An Aphotic Zion

A city floating in dreams

One week later…..

Shibi wakes up, he is still wasted from last night’s party he attended during the Dragon’s Breath festival. “Looks like I overdid it last night, should have just stayed at home” he says as he starts to get out of bed, his looks up at the time and jumps! “Its 7’00 am already!! “ He runs up to take a quick shower and change his clothes. The VI in his room cleans gets turned on for the routine clean up. The VI gets projected as a Hard-light projection and cleans up the room while Shibi gets dressed in his new uniform. He looks at the mirror as he moves his head too quickly. And realizes that his reflection takes more some time to form perfectly. “What just happened? I guess I am still shaken by the drinks I had last night. “He stops and gives a thought to what he just said “Come to think of it, I didn’t take any drinks last night, then why I do feel so dizzy? “

He then heads out to reach the academy but then he gets an incoming message from Nuong that says “Meet us near the training grounds, we have stepped up our schedule due to an attack on the Grissom Academy” He starts running to get to the training grounds, the 2nd section of the air is filled with sky cars so the uses his Hesh to increase his running speed and he makes a dash for the Training grounds, even though he doesn’t knows where this training ground is; he keeps running for a few minutes and then realizes that he has been running blindly all this time so he stops there and calls Nuong for the co-ordinates “Hey, I don’t think that I know where this training ground exactly is, so would you mind uploading the co-ordinates to my holocom? “ Nuong is greatly disappointed so she just locks on to Shibi’s position and teleports him at the training area. “Seriously? Even if you didn’t knew where to go you could just check-in at Grissom and get redirected here! “. He apologizes and then gets up.

Shibi looks around the training ground where he sees various Hesh students training there. Some are training in use of Hesh Module 2 while rest are trying Hesh module 1. So, Shibi goes up in the cabin where he finds his squad Instructor, Kaiden Alenko, who is a council Spectre and the first even human to gain both Tech and Hesh powers. He looks at Shibi’s appearance and quickly finds out that he is a ‘Firebrand’, so he stops him from entering the Hesh module 1 and Hesh Module 2 practice areas so that he doesn’t kills other students accidently. “Sorry son but those areas are off limits for you? You have to learn Dark Matter or better known as Dark Hesh before you can learn the use of Hesh Module 2 and Hesh module 1 “He bluffs about the fact that he has to learn Dark matter before he can learn Hesh module 1 and Hesh Module 2. He knows all about the deadly powers of a Firebrand, after all he has seen them first hand during the 4th Great War.

Kaiden takes Shibi to another training ground which is especially reserved for Hesh experts. When they reach that place they can see some targets floating in the air, some stationary targets in front of them and some moving targets behind them. “First, focus your energy; leave all the tension behind and then channel that power to make a Hesh ball like this” says Kaiden as he makes a Hesh ball which looks like a blue flame in his hand and then he throws multiple balls like that to take down 3 moving targets and 3 stationary targets. “Alright then, I will be watching you from that tower. Make sure that you don’t mess it up completely.” Kaiden describes him the use of Hesh as he leaves the ground. So, Shibi sits down, puts creates a barrier surrounding his body and then places his hands out in a position, a small blue ball of flame emerges in between of his hands. But he keeps meditating with that ball in his hands for a few minutes as if he already knows how to charge up his Hesh beforehand. Then he stands up and throws a powerful Hesh ball which is also known as the Dark Matter! The Dark Matter strikes one target, destroys it, then moves on to another, the process goes on until it destroys 5 total targets and then it stops. But this attack has taken a heavy toll on Shibi’s body. He gets tired so he drops down.