xkarnation
patreon
6. The Hidden Potential Of Psychokinesis
🕑 Added 2022-01-07 19:29:11 +0000 UTCDamien stood 10 meters from a wooden structure with a look of annoyance plastered on his handsome face.
“Fay?”
“Y-yes?”
“Why are the horses lying on the floor, covered in frost and not breathing?”
“Well, you killed the stable master a few weeks ago? Snapped his neck in half, do you remember?” Fay asked with annoyance evident in her voice.
Damien's glove flew over with surprising speed and grabbed Fay's neck.
“Of course, I remember, why didn’t you look after the horses like I ordered you to?”
“I tried, but I have no idea how to look after horses, I changed their food and water every few days,” Fay responded and went a bit limp in my grip. 'Oh crap she's suffering from blood loss, I forgot', Damien quickly released his grip.
Damien picked up a rock from the ground with his glove and directed the glove over to a crudely made metal trough. Due to the 10 meter distance, they couldn’t see the contents of the trough. But Damien already had a slight suspicion, it was January, one of the coldest months of the year here in Kassinki. A thin layer of frost could be seen covering the ground, showing the low temperatures.
Once above the metal trough, the glove released the rock, it fell until it impacted something hard and the sound of ice cracking could be heard, the top of the rock could still be seen peeking over the side of the trough.
“The horses needed to be moved inside, and the water had to be regularly replaced during this cold month, the water froze over due to the cold wind and the horses died of dehydration and lack of protection from the cold.”
Fay seemed surprised by my knowledge, this wasn’t knowledge I gained from playing the game but instead from my endless browsing of documentaries online. Even without this knowledge, just a basic understanding of water's freezing point would allow anyone to make this assumption.
In front of the wooden stable was a carriage, it was a tiny wooden box with a door-sized hole. Apart from the two iron bars being used as axles, the rest of the carriage was made from cheap-looking wood.
The carriage was designed to be pulled by a single horse. There was no room for a coachman to sit, instead, someone was expected to ride upon the horse's back and direct it manually.
There was an empty space left in the wall facing the horse to allow the Baroness to see where the carriage was going and direct the person on the horse to her intended destination.
Damien observed the carriage and then the mud road that led out of this house's grounds. In most cities, the nobles like to live as near to the center of the city as possible, usually where the royal family lived. But here in Kassinki, the nobles preferred to live away from the loud and foul-smelling city and placed their estates around the city.
This made the land cheaper for the nobles, as land to build a massive mansion in the center of the city would cost a lot more. Of course, some nobles still liked to live in the city center, but the vast majority preferred to be out here.
The city walls could be seen in the distance, about a 30-minute walk away, by Damien's estimates. But in the freezing cold weather, that walk certainly was not a nice prospect. The carriage would take only around 10 minutes. There was only a simple dirt road from here all the way to the city gates, if he had to walk he would definitely get mud on his shoes.
Damien had visited the city a few times since he arrived here, every time he took this carriage he had Fay ride on the horse. Since she was a noble, horseback riding was part of her education.
But with the horses dead, was there any other way?
‘What about Psychokinesis?’
Damien walked towards the carriage and climbed up to sit inside. There was a single wooden bench inside that faced the ‘window’ allowing him to see ahead of him.
“There's not even any padding, it's just a simple wooden bench, the Baroness really was too poor to be willing to ride in this.”
Damien released control of his gloves and closed his eyes to concentrate. He started off exerting force on the wall behind him. It creaked from the force, but the carriage didn’t move.
“I thought pushing it like a toy car would work, but it seems rather inefficient.”
Damien then spread his power over the whole of the small carriage and tried to move it forward. The carriage floated a few centimeters off the ground and moved forward slightly before crashing back to the ground.
“Ugh” Damien clutched his throbbing head. “That used way too much concentration and mana.”
‘It seems I can’t just pick up the carriage and float along, it's too heavy.’
Damien took a moment to relax and allow his [Lazy] trait to kick in and restore his mana.
“Master, are you trying to move the carriage with magic?” Fay asked from the side. Due to her short stature, she could only see the floor of the carriage and Damien's shoes.
“Yes, but it uses too much mana,” Damien replied rather sluggish while still clutching his head trying to massage the headache away.
“Did you try to move the wheels?” Fay asked
“No… wait. The wheels!”
‘I have only been using Psychokinesis to move entire objects so far, in the game players could only grab complete objects with Psychokinesis. I was thinking of how to manipulate the individual fingers of my gloves earlier! Psychokinesis is way more versatile in real life than it was in the game…’
Damien took another five minutes to control his headache and then attempted his new idea.
He reached out with his mind and located the wheels. The carriage had four wheels, Damien knew that he didn’t need to move all four at once, two-wheel drive cars exist back on Earth after all. He just needed to put force into two of the wheels, and the other two would follow along.
With this carriage only the front two wheels could rotate to change direction, the back wheels were fixed in place. Therefore, Damien chose to put power into the front two wheels and simultaneously use them to steer the carriage.
For the first attempt, Damien exerted force onto the entire wheel, his control was still lacking, so the wheels just tried to escape from their brackets to the carriage instead of rotating.
‘I need to exert physical force onto the top of the wheel to make it rotate forward.’
After another twenty minutes, Damien sat in the carriage with sweat dripping from his forehead and freezing onto his skin. He was breathing heavily but had a happy and triumphant smile.
His Psychokinesis hadn’t upgraded to B grade, but he could feel he was close. His level of skill with his powers was increasing. Using magic was difficult but very rewarding and Damien enjoyed the experience.
Wiping his brow, he turned towards the shivering Fay. She had been standing there quietly while watching Damien trying to move the carriage. Although the space inside the carriage was small, it technically could fit two people.
Damien felt being trapped inside a small space with that woman would be repulsive and went against all his noble traits. The human side of him was screaming at his body and traits in defiance to take the women in, but his body refused to comply.
‘She is dirty’ my [Germaphobe] trait whispered.
‘A noble vampire would never sit on the same bench as a lowly blood slave’ his [Noble Vampire] soul urged.
Damien just sighed deeply. He really felt bad, but to be fair she does want to stab him.
“I will use the carriage to get to the university. You can stand in the doorway and direct me, but you cannot sit down on the bench next to me.”
This was the best compromise he could make. He almost made her walk the rest of the distance, but that would greatly slow him down, and he was already feeling the cold more than he cared to admit.
Fay nodded and used a rock as a stool to climb up into the carriage with great effort. She sat down in the doorway (there is no door, it's just a door-shaped hole) and dangled her legs off the edge with her back to me.
Turning my gaze from her back, I look forward. Keeping my eyes open, I exert physical force onto the top of the wheels, and they begin to turn. The speed is definitely slower than a horse, but the world's first Psychic powered car was on the road!
