The Essence Flow-Chapter 42: Echoes Beneath The Skin
He landed with a soft step, already repositioning.
(I’ve seen that counter. He’ll pivot, then go for a sweep—right… now.)
Towan slid his foot back a moment before Lytharos’s leg swept forward. The timing was perfect.
Now it was Lytharos who was frowning.
((He’s predicting me? No… reacting before I even commit. That spin—I've seen it before. But not from him.)
Towan’s eyes narrowed. He wasn’t thinking—he was
reacting
. Every movement from Lytharos felt… familiar. Not in the trained way, but like a scene he’d watched on repeat in some forgotten dream. The angle of his shoulders, the shift of weight before a strike—it all screamed déjà vu.
“What's wrong?” Towan said calmly, circling him. “You’ve slowed down. Or have I just… caught up?”
Lytharos didn't reply. But he took a full step back.
And that, Towan thought, was new.
Towan narrowed his eyes. Lytharos was fast—fast enough that a slip in focus would get him floored. But his body felt... dialed in. Not perfect, not even polished, but like it
knew
the blueprint. Like the bones remembered a war his brain had forgotten.
Lytharos took a subtle step forward. The way his hip shifted—it was bait. Testing reaction speed.
(That’s the same setup Elliot fell for.)
Towan didn’t bite. Instead, he smiled.
“Alright,” he muttered under his breath. “Let’s try something dumb.”
He leapt—not into a simple kick or jab—but into something... dramatic. His heel shot upward in a high, arcing vertical kick. The wind cracked. His leg carved through the air with a velocity that made the grass ripple beneath him.
Lytharos’s brow lifted a fraction.
(That technique—wait, is he trying—)
Towan shouted mid-kick, fully committing to the drama:
“SKY—BREAKER!”
His foot sliced upward with so much force that a
tiny
gust shot toward the clouds. He landed with a stomp and raised a brow like he’d just pulled off some divine finishing move.
Lytharos stared at him, unimpressed but... slightly confused.
“…Sky Breaker?” he asked flatly.
“Yep,” Towan replied, shaking out his leg. “High kick so powerful, it threatens aviation.”
A pause.
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“…You’ve never even been on an airship,” Lytharos muttered, brushing dust off his robe.
“I don’t need to
board
one. I
am
one,” Towan said, grinning now, breath slightly uneven.
Lytharos’s smirk was subtle, but there.
“That kick,” he said quietly. “It’s… nearly identical to one I saw performed by someone else. But theirs was sharper. Cleaner.”
Towan shrugged. “Hey, give me a couple years and I’ll be clean enough to slice lightning.”
That earned a genuine chuckle from Lytharos. Just one.
Then he moved.
No warning—just a blur. Towan
barely
blocked the sudden palm strike, and even that sent a shock up his arms. But his feet shifted, adjusted. Like they already knew what was coming next.
(I’ve dodged this before. Not here. Not now… but I have.)
He ducked under the second blow, twisted around the third, and leapt back before the sweep hit his ankles.
Lytharos paused again.
(That’s three advanced counters. All predicted. All evaded.)
“You’re not just instinctual,” Lytharos said, low. “You’re recovering.”
Towan exhaled, rubbing his wrists. “Recovering what?”
Lytharos didn’t answer immediately. He just gave that same unreadable stare… but this time, there was a flicker of
concern
.
“You tell me.”
The fight was over. Lytharos already assessed their level by that point
“Say,” Lytharos asked, brushing the dust from his sleeves. “For how long did you train with Leon?”
Towan exchanged a glance with Elliot.
“Around one month,” Elliot replied, casual. Like he hadn’t just been spinning through a dance of refined technique and instinctual precision.
Lytharos blinked. Once.
“…One month?”
He couldn’t help it — his posture shifted, just slightly. Not in fear. In
reevaluation
.
(They moved like fighters with at least a year under their belt. No… more. Some of those counters were damn near textbook. And that kick—Towan called it something dumb, but that wasn’t something you learn by accident.)
His gaze sharpened, flicking between them like he was recalculating an equation with new variables.
(So this is why Leon picked them up. They’re no joke.)
Towan tilted his head. “What? You thought we’d be tripping over our own feet?”
“I mean,” Elliot added, shrugging, “we
were
, for the first two weeks.”
“Oh yeah,” Towan said, chuckling. “Remember when you tried to punch that dummy and broke your own wrist?”
“I was aiming for its
soul,
” Elliot muttered, deadpan.
Lytharos didn’t laugh. Not because it wasn’t funny — but because he was too busy connecting dots that hadn’t even been drawn yet.
He looked at Towan again. Really
looked
.
(Unrefined but adaptive. His flow stumbles then corrects itself mid-action. Like watching an amateur fighter with a veteran’s muscle memory waking up beneath the surface.)
And Elliot…
(calculated. Defensive. His steps are too precise to be random. And when he strikes, he commits — the kind of commitment that usually gets drilled into you by failure, not success.)
“Leon doesn’t take students,” Lytharos finally said, voice low. “Not unless there’s a reason.”
“He didn’t have much of a choice,” Towan said, smiling faintly. “We kind of… forced it.”
Elliot nodded. “And he told us not to die, so. We’re following orders.”
That made Lytharos pause.
(That’s something Leon would say.)
He stepped back from them, folding his arms. For the first time since they met, there was something cautious in his expression. Not fear. But the awareness that he was standing in front of a storm still forming.
(They’re not just talented. They’re echoes of something older… stronger. Like their Essentia’s trying to remember a shape it once had.)
“Keep training,” he said finally. “And don’t slack off.”
Towan raised an eyebrow. “Is that concern I hear?”
“It’s a warning,” Lytharos replied. “You’re getting stronger faster than you realize. That always comes with consequences.”
Elliot frowned slightly. “What kind of consequences?”
Lytharos looked past them, toward the woods beyond the training field.
“The kind you don’t get to walk away from.”
.
!
Chapter 42: Echoes Beneath The Skin
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