Liam's brow knit into a puzzled frown, repeating the phrase like a foreign coin. "Bodily gates? I've never heard that before."

Miuson stepped up before anyone else could answer. He folded his hands behind his back and gave a small, matter-of-fact nod. "Our ancestors wrote of them in the old scrolls. They called them 'gates' because they're places in the body where soulura have to travel. Nodes and channels, soulura travels a set path. Naturally, the gates stop too much soulura from flowing out. If the gate is opened, the flow strengthens. If blocked, the flow ceases."

He tapped his temple for emphasis. "It's not word-for-word science, but it's what the old teachers called it."

Liam took in the explanation, jaw working as he tried to reconcile the idea with what he already knew—ancient metaphors, folk anatomy, the lessons Tsubasa hinted at back in Enohay. The pieces didn't yet slide into place, but the image—soulura flowing through specific nodes in the body—gave him a faint sense of familiarity.

Dominitus watched the exchange with an approving half-smile. "Words are fine," he rumbled, "but it's better to see." He turned and walked to a low shelf along the wall where rows of scroll cases had been stacked.

His hand grabbed a single weathered scroll. Linen-bound, its binding frayed, the wooden handle dark with use. He strode back to Liam and offered it. "Here," Dominitus said, handing the the scroll into Liam's hands, "ancestral diagrams and notations. The bright ones tend to learn quicker by sight than by ear; figured you'd benefit!"

Liam's fingers closed around the scroll. It felt solid, lived-in, like a thing meant to be handled with care and perserved, not just read. Dama edged nearer, curiosity wide in his eyes; Mumu and Nini puffed up on their paws, heads cocked, equally interested. Liam turned the scroll over in his hands, the parchment whispering as it unrolled.

Inside—the ink faded, yet still readable—was an anatomical outline of a human body, drawn with the care of a scholar. Dozens of tiny circles peppered the figure: along the spine, clustered at the shoulders, at the hollow under the ribs, radiating along the limbs. Each was labeled with numbers and notes.

He paused, thumb resting on one of the inked circles. "These…These are the bodily gates?" he asked, looking up.

Dominitus nodded, a small, satisfied grin cracking his face. "Aye. The channels the old masters would point to." He crossed his arms and watched Liam's expression as if waiting to see the moment the light clicked on.

It did—Liam's eyes widened. The scroll's chart, the circles and lines, tugged at a piece of knowledge thanks to his medical background. He straightened, breath catching. "Oh! Bodily gates are pressure points! We call them pressure points in Enohay!" He sounded half-amazed at discovering a single truth wearing two names.

Miuson and Dominitus exchanged baffled looks with the former cocking his head. "Pressure points?" He repeated; the word had the flavor of something taught with hands-on drills, not straight from a book.

Dominitus's brow furrowed in a different way—less puzzled than amused. He rumbled a laugh and shook his head. "Different words for the same thing across the countryside, makes sense."

Okun, watching the exchange with a small smile, let out a warm chuckle. "There's always another name," he said, eyes crinkling, "I knew there was a term I couldn't quite place." He folded his hands and, for a moment, the teacher in him settled like dust finding a table: the time to explain had come.

He gestured toward the gathered youths, the torchlight catching the lines of his face. "The first of the Forced Awakening methods is called 'Soulura Transference'..." he announced, voice steady, words measured. "It involves channeling one's own soulura into another's body. The idea is to overload the receiving person's bodily gates, or pressure points, so the soulura can flood every channel at once and the receiver learns the feeling and flow."

Mesmerized, the image that popped into Dama's head was strange—the notion of a river of light pulsing through every narrow place in the body.

Okun's expression sobered as he continued. "It works by overwhelming the system, but that in lies the risk. If it is not performed by a skilled individual, or if the recipient's soul or body is not strong enough, the transference can fail...catastrophically." He let that sit, the words heavy.

"When transference fails, the most common injury is to the internal injuries. The soulura can scramble the precious rhythms and balance of the body itself." He finished, the caution in his voice plain as a bell.

The room hummed with the weight of Okun's words, and for a beat there was nothing but the crackle of the torches and soft breathing. Dama's eyes were wide; he straightened and stood a little straighter as if panic might be kept at bay by posture alone.

Liam, in contrast, went through an entire pantomime of horror in a single heartbeat—his face crumpled, his eyes bugged, and his mouth dropped open in a display of disbelief that could have been pulled straight from a comedic sketch. He drew a hand to his temple and looked every inch the man whose imagination had just sprinted into worst-case scenarios.

