CelestialShadow
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Chapter 89 - Nighttime
🕑 Added 2024-02-05 14:11:08 +0000 UTC“Adion, quick!” Quahim yelled as he jumped up from his seat.
Adion immediately got to his feet, too. Only a second passed before the image of ‘Atao’ appeared in the back of Adion’s mind, but it was a second too late.
“You got me,” Adion said, taking his seat again.
“Mm,” Quahim nodded, sitting down and picking up his brush again, “It’s good to react quickly. But to react in the best way, you need to keep calm. I could tell a lot from your expression before you got a hold of it; nothing that reveals anything you want to hide, but it can be abused.”
“I know,” Adion nodded, “It’s getting there.”
Adion could already feel himself improving, and it had only been a little over two weeks since he first started practicing. So Adion was more than pleased at his current pace.
“So, what painting are you thinking about? ‘A mother’s smile’?” Quahim asked.
Adion didn’t reveal anything from his expression. The complete darkness of Atao was still in the back of his mind, allowing everything that happened to lose its edge and Adion to keep control of his reaction.
“Well done,” Quahim said, “Even if you are ready for it, you have gotten the hang of it quickly. You must have thought of a very effective painting.”
“It seems that I have,” Adion said with a small smile. He didn’t remain completely expressionless. Just like Quahim, Adion just had control of when to show his emotions and when to hide them.
Adion focused on his painting once again. He had gotten as far as he could with his current skills with the painting of Sell’s hair. It was something he wanted to do justice so he had decided to finish it once he had practiced more.
At the moment, Adion was painting the view of the Endless Forest from the mountain he had arrived in when he stepped through the teleportation formation over four years ago. The image was still etched in his mind, and as he painted, he could feel memory coming alive, feelings he had forgotten he had once started stirring as the sky and forest came to life on the canvas.
I feel like this could become really nice once it’s finished. That’s the first time I’ve held that level of confidence before a painting is finished. Maybe because it’s just a landscape with no people involved.
After a few more hours of painting, and a few more attempts from Quahim to startle Adion, it had gotten too dark to paint. Adion noticed Quahim putting down his brush, and Adion did the same.
“Thanks for today, teacher,” Adion got up with a slight bow, “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“Mm,” Quahim nodded.
Adion went down the stairs to the first floor. He said goodnight to Ferrith and Demoth and went out on the street. Breathing in the fresh air after being cooped up in Quahim’s studio the entire day brought Adion great relief.
It didn’t take long before he reached his inn, where he sat down and ordered something to eat. His Will had recovered a lot from the hours of painting, but Adion wanted it to be fully rested before his nightly activities. And it wouldn’t do to be hungry during his exercise.
Adion had shifted his daily routine of exercising from morning to night time. It was partly because the morning was too hot, but also because it always resulted in him wasting a few hours of daylight that could be spent in Quahim’s studio.
The sky still has some light in it. I’ll head up and do some light practice in the meantime.
Adion got to his room and sat down on his bed. He focused on his Authority over space and grabbed hold of as much space as he could. He then conjured some space from his core. The amount of space he could conjure had increased by a lot since the beginning of his journey, but it was still only about the volume of a grain of sand, just a bigger grain of sand than before.
Adion wasn’t expecting the amount of space he was able to conjure to become useful any time soon, though, so he wasn’t bothered by the small volume.
As space was so hard to conjure, it was also easy for Adion to control, almost indistinguishably from having Authority over it, at least in the short term. So Adion now had the maximum amount of space under his Authority plus the amount of space he had just conjured. He focused on pushing the newly conjured space into the same area where he had Authority. It was tough, and it was slow work, but it showed results. After successfully making the space he has Authority over and his newly conjured space indistinguishable from each other, Adion successfully slightly increased the amount of space he had Authority over.
Even if I do this every day for a year, it will barely make a difference, though.
This was something Adion had started doing when he first got the idea as a middle Bronze mage. With time, it had been left to the wayside, though. It took too much effort and showed too little result. Now that he could conjure more space, it was slightly more effective. But Adion still didn’t do it every single day, only once in a while so as not to get out of touch with his space powers in his pursuit of mastering shadow magic.
I still have no way of increasing my Authority over fire and shadow, though. Even doing the exact same thing shows no results. It would be great if I could find a way to do that. No matter how small the increase is, it will be crucial in the long run.
