Beyond The System-Chapter 282: An Old Method

The air over my palm wasn’t still. I exhaled slowly and raised my left hand, fingers slightly curled, focusing on that subtle change in pressure that marked my Air ability.
I knew what Harua and her people could do, what real Air Force power looked like. Bending wind itself, cutting currents, turning the sky into a weapon. In comparison, what I commanded in my body felt… incomplete.
A small sphere of compressed pressure formed above my hand, invisible but tangible in the way it pushed against my skin. I felt it bleed outward, pressing down on the surrounding air, muffling sound.
Silence. That was one thing I could impose, if only in a small radius. But that wasn’t enough. Not yet. What I want is control. Not just making pressure, but changing it. Shaping it. Layering it onto my already existing abilities.
I didn’t have the full understanding of atmospherics or exact measurements, but I was sure of one thing. I could create pressures lower than what they should be at this altitude, in this environment.
“I’m bored,” Elric said dryly from a few paces away.
We were in a thin patch of forest just outside the slums, a narrow belt of brittle trees and dry underbrush that had somehow escaped being cut down for fuel. Elric was sitting with his back against one of the trees, knees bent, a stray leaf caught in his hair.
I didn’t look at him. “I tried to explain what I’m doing. The science of pressure. I told you, if I figure this out, direction of energy would be much easier. Plus the creation of storms, explosions—the possibilities with air pressure is endless.”
Imagining what a directed Blasting Wave would look like was enough to make me giddy. Surrounding on sides with heavy pressure, a near-vacuum before it. Finally, I wouldn’t blow myself up.
Elric made a sympathetic sound. “You know, we really should have brought Trevor. Or Griffith. One of them would probably understand. Or at least, go mad with interest about altitude, density, differential whatever you were on about...”
“Griffith would be fascinated,” I commented, sure that Trevor wouldn’t have that much of an interest. “Really, I just wanted someone to talk to,” I admitted.
Elric snorted softly. “Ah. So I’m here as a conversational prop.”
“Yes,” I confirmed.
“Rude.”
I allowed the faintest smile to tug at my lips, but I still didn’t look away from my hand. “I really just can’t figure out what to do here.”
Elric watched me for a while, eyes half-lidded as if he might drift off at any moment. Eventually he sighed and said, “Perhaps it’s feeling.”
My focus wavered. “Feeling?” I echoed the word, definitely interested. Elric’s intuitive control had always far surpassed my own, and if he was suggesting something, I wasn’t going to ignore it.
Elric nodded. “Well. Literally. As in—what do you feel when you use that power? Numb? Giddy? A tingle just above your ass?”
I slowly turned my head to stare at him. “Do you feel a tingle when you use your abilities?”
We both went silent for a moment, the forest’s faint, dry rustle filling the space between us.
Elric cleared his throat and looked away, as if the question had never been asked. “Whatever it is, find it. Focus on it. Then reverse it if you’re looking for the opposite effect. But…” His mouth curved in a knowing smirk. “Knowing you, don’t expect it to be quick.”
This time, I rolled my eyes. “Sure.”
I turned my attention back to my hand and gathered my Will.
A small pressure bubble condensed over my left palm, then another, then a third that flickered and broke apart before fully forming. I listened to the barely audible creak of disturbed air as if it would give up a secret.
“Have you finished purification?” I asked, keeping my tone casual as I continued to summon and disperse the bubbles.
Elric let out a long breath and rubbed the back of his neck, as if the motion alone could relieve the tension there. “I don’t know how you’re able to continue at your pace,” he admitted. “Forming the false cores is much harder than before. If it wasn’t for the Harmonic Foundation, I’m afraid my progress would’ve been close to none.”
I lifted an eyebrow, still not looking away from what I was doing. “Thea hasn’t complained about it. Neither has Sia.”
Elric gave a short chuckle. “They probably don’t want to bother you.”
Then he tipped his head back against the tree and stared up through the sparse canopy, expression flipping between admiration and annoyance.
“But seriously,” he continued. “Maybe you weren’t talented in control, battle, looks, being nice to girls—probably guys, being good with parents, explaining things, or thinking about anything at all—”
“I get it,” I cut in flatly.
