The circumambient rustling of the foliages and ocean susurration broke the scorching silence of this high noon. Kôra and the other gathered in an empty beach for the practice, just at a spitting distance behind the host’s home. There were only little signs of life existing as Rangga’s chickens were held in their pens. From his house, they brought pairs of tables, umbrellas, and mats; along with cardboard boxes that were weightful to lift.
Doing physical activities under the sun had once been Kôra’s modus vivendi back in the village, but not with the coarseness of lowland heat. The boy had to warn his uncle not to overdo himself with the labor. All meanwhile, Keane slacking off in the shade untroubled. Kôra observed how effortlessly Arim and Sölsa lifted the boxes, while being curious with the contents as they handled it with a great care. Not only that, a remaining coldness exuded from the boxes’ holes made him think of them containing some produce. 

After placing the items and arranging the furnitures, Rangga called everyone to come around.

“Before we start, Miss Sölsa, please attack me with anything,” he requested. “Just a warm up, I need to know if—”

“Valmer!” She materialized a fireball twice as big as her head.

It disappeared before she could shot it towards Rangga.

“That could kill me! At least give me a warning!” the man yelled. Not only it sent him into a panic, the magic put both Haren and Kôra on their guard. “That’s too big! You murderous woman!”

But that fireball did not even touch him, the boy thought.

Instead, Sölsa grinned in amusement. “Okay, I’m going to make an even bigger one—Valmer!”

The spell of silence gave a baffling effect; Kôra turned around to see if anything had happened.

Nothing.

“Stop messing around!” Rangga bleated. “I know you’re going to do those explosion spells!”

“Relax, your ability is already activated. I cannot cast any spell,” the woman said.

Is he really that strong? Kôra’s eye widened; an unexpected quality from Rangga’s faint-hearted attitude. Is he pretending to be weak all the time?

“Mr. Haren?” Rangga turned to the redhead man with a shaky voice.

“I can’t activate some of my seals, too,” he stated while touching the tattoos on his arm.

“Thank you, thank God!” Rangga praised.

Should not his ability be activated by default? It’s a passive ability for the most, the teen ruminated. A perturbing question in his mind, however, was more crucial.

“Mr. Rangga,” Kôra  called. "Will it undo my eye concealment, or the other seals I have on me?" They boy touched his eye shield. The last thing he wanted was to undergo the excruciating process of sealing.

“I innately won’t undo them. I must purposely target them to undo it,” Rangga answered. “Yours must be tremendously strong ones, and seals in general are harder to undo because they’re an encrypted form of magic—maybe. . .” his sentence trailed as the man tried to find a better explanation.

“Can you undo Keane’s ability?” With a frown, the boy pointed at the loafer who was laying down on the separate mat. The other people turned their heads towards him, too. With no care, Keane went on with his lazy business—occasionally chuckled from whatever was on his phone.

“Most Sandurian alterants can’t, but people with Earthling blood can do it because we lived with creatures for so long, while having our magical ability suspended,” he explained. “It’s way less effective and prone to fail for most other people; I don’t know if he would allow me to, though.”

“Now that we are done preparing, what will you do with me?” Kôra inquired.

“We’re doing a game!” Rangga said while opening one of the box. “These are apples from earth; my favourite fruit. Unluckily they’re expensive and nearly impossible to  get here,” he explained while showing off the yellow-streaked red pome. Kôra nodded in awe; this was the first time he saw them in real life.

The man moved on to a much smaller box. 

“And do you know what is this? It’s from here.” He lifted a hexagonal-shaped fruit with a hard shell. It was green with a purplish tint near the corners.

Kôra shook his head. As any lowland plant is a blank in his mental almanac; Sölsa, Keane, and Haren were on the same boat.

“I don’t know either—there’s plenty of them laying here,” the black-haired man said with a chuckle.

“We call it ‘plon‘, common fish toxin,” Arim told. “Safe to touch,” he added as Rangga immediately lifted his hand from the fruit.

Afterwards, Rangga arranged the fruits on a table; a pyramid of sixteen apples with the plon buried in the middle.

“Your first task is using your ability on the plon without damaging the apples,” he said just after finishing.

So, it is to test my skill in selecting target⁠—like Father trained me.

“And with my ability on,” Rangga added. “Don’t worry, I use the lower end of it. You still can use yours.”

Fighting the ability that prevents you from using one in the first place?! This is going to be difficult, the teen thought.

