Training and Fluxing (Solo)

[Markus Andres]

1st of Summer. 512 AV. Naught but darkness in his world. Few sounds. A glimmer of hope. But no. A will made of isurian steel would deny him. Stumbling through the darkness. Hitting dead end upon dead end. At a distance there came a rhythmic thud. Thud. Thud. It was maddening. But he pressed on. The will would deny him any rest. It felt like days passed. Submerged in darkness. Naught but a senseless search to keep him occupied as the maddening moments passed. But as he felt the darkness would be winning. As he gave up hope completely. He found a chaotic stream. It was invigorating. It felt as pure liquid joy. It felt as power. He could hardly contain his joy. His quest was over. The distant thudding grew quicker. More excited. He could feel the will weakening. He sensed an escape from this torment. But something compelled him. Willed him back at the stream. He dammed it up for a brief moment. Until much was gathered where it was needed. The powerful stream tried to dissipate, but he quickly moved through the darkness to stop the flow from moving in a new direction. Finally The young man from Zeltiva moved into action. He could still not see, but he knew where to go. Both arms wrapping around a large sack of sand. His legs bend. Lifting it into the air with ease. Both legs having their natural strength amplified with the energy of Markus’ flux. He lifted the sandbag well over his head. Standing with it straight in the air. Before he energy went back to status quo and disappeared to all over his body. It would be a single moment from Markus feeling like the grandmaster of the world. To him having a sandbag fall on his feet as his arms suddenly could not hold it any more. In turn, the man would: Stumble back. Knock his head against the stone wall of his masters room. Slide down the wall slowly as he was quite dazed from a double hit to the head and he loudly uttered some things an honorful knight would never say. He ripped the blindfold off and stared at the room. It was still dark but light peeked in from under the door. He was all alone in there. His master was out patrolling the road to Zeltiva. Would be days before he would return. Hence, why Markus had decided to use his room to train in private. For he had decided not to tell anyone of his dabblings with magic. He was not sure why he had decided to keep it to himself. A personal preference to keep a part of him hidden from even the knights? He shrugged as he gently rubbed the back of his head. His hair was dry, so no blood had been spilled. But he did have a headache that pounded loudly in his skull. His muscled torso heaved as he took a deep breath. It had taken a while to find the energy this time. Perhaps because it had been a season or so since he had last practised. But once he had felt it, he had instantly recognized it. He knew he could find it much. Much quicker now.

[Markus Andres]

In the end, Markus knew that all these individual and minor attempts at learning how to actually spend the energy first would mean little to nothing in the long run. Strength training was succesful after one had performed the same set hundreds upon hundreds of time. That was how one increased body strength. He figured there would be some inherent risk in thinking of using his energy in this method and he was a little uneasy about training magic, mainly because he had heard those horror stories as a child. He was a child of Zeltiva after all. And not a child of the magical establishment. Those stories had kept him up as a child. He pushed the thought aside. No time to mill about and get nothing done. He pushed away from the wall and stood for a moment disoriented in the dark room. He took a step forward and with a cautionary foot searched for the sack with sand. His foot hit something heavy and rough. It would appear he had found the sack in question. He knelt down and grabbed the edge of it and lifted it back up placing it on the flat bottom again. A sudden thought dawned on Markus. Why not just combine his regular weight training with flux training. He could practice it out in the open and none would be the wiser. Weight training was strenious enough that it might be a distraction. But he might have a way around that particular problem. He absent minded kicked the sack to celebrate his brilliance. He closed his eyes and mentally delved into his inner workings. He had gotten a grasp of finding and understanding his djed flow now. To a degree where he felt comfortable enough finding it with relative ease. The great general, he considered himself when controlling his djed-flow, starting to issue the commands. Direct soldiers from the unused parts of the battlefield to the points where the extra soldiers were needed the most. In this case, back into his hips. He actively directed energy to his hips. Never more than a trickle of the energy he could sense, he knew it was best to not guide everything into his hips. Although there was a part of him that desperately wanted to harness all the energy and force it around his body at will. Become a superhuman for a moment. Perhaps even godlike. Markus eyes shot open at that thought and all the energy he had pushed into his hips having not been spent. His mouth silently moved as if to say the word "hubris" but no air escaped his lips. Calling himself godlike. He kicked the sandbag with a heavy frontal kick and the heavy thing fell over with extreme easy and even rolled on for a couple of feet before it stopped. Markus realized that he had not used the energy he had harnessed until that kick. It might have been a brief moment between opening his eyes and kicking the sandbag. But the energy had stuck around. He found that peculiar.

