Chapter 2:
Light
Metropolis No. 8 - Erde
My mind was racing.
Right after the headmaster left, I immediately ran up to my room, threw my bag onto the bed, and pulled out the practice suit.
Downstairs, my parents were arguing about something in the living room, but I didn’t care to listen, busy with trying to get my clothes off so I could put on the suit, but in my haste and nervousness, I just got tangled up, which only resulted in me getting even more nervous. I even heard a clear ripping sound from the black shirt with the tree symbol of Terra on the back that my parents bought me for my birthday.
“Dammit, just get! Off!”
Finally, I freed myself, and quickly slipped into the latest version of the commonplace technology allowing one to use magic, although this model was significantly less powerful than the standard one, as it had been made for beginners without much control.
Looking back, I should have found it weird that I cared this much about some random stone I found in a forest, but in the heat of the moment I paid it no mind.
“This won’t be enough”, I said to myself, taking the thing off again and putting it on my desk which was littered with cables and small pieces of metal.
I guess this is as good a time as any to mention that I planned on becoming an engineer and had been playing around with some machine stuff for a while. Working on developing these suits even further had been a small dream of mine at that time.
I took a screwdriver.
I inserted it into a gap on the box placed on the suit’s chest-
-and I cracked it open.
Good thing that this model used cheaper material.
Well, maybe it was a bad thing considering that it was easy to damage them, which would result in having to pay a hefty sum of money.
Really, why did I care so much?
“I can’t take too long on this- “
While I would’ve loved to properly study a real version, the situation demanded speed.
Quickly spotting the magic converter, which was responsible for drawing the raw magical energy out of the ground (that’s what those lines leading from the feet to the chest were for) and changing it into usable earth-type mana, I tried to take it out as gently as possible and instead put in my own version I’d only finished recently and hadn’t done much testing with.
“I hope this works as planned.”
Since I’d been so rough with opening the thing, I couldn’t close it again – and my prototype converter was too big anyway.
Putting on the suit again, I noticed a slight imbalance due to the extra weight in front, but that couldn’t stop me.
I opened the window and slid down the grass-covered wall before running off into the forest.
***
Why were there so many people here.
Cursing internally, I slowly lowered myself to the ground and crawled under a bush, trying to keep track of all the people in the area.
At least they didn’t care to hide themselves?
But realistically, if even one of them saw me, I’d be done for.
While I couldn’t see Mr. Grond, I did spot the PE teacher (the actual one) and several of the more skillful members of the school staff, along with some other adults I didn’t recognize, but they were even worse – everyone here (except for me of course) was wearing the most powerful of the three main models, usually reserved for police and military, and given the air these unknown adults carried themselves with, I had little doubt that they were actually part of those.
Meanwhile, I was alone, still 17, and had the student’s version with some modifications I didn’t even know for sure were safe…
Sigh.
My eyes opened wide and I resisted the urge to slap my hand over my mouth when one of the police/military guys immediately turned my way.
How good was his hearing?!
A step forward.
Shit, shit, shit.
Don’t panic.
I was covered by the bush-
But how much would that do when he was right in front of me?
Another step.
…I could still stand up and just… tell them I give up, right?
After considering it for a moment, I threw the idea overboard.
It wasn’t uncommon to hear about some police officer acting on impulse-
And also, I was in too deep.
The third step.
Okay, what do I do.
In a move of desperation, I decided to try and slowly have a layer of earth cover me, so that I would just look like a random hump in the ground.
I heard the sound of boots crunching grass coming closer second by second.
The earth was slowly moving up my sides.
I closed my eyes and pressed my head to the ground.
Robbed of one of my five senses, the noise only became clearer.
Step, step, step.
Cool soil slowly covered my shoulder blades.
My breathing became faster, but even with the air pocket I left for myself, it was getting harder-
The guy sounded way too close now.
Then, I was fully covered.
A final step right in front of me.
Then, silence.
No, that’s wrong.
It wasn’t silent at all.
My heartbeat sounded like cannons in my ears.
Thmp. Thmp. Thmp.
For a moment I thought my heart would stop, and for another, I wished it would.
My body felt hot.
Then-
A voice.
“Hey, you guys!”
Wait.
I recognized that-
Jasmine?
What was a girl from my class doing here?
I kept quiet (of course) and listened harder.
She told the guy and the others around here that our physics teacher had called everyone to move farther in.
I wasn’t sure whether I wanted to laugh or cry, but both were a really bad option right now.
And then I felt dirt in my nose.
Bad timing.
Resisting the urge to do literally anything, I forced myself to hold my breath and waited.
It was excruciating.
Everyone seemed to be on the move now, but I couldn’t let my guard down just yet.
I had to wait until they were actually gone.
