A wave travels through the entirety of the canyon. Shaking the ground, the dust rising from the ground and gliding with the wind.
I suddenly feel more stronger, way more stronger than before. The creature got knocked back 3 meters away from me in that instant.
Is the transformation done?
It should be ln(1/x). Which means…
I can fight back.
I attempt to stand up. My arm throbbing in pain. I cannot afford to even support it. My eyes are on one target- this creature.
I've seen it in the Zahl textbooks. It's called a Snair. Very fast, but has a weak exoskeleton. I've to only watch out for its rapid acceleration.
Maybe I don't have to.
The creature struggles to get back up. I release my Domain in a pulse, repeating after every 2 seconds. It's as if I'm patting the middle of a river, letting the ripples rip apart the Snair. It repeatedly gets knocked back. The impact of the wave slowly cracks open the exoskeleton.
I walk towards it, finally being able to support my arm. I wince in pain as I approach the Snair. It attempts to scurry away, but I do not care anymore. I reduce the time between each pulse to 1 second.
It starts screeching in pain. I do not feel remorse whatsoever. It deserves this. I'm almost out of energy.
𝟎.𝟓 𝐒𝐞𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐝𝐬.
The Snair begins to crumble apart.
𝟎.𝟏 𝐒𝐞𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐝𝐬.
The exoskeleton dissolves by the waves. I only see pink flesh. The Snair is immobilized with pain.
I grab a rock nearby.
I repeatedly bring it down on its skull.
Blood gets all over my face.
I don't care.
I need to be stronger.
To murder that motherfucker who killed Mom.
The ground around me is stained in emerald.
Pieces of flesh splattered all over, complimenting the pieces of rubble caused by our fight.
I lie down. So this is a fight. The record I had back in Zahl was only because no one could escape my Shield. It was easy pickings. Now this has changed my whole perspective of battles.
I want more.
>>
A day passes. I took a long nap. My arm is still broken. My domain is back to full capacity. I expect the rest of the Snair Pack to come and find me. Isn't that perfect? I slather myself with the blood of the one I killed yesterday. Weirdly enough, I don't feel the need to drink or eat.
I walk out into the open. The sand beneath me is grey and coarse. Walking barefoot is an advantage, if I ever have to force myself awake to walk for kilometers. I only see the mouth of the canyon where I'm in the middle of for hours. So far no turnings.
I wasn't expecting confetti or festivities in the Complex realm anyways. There is no Sun or Moon, and there are 0 stars. Theres just dim light wherever I go, illuminating the bland road ahead of me. I hear scattering in the distance. It's the pack. Finally.
I can use my new ability at a 0.1 phase difference.
Only problem is, I don't know how long it'll last for.
The pack jumps down at maybe half a kilometer from my position. It looks to be a fair 50-100.
I adjust my collor and do some stretches. The ground around me begins to vibrate as I slowly activate my new ability.
"Come on and face me, assholes.
𝐋𝐞𝐭 𝐦𝐞 𝐭𝐞𝐬𝐭 𝐨𝐮𝐭 𝐦𝐲 𝐧𝐞𝐰 𝐩𝐨𝐰𝐞𝐫."
[𝐍𝐚𝐭𝐮̈𝐥𝐢𝐜𝐡𝐞 𝐖𝐞𝐥𝐥𝐞]
The Snair Pack run dash towards me. I slowly decrease the time interval of Natüliche Welle.
1 Second
They closed the distance between us by a couple hundred meteres, but they stopped dead in their tracks. They all begin to topple onto themselves. So far nothing much. One of them got back up.
Most of the Snairs have stopped moving.
More..
0.5 Seconds
The andolescent Snairs's exoskeleton begins to crack rapidly. The sound is so satiafying. God. The other ones are holding on a bit.
"Too bad."
0.1 Seconds.
At this stage, every single one of the Snairs are on the ground, almost naked. They have all been stripped of their precious weak scales. They've all been disintegrated. The weak ones have been crushed by the repeated barrages of the waves, hydrating the stale ground with its blood.
This is perfect. On one side, my function provides me with an incredible defense. On the other side, my Natülich Welle lets me constantly add pressure onto the opponents while dealing insane damage to them. It even restricts movement. When it's at 0.1, the drain is about 25% of my Capacity per minute. This isn't anything near what I want though.
I grab my left arm in support as I march towards the blood bath that's forming ever so slightly. It seems that the intensity increases as I get closer. The adult Snairs slowly melt into the ground with every step I take.
I take a look behind me.
Nothing but green blood.
Get used to it Atlas.
You need to get used to killing.
It'll help once I meet Sir Crey again.
My Capacity is around 50%. The fight took around 1 minute 25 seconds. Then again I did increase the intensity of the waves. There's so much I have to discover on my own. This is really fun.
I encountered 4 more packs, each of 50 Snairs. It was rinse and repeat. I took breaks in middle, hiding in crevices that occur inside the walls of the canyons.
1. I can alternate between X and 1/X but there's still a time lag of 3 seconds. This is somewhat of a problem whenever I get a small chance to counterattack or if I need to block a trump card of my enemy.
