Mythshaper

I returned to my room, inching every step carefully so as not to disturb the engraving pen hovering between my palms. Two pairs of essence threads latched onto either end of the pen—one pair holding it aloft in the air while the other pushed it around in a continuous spin.

This was one of the easier exercises Mum had shown me. The more straining exercises required me to divide my attention into two parts, spinning the pen along horizontal or parallel lines. The exercise was practically futile without Split Focus, because only through the advanced attribute was I able to interchange the anchor point between the two ends.

Mum said I needed to follow all the steps before progressing to the more advanced ones. Skipping ahead would be like trying to run without learning to crawl first.

A hundred hours was the rule of thumb to be any good at telekinesis. So I was looking at completing four layers of telekinesis in the coming weeks before moving into more advanced training.

I wondered if it was possible to use telekinesis to push myself off the ground and fly around. The theory seemed feasible, though it probably wouldn’t work if I targeted myself with the threads. It likely had to function by pushing against the ground.

Hesitating a little, I ceased the exercise with the pen and thrust all eight of my essence threads against the floor. A strum of vibration reverberated through my essence seed, but nothing else happened. My essence wasn’t nearly strong enough to bear my weight.

I knew it was hopeless. I had awakened only a few hours ago, and yet here I was, dreaming of sailing in the sky. I would probably need dozens of essence threads to even attempt it. Makes me wonder if Mum was capable of it.

There was still some time before bedtime, before Mum would come checking on me. Despite being tired, I was still too excited to call it a day. I considered practising my influence or attempting to manipulate my weight when my gaze drifted to my desk and found the metallic cube resting atop a stack of books.

If my influence reached far enough and my grasp over my power was strong enough, I would have thrown my essence threads at it and yanked the arcane knot into my palm. That kind of control was still days ahead of me. For now, I had to put my limbs to work.

It had been some time since I had completed the runic variant of the cube. But the one in my palm wasn't anything like its previous form. It was a true arcane knot, a device wholly designed to train essence-weaving capabilities, as far as I knew.

Without the ability to wield essence, it was essentially impossible to solve the arcane knot. I had lacked such capability until now, but with my awakening, I could finally try my hand in it.