Chapter 98 - Dora Reva

Dora vocalised her issue hesitantly. "It's not that I don't want to focus... It's just... there are too many things around me calling for my attention."

Guy followed up with a few questions to narrow down the true cause of the girl's problems. After realising that developmental disorders were present in this world, through diagnosing Kano's dyslexia, Guy raised his perceptivity to possible outcrops of any other similar problems amongst his wards.

Now, Guy initially assumed that Dora was suffering from ADHD, a neurodevelopmental disorder that affects an individual's ability to focus. It also affects their capacity to control their impulsive behaviours. Many of the girl's actions and mannerisms pointed towards it as being the cause.

However, through questioning her, Guy realised that his hypothesis may not be completely true.

"So by other things calling for your attention, you literally mean other things CALLING for your attention?" Guy repeated in disbelief, to which the girl nodded vehemently.

"Can you give me an example?" Guy asked.

Dora pursed her lips and hummed in contemplation. After a short pause, she pointed at a faraway branch of a tree and said, "That bird keeps saying weird things. Like "Witness me!", "Observe my vibrant tailfeathers!", and "Show yourself, you saucy wench!"

Dora frowned and asked with an innocent expression, "What does "Let this magnificent one betow his virile seed upon thee!" mean?"

Guy's face contorted with distress and urgency. He quickly spun up a |Gust| spell and flung it towards the branch in question, causing a plush bird to stumble out and fly away.

"Now it's saying "Which interloper dare disturb this magnificent one? Come out and kowtow three times before me, or face my undying wrath!" Dora translated the retreating chirps.

"You can understand their speech?" Guy asked in surprise.

"Ummm," The girl scratched her chin as though she were struggling with an explanation. "It does feel the same way as talking with other people. With these animals, it just makes sense. Inside, I just know what they want to tell me."

"And you're finding it difficult to filter out these... voices?" Guy probed. The girl affirmed with loud nods and exhaled in relief.

"Hmm... Why haven't you told this to anyone else?"

Dora wore a bitter expression and answered, "I tried... But they just thought that I was making excuses."

"You didn't tell your family either?"

"No... I was afraid they would think the same..."

Guy sighed in distress. "You poor girl..." he muttered under his breath. He didn't expect Dora to have such a deep chip on her shoulders.

But what bothered Guy, even more, was the fact that her problem was a bit beyond his level of understanding. Sure, Guy was trained to handle most normal developmental disorders, learning disabilities, and childhood mental illnesses. However this! Would this even qualify as a disorder, disability or illness? If anything, this seemed to be more of an ability and Guy was severely underinformed to make any assumptions and/or conclusions on the matter.

Yet the problem remained. Dora's so-called gift was also hindering her from pursuing tasks she was interested in.

Guy gestured for Dora to take a seat, and he himself slumped down into his own. Guy retreated into the RoK and sought out any books he could find that may aid him in the matter. Due to the limits imposed by Mast regarding the access to some of the books, Guy could seek out highly technical and research focussed literature, as they were apparently too advanced. However, some of the more commercial literature catering to self-help and so on were accessible.

Thus, Guy picked as many of them that fit his search parameters and started to scan through them. All though it had been some time since he read these books, the gist of their content was ingrained into his mind, so there was little time wasted in chasing down false leads.

While Guy was perusing the books, Markus had arrived with lunch. He handed Dora's share to her and placed Guy's in front of his Master, who was sitting still with a blank expression. Markus had seen his Master enter this state many times before, so he chose not to disturb him.

Unfortunately, Guy didn't exit the state for at least an hour, causing the lunch to turn cold. Markus frowned and proceeded to remove the cold food, but he was stopped by his Master who just happened to exit his checked-out state.

"It's alright! I can still eat it," Guy said.

"But Master, it's cold. Let me at least warm it up?" Markus replied.

Guy activated a custom spell that started to both simultaneously circulate and heat the air above the food. Gradually the food items started to heat up under the convective current.

"There! All done!" Guy exclaimed and scarfed down the contents in large gulps.

"Dora! Let's go!" He called out after finishing his food.

Right as he stood up, Jean arrived as it was time for their session on theory and application of magic.

Guy clicked his tongue in realisation, and quickly said, "Markus! I want you to get started with Jean and gauge her current level of understanding. If she is a complete newbie, start by going through the basic curriculum you covered back at the Academy. She needs to have a thorough understanding of manipulating and shaping mana. She must also understand the theories pertaining to the properties of mana."

Markus nodded in affirmation and pulled Jean over.

Guy called Dora to an open area and told her to wait there. He then went back into the orphanage and brought out two large woven mats from the storage. He unrolled them and placed them three arm's length away from each other.

He sat down in a lotus position on one of the mats and gestured for Dora to do the same on the other.

"From today onwards, every morning before your lessons, I want you to come out here and practice the following set of exercises with me. The problem you are facing right now is narrowing your focus to contain only one task and one goal. The issue is that your senses are receptive to a plethora of inputs all at once, and your mind is finding it difficult to grasp onto them one at a time."

Through his quick research Guy was directed to one solution, meditation. There have been many studies on the benefits of meditation and how it can affect a human being's mind. Although these publications were outside Guy's limits in the RoK, he still had access to the commercial texts that condensed this into bitesize chunks.

