Icarth was at peak concentration. The universal energy around him had thickened to a considerable extent. It was pressing down on his body as a whole, the heat was nearly burning his skin. Ignoring the pain in his body, Icarth completely focused on the feeling of the heat around him.
3 minutes of total concentration had passed yet Icarth felt no different. The only thing he felt was the heat that pressed down on him. He couldn't feel anything special in the air surrounding him.
It just felt like he was outside on a really hot day. Well, a hot day was a severe understatement. It was more like he was on the cusp of a volcano boiling with magma.
But Icarth didn't give up. His brain raced for an explanation or a reason or any way to acknowledge the existence of universal energy surrounding him like a blanket. Another 2 minutes passed. The heat becoming dangerous at this point. Icarth's skin started to crack due to the lack of moisture in his body, all the sweat had dried up a long time ago. It was painful to breathe, but Icarth kept his breathing normal not to alert Melvin.
At some point, Icarth stopped searching for the universal energy around him and just tried his best to bear the heat.
As soon as he switched his focus, the heat tripled. Icarth nearly fainted then and there. The only fact aiding him was his impressive physical body which could bear the pain and heat.
'....must....endure...need to reach.....more than 10 minutes...'
Even thoughts were hard to form under the intense heat.
'....get...stronger...'
'....stronger...'
'.....stro....nger....'
The seconds that ticked by felt like an eternity.
Icarth repeated one thought in his head until even that stopped circulating.
Eventually, he hit the end of his rope and collapsed. The heat around him had stopped increasing a while back. In fact, it was slowly decreasing so as to not throw Icarth into shock by releasing it all at once.
Melvin gazed at his unconscious student, slumped in a sitting position.
Icarth's skin was red due to the heat it had been subjected to.
'What intense willpower....' Melvin thought impressed. 'But the fact that he didn't take into account his bodily limits.....' Melvin made an internal note to keep an eye on this reckless pupil of his. To make sure he doesn't try to self-destruct in the future.
The rest of the students were already done with their sessions. Sefir had tapped out a while back, knowing that his body couldn't hold much more heat. Through this session, Sefir realized the way to absorb more universal energy into his body during his training sessions.
Every time during his training, Sefir couldn't directly force the universal energy to flow into his body. That was because he couldn't control it yet.
But unlike the others in his class, he had an instinct as to where was traveling through his body. Sefir didn't know how much longer it would take, but he did know that he was on the cusp of discovering his way to see universal energy.
For the first time, he was grateful for his gift that gave finally gave him an edge in something.
Ragnar was the only one still left bearing the session.
Still taking deep breaths into his body, Ragnar too was on the borderline of self-destruction.
Sighing softly, Melvin started to decrease the heat around Ragnar, bringing the session to an end. While he did say that he could make the kids go through another attempt, he decided not to after seeing their conditions. Most of them were on the verge of collapse after just two times, and Melvin didn't want to injure them too seriously on just their first day.
Ragnar's eyes shot open after he felt the heat around him decrease.
"Why did you stop? I can still go!" Ragnar bellowed, causing everyone to turn to him.
Melvin gazed at him calmly, "No, you cannot. I stopped to prevent you from ending up like your classmate here." Melvin gestured to Icarth's unconscious body.
Ragnar snorted, "I am not weak like him. Now start again for me." Ragnar demanded. A brutal aura started to rise around him.
Pressing his lips together, Melvin simply said, "No."
The brutal aura around Ragnar was suppressed before anyone could notice anything.
Well anyone but Ragnar that is. Feeling suffocated, he glared at Melvin and relented.
While Ragnar was rude, he did respect the strong. Melvin had shown that he was leagues above the current Ragnar. So Ragnar stopped disrespecting him in front of the entire class.
"Now, your next class will be next week or so," Melvin smiled. "I'll check out whether I can get another block lecture like this one."
Most of the students groaned internally. Another set of a boring class plus what was basically torture afterwards? Everyone started to dread this class and the mild-mannered teacher that taught it.
"Now class is dismissed, you guys won't have any other classes for the rest of the day. For those that need it, go to the nurse's office." Saying his goodbyes, Melvin walked out leaving the students of class 7 bone tired in the room, dehydrated, and frustrated.
Emmia especially was frustrated. She couldn't last past 3 minutes for both attempts. The heat was too suffocating for her.
Sighing in disappointment, she didn't notice Luna approaching her.
".....how was it?...." Luna finally asked after sitting down next to Emmia.
"Oh, hey Luna. Not good," Emmia said dejectedly.
Receiving Luna's blank look, Emmia explained, "I couldn't last past 3 minutes for both attempts. What about you?"
".....5 minutes," Luna said after a pause.
"Oh, that's pretty good," Emmia gave a small smile. But Luna knew that Emmia was beating herself up internally about her performance.
Hesitating on what to do, Luna took a breath to say something to Emmia before both were interrupted by Sefir.
"Mia, help me carry Ica to the nurse's office." Sefir requested.
Emmia nodded and stood up to leave.
Panicking, Luna grabbed Emmia's hand reflexively to stop her. She wanted to cheer Emmia up and didn't want to leave her like this.
"What's up?" Emmia asked, turning around.
"...I wanted to hang out later.....do you have a place?" Luna mustered up her courage and asked the question. She really wasn't good at these types of things at all.
Stunned for a second, Emmia thought for a minute and said, "Let's meet up in the library after lunch?"
Luna nodded readily.
"Ok, See you," Emmia called out before leaving to drag her brother to the nurse's office. Unlike before, Emmia felt lighter and moved with a spring in her step.