As he tried, the mountain in form of mist and without any success despirited him.
Recalling René's words helped him somewhat, but still without visible improvement he couldn't help being somewhat down.
'Ingnore it Mikael. You were warned, the road is never easy, especially for you. You feel that mana, and could move it before. There isn't a reason to not accomplish that again.' he motivated himself.
But it was far too late already, so as he closed his eyes again, the exhaustion from made him sleep instead of meditating.
As he opened his eyes, he sat on his bed, facing the door. His mind was clear, and thinking was much easier than last night.
'I shouldn't push myself too hard.' he realized, feeling as if his blood pulsated inside him, but it being the mana which he discovered. Closing his eyes again, he concentrated.
This time, without the goal to move his mana, but to observe it, how it settle or moved naturally inside him.
'Not that my body can move either way.'
Resting in this unnatural way, his muscles together with the ache refused to listen to his commands, hurting if he even twitched.
'Can as well use that.'
After some time he naturally slid into a half conscious state. He noticed his mana was a lot more active and plenty.
Recuperated it was nearly as quiet as a lake. But as he observed, sometimes, when a slight pain arose or he thought of maybe moving a bit, a ripple came up, like a pebble thrown onto it. This lake tho wasn't a flat surface,but a space within him. Not entirely encompassing, but forming a root-like system.
When his toe itched, a small ripple came from that area, as well from his head. When his finger bend a bit, the same happened. It was incredible fast and still so openly visible. Mikael was in awe, forgetting the task to move it and only observing. He played around then, searching for the sweat spot where his concentration would loosen.
As time went on, he felt his muscles ache more, and his mind became cloudy.
Mikael opened his eyes, his condition from before, rested and wide awake, much more tired now.
'The combination of mental and physical exhaustion is pretty scary. Without training even meditating, keeping still and observing mana makes me like that.'
As his gaze wandered to the small window, the sun which had only risen, was now much higher, and a bell ringing indicated he had spent around 3 hours in his mind.
'Holy Mother, I didn't kept track of the time!' he thought, hastily putting on his clothes, assembling his equipment and checking if anything was left.
'I certainly need a place to keep some of that stuff. Taking everything with me is the opposite of necesarry, considering my trip today.'
His room had a simple lick, yes. But not trusting that, he tried one night to open it with his few tools. Not able to open it, he still saw how fragile and loose that lock was, and with a small forcefull impact one can break in.
So with everything on him, he walked towards the Guild,excited how the Guild Master Simon may receive him, as well the reward they'd get.
'My promotion may also be smooth sailing. With such dangerous encounters and my contribution the profile should speak for my abilities.'
Still, with a queasy feeling he entered the building, greeting the bartender who was the big bald, but friendly man.
Walking past the rows of tables and climbing the steps, when arriving on tee first floor he felt as if he was weighted down by a weight.
'Weird, why did it suddenly get harder to move?'
His movements weren't restricted heavily, but each step he took, it got worse.
"Oh, I assume you are Mikael. Mr. Crownfield and Mr. René are already in the house, waiting upstairs. The others aren't here yet, but I was told you can join them." A guild employee said before passing him, some stacks of paper in his hands and pins between the corners of his lips.
"Alright, thanks." Mikael replied, but the constantly increasing pressure made talking difficult.
'Is this another test? To maybe gaugh my potential, or something else?'
Whatever he thought, he went towards the stairs on the other end. Half way there, he had to take a stop, concentrating to take in deep breath. His head began to hurt, and slowly the force seemed to weigh down on his mana, as he noticed.
Mikael closed then his eyes, doing his best ignoring the pressure and looking at his mana. The previous wide roots now seemed more compressed, as if having difficulty flowing.
It responded still to even smallest stimuli, but with a ever so slight delay.
'Would be great if I could make it circulate.' he thought, a bit bitter about his inability.
He took another few steps, arriving heaving and gasping at the threshold.
'I can't do that. It is too heavy, as if I'd to carry Mark alone with a bunch of rocks.'
Concerned, he meditated a moment, and his root like mana system was even more compressed, and as he wanted to check the response, the time nearly tripled.
