I sighed as I left the last class scheduled for today. That had been a disaster. After Swordsmanship I had had two more classes, Logistics and Advanced Mathematics. Logistics had been fine, if severely boring and mind numbing, all I had had to do was listen to the Magister teacher rave about supply lines and food production and troop movements and tank engine maintenance. Advanced Mathematics though had been an absolute mess. As it had turned out, being from a poor Servi family on the minor outcast planet of Lavinius had not prepared me for the high standards of the Scholarium’s mathematics program. I knew my numbers, knew how to add and subtract and multiply and divide, knew how to calculate basic things quickly in my head, but today was the first time I had ever set eyes on the dread monstrosity known as calculus. I had no idea what the derivative of a function or a tangent line or an infinitesimal was.

When I had failed every question on the opening exam the Magister had given us to assess our abilities, the instructor had singled me out in front of the class and had done and said just about everything short of outright calling me mentally handicapped. I still felt the shame of having my classmates snicker at me as the teacher dressed me down.

“Oh well.” I muttered. I was still a Bronze Imperator who had gotten into the Scholarium with the rank of 002 and had been made Spartiate of Team Nine. So what if I was bad at one class? I would put in the work to catch up and that would be that. One rough beginning did not have to define the rest of my three-year career at the Scholarium as a student. I consoled myself that even if it looked bad to the others who had grown up with tutors instructing them in complex subjects from an early stage, it was not a personal failing for me to be ignorant of higher math. I had not gotten the opportunity to learn more, the little schooling I had had before my father had me drop out to work in the Jovium mines of Lavinius had not taught me much of any worth at all and even if my parents had let me, we did not have the money to send me to a university. It was out of my hands, out of my control. I just had to make the best of my situation and try not to fail out of an entire class. Screw what my other classmates in Advanced Mathematics had to say or think about me, I knew my own worth.

Moving onwards, I followed the map on my wrist communicator to go to the location Instructor Kaesarion had sent me in her offer to teach me psychic physio-augmentation.

The map led me to the base of one of the gleaming, glittering towers made of diamond-like crystal and lustrous gold metal. This one was shorter than some of the towering behemoths scattered around the floating castle of the Apollonian Citadel, unlike the others it did not nearly reach the artificial sun set in the ceiling of the Scholarium, but still it was quite tall. There was nothing like it on my homeworld, either in such expensive and extravagant materials or in its dominating size.

I climbed the steel stairs of the tower, scaling its many stories and floors until I came to the very top where Instructor Kaesarion waited for me, the windowless sides of the tip of the building letting in the breezes of the evening air as the artificial sun dimmed and the Scholarium’s interior cooled.

“Hello, Lucion.” My Swordsmanship teacher said to me. She was barehanded.

“Hello, Instructor,” I said. “No swords today?”

“No. More verbal learning and meditative practicing today for the basics.” She replied.

“Alright with me.” I said, glad that she was secretly teaching me this power at all.

“We will start with some warnings and words of caution. Physio-augmentation is a dangerous psychic art, one that offers great power not without cost or risk to one’s health and wellbeing. Many a young Strategos officer just out of the Scholarium has pushed themselves beyond their breaking point and risked their lives and those under their command as well as their missions with reckless abandon and hubristic arrogance. Know that prudence and control will serve you better with this ability than crazed fury and overreliance. Physio-augmentation dramatically increases physical potential, both brute strength and quicksilver speed, but it does not amplify your regeneration or your durability. You can punch above your spiritual and physical weight class, but you will not be able to take the same damage that you dish out, nor can you rely on your body keeping up with the strain you put it under. You are a glass cannon, as the phrase goes.” She said.

“Understood.” I said. “I will use it under the principle of moderation.”

“Physio-augmentation does not quicken reaction time and reflexes, nor does it affect dexterity and coordination so you may find yourself moving faster then you can control with the possibility of being unable to fight effectively in close quarters without overextending yourself or launching yourself away from your target. The power exhausts your natural endurance quickly and taxes your healing factor to recover that stamina. You can rely on your spirit and regeneration for a while, but you will need to intake water and calories for extended use and longer time frames.” Kaesarion said.

“Got it.” I said, processing the information. “How do I go about activating it?”

“As with most psychic arts, you begin with a mental visualization and move out from there. I want you to close your eyes.” She said.

I closed them.

“Now I want you to become aware of every part of your body, every component and organ. Your heart beating, your stomach filled with acid, your veins rushing with blood, your muscles and nerves, your liver and spleen and kidneys.” Kaesarion said.

“I am doing so.” I whispered softly.

“Now break those organs down into tissue types, visualize the cell lines and variants that make up those body parts.” The instructor said to me.

I nodded, my eyes still shut and closed.