And so, while every fiber of my being was screaming at me, I waited.
The steps were slowly getting quieter, but I couldn’t tell how much of that was the distance and how much it was my consciousness fading.
They didn’t move particularly slowly from what little I could tell, but they didn’t seem in a hurry either.
I had to hold on just a bit longer.
My stomach started to tingle and I felt like throwing up.
But I held on somehow.
And then they were gone.
I could barely hold myself back from jumping out of my hiding spot, but as slowly as I could realistically bring myself to go, I pushed my head out, put a finger against the side of my nose that wasn’t blocked, and forcefully pushed what little air I had left from my lungs.
I was lightheaded and probably the gladdest I’d ever been over a simple breath of air.
But I wouldn’t stop here.
I needed to continue.
…After a moment of rest, of course.
Silently, I promised to show some more respect for our physics teacher from now on.
***
Having recovered a bit (but still sweating, was it getting hotter?), I slowly proceeded towards the inner parts – the others may have gone ahead, but there was still the possibility of them having left behind a guard.
For stealth purposes, I crawled along the ground, lowering it right in front of me so that I was always slightly below ground level, which would let me cover myself more naturally in case I’d need it. Of course, I raised the ground again right behind me as to not leave a trail.
It took a good while before seeing something again, but that wasn’t really a good thing.
They were close to the clearing.
Quickly scanning my surroundings, I was able to spot Jasmine along with another student from a parallel class, a teacher I didn’t recognize, the headmaster, and one of those military grunts.
Not the best odds.
“Are you sure we’re on the right path? You sounded so confident choosing this direction back when we split up for the search, but…”
That voice was Jasmine’s, and she was talking to Mr. Grond.
“Well, I wasn’t one hundred percent certain, but… let’s say, 98.3? And I can feel that we’re getting closer. It’s kind of nostalgic, to be quite honest…”
There were a lot of questions on my mind, mainly how he could feel the position of that place, but I wasn’t exactly focused on getting any answers right now.
“And also,” he then added, turning towards my hiding spot below another bush.
I swallowed.
Hard.
“I now have another reason to believe this is the right place.”
With a smile that I wasn’t sure was fake or genuine, the headmaster signaled to the military dude to not immediately attack.
That was… kind of reassuring, at least?
“Vide, you can come out now.”
I charged.
Not thinking, I just went on the offensive.
Creating something akin to a sprint starting block from the earth below me, I pushed my feet against it and let it push me forward as fast as I could go.
For a moment, I almost fell over, but then I was racing towards Mr. Grond, shouting some sort of battle cry and took a swing-
-and then, all of the air in my body was gone as I felt his fist collide with my stomach.
I couldn’t stop the earth pushing me, so with the momentum at my feet and the hand blocking my upper body, I went flying, the world spinning around me, before inelegantly landing on my back.
The next moment, he was above me.
Instinctively, I rolled to the side, but it didn’t look like he had attacked the spot I was in.
So, he wasn’t about to beat me up for fun, at least.
But when I turned to run to the clearing, I found myself suddenly staring at a wall of clay blocking my path.
Some voice-like noises reached my ears, but with everything going on, I couldn’t properly register what they were saying.
The wall was too thick for a regular practice suit to do anything about-
But maybe with my modifications…?
Trying to calm my heavy breathing, I focused on a spot in the middle of the barrier and threw myself against it, the hands where the Mana was concentrated colliding with it first and weakening it enough for me to break through.
A small feeling of success ran through my body, I’d somehow managed to strengthen the suit-
And then, a searing pain bit into my conscious.
My hands felt like they were on fire.
I screamed, surprised by the sudden sting, and tripped.
What?
Why?
Looking down, it hit me.
It hadn’t been getting hotter-
The suit was overheating.
“Damn it”, I spat, getting up again.
No time to waste, then.
And again, the next moment, I saw the headmaster in front of me, this time clearly intending to strike.
Almost on instinct, I forced the nearest tree to fall over, directly onto him.
He jumped back in time, while I felt the heat tearing into my hands once more.
This time I had been prepared for it and kept moving, but it still hurt like hell.
I took a few fast steps.
And then I was there.
Alright, one final time.
Bracing myself for some nasty burns, I let myself be pushed by an earth block again.
At this speed, if anyone tried to stop me, I could probably easily break my neck and die.
But they wouldn’t risk something like that.
…right?
Apparently not, since I only heard Mr. Grond shouting something after me.
“Vide, just listen, for fucks sake!”
I came to a halt before the stone.
…wasn’t it brighter than before?
Like, quite a lot, actually.
I had never noticed that it slowly got more and more light over the days I visited.
“It’s dangerous there! Get back!”, the headmaster said.
Huh?
The stone began to glow.
And then, everything went white.
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