Perhaps I need to find a different angle. If I could experience something similar to when I froze the entire Outskirt building in Trabis, I wouldn’t need to waste my time like this. But I have never even got a feeling resembling the one I had back then. And I’ve gotten plenty angry plenty of times.
Well, this is the power Phoenixes have. It’s not strange that I can’t increase it with just my Silver mage Will.
Adion didn’t want to tire out his Will too much, so he started meditating and working on slowly increasing the size of his core.
After about an hour had passed, Adion felt that it was dark enough outside to begin his nightly routine. He got up from his bed and changed into a newly bought outfit, loose pants and a tight-fitting shirt, both completely black in color.
He released a load of space mana from his core and created his sphere of space mana, filled to the brim so he could get a nice image of his surroundings. He focused on the street below his window and teleported outside.
A quick look around confirmed what his senses had told him: no one was around to spot him. Adion conjured as much shadow as he could control with his Authority and spread it to cover his entire body.
The shadow was far from entirely dark when spread so thin, but it was still incredibly useful during the night.
Adion closed his eyes and began running down the street. He could see through the shadow covering his eyes somewhat, and even if he controlled the shadow to clear his eyes, he didn’t think anyone would spot him because of his eyes. Still, Adion was planning on having a much darker shadow in the future, and he didn’t want to get into the habit of being able to see while hiding in his shadow.
It was also great practice for his spatial awareness. He already had a great sense of space, and with his sphere of space mana, not much could escape his notice. But Adion knew that he could still improve. Just imagining being able to see the expression on people’s faces or read secret documents through his space sense was enough to motivate Adion greatly.
Running with his eyes closed was also great practice for sensing shadow mana. Even if it was dark outside, light was cast from the windows in basically every alley. The bigger streets also had runes lighting up the way all through the night.
A quick look would immediately reveal the best places to hide, but Adion wasn’t going out to get someplace special without notice. He was going out to practice.
Adion focused on his senses, the information from his sphere of space mana almost overloading his brain. But he didn’t want to be caught unaware, so he would need to be able to focus on other things while still paying attention to what his senses told him.
After running for a while, hiding his body and aura as best as he could, he reached a street that was busy with life. The street was crowded with street vendors selling food and alcohol. People were out enjoying the summer night in the company of friends and lovers. The noise had reached Adion from blocks away.
The street wasn’t lit up by runes, but big fires placed in intervals down the road. It gave a vibrant life to the shadows that danced on the ground and surrounding walls.
Adion stopped next to a building and decided to try to approach a vendor as close as he could without being noticed.
He stood and observed the people and shadows for a good thirty minutes before starting.
Adion focused on his target, a vendor selling liquor across the street from where Adion was standing. The vendor didn’t have any customers at the moment to distract from Adion’s approach, making it a perfect little test.
Adion didn’t even try to keep up with the shadows cast by the fire. He had no idea how he would manage that. Instead, he tried to slowly walk where he could feel shadows gathering for longer, and as he was about to be revealed by the light cast by the fires, he took quick control of the shadows around him, trying to cover up his unnatural movement and distinct shape.
Controlling a shadow without Authority was incredibly difficult, but Adion didn’t need to control them for long. A split second of covering himself with them when the light from the fire would otherwise reveal him was enough.
It was exhausting work, though. Infusing his Will into the shadow mana surrounding him, only to be immediately fought by the Will of the world, wasn’t a great feeling. He had to let go of his control and try again.
But he managed to cross the street unnoticed. He pushed himself against the wall of a building facing the street and looked to the vendor about 30 feet to his left. Now that the light from the fires wasn’t as big of a threat, Adion focused on the shadow he had surrounded himself with. It was far from completely black, looking more like dark smoke than the pitch-blackness of Quahim’s shadow. But during the night, it did its job.
Adion had also noticed that his shadow did grow darker with time. He didn’t know how exactly, as there had never been a clear improvement from one day to the next, nor had he had any great epiphany.
I guess I have spent several months pondering shadows and particularly the concept of darkness. It’s not strange that I have come to understand it better, if only slightly. I suppose that is how most mages comprehend concepts.
