40 Testing

Name:Hero's Return Author:Artpyro
[Message From Art]

I'm trying out a new format when it comes to how I write this story, I think it might make explaining the surroundings and story much easier and better whilst also allowing me to easily add to the dialogue, but that's just me. Tell me if you like it and if you don't I'll switch back to the old format.

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Constant banging sounds could be heard in Sora's space, the field was filled with craters, some deeper than others - all of these craters completely missing the target. There were definitely craters getting closer and closer to the target but the amount of shots that had been fired were numerous.

Sora was exhausted, huffing and puffing at a rapid pace. Inwardly, he could almost feel Leah shaking her head side to side.

Le: "Oh my..."

Sora smiled and repositioned himself.

So: "I did tell you... I'm really bad at this..."

Sora had been here for hours now. After taking a short pause, he once more practiced in his aura placement, unlike before he could withstand the recoil from the shooting aspect but now he had to work on directing all that power to a single point. Once more he positioned himself in line with the target and readied the arrow.

Sora took a deep breath as he pulled back the bowstring, at the same time placing his aura into his eyes, fingertips, and a smaller amount all around the rest of his body in order to reinforce his stance.

Looking straight towards the target he exhaled and let go of the bowstring, the recoil blasted his arms back a small distance but he had held his ground.

The arrow pierced through the entirety of the field, flying straight towards the target.

Sora looked with anticipation.

Le: "Way better..."

With this inward comment he felt even more excited than before, he subconsciously held his free hand in a fist near his chest, his excitement moving higher and higher. This shot seemed like the most promising one so far!

As the arrow sped towards the target, Sora's excitement reached it's highest point!

Le: "But... it's not enough..."

Sora couldn't help but look at the ground, seemingly trying to look inside himself at Leah.

So: "Huh? What?"

Sora had only looked down for a split second but as soon as he looked up he found that the target was completely fine, with only a hole in the middle from the shot fired by Leah earlier. The only difference being a crater behind the target.

Sora sighed and slumped down but quickly rose up with a more optimistic expression.

Smiling he said.

So: "Well that's much closer than the other ones"

Leah seemed to be smiling from inside him.

Le: "At least you shot it that far now, let's stop here"

Sora was confused.

So: "What? Why stop now? I got really close"

Leah gave an inward sigh.

Le: "Alright, try to fire another shot"

Sora didn't know why Leah wanted to stop, he followed her order and did the same thing. Inhaling and holding his breath as he pulled on the bowstring, pouring his aura into the appropriate places.

Looking straight towards the target he attempted to let go of the bowstring but for a reason unknown to him he couldn't, exhaling and holding his positioning he looked at his hands.

Le: "See that's the problem"

Sora's eyes widened. His hands were trembling, looking around his entire body he saw that most of his limbs were trembling.

Le: "For some reason you don't notice your own exhaustion, anyone would be tired after constantly using aura for hours"

Sora unsummoned the bow, as soon as he did he fell straight to the floor.

Le: "Yes, you're getting closer but you need to know your limits. Overworking is just as unhealthy as underworking, so far throughout your entire life you've been training with the sword, your gauntlets and now my bow. You've never really fully dedicated time to just building up your stamina"

Only after finally stopping did Sora feel the exhaustion creep across his entire body. Looking towards Mana he said.

So: "Hey... Mana..."

Sora let out a deep breath.

So: "How long have I been here?"

Ma: "About 8 hours"

Sora had explained to Mana when he started out that the first shot was just extremely lucky. Whilst Mana could read Sora's mind the predecessors had set up an anti-magic barrier around them that blocked most magic that could find them.

So: "Jeez, I think I'm gonna rest up a bit"

Ma: "To think you'd spend your first day doing nothing but training..."

Sora smiled as he stood up.

So: "Well I'm trying to learn a new thing"

The spatial sprites had been created in order to serve the students, no matter what power they held. So Sora creating weapons out of darkness and light sparked no curiosity from Mana.

Ma: "Well, I'll retract this field for now then"

So: "Thanks"

Rin, who had been sleeping up until now ran up to Sora as he walked back into the house, jumping back on his shoulder before he entered.

The rooms that had been created for anyone in the school had any basic necessities that they could imagine, so Sora had everything he needed in here. After taking a short bath he changed clothes and jumped onto his bed. As he was about to fall asleep an idea popped into his head, he looked towards the small dark ball bouncing around the room slowly.

So: "Hey, Mana"

The ball expanded to about double it's size.

Ma: "Do you need something?"

So: "Is this whole 'space' thing separated from other people's 'spaces'?"

Ma: "What? Do you mean are all the rooms in the same pocket dimension?"

So: "Yeah"

Ma: "Well, put simply, yes. Why?"

So: "There's a whole bunch of sprites like you right? All connected by mental links?"

Ma: "Yes? Oh, that's what you want"

Sora was confused for a small time but figured it out.

So: "Read my mind?"

Ma: "Yeah"

So: "Um... can you only read my mind when I request something please?"

Ma: "Well technically this is a request"

Sora laughed.

So: "I guess so, anyway, is it possible?"

