“…But, is that true? Maybe the only reason I can access my music will better with my voice than with an instrument is simply because I use my voice more than I play the piano or a lyre?”

A sudden realization hit the crowd. They shivered. It was almost like a door of endless possibilities was opening before them.

“You must all be wondering why I would bother reigning in the power of my wills. Wouldn’t an attack from a 9th level will always be more powerful than one from that of a 1st level?”

Many nodded.

“But, you’d be wrong again. For the very same reason that there is no single path for wills, because wills can be combined.”

An endless silence filled the coliseum. The amount of secrets Dyon was revealing were akin to books that only the highest levels of the Sapientia family would author. And yet, he spoke of them like it was nothing. Why? Because Dyon knew that even if he told everyone in the world this, no more than a handful would be able to copy his path.

“Did you know… there’s a very interesting human mortal realm concept…” Dyon’s hands began swirling with first level space and time wills, together, but separate.

The sparkling black and grays coated his hands, causing a collective breath to escape the coliseum. Space will was rare enough, but the will of time was so rare and elusive that had Dyon’s hands not been moving in a fashion much too slow for the speed of his actual body, it wouldn’t have been recognized.

“Space is actually a fabric… a piece of paper layered again and again in every which way….”

Dyon’s words were confusing, but his voice made them oddly understandable. It gave the crowd and geniuses an odd feeling.

“The dimensions of the world… ie forwards and backwards, up and down, and left and right, actually have a 4th level to them – that being time.”

The wills in Dyon’s hands spun more vigorously, giving the geniuses near Dyon a suffocating feeling. They felt as though their bodies were growing heavier as time went on.

“Meaning… movement forward in time, is the equivalent of you taking a step in any direction.

“So, why is this significant? Because, mass causes dips in the fabrics of space… bending the paper inwards, if you will.

“However, curves are very interesting in their nature: they force straight lines to come together in response to their movement in the 4 dimensions. What does this mean? It means that the natural tendencies of objects in curved space is to come together.

“Don’t believe me? Take a large round ball, and two elastic strings. Tape the strings parallel to each other, and draw lines at that starting point to prove that the strings never deviated from their straight path. Then, spin the ball, slowly stretching the strings. What you’ll notice, is despite the string remaining straight at the taped end, the other ends of the string come together.”

The crowd had no idea what Dyon was talking about. What does this have to do with wills and their combining? But, despite their wishes, an array appeared above Dyon, manipulating the experiment as he described. And under the shocked gaze of everyone, the un-taped ends of the strings came together, but, the taped ends were still straight!

Dyon smiled, “you must think that this is just an optical illusion. Even worse, you must think it has nothing to do with wills. But, you’d be wrong.

“The ball spinning and stretching the strings was an example of movement in the original three dimensions. But, what about the fourth?”

A sudden realization hit the crowd. Their faces froze in shock and understanding.

“That’s right, movement in time. Curvature of space. Coming together despite the original configurations of the object. The combination of these things is exactly what you’d call… gravity!”

BANG!

Dyon’s hands clasped together. The coliseum shook. The knees of the weak creaked and groaned. The structures shook violently, suddenly unable to support their own weights anymore.

The shock on the faces of the crowd soon reached the elders. They could no longer maintain their nonchalant attitudes.

Dyon combined his space and time will to exponentially increase gravity!

Dyon chuckled, seeing that everyone had suffered enough. His wills dispersed, returning everything to normal.

A cold sweat appeared on each and everyone. ‘This is the power of combining wills?…’

“The reason I learned to change the depth of my wills at will,” Dyon chuckled, “is because combining wills is exceedingly difficult. It’s much easier to control should their levels be lower. Yet, their affects are much more powerful than even them at their peak.

“I hope you understand now that wills have no set path. There is an infinite amount of possibilities and possible avenues of understanding. There is no path better than another, and no one cares, or should care, what level your wills are at.

“So what if you soul allows you to reach a deeper level? You clearly don’t even understand the basics, so why would you dive deeper?”

Dyon suddenly jumped up from his seat. His shirtless torso rippling as he stretched and yawned lazily.

Stretching his waist, he winked at the beauties and jumped onto an array platform, floating up to Ri.

“Wanna go see Little Lyla?” Dyon asked, stretching out his hand.

Ri smiled, nodding her head and ignoring his hand to jump onto the platform.

Dyon chuckled bitterly, “you could at least give me some face, you really know how to hurt a man.”

Ri rolled her eyes. “Why don’t you go ask ‘Madeleine Sapientia’ to take your hand.”

Dyon’s robust laughter filled the quiet coliseum. “You’d like her. You two would bully me quite well together.”

Ri looked at Dyon. It seemed she understood that he wasn’t lying either. But, it was only a feeling.

Dyon waved to Uncle Acacia who held a proud smile on his face. “See you later Uncle Acacia.”

Uncle Acacia nodded in acknowledgement, his smile never fading as he watched them float away.

The crowd and the geniuses watched Dyon and Ri disappear into the distance, still not knowing how to feel or what to do.

Zaltarish could only maintain his calm outer appearance.

‘You’ve won this time… we’ll see how long you can jump around happily in my kingdom.’