“Move down a level, zoom in even more from the organic tissue to the individual cells of your body, all thirty-seven trillion of them. Peer into those cellular structures, dive into them past the cell wall, and find the nucleus at the heart of them.” She said.

“I see them!” I said, shocked, the rest of the exercise had just been me imagining looking at magnifications of parts of my body but now I saw them like I had eyes on each of the trillions of cells that made me who I was.

“Good. Your nuclei hold your DNA, the code that marks you as an Imperator and decided your Path since you were a zygote in your mother’s stomach. Picture a psychic flame, an emerald one, enveloping your bound chromosomes. Not burning them, not unwinding their molecular bonds, not annihilating them from existence, but simply surrounding and penetrating them.” Kaesarion said

I willed green fire to form in each of my numerous cells and I felt a warmth spread through me, like a pleasant summer’s day.

“Fill the emerald psychic fire with thoughts of growth and strength and vitality, impress it with the very idea and soul of life itself.” She said.

I thought of how I had grown from a child to a teenager, of how my wounds knit together in the Red Sands arena, of plants sprouting from the earth and flowers blooming. I took all those thoughts and emotions and visuals and implanted them into the psychic fire. The trillions of microscopic flames hidden in my cells built to an inferno. Strength surged through me, and I felt just as alive as I had when Heracles’s pyre had raged inside me, though this time it did not feel like it was overwhelming my mind, mood and personality to reshape me into something manic and savage.

I opened my eyes, and she took a stance and I moved. We clashed with each other as we had during class with Keenblades, but this time I had the same freakish, unnatural mobility and potency that she had displayed. The feeling was gleeful and ecstatic even if hitting her and being hit in turn hurt like all hell with our incredible athletic abilities amplified.

We fought for three exhilarating minutes and then my internal reserve of stamina ran dry. I had burned out quicker than I had expected, and I felt drained. The trillions of miniscule emerald flames winked out and when I tried to bring them back with visualization, I found that the psychic power was not activating. My thoughts felt slow and sluggish too, a reflection of the weariness in my body, just as I had exhausted physical stamina, I had apparently siphoned away some of my mental functions using the psychic sorcery.

“A good first try, Lucion. You will need regular and consistent practice to use it more and to be more efficient with your body’s energy by focusing your cognitive side to greater effect.” The instructor said.

I did not really feel the need to breathe heavy, but I felt like I had been up for weeks, a heaviness in my bones.

“What kind of threats would I be using this against when I’m a Strategos of the Solar Guard?” I asked Kaesarion.

“Likely, you won’t need it for most things.” She said. “Most of the possible threats that could come up would be lower Ranked and of a lesser Path because while it’s not as hard to level up for most Paths as it is for Imperators, it’s still harder for many subspecies to do than Servi and Hetairas who advance through servitude or sex work in the Courtesans’ case. Bronze Venators are as fast as you without physio-augmentation, but not as a durable or strong or quick healing as an Imperator. Militares are mostly a threat through the use of their firearms, really they are just kind of like stronger, more resilient and taller Servi with heightened aggression. Even Fourth Rank Campeadors are slow compared to Bronze Imperators, but still be wary, their spatially warped dense muscle and bone mean that a Golden Champion’s fist hitting you is like a hovercar’s mass compressed into a large hand striking you at high velocities.” She said.

“So really the risk is other Imperators.” I said.

“Theoretically, but in all honesty most skilled ones are on our side.” Instructor Kaesarion said.

A different thought came to me and I changed the conversation, thinking of my team’s adviser.

“Do you know my guidance counselor? His name is Justinias Barathion and he said he used to be the psy-science teacher. I was wondering if you could tell me what happened to him and why he was kicked out of his job.” I said.

A look of distaste came over Lilliana Kaesarion’s face.

“Yes, I know him. Justinias nearly killed a student during an argument about grades in his class and that’s what removed him from his instructor role and banished him to be a guidance counselor for first years.” She said.

She looked at her communicator, “Listen, Lucion, I have to go but I’ll tell you when we can meet up again.”

“Thank you, Instructor.” I said and walked down the tower.

I wandered for a while in the streets and alleys, not wanting to go back to Tertius Mons just yet. As I meandered around, I came across the same third year back at it again making more obscene graffiti.

Gathering my nerve, I went over to him and put my hand on his shoulder.

“What do you think you’re doing?” I demanded. “What gives you the right to make such vulgar images?”

“Because I’m Diokletian Claudion and I’ll insult my father however I damn please, Firstie.” The third year replied, revealing himself as the Governor’s own child.

I blinked and felt my hand on his shoulder dip down suddenly and when I opened my eyes again, he was gone, having disappeared right in front of me.

“How does he do that?” I said, frustrated.