Dominitus couldn't hold it. The burly captain threw his head back and bellowed with laughter, the sound booming off the oaken beams. "Aye, I don't blame you for that reaction, lad!" He howled, slapping a heavy hand over his heart as if to steady himself.

Miuson shot Dominitus a disproving look. "Come on, captain..." he muttered, but the edges of his mouth twitched. Dominitus wiped a theatrical tear from the corner of his eye and, still grinning, gave a half-apology as he forced his composure back into place.

While Liam stared in pale, wide-eyed shock—mind already cataloguing ruined organs and any else that could go wrong—Dama was the one to find his voice. His question was breathless, each syllable thick from fear. "Th-then what's the second method...?"

Dominitus stepped forward, rubbing the back of his neck as if to gather the right words. He spoke in the rough, plain manner of a man used to action rather than rhetoric. "The second method is the blunt one, think of it as a direct version of the first. Instead of channeling soulura into another's body, you strike them with attacks infused with your own soulura. The blow shocks the body, triggers reflexes, and, if it's done in the right way, forces the recipient's system to adapt by defending with its own soulura." His voice was blunt and practical; he didn't dress the idea up.

Dama's face flickered with awe and fear. "You…You mean someone hits you until you—until you glow?" he stammered, picturing it with a child's blunt logic.

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Okun took the explanation, smoothing it with the calm patience of a teacher. "Think of it like this: the technique uses the body's natural defenses. When the body is struck, it instinctively channels soulura to the damaged area to protect and repair. The method exploits that recoil—amplifying the soulura directed by those reflexes so the flow races through the bodily gates. Because the body always uses soulura subconsciously to respond to harm, a caringly calibrated strike can force the soulura into patterns the learner would not otherwise access."

That last notion—about the body using soulura unconsciously—caught both Dama and Liam attentions. They leaned forward as if the words themselves could be grasped more easily in proximity.

Liam's fingers twitched on the edge of the scroll in his hands, his curiosity replacing the earlier dread. He blinked rapidly and asked, voice small but focused, "What do you mean the body uses soulura subconsciously?"

Okun folded his hands with an amused look. "It sounds complicated, but it isn't..." he said, Then, leaning forward a touch as if confiding a simple truth, "Liam, you instruct as a teacher and mend bodies as a doctor, at least from what I heard from Himon. You of all people should know how the heart pumps, the lungs breathe, and the stomach digests. All of it runs without a thought. The body does these things on instinct; you don't have to tell it how to do them. You don't even have to understand the mechanics for them to work."

Liam's shoulders straightened. "You don't mean—!" he began, the sentence already completing itself in his head.

Okun's grin widened at the look of recognition on the man's face. "Exactly. The same principle applies to soulura. The body knows how to call on it automatically, in the way that it knows to breathe or to clot blood when you're cut. For most people, soulura isn't required for daily life the way breath is, so they never notice it. It only becomes obvious in extreme situations—when the body is pushed to call on every reserve."

Dama, listening, felt a little shiver of comprehension run through him; the memory of his own body surging when he had protected Giona nudged at him. Dominitus cracked a satisfied nod as if the logic fit the way he'd always trained: hard work to make instinct sharper.

Okun pressed the point further, voice calm and patient. "And there's another link: breathing. You don't have to think to breathe, but if you train your breath, the way you breathe, you can achieve near superhuman results."

Taking a moment to point at the scroll Liam had in his hands, Okun continued. "Our Briarstone ancestors used such techniques in ancient martial arts. They found ways to not only train, but master breathing in such a way in order to improve their craft. Soulura works the same way. The body can use soulura subconsciously to react and repair, but if you learn to call it, shape it, and direct it with intention, you unlock its full potential."

Liam's fingers flexed on the scroll in his hands as he leaned forward, awestruck. Dama too, tasting the idea—something he could practice, something tangible to hold against his fear, something he could use to protect. Even Mumu and Nini seemed to lean in, mimicking the group's attention.

"In short," Okun finished, folding the lesson into a simple rule, "soulura is not a mystical otherworldly thing that only a chosen few can glimpse. It's part of you—often unconscious, sometimes dormant. What we will teach you is how to bring it into the light: how to sense it, how to guide it, and how to make it obey your will. That is the first step of Soul Amplification."

