The wind taught him speed, but speed without direction is chaos. Krish discovered quickly that the newly awakened gust was not merely a toy of motion; it was a tutor that demanded discipline.
When he first tried to strike the wind outward, the air unfurled in random currents and scattered like leaves in a storm. The force ricocheted back and pried at his limbs as if testing his resolve. He nearly lost his grip on himself—his mind spooling dangerously at the edge of dizzying motion. RC's alert tone cut through his focus.
"Warning: vestibular destabilization approaching. Recommend centering protocols," she said.
Centering protocols became his mantra. He learned to make the wind bow to the small gravity of his intention. Little by little the gale became a refined instrument—swift, precise, controllable. When he moved, the currents matched him like a faithful steed. When he stopped, they folded into restful eddies that circled like waiting thoughts.
Once movement was tamed, Krish pushed further. He began coaxing the wind into patterns that carried not only speed but nuance—the way a blade whistles at the edge, the ripple on a lake when a stone skips. Wind became not simply motion but expression. It could whisper secrets or scream with dragon-tongued wrath when commanded. It could support his body between worlds, hold him aloft, or vanish entirely. Its versatility widened his concept of power.
That versatility had to be tempered by the thunder still drumming within him. Thunder demanded impact and violence; wind demanded strategy and grace. The internal friction between them could have ruptured him if he had not discovered the quiet center—the place in a man where contradiction becomes balance.
He practiced until his lungs—if lungs could be said to exist here—achedd from the exertion of imagined breath. He shaped layers of wind that folded into each other like nested gears, generating thrust without tearing the fabric of this silent space.
Silvia, when she stirred in whatever sealed slumber kept her slumbering in ancient memory, thrummed a low note that felt like approval. The dragon's presence was a distant comfort; her acknowledgement meant he was not alone in the vastness of his task.
RC's updates grew less urgent and more analytical. "Wind profile: achieved mastery of localized manipulation. Integration with thunder at 42% efficiency and rising."
Krish stopped, suspended in a ribbon of air that held him like a hand. He let the wind settle into a hum. "Forty-two percent," he repeated, tasting the numbers like a promise. "Then we grow to fifty. Then to a hundred."
He felt the wind answer him with the faint scent of far-off storms—possibility on the horizon. The void, once merely emptiness, had become a place of training floors, each element layering like floors of a tower of being. He would climb them all.
And somewhere in the silence, thunder rolled approval.
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