recalled the magicians in the mountains who would very rarely go out to see others and how they trained by sending their aura into the life around them, but that still required a basic control of their own aura which Noah still did not have.

Another way he recalled the beast-men would often use fights to push their aura out as much as possible while keeping it natural. They would normally fight barehanded, pushing each other to the limits while expanding their aura. Only with this method, there was no method of control until you had mastered expanding aura.

Time passed and he could hear Noah come in and out again. Not caring what he was doing; he continued to let his mind wander until he found a workable solution. His mind kept wandering back to the way beast-men trained their aura, the way Noah released it by himself for the first time was so similar to their training it was most likely the best way for him temporarily.

Slowly opening his eyes, Noah was setting firewood in the corner of the room building it up in a small pile. "You look like you kept yourself busy, sleep tonight and we will continue with our original training plan."

Standing and exiting the room, Noah was left alone in the confines of the room. Finishing the pile he took one log and placed it neatly on top of the fire before sitting down.

For the first time since leaving the Dragons Keep, he let his body rest, feeling the ache in his legs from the running and sparring. Turning his hands up and looking at them, they were covered in blisters some were burst and some were giant balloons ready to pop any second.

The pain of each blister dug into his hand and made him want to let out a small cry but he knew this was just the start and he had a lot more to come.

Allowing himself some time to adjust to the pain he flexed his arms and felt spasms of pain. Noah accepted that the only way to make it better would be to sleep and prepare for tomorrows training. Remembering the glare from his master while they were sparring he didn't ever want to feel like prey again and would fight to change their roles as much as possible.

Lying down and closing his eyes, he listened to the world around him and quickly fell into a deep slumber.

.....

Noah felt a warm feeling spreading across his hands while he slept peacefully. His whole body felt tingling like he was getting a pleasant shock on every piece of skin on his body.

Warmth surged through his body from his stomach and spread cooling the tingles faster than they came. It wasn't long before he felt like he had been wrapped up in a cocoon of blankets.

After the warmth wrapped Noah up it slowly dissipated back into the air, leaving a cooled layer behind itself. This made Noah twist and turn on to his side during the night.

The fire's warmth soon started to warm Noah back up but he could not recall it in the morning as all he would remember is a dream of his father; mother and himself at their home living their lives as nothing happened.

What was left if the fire burned away, the crackling of wood being burned was the only sound but for a moment there was another sound, a deep vibration.

...

Just before the sun broke over the horizon Noah woke up feeling refreshed, his body felt new and clean like the previous day had never happened.

Exquisitely he took a look at his hands to see how they had healed through the night. He expected to have the blisters stacked one on top of the other, but to his surprise, there was nothing but normal skin. Not a sign of any blisters or scars.

Exploring the room to see if there were any other differences the only thing Noah noticed was his leather armour had been cleaned up and placed on the opposite chair.

'Oh, Master must have healed me with magic during the night to not disturb me.' Putting the armour on, he left the house to hunt for some breakfast of some sorts.

Quickly he found some edible berries he used to fill himself up before washing his face and starting his laps.

263 Laps later Noah leaned against a tree while he was halfway around his circuit. His breathing haggard and the sweat covering his face stinging his eyes as it dripped down and over his face.

Sitting between the roots of a giant tree, Noah enjoyed the shade from the sun which helped keep him cool.

The only sounds in the forest were a gentle breeze going through the leaves, he closed his eyes and breathed it in. Deeply and Slowly.

Noah let his mind wander, he started thinking of those little particles that Master had spoken about. He felt like he was surrounded by them out here in the woods. His mind pictured the surroundings and imagined the particles floating gently in the breeze.

His chest began to feel a pleasant warmth, which slowly spread to his stomach. The more is spread across his body the more it felt like he was being engulfed by a warm bath. The particles started to move from floating and steadily started swirling around Noah.

He was perceiving them in all different colours, black; blue; red; yellow. There wasn't a colour that didn't cross his senses. They seemed to start vibrating when he focused on them for too long speeding up.

The aura he had gathered in his chest and stomach was now covering everything except his face. It was a strange experience for Noah. Noticing with each whirl of particles Noah could feel them start to bounce against the trees and the ground, it felt like he was touching the trees and roots.

Slowly opening his eyes, there was a white and black misty cloud around him. Even with his eyes were open he felt like that they were still closed the misty cloud was all the particles he had felt around him. Every time that the cloud brushed over the green grass or the root of the trees he felt like he could feel their life pulse against the aura.

He kept picturing the particles going wider and wider, soon the whirlpool of particles was 4 metres wide and it just kept getting wider. His feeling on the aura was being pulled to the limits, every particle felt like it was on a string swinging from his body in the whirlpool.

Just as he was away to try and stop the cloud he felt the particles move over something that wasn't living but it wasn't like anything else he had covered in the aura. The small pebbles that his aura washed over felt like nothing to him, the feeling of the aura going over this small object were like a black hole sucking in all life.

The particles that crushed or even floated near enough to it would be sucked into the area and disappear into the unknown. Noah tried to find the source with his eyes but couldn't see it, it was just too small being at the edge of his small clouds.

Closing his eyes, Noah decided the best way to drop the particles without his Master there would be to imagine the particles going over the unknown black hole. As if he was gathering dirt and pushing it down into a hole, he imagined the particles on their strings were easily pulled and pushed.

I took some time but eventually, there were no particles left, even inside of him.

Opening his eyes again he looked down, feeling empty without the aura particles in him. Standing up and taking a step forward, he ended up staggering. Not realising the time he spent meditating and pushing the particles had actually drained him of energy.

Giving himself a few seconds to recover before walking over to where the black hole was roughly around the area that was sucking in all the particles was just mud. It was a little strange as there was no rain in the few days he had been there and the mud looked quite wet.

Deciding to satisfy his curiosity a little more he got onto his knees and searched the mud for anything that could suck in that much aura. The digging paid off, he felt something colder than the mud touch his palm. Doing his best to clasp it and pull it out the mud.

It was a ring engraved with some writing that Noah couldn't understand, it was on a chain both were covered in dirt.

Taking it to the lake Noah used the lake to wash it, discovering it was all gold and shiny after he cleared it up. The writing was very small and intense, scribbling around both the inside and outside of the ring.

Admiring the ring he wondered how it had ended up here if it was from his Master or if it was from passing by Dragon Trooper. The more he stared at it the more he felt like he was getting lost in it, a similar feeling to the abyss overcame him. He quickly looked away.

Deciding for the time being to put the ring away by wearing it around his neck, he knew he wouldn't lose it and it would give him some time to ask his Master about it. The chain was cold against his skin, the leftover water from being washed off slid down his chest.

Turning back to the lake he started to jog, finishing off his jogs as best as he could. Thinking of the writing he saw as he kept going on wondering more and more about it.