“There’s a catch, though,” the man told Kôra, who was just sat down to do his task. “For each apple you damaged, you shall pay monetary compensation for it. Each will be fifty Punai.”

Kôra struck flabbergasted; looking left and right for his uncle and Keane. Have mercy, Lord Kâmun.

»»-------------¤-------------««

“I won’t charge you for the apples. I was just kidding. Mr. Keane gave me four boxes of these; I still have more!” Rangga conciliated him while placing an unopened water bottle at Kôra’s side. “It’s been an hour. Just let go of your ability as normal.”

The sweaty, bedraggled Kôra turned his head. Kôra’s jacket was off and his hair was undid; his condition was as if he had done running laps below this sun. An empty water bottle sat near his feet. He looked at the man with an enervated stare and said:  “No, I simply cannot!”

“Y—you meant if you unleash your ability as usual, we won’t stand a chance of survival?”

“Please do not get the wrong idea! I cannot hurt you while it’s not even working!” Kôra replied with a hoarse voice. The heat got into his mind. “I cannot even make to show it—the white thing—it is like an invisible force is strangling my ability!"

He went back into solving the challenge with a frown on his face, while Rangga insisted the boy was bluffing.

“Take a deep breath, kid; drink water! You will do it!” Sölsa heartened the kid. “You can figure it out!”

It’s a matter of strength. What needs figuring out? And I am not a ‘kid,’ unless you are an old hag!

Kôra took a deep breath.

Oh! While his is not magic, it’s still an ability

Kôra reminded when his darned ‘defect’ thwarted all his uncle’s efforts, from seals to potions.

She’s right! Rather than trying to manifest my ability,  I should try to push his back like I always did subconsciously.

The teen clenched his jaws.

I can do it!

And the light broke in.

“It's coming out! It’s coming out!” Rangga jumped from the sight of the needle-puncture-sized white orb. “Mr. Tsiyu, protect us!!!” he grabbed the equally confused man.

Arim covered his ears. "Shut up!" 

Now slowly increase it. . .

The sphere got bigger at a near-stagnant rate.

“Slowly! You are doing good!” Sölsa cheered.

“Don’t mess up,” Arim added.

“Don’t kill us!” Rangga blurted out, still holding the annoyed Haren.

Release it slowly! Slowly! Remember your cabbage training, focus on how big the fruit is!

After twenty minutes more of building it up, a brief gust of chilling wind blew.

A gentle wind that did not even disturb the formation of sixteen pristine apples.

Yes!!! Now the plon must have wilted! And the apple looks fine, too!

The white light had been extinguished. All the audience applauded. Kôra’s hands were stiff and jittery, with a flash of warm sensation remaining in the center of the palms. His jacket was drenched in sweat. Between his heavy breaths, the teen smiled in relief.

“Let’s see. . .” Rangga deconstructed the fruit pyramid with a pair of tongs—revealing a blackened and dessicated fruit in its center. The final size was a quarter of its initial size, and some of its mass had turned into ashy substances scattered near it.
 Kôra’s self-assurance shattered as Rangga turned the apples around. The outer sides were deceivingly not displaying any sign of damage, while the inner sides showed some extent of browning and wilting. It was on all of them. A great shame; the boy shook his head while putting his hand on his temple.

“That’s pretty good. I expected something worse,” Rangga remarked. “Now, try again until you pass, then we’ll move to the next levels.”

The teen raised his eyebrows. “Next levels?”

“There are five! It’s okay to not pass the last one, though,” he said. “Arim, let’s prepare the aquaria.”

“Wait, aquarium for water plants, right?”

“Fish,” Arim answered.

“The second level will use intact plants, insects for the third, and fish for the fourth!” Rangga listed with a bright tone. “Lastly, the fifth will use jellyfish—with Arim using his ability on them!”

Kôra found it impossible not to balk out at the idea. “Mr. Rangga is raised Tôryaemaen, so you know that pointlessly harming animal is a sin, right? Is it not too much? I am not sure the dead fish is even eatable.”

“Don’t worry, I’ve asked God to make that your sin⁠—and Mr. Keane’s too!” he replied with a beam of glee.

Oh, Kâmun! It does not work like splitting a bill! Kôra shook his head. 

“If the marine animals aren’t dead yet, Arim can heal them like new,” Rangga  continued. “If they’re dead, Arim will eat them! He can eat even the most poisonous fish!” 

The blond man made a circle from his thumb and index finger; in his other hand was the damaged apple with a bite mark. 

