Ahh — that was not a knowledge transfer. Jin thought, lying like a rag on the ground in absolute blackness, senses gone. Energy absorption or whatever better be worth that torture.
some time passed, as Jin waited.
…So are they going to heal me or what? He tried to move. Nothing. It must have been thirty minutes. At least. Right?
The next half hour boiled him into a new level of agitation. Constantly thinking of Ohner.
First he steals me from my new family right on the precipice of the true freedom I have wished for my whole life.
Gets angry at me because of his own stupidity.
Almost suffocates me to death with some sort of magical aura.
Trash talks me but forgets to mute his stupid mic from his over inflated ego.
Seemingly is on a streak of stealing from his fellow world owners or whatever.
And now he cant even heal me from the trauma he has inflicted.
Jin, in his mind, happily continued stacking up ways to repay Ohner's cruelty — when at last he felt something.
But fear struck fast. The first sense to return was touch, and what met him was not the cool marble floor he had known before as thousands of tiny pebbles pressed against the skin of his back, and a cool breeze slipped around him like a thin blanket.
No, no, they didn't… Did they already send me out? Panic rippled through him. I've gained nothing! This skill has weakened me instead of given me strength! I'm like a newborn child!
Realization then struck hard. That man said he would put me in a dangerous situation because he believed I lied to him.
I am a blind and deaf child in a vegetable like state, thrown in the middle of an unknown magical and dangerous world, with only god knows what could be staring at me.
Is he trying to kill me?!
What kind of freedom is this?
Then, without warning, the wind died. The cool air that had wrapped Jin like a blanket was suddenly replaced by a swift, suffocating heat that baked the pebbles beneath him. It lasted only a few seconds before the chill returned, the breeze once again brushing over his skin like a protective veil.
That can't be good.
Unable to move, all Jin could do was wait and stew in his thoughts.
Damn Ohner. Damn Melissa. Damn this world. Damn energy absorption. And, just because, damn the mongrel!
I'm only in this mess because some idiot keeps trying to kill what might be a god.
He wanted to groan but couldn't — his muscles still refused to obey him.
Time dragged on. The random bursts of heat were the only changes in his strange limbo. With every flare and fade, stress crept further under his skin. Hours seemed to slide by without meaning.
Might as well try to use the skill I supposedly gained. But how?
All I can do is think, so… better get to thinking.
They called it "Energy Absorption." Am I supposed to absorb electricity? Or the kinetic energy from a moving ball?
No… magic world. It's probably magical energy or something.
He fell silent again. With none of his bodily functions working properly, there was nothing to test — no hint of how his elusive ability might activate.
More time passed. Jin still couldn't form a good estimate of how long it had been. The heat hadn't returned for a while, and even his crude "heat clock" had abandoned him.
Oh. I can flex my muscles now. Can't move anything, but I can flex. Great…
It wasn't much, but at least it was something he could try — though he had little hope it would help.
Jin began flexing every muscle he could think of, one after another, straining with everything he had.
Come on—please work. Give me something!I can't just die here!
Seconds crawled past before his muscles began to give out. Just as the last flicker of hope started to fade, he felt something stir.
The breeze around him thickened and tugged inward, unseen to any human eye, blanketing him like a living thing. Then it plunged through his pores in a torrent of invisible needles—uncontrolled, explosive, ravaging.
Pain erupted. It was like being pierced by millions of splinters of wind.
Dammit—what's happening?! Think fast!
His mind kicked into overdrive, adrenaline burning through his thoughts.
This has to be my Energy Absorption skill.Maybe the wind's flow is too chaotic. I need to control it.
Jin imagined dragging the wind into himself in a deliberate pattern—no longer a wild rapid, but a winding, steady river. It worked, to a degree. He could now direct where the wind went inside him, though the pain remained unbearable.
Great. Now I'm just controlling the destruction of my own body. What else am I missing?
Energy absorption…Wind is energy, so that should be—
…Freaking magical world!
Energy absorption must just be this world's version of mana… or ether.
If they altered my body to absorb energy, then I'm doing it halfway right. But how do I convert raw air into something I can actually use?
I contract my muscles, pull in my surroundings. I'm missing something… maybe a cleansing process? Like a water purifier. A sieve.
Well, might as well try something before I die.
Jin forced the pull of the surrounding wind even harder than before, but this time he pictured his pores as cylindrical sieves. He didn't know what this energy was, only that his skill should sift it somehow—separating what he needed from what would destroy him.
And it worked. The stabbing wind turned into a smoother flow, a soothing current of something—some kind of energy—coursing through him.
Gotta find out the real name of this stuff later… but first, fix the other problem.
The wind-needles already inside him weren't leaving. Worse, as he absorbed more energy from outside, the harder it was to control the entire flow. The needles bunched up, pressing against his pores from the inside, unable to escape.
Ah—ah—ah— Jin gritted his teeth as he tried shifting the mass of needles, dragging them from his left arm, across his chest, down through his right arm, into his hand, and back again.
The air energy and the wind needles aren't mixing. How do I get rid of them?!
Suddenly the ground beneath him heated, and the breeze vanished, replaced by a burst of feverish air. He reacted too slowly and accidentally absorbed the hot wind—but it filtered into something different inside him: a sort of heat energy.
Man, I don't know anymore! Take this stupid wind!
Thinking fast, Jin hurled the collected heat energy at the clumped-up wind needles.
And, impossibly, it worked—the heat tore through the needle clusters, burning them into nothingness.
Burning away the needles left behind a completely different sensation, one that washed over Jin's entire being like the embrace of a warm summer day, a soft breeze threading through his veins. For a moment, the pain gave way to something almost tranquil.
Constantly forcing my brain to manage this flow… this isn't something I want to be doing forever.
Not knowing the full intricacies of his so-called energy absorption, Jin decided to gamble. He released his mental grip and let the currents do what they wanted, surrendering to them.
At once, the heat and wind energies fanned out through every inch of him — from the tips of his fingers down to his toes. Even his long, tangled curls felt alive as power threaded naturally through them.
Ahh… this might be the best feeling ever. If only I wasn't blind, deaf, and paralyzed. I wish this stuff could heal me…
As if answering its new owner's unspoken plea, the two energies swirled together into something new. A warm, orange glow bloomed within him, clinging to his eyes, his ears, then spreading outward until his entire body shimmered faintly from within.
He could feel everything now — not sight, sound, or touch, but the subtle workings of energy inside him. He studied it as best he could. The mingled currents, the strange glow, the way each piece moved.
The wind remained wild and free, drifting wherever it pleased but always slipping back toward the lower half of his body, pooling around his feet. The heat pulsed like a tireless flame trying to expand, only to be kept in check by some unseen boundary. It liked to nestle in his soles, his palms, his elbows.
The new energy — Jin quickly dubbed it glow energy — behaved differently from either of its parents. It didn't idle or pool. It moved with intent, circling specific parts of his body like a worker inspecting damage. Jin could only assume it was healing him, little by little.
So he stayed still, lying there in darkness, clinging to that fragile hope that the glow would finish its work before something in this new world found him first.