Wrath's Virtue

As Sten led the children towards the building, Aurelion followed from back of the group.

He watched the weary instructor, his mind already analyzing, wondering what they would be taught in their first real lesson.

Sten brought them into a spacious classroom. Unlike the training halls, this room was filled with simple wooden desks and chairs, all facing a lectern at the front.

"Settle in," Sten said.

His voice echoing slightly in the quiet room. He walked to the front and stood behind the lectern as the children found their seats.

Once everyone was settled, their expectant eyes turned to him.

"Most of you probably know this by now," Sten began. His tired gaze sweeping across the room.

"Every living being has a Core within them. It is the source of your power, and it is what you must develop. Until the age of nine, most of you were not taught how to use your Core. This was because your bodies needed to strengthen to handle the energy within, and your Cores needed to fully mature. You are now beginning to meet those conditions."

He reached under the lectern and pulled out a wooden box. Opening it, he took out a core that pulsed with a soft, blue light.

"Cores have nine Ranks," he continued, placing the core on the lectern. "All of your Cores are currently at the first Rank."

"It doesn't matter how you fight. Whether it's hand to hand, with a weapon, or with energy manipulation techniques, you draw your strength from your Core. That is why you must develop it."

"There are three ways to develop your Core. If you keep your Core active by constantly using your energy, it will develop. If you draw the ambient energy from your surroundings into your Core once your energy sensitivity has improved, it will also develop."

He then placed a single, dull gray energy stone on the lectern next to the glowing blue Core.

"Or, just as you draw energy from your surroundings, you can also draw it from an energy stone that is compatible with your own energy to develop your Core much faster. However, this can corrupt the purity of the energy in your Core, so doing it excessively is more harmful than beneficial."

"I will push your bodies every morning with the warm up run, and then I will teach you how to use your energy."

He paused for a moment, his gaze dropping to the floor, a wave of exhaustion seeming to wash over him. He took a breath to steady himself. "We will begin that now."

A quiet murmur spread through the children.

"Finally."

"I wonder what he'll teach us."

"I hope it's not as tiring as the warm up run."

"Don't be a baby."

The whispers died down as Sten raised his hand. A crimson energy began to glow in his open palm. The light intensified, swirling and coiling upon itself until it blossomed into a flickering ball of fire that hovered just above his skin.

"Every person has an energy manipulation they are compatible to, based on the characteristics of their energy," Sten continued.

"No matter how you fight, you can use your compatible energy to strengthen yourself."

The ball of fire in his palm grew larger, and the children in the front rows could feel a wave of heat wash over them. Then, in an instant, the flame vanished without a trace.

"Now, you will discover which energy manipulation you are compatible to. Look in the compartment under your desks and read the book you find there," he said.

Aurelion reached down. His fingers brushed against the leather bound cover of a book.

He pulled it out and placed it on the desk. The title was embossed in simple, silver letters.

Basic Energy Manipulations.

Since Aurelion could already perform a form of energy manipulation as advanced as lightning, he wasn't particularly interested much.

Still, thinking, "Let's see what they've written,"

He opened the book to the first page. His eyes scanned the text accompanying an illustration of a swirling flame.

The page was divided into three parts. The first was a poetic description.

The Ember's Song: "I am passion, I am rage. I create and I destroy. I am the ember in the heart, the warmth in the vein. An uncontrolled fire, but in the forge of will, I am the hammer that shapes civilization. Do not try to command me, feed me. And I shall give you my light and my strength."

Below it were two practical sections. The first.

"Close your palm. Recall your strongest emotion: a moment of triumph, a deep rage. Do you feel your palm warm, a tingling sensation? That warmth is the first whisper of the ember."

And the First step.

"Gather that warmth in the center of your palm. Imagine it as a candle flame. Flickering, small, but alive. Let a thin wisp of smoke drift from your fingertips. This is the first breath of fire."

Aurelion's brow furrowed. "What the-? Is everyone who writes these books a bad poet?"

He flipped to the next section. Water.

"The River's Song" spoke of change and adaptation. Instructed him to focus on the rhythm of his own blood flow.

The First Step was to channel his energy into his fingertips and imagine it as a cool, heavy drop of water, with the goal of creating a single bead of dew suspended in the air.

He skipped to Wind.

"The Storm's Breath' was about freedom and thought. The exercise was to feel the air on his skin and channel his energy into a gentle current over his open palm.

Finally, he glanced at Earth.

The Mountain's Bones praised patience and endurance. The practical application was to wrap his energy around his arm like a second skin, feeling it harden into a dense, protective shell.

When he reached the end of the four elements, he stared at the book in disbelief.

"What is this nonsense? That's it?" he said aloud to himself.

A few of the other children, who were trying to concentrate on the text, shot angry glares in his direction.

From the front of the room, Sten glanced at him out of the corner of his eye. "That book is for discovering basic energy manipulations. If you want something of quality, earn tokens and get it from the library. Don't disturb your friends, and try what you've read."

Just then, the scales on the hands of a lizardkin boy nearby turned a stony gray and seemed to thicken.

"It worked, it worked! It really worked!" he exclaimed, staring at his hands in amazement.

The other children looked at the lizardkin boy in shock, then turned back to their books with a newfound seriousness.

Aurelion glanced at the boy with a flat expression. "That's bullshit," he thought.

Turned his attention back to the book.

"Alright, I'm not going to waste any more time with the sentences of the fool who wrote this," he decided.

"I'm not great at water manipulation, but I can do it. That leaves the others."

"Fire sounds nice, but it's an element with weaknesses, and lightning manipulation is better than fire in every aspect. That leaves two options."

He flipped the pages of the book, opening to the sections on wind and earth.

"Wind and earth... Earth manipulation is incompatible with my lightning. I could reduce my own attack power. Wind, however... wind could be useful."

His mind began to race, connecting concepts with scientific logic.

"The greatest sources of lightning in nature are storms. And storms are nothing more than massive air currents, wind. Ice crystals and water droplets inside clouds rub against each other due to the wind, accumulating a massive static charge. When that charge becomes large enough, it discharges as lightning. This means wind is the natural generator of lightning. If I can control the wind, I can prepare the environment to create my own lightning, perhaps even increase its power. If I can use wind to momentarily change the pressure and density of the air, I might be able to create a path of less resistance for my lightning to follow..."

Aurelion considered a multitude of possibilities in a flash, his mind mapping out the potential synergies.

"Fire is primitive next to lightning," he concluded.

"Earth hinders my lightning, absorb it down. Water is a good conductor for my lightning, and I'm already trying to improve my water manipulation. And wind... If I can also control the wind, then the potential of what I can do with these three together is immense."

With a new sense of purpose, he focused his attention on the page that described the wind.

Aurelion read the first line of the poetic description.

"I am freedom, I am thought. I am unseen but I am everywhere. I am the gentlest breeze, the most destructive hurricane. I whisper secrets and move mountains. Do not try to catch me, move with me. And I shall give you my speed and my unpredictability."

"Screw this, I'm not reading any more of this nonsense," he thought, and shoved the book back into the compartment under his desk without a second thought.

He raised his open palm, staring at it for a moment before closing his eyes and slipping into his state of Void Focus.

The sounds of the classroom faded away, replaced by the familiar, silent expanse of his own consciousness.

"Wind"

His thoughts echoed in the void, stripped of all poetry and metaphor, reduced to a single, cold fact.

"Is simply the air molecules around us."