Ma: "What you're specifically thinking is impossible, but I can send a letter through the space to a specific space"

So: "Well I guess that would work, we'll test it out later. Thanks Mana"

Ma: "No problem"

Mana shrunk back into a small ball that began slowly bouncing around the room. Sora looked at him it for a short while before looking towards the ceiling of his room and slowly falling to sleep. Rin, who had slept during Sora's training took a while but she had fallen asleep next to Sora eventually.

[After a long time]

Sora slowly opened his eyes, he looked to his side and saw Rin peacefully sleeping next to him. He carefully shuffled out of bed so as to not disturb Rin and walked towards a table near the bed, sitting down on the chair next to it he took some paper from a stack of papers on the table and drew a pen to begin writing.

The letter was mostly questions for his friends about how their rooms and experiences were, whilst it had really been only a day, Sora spent all of it training. He wanted to see what the others were doing.

Finishing the letter, he stood up and folded it up.

So: "Mana"

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...

Sora was confused, now that he looked around he realised that the small ball that bounced around his room was completely gone.

Sora was frantic.

So: "Mana?!"

Sora was running around the space, looking everywhere he could have looked.

So: "Wait... isn't he supposed to appear no matter what anyway?"

Sora looked towards Rin, who was still sleeping.

So: "This doesn't make sense... I'm panicking and Rin hasn't woken up..."

Worried about Rin, he ran towards her from across the room, before he could reach her the entire room shattered, revealing the outside of the room, Sora expected to see the endless space that he had gotten used to seeing but was met with a completely different environment. A Purple moon filled the sky with a flourescent violet colour, fire ran around across the ground and the entirety of the endless land around him was barren.

Sora was thrust into this world from his room in the air and was currently falling. Rin was still sleeping and falling with him, as he reached out to her fur began to burn. In an even more panicked state than before Sora reached out his hand for her but she had already turned to ashes.

Sora's state of mind was all over the place right now. He didn't know what to think, but as the ground came closer to him at an extremely quick pace he subconsciously guarded himself and tried to slow his fall, but no magic he had access to could defend against this, preparing for the worst he closed his eyes as he landed on the ground.

Sora felt no pain, he was confused, as he opened his eyes he found that he had landed on the ground completely fine, the ground didn't even seem to have been touched under him as there was no crater or even small cracks left on it.

So: "What is..."

Before thinking about anything else Sora heard crying in the distance, seemingly by a group of people instead of a single person. Suppressing his own current emotions he tried to charge light magic to run towards it but realised that he couldn't use magic.

So: "What?!"

Attempting to use aura he quickly realised that that didn't work either. Frustrated, he began to run towards the crying. As he did he began to hear dialogue, but as he got closer the words that he heard began to grow distorted, he couldn't make out exactly what they were saying.

He reached the point where he heard the crying and in the distance he saw a small group of people, they seemed to be huddled around a single person, they were all kneeling whilst the person was lying on the ground. One of the smaller people seemed to be trying to heal his wounds but it didn't look to be effective, the one in the middle was definitely dying.

Sora currently was watching this from the top of a small cliff, without hesitation he jumped down to try and continue towards the people but as he hit the ground he seemed to fall into it, as if it was water. As he sunk deeper and deeper he was surrounded by darkness but there was no water, he didn't feel at risk of drowning at all - he just felt as if he was floating.

In the darkness he heard voices, some he felt sounded familiar whilst others were completely unknown.

"You'll never reach the peak"

"I will do it!"

"I'd rather die trying to save everyone, rather than live with the knowledge that everyone I know might die anyway"

"You really think I'm that weak? I may not be the most powerful of the ones who hold this power but that doesn't mean I'm weak!"

"So many unwanted expectations... I want it all to go away..."

"Why was I chosen for this?!"

"Fists of the dark?"

"How are you able to control both?!"

"A Bow utilising both elements? Shouldn't that be impossible?!"

"We've had many enemies over the line, whether that be me, or anyone before me! You're not anything special!"

"Oh come on... you guys were smiling a second ago..."

"What... is that weapon..."

The surrounding voices boomed in Sora's head, constantly growing louder and louder as well as more and more numerous. Sora put both hands on his head, he had an intense headache.

'What are these voices?!'

With each passing line he felt the emotion behind them.

So: "Could this be?!"

Before he could think any more than this, more and more voices swirled around in his head.

"Why do you think I was chosen and you weren't?"

"Imagine thinking that someone like you could ever make it anywhere but the bottom!"

"Why me?!"

"You're insane... how could you do that to a friend?!"

"I never trusted any of you..."

"You're like an angel..."

"You devil!"

"How could I lose to the likes of you?!"

"Destruction is just a fancy word for boredom"

"I do it because I want to, not because I need to or was told to by someone else, if I want to do it I'll do it!!!"

"I... leave everything...

to you..."

Sora opened his eyes and jolted up from his bed, his hand seeming to extend for something out of reach. He was sweating all over his body and his heartrate had sped up to an extremely fast beat, he was hyperventilating. Rin had already woken up as she sensed some kind of inner torment from her master whilst he was sleeping, Sora saw that she had walked up to his side and he immediately picked her up and embraced her.

So: "Still alive... still alive..."

Sora's breathing began to calm over time, Rin had enjoyed being praised by Sora as she saw Sora as both her master and friend but this was a different kind of embrace, sensing this she didn't try to move at all.

Sora slowly exhaled and looked around the room, everything seemed to be in order, including the small dark ball bouncing around.

So: "So... just a nightmare..."