The Odd Dragon Out: Reckoning of the Cinder-Born

"Now, I'm sure you all have been doing the daily exercise assigned to you in the Mortal Conflict course, so you should be aware – I'd be cross if you didn't – of the differences between Permeation and Saturation," Professor Lyall said as she rolled up her sleeve.

At the mention of the daily exercise, the students suddenly started - or rather resumed - opening and closing their palms repeatedly. Ginger found himself doing the same too.

His plump instructor didn't say a single word more.

She instead extended her arm forward, naked to the elbow as it was, revealing her shockingly smooth skin. She then crouched a little, her legs spread apart modestly - which looked rather... odd.

A soft, blue haze with a gentle feel to it blossomed around her, visible to the students. It instantly registered to Ginger and the rest that Professor Lyall was 'dumbing down' her Kardia Aeras for educational purposes, as Professor Mara had done.

Everyone watched as this soft blue energy, like smoke, created a large, wispy blanket around the thickly built instructor – a 'hefty task', some whispered.

Ginger noted the difference in how it looked compared to Professor Mara's instantly. The gentle feeling it instilled seemed to mirror what he knew Professor Lyall to be like – kind and caring, behind her strict, default personality – but its visual appearance, even as a tide of blue smoke, was more akin to chaotic mashes of paint on a blank canvas made with different shades of blue.

No. Maybe, better than that, it was more apt to say it looked like raging blue fire forced to move eerily slow.

Ginger got so lost in how Professor Lyall's Kardia looked that he almost missed the direction of its movement. The Kardia gathered around her feet, and then, in a surprising display, it turned faint, a majority of it forming a bloated, blue circle on the dirty floor.

The class marveled.

The circle gave out a highlight to the Prime Instructor's body from below and muted the light coming from the windows subtly.

Reiss beamed.

"Contra Parousia..." he whispered just enough for only Ginger to hear.

As it registered to the plump dragonling that this was what the Professor was currently demonstrating, his interest was detached from the appearance of her Kardia and invested in what she would say.

"I have decided to demonstrate the three Pieyro in an order that I've noticed makes the most sense for First Years through my time. Contra Parousia, as Reiss has stated, is a countering application of Kardia. By channeling the majority of your Kardia to your feet via Saturation and Permeation, you can withstand the natural presence of an enemy – though that is a mere basic function," she said while looking over her glasses at the class.

"If you had mastered this application, I wouldn't have been able to blow away your Kardia two days ago."

The event Professor Lyall referenced gave more oomph to her explanation, as all the students could recall it without exception.

Ginger instantly latched onto the memory of how his Kardia disappeared after Professor Lyall merely sighed.

'I see...' he thought before gazing at his palm.

In practice, Contra Parousia applied Permeation and Saturation, which were different types of Kardia flow within the body.

Permeation was what the First Years experienced when they first attained their Kardia. It was when their Kardia rushed or leaked out of their bodies through their skin, a process often mistaken as superficial.

Saturation, on the other hand, required time to learn. It was when Kardia pumped from the second heart and used blood vessels to flow through the body. It usually ended up sinking into the flesh, edifying it.

Ginger opened his palm and closed it again.

The Firsr Years had been commanded by their instructor for Mortal Conflict to perform this exercise. Each time they did, they were to try and familiarise themselves with blood networks in their bodies while setting loose bits of their Kardia to their arms, where the effect of the exercise was most effective.

By opening their palms and then squeezing their fingers repeatedly, their keen dragon senses were likely to adapt to the flow of blood in their arms.

This was a way of teaching their Kardia how to Saturate their blood vessels.

Now, Contra Parousia seemed to require adequate skill in channeling Kardia in both these forms.

"Contra Parousia is very useful when dealing with a stronger opponent that would otherwise dominate you just virtue of being older," Professor Lyall said. "Our system as dragons is built on seniority, but of course, it is not an absolute fact. Contra Parousia extends its influence outside the body through Permeation in order to mark where the presence of a stronger, older opponent's influence ends. With Saturation, you strengthen your lower body – strengthening your center of gravity. Do note, this stance is vital."

The stance, was of course a mild crouch, with an arm extended forward.

A student raised her hand to inquire shortly after Professor Lyall explained the mechanics. When given permission, she promptly asked with a curious visage.

"Why is it that Kardia needs to be moved to our lower body? I've noticed the rest of your body is left less guarded," she said. "Isn't that risky?"

Professor Lyall's lips drew taut and wide.

"Good question," she said, and Ginger felt Reiss click his tongue. He had obviously wanted to be the one to ask this question. "I'm certain the majority of you must have encountered a situation where you were frightened, or intimidated by something. It could be anything from a memory, to a genuine enemy that posed tremendous threat. Something you truly feared. Which part of your body did you feel loosen, or perhaps weaken in the first instance of feeling afraid?"

The class stirred. The answer seemed obvious, even to the few who hadn't felt terror in their lives.

"It is your legs, isn't it? For juvenile dragons like you, collapsing under pressure isn't outlandish. Your legs may give out in such circumstances. However, the reason for flowing Kardia into your legs and feet isn't so mundane, though it also isn't unrelated."

"When fear strikes – a common occurrence when facing stronger Blighted and Condemned – any living creature is prone to losing balance. The presence of a stronger opponent naturally cripples your confidence, and to remain steadfast and not be counted out of a struggle for your life by a mere breath, Contra Parousia is the answer."

Professor Lyall once again scrolled across the class with her eyes. Looks of understanding met her. It seemed her phrasing worked to make what Contra Parousia fought against relatable.