Guy realised that by teaching Dora to meditate, not the kind used to replenish mana, he could train her to compartmentalise the inputs assaulting her senses. However, standard meditation was simply too boring.

In fact, this wasn't Guy's first attempt in introducing meditation into children's daily schedules. He had tried many times before in his past life and failed in the process. Finally, through repeated trials and errors Guy found out the most optimal method. Though this wasn't guaranteed to succeed, there was a higher probability of it sticking.

And this method was by practising Yoga.

In the modern age, this practice which originated in ancient India had evolved into a form of physical and mental exercises seeking to centre the mind, build core strength, and improve overall well-being. There were many theories, techniques and variations of this form that could be applied to a variety of different cases.

However, Guy simply sought this out for the purpose of tempering his students. It was a healthy practice that didn't take a lot of time, nor did it take a lot of investment. Anyone could practise it and enjoy its results, and it also doubled as an effective form of meditation. There were many health benefits to Yoga, and Guy took some time during his later years to learn it for the purpose of propagating it.

Although he couldn't say that he was an expert in Yoga, Guy was trained in it to a sufficient degree to tailor the exercise from person to person.

"What we will be practising is called Yoga. It is a meditation exercise the trains both the mind and body. Before we begin, we will first stretch so that our body is loosened up."

Although Yoga was inherently a stretching based exercise, it was safest to warm up the muscles to reduce any unwanted consequences. This was especially important since the practitioner in question was a little girl.

Guy expertly cycled through a sequence of stretches, the first half of which were all grounded. Dora had some trouble replication some of the more complex stretches such as the "Eye of the Needle Pose". In those cases, Guy personally showed her the correct positioning and the intended outcomes. Each time Guy showed her a new pose, he would explain what the targeted muscles or segments were and how they should feel. The girl didn't understand the terminology in the beginning, however, through repetition and application she started to hum and nod along affirmatively.

After going through the stretches. Guy began by displaying the first 5 sets of poses Dora needed to master.

"This first pose that you need master is the Child's Pose. Think of it as a resting position that you can move through before attempting another more difficult pose. While you are doing this, you need to breathe measuredly, not hurriedly. And always focus on your breaths!"

Guy displayed the pose using his body and then asked Dora to replicate it. The Child's Pose was inherently easy and she didn't have much trouble repeating it. However, there were still a few deviations that Guy corrected while calmly drawing Dora's attention to her own breath.

"Never deviate your attention from your breath. Feel it as it enters your lungs, and feel it as it gushes out through your nostrils. If you're finding it hard to do so, try to find a fixed point in your gaze and keep it firmly within your attention."

After ten breaths, Guy moved on to the next pose, The Cat-Cow Pose.

"This is an alternating pose. We start on all fours..."

Guy displayed the sequence slowly and asked Dora to replicate him. After adjusting her body, Guy moved her through the inhaling and exhaling regime. "The goal is to loosen the spine and back. Don't rush through it, slow and steady, slow and steady."

____

"Cantrips are a good way to gain a decent understanding of how mana circulates through the body during spell casting. One thing I want you to focus on this time is where the mana circulation starts- Jean, are you listening?" Markus said while snapping his fingers in front of a distracted Jean.

"Uh? Sorry Senior Brother, I got a little distracted," Jean quickly apologised.

Markus followed Jean's gaze and observed his Master and Dora moving through a bunch of mundane gestures and poses on a mat.

"What is Teacher Larks doing?" Jean inquired during the pause.

"I... don't know," Markus confessed with a loud exhale. "Master is very... well-informed. What may come across as nonsensical shenanigans often hide vast and boundless insights."

Right as Markus finished the statement, his Master and Dora both entered a pose in which they raised their bottoms upwards and held their bodies in a triangular shape with the floor.

PRRRRT!

"Uh oh! Sorry about that!" Guy exclaimed with loud laughter.

"T-Teacher Larks..." The little girl said with a flustered expression.

"Sorry about that you guys! That was my bad!" Guy then apologised to Markus and Jean and continued explaining the pose to the now crimson Dora.

"Isn't Teacher Larks in Foundation Establishment realm?" Jean questioned in a low tone to Markus.

Markus hummed in affirmation.

"Then shouldn't his body not produce any waste?" She added.

Markus hummed once again.

"Then?..."

"He's saving someone else from embarrassment," Markus replied as he shook his head with a faint smile.

____

Guy brushed off the incident as if it never happened and continued instructing the girl, amidst her obvious embarrassment. Eventually, her mind centred itself as she entered a deep trancelike state.

It looked as though the exercise was a success. Dora exhaled a long breath as she terminated the final pose and gazed out with a calmer, less erratic, expression.

"I-I don't hear them anymore!" Dora exclaimed with a low mutter. Multiple small fireworks exploded in the girl's mind as a sense of relief washed over her. This feeling... It was new... And satisfying!

"Don't get so excited now. This is only temporary. You will have to keep practising this if you want to maintain this state of mind."

Although the girl now had improved clarity, she didn't hear a single word Guy said. She was too distracted to appreciate the silence around her.

She quickly rubbed her eyes with her sleeves and leapt into Guy's arms while sniffling.

"Thank you! Teacher Larks!"

While Guy was caught up in the sudden turn of events, Mast interjected in his mind, (You have your fourth student now.)