Fen was tempted to ask Erik how he had managed to find the pulse in the center of the metal training ball, but he suppressed the urge. There must exist multiple paths to learning how to manipulate Vitality, and he needed to find his own without relying on his comrade. Besides, it was only the first Lesson; if he gave up now without even putting in any effort then how could he say that he was trying his best? If he died, he wouldn't even have the dignity to say that he had tried his best and that nothing else could be done.
He wanted to die with pride... At the same time that he thought that, an inner conflict rose within him. Should Fen prioritize surviving using any and all means, or should he train with his pride on the line risking a death that could've been avoided if he threw away his pride?
With the thought of death looming over him, Fen doubled his efforts to find the pulsing core within the training ball. He put that question on hold because it was too depressing to think about his own death.
Rather than looking like he was putting in effort, his body relaxed, retaining the minimum amount of energy within his body to remain standing. Then, to increase the amount of focus he had, Fen sat down on the ground and crossed his legs.
With this increased amount of focus, he studied the ball and it's markings to see if he could learn anything else about it from the strange formations on it.
Raisen was about to instruct the candidate on how to better sense Vitality, but when he saw the amount of focus he was putting into his observation the old Knight stopped. The old man figured that he might do more harm than good if he interrupted whatever Fen was doing. For his part, Erik looked intrigued at his method of observation, before heading to an opposite corner to practice.
While Fen was busy trying to sense Vitality, Raisen had told the other teenager to try and gently guide the energy within the ball instead of forcing it out; that way Erik could get a better sense of Vitality and its form to increase his skill at manipulating it. What he had done before was almost make the energy inside the ball explode by trying to carve it out instead of guiding throughout the construct. Although the candidate was extremely gifted, he still needed instruction to improve.
For Fen, the old man didn't know how to make him improve. He was afraid that if he influenced his learning in any way then he might not learn from his instincts. Only after Fen managed to manipulate the energy on his own would Raisen dare give him any advice, because then Fen would at least be able go off his own talent.
While sitting down, Fen got a sense for the markings on the metal ball. The inscriptions ran parallel to each other, with several rings circling the construct in several different layers. The middle ring was the thickest, and inside the carving were several small engravings that, if Fen was close enough, he could see faintly glow in the dark.
Ignoring the inscriptions and simply considering the metal surface of the training ball , the surface was completely smooth with no blemishes or imperfections. The only way to get a good grip on the ball was to dig your fingers into the carved rings. That, or have a large hand to simply palm it.
If Fen had a deeper understanding of magical inscriptions, he might've been able to understand the 'how' and the 'why' of the construct, but this was the limit of what he could observe. He glanced around the room and saw that Erik had progressed even more, and was making the glowing ball pulse in several different patterns. He couldn't even understand the method behind controlling Vitality, and yet his comrade was already improving at a steady pace!
Outwardly he praised his talented comrade for learning so quickly, but a very deep part of him turned a few shades greener with envy.
His frustration reinforced his resolve, and Fen finally moved on from observing the surface of the ball to trying to sense the inside.
But no matter what method he tried, the only sensation he felt was the warmth coming from the ball, steadfast against his growing impatience. Pinching his temple, he took a breath calm himself down; being impatient would not help him, and neither would frustration.
He dropped the ball next to him and went over to Raisen, to at least ask for advice. The conversation didn't go as expected however.
"How the hell do I do this?"
"Figure it out." Raisen snorted, turning away from him and immediately starting to mess around on the interface. How this old man became an instructor escaped every common sense known to humanity. It was like a group of intelligent humans had somehow allowed a seal within their ranks of scientist; an impossibility. But unfortunately, Fen knew the reason for this; the Foundation was full of crazy and insane people.
"At least tell me what to do with the heat!" Even if he knew that frustration wouldn't get him anywhere, that didn't mean that he could completely control his emotions. Humans can only be, and will forever be, humans after all. And Raisen was the perfect target for his anger, with his smug and old face.
This time Raisen became interested however, shocking Fen, who's expectations were at the lowest they could be. For a moment the image of a competent instructor appeared in front of him. He must be delusional.
"What heat? Describe it in detail, without missing a single word." Raisen pulled out a section of the interface in front of him, and quickly zoomed over to where his notes on Fen were. The old Knight was seemingly well-prepared to write an entire research paper on Fen's next words.
