Eyes popping open, I reached for my sword and scrambled to get to my feet. I needed to defend myself, but before I could jerk my leg or twitch my hand, I stopped and let out a groan of pain, "Argg!"

"Instructor Green," whispered a soft and soothing voice, "Stay still. You have a severe head wound… And we don't want to draw attention."

I couldn't place the voice, but it sounded oddly familiar. Familiar enough that I forced myself to shut up and change my moans of pain to whimpers. I hardly even let out a sound as I rolled onto my side, pulled my legs up, and crossed my arms over my chest to shelter and soothe the deep throbbing pain. My curling up was doing nothing and might have actually been causing more discomfort as my chest stretched and constricted, but it made me feel slightly better.

Not that I was groaning at the pain of moving. I was long used to having a bruised and beaten body. The whimpers solely belonged to my pounding headache that was making the world spin, a situation made worse by holding back the bile bubbling at the back of my throat. Oh, and opening my eyes caused spikes of blinding, burning light to be driven through them into my skull.

I lay on the ground, and the only thing I could feel past the agony in my head was a gentle hand on my back, sending out mental waves of relaxation and comfort. For long minutes, I adjusted to the reality I awoke to, trying to accept the pain, and eventually, I managed to do so. It was all still there, as strong as ever, but its sharpness had faded and wasn't as all-consuming as when I first opened my eyes.

With that minor level of relief, I was able to think clearly for the first time since I awoke, and I realized what I had to do. Sucking in a deep breath, I fell into my mind and pushed myself to dive deeper. The farther I went, the duller the pain became until I was stopped before my reservoir.

Reaching out, I tried to grab onto the mental energy, only for it to slip through my mental fingers, doing little more than sloshing the energy around. Though I failed to control my energy, I did impart some will, and a wisp of my energy broke free from the reserve, causing another spike of pain to spike through my body, breaking my focus and pulling all the other aches back to the forefront of my mind.

Gathering myself, I focused my mind to try again. And then again. In one of my successive attempts, I was able to grab a strand but couldn't force it to do anything. I felt like a child, and just like a child, I had no choice but to fail until I got it right. I kept smashing my face with the pain reborn with all its jagged edges as the momentary relief of retreating into my mind shattered over and over.

With every failed attempt, my haggard mind became duller and filled with a mental fog I could not push away, no matter how hard I tried. I was at the point where controlling my mental energy was like running an obstacle course while having one working eye that was blurry and a numb body. An obstacle course that if you fuck up bad enough on, you could end up dead. Most likely, I would only make the headache worse and wish for my quick death, but that did not change how I only needed one bad roll for me to pay the ultimate price.

With every failed attempt where I fumbled my energy, the process became a little more challenging, and the amount of mental energy I tried to control shrunk. I had reached the point where I was trying to draw the smallest of threads from my reservoir, and I wasn't sure I could make another attempt if I failed this time. But that worry was smothered when I succeeded.

Honestly, I was shocked. At this point, I expected to suffer away my last hours in this world with an agonizing headache, waiting helplessly until whatever my current situation was brought to fruition. However, with a chance opening up to me, I could not do less than give my all to seize it. It was my duty.

So, I pulled on my energy. At first, it was hardly any mental energy at all. But like a string connected to a rope attached to a chain, my strand grew and collected until I had gathered nearly all of my power. The moment I felt like I was pushing myself to maintain control, I pulsed the mental energy, pushing it out to fill my mind, ensuring that it was spread evenly and filled every corner.

With the mental energy suffusing my mind, I clenched it tight like a muscle. Everyone had other ways to describe the action, but the result was the same. Mental energy was compressed into my body.

When it involved the telekinetic school of mental disciplines, few could match me in pure force control. Not that it mattered how good I was on the first level, where you only control tendrils. It was only at the second level of body integration that real power was found.

At the second level, you spread your mental energy through all or part of your body. It has to reach a certain level of density before anything happens, but once it does — even to the slightest degree — the results are superhuman. I have never heard of an upper limit to infusing a body. The only thing that came close was how strong their willpower was, which directly correlated to how much mental energy an individual could control at one time.

However, I have read some studies that suggested that the better one understood the body and how it functioned, the better their efficiency and results would be with body integration. Sadly, with every aspect of mental energy usage, intent and raw power were what mattered most.

I couldn't spread enough energy through my whole body to count as a full-body reinforcement. To put it in perspective, it was like I had a light fog when I needed a lake. The two were hardly comparable. I could, however — if just barely — enhance a single part of my body, which does more harm than good more often than not.

Enhance your leg and kick out? Sure. You get a super kick capable of shattering the trunk of a tree. You would also get a ripped-off leg at the hip, a broken back, and internal organ damage. So, it's worse than useless, with one exception.

When you enhance your mind, you can think faster, react faster, and, most importantly, control your physical sensations. Aka, pain, as the head was the center of the body. If you control it, you control the body.

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

While enhancing my mind, my options for other castings were limited to a few tendrils, so it had very little usefulness up until now, my usage of heightened perception to strike the diving birdkin being the exception. The only reason I was confident in doing it at all was that I wanted to prove to… certain people that I could, so I spent a few months practicing to show off.

With my mental energy enhancing my mind, I was not surprised to feel the damage in there. Whatever had knocked me out was not gentle, and there were multiple severe backlashes right before that, which could not have done me much of a favor.

As soon as the enhancement occurred, I willed my sense of pain to lessen gradually until it reached the point where I could hardly feel a thing. It wasn't a great idea to numb my sensations, as they existed for a reason, but I didn't think now was a good time to be incapacitated. Now that I could focus without pain, I willed my infused energy within the damaged areas of my brain to take on the duties of the flesh, clearing up most of the fog clouding my mind instantly and letting me function normally.

