Beatitudes

Episode 96.

Isaac moved at the foremost position as they began to hasten their assault on the wolf to prevent it from quickly healing up and thus lose the only advantage they had.

It was a tacit understanding that was met with no disapproval, Isaac was after all, the only one who could inflict any substantial wound on the wolf and thus create an opening for them as well.

Charging forward, a white sword condensed from its hilt down to the sword tip at a very fast speed. It was a wonder as to how he was able to still easily condense a sword shortly after condensing an object as big as the one he just did minutes ago.

Only he knew that he reached somewhat a new high in his willpower manipulation. The massive fly swatter had disappeared after doing its job, but it actually hadn’t dissipated into the surroundings like how his constructs usually did in the past. He had gotten a flash of inspiration in his fuming state due to haven been tossed out of the fifth floor like a ragdoll earlier, and he finally had a better understanding of the spiral of willpower within him. Forward to release, backwards to recall…

Willpower was something on a somewhat ephemeral level, hard to grasp, yet remaining ever so present within one’s self. This was how it normally was as every single person, every single being that lives had a variable amount of willpower that they possessed.

Perhaps he had always had it in him like that or perhaps it came to be after he had gained his class, but Isaac knew and could definitely tell that his willpower was somewhat different. It manifested within him with a visible color, and could even take a myriad number of forms. He hadn’t explicitly been told that the misty white energy he wielded was his willpower, instead he had an instinct, a sort of instinct that was there to clarify it for him.

He was able to grow and wield his willpower, but he had only been wielding it for a short while so there wasn’t much he could do with it. He could only comprehend how to wield it at his own pace. And he had only finally been able to understand something, which he absolutely knew to be a crucial point, today.

When he fought, he had always been exhausting a large amount of his willpower a little too quickly than he could manage with. It was the one thing that had mostly always limited his fighting skills and attacks to incessantly keep on slashing his sword and only occasionally condensing extra spikes to pierce his opponents and catch them off guard.

He had already assumed that as he grew in ranks and tiers, his willpower would naturally rise along with it and thus give him much more energy for more flexibility in battle, hence the reason why he kept things on as it was. It was only now that he realized that his willpower gathered within him in the form of a white spiral, an ever-moving spiral.

Obviously it was something he was already aware of, not that he was oblivious to it. But there was a deeper meaning to the way his energy gathered. A spiral was an odd shape that couldn’t exactly be said to be a shape actually. Instead it was like a path, a path for flow. Anything could flow along the path in any state it existed in. His willpower followed this continuously winding path as each successive winding took a progressively longer distance and time than the last.

When looking at something flowing along a path, two things are considered out of many, the speed of the flowing energy or substance and the direction in which it flows. These two things would naturally also apply when it came to Isaac’s willpower flowing along the path of a spiral.

Since it was his own willpower in question, he was naturally able to control wherever it was, whether outside or inside his body. But he had never been able to alter or control these two mechanisms of his flow. On the path of a spiral, the speed of flow would naturally increase as the width of each winding grew bigger. He could hasten the speed by moving his spiral faster. This would allow him the ease to condense objects quicker than he usually did.

The even more significant mechanism of his flow was the direction, that was the main thing he had realized at the moment, and was what spurred him on to gaining a sudden enlightment, if that was something he could call it.

Forward to release, backwards to recall…

These words contained the essence of his enlightment. He realized one thing, whenever he drew willpower from his spiral to attack with, the spiral spun with the energy within flowing in a forward direction. This was how it had always been and he came up with a thought due to it. If I can direct the flow forward to release my willpower, to draw it back into my body I should be able to do that by directing the flow backwards instead…

It was a thought that held no certainty for success, but perhaps because the energy in question was his willpower, he was somewhat able to instinctually know what to do, all he needed was a little spark of inspiration flaring up once in a while. The method did exactly what was thought of it.

When he tried it for the first time, which was just a while ago after swatting the wolf away, he found out that like the push that was exerted on his willpower when it flowed forward, a similar yet opposite force was exerted when it flowed backwards. A mild yet firm pull was what erupted when he did it.

It was that mild pull from the spiral that forcefully drew back all his willpower that was about dissipating once released outside his body and merging back with the surroundings.

Now that he had confirmed such a theory of his spiral, he was elated to realize that the wonders of his spiral had probably not yet been fully revealed.

He was now able to retain a considerable amount of his willpower throughout any battle. This meant he could be more versatile and flexible, but he still had to watch out. Although he was able to pull back the willpower that he had already released from within him, an amount that was neither negligible nor was it excessive was still able to escape the force of his pull. It wasn’t about the force of his pull at this point, it was more like an exchange that had to be given for wielding like his.