[Markus Andres]

Markus knelt and picked up the sandbag. His earlier idea about weight training with flux was a solid one and unless there was a way to detect magic being used, he assumed no one would notice if he worked on both toning his muscles and giving his astral self a rigorious workout. Besides, he hated lifting the sandbag. Its rough exterior always irritated his skin when he started sweating. He picked up the sandbag in both arms. Feeling his arms harden as he did so. He could feel the muscles bulge against the backside of his arms and stretch the skin. The good thing about Syliras was that there was never really far from any one place to the next. Soon he had dropped off the sandbag, ready for other young knights and squires looking to obtain a well-trained body. He was on his way to a simple training area. He strode into the training area. There were some other knights and squires present. Attempting to turn flappy fat into a strong muscle for the Syliran knights. Markus gave the ones who looked at him a nod of respect before continuing to the weights. The idea was simple. Good ol’ faschioned bench press. Nothing fancy. This was something he knew how to do and it was about as easy as breathing was. Weight training. Bench pressing was his favorite. Excellent strenthening of his upper body. He found an available bench and started moving around the weights. Normally he would have someone to spot for him. But he wasn't going anywhere near his max load today. That was not the idea. Not today, at least. Besides, they might notice his odd training and guess he was using djed. He couldn’t have that. Not yet. When he had found the appropriate set of weights. It was around sixty percent of his max load with a single rep. He took a deep breath to ease up his muscles and joints. He started to gently roll around his joints. Get them loose. Work out any kinks and most of all to feel any aching muscles. When he was satisfied that he was up to the task. He was still not certain how it affected his muscles. He could never be too careful. He would be nothing more than a useless hunk of meat if he permanently injured his muscles. Useless to the knights. That would be a fate worse than death to Markus. He sat down on the bench. Moved back up and laid down. He spead out his legs to get a good balance and focus. He took a deep breath. Relaxed and let his back have a natural posture. No trying to straightening it out by pressing against the bench. His eyes focused on the bar, both hands reached up and gripped it. He breathed out. Then lifted the bar off the stand. It was not too heavy. Nor was it light, that much was certain. He moved it so his arms were going straight into the air. His eyes found a piece of the ceiling to focus on. The place where he would try and push the weights in the direction of. He would keep his eyes away from the bar itself. Or he might accidentally start lifting it above his head and if he made a mistake or his muscles gave away. He would drop the thing directly on top of his head. Not a pleasant feeling. With a deep breath. Revitalizing his muscles he started.

[Markus Andres]