"As for whether it is risky. Indeed it is! Leaving the rest of your body unguarded is treacherously dangerous, but that is where another of the three fundamental Pieyro comes in!"

At once, the glow around her feet dissipated, and instead, her body, rather, her arm, which was exposed to the elbow, showed signs of change.

Quickly, it transitioned from looking like a sand-toned tubular eggplant to attaining marvelous curves and rigid contours that swelled by the second. Professor Lyall's skin turned thick, gaining an ivory-grey tone while simultaneously shedding the faint looks of age it once had.

Tiny wisps of Kardia danced over it, but Ginger didn't feel the gentleness of them anymore.

"This is Supplementum Soma – reinforce body – an enhancing application of Kardia that requires far more skill in Saturation than Permeation, as evidenced by how little of my Kardia you can see," the thickly woman said. Her plump face heavily contrasted against the muscular limb attached to her body which was built pretty much like a pear. The wide V shape of her lips completed the comedic look she had all in all.

Ginger gawked at Professor Lyall's arm with twinkling eyes.

"Unlike Contra Parousia, Supplementum Soma is as simple as it looks. Saturation is flowing your Kardia through blood networks, right? This process allows you to enhance not just the flesh, but to finely invigorate yourself from your very blood cells. The change, as you can see, is rather vivid."

"I'm going to need to master that if I want to have any hope of lifting that hammer," Reiss said sullenly.

"You can lift it if you just master your Affix-type Kardia," Ginger turned to the dwarfish dragonling and said.

"No, no, I don't want to have all my eggs in one basket. If I can't master it in time, I'd rather invest my time in learning Saturation," Reiss said.

Professor Lyall answered a few questions from other students who raised their hands, inquiring about things like, "What is the upper limit of Supplementum?" or "How beneficial is it for those with Pooling-type Kardia?" to which the portly dragon carefully, but calmly explained that limits were determined by the individual's cast and that Poolers were actually the best at using Supplementum Soma, respectively.

Ginger beamed at the revelation.

Apparently, Supplementum Soma worked best when most of one's Kardia was used to augment the flesh and cells in one part of the body.

Ginger had begun to see a vision of himself using Contra Parousia and Supplementum Soma at the same time owing to his dual-natured Kardia when Professor Lyall immediately shot that delusion down.

"These two Pieyro go hand in hand, but even the most skilled dragons cannot use them at the same time. The flow conditions for each are different, and generally attempting them at once, even if possible, would only make one of the two suffer. Even for one as skilled as I, the best I can do is switch between Contra Parousia and Supplementum Soma on a dime," she said before a circular glow appeared under her feet, while her arm turned tubular and unattractive once again.

In the next moment though, the reverse occurred, with the glow vanishing, as though to feed into making her arm beefy and steel-like.

Professor Lyall was demonstrating a swift transition between the two Pieyro she had just taught.

Ginger was disappointed, but what he saw was the next best alternative.

Professor Lyall's feat, even to children like them, seemed impressive, though none of them quite realized the true extent of how impressive it really was. In any case, Ginger recognized this skill level as born from something he wanted to achieve beyond simply being the strongest.

Finesse.

"Now, for the last one. Custos Zoe..."

The class was smitten aghast to see a spherical pool of Professor Lyall's Kardia storm out of her body in a careless torrent that gathered before her while barely maintaining a thin stroke around her!

It then suddenly turned doubly bright before molding itself into a shape. Thick points – like elongated triangles – innumerable in number, appeared at the edges of it, making it look like a bizarre, blue star. These points then curved, arching back to surround a portion of Professor Lyall.

On the arched belly of this blinding shape – much like a somersaulting star – a strange pair of eyes, dark oval shapes really, and a wide V-shape below them appeared, seemingly finishing the manifestation.

Professor Lyall's voice came from the behind the arched star.

"Custos Zoe is a guarding application, which means you expel your Kardia via Permeation, give it shape, solidify it, and guard against attacks with it," she said. "It's the easiest of the three to learn, and what I wish to be the product of our lesson today."

The large star swivelled to the side revealing Professor Lyall's figure and face which matched the features of the star.

"Solidifying your Kardia is a challenge, I know, thus for today, you will learn to give your Custos Zoe shape. Alright, give yourself some space and imagine what you want to conjure. Need I say, it can be anything. Anything at all."

The students did as they were told.

Ginger parted from Reiss and took a deep breath.

Pooling-type Kardia.

Alien-type Kardia.

Which would he use, and what shape did he want to create?

Different from the previous lesson, Ginger was a little stumped.

And he wasn't the only one.

Professor Lyall didn't leave them to agonize on their own though. She began to walk student by student diagnosing what she saw to be holding them back in an instant and offering a solution that inspired a little more confidence.

By the time Ginger found that he didn't have the slightest inclination to try to form a shape yet, the Prime Instructor had already helped five students gain enough of a desire to start expelling their Kardia.

The plump dragonling smiled, and his spirits lifted.

There was quite the stark difference between Professor Lyall and Professor Mara, and Ginger appreciated it.

She really was as good as she had said; as good as Ira had said.

Now, he only had to wait for her and ask a few questions that stagnated his desire to try. This was mainly a problem born of indecision actually. Ginger had many ideas but he didn't know if most of them were practical.

He needed to see a few more examples of Custos Zoe shapes to make a choice of his own.

At that moment, his wish seemed to come true.

A bright blue haze burned from his left, and he, along with the rest of the class bore witness to a full, intricate shape manifested by one of their own already!

At first, Ginger had assumed it to be Vassilis with a hiss.

But no.

It was instead, a girl with red springy hair and baby blue eyes, a dull, unfocused expression on her face even now.