Episode 20: Builders

Arson stood alongside Xani and Khalif in front of a wall full of separate camera screens. Displayed were dozens of tandem hover-bikes and their projected surroundings. On them were mostly teams of 2 and 3, but sometimes teams of 4 could be seen.

The higher the value of the goods being sold, the higher number of team members. A salesperson and guard were the minimum. The higher-numbered teams expanded to include a spacial containment expert from Xani’s group and an additional salesperson from the newly designated BlackHole.

Arson liked the name for what he thought to be the parent company of all his sales groups, as well for the eventual storefront.

Arson watched as the spacial experts unloaded entire stores worth of product based on categories requested by customers. Salespeople seconded as chefs, and they cooked meals from kitchens dropped by those same spacial experts, and some bodyguards even recruited for BlackHole from some interested parties.

The bodyguards only recruited when the other members of their team were semi-trained. This was because the entrance challenge to join was to beat the guard in a one-on-one fight, and things sometimes didn’t go as planned.

Not all truly wanted to join, and so those types knew the cargo that the new hover bikes seen around town held.

This caused Xani and Arson to develop a system that could instantly pick up and store all nearby inventory and display cases into small spacial storage boxes they’d made and continued to advance further as more needs became required for the groups to operate.

“Do you think we will have a good turnout?” Arson asked his peers.

“Are you kidding me,? All I hear on the streets is about Builderfest. I thought that it would only be cool to the orphans, but apparently even the common folk and the lower-spectrum Cultivator communities are interested,” said Khalif.

“Yeah, I have many vendors very excited to show off their products,” said Xani. Arson nodded and hoped all of the entertainment he’d planned for the event would show. He’d been laughed at by many of those whom he’d proposition as himself, but got better results when he introduced himself as the newest scion in the city of Maelstrom.

“We will see in a few days, but the advertising seems to be going well,” said Arson.

The others nodded along, and Arson finally turned to Xani when he was satisfied with the movements of the orphans on screen. “So, I have managed to levitate for almost a handful of breaths, and I wondered if we could maybe skip forward and work on propulsion? I know I need to be able to stop at any time, but I figure if I can aim away from the ground—bare minimum—I won’t end up scrambled eggs on the pavement.”

Xani rolled her eyes at Arson and shrugged. “Skip around if you want, bossman. It’s your life on the line. That’s the best part about learning to fly.”

Xani’s voice contained an exhilaration Arson didn’t know he would ever personally experience. He had learned how to levitate from Xani through a mana manipulation technique that was known as the basis of flight in the Cultivation world. Regardless, his fear of heights still remained.

“I can’t keep focused. It’s not that I run out of mana, it’s like my mind goes on autopilot and the technique cuts off,” said Arson.

Xani once again rolled her eyes at him. “Start from the beginning every time that happens, and eventually, it won’t anymore.”

It was Arson’s turn to roll his eyes. He did as she said. Non-stop. In every moment he could. Before long, he was forced to increase his physical training as a result of being constantly afloat.

Days passed and it became a regular sight to see Arson a half foot to a foot off the ground. He refused to skip steps. Xani wouldn’t let him, but that only reaffirmed his gut feeling.

Shortcuts would kill him in the long run. So he trained. He fought off the ground. He even took more risk during combat by nearly being able to fly.

This, alongside his poisonings, took up the majority of his available time. He gave his spare moments to the need of his guild, but primarily trained with his mother.

He barely got to see Troy, which bothered him, but she planned on a return to the dump at night.

She’d fought almost every single night since she’d fought The Demon, and slept after every fight, rather than be able to stay up with Arson.

Arson trained during the day, and also at night. He wished he didn’t love it as much as he did, so that maybe he had time for other things, but he figured if it truly mattered to him, he would eventually find the time.

“I think you are finally ready for propulsion, buddy,” said Xani. Arson held his hands over his eyes and refused to remove them.

