Zephyria - Chapter 13

“So. Frikkin. Cool!” Elektra gushed. You could almost visibly see hearts protrude from her eye sockets, triggering an identical response by Ryan.

As Yami observed this short exchange, he quickly became astonished by Ryan’s behaviour. For his entire life Yami had consitently trained at the highest intensity and continuously strived to get better. This pursuit for greatness hadn’t provided him the time to be content with his hard work, so seeing Ryan gush over his own creations caught him off guard. He wanted to experience that feeling of true satisfaction with himself.

Alas.

After frolicking around in circles with Elektra, Ryan gathered himself and turned to face the team, now with a more stern look.

“I must sync each of your sOr with the hardware. Hikari?”

The prince extended his arm, and his hand harness activated, glowing pure white.

Hikari nodded in response, pressing a button on the handle of his hammer to eject his [Nova] sOr. He held it out in his hand confidently, without flinching, without turning to another for assurance and without saying a word.

His manner was intentional. It was important that he set an example. Though physically and mentally gifted in their own rights, their sOrs were fundamental to their entire lives, so to unequip and entrust someone else with sOr of that rarity was akin to offering an internal organ. By doing so unhesitatingly demonstrated both his unquestioning loyalty to the throne and his trust in his team member. He wanted the others to understand that the missions to come required this attitude, and that they were to be accountable for one another.

Seeing this, Ryan extended his fingers. Several fibres spawned from the central unit of his harness and formed a thread, which then bonded with the ring on his middle finger. It then stretched out towards Hikari and wrapped around the [Nova] sOr. The movement of the string was incredibly fluid, so fluid that one could think it was sentiment.

It was not, but it’s capabilities did make it distinguish it from its regular inanimate counterparts.

In one swift motion Ryan turned his hand and recoiled his finger, pulling the sOr towards him. Doing so reeled the string back into the main compartment whilst retaining a clear trajectory towards the ring and into his palm, to which he closed. He then spawned a single fibre which shot straight out and instantly attached itself to a socket in what seemed to be a white baton laced with gold. As he opened his palm the fibre was cut, and its other end fused with the [Nova] sOr. He let go of the sOr, which lingered in the air attached via the fibre to the baton before being pulled into the baton

Ryan then reverted back to his shenanigan-filled, almost bafoonish state of being.

Elektra’s elation expanded tenfold at the sight of this. She had been friends with Ryan for a few years but had never witnessed this serious side to him, perhaps in part to him concealing his royal heritage. She noticed the similarities in both their tendency to casually yet radically “switch” emotional states, and she admired this.

“Please,” Ryan said, gesturing towards the tool and smiling coyly at Hikari. “I myself cannot pick it up.”

Hikari was doubtful. “I mean it certainly looks nice, but.. A Baton?”

“Just take it!”

Hikari looked at the baton almost unconvinced, then finally gave in. As he picked it up his not-so hidden unimpressed feelings slowly disappeared.

“This really has some some weight to it” he said, lifting it up and down. Though his strength allowed him to carry it with relative ease, this was too much for several regular people to hold and much heavier than his previous weapon.

“Grip it and thrust it outwards to activate it” the prince suggested, mimicking the motion.

Hikari stepped back, looked at this weighted baton and did as suggested. As he swung his arm out, the baton extended significantly and expanded at the very top, forming the head of a hammer. He grinned, quickly warming up to the device.

Ryan crossed his arms, proud of himself. “I’ve made your Hammer collapsable for portability, and heavier for stronger hits. It contains many other new functions from your previous hammer, which we can test out later c:”

The leader half-listened to this, as he swung his new, slimmer yet beefier warhammer several times in the air. As he wandered off, Ryan turned to see that Gale had her [Tempest] sOr removed from her collar and ready in her palm. Ryan performed the similar procedure to before, this time inserting it into the socket of a pendant. The [Tempest] sOr’s natural silver glow was complimented by the silver necklace attached to it, much to the acclaim of the others. Even Gale found it beautiful, which was rare given that her slightly snobby attitude left her unimpressed with most things. She carefully lifted it and placed it around her neck.

Ryan then a glowing fibre which attached to the pendant, and another which attached to Gale’s forehead. He crossed his fingers, knotting the two fibres together, and the fibres dissapated.

“I created a mental link between you and your necklace” he pointed out. “Will your Royal Cloak into existence.”

Gale sort of understood, and thought “Cloak.”

Cotton fibres spilt out of her pendant, instantly weaving together to form her Silver Royal Cloak, to which she then despawned. This pleased her greatly.

“Finally! I don’t have to constantly wear that cloak if im not wearing my wings.”

“Speaking of wings, go ahead and spawn them.”

Gale thought “Wings”.

A few fibres spawned and wrapped together to forming an exoskeleton. At the same time a lot more cotton fibres weaved together tighter to form sharp and sturdy feather blades which attached to the exoskeleton. The result were two large, sharp angel-like wings. Ryan and Elektra continued their fangasms, before Ryan composed himself once more.

“The blades are sharper and sturdier, and the entire kit has 50% higher a movement speed than your previous wings.”

As Gale examined her new wings, she suddenly became surprised, noticing that she possessed complete control over each wing.

“Yup. The wings are also fully articulated. We’ll soon do test flights xD”

After Gale retracted her wings, she held the pendant with one hand and admired it. Satisfied with her satisfaction, Ryan turned to the rest.

“Who wants to go next?”

“I, ” Xero said, stepping forward and gently pushing Amber. ” think it’s best if the newcomer he-”

“DON’T BE SO CONDESCENDING YOU MORON. AND DON’T PUSH M-”

Amber had already grabbed her new weapon and swung at Xero’s head.

Xero was 99% about to legitimately experience death by angry girlfriend.