When Shadow woke up again, it was early dawn. He sat up and stretched before he got out of bed. He sleepily went to open the empty closet, remembering he didn't have any clothes other than the ones he was wearing. He just sighed sleepily before teleporting into Jay's kitchen. He looked around the house to see both Jay and Emperion still sleeping. Shadow silently returned to the kitchen, put on his apron and started getting out stuff to make hamburgers. He had just put the patties in the pan when he heard footsteps thumping down the stairs. It was Emperion, who seemed more asleep than awake. He yawned and looked up at Shadow.
"How'd you get in 'ere?" he questioned sleepily. "We made sure to lock the door this time."
"You make it sound like the whole purpose of locking the door was to keep me out." Shadow giggled awkwardly. "I teleported in."
"Sure you did."
"Believe me or not, that's what I did."
"Why are you being so loud so early in the morning?" Just then, Jay walked down the stairs. Emperion moved aside to let him pass.
"Oh, hi Shadow." He yawned as he grabbed a cup from one of the cupboards. "Wait, Shadow? I never said you could start cooking!"
"Relax, it's just hamburgers like I promised." Shadow assured. Emperion perked at the word 'hamburgers'. "What were you planning on having for breakfast this morning? Raw meat?" Jay didn't respond. Instead, he filled a cup with water from the sink and sat down at the table. Emperion sat down next to Jay and watched Shadow sidestep around the kitchen. Again, Shadow served the burgers without their tops on and placed the sliced vegetables next to them on a cutting board. This time, none of them hesitated to take a burger.
"Do you want to go shopping with me after we eat?" Shadow invited.
"What for?"
"I still need to buy some stuff for my house."
"Why was your house finished so much faster than mine?" Emperion whined.
"Because I worked on it. If you want me to help build your house too, you just need to ask." Shadow suggested with an air of self importance.
"No! If anyone's going to work on my house it's me!"
"Why aren't you working on it then?"
"Guy's, stop fighting! After we go shopping and get a tour of Shadow's house we can go look in on your house, Emperion." Jay decided. Shadow nodded in agreement and Emperion just huffed and finished his burger. Once everyone had finished eating, they went to the main shopping area. There, they wandered around the streets, looking at all the stores to try. They bought all sorts of stuff; food, cooking utensils, towels, toilet paper, soap, and many other things. After they bought everything they needed and had their lunch, Shadow put their new belongings in his void storage and led them outside and towards the Central area. When they reached the Central area, Shadow led them to the right and around the fountain and to the right of the tunnel they had entered the city from. On the wall were stairs leading up the mountain.
"Now!" Shadow turned round to face the others. "The air up on the mountain gets really thin, really fast. If you feel like you're going to pass out, let me know so we can take a break for you to get used to the thinness of the air. It's only going to get worse the higher we fly."
"Why'd you build your house so high up then?" Emperion complained.
"As I told you before, my magical power can be a lot to handle at times so I had my house built high up the mountain to prevent others from feeling my magical power." Shadow explained.
"But you only have one wing."
"Whatever, you don't need to know! Let's just go! You'll find out someday." Shadow turned back to the mountain and jumped into the air. The three flew up the side of the mountain, following the stairs that had been put into place for humans. After a long time of flying, Jay began to lag behind.
"Can we take a break? It's getting hard to breathe." he insisted.
"Really? We aren't even up that high yet." Emperion complained.
"Calm down, flying up the mountain when you're not used to thin air can be really tough for some people." Shadow flew back down towards Jay and sat him down on one of the steps. They rested for a bit before continuing up the mountain. Once they reached his house, they landed and Shadow eagerly ran over to his front door. Meanwhile, Jay and Emperion were trying to catch their breaths.
"What's wrong guys?" Shadow asked, confused.
"You fly too damn fast, that's what." Emperion complained.
"We're just a bit tired, that's all." Jay explained.
"But we didn't even fly that far. We're not that high up either." Shadow insisted, innocently.
"That doesn't change the fact we're still tired." Emperion complained.
"Alright, I'm good to go!" Jay exclaimed, standing straight up.
"What?"
"Emperion, if a small flight like this is enough to get you down for the count, you won't make the entrance exam." Shadow said, disappointed.
"You make it sound like you know what the entrance exam is." Emperion huffed. Jay strolled over to where Shadow was standing in front of the door.
"Hurry up, Emperion, or you are going to be left behind." Jay called. Shadow turned and tried to open the door when it wouldn't budge.
"Oh, right. It's locked." he chuckled, embarrassed. He then pulled out the house key from his void storage and unlocked the door, leading Jay inside. Emperion rushed over through his exhaustion.
"This is the entryway. Put your shoes there if you have any on." Shadow pointed to the shoe box. "Over there is the kitchen and right here is the living room." He pointed in front of them, then to their right. He then led them down a stairwell on the left. He turned halfway down the stairs and led them through a hallway.
"A guest room on either side of the hall and a bathroom at the end." Shadow explained. Emperion stuck his head into the room on the right and turned on the light.
"Wow, these rooms are spacious!" he stated, impressed. Shadow nodded. He led them further down the stairs into a small room. It had a washing machine and dryer.
"The laundry room." There wasn't much to see, so Shadow led them back up the stairs and across the living room to the other set of stairs.
"The training room." Shadow stepped aside to let Jay and Emperion enter first. When Jay, the first to enter, stepped inside, he suddenly felt disoriented, and fell face first onto the floor.
"Huh?" He placed his hands on the floor and tried to lift himself up.
"Jay, what are you doing?" Emperion sneered. He finally pushed himself back up but he struggled to stay standing.
"The room feels heavy." he grumbled.