“If I look down I think I may pass out. If I didn’t know I could survive a fall from here I’d probably already be out cold,” said Arson.

“We walk off the roof and you immediately closed your eyes, kid. How are you going to fly around with your eyes closed the whole time?”

Arson crossed his arms over his chest, and for the first time in as long as he could recall, he acted his age. “No. Nope. I changed my mind. I don’t need to fly. I’m going to run really fast instead. Like Troy!”

“Yeah right, and your mom should give up on those massive portals she can make because they look terrifying to enter and ride a unicycle everywhere,” responded Xani.

Arson still hadn’t entered one of his mother’s portals, nor did he plan on it any time soon. Even if the dungeons inside some of them could help him fain speed more quickly.

“Wait, are you insulting users of motion? I’d like you to say that to Troy’s face,” said Arson with a laugh and was rewarded with a very stern glare from the older Xani.

“Don’t you look at me like that. I’m not sure even you could get away from her now. No other clouds have gotten away in the ring and you know how they are,” said Arson. Xani nodded, as she herself was a cloud, or sky traveler. Whereas Troy was a user of motion or increased speeds.

Arson had dreams of being both, a cloud, and a user of motion, but would settle on the sky over anything else. He no longer wanted to fear any fall, small or large.

“Forget about that, bossman. I need you to open your eyes and concentrate.” Arson did as the young woman directed and centered himself as he’d learned to while he levitated.

They were dozens of floors off the ground and traffic rushed below them, both hover-car and street terrain vehicles alike. Xani had chosen such a height both for their safety and the seclusion offered.

Arson had to force himself not to look at the vast city below him. His mind had always been enraptured by beautiful sights, and the marvel beneath his feet was not an exception to be missed.

The city of Maelstrom could be seen in every direction. Luscious green grass-topped roofs, tree-lined buildings made of sandstone and glass, waterfalls that splashed softly down the side of skyscrapers and flowed into fountains.

Arson’s breath was taken away every time he took in the patterns made by the rivers that lined the streets of Maelstrom. The entire city seemed to glimmer like a diamond in the sunrise.

“I said FOCUS!” Arson took his eyes from his surroundings and smiled at Xani. For the first time in his life, he felt less fear at being high up, and he knew this was what Xani meant for him to experience.

“Sorry, this place is just beautiful,” said Arson.

“Yeah, and that’s exactly why the dump is so bad and we have that much more work to do,” said Xani while she orbited Arson.

“Will you stop? You’re making me dizzy, woman!”

Xani only giggled. “As you have learned thus far, everything is a system of give and take—the energy used both comes from one point and must be distributed elsewhere. This is also the premise behind ambient mana.” Arson rotated slowly in an attempt to keep up with her circular flight path.

“If you can manage to power your flight with external or ambient manas, you will never need to calculate whether you have available resources during your flight.”

Arson had already gotten a decent handle on the ambient mana levitation, which was common to learn for clouds or those born with wings, but the next level of the skill was almost impossible for most to understand or store as permanent, useful information.

“For this next step, you’ll have to learn circular breathing, as well as how to make the ambient mana around you perform the same task,” said Xani. Arson’s face scrunched and Xani giggled.

“I have to make the mana breathe in a circular pattern?”

Xani closed her eyes slowly and sighed before she shook her head.“No, my young crime lord, you must breathe in a circular pattern, and make the mana around you move in the same style of system.” Arson gestured for her to continue.

“You breathe in oxygen, and your lungs process the air into the blood stream and it nourishes the body and then you expel carbon dioxide. Simply put, fill yourself with power from around you, use it and expel what remains,” said Xani. Arson was nearly on the verge of an epiphany, and his mind raced at the possibilities of what Xani hinted at.

“So, how do I translate that into mana usage?” asked Arson.

Xani shrugged and smiled back at him. “I have no idea, I did it by a fluke, and really don’t know how I understand the process, but my body does and that’s all that matters,” said Xani.

