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Post by Noa on Jan 31, 2021 22:13:08 GMT -6
{What are you going to do with these?} he asked.
“Well, you can see in the dark now, so I figured the next thing to do was to make sure you could see in bright light,” Aster said. “There’s a thing that Rhys can do… Wait, I don’t think Rhys could blind anyone with it. But I’ve seen a few other creatures make use of it in the fighting pit. Bright flash of light, and their opponents suddenly have no idea what they’re doing. It’s a pretty effective disruption tactic.”
{A light, huh… Couldn’t I just look away?} Avander said.
“It’d be nice if you could, but I don’t know if you’d always be able to react in time in the heat of a fight.” Aster gave the matter some serious thought, but he had already mulled it over in his own time.
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Post by Noa on Jan 31, 2021 22:13:47 GMT -6
And this had been the conclusion that he had arrived at back then too. “Besides, you never know what might happen," he added. "I feel like it would be a good skill to have, just in case.”
{Which means that you’re dead set on having me do this,} Avander said. He let out a long breath. {Okay. So how bright will this be?}
“We’ll find out,” Aster said. He was already busying himself setting up the lights. There had never been any real question of whether or not they would actually get this thing under way, after all. The set-up did take a bit of time, and Aster wasn’t looking forward to taking it all down and packing it back up again once it was time to leave, but it wasn’t the worst thing he had done for the sake of training by a long shot.
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Post by Noa on Jan 31, 2021 22:14:23 GMT -6
Once all the lights were in place, he plugged them in and turned them on. And the effect was dramatic alright. Light flooded the portion of the courtyard that they had staked out and surrounded with lights. It was even brighter than Aster had expected, and he was the one who had picked out the lights himself. At the time, he had wondered if maybe they weren’t going to be bright enough to be disorienting, but now he knew that he didn’t have to worry on that front. It was a good thing they were doing this outdoors in winter; the snow reflected the lights off its surface, making it so bright that Aster couldn’t bear to look at it.
{Yow,} said Avander, wincing back from it. {That’s too bright!}
“See? That’s what I’m saying,” Aster said. “You think you can fight in this?”
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Post by Noa on Jan 31, 2021 22:14:46 GMT -6
{No… But can’t you turn some of them off?} Avander complained. He had stepped out of the right of lights, narrowly missing knocking some over as he backed out. Now he was shaking his head with his eyes closed.
Aster thought on this for a moment, and decided it wasn’t a bad idea. Actually, working Avander up incrementally was probably a good way to start. With wandering the mansion at night, there hadn’t really been a way to make it incremental, but here Aster had more control. He might as well use it, if that was the case.
Aster turned off about half the lights. He still wanted it to be bright enough to be uncomfortable, or else there would be no point. But it wasn’t so eye-searingly bright anymore, and Avander was brought reluctantly back into the circle of lights, blinking and squinting as soon as he entered.
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Post by Noa on Jan 31, 2021 22:36:16 GMT -6
{This is terrible,} Avander said, pinning his ears back in distaste. {Have I mentioned lately how much I hate you?}
“All the time,” Aster said, deadpan. “Okay, I’ll set up a few targets. Have a go at trying to hit them.” If Avander had something to focus on, it would probably be easier not to think about how bright it was constantly. And seeing his relative accuracy would give Aster a good benchmark of how he was doing with regards to seeing in the bright light.
Avander had done more or less the same thing when they had been working on his ability to see in low light, so he knew the drill by now. This was just the same thing with a different set up. Aster called the first few commands to him, but after that, Avander took the initiative on his own, trying to hit any of the targets.
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Post by Noa on Jan 31, 2021 22:36:34 GMT -6
If the intent had just been to have Avander hit the targets, he could have done that with a wide attack. But that would have knocked over the lights too, and it would also have defeated the purpose of the training. Not to mention that those big splashy moves were more tiring to execute, and these acclimation training sessions were as much about endurance as anything else. And so Avander fired more pinpoint blasts of ice at them, both to test his own accuracy and to conserve energy.
The results of that first session… really weren’t anything to write home about. Avander’s aim was dodgy at best, and he managed to hit only half the targets he was aiming for. And this was with the lights at half capacity too. So it was clear that they had a long way to go before they got anywhere with this.
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Post by Noa on Jan 31, 2021 22:37:37 GMT -6
But then, Aster hadn’t really expected anything less. If he thought that this wouldn’t be an issue, then he wouldn’t have bothered putting in the effort to train Avander in this way either. In a way, it had vindicated him to see that it was a real concern after all, and not just a needless worry he had come up with.
Still, more time and practice was pretty much the only way things were going to get any better, so Aster packed up the lights after that first session, and planned for several more. They did a bit of scrounging around the grounds for some goods to take home, then packed up and left. But Aster’s mind wasn’t really on their finds so much as it was on what, if anything, they could do differently next session.
Their game plan didn’t really change from there on out though.
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Post by Noa on Jan 31, 2021 22:38:28 GMT -6
The mansion, with its wide grounds and steady supply of snow, made for a good practice ground for this particular training exercise. It was a pain lugging all the equipment out there every time, but once they got into a routine, Aster got used to the process of setting up, taking down, and packing up again. And Avander got used to it too, even if he wasn’t happy about it.
