Ink looked at a small, a couple of millimeters in diameter, transparent sphere on his index finger. She flashed with a golden light. It took some time to remove the excess power. When any hint of radiance disappeared, Ink brought his finger to the damaged area on the blade of his sickle. The sphere stretched, impregnated the damaged area of ​​the blade. It was possible to level it without much effort. Only one desire was enough to correct the consequences of careless handling of weapons.

"Power is wasted," Ink felt . "Can I use it to attack?"

A thin film covered the ground part. The will let gold energy into the finest transparent layer. It took time to remove the glow. Ink began to experiment by touching the blade of a stone floor. Saturation with power without a glow turned out to be too small to cut a stone, and with a golden flash it was consumed too quickly.

"For a one-time strike, it will do. Bring the weapon to the enemy, and sharply pump the field with force. Here the armor will not stand. Only in training fights does it make no sense to show. Immediately all this technique will understand and remember. Secret weapon for a real fight. "

To his surprise, Ink discovered that using gold energy to repair weapons is not necessary. The main thing was to impregnate the repaired area with a force field. After that, he could change the shape of the blade distorted in the experiments by the power of thought.

"The feeling that my will is confronted with the will of metal ... if the alloy is stronger, could I even align it like that?"

Testing the theory on the crumb of the stone floor showed that Ink a's abilities are not enough to somehow influence the form, but having saturated a part of the stone he can move it without touching. This kind of telekinesis fascinated. As it turned out, she also has her own shortcomings. The movement was too slow, and when going beyond the boundaries of the micromanipulation, the stone fell almost immediately. Golden energy was able to solve the problem. Ink understood that it acts as an amplifier or fuel for a given action, but could not conduct a full-fledged experiment, because the strength reserves of the newborn thin body were exhausted.

In the arena, the necromancer systematically beat the enemy. The mage was still fluttering, he managed to break the nearest spirits with three arms and heads with his explosions. To do this, he no longer used chewing gum, instead clapping his hands, creating an invisible wave of destruction.

"He can no longer precisely control his strength," Ink said , and immediately explained it was not clear to anyone. - Hands glow red.

"That's right," said Troch. - Flight is a very experienced fighter. He used to use this trick to fight against your teacher.

"Did he challenge Glam?" - marveled at Ink . "So he is also in a gold league, not a silver one?"

"A flight of silver, but rather ambitious." Crazy Glam uses a battle uniform to create six arms, but even the necromancer's merged spirits could not oppose him, either when combining in three, or after turning into an old-armed hecatonheir. Glam destroyed the huge creature with just one blow. Some of the spirits suffered so much that they fell in their power, instead of sentient beings they began to look more like half-wild animals. Flights from the highest rank of silver were lowered to medium. Even if you don't say it, necromancers take care of their servants, because they represent their strength. Since that time, Reis has been looking for a way to protect the mind of the wards. I don't know if he succeeded, but in really serious fights he never participated again.

"Does he dislike us?" - Ink came up with the idea of ​​a possible revenge on the part of the necromancer, but he immediately threw it away. "The students of Glam?"

"The flight is not so petty," Trosha's voice sounded all the same emotionless. - He got a lot in the arena, became stronger here, concluded contracts with the reborn. He cares about the rules of this place, even if he is not one of the workers. Fussing with beginners is a kind of tradition. Someone needs to put them in their place. Flight forces are more than enough.

Ink did not take his eyes off the arena. The young magician, who not so long ago famously beat up Grank , was now breathing heavily, lying on the floor of the arena. Dusty clothes torn in some places left no doubt - he got a lot. Ink noticed blood on the knuckles of the fists of the arrogant messenger Michaelon.

"I give up," the novice's voice was hoarse and muffled.

The flight left in silence. His servants turned into fog and soaked into the body of a necromancer. The audience finally stopped stopping the young magicians from going to the arena, but they were not in a hurry. The battle has already ended; they could not help defeat. No matter how high their self-esteem after the battle with Grank , now it has crashed. Nobody said a word to Ink , while he dragged a disgruntled comrade on himself to the exit from the arena.

Kiass was waiting in the room , he was looking at a brochure describing the second step of the keenra.

- What happened? - surprised golden-skinned.

"Mages have come here," Ink answered , laying his body, hissing from the pain of Grank on his bed. - They say from Michaelon.

After hearing a retelling of events, Kiass lowered his head and clasped his fingers, collecting thin metal skin into small folds.

- I thought that as a descendant of the clan I know a lot, but the world is deeper and wider than it seemed to me. Now it's clear why there is no hegemony of clans in the zero world. We are strong in the buffer, but here ... " Kiass shook his head. "The reborn ones need a high level of keenra, and the ascended ones are too few to organize a full-scale confrontation."

"Don't forget about people," Ink added . - Witch hunting in the modern world will be more effective than in the Middle Ages. Can your skin protect against a bullet shot?

"I don't know ... hardly." I do not want to check.

"Shut up already," muttered Grunk from his seat . "Maybe they are stronger now, but the time will come when I will trample these upstarts."

Kiass just sighed and shook his head.

- Already studying the second stage? - asked Arsi .

"Yes," the golden-skinned nodded, not taking his eyes off the pamphlet. "I would be grateful if you would not distract me."