'Wait, what is that?' he grew curious. The previous mist like roots now looked more like a condensed steam, almost fluid like. And as it reacted slowly, when Mikael imagined to make it move, it could barely evade his will.
'This is actually helping me. With a bit more force, maybe I can...' he thought, immediately imagine the stagnant mana to flow, as if pushed from a immovable force against a dam.
First it resisted, wanting to go away as it did always, but contained by the force and Mikael's mind in slowly, but surely gave in.
'Concentrate, don't rush it.' he subconsciously reminded himself.
He felt he choose to move mana from his chest, as the weight seemed to be the strongest there. So the nearest option was his arm.
'To move my legs would be a better option, but I'm nearly fainting already! Come on, just a small bit now...'
Never had he imagined not killing hordes of creatures or traveling for hours would pale in comparison to his task now, but his condition spoke for it.
The others around him felt nothing, only witnessing as a young hunter walked with increasing weighting steps towards the staircase.
"Is he alright? Should we get some help?" a young woman asked the staff Mikael talked to before.
"No need, he is alright... I guess." he answered, as Mikael's last step before the threshold made small cracks on the wooden floor, a splintering sound for a brief second.
"Let's keep an eye on him, to make sure."
Another person at the board loomed over his shoulder, a pale appearing eye glancing at Mikael.
"Pffew, impressive kid. But he still has a long way to go. Only now getting the gist of it. Well, better now than never. At least our little branch bore a new one." he shhok his head, ripping of a quest which was written on a expensive looking paper, the space around only having few other missions.
Mikael right now put all his concentration into his arm, making the mana flow towards his fingertips and back to his chest.
Due to that he could grasp the handle, pulling his heavy body under immense pressure upwards.
As the pressure only rose a bit, he tried again, this time wanting to move the energy downwards.
Halfway there he succeeded, but then his concentration slipped, and with it the control.
A guy from the staff who held a bunch of papers had tripped, scattering his stuff all around the floor.
The sudden noise made him instinctively flinch, which led to his slip up.
Before he could hold himself up by somewhat redirecting the external pressure by circulating his own, even if Mikael didn't knew this. Now, the full force weighted on him, making him kneel on the steps instantly, the previous mana he'd moved stoic again, uncaring and like mist.
"You did a great job there, Mikael. Glad to see you make such an important step so early, even with Simon's... support I think." René said, and immediately the pressure vanished, leaving his body as if it was an illusion.
Only his heavy breathing, slight headache and pulsating non-existing mana veins reminded him.
"What was the reason for this?" he asked first, sure the other questions would also be answered in time.
"A small test from Simon. Told him I thought to awaken you prior to what he planned was needed, so he wanted to take a look for himself what you could do already. But the surprising thing was your progress without mana assistance. Moving under such pressure would immobilize most people before getting to the stairs. And then you even managed to make more progress, after just few days being awakend moving the energy."
"But it wasn't much, I barely made my hand move, forget my legs." Mikael rejected, standing up and brushing of some dust from his legs.
"Don't think like that. When do you start thinking more positively. You are a commoner, without any real knowledge or teacher, but still managed to take that important step, with a bit of help. Now come, Simon is waiting and wants to talk."
René led the way, and Mikael with lighter steps followed.
'I can feel my mana better than before. This improvement from just this test alone has such great impact. And I didn't even got teach much yet.'
He had to closely listen to himself, but clearly the energy coursing was there, not as faint as before.
With a wildly beating heart and excited mood he went into Simon's office, seeing the man in his clean outfit sitting behind his desk.
"Hello Mikael. Congratulation on awakening. Guess my little test had to suffice for now. The other I'd prepared to help you is now irrelevant." his tone was calm, but his smile showed his honest delight.
"I've waited quiet some time to see a new magician sprout inside our community. Glad a bright and good guy like you is one of our elite. I want to talk with you for a bit tho. Make myself a picture, you know. After all it is about the mystical arts, not just anything common. Sure René told already some stories and explained the rules."
He said, interlinking his fingers, hiding his smile only showing his eyes. And suddenly the previous happy face has become one serious, as if glancing at his soul.