Chapter 15

Teri and Yayoi spent the next hour sharpening the image of their aura, somewhat believing that it was cool and for it to be the standard. In the first ten minutes, and after making their brain bleed and dunking their faces in the ink to numb the pain, they managed to make it clearer. At this point, the way how their aura behaved became more defined, smoother. After twenty minutes of going through the rough process, their aura adopted some kind of color. Teri’s aura became purple, sometimes turning black. Yayoi’s became green. Five minutes was spent on Yayoi explaining why it was teal and shitting on Teri for not knowing other colors except the ones on the rainbow. And for the next thirty minutes or so, they tried moving around the room to see if they could maintain the consistency of their aura while doing other things.

Taku woke up. He staggered towards the two, rubbing his eyes, his belly, and yawning—not in that order and sometimes all at once. He said that he had a good night’s sleep and dreamt about exploring a sick-ass place made from the body of a dead god. But he dropped everything, beaming as he saw the two glowing with some kind of energy.

They explained what they were doing as Taku sat in front of them with bread in hand, breaking it for sharing as the discussion went on. He listened to Teri. For Yayoi, he nodded thoughtfully, especially at the parts when she was explaining literally anything. The bottom line was that the process itself was hard, and there was no way all of them could master it this early even with the ink’s healing properties.

But Taku said bet.

He picked himself up and stepped back, letting out a few long and deep breaths as he did. Yayoi nudged Teri’s shoulder. He chuckled at her, ignoring the possibility of Taku popping like a balloon and spraying them with his blood. He also took a rock off her hands and had her quietly admit that she felt like she had to make Taku mess up somehow. She punched Teri’s shoulder, making the both of them laugh.

“Behold…”

Taku shut his eyes and strengthened his posture. Teri and Yayoi kept their gazes steady, determined to cheer him on and run if he did pop like a balloon. The man started doing handsigns, mouthing its name one by one so that Teri could afford not to bother describing them. Ox. Hare. Monkey. Dragon. Rat. Serpent. Ox. Taku’s expression crumpled as he tried keeping his concentration. He gave up doing the rest of the hand signs and started slapping his hands and fingers together.

His aura surged, starting from his heart and extending to cover his entire body. It exploded out of him. But it was controlled by some unseen force, making it more gentle. Then, it became clearer, soon adopting a white blue color until it glowed brighter and turned pink as it took the shape of cherry blossoms. And giving off the feeling that he finally grasped his essence, he snapped his eyes open and spread his arms wide to do a T-pose appropriately matched with his confident smile. For the last time, his aura transformed again, turning into a backdrop of different flowers and fire brightly painted into reality.

“This shit is easy…”

Taku laughed like a cartoon villain and asserted his dominance over his two best friends, Yayoi being the most affected. He smiled even wider when he started bleeding from his nose and crying tears of blood. He wobbled backwards, but Teri caught his hand and threw him over to his ink patch. Teri also stopped Yayoi before she could kick Taku while he’s down.

“God…” Taku mumbled with a breath of satisfaction and relief, his eyes darting from side to side as if it finally regained its vision. “I thought my brain was going to melt. So, what is it for anyway?”

“Beats me,” Teri replied as he sat beside his best friend. “All I know is that getting attuned to that ‘something’ makes me focus real hard. I don’t even know what we call it.”

“It feels like a precursor to a power move.” Taku looked at Teri. “Did it make you feel strong? Did it slow things down?”

“No. I don’t think so,” Teri said, glancing at his now-calloused hand. “I’m just as powerful, but I feel more deliberate with my actions. It’s not a confidence boost either, since I didn’t even have the room for it. If anything…”

“You feel like you’re moving and thinking at the same time, right?” Yayoi added, sitting on Taku’s other side. “I was trying to wrap my head around it for a while now. I’ve heard some people call it being in ‘the zone’ or being in the ‘flow state’ where you perform at your best. Well, athletes, specifically.”

Taku faced the ceiling.

“Being in the zone naturally means that you’re so focused that you can perform actions without much thought, making it faster and more efficient. No thoughts, no room for doubt or second-guessing. Or even better—fear. Though what we’re doing is a bit different,” Yayoi continued. “Anyone can get into the zone with enough focus and training. What we’re doing is forcing ourselves into it.”

“So, that’s where the recoil comes in?” Teri asked.

“Nah,” Taku replied. “You shouldn’t get brain damage by forcing yourself to enter this state. It’s free, after all. I can sort of tell because unlike you, my head is the only one that’s hurting. My best guess is that the recoil comes with our bodies trying to keep up with the image in our heads. So, forcing ourselves into the zone turns off our body’s limiters for some reason.”

“Okay, so I broke my body by forcing myself to enter the zone in the previous fight. But how does that explain the brain damage we get when we’re doing nothing but breathing exercises?”

“You probably breathed too hard,” Yayoi smiled and slapped Taku’s shoulder, making him laugh along. “This dumbass thought that closing your eyes and breathing deep and hard means higher focus.”

“I got into focus, didn’t I?” Teri laughed back. “You got brain damage too!”

“If we’re going with my assumption that forcing ourselves into that state means turning off our limiters, you two probably enhanced all of your senses too much to the point that it literally burned your brain. I mean, look at me.” Taku raised his hands, the rest of his body still in his ink patch. “That also means that if we think hard enough, also maybe practice, we can control how much strength we can get and what we can strengthen in the first place. For Teri, probably his speed and power… as much as his body allows without it absolutely breaking. And for us—”

“A greater control of our spells,” Yayoi gave Taku a confident smile. “My ‘Scan’ and ‘Hack’ are applications of Wind Magic that I got by wearing this ring.” Yayoi paused. She looked at Taku and Teri. She gave another moment to herself, and her eyes beamed. “So that’s what I was missing!” She rocked Taku’s body like a log. “Tapping into this forced state allows us to directly manipulate how our magic could be used! Either greater control… or power… The more we get used to it, the more powerful we can become!”

“Wait,” Taku snorted. “If you didn’t know this before, how come you can use ‘Scan’ and ‘Hack?’”

“Because I’m a genius, dumbass!” Yayoi raised her voice, her tone a bit shaky. “It’s only natural I could do something like this.”

“No, the only explanation is…” Taku squinted. “If you have a point of reference…”

Taku mumbled his next few words. He glanced at Teri and then at Yayoi, smiling from ear to ear and on the verge of letting out a victorious laugh. He waved his eyebrows. For the first time, genuine fear flashed before Yayoi’s eyes.

“You’re a shounen fan, aren’t you?”