That wasn't an exaggeration; even as Fen watched him the old man continued to prepare several devices meant to capture video and audio of him describing the heat. There were a total of three cameras on Raisen's desk... Oh, now there's four. Oh, he's still going.
'Where is he getting these cameras?! This desk doesn't have cabinets!' Fen thought to himself with wide eyes. He couldn't even control Vitality, so of course he wouldn't know about spatial magic, which made it appear that Raisen's increasing number of cameras were simply appearing from the air. However, this little trick wasn't actually a use of spatial magic but instead Raisen just grabbing them from within one of his massive supply of pockets.
But, Raisen's hopes for a recording were crushed before they could even come into existence.
"Figure it out." Fen snorted in the same way he did, mocking his tone before turning around and going back to the training orb. The old man had already given him a hint on how to advance; he just needed to experiment with the heat coming from the ball for a while.
The old man was curious about this 'heat', which implied that he didn't know what the heat was. As an instructor, he should be knowledgeable about all things related to Vitality, so for him to not know what it was, then it could only be a phenomenon related to his Vitul nature!
Fen had gained an insight into a potential solution to his problem. He was thinking about the problem the wrong way; there was no problem in the first place. He had an advantage that no one else possessed, his abilities as a Vitul. Before he had believed that none of those abilities had manifested yet, but Raisen's reaction led him to think that the heat coming from the training ball wasn't actually heat.
He sat back down on the floor and grabbed the ball again, setting it on his lap. The heat was still present, but this time Fen had an inkling of what this heat might be. He spent more effort studying the this strange sensation. If his body could actually sense Vitality, then there would be minute differences between this 'heat' and real heat.
In order to tell the difference however, Fen needed an actual source of heat to feel in order to record the differences. So, he asked Raisen again, who was more than willing to provide him with a candle that he had brought for his own reasons. For various reasons the Foundation had not prepared many flammable supplies specifically used to produce heat; after all, to skilled Mages producing a constant stream of fire was extremely easy.
"..."
The candle was bubblegum scented. Fen gave Raisen a weird look before returning back to his spot on the floor. The smell of the candle gave him a strange image in his mind of the old man's original intentions for the candle, which he did not want nor care to know about.
The old man had already lit the candle for him using magic, and Fen intended to spend the entire length of the candle's life comparing the two 'heats' for irregularities.
Sitting down, Fen kept one hand on the surface of the metal ball and another close to the flame, far enough to prevent him from burning but more than enough to make him feel slightly uncomfortable.
Immediately, he could tell a difference, one that almost made him slap himself in anger.
The heat within the training ball wasn't hot! Er, it didn't burn him no matter how close he was! Fen cursed himself out inwardly because this was something that he shouldn't even need a flame for! He cried inside his heart; if he could have discerned the difference beforehand, he would have been spared from learning more about Raisen's 'habits'.
Comparing the two, the training ball felt very pleasant, almost comfortable to feel. The candle instead felt aggressive and dangerous, and... foreign? Fen narrowed his eyes at the training ball, which he now looked at in a different light.
When he felt the training ball, he felt a few strange emotions among which was a very strong feeling of familiarity, and something else... Although strange it did made sense; as a Vitul, he should have a very strong connection to Vitality so it wasn't completely impossible that the energy within a training ball would feel familiar.
Through observing the flame and the training ball for quite some time, Fen noted some characteristics of the Vitality within the ball. Instead of emanating outside towards the air like the heat coming from the flame, this energy flowed inward in a circular motion, gentle, and smooth. Although it was hard to tell, he was almost certain that the energy flowed from a dense core within the ball.
That would be the core that Raisen wanted him to manipulate, but it was just outside of his influence.
After watching and feeling the energy for so long, he felt that controlling this energy was just barely outside of his reach. Every time he tried to control the energy he failed, whether it by using pure will or by some other technique, such as praying for a miracle. Fen had even tried rubbing the ball to make it react out of pity, which also didn't work.
He sighed, and dropped his hand away from the ball. No matter he tried, the only thing he was accomplishing was gaining a better understanding of the energy within the training ball. So, he decided to switch his strategy out with something else.