Lowering the weights were not troubling. He could feel the gravity work against his muscles, but he kept the descend smooth and even. His muscles responded to the call of duty and performed admirably. Markus felt almost good just doing this alone. In fact, he almost forgot the goal of coming there to train. It was not his muscles, it was his mind he had to condition. Prep for the strain of keeping a focused mind. Not let distractions guide his focus away from the pathways of djed within his body. He lowered the weights so they were hovering above his massive chest. Then he pushed it away. Keeping the ascend smooth and even. Quicker than the descend, much quicker. Pushing away hard in a single explosive move. Then he was going. The bar moving up and down in an intense rhythm. He could feel his muscles respond to the training. At the corner of his eyes he could see the biceps and triceps tighten and relax as they both went from tense to soft, or as soft as his muscles could go. For they really never got time to go soft. With a simple thirty reps he could feel his muscles. It was a glorious feeling. Once again, he had to remind himself of the real reason of coming down there that day. His jaw tightened as he pressed the weights up and placed the bar back on the stand. The last push having been a little tougher than he had expected. A sign of weakness – he smirked at the thing his master would say. This was simple endurance training. He was certain he could not keep his mind focused on the shorter duration that the other types of strength training required. He exhaled sharply, before inhaling much slower. Get his heart and body down to a much more normal rate of activity. It was time to relax before he got back to work again. He would spend the time wisely. He did not close his eyes as he usual did. But his eyes did not waver from the spot he had been looking at when he had been bench pressing. He would spent a couple of chimes of downtime between each set. Normally he spent it idling around the weights. Perhaps getting some water or what not. But today, it was all about the inside of his body. The ability to harness magical energy from unused parts of his body and channel it to places where his conscious mind felt it was better suited, than his subconscious mind. Another way for him to master his subconscious mind and make his training and life more disciplined – that thought had not occured to him before then. He liked the idea and with renewed vigor started to focus inwards. There was bustling activity, even his barely attuned senses could pick that up. Much energy was being moved to and away from his arms. It brought a sense of awe to Markus. So many things he had no idea existed until his fateful encounter with a mage knight a year before. He wished he had run into him before. He began to harness what djed he could and push it up to his large biceps and relatively smaller triceps. Wondering if that would aid the recovery or just bottle up more energy than was needed. Barely a chime had passed since he had started the break. But he could feel his arms were more than rejuvinated. An irritating logical side of brain kept insisting it was a side effect of pushing around djed. But he disregarded that, even if he had not gotten the couple of chimes rest between sets, he knew from experience that the risk of injury were minimal. With djed to aid him? The risks seemed abysmally insignificant! With his focus on his inner workings, he let a part of him run on auto-pilot. Pick up the bar from the rack. Feel the added weight in the palm of his hands. It was impressive. Get comfortable with the weight. But as he started to lower the bar. He saw something even more impressive. How energy moved to his arms by itself. Not guided by his will. It was amazing. It was his body’s natural usage of energy. His focus was entirely on this spectacle of moving energy. As he pressed the bar away form himself, he was even more astonished. Sensing the natural flow of energy aid him. Any knight in the room who looked in his direction, would see a silly smile on his lips. Markus lowered the weights. Still mesmerized by the flow of energy. Of djed. Of pure power. The power he was now starting to grasp. His arms descended. Keeping the bar from free-falling into his chest. Crushing the ribcage and perhaps, permanently cause him to exhale the content of his lungs. That grim thought brought his focus away from the spectacle of moving djed in their designated astral pathways. Rather than let the natural flow deal with the training. He now had to find unused djed and push it into the area where he felt it was needed. In this exercise, it was easy to gather where the most of the unused energy was located. In his lower body. Pretty much anything below his hips would have plenty of unused energy he could urge towards his arms. His arms strained as he pressed the bar up, third rep, he held it in straightened arms for a second before he breathed easy. Then he started to push the djed into his arms. The first thing he noticed was that the weights did not seem all that heavy. Not light as a feather, but certainly not sixty percent of his max. Perhaps closer to forty five to fifty percent. It was still heavier than his armor, but boy. It felt easy to work with it. He lowered the bar and with seemingly no effort, push it back up again. The most straining part for him was keeping his focus. That extra djed did not march its sorry ass up to his arms without his strong will whipping it all the way. He noticed that his control was not great enough to make the distribution of djed even to his shoulders and muscles. His right arm received more power than the other, so his training was uneven. First right pushed up and then the left one. He began to try and even out the djed flow, balance it so they both got the same amount of distilized power. It was straining to his mind. Rather than just whipping the djed into place, he had to exert great control. Although he tried his best to obtain this control, his training continued to be uneven. In the long run that would be detrimental to his muscular training. But this once, it would hardly matter. But he stopped whipping djed up into his arms. For some part of his mind had kept count of the reps. Somewhere in the fifties. That was certainly more than he had inteded to do. With no aid from extra djed, Markus felt the actual weight of the bar and he struggled for a bit before he managed to press it all the way. The bar was placed on the rack with an audible metal and metal sound. He let out a sharp exhale and sat up with a smile. Looking at the other training knights for a brief moment. Observing their struggles with the weights and their different ways of passing the downtime.

[Markus Andres]

But there could be no extended rest for Markus. For as he sat there his thoughts began to work. He could feel his arms were tired from the training. It was to be expected with the load and the intense endurance training he had just performed. But that was worried him. Had the knight who had trained him not warned him of not overdoing it. His thoughts had been swirling around that, a lot. But if he was just doing this. His regular training regiment and he only felt the same tiredness in his arms. What could the harm be? Was he putting additional stress on his arms by allowing more power to pass through them? He did not feel that way when training. It just made it easier as he performed the training. Well, easier on the body. Keeping his focus in an area where half the air seemed to consist of other men’s sweat, was harder said than done. But even that he had somewhat learnt to control. It still took time to really understand the djed and whip it to where it was needed. He flexed his arms and they responded immediately. He patted the muscle on the oppossing arm and they did not feel sore. Tired, but that was the point of the training. Push beyond the limits, force his body to improve. Now it was time for his mind to do the same. He spend several chimes just relaxing. Giving his arms plenty of rest. The earlier omnieous thought of becoming a useless lump of injured meat was still present. The euphoria of pushing around djed had made it dissappear for a while, but now it was back. He had to tackle this with discipline and not lose control of himself as he controlled the djed. Complete and utter control of everything he did. Thirty reps. No more, no less. With his mind set in steel on this, he laid down again. Centered himself on the bench. Reached up and grabbed the bar. Found the same spot on the ceiling he had been looking before. Breathing easy. He was already sensing the djed he would be using. The power. But the little reprimand he had given himself stuck. He disregarded the feeling of complete power. Disregarded his own innate desire to become much stronger. Forced himself to remain aware of his surroundings. As much as he now could. He could tell his focus on the djed was suffering due to this. He could sense it and he pushed it in the right direction, to his arms and shoulders. He lowered the bar and then pushed the djed to aid in the pressing of the bar. Once again, it felt lighter. It was a great sensation. But he did not allow himself to give in to this sensation. His teeth bit together and he stopped pushing djed to his arms as he lowered the bar again. He would not require the energy then. Of course, it wasn’t as if it was easy to lower the weights, but the tough part, to him, at least. Had been pushing it the other way. The unused energy in his legs were pushed up to aid his arms. It was a long way, but he kept the focus. Constantly pushing djed into his arms and then away again so he did not overflood his arms with energy that he could not use. He liked this training. Learning a finer control of his djed while at the same time strengthening his body. Mixing two things, one he desired to master, another he enjoyed training. He lost focus on the djed for a brief moment. It was enough that his arms were not aided with the extra djed and Markus really felt the real weight. He grunted and pushed away as he exhaled slowly. At times like that, he was glad he had chosen to do endurance training and not strength. If it had been strength and the bar had been at eighty to ninety of his max rep, then he could not have taken over like this. He would simply had been struggling not to stop the bar from crashing into his soft and squishy body. He exhaled slowly as he held the bar with straight arms and locked joints. He had to regain composure and keep the picture clear of any disturbances he could not handle as he manipulated with his natural djed pathways. His arms would remain straight and joints locked in place as he concentrated on the astral pathways. Once again pushing the djed from his lower regions up. But he was having trouble right now. On focusing on the djed. It seemed to slip out of his grasp. He felt like a mere rookie. Incapable of even gathering, no, sensing the djed. Last time he had tried to force the djed, he had kicked and punched a tree. He would not start doing that today. Rather, he would just continue the exercise and hope by the time he started the next rep or exercise that he could actually feel the djed again.

