Chapter 47: Chapter 47 : A Special Telekinetic

A sphere, a knife, a sword, a spear; arriving on the other side, Rei found his other self already making Psi constructs. Seeing the Psi move obediently according to Ralf’s will, Rei confirmed that the Consolidation Phase had indeed passed. Not content with just watching, he got into it himself

[[Oh Rei, pretty cool right.]] Only at the appearance of the foreign Psi orb did Ralf snap out of his excited daze.

[[Super cool.]]

Making sure to not use more than fifty percent of the available Psi, the two explored their new powers in wonder.

Psi Scan was the first thing Rei focused on.

'Besides the slight blue tint, everything is no different than our omnivision in the Mental Space. Our extensive use of it has paid off. This feels totally natural.'

Discomfort and disorientation were chief among the feelings listed by psionics who used their Psi Scan for the first few times. Only after repeated use would these feelings go away, but even then, one would still have to use it quite a bit before one became comfortable with this new non-physical sense. The timeline varied from individual to individual but most took weeks to accomplish this, and several more weeks to mentally balance the use of this sense with their physical senses.

The duo, thanks to their time spent in the Mental Space, ran into no such problem. They could use their Psi Scan properly from the get-go.

Rei continued exploring the yard with his Psi Scan. At the same time, Ralf used his telekinesis to fling a stone. Rei observed this stone’s trajectory through his Psi Scan. As he did, he shifted the sense's energy arrangement. Pouring energy into Psi Scan’s perception slow property, the once speedy stone slowed to a sluggish crawl. Rei appreciated this for a few seconds before returning his perception back to its previous information processing rate. After doing so, Rei began playing with the Psi Scan's shape.

The Psi Scan's natural form was a sphere, but it could take any shape one wanted as long as it stayed within one's Psi Range. An amoeba, a cylinder, a half-sphere, and then back to a sphere. After having his fill of this, Rei had his Psi Scan explore Ralf's body. By focusing Psi Scan on one area, and shifting the sense's energy distribution, one could perceive microscopic things. Right now, Rei’s mind's eyes moved through Ralf's - his body.

‘Whoa…’

Blood flowing through veins, bones, Ralf’s beating heart, his diaphragm moving up and down, his brain trembling as endless neurons constantly fire; capturing everything, Rei was awe-stricken.

While awe-struck, Rei made sure to move through the entire body and capture every inch of it. Mapping out and recording their body was vital for a number of reasons. Moving on, Rei tossed a few stones with his telekinesis before shifting to creating Psi constructs.

‘The books made it seem like it would be more difficult than this. I suppose our energy manipulation and crafting in the Mental Space must have sped up the process.’

It did.

[[Ralf, let's see who’s dominant. Direct all the Psi to the right hand, I’ll go left.]]

[[Okay. In three two one, go.]]

The two willed it towards their respective directions, but in this parental spat, the Psi chose no side, merely trembling in place.

[[Equal again, not surprising. We’ve had enough fun, let's start the tests and calibration process. The sooner we’re done, the sooner we can start the real training. Go call mom…your mom, we’ll need her for comparison.]]

[[Yeah,]] Ralf responded nonchalantly, allowing Rei’s ‘error’ to get carried away by the passing winds.

Hana arrived, and an extensive list of tests ensued.

***

‘Extremely.’

Ralf would answer this way to the question, ‘How talented were they as Telekinetics?’

What constitutes Psi talent?

Maximum Psi Manipulation (MPM) vs Maximum Psi Emission (MPE) percentage, Mental Energy, Conceptual Memory size, Psi Capacity, and Psi Sensitivity; these five were the criteria by which one measured a Telekinetic’s Psi talent.

After performing tests with the helpful Hana and comparing their values with the benchmarks in the Society of Learning’s books, they confirmed that they were absurdly talented.

The most critical one for fighters was the MPM vs MPE percentage. The former was the total Psi one could control at any given time, while the latter was the total Psi one could ‘draw out in an instant. The closer one's MPE was to one's MPM, the better it was. A Telekinetic’s offence and movement speed were greatly affected by this percentage.

According to the Society of Learning’s figures, the average person’s MPE was half of their MPM. The duo didn’t need any complex calculations to work out this metric, their MPE was equal to their MPM, putting them at the zenith of Psi talent.

By the way, Hana was slightly above average at sixty percent. The MPE vs MPM percentage was, barring a few exceptional cases, a static value. With nowhere to jump up to, the transmigrator duo hoped that this percentage remained constant.

Having a high MPE vs MPM percentage was great, but could be made useless if the quality of one’s Mental Energy was poor.

Mental Energy, the energy of one’s soul, allowed one to materialize and manipulate Psi, both in one's Mental Domain and in the outside world. The quality of one’s Mental Energy affected: the speed at which Psi could be manipulated, the rate at which it could be drawn out, and the duration a psionic could actively use their powers.

Just like the prior criterion, the duo’s Mental Energy values were through the roof. This didn’t come as a surprise though. The Mental Space was a monstrosity of Mental Energy after all. They had quality and quantity.

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The Mental Space also helped with the next criterion, Conceptual Memory. This was essentially a mental library one could store recorded Psi techniques and constructs in. No matter how adept one’s aura manipulation was, constructing an object from scratch would always be slower than constructing it via the Conceptual Memory. Where the former was manual and required active thinking, the latter was semi-automatic. It could be likened to a mental hotkey.

Psionics stored objects or techniques they frequently made use of in the slots of the Conceptual Memory. Hana’s sculpting knife, Turner’s Psi armour and sword were examples of this. Most had very limited Conceptual Memory slots and had to make sure they didn't fill their slots with useless items. It wasn't impossible to scrub these slots clean but it was ill-advised. Still, while most psionics had to choose wisely about what was saved, there were exceptions. Jeff was one of them, and the duo was another.

