Chapter 517: Maybe I Should’ve Paid Attention To That Lesson

For one loose second, I experienced nearly every negative emotion known to mankind. Fear and regret, anger and misery.

Finally, there was acceptance.

...And then there was fear again, because apparently acceptance had been a fucking lie!

"AAAAAAAAHHHHH!"

The air out here was so cold it felt razor-sharp in my chest, like I was inhaling shards of broken glass with every breath.

Minus twelve degrees Celsius? The AI was dumb. It was at least minus fifty!

The freezing air stung my eyes and turned my breath into frost, while the high-altitude winds whipped at my clothes and face so fiercely that my headband flew off.

"MY HAIR!" I cried out, because I could make my peace with dying, but not dying with bad hair!

So I frantically reached out to grab back my headband... which was a mistake. Because the moment I moved my hand, my body tilted.

The ocean tilted, and the sky tilted as well.

My entire existence tilted.

"WHA—!"

I started spinning through the air like a badly thrown potato, locked in an uncontrolled free fall.

I tried to orient myself, but there was absolutely nothing to orient myself with. Up had become down, down had become sideways. I tried to call upon my Origin Card again, but still to no avail.

After wasting a quick second flailing around in panic like a dying fish, I forced myself to calm down and spread my arms and legs wide.

The moment I did that, my body stopped tumbling quite as wildly. The wind still tore at me, but at least I could tell which way was up now.

Once I had stabilized myself, I looked down.

That was a mistake.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH!"

I started panicking again.

Below me, the Northern Ocean looked like a churning cauldron of pitch-black water and floating white icebergs.

Those icebergs were the Shattered Isles.

I was quickly falling toward some high-rise mountains, their snowy peaks protruding out of the ocean like jagged teeth of some enormous monster.

Okay, think! Think! I told myself.

The wind roared in my ears, the white-capped hills getting dangerously closer by the second.

Fuck! Fuck! Fuck! Fuck! Fuck! Fuck! FUUU—

I started thinking back to Aarav’s impromptu lecture.

Method One: Treat my Spiritual Pressure as a second body surrounding me, adjust directional vectors, and calculate a bunch of spatial math while screaming and crying.

Easy.

There was only one problem.

It was, in fact, not easy!

To use this method, I needed an exceptional level of mastery over my Spiritual Pressure — which I did not have, obviously.

I couldn’t even use telekinesis yet.

So that left me with...

Method Two: Pushing against gravity itself. Create a concentrated field of Spiritual Pressure right under my body and push downward with enough raw force to slow the hell down.

Simple. Rely on brute force.

I had already done something similar during the Mock War.

I had used my Spiritual Pressure as an explosive launchpad to propel myself over the cliff, and later used it to jump across the forest and reach the Ebony Tower in time.

This was the same principle! I should’ve been able to do it, right?

...No.

Because it wasn’t the same principle at all.

Back then, I had been standing on solid ground. I could brace myself, gather my Spiritual Pressure, and push.

Now? Now there was nothing solid beneath me. What I needed to push against was gravity itself.

It was a stupid notion. How could I push against something that wasn’t even tangible? Gravity wasn’t a wall or the floor or a force I could physically grab onto.

It was just... there.

And yet, as the mountains rushed closer beneath me, I didn’t have the luxury of questioning the intricacies of physics.

I had to give it a try. So I did.

I clenched my teeth and focused on the space right beneath my body, willing as much Spiritual Pressure as I could downward, imagining an invisible platform forming beneath my feet.

Nothing happened.

...Literally nothing.

If anything, I think I started falling faster. Yes, yes, it was probably only my imagination, but that didn’t stop me from shrieking like a little girl.

Fed up and just short of pissing my pants at this point, I went back to try the first method — the one that needed me to use telekinesis.

I had no idea what the fuck I was doing, but that had never stopped me before.

I bit my lips and stretched an arm up.

The mountain under me was closer now. Much, much closer. I had ten seconds at best.

I could see the snow covering its slopes. I could see enormous chunks of ice breaking off its cliffs. I could even see what I could only make out to be a frozen waterfall winding down one of its sides.

Wonderful.

I was going to die with a beautiful view.

Pressing my teeth harder against my lower lip, I focused on my Spiritual Pressure.

Maybe it was because of the adrenaline, but it felt as if my senses had expanded far beyond the bounds of my flesh. Usually, whenever I tried using my Spiritual Pressure, I did so on instinct.

But this time, if even for a second, I actually felt it. I felt a force radiating out from my body in waves. I felt it move.

It was a weird sensation.

Normally, our senses are limited to our bodies. We can touch, smell, hear. But with my Spirit Force, it felt like I had grown another set of senses outside my skin.

It’s difficult to explain.

My nervous system had suddenly leaked out into the open sky.

I could feel the air rushing past me and the mountain closing in on me. I could feel the snowflakes colliding with the invisible field around my body long before they ever touched me.

I wasn’t seeing any shapes or feeling any surfaces, but I was aware of every foreign presence in my immediate vicinity.

Like I said, it’s difficult to explain.

Imagine closing your eyes and still being able to feel the room around you — the walls, the furniture, the distance between everything.

It made me understand that unlike Essence, my Spiritual Pressure wasn’t something I pushed out of my body. It was an extension of my soul. My command over the world itself.

It was my will.

Which was ironic, since Spiritual Pressure was also called Will.

Now it made sense why.

I had to act fast, though. Because this feeling of awareness was already slipping away.

With my outstretched hand, I reached for that invisible presence again and this time consciously moved it skyward, intending to grab something there.

And once I did, I pulled.

SWOOSH—!!

A thin, black headband flew into my grasp, and I immediately slapped it back on my head.

The relief I felt was unworldly.

Finally! With my hair back in its peak condition, I could now die in peace.

THWAAAAAM—!!

The first impact didn’t shatter my spine, which was a huge plus.

My body plowed through a thick, overhanging canopy of ice-encrusted pine trees.

CRASH! CRACK! THWACK!

Branches snapped like brittle glass as I tore through them. Every single strike rattled my teeth until I hit a steep, icy incline, rolled down it, and came to a stop at the bottom of a shallow ravine.

"O-Ow..."

Everything went black.