Elric ignored me. “Buuut,” he dragged the word out, “it seems you’re not just limited to sensing energy. Or maybe this is a byproduct of that. Maybe it’s a different kind of control. Or… suitability? I don’t know, but I’m certainly lacking it compared to you.”
I smirked, but didn’t offer a snarky retort. Something shifted in my arm. Faint, light, almost not there. Another pressure bubble formed more cleanly, lingered, then dispersed.
There.
I formed another, trying to hone in on that sensation. On the seventh attempt, the feeling sharpened. Not a tingle, not really. More of a burn. A thin, subtle line of heat that started from my Nexus and flowed down to the center of my palm.
But the strange part wasn’t the path.
It was that it didn’t feel like the flow of Force. It felt… parallel to it. Riding alongside the energy without being fully part of it.
“Makes me wonder,” I said quietly, more to myself at first, “if the people we recruit, and the ones we bring home… if their lives will really change at all.”
The bubble over my hand popped with a soft sound.
Elric leaned back further, brushing away some brittle leaves from the ground beside him. “It’s possible their strength won’t grow,” Elric said. “I’m certainly special. Talented. Handsome. Charming—”
“Seriously?” I shot him another flat look.
Elric cleared his throat. “Anyway. Lyra, Sia, Thea, Drake, Griffith, Marcus…” He began naming our companions one by one, counting them off on his fingers. “We’re all a collection of highly skilled individuals. I mean, Synthia—the way you described her—she’ll be a true monster before any of us if she can figure out all her bloodline. Control it.”
I nodded slowly. “But now we’re taking in others.”
“Yep,” Elric said simply. “You’re a magnet for us. Maybe it’s fate, or maybe you’re just too nice. The others?” He tilted his head, eyes narrowing as if studying me from a new angle. “But still—to say their lives won’t change? No.”
He shook his head, certain.
“You’re different,” Elric said. “Different than me. Than Drake. My father, the noble houses of Voxter...” He gestured vaguely toward me with one hand. “Their lives will change just by following you.”
“For better or worse,” I said, a small laugh escaping me.
Another bubble formed. This time, as I pulled at the Air Force, the burn traveled sharper from my Nexus down into my palm. I dug into the feeling.
But how do I change a feeling?
I experimented with the amount of energy I sent, first increasing it, then thinning it out to a trickle. The burn didn’t change in any meaningful way. I altered the speed from slow, then rapid, but the quality of the sensation remained the same: that faint parallel burn.
So I stopped relying on quantity and speed, and turned inward instead.
Intent.
Unlike my past elements, this one seemed stubborn in that respect. With Water Force, with no specific intent, water was produced. Fire was similar in its own way, spawning the explosive energy in a fuse.
Air might not be so different from water. It probably changes the air around me in ways so subtle I can’t see
.
Maybe producing small bits of… well, air.
I shifted my mindset, letting my thoughts echo a simple request: more.
Not just more Force, but something else. A demand for… more effect, maybe. More change. The burn increased, but very slightly.
Not enough.
I tried the other direction, thinking
less
, drawing back, trying to imagine the inverse of more emptiness while holding the burn in mind. It still wasn’t what I wanted.
Intent is related as always, but it’s not the key here.
My jaw tightened. After another long moment of silent trial and error, I finally relented and asked, “After the feeling, what do I do?”
Elric blinked, as if the question had yanked him away from some idle thought. “Feel the opposite,” he said.
I stared at him. “I hate you so much.”
Elric smiled brightly. “Must be hard being so untalented.”
“Same to you,” I shot back. “And you’re a terrible teacher, by the way.”
Elric spread his hands in a helpless gesture. “Fine... What have you tried?”
I snorted, but my hand remained steady. “Speed, amount, intent—basically everything.”
Elric narrowed his eyes, hand lifting to his chin in thought. “Flow?”
“What do you mean?” I asked, forcing him to elaborate.
He snorted, straightening. “Maybe you didn’t notice, but there was a time when we all drastically changed the flow of our Internal Force. It was subtle, but of course, I could feel it. A difference in
feeling
was created by that change.”
One brow lifted, urging him to continue.
He sighed. “Maybe you’ll have to do it again.”
“Stop messing with me,” I begged.
“Grand Carving,” he finished with a satisfied smile. “Change direction and pattern.”