(Meanwhile, within the Time Stilled World, Moltherak’s Floating Island, Leo’s POV)
Leo sat cross-legged at the center of the chamber with his eyes half-closed, as a thin veil of crimson haze slowly unfurled from his body, drifting outward with noticeably more control than the previous attempts, while Moltherak watched him from across the room with the quiet intensity of a teacher who had witnessed his number one student fail at the same stage countless times.
However, unlike his first day trying this method, Leo no longer felt completely blind while trying to sense the fourth dimension.
"I can feel the first wall...."
He murmured, as he sensed the environment around him with a slow, cautious sweep of his aura, maybe hoping that the faint texture he detected earlier had not been his imagination, and to his relief there was indeed a slight disturbance in the air, barely perceptible yet unquestionably real.
The aura extended again in a thin ribbon as Leo leaned deeper into the sensation, trying to listen not with his ears but with the killing intent circulating through him, and for a flicker of a moment the chamber around him no longer felt smooth and uniform but patterned, as if containing subtle points where the aura hesitated slightly before slipping past.
"It’s faint... but it’s there," Leo muttered as his brows tightened with concentration, because the wall he sensed currently was not physical, nor something he could ever touch, but a boundary of resistance that existed only as a whisper across the edges of his awareness.
"Mmm—"
Moltherak murmured as he nodded slowly in acknowledgement, his enormous form shrinking into a more compact posture as his eyes gleamed with faint approval.
"You are beginning to sense the temporal grain, boy. Not clearly... but enough that you now understand what is real and what’s not.
You no longer mistake the noise of your own mind for what is truly there."
Moltherak encouraged as Leo exhaled, allowing the aura to flow sideways instead of forward, as he tried to catch a second weak point.
However this time the haze wobbled slightly as if brushing against an uneven surface before settling again, giving him the unmistakable confirmation that it was not some accident.
"I felt it again—just a little dip," Leo whispered, half relieved and half annoyed, because although progress finally existed, it remained painfully elusive, like chasing shadows across a fogged window.
"Good," Moltherak said as he traced a slow circle on the floor with his tail, "but do not expect consistency yet. You are still a child trying to read weather patterns with your fingertips."
Leo tried again, letting his aura expand in a broad sweep, but this time the haze met only uniform resistance, no dips, no tremors, nothing but the same blank air pressing evenly against him, and frustration tightened his chest as he opened his eyes slightly.
"Tch... it disappeared," he muttered as the haze flickered and lost its shape, collapsing back toward his skin.
"It did not disappear," Moltherak corrected gently, "you simply lost the sensitivity required to notice it. We are dealing in margins thinner than a breath, boy, and any turbulence in your mind disrupts the entire exercise."
Leo gritted his teeth as he forced his eyes closed again, letting his aura soften until it behaved almost like silk rather than a blade, because Moltherak had repeated that instruction enough times to make it echo in his skull.
The haze drifted outward again.
And this time—
A tremor.
Small, weak, inconsistent.
But unmistakably real.
"I got it again..." he whispered, the words escaping on instinct as relief washed through him, even if the sensation was still too faint to grasp fully.
Moltherak allowed himself a faint smile as he tilted his head.
"You are beginning to touch the edges of the fourth dimension. It is not mastery, not even close, but comprehension always begins in fragments."
Leo let out another long breath as he continued sweeping his aura in slow arcs, trying to string the faint tremors together into a pattern, yet every attempt yielded only scattered results, as if each weak point was drifting away from him faster than he could recognize it.
"There’s no rhythm to it..." he muttered. "I can’t tell where the next one will be."
"Because you are not skilled enough yet," Moltherak replied calmly. "Even sensing scattered points is exceptional at your stage. Precision will come later, once you learn to refine your aura until it behaves like a needle instead of a wave."
Leo groaned quietly.
"So I’ve barely taken the first step."
"Yes," Moltherak said without hesitation, "but it is a step that even King tier warriors struggle to reach without guidance. Do not belittle what took you these last couple years to achieve."
Leo remained quiet for a moment, letting the praise sink in—rare, genuine, and grounding—before he folded his legs tighter and steadied his breathing again.
He swept his aura once more.
Another tremor appeared.
Then vanished.
Then a shallow dip surfaced near the northern wall, far weaker but still present.
Three ripples in one attempt.
Not mastery.
Not clarity.
But progress.
"...Alright," Leo murmured as a small smile tugged at the corner of his mouth, "I can work with this."
Moltherak nodded as he rose slowly, stretching his wings while keeping his eyes fixed on Leo’s aura.
"You now possess the foundation to begin actual breakthroughs.
And can now learn how to push through these weaknesses to open temporal gates.
However, before we continue on to that stage, you need at least a month more to perfect this stage.
But after that, you only need half a year more to master space tunneling."
He said, as Leo let out a deep sigh.
The finish line was now close, however, he still needed to make rapid progress to reach the end and meet his self imposed deadline to lead the army out of the Stilled World.
’Dont worry, Cuz, I will save you anyhow’
He vowed internally, as no matter what happened, he wanted to try his best to save Veyr, and a key element of that outcome depended on him learning how to perform this move safely and consistently over a long time.