"Sure it does." Emperion walked in behind him and stumbled. He fought to keep his balance but made sure he didn't fall like Jay did. "This is nothing." He insisted, really straining himself to stay standing. Shadow just snickered as he watched them. He walked in behind them with ease.
"What's got you guys so down? Is there something wrong?" he teased.
"How can you stay standing? Don't you feel the pressure in this room?" Jay wondered.
"Yeah, it feels like regular gravity. Why?" He replied with an indifferent look.
"Alright, you bastard. What did you do to us and when are you going to stop it?" Emperion growled.
"I didn't do anything to you guys. The room did." Shadow walked away and turned down a dial near the entrance to the room. The pressure that had been holding down Jay and Emperion suddenly vanished, and they could walk freely again.
"I just had this room built with magic-sealing stone." Shadow explained.
"What? Why!"
"For training. What else?" Shadow crossed his arms.
"No, I meant why did we feel so pressured when it's just magic-sealing stone?" Emperion demanded.
"Do you not understand how magic-sealing stone works? Or magic for that matter?" Shadow scoffed. He raised a knowledgeable finger. "Magic energy is a power source that flows through a specific system in our body, like our circulatory system. The practice of magic helps circulate our flow of magic and increases the strength and fluency in which we can use magic. The magic system is a lot like our nervous system and muscular system, it stretches all throughout our bodies and helps us move around. That's why you feel so sluggish when you use an excessive amount of magic. Magic-sealing stone forces the magic within your body to flow in the opposite direction, effectively slowing your magic flow or even stopping it. That's why, when you are put in a room made of active magic-sealing stone, you feel pressured and it gets harder to move. That's also why demons with large amounts of magic aren't affected by magic-sealing stones as much as those with lesser amounts. The more magic you have, the denser the magic flowing in your magic streams and the more magic there is to push back against the reverse flow of the magic-sealing stone." Shadow explained. Emperion stood there, staring blankly at Shadow, while Jay looked excited.
"I asked for an explanation, not a lecture." Emperion stated.
"Why don't we feel pressured when we wear magic-sealing clamps?" Jay asked, raising his hand and ignoring Emperion's irritated expression.
"It's because magic-sealing clamps are too small to slow the whole magic system. It's when they're placed on our wings, the source of our magic, that it has the same sealing effect as if you were in a room of low level magic-sealing stone. Aside from being slowed, that is." Jay stared up at Shadow with awe.
"If all that is true, why didn't you get toppled under the pressure of the room? With only one wing, you have less and worse magic than Jay here." Emperion questioned, suspicious.
"Simply because my magic is tougher than the magic-sealing stone's reverse force." Shadow shrugged.
"Shadow, if you have so little magic that your magic flow gets completely reversed, what happens to you?" Jay wondered.
"I don't know." he admitted, turning around to continue the tour. He led them up the stairs and through the door in front of them. "And this is my room." The others both gasped.
"Why is it so big?" Emperion exclaimed, forgetting all about the earlier discussion.
"It's my room."
"But why is it so big? Jay's whole house could get stretched flat like a pancake and still fit in this room." Emperion wandered around the room while Jay stood in the doorway, looking around with a dumbstruck look on his face. Shadow smiled and flopped on the soft carpet that covered the floor.
"Wow, you can see so far from the balcony!" Jay finally moved and walked outside to join Emperion, Shadow right behind him. There, they all enjoyed the view of the midnight city. It was dark and cloudy, but the lights from the houses and streets lit up the city beneath them. Shadow pulled out one of the grocery bags from their earlier shopping and held it up to the others.
"How about we have dinner?" he suggested. Jay and Emperion relaxed on the couch, watching TV, while Shadow began cooking their dinner. He grabbed a pot from the groceries they bought and filled it with water before setting it on the stove. While he waited for the water to boil, he set bowls on the island in the kitchen and placed brand new chopsticks next to them. Once the water was boiling, he threw in some noodles and started a three minute timer. He stirred the noodles a bit as he waited for them to cook, then put the pot on a hot pad before he turned off the timer and burner. He then added a seasoning packet to the noodles and stirred it all together. Afterwards, he distributed it equally between three bowls and called the others over.
"What's this?" Emperion questioned.
"Ramen." Shadow explained. Without even picking up the chopsticks, Emperion grabbed a fork from the grocery bags. "You monster! How could you eat ramen with a fork?" Shadow exclaimed, faking a horrified expression.
"How could you not eat ramen with a fork? Chopsticks are impossible to use!" Emperion argued.
"Look at Jay! He's never even seen chopsticks before and he already knows how to use them!" Shadow shamed. Jay just looked up at them, noodles hanging out of his mouth. Emperion hesitated before sitting down and grabbing a chopstick in each hand. He tried to pick up the slippery noodles with his chopsticks, but failed every time.
"God, you suck worse than I thought. Maybe you do need to use a fork."
"Why. . you. . little-! I will literally end you one day." Emperion threatened through gritted teeth, slamming the chopsticks on the counter and picking up his fork. He continued to grumble as he ate his ramen.
"Jeez, what's his problem?" Jay whispered to Shadow.
"No clue." he whispered back.
"You're the problem!" he yelled, spitting ramen bits everywhere.
"Do you guys want to stay for the night? It's quite a flight back to Jay's house and it's already gotten dark." Shadow invited.
"Don't ignore me!" Emperion grumbled.
"It might be a bad idea to keep someone in your house when they're after your head but I'm down for it!" Jay accepted.
"Hey."
"What now, Emperion?" Shadow sighed.
"There's a person staring at us through the window." he pointed towards the living room at a black figure that was standing ominously in the middle of the window.
"That's so creepy." Jay shuddered. Shadow stood up and walked towards the door. He turned on the outdoor light and stepped outside, closing the door behind him. He turned towards the figure, who stepped into the light.
"Silver?"