After a long few moments, Roy finally uncurled, wincing in pain as his entire body protested the motion. He was just in time to see the golem collapsing back into the pool and the blue light fading from the water. Getting painfully to his feet, Roy stared despondently at the now still pool.
Shame filled him, making his face burn red. He’d failed, of that, he had no doubt, but instead of facing his failure, he’d curled up like a coward and waited for the golem to finish him. His shame was then replaced by the familiar feelings of disgust and self-loathing that he was all too familiar with.
His mood sour, Roy turned his back on the pool and headed over to the next Torii gate. This one was for the opposite Essence type as the one he’d just come from - The Trial of Fire. His body still ached with all of his bruises, and his broken rib ground painfully as he walked, but he gritted his teeth and bore it. He deserved no less for the cowardly way in which he’d acted before.
However, as soon as he passed through the red gate, a searing heat washed over him. Within seconds, all his pain had vanished. The bruises disappeared, and his rib knit itself back together. He’d been wondering how he could possibly hope to go through all eight trials with his injuries accumulating. At least he now knew that he would be healed after taking each one and that the golems would stop short of killing him, though the risk of severe bodily harm was still very much a possibility.
He now knew that he had no affinity for Water Essence, though he should have known as soon as he’d walked through the gates. He hadn’t felt the resonance with the Essence that he’d heard others speak of. He wasn’t too worried. Not every Essence type was for everyone. And not all Essence types were as widespread as others. Some Paths were rarer and choosier, and some, more common.
It didn’t take long for Roy’s clothes to dry as he walked in the ever-increasing heat of the Fire Trial. This heat wasn’t like the sweltering, damp heat of the Water Trial, but rather a dry heat, that leached the very moisture from the air. Much sooner than he expected, he was breathing hard, feeling his skin beginning to burn.
The ground underfoot was scorching, and every breath he took was agony. The air shimmered with the haze of heat, and his surroundings were tinged a bright, orange-red. Roy felt his eyes beginning to droop as he walked, climbing an ever steeper hill. He knew that wasn’t good and that if he fell asleep here, he might not be able to move once he woke up, that was if he woke up.
He knew that the golems wouldn’t kill him, but he had no proof that the environment would be so accommodating. He once again had to wonder if everyone was subjected to trials like these, or if he was being given a much more difficult test. Either way, he didn’t think he could go on for too much longer. He was dehydrated, his mouth feeling so dry that not a drop of moisture remained. His lips were dry and cracked, and his skin was blistering.
Not even sweat could cool him off, as it evaporated before it even had the chance to form. His mind began to wander as he walked, wondering what this part of the trial could be trying to teach him. If he had an affinity for Fire Essence, it would be no problem to cool himself off simply. The problem was that he could still feel nothing.
He tried opening his senses as he had back in the Dungeon and was blinded by a brilliant red light. It was clear that he was surrounded by Fire Essence, but if he couldn’t so much as feel it, it could only mean that he had no affinity for it. So, if he had no Fire affinity, what was the point of taking the Fire Trial?
The heat intensified again, and Roy staggered, nearly falling to his knees. It was getting to be too difficult to even to move now. His body felt so weak, his mind foggy with exhaustion and dehydration. Even if he wasn’t a Fire cultivator, someone with a different type of Essence fueling their body could still survive here. They wouldn’t be as comfortable as a Fire user, but they would still survive.
Roy stumbled to a halt when the thought sank into his tired mind. It took him longer than he would have liked to retrace the steps his mind had taken and drawn the obvious conclusion. He had to learn to channel his own essence if he wanted to survive.
Swaying on the spot and breathing as shallowly as possible to avoid the burning pain the heat caused, Roy concentrated inward, focusing as hard as he could on feeling the core resting in the center of his chest. It wasn’t easy under these conditions, and since it wasn’t something that he really knew how to do, it was made all the more difficult. Without Geon actively helping him, he had no idea what to do.
At first, all he saw were the insides of his eyelids. But ever so slowly, an image began to superimpose itself over them. An image of a small white orb floating in a pool of darkness. He sucked in an involuntary breath when it finally came into focus and coughed hard, irritating his already parched throat. He could taste blood and knew that he was running out of time. Concentrating harder on the image of the white orb, Roy watched as the blackness around it began to fill with tiny white strings.
At first, they seemed faint and random, but soon, he could see that they were an intricate matrix, all connected to his core. These were the channels that Geon had burned into his body to allow the Essence to flow freely, and Roy was shocked by their sheer number. The white channels of light permeated his entire frame, from the top of his head to the tips of his fingers and toes. They were layered as well, some running right beneath his skin, while others ran through his very bones.
From the few books he’d read about cycling Essence, Roy knew it had to do with two main factors: The Martial Artist’s breathing, and their intent. That would control how the Essence flowed through their bodies and in what pattern. Since he already had all his channels made for him, all he would have to do was find the correct breathing.
He experimented for a few minutes, concentrating as hard as he could on the core and willing the Essence pulsing within to move. Finally, after what felt like an eternity, he felt his core respond. It glowed brighter as he sucked in a half-breath, then pushed it out over the course of five seconds. It was agony, of course, as the amount of oxygen entering his lungs didn’t seem to be nearly enough, and he suspected that if he kept this up for too long, he would pass out.
As the core glowed brighter and started sending pulses of Essence flooding through his body, however, Roy didn’t care. The relief was almost instantaneous. He felt amazingly and blissfully cool. His skin stopped blistering, and the air cooled to a temperature that he would only consider to be hot. It wasn’t as cool as he would have liked, but it was still better than the furnace he’d been walking through up until now.
His mind began clearing as the essence flowed up into his brain, rejuvenating him. Grinning stupidly, Roy began moving forward again, keeping his breathing technique going. It was extremely difficult, but as the ground began leveling out, Roy knew that he’d passed the first part of the trial.
It had been meant to teach him Essence control and show him that he could persevere on his own, so long as he had the will and determination. He was forced to let go of his cycling technique as he began to feel faint. He wasn’t sure if this was the most efficient way to cycle Pure Essence, but now knew why everyone had an affinity; it would be impossible to fight with only half a lungful of air every five seconds. At least for him anyway.
Once he released the breathing pattern he’d been holding, the heat returned, though not nearly as bad as it had been before. Even as he walked, the heat faded down to a tolerable level. One thing that was immediately noticeable was the amount of Essence in his core once he’d released the technique. It was almost completely drained, now glowing only a faint white color.