And Avander did improve, whatever his own misgivings on the nature of these sessions. Slowly but surely, more of his attacks found their targets. Eventually, when he was more comfortable seeing in the current setting, Aster began turning on more of the lights. It was just one or two at a time, not enough difference to throw Avander completely off overnight. Aster had thought about taking it up in more dramatic increments, but he figured this gradual method would be better.
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Post by Noa on Jan 31, 2021 22:39:13 GMT -6
This way, Avander didn’t get too disheartened at once by a sudden loss of progress, even if it meant that for a while, it looked and felt as though he had stagnated. He didn’t hit many more targets than he had managed to before, but at least he didn’t hit many fewer than he was used to either.
In this way, they eventually worked him up to attacking the targets with all the lights on. By that point even Aster had managed to acclimate to it somewhat, if only from being exposed to it for as long as he had, day after day. Unlike Avander, who seemed to genuinely be adjusting and seeing more as time went on, Aster merely found more ways around the bright glare issuing from the lights.
Now that they had no more lights left to turn on though, Avander could finally start moving forward.
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Post by Noa on Jan 31, 2021 22:49:47 GMT -6
It was a relief for the both of them to see Avander hitting more and more targets as the sessions went on. It took a few before he could hit them all the way that he would have been able to under normal conditions, but they got there. Aster insisted that they spend a couple more sessions on it just to be sure, and Avander conceded that he would never be comfortable fighting in these conditions, but at least he wouldn’t be totally incapacitated in the face of them either.
Eventually though, it was finally over.
{It’s over!} said Avander, darting out of the circle of lights with speed and grace that would have put a feline to shame. He could see well enough now that there was no risk of him knocking over any of the lights, but Aster still hurried to pack them up just in case he was tempted to out of spite or something.
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Post by Noa on Jan 31, 2021 22:50:22 GMT -6
Honestly, after all this, Aster wouldn’t have blamed him for feeling those sentiments, but they were still equipment, and it would have been troublesome to have them destroyed if it could be prevented. If he needed to do this again, he'd have to pay to replace them. Dummies and training targets were one thing, but these lights weren’t meant to be brutalized, and they were meant to be reused.
Avander was celebrating his freedom pretty dramatically though. He shoved his entire head into the snow, then made an exaggerated rumble of contentment. “Yeah, yeah,” Aster said, shaking his head as he looked on. “Get it out of your system.”
{Hey, I found something,} Avander said, pulling his head out of the snow with something in his mouth. {Do you want it?}
Aster, thinking that he had probably found another pair of mittens or something, glanced up without thinking much of it. “Yeah, what--- Holy shit.”
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Post by Noa on Jan 31, 2021 22:51:41 GMT -6
He dropped the thing that he had been holding as soon as he saw what it was. Good thing it had only been one of the wooden targets, and not something more valuable like the lights, or heavens forbid, the portable batteries. “Is that a remnant crystal?”
{I don’t know, you tell me,} Avander said. He deposited it into Aster’s outstretched hand as soon as Aster reached him. {What’s a remnant crystal?}
"Yeah, I guess you wouldn't have had a chance to see these before, huh?" Aster said. He studied the object in his hands. "Yeah, this looks like a remnant crystal alright..." It looked a lot like a piece of quartz, but in a dull grey color, and glowing faintly. The glow was less evident in bright daylight, and the remnant type of crystal had never been particularly flashy, but he could sense the energy thrumming inside it.
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Post by Noa on Jan 31, 2021 22:53:58 GMT -6
Avander waited patiently for him to answer, and Aster thought about how to explain. "It's a kind of magic crystal," he said. "On its own, it doesn't really do a whole lot, but..." Rooting around in his pocket, Aster managed to produce a hollow node. It was an object the size of a marble, not unlike the things that they had been finding this month in the mansion, actually. But the glow was brighter, and if one had a sense for magic, the two were impossible to mistake for one another. The hum of power was much stronger, much more concentrated in the node, even though it was smaller.
"You use these crystals to make nodes, like this one that I've got. Once you have one of these, you can do magic."
{Oh, like how you can fly now?} Avander said. This was, to be fair, the most memorable bit of magic he had seen Aster do.
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Post by Noa on Jan 31, 2021 22:57:07 GMT -6
"Yeah, or like how I can hold creatures in place with ice and stuff sometimes," Aster said. "I can't fight on par with you, but it's a nice tool to have."
{Huh. That's pretty interesting. This little thing can let you do that?} He eyed the crystal again, but it remained an inscrutable little object. For that matter, the node was the same.
{Come to think of it,} Avander said, {now that you can fly, how come I have to carry you everywhere? Why can't you fly home by yourself? Oh, you can carry all that stuff too. It should be easy for you now, right?}
Aster laughed. "Oh, I wish. It doesn't work like that. I can do a lot of things, but not for very long. I get... what, fifteen minutes of flight, tops? So unfortunately for you, you'll still be carrying me and all our equipment back home."
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Post by Silver on Jan 31, 2021 23:20:22 GMT -6
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