How either of the things I wanted happened, I couldn't say. But the intent of a casting was the most important thing about it. I wanted it to work, so it did, though if I knew how it was doing what I wanted, it would require less will and energy. Opening my eyes, I felt them contract and send out signals of pain, but it did not matter. The signals never reached their destinations.

It took a moment for my eyes to adjust to the low light, and when they finally did, I found that I was looking at a stone floor with a leg at the edge of my vision. Following the body part, I found that it led to… I could not remember her name. And I wasn't sure if that was because I never knew it or if my concussion was worse than I thought. I knew, however, that she was one of my trainees.

"Whe—" My throat was so dry that was all I could get out until I licked my lips and worked it getting some moisture back into my mouth. The woman turned to glance down at me with concern when I gurgled, only for her eyes to widen in shock when she saw my eyes were open and focused on her.

When she leaned down to check on me, I managed to rasp out, "Where are we?" I saw her eyes rake over me in concern, as she didn't say a word. Grunting, I tried to roll over, but the woman's arm snapped out with surprising speed, clamping onto my shoulder and locking me in place as she furtively looked around.

"Easy there, Instructor," She said softly once she was done, "I was just making sure no beastkins were watching. I believe we are in the fort you were shown. Can't think of anywhere else we could be…" She finished trailing off in uncertainty. My eyebrows shot up in surprise, as that was the last place I expected us to be.

"Why are we here?" I asked, not expecting an answer.

"We think it has to do with their powers." The trainee said, surprising me. "A scout in here overheard them talking about using us to make themselves stronger by using a forbidden spell… whatever that means."

I let that sink in momentarily before asking, "We?"

"Oh, yeah, there are dozens of us here trapped in these cages. I would guess nearly a hundred all combined. Most of us are scouts, but I think I saw some cavalry in the farther cages, though we can't know for sure as they are blocking sound, and they won't let us talk amongst ourselves much either. They will even stop us from using our hand signs if they see it." Sathera whispered as I half paid attention to her. The whole time she was talking, I was moving and testing out my body in small ways. When she was done, I pushed myself up in one motion, sitting with my legs crossed.

I faced the attractive woman, who had reached out to me before stopping halfway. There was a look of shock on her face, then my eyes flicked past her. Behind the woman were steel bars, with the stone ground stretching for ten feet before I saw another cage with slumped-over figures in it. Behind that cage was a stone wall with lit braziers hanging on it. "How are you…"

"I'm enhancing my mind and suppressing the pain." I replied, "… I'm sorry, I can't remember your name."

She nodded in understanding, saying, "Ahh, I see. And don't worry, Instructor, I'm not insulted. You have quite the head wound. It's understandable. I'm Sathera. Sathera Flenk."

I was surprised that she had a last name. Hmm, she must be a noble… guess they all weren't killed. Shuffling around, I moved to sit at her side while taking a good look at my surroundings.

Besides the cage I was in, I could see them extend in a line. I lost count after the third set of cages — including mine — but there weren't that many more after. Probably one, but hopefully two.

As far as I could tell, ten or more captives were in each cage. They were positioned in a rectangle two deep, so I was having trouble looking in all of them, but I was pretty sure there were eight. If there was, it was kawrashit, and they should capture some more people to justify building another two, the inconsiderate bastards.

Studying the walls more, I realized what I took for braziers on the bare walls were actually lanterns. It was a reasonable mistake, considering they glowed a steady red-orange light that was still stabbing into my mind with their brightness. I didn't feel the pain, but I expected to and instinctually shied away from looking at them. There weren't many of the things, but they gave out a surprising amount of light, filling the courtyard.

Besides that, only a few pairs of guards were standing around the square or walking the walls, most of whom were around the cages. The center of the square was taken up by a massive stone plate a foot thick that looked to have intricate carvings on top. The thing had to be at least sixty feet square, and for some reason, it made my hackles rise just to look at it.

Turning to look at those in the cage with me, I looked at one familiar face after another, as they all belonged to scouts I had known for months. Most of them were sleeping, lying flat or curled into balls, but one was looking at me. As my eyes settled on her, she smiled back.

A shiver ran up my spine as she spoke, "Well, would you look at this. Sleepy Head finally woke up. I was starting to hope that you never would. It would be one bright spot to this mess." Celeste's words were filled with a bloodthirsty disappointment.

"Fuck…" I hissed as my body went stiff, my eyes darting around the cage for anything I could use as a weapon.

Hearing my words and feeling my tension, Sathera leaned close and whispered, "Instructor? What's wrong between the two of you?"

"She wants to kill me. Or at least see me in pain." I said, nodding at Celeste before shuffling back to ensure nothing could get between me and the bars. "How long have we been here? And why are we still trapped in this cage?" I asked Sathera.

"Ahh," Sathera said, a faulty understanding entering her eyes as they flicked between Celeste and me before she hesitantly answered, "…almost a day, I would guess. We were carried here after the fight. And wh—

"Go ahead and grab the bars and pull on them, you Knife-Eared-Leaf!" Celeste shouted, goading me. I squinted at her in annoyance and suspicion as Sathera gasped in shock at what the other woman called out to me.

On the one hand, I was already looking at the bars and considering doing just that, but now I would be doing what Celeste wanted me to do. But if I didn't, then I would be telling her I was scared. Ehh, might as well, I thought, reaching one hand out for the bars. What's the worst that can happen? And it will shut that bi—

"Instructor! Wai—" I heard and saw Sathera reach for me out of the corner of my eye, but it was too late. My middle finger touched the bar, and the mental energy inside of my body exploded in chaotic movement as I passed out.

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