Adion took his steps slowly, focusing on hiding his aura now that he was getting close. As he got within ten feet, he focused on his space Authority and grabbed hold of a thin film of space surrounding himself, hoping to block any noise that could reveal his location.
5 feet, 4 feet, 3 feet, 2 feet…He can’t tell I’m here?
Adion opened his eyes to look at the man, controlling the shadow over his eyes to disperse. The vendor was right next to him, looking out into the street in search of customers.
Amazing. Well, let’s go before he discovers me, and I scare him to death.
Adion started to slowly back away, closing his eyes and covering them with his shadow again. Once he was at a distance from the vendor again, he took off running down an alley, heading for the place he had planned to visit that night.
Let’s see how good of a thief I’d make.
After running for a while, Adion came upon a small manor on the west side of the city. It belonged to a 4th-tier family clan that Adion had received some information about. He had nothing against them and wasn’t planning anything nefarious. He simply wanted to test his abilities without risking being discovered by a mage that was too strong.
He had visited the same bar that he had gone to when he first got to Rethi and asked for information about Quahim. He wanted to have a list of 4th-tier family clans in the city, something that was arranged without much hassle for a small amount of money.
There is only a single Gold mage in this family, enough danger to make sure I have to be careful, but not enough for me to fear not being able to get away.
The manor was placed on a street lit up by runes, making it difficult for Adion to approach unnoticed. He looked around for any building nearby, thinking he might be able to climb up them and jump across the walls, but nothing like that was close by.
I guess having a manor wouldn’t be very safe if it was that easy to sneak into.
Adion looked towards the gate leading into the manor further down the street. Two guards were stationed there, keeping a lookout.
Could I just run across the street and climb the wall without them noticing? That seems like a risk. Guess I’ll just teleport. Even if it feels a little like cheating, I’m using my own power in the end.
Adion focused on his sphere of space mana. It reached across the street and into the manor without issue. He could feel the shape of a tree on the other side of the wall. He focused, the distance not affecting the difficulty at all as it was still well within Adion’s abilities. He could teleport anywhere within 400 feet at the moment, after all.
After a few minutes of ensuring the area was safe, Adion teleported. He opened his eyes and found himself just where he pictured, on the branch of a tree on the manor. It was dark, thankfully, so no one would be able to spot Adion easily.
After looking around for a while, deciding on his path, Adion closed his eyes once again and jumped down the tree. He could feel that he was in a deep shadow and wasn’t scared of being noticed.
Only when he got close to the main mansion did he slow down. He opened his eyes once again to get a good look. A lot of the windows spilled light on the surroundings, making an unnoticed approach slightly more difficult. But it was a big mansion, and Adion could make out a few paths covered in shadow where he could hide well enough.
He closed his eyes and started sneaking up to the mansion. There were a lot of things to pay attention to: hiding his aura, hiding his body in shadow, hiding his sound through his space isolation. And when the mansion entered Adion’s sphere of space mana, there was too much to focus on for Adion to process it all. He just rushed to the wall, ignoring the information his senses gave him.
Reaching the wall, Adion focused on hiding his aura and what his sphere of space mana told him about the mansion's interior.
I can’t feel all of it…But there is no one close to where I am at the moment. I should be able to teleport onto the roof and find some people.
Adion did just that, and once on the roof, he started pacing around, focusing on the new information his sphere of space mana provided him.
That’s a Gold mage!
Adion was excited to feel the aura of the Gold mage. He stopped moving and sat down on the roof. He focused on the room he could feel the Gold mage in and grabbed hold of space there. Not teleporting, but still infusing his Will into the space mana, just enough to feel like he was almost in the room.
“We could,” A man’s voice reached Adion’s ears.
“Good,” An older voice said, “I’ll leave it to you.”
“Don’t worry about it,” The man responded, “Goodnight, father.”
“Goodnight, son,”
I almost feel a little scared at how easy this is. I’m just a Silver mage and can get away with this. All thanks to unique abilities, but still. I don’t know how people without a sphere of space mana could ever relax.
The two men’s conversation ended, and Adion walked around atop the roof some more, listening in here and there, but didn’t hear anything interesting being discussed.
Adion teleported off the roof and ran off the same way he had come. It didn’t take much effort for him to leave the manor again.
I suppose this is good enough for tonight. I’ll visit another manor tomorrow.