"Of course, my love," the girl handed out in a joyful tune. Then she turned to Ink and said rudely. - Hey, you. Help my lover master the second step. Tell me everything. What already managed to understand about her, so that he could go around you in the level of comprehension.

"Good," Ink w was lazy to be angry at the statement and the tone with which it was made. He was much more interested in whether he could fly with the help of telekinesis on himself. Logic suggested that the displacement of objects is relative to its position and this is hardly possible. On the other hand, energy and physical embodiment are not the same thing. They exist on different planes of the universe, as Ink understood . Experiments on all the possibilities of applying a force field were required. He decided to spend one of them right now. - Look, Kiass . This is the essence of the second stage.

With these words, he presented a bright blue inscription "fool", then transferred it to Arsi's forehead . A force field permeated an imaginary radiance and, justifying Ink 's best expectations , became visible to others. Gran laughed hoarsely, pointing a finger at the girl's forehead. Kiass allowed himself a slight smile and nodded his thanks for the demonstration.

- What? - surprised Arsi .

"Come to the mirror," he first showed such a good mood, "is a fool."

- Himself a fool! - snapped the girl, running out of the room.

Arsi took a lot less time to get to the bathroom and get back than Ink expected .

"Take that curse away immediately!" She demanded upon her return.

- What else ...

- You know! My transformations do not allow to get rid of this rubbish.

The girl's words were confirmed by a change in appearance. She became younger, older, turned a parrot, a snake, a spider - the inscription always remained on her forehead. Only when it was stratified into two children was it possible to achieve some progress - the word flickered on the head of one of its incarnations.

- Take it away! Arsi demanded angrily .

- But what about helping your loved one? - teased her Ink .

The girl turned to the golden-skinned one, but he defiantly stared at the brochure.

"Beloved," the girl pouted because of complete disregard from the alchemist, "you are so cruel ..."

Arsi began to demand to remove the inscription, and Ink introduced a thin film that covered her mouth. The force-field drink made it somewhat more difficult for her to speak. However, the girl immediately separated the parrot from herself and began to scream already in his mouth. They managed to reassure her only by demonstrating the reflection in the created mirror. There was no glow. To explain that he simply removed the force field, and the inscription itself is still present, although visible exclusively to him, Ink did not.

"In the end, I endure you and these antics just for the sake of my training. You are a convenient simulator, Arsi . And stay that way. "

All attempts to influence themselves with drops of a force field turned out to be too weak, albeit sensitive. Ink thought about the natural defense mentioned by the newcomer magician and came to the conclusion that it would take something more serious than his rainbow foam to influence people.

"Curses ... Arsi may not be so far from the truth. I thought this drawing is just a figment of my imagination, which is fixed on a subconscious level. What if this is not so? The sign represents a certain energy. It is imprinted on other objects. Can this power be felt? To isolate, like a golden substance from a thin body, a lyrs? "

Ink created the sign in the palm of his hand, tried to feel it, but for the hand as if nothing existed. He tried to approximate and remove a drop of the force field to the picture. He extended his hand to the side, touched the mark with a force field and pulled it out with a thin thread. A barely noticeable hair sparkled in space. Arsi watched this with suspicion, Kiass with curiosity, and Grank with wariness.

- What is he doing? - specified the motorcyclist.

"He's getting ready to go to the third step of the keenra, as far as I can tell," the golden-skinned answered.

"You too got used to it pretty quickly, right?"

"I studied keenra even before the ascension," Kiass shrugged at the question of Grank . "In clans, everyone is given an understanding of the basics of keenra." The third step is a real beginning, the first two are just preparations for it.

"Shouldn't this interfere with the study?" - Arsi walked around the room, trying with a flick of her hand to move the sparkling thread. She was afraid to touch her and jerked several times sharply when Ink seemed to accidentally bend a line to approach the girl.

- The knowledge of exercises, but not the essence interferes. Some people find it easier to train when they know what they are doing.

"I'm one of those," said Grank rudely , still not getting out of bed. - Come on, lay it out.

- The first two steps are designed to load the brain with work. First, the subconscious is accustomed to remembering huge amounts of information. Theoretically, the space on a neural storage medium should be exhausted sooner or later. Only in fact, for some reason this does not happen. The second stage thins the line between the subconscious and the conscious. Deliberately leave an imaginary sign on something and fix it on a subconscious level. Such a training is not too difficult, but at some point comes the realization that the sign is left ...

- Do not imagination, but the real mark - finished for Kiass and Ink . - Although initially it was the other way around.

"Yes," the golden-skinned nodded.

Ink looked at the thread flowing from his hand. He could control it at a greater distance than his previous tests showed. In fact, the control area remained the same, but was not counted from his head, but from the mark in the palm of his hand.

"The manifestation of consciousness ... It and the brain are not the same thing."

Something seemed to click. Ink looked at the surroundings from two perspectives. One was a little closer than the other - eyes and something, as if drowned deep into his head. It was not possible to look at the surroundings with the help of the sign in the palm, as well as through the mark left on Arsi's forehead . Moreover, the sign on the girl did not expand the area of ​​his control over abilities.

"Consciousness," Ink said . - The third step is work with the consciousness itself.

"I think if Glam were here," said Kiass , "he would definitely clap again." Because such a speed of development is really something abnormal.