After trying to think around the whole process, Arson nodded at her. “In the example given, if I were to try and think of my core as my lungs, and mana as oxygen, what is the difference between my natural mana regeneration and the process you have in mind for me?”

It was Xani’s turn to think before she responded. The girl tapped her chin as she floated smoothly through the air around Arson, posed as if she were lying comfortably on a couch.

“Let me put it like this; one is active and the other is passive. Your regular process is like breathing without thought, and this process should be considered the equivalent to deep concentrated breaths—like during meditation—when the process is automated, it sustains, but when it is focused, you can achieve more, move longer, push harder,” said Xani. She had no idea what she was truly able to give to Arson in that moment, but with his new understanding, Arson would be forever changed.

“So how do I begin to circular breathe?”

“Easy—well, not easy, but easily practiced. Open your mouth slightly, and use the muscles of your abdomen to compress and decompress your lungs. The effort comes from the continual intake of air through your mouth or nostrils. What you will be able to achieve eventually is endless breaths, the continual filling of your lungs with fresh air, without the need to exhale or inhale,” said Xani.

Arson once more closed his eyes and listened intently as he attempted the process.

When he woke up in a nose dive toward a lane of air traffic, he’d realized he must have done something wrong and passed out. He screamed and before he could ram face first into a sky taxi, Xani caught him by the ankle, and pulled him back into the air above the skyline.

“Looks like you need more training, kid!”

Arson nodded and tried not to flail as Xani placed him in a rooftop garden. The two sat and conversed on random matters.

Arson spoke on the epiphany he’d had before they’d stopped flight practice, and Xani discussed her struggles with completing the perfect drone for the dump’s needs.

“So what’s wrong with the ones you are already making? They seem fine enough, excluding the weaknesses you just brought up?”

“That’s the thing, dude, those weaknesses are the only things left that cause us to lose money. They need to be combat ready, fast, and able to carry a large load,” stated Xani.

Arson nodded as he spoke without thinking. “Man, that sucks, makes me think of the story that Jade told us over dinner the other night about how Cultivators used to fly on swords because they were incredibly aerodynamic when filled with mana and could always be used as a backup weapon. Makes me wish I could teach your drones swordplay,” said Arson with a few fake stabs toward a nonexistent enemy beside them. Xani didn’t say a word, and Arson began to wonder he’d said something dumb and looked at his chosen rival.

“Sparks! You are a genius!” The girl squealed in excitement as she shot to her feet and let her ideas flow free.

“All I have to do is build the storage devices for our deliveries into the handles of swords. If I use the swords in the dump, I already have the shells for the drone bodies, and with a little programming magic and testing, I may be able to have the swords defend themselves,” said Xani with a few faux fencer’s strikes of her own toward Arson.

“Wait, what now?”

“Don’t worry about it. You will see, little lord!” Xani hugged Arson and took flight without another word. All alone on the rooftop, thousands of feet above ground.

“No problem. I should be able to get back just fine on my own,” yelled Arson to the empty air. He rolled his eyes after a moment and rose to his feet.

Thousands of feet above the city below, Arson strolled confidently up to the edge of the rooftop, closed his eyes, took a deep breath and prepared before he set his sight on his destination in the distance and jumped.

He focused on his breaths as wind whipped past his face and body. Mana thrummed throughout his being as light filtered in through his pores. A moment of weightlessness took over, and he was propelled forward with a jerk but the power sputtered and flickered out in the next moment. He screamed a curse and tried to focus on everything but the quickly approaching ground below.

“I am not my own worse enemy, I am Endless.” Arson repeated the words over and over, until a mere few hundred yards separated him from death.

No one is coming to save you, Arson, come on!

Arson felt the gravity around him distort after his realization. The power he’d felt earlier thrummed to life once more and shot forward like a hawk in a dive.

Buildings stretched around him in his vision as his power exploded violently behind him to propel him faster. He was barely in control, but he didn’t care, as he was flying.

“Woohoo!”