“Only if she’s going to fight monsters,” Erika said. “I don’t want that for her.”
“Mum had specific ideas about what she did and didn’t want for me,” Jason pointed out. “It didn’t work out so well for her, but I suppose it won’t be like that for you and Emi. She’s nothing like me.”
“Point taken,” Erika said. “I just want her to be safe. I know you said that safe may not be an option, though, even if we stay here.”
“Just start giving the idea of home schooling some thought,” Jason said. “I know how big a change that is. It’s deciding the future of your family in a single moment.”
“Home schooling,” Erika said. “You can’t train her if you’re off who knows where.”
“Farrah can train her better than I can. And I won’t be gone forever. While I am, I’ll need you to step up and take the family in hand. Did Ketevan call you yet?”
“Yesterday afternoon. I had to dampen her enthusiasm. She would have had us all in a room at six in the morning, given her way.”
“I think she wants to steer you away from my influence.”
“That’s a sound approach to most things,” Erika said, squeezing her brother’s shoulder warmly. “I really am glad you’re opening up, Jase. I want to be there for you; you just have to let me. Tell me that you aren’t leaving just to run away.”
“I’m not running,” he said. “I know who I was here and who I was there. I need the time and the space to figure out who I am in both. Who I want to be, and how to find my way to that.”
“Alright,” Erika said. “You’ll have to take a lot of Uncle Jason time before you go, you realise.”
“There are worse burdens,” he said.
Sitting in a meditative pose, Jason opened one eye to watch Farrah floating in the air.
“You’re not concentrating,” she scolded, her eyes remaining closed.
Levitation, Jason had discovered, was a perk of reaching silver-rank. It was an intrinsic property of a silver-rank soul, allowing the aura it projected to physically affect the environment. Jason’s aura, despite being stronger than Farrah’s, could not equal the feat. It was a quality versus quantity issue; Jason lacked not the aura power but the inherent properties of a silver-rank soul. Which hadn’t stopped him from wasting a good amount of time trying to replicate it anyway.
“You need to get back to aura training,” Farrah admonished. “This levitation isn’t even a practical ability. It requires intense concentration, has minimal effect, and is easy to disrupt with just some basic aura suppression.”
“Yeah, but floating as you meditate looks super cool.”
When rebuilding his suite of aura control techniques from scratch, Jason drew on various sources of knowledge, experience and inspiration. Farrah’s instruction was the bedrock, as her mastery of orthodox aura control technique made the perfect foundation onto which he could build more exotic approaches.
That began with his own experiences. He had seen a lot and frequently used his aura in combat. His soul had been savaged to the limit of tolerance and, with help, come back stronger than ever. All of that gave him a wealth of personal experience to incorporate into his new aura control praxis.
Vermillion also had contributions to make. While the vampire’s aura operated somewhat dissimilarly to an essence user’s, he had numerous insights into fine aura control, having spent decades using it on normals without them ever being the wiser.
A source of inspiration was the sole diamond-ranker Jason had met, the Mirror King. His aura had felt like a part of the world around it, as if his very nature was in perfect symbiosis with the world. Jason had only been an iron-ranker at the time, with only the beginnings of the aura strength he now possessed. He didn’t know if the Mirror King’s aura truly did merge into the world around it or if it was some manner of exquisite technique. Either way, he kept the Mirror King in mind as he established not only a new baseline for his aura techniques but set a path for further growth.
The final pillar on which Jason supported his new techniques was Shade. The elusive shadow entity had a natural proclivity for stealth and years of practise that put the Mirror King to shame. He had an extensive knowledge of Order of the Reaper stealth techniques and the accumulated knowledge of previous essence users he had also served as a familiar.
Jason had never been able to emulate Shade’s own aura-masking prowess. Shade’s method of producing an aura was more alien than Vermillion’s, or at least, it had been. With the World-Phoenix’s blessing, Jason’s spiritual nature had grown much closer to that of an astral being. The methodologies didn’t directly translate, but Jason was able to glean at least some insights from Shade’s bounty of knowledge and experience.
Over the course of a month, Jason spent almost every moment either in seclusion on the houseboat or discussing aura techniques with Farrah, Shade or Vermillion. Whenever he took a break, he sought out his niece, not for training but simply for family time. He had already passed Emi’s nascent training program fully into Farrah’s hands. The only other exception to his dedicated training was a weekly gathering of friends and his closest family.
74
WALKABOUT
Jason had satisfied himself that his newly refined aura control techniques were adequate. It was now time for a test, which Vermillion had devised for him. That had brought Jason, Vermillion and Farrah to a large shopping centre in Sydney, where they were sitting on a bench not far inside the entrance.
“I’m not sure this is the best idea,” Jason said. “If I don’t get this right, the Network won’t be happy.”
“There has to be a failure condition,” Vermillion said. “If there’s no pressure, it isn’t a proper test of your abilities.”
“A gold-ranker can use their aura to pass through a crowd unnoticed,” Farrah said. “A high-end silver can do the same, and you’re approaching that level of aura strength.”
“Strength aside,” Jason countered, “I don’t actually have a silver-rank aura. Otherwise, I'd be able to levitate.”
“Levitation is a capability inherent to silver-rank auras,” Farrah said. “What you’re attempting here is a matter of strength correctly applied. You’re used to masking your aura when you’re sneaking around. This is a more sophisticated version of that.”
“That’s an understatement to the point of being a lie,” Jason said.
Farrah had originally trained Jason in the three basic functions of aura control: projecting his aura, retracting his aura and suppressing the auras of others. All aura control techniques were variations or extensions of those three. After Farrah’s death, Jason had mostly developed his skills through experience, with only occasional external guidance.