Dominitus stepped up beside the chief with the energy of a man who'd been waiting all morning to put folk through the wringer. He punched a heavy fist into his open palm. "All right," he barked, eyes scanning the three boys like a foreman choosing a crew, "explanations finished. Who's first, and which method do you think you want to try?"

The question hung in the air. Miuson and Dama exchanged a look that was equal parts excitement and an edge of fear. They both shifted backward a hair; the risks Okun had spelled out sat between them like a visible thing.

Dama forced a shaky chuckle and looked down at the scuffed floorboards, fingers worrying at the hem of his sleeve. His voice, when it came, was small. "U-um…" he started, then swallowed, eyes flicking to Mumu and Nini for the steadiness he always found in them.

Miuson's bravado faltered too; he scratched his cheek, avoiding Dominitus's steady, assessing gaze. "I—" he began, then stopped, the soldier's front cracking to show the still young boy beneath.

Before either could say more, Liam pushed himself forward from where he'd been listening. He walked up to Dominitus and Okun, meeting the chief's patient eyes with the calm steadiness of someone used to weighing outcomes. "Before we jump into forced awakenings, could you...could you demonstrate first? Show us how you control your soulura. Let us see the motions, the posture, what to feel. Maybe Dama, Miuson, and I can practice following your example. If we can coax our bodies into recognizing how it's done, perhaps we can avoid the…" he fiddled his hands in the air, "more dangerous methods."

There was a hopeful edge to his words—reasonable, teacherly. He wanted a safer road, a way to learn without gambles that could end in shattered organs or worse for the two boys behind him.

Dominitus and Okun exchanged a look, the kind that passed between men who'd been in harsher places together than a training hall. For a moment the chief's expression was unreadable; Dominitus's grin slid into something quieter, more resigned.

They both shook their heads, the motion slow and deliberate. "It isn't that simple, unfortunately." They said in unison.

Okun's face softened into something like a teacher's patience as he folded his hands. "Soulura is a single word we use to make the idea manageable, but don't mistake that for uniformity. Every soul gives off its own signature of soulura. What I feel when I shape mine may be completely unlike what you would feel when you shape yours, Liam. It's not one-size-fits-all."

He shrugged a little, a humble crease at the corner of his mouth. "In truth, I'm probably one of the worst to ask how it feels—it comes to me with so little thought, even in my youth, that I don't have the words to explain it. Everyone's flow is their own."

Dominitus stepped forward as if to indulge the question. He blinked, looked at his hands, then at the empty air before him as if summoning a memory by sight alone. "For me," he said in that rough, practical voice, "I don't think of breath or posture first. I think of the moment that made me need it." He drew himself up, lifted one arm and opened his palm like a man offering proof rather than phrasing.

His face changed, tightened around a remembered hurt, and the room grew still. Dominitus' eyes went distant and hard. He told them, simply, "The bear. The slash across my ribs. The pain, the adrenaline, the anger. I remember that entire moment, down to the smell of bloody fur."

As he spoke, a subtle change began at the edge of his hand. It was not a shine so much as a pressure, a warmth that gathered like a low heat before a forge. The air by his forearm seemed to thicken.

Even without a sense for soulura, Liam felt that thickening as a thing shifting the hair on his body. Dama's eyes widened at the sight, and Mumu and Nini tilted their heads in the same puzzled, fascinated way they did when they saw Okun's soulura.

To all of them, Domitius' soulura, despite having no where near as much pressure as Okun's, was undeniably there. To Mumu and Nini specifically, was pale, no color, and was far less opaque than Okun's.

Dominitus nodded once as if satisfied, then continued, "I can feel it coursing from my chest and through my arm—like a river of life inside me. I latch onto it and steer it where I need it to go. That's the closest I can get to explaining it."

He took a moment to think while rubbing a thumb across his palm, as if smoothing a thought he couldn't quite put into words, then offered a rueful grin. "Sorry I can't make it clearer. It's something you learn by hurting and then by choosing not to hurt again, if that makes sense."

Liam watched him the whole time, not with the slack-jawed terror that had coursed through the room earlier, but with a kind of analytical wonder. "I felt it..." he said quietly, half to himself, half to the room. "Not the soulura, not yet—but the change it makes to the space... Fascinating..."

Liam then looked to Dama, who had an earnest face of a boy at attention. Giving a brotherly grin and exhaling, a soft sound of resolution, he turned back to the two instructors with the calm of someone used to stepping into new lessons. He straightened and nodded once. "All right, I understand. I'll go first."

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Next: (Chapter 82) Forced Awakening: The 1st Method

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