[Markus Andres]

Markus had managed to do a third of the reps in this set before his djed had stopped. Without having his arms and shoulders fueled by the extra djed, the weights felt heavier than they actually were. Not too heavy, but still, it was noticeable. His muscles getting sapped of energy. Slowly being drained faster than his body could replenish it. It would be a challenge to complete the set like this. But he gladly accepted any challenge that pertained to his bodily strength and endurance. He lowered the bar in a fast motion. Without the extra djed fuel, he actually managed to keep his arms even and the bar well balanced. He noted that was something he had to work with. Able to split the energy evenly between to musclegroups and not favor one above the other. But he had learnt that would require much more training than he had underwent already. He enjoyed the struggle of his muscles as he pushed the weights up a twentieth time. He gave himself a little breather then, by locking his arms. Several seconds passed before he continued. Arms moving rhytmically up and down. Progressively getting more and more tired as he did the exercize. Twenty fifth rep. He was getting there. He bit his teeth together as it got harder. Using djed to fuel his arms was more taxing than he had first thought. He lost control of the djed supply to his arms and rather than constantly reinforce his arms, the djed dissipated to their natural places in his body. Without the djed, he felt the true condition of his arms. Markus could feel he would not be able to perform a single explosive push more. He could not gather his focus on pushing more djed for his arms so he could safely get the bar back on the rack. He bit his teeth together and realized there was only one option. The roll of shame. Either that or yell for someone to assist him. A prideful streak inside of him decided the roll was less shamefull than yelling for help. He lowered the bar until it almost touched his chest. Then slowly lifted it further down his body. He breathed in deep and tightened his stomach. Let the bar roll over his hard abs. The lower weight on his arms was a god send. He rolled the weights down to his legs. Narrowly avoiding clenching a private part between the bar and his thigh. Markus sat up. Took a couple of deep breaths. Let his arms recover as the bar tried to dig into his thighs. He stood up and held the bar for a moment while gently putting it down on the bench. He released a heavy sigh of relief. It had almost gone wrong. But luckily the roll of shame had saved him from dropping the bar directly onto his ribcage. Markus got up and started removing the weights from the bar. He was done for the day. Far from a full exercise. But he knew he should probably go get a massage or good long relaxing bath at the soothing waters. But not before he had stretched out. Once he had cleaned up after himself. Markus stretched his long arms out before him. Then slowly moved them each their way around his body until he could feel the pull as he started stretching behind him. He kept his movement as smooth as he could. No jerking his arms back and forth to achieve a greater stretch. Just slowly stretch until he didn’t feel comfortable pushing it any further. He slowly went through several different stretches before he felt comfortable leaving. For he knew no matter how much stretching, massage or blissfully hot water he sank himself into, his muscles would be sore as petch tomorrow.

[Accolade]

Markus Andres

Experience

Skill	XP Earned
Flux	+ 5 XP
Body building	+ 5 XP
Meditation	+ 2 XP
Observation	+ 2 XP

Lores

•	Lore Earned
•	Using the roll of shame
•	Understanding the flow of djed in use of flux
•	Knowing ones limits
•	Learning to control and release djed to the right muscles

notes :

Hard training thread. woot! Just be sure to pace the use of djed, wouldn't want our Knights to get broken while he is still useful. Okay so, Markus will experience deep pain in his shoulders and arms for about several days, and a slight soreness for a day or so after.

The Sylir has spoken

If you have any questions or concerns regarding your grade, please send me a PM and we can figure it out.