'Now, I'll eat the ball and wait for magical powers...' Of course, Fen was kidding. Sort of.... He was very tempted to do so, if it meant that he would at least progress a little bit.
Deep breaths wouldn't help him now, he was tired, and his legs were cramping from sitting down for so long; but he still wouldn't ask Erik or Raisen for help. He needed to figure this out on his own, to prove that he had some amount of talent and that he didn't waste his one chance for survival on a Lesson that he couldn't understand.
'Dammit! I need to learn something, anything, to help me survive this messed up Program... Is this really going to be the reason for my death? I couldn't learn how to manipulate energy fast enough? Bullshit!' Emotions gushed out from his heart, and Fen glared at the training ball with seething frustration.
This wasn't a game; Fen understood that better than others. But even if he did understand that, he didn't need understanding, he needed skills and abilities to help him fight. Somehow, he needed to convert his understanding and will to survive into skills, but now that he had the chance to learn, he wasn't able to do it.
'How the fuck am I supposed to survive if I don't even have any talent?! So what if I'm a Vitul, or if I'm intelligent, or if I gained a fundamental understanding of the whole damn universe, none of that would matter if don't get through this one damn thing!' He thought.
The issue of manipulating Vitality had evolved into a much bigger challenge, one that Fen saw as a trial to prove his will and how much effort he wanted to put in to get home.
And yet, his own body was against him, too slow in changing and adapting as a Vitul. His nature was denying him, but he couldn't understand why. Fen had tried so hard at controlling the Vitality in the ball, but none of his efforts were recognized, and his anger surged out once more.
An uncontrollable heat pumped into his body, spreading to all his extremities and soaking his limbs with a strange feeling. Fen grabbed the ball roughly and pushed against it with all his strength, no longer taking no as an answer. He forced his will into the ball, not knowing that he was spreading his own energy into the ball, causing it to flare up with splendid golden light.
The inscriptions ignited, and started spinning around the ball, getting faster and faster over time. The entire time this was happening, no, even before, Raisen was already sitting at attention and watching this process happen. His recording devices were already set up since long ago, pointed at the young Vitul candidate.
Fen couldn't see this happen, but he was currently wrapped up in the same golden light as the ball. His eyes sent out rays of light towards the ball, enwrapping the construct with his will. This energy became more tangible over time before the light completely vanished just as quickly as it appeared. It was all sucked into his body which now had a slight red glow flashing from underneath his skin.
The Vitality training ball was now empty, sucked of all its energy. The rings that were inscribed onto the metal opened up, before completely revealing the inside of the metal ball. Inside, an empty core surrounded by smaller rings lay dormant, no longer active now that the fundamental energy that kept the ball active was stolen from it.
Still, the most phenomenal change was one that neither the wide-eyes Erik nor the excited Raisen could detect. Fen, sat on the ground, widened his eyes as his senses exploded.
His skin burned, his every cell started to scald and shiver as violent energy entered his body. The golden glow returned but instead of brightly shining across his body the energy gently flowed through his cells. The energy cleansed them from all the unnecessary substances that prevented his body from moving at peak efficiency.
To make up for this 'gift', Fen felt excruciating pain everywhere in his body, so much so that his muscles locked up on reflex to prevent him from hurting himself accidentally. He could only sit and endure the transformation his body was undergoing. Wherever the energy passed, Fen could feel a small remnant of Vitality remaining in his limbs, extremities, and organs.
After some time passed, the energy finished and exited his body in a brilliant stream of light, almost blinding Erik who had been watching the whole event. Raisen's body was much more durable, so he managed to watch the whole thing with barely suppressed excitement.
When the light disappeared, Fen was still sitting in the same position, tentatively tensing his muscles as he felt the changes. He momentarily disregarded the pain he felt because he was so enamored with the changes he could feel within him. The Vitality that he felt inside the training ball was completely gone, and the metal was cold to the touch. However, inside him he could feel warm energy gently flowing within his veins and accumulating in mass near the center of his body. The energy was extremely faint, and was nowhere near the level of the training ball but through expending some effort Fen was able to manipulate this energy and move it elsewhere around his body, although there some slight resistance to his will.
For the first time since entering the Void, a wide smile appeared on Fen's face. His nature had answered his will, and now he had hope for the future.