 This does not ease my worry at all.

“But hey, with a bigger consequence, you’ll try to be more careful!” Rangga pat the boy’s shoulder.

“Better kill a fish now than a person later,” Sölsa said.

“Do your best,” Arim added.

The boy thanked the three. Sölsa’s words especially convinced him to go through. Despite that, a thing was incomplete. Kôra stared still at Haren, waiting for the man to say something.

Noticing it, the uncle nodded at him.

Kôra replied with a downhearted smile. 

“Where’s Keane?” He turned to Rangga.

“At my house, he wanted to lie down as watching you struggle for too long was boring,” Rangga turned back and answered. “He said that you aren’t the sharpest tool in the shade. You’d take an hour just to manifest your ability.”

Really? That bastard!!! He does not even work at all! The boy threw his empty water bottle to the ground.

Keane’s remarks being exact in its ridicule, was a direct blow to his ego; an attack than cemented his resolve in the end.

»»-------------¤-------------««

Seven past fifteen post meridiem.

Kôra sighed in disappointment while staring at the horizon. The remaining afterglow felt like a consolation prize to him, which would soon disappear as the night pushed it out. Frigid as the sea wind which blew; the slivering cold stung to his bone even when he already put back his jacket. This temperature drop was a literal night and day.

I want to ride a water scooter; I want to swim; I want to see the sunset! I want to do the normal thing people do at the beach; write my name on the sand, burying myself in it, Kôra thought. And what I get? Being tired.

He pushed his aching body to bring two roll of mats back. As he approached Rangga’s house, the aroma of grilled fish filled the air. From afar, he saw those who handle the dinner:  Keane was in charge of the fire while drinking.  Sölsa was doing most of the cooking. The shirtless Arim prepared the fish. Haren moved back and forth, delivering the dishes and kitchenwares.

Don’t be selfish. Everyone else is doing this because of me. They have to spend their weekend for this. Uncle has sea sickness, and Keane hates the sea.

He looked up at the sky.

I probably cannot do the ritual for the night prayer. I want to talk to Yuzan.

Haren’s constant leaving between training sessions was a profound demotivation. Rangga, Sölsa, and even Arim were persistently supporting; encouraging him at every stage of the training. However, it did not divert his thought from his missing uncle. It was incomplete. Unlike in the past which he longed for, the time he spend practicing alongside his father. Now, the closest thing to Polat was absent; the person he wanted to find his father in. 

Well, it’s my fault. If only I was more talented. I still cannot do anything right.

“Hey, you don’t need to bring back all of that!” Rangga, who was just came from the grilling ground, intervened. “Rest for a while! You missed Arim eating raw squids and getting the ink all over him!”

“We’re both tired, let us make it fair,” Kôra attempted to fight back Rangga’s hand who took a mat away from him.

“You really should relax and take a bath,” the man said, now walking beside him. He took a good look at the greasy, disheveled boy. “Take a bath, then we’ll eat grilled fish together.”

I must stink horribly.

“You look disappointed,” Rangga noted. “Don’t be. You did great! You even killed a jellyfish on the fifth level!”

“Thank you, but I’m not satisfied.”

“You’ve done pretty good for someone with a dangerous, volatile ability,” he told while opening the door for Kôra. “And I admit I didn’t hold back as much as I should—I was wary.”

Kôra sighed. Which is it? Should I be glad if I am weaker, or if I am stronger than him?

They entered the house and unloaded their things in the living room.

“You know why I live on an island?” Rangga asked.

“Because you dislike crowd?”

The man laughed. “It’s because of this alterant ability. Back then, I couldn’t control it this well,” he elaborated. “Thank God, now I can control it well enough.”

So, he did not have a choice in this. Is he saying I should live on an island if I never manage to control my ability?

“Is it safe to live here?” Kôra asked. As the lights went out, the sense of solitude and smallness got into him. What was an idyllic life under the daylight turned into a forsaken prison after the nightfall. He could not shrug off the feeling that the vast ocean of darkness would swallow him whole as he walked, leaving him with a nonbeing. An unspoken isolation. The man could die or disappear at any moment, and the world around him will not realize. “No offense, but Mr. Rangga is seemingly afraid of everything.”

“I am, I am.”

“Then why don’t Mr. Rangga live on the mainland?”

Rangga opened his wordless mouth, yet his cloudy eyes remained static. After an inhalation, he answered: “I don’t want to cause more trouble.”