39 Aspects of Peace and Calamity

As Sora fell asleep his body completely shut down, finally being given the rest it craved. Sora found himself floating in a dark sea of his own consciousness, he could immediately recognise this place, floating above a black space, with only him present. He had been here many times now and was expecting someone to come and greet him, but no one did, not for a long time, he didn't know how much hours had passed outside but to him, he had been floating in this space for quite a while now. When sensing his surroundings on the outside to see if this was because of some kind of magic he only saw that familiar looking room, with Rin next to him and a small black ball bouncing around the walls and surfaces of the room, nothing was really out of the ordinary.

Finally, a bright light began to coalesce into a single point, bursting in a small explosion of energy, revealing Azu.

Az: "What are you doing here?"

So: "Huh? Didn't you call me?"

Az: "No? Why would you think that?"

So: "Well, usually the only reason I'm here is because you or one of the other guys wants to tell me something"

Az: "Well none of us have anything to say to you right now..."

So: "Oh. Then... how do you explain why I'm here?"

Az: "I don't know... it can't be... did you slip here on your own?"

So: "Maybe, I don't really know how slipping in and out of here works so maybe I did it accidentally"

Azu seemed to be surprised.

Az: "If that's the case... you've grown closer to us somehow"

Sora was confused now too.

So: "Grown... closer?"

Az: "Well that's the only explanation, if you can come in here on your own now then you must have grown closer to us somehow"

So: "What? What does coming 'closer' even mean?"

Az: "Essentially you've gotten stronger somehow, we were watching everything on the outside though, the only reason I noticed you is because you sensed what was outside from in here, we felt that and I immediately came here"

So: "Hmmmm, well if that's the case, what does getting closer to you guys do to me?"

Az: "Simply, you get more powerful, you'll probably get the ability to summon our weapons in the future too, but that's entirely up to you - I never did it because I never learnt anything outside of using my fists"

So: "Really?! So I can use the bow that lady had? Or even the other predecessors that I haven't met yet?"

Az: "Well yeah, but probably not to the same effectiveness that they used it with. Think of us like entities that you can borrow the powers of, but obviously the weaker you are the weaker your connection to us will be, so that means your use of our weapons and powers are limited"

So: "Oh, I actually wanted to ask you about that"

Az: "Hm? About what?"

So: "In terms of how much I can really access for Peace and Calamity, where would you say I stand?"

Az: "Hmmmm..."

Az: "Maaaybe aboooout..."

Az: "6%? Somewhere around that ballpark"

So: "What?! That low?!"

Az: "Well yeah, how else do you think you're gonna beat that demon, I think I died at around the 60% stage, so as of now I'm about 10x stronger than you, and you have a pretty good foundation from your childhood"

So: "Seriously... has anyone ever reached 100%?"

Azu thought about it for a while.

Az: "Well technically yes, the first user reached 100% but we only say that because he was the first user, he's the one who reached the highest, the actual cap hasn't been reached by anyone, we've just been using his peak as the current goal of 100%"

So: "So it can go much higher?"

Sora looked at Azu with expectant eyes as Azu bumped him on the shoulder with his fist.

Az: "Don't look too far, stay to getting to my level first at least"

Sora laughed.

So: "Yeah I guess, oh yeah, there's something else I need to ask about. Since I don't really know who else to ask"

Az: "Hm? What do you need to know?"

So: "Since you guys are linked to me I wanted to ask, did you guys do something earlier when I cried?"

Az: "Oh, about that, all I'll tell you is that you can probably feel our emotions a bit too, now that you've grown closer to us"

So: "So what does that mean? One of you were sad?"

Az: "You could say that"

So: "Sad about what though?"

Az: "I... can't say"

So: "Oh, well I won't ask any further then, no point"

Sora used a teasing tone for the last portion of his sentence but he let it go.

So: "So, I guess I'll go back to the real world to try and use some weapons of yours"

Az: "You can try"

Azu smiled, Sora was already using his weapon but in terms of effectiveness Azu was far beyond Sora in every way. Just as turned to leave he looked back at Azu.

So: "Oh yeah"

Az: "Hm? What?"

So: "Can you tell me the name of your teammates now?"

Azu chuckled.

Az: "Pfft, get outta here"

Sora smiled.

So: "I'll get you to tell me one day you know"

Az: "Yeah well.. that day isn't today... seeya"

The black space around the both of them became more and more reminiscent of Sora's outside surroundings, until Azu had completely disappeared and Sora woke up from his sleep. Looking up he saw the same small ball floating around and Rin, at his side, was now awake, staring directly at him. He looked up to the ball.

So: "Hey, Mana!"

The ball immediately expanded and formed into the same sprite he saw when he first walked into the room.

Ma: "What?"

So: "How long have I been sleeping?"

Mana took a short pause.

Ma: "About 10 hours?"

So: "10?!"

Ma: "Yeah 10"

So: "Jeez, didn't feel like 10... anyway. Could you make me a training ground, I wanna try something out, make it long and put some kind of target at the end. I wanna try something"

Ma: "Sure thing"

Within seconds a field had been made outside his room, the surrounding black space had now been transformed into a huge field, with mountains and forests filling the background as well as a blue sky. Sora walked out and was surprised, Rin, who was on his shoulder jumped down to the ground.

So: "I didn't ask for all this other stuff, why did you do it?"