The Mental Space acted as their Conceptual Memory, meaning they had practically limitless slots. The duo had already saved dozens of Psi constructs into their Conceptual Memory. Had an ordinary psionic seen these actions, they would have spat blood.

Next was Psi Capacity. Just like their Conceptual Memory, this was similarly 'limitless'. In a battle of endurance, the duo was confident that they could outlast anyone.

Psi capacity wasn’t a static value either. Over time, it naturally increased, and with rank-ups, there were massive jumps. While they were satisfied with their current capacity, the duo welcomed any increase, even an iota’s worth.

Lastly, there was Psi Sensitivity. While not one-to-one with Psi capacity, the two were highly correlated. And for the duo, this statistic held true. Even now, as Ralf was practising in his backyard, he could sense very distant Psi signatures going off.

Psi Sensitivity was very important for combat. The more sensitive one was, the better one could read the flow of Psi, and the better one did at anticipating their opponents’ next actions. In the sparring match against Jeff, Rei was greatly aided by his high Psi Sensitivity.

All in all, the duo had prodigious Psi talent. The crux of which came down to the fact that they weren’t an ordinary Telekinetic, but a combined fused version. Essentially, a perfect example of constructive interference at work.

‘Our Psi Rank is unfortunate, but everything else is great. We have more than enough cards to play a winning hand,’ Ralf thought as he punched out.

The air before his fist scrambled as the force propelled forth. Ralf held the pose as he eyed the thin coat of blue that wrapped around his arm. Appreciating its splendour for a few more seconds, he continued his Psi-enabled high-speed movement.

It was the early hours of the morning and the moon was smothered by clouds. In this darkness, Ralf practised nonchalantly. With his enhanced vision and Psi Scan, his surroundings were crystal clear in his mind’s eye.

Swoosh!

Punches, kicks, flips; all were done with speeds easily dwarfing those he could reach with his physical body. He didn’t stick to conventional movement either. Halfway through executing a front flip, Ralf created a foothold in mid-air, stepped off it, and transitioned into a backflip. Landing, he rolled back into a cartwheel, then halfway through twisted his body and began performing helicopter-like kicks.

‘When adding Psi to the equation, capoeira becomes very viable. Not just capoeira, any martial art that uses unconventional moves can ascend to the realm of practicality. I wonder if this world has a Drunken Fist equivalent? If not, maybe we should introduce it...'

Zipping around at neck-breaking speeds, Ralf's thoughts were as casual as ever. After hours of continued use, he had got the hang of high-speed movement. Needless to say, his rapid mastery was far from how things usually went.

The Psi enabled high-speed movement Ralf was currently exhibiting was known as Psi Stepping or Blinking. Mastering Blinking was vital for every fighter. Developing a competent Blinking technique wasn't easy though. It required one to master all basic Psi abilities, to have some prerequisite knowledge of the necessary sub-techniques involved, and to do a lot of practice.

So, how does one exactly go about creating one?

To create a Blinking technique, one needs a Second Skin.

The several-centimetre-thin blue membrane of Psi encasing Ralf's figure was exactly this. It got the name Second Skin due to the many markings on it resembling a full-body tattoo; looking at Ralf's, one would note many dots and lines adorning it. When he moved, sections would light up like circuit boards.

As cool as they looked, these things weren’t for show. The dots served as pools for force absorption Psi and the lines as tracks for this Psi to travel through in response to a movement. Without them present or working properly, Ralf's body would be torn up or worse by the intense telekinesis being applied to puppeteer his figure about.

Blinking was very dangerous. To others, but mostly to oneself. Accidents were a frequent occurrence for upstarts, and even old hands weren’t immune to a mishap or two. These mistakes could be very damaging, and in some cases even fatal. People would throw punches and have their arms shatter, perform Psi Steps and get whiplashed, knock themselves out from excessive gravitational forces...the number of such cases was innumerable.

The Society of Learning saw this problem and stepped in. No library was without a book detailing basic psionic techniques and their creation. With the danger it posed, high-speed movement and Second Skin's creation had an especially long and in-depth section dedicated to it, everything from how to record one's body's full range of motion, to how to go about conducting a stress test on the individual sections, to how to maintain stable air pressure within it to prevent one's lung from exploding, to how to configure one's barrier, to...everything. No consideration was left off the table.

And even then, the Society of Learning always advised that new psionics learn the technique from someone who had it mastered. The duo did just that. While not a fighter, Hana had a competent Blinking technique. Robert was the one who taught her it. With it being modelled after his, it was fairly high quality. The duo copied Hana's Blinking technique. She was only too happy to help with the process, and within fifteen minutes, Ralf was zipping around.

'Hmm, guess we could call this a hand-me-down. Appreciate it pops…but your son can't wear such shoddy clothes.'

While Ralf's movements were brisk, it was far from the fastest he could be. Their current Second Skin was inefficient. There were a lot of areas to improve on. The duo was well aware of them and had ideas at the ready.

But before deploying them, they made sure to get comfortable, thus, Ralf's current practice.

Swoosh!

Ending with a backflip, Ralf cast his hands out to his sides then did a clenching action. A moment later, two identical short swords materialized in his palms. As he was set to begin his flurry, Ralf paused as the Mental Link suddenly connected.

[[Everything’s done, come over.]]

Hearing Rei’s words, Ralf’s heart jumped with excitement. [[Give me a second.]]

Following the reply, he rushed to his room, got into a comfortable position, and made the trip over.

The two then began their Psi training in earnest.

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