2. My Domain Capacity is still a problem for both of my techniques. I have to ask Crey regarding this.
3. I really do take after my mother, seeing as how after every fight, I begin to search for more enemies.
Again..
>>>
Heet left after the "spectacle" I made, asking me to take some rest. While doing my evening workout, I've also tried to get a feel of this new "muscle". The mold training is pretty much done, that isn't an issue. My problem is trying to learn something, all the Defined can do subconsciously. For them, it's just breathing.
After maybe 3 more hours, all I've been doing is flexing my "muscle". The grass around me has been perfectly been trimmed to concentric circles.
Satisfying.
It's getting dark outside, I should probably have another go at it before calling it night.
I get into position, my arms stretched out and my palms facing up.
The mold is next. I slowly form the line segment.
Okay good.
Now for the muscles to work.
The gusts start forming around me, slowly gaining speed. I can see it!
My Domain is finally flowing into the mold.
The color looks like a metallic grey, slowly filling up the mold.
Okay it's filled.
How do I want to release it?
I could do what Heet did..
I bring my hands together with a clap.
A huge shockwave emerges from the mold.
It completely lit up the hill.
"December, come on it's too late, it's time for di-"
Heet walks up the hill and looks at the laser I just launched at the poor trees.
"I-
It hasn't even been one day…"
"I think I did it!"
I'm in awe. The beam came out as a horizontal line. It's as if I swung a 30 feet sythe onto these trees.
Heet looks flabbergasted. She did say it would take me months, or best case scenario, two to three weeks.
"This is just insane.. You're not even one of the Defined-"
I look up at her.
"Is that a problem, Heet?" I asked sternly.
"No no. You know I don't mean it prejudicially baby."
"I'm just playing with you, "baby". "
Heet smiles, a bit too aggressively.
Maybe calling her baby was a bad decision after all-
"Now come on, let's go eat *dinner*."
"Uh- yeah. Sure."
What kind of dinner is this idiot talking about…?
>>
A couple of days go by. Nothing much happened, just your usual five to six hour practice sessions. Me and Heet decided to split for now. That day, we asked Uncle Oris if we could both write a letter to the Headmaster for an evaluation, a week or two from now. If we impress him, it's a one way ticket to Zahl Academy.
Heet.
Nope. Nope.
What happened that day, I shouldn't dwell on it.
Focus on the task at hand, and not your completely dried lips, and that scar on your neck.
I've only been practicing pouring the domain into the mold, but I want to try something new.
What if I make the mold, an expression in set theory?
I've been doing some thinking. What I need right now is a way to attack. My sword and shield. If I'm not wrong, Atlas would be searching for his sword and shield using his Function. I need to be able to overwhelm my opponents with maximum efficiency.
Exp(x) is an exponential, so how about I try to use something that relates to that? The manner in which my domain is poured out is determined by my Function. That's why the horizontal slash from before was so strong. It was embedded with the property that even a sliver of Domain can be exponentially powerful.
Wait…
A property of exponentiation is-
exp(x+y)=exp(x) • exp(y)
So potentially, I could convert addition into multiplication. A multiplication involving two exp's…
Isn't this stupidly overpowered…?
Addition and Subtraction in Domain Manipulation is different from the special Functions that involve Addition and Subtraction. The Functions can manipulate properties of the exterior environment, like Heet's subtraction, but the technique itself is useful for attacking and defending respectively. Become strong enough and you could subtract the enemy's attack literally, or you could effectively double your potential damage using Addition.
Furthermore, the Functions give you an innate boost to the respective technique. Heet, if she practices enough, could be a real defensive monster too. As for me, Addition and Multiplication is basically what exponentiation is. Repeated addition is multiplication, and repeated multiplication is exponentiation…
Aunt Oris, whenever she finds the time, she goes on rants and rants on how she found out what she could do with her dual Function. Luckily, I remember each and every bit.
One thing she used to do was take a simple concept, that for addition, one could double their own attack stat, and for multiplication, she could square it. She used to do that at the same time, which increases her damage output into another realm.
I can't do both so that isn't possible.
Or maybe I could.
What I could do is, with set theory, I'll write out an expression, which defines a variable X, such that whenever I input something into X, it spits out two times that value. Basically, I changed the fact that I couldn't do addition.
Now to make the mold.
I imagine the letters, but this time on the skin of my right forearm. Mathematical symbols begin to embed my arm, with a dark purple hue.
I imagine making a fist with that ghost arm, and the mold begins to fill with the same metallic grey liquid. My entire arm is filled with a burning sensation. I can feel it, this new strength inside of me. It's like my entire arm, fingertips to my shoulder, is covered in ice.
I suddenly feel a sharp sensation of vertigo.
This is the backlash of set theory I guess, but who cares?
I aim at the sky, wind up my arm..
"Decey, you listening????
You have to wind up your arm like this.
Use your hips to support your momentum,
And punch!!
This is what got me into the Real Set, and instantly got shot up to the position of Commander!
I call it-
『Singularity』"