Ma: "Read your mind, put the picture in there out here"

So: "Oh, well that's useful"

In the distance Sora saw a target, from where he was standing he could gauge that the distance was about 70-80ft away.

So: "This'll make for a good start I guess..."

Sora closed his eyes and focused, thinking of the same bow and arrow that he saw one of the previous owners 'Leah' holding.

Before long a black bow created by darkness appeared in his hand, the bow itself had intricate carvings on it that only added to it's beauty, the bowstring was made of light magic that was extremely flexible and strong. In his other hand an arrow of light appeared that had similar carvings etched onto the arrow. Looking straight at the target he readied the arrow and pulled the bowstring as far as he could, focusing his aura into his hands and eyes in order to both keep his aim accurate and steady. Even with all of this support though Sora found that his aim on the target wasn't perfect, he wasn't used to precise, miniscule movements as he was more focused on fast, agile movement that allowed him to out-maneuver his opponent and make the most out of small openings. Staying immobile and focusing an an attack on a single point from range wasn't something he was used to, as soon as he picked his preferred weapons during his childhood those were the weapons he was trained in - he had some light training on how to properly hold and fire an arrow from a bow but that was about as far as it had gone.

So: "Rez is way better at this precision stuff"

Sora recognised that he probably couldn't make the shot, the readied bow disappeared in his hands as he looked straight towards the target and he relaxed his body. He looked towards Mana and tried to ask him to shorten the distance between him and the target, as he turned around his aura completely changed as the colour in his eyes slightly faded.

So: "Double the distance"

Mana didn't know Sora so he didn't know his abilities, and he wasn't reading his mind at this point either, the voice that Sora spoke in didn't sound like himself though, it was a much calmer tone. Sora's mind was still his own inside, he could still see everything happening on the outside and was extremely confused and worried. Rin took a hostile stance towards Sora as she could sense that he had been possessed by something, his aura had completely changed and the mental link between them was showing signs of stress and confusion, she didn't attack immediately though as whatever had done this to him showed no signs of aggression or evil intent.

Ma: "Okay"

The ball emanated tiny waves of magic and the target moved further away until it was exactly double the distance away, now being about 160ft away.

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'Sora' looked towards the target once more and resummoned the bow, this time the power within the bow seemed to respond to him, the power it exuded was completely different from before, with the dark bow having carvings of light slowly beginning to appear on it's surface. Sora could sense the aura in his body moving to his fingertips and moving specifically to his irises, as he pulled the bowstring back his body shifted to the side to get the maximum force out of the bow whilst not stressing his body too much. As he exhaled he shot the arrow towards the target, cutting through the wind and seemingly not affected by gravity or the air itself, it quickly reached its mark, straight in the middle and with enough power to completely pierce through the target itself and keep going for a couple of metres.

Ma: "That is impressive... so you're a bow user?"

The colour in Sora's eyes returned as he turned towards Mana.

So: "Wh-what?"

Rin could immediately sense that her master had returned and jumped back up on his shoulder. Sora looked at the bow in his hand and it felt like it had been a child, lost in a crowd of people, losing all connection to him and losing the same glow that it had a moment ago, the carvings disappearing and the bow turning back into a fully pitch black state with the only light on it being the bowstring.

?: "Impressive huh?"

Sora heard a familiar voice in his head. Speaking within his own mind he questioned the voice.

So: "Hello?"

?: "So you're trying to use my weapon now?"

So: "Um, yeah, are you Leah?"

Le: "Yep, as soon as I saw you trying to use my weapon I couldn't help myself, you didn't even try to shoot after all"

So: "Well... I've never been trained prop-"

Le: "Hm, I guess so, well it doesn't matter. Now that you've grown closer to us we can do stuff like possessing you for a short time and talking to you directly like this, we can be your trainers, you should have felt where I directed your aura during that, try and imitate it"

So: "Really? With the same distance?"

Le: "With the same distance"

Sora still wasn't really confident but it couldn't hurt to try

Sora tried his hardest to imitate the aura placement he had felt during his possession but no matter how hard he tried, the precise placements that Leah had done were completely outside his zone of expertise, concentrating all of his aura into one place he shot the arrow but he found that he was blown back by the force of the shot, unable to balance himself on time he fell to the floor as the arrow of light shot upwards before losing momentum and coming back down, piercing into the ground then dissipating. Sora, on the ground, was heavily breathing, the amount of power the arrow burst with was definitely impressive but he couldn't have expected the recoil from it to be this harsh.

Leah sighed.

Le: "You weren't kidding, we've been here for all your life but I didn't think you'd be this bad"

Sora, defeated, let out a laugh.

So: "Sorry, I really don't know how to use a bow - it would be useful to know though. If I had the ability to fight from both close and long range, I would have a major advantage"

Le: "Well, anything to help you survive, I'll teach you. Your the last one in the line anyway, if you die that demon will take over and all furthur successors will probably die"

Sora constantly thought about the Demonic King, but the presence of those that surrounded him managed to calm him down most of the time.

So: "Well, it's not like I can escape is it? Azu told me that this is different from 'destiny', at this point I'm just doing this to give my friends a chance to live"

Le: "It's as good a motivation as any right?"

Sora smiled.

So: "Well I'm kind of limited on options here aren't I? Don't really have much else to fight for"

Sora stood up and looked at the target once more...

So: "So how did it go again?"