Chapter 2: Where are we?

The water below his feet seemed to stop, just before he stepped on it. As Res did not know what else to do, she followed him. As she stepped on the water, she noticed that the water reacted to her feet in the same way that it reacted to Nelion's feet. She walked a little further into the river and stoped. She was now standing still on a fast flowing stream of water. Suddenly she noticed Nelion as he was standing on a rock at the edge of the waterfall. He was just standing there, as if he was enjoying the scenery. Then suddenly he jumped, and fell down. Res rushed towards him, stoped on the rock on which Nelion was standing and looked down. She noticed that about, half of the water from the waterfall was not falling down directly, but it floated in the air, following a curved path and joined the river in a distance. She then also saw, a floating island in a distance beside the settings sun surrounded by huge yellowish clouds. She also noticed that she herself was on a floating island and that the two islands were connected to each other by a rainbow. There were a bunch of other floating islands as well. A herd of magical birds were making their way from one island to the next, although they were too far away for her to recognise them. She stood there for a while in an awe, but as she did not know what else to do, she decided to jump as well. She jumped from the stone and stared falling down, she was washed by the floating water and then started falling down again. "AAAAAAAAA!!!!!" she screamed in fear as she fell down. Suddenly she noticed Nelion falling beside him, and soon he was above her. She was falling faster than him. "HUH???" she screamed as she fell down. Soon she met the surface with a huge splat, and sank deep below. She got hurt in the process but she did not feel much pain. The wounds were not severe. Moreover she started feeling more comfortable, as all of the wounds of her body started to heal quickly. She realised that the water had healing properties. She tried to hold her breath for a little longer, but due to screaming while falling, she lost her breath. But, suddenly she realised that she was able to breath, underwater. As she couldn't swim, she stayed in the water, for a while. Suddenly, she felt that her head was being pulled by something. Before she knew it, she was out of the water. A wave of water, spiralling like a tornado, with one end in the water and other on Res' head, shaped like a hat or a bandana, was holding her above ground level like a curved stand or a hand. Nelion was standing on water with his hands crossed, looking at Res. "Welcome to my personal pocket dimension. This place is my training ground. If you don't find me at my house or school, odds are that you will find me here. Now then, might I ask, Why are you here?" asked Nelion, as Res struggled to breathe. "Huh?... What?..." Res asked confused. "Tell me, why are you here?" asked Nelion. "Umm... I... I..." said Res before she stoped to clear her thoughts. "I wanted to say thank you." said Res, finally pulling herself together. "Is that all?" asked Nelion in his usual soft voice. "Umm... I ..." said Res but she was unable to speak any further. The water which was holding her, gently brought her closer to Nelion. He touched her cheeks gently. "Unable to even ask for help, are we?" said Nelion in his usual soft voice, while the expression on his face still remained unchanged and calm. "Follow me" said Nelion as he walked into the forest at the bank of the river. The water kept Res down. She looked at Nelion with a bit of curiosity for a while, before she finally decided to follow him. While the two of them were walking, Res suddenly noticed a little white rabbit in a distance. The rabbit ran away as soon it saw her looking at it, as if it was running for it's life. Res had never seen an animal react like that before. "Judging by the various wounds on your body, I am assuming that no one cares about you at home. Am I right?" asked Nelion. "Yeah" said Res in a sad tone. "Then I guess they couldn't care less even if you don't go home at all. Would they?" asked Nelion. "No, they won't" replied Res. After walking into the forest for a while, Res and Nelion entered the plains. "Now, we can cause as much destruction as we want to, over here." said Nelion. They walked a little further in. "Now then... Since no one cares about you, then I guess no one will complain about it even if I beat you to death." said Nelion. On hearing this, every muscle in Res' body got tensed. She looked at Nelion with a shocked expression in her eyes, for a while before her head lowered in submission. Nelion slowly walked up to her and placed his index finger in her abdominal region, just a little below the diaphragm, and passed a small wave of magical energy into her body. "Listen to me" said Nelion who now had Res' attention, "I want you to memorise the new feeling that you are about to experience right now, because I don't want to do it again." he continued. Suddenly, a huge wave of magical energy was released from Res' body. Nelion jumped back a few steps and made a magical barrier around himself. Res looked at her right hand, surprised as the blue aura originating from her body rampaged the surrounding area with huge gusts of wind and rose high in the sky, passing through the clouds. Res simply looked at herself with curiosity. "Incredible. The amount of pain she must be going through right now would easily kill any normal human. What kind of treatment does she get from the people around her which made her used to this level of mental torture?" Nelion thought to himself. Res' feet started to leave the ground. She started floating and hovering in the air. The winds became stronger and started transforming into a tornado. As the ground below Res just started to crack by the extreme forces of the wind, Nelion snapped the fingers of his right hand. As soon as he did that, the blue aura halted it's ascend towards the sky, and formed a small hollow sphere shape around Res' body, which expanded it's radius and covered a huge distance before it started to fade away, like a shockwave. Meanwhile, Res slowly started to come down to the ground, her eyes started closing as she slowly fell unconscious and dropped to the ground. A while later, Res felt something splash her face. She opened her eyes and saw that she was now near the bank of the river from earlier. Nelion was holding water in his hands and Res felt that her face was wet. Also, she felt that she was laying on the ground and her hairs were in the water of the river, her head was half sunk in it. "How are you feeling?" asked Nelion, with the calm expression on his face, as usual. "Where am I? What happened?" asked Res. "I asked first" replied Nelion as he dropped the water he was holding back into the river and extended his hand, in order to help Res get up. Res took his hand and got up and said, "I am fine" in a confused tone. Then she look around confused. "How long was I out?" asked Res. "Not very long" replied Nelion. "Do you remember what I told you to remember?" he continued. "Yes, I do. As clearly as daylight." replied Res. "Good" said Nelion. "Now, I want you to close your eyes and concentrate on other sources of that feeling, apart from yourself, in your surrounding area." said Nelion. "But, why am I doing this?" asked Res. "Because once you do that, you will learn to interact with the magical energy in your surrounding area. This skill is usually taught to children, but I guess no one taught you. But, once a person crosses the age of ten, then there is no way to teach this skill to that person in the same way it is taught to children. Although there are 'other methods' to teach this skill to them, but unfortunately, these 'other methods' often require sacrifices. The method I used on you, requires sacrifice in the form of pain, which you just went through. So, now that you have experienced what magical energy feels like, you should be able to interact with the magical energy in your surroundings." said Nelion. "So what if I would be able to 'interact' with the magical energy in my surroundings? What will it change at all?" asked Res. "What will it change?" said Nelion. He sighed, "It will give you the ability to cast magic, you idiot." he continued. Res felt like her heart stopped beating for a second. Tears started flowing from her eyes. She hugged Nelion and cried, "thank you... thank you..." Nelion got a bit annoyed by this.