Meditation, meditation... The more time Ayu spent on it, the more sure she was that to reach the higher point of focus she needed to try harder. With more devotion and faith. Put more into it... Though it sounded like encouragement she wasn't so sure if she was even able to control more than she needed. What she desperately was striving for was to learn how to handle herself. Her powers, the fate of the world, what was coming for them and what could not - the strength she required was one thing and the need to use it was a dire necessity. Yet, forcing herself to meditate wasn't the way to go and it could backfire horribly... Of course that Ayu loved this way of training more than anything else but it wasn't perfect for everything. She tried, she did. Not to mention that only recently she was able to sharpen her senses enough to say anything about feeling her own Ki. It wasn't of course a perfect ability... And that lead her to this day when Ayu decided to take more than one step back and turn to the way of meditation she used months ago. Before... Everything. There was no reason for it, no aim to hone a skill or overthink a past tragedy... Just her, breathing slowly, sensing the world around her with every fiber of her being.

At dusk, Ayu was sitting at the edge of the Lookout with her legs crossed and hands joined on her lap. Her eyes were closed but her mind was open, listening to the world around her. And the song of life signatures was certainly, something one could not hear with their ears but sense with everything they got.

Under the Lookout was the Korin Forest, bustling with life big and small. People's energy was always so different than everything else she felt, so complex, unique in its structure, full of layers consisting of emotions, thoughts, and sense of self. Maybe it was just her but to feel their signatures bright and content was quite a pleasant sensation. Even if the average power of Earthling wasn't too high, Ayu wasn't the one to brush away a being only because they lacked something - they all were important. The power struggle... Oh, she wished she could stay away from that but she was already in too deep - simply because her power grew on its own. Never mind that now... The animals' energies were less complex but not less important. Bugs and tiny critters were like dust particles of energy while big and fierce predators' life signatures were more intense. Their sharp instincts were what made them different - acute senses, simple but honest nature, they were cogs of the world around them. The food chain at its finest... And there was nothing wrong with that. Nature had its laws. Too bad that the civilization turned away from them, not everything was bad among the big cities and crowds but not everything was good either.

The flora was something that Ayu was able to sense with pleasure. She felt close to those energies, simple lives, silverish presences that were a completely different category than animals or Earthlings. Delicate. Refined, simply growing and living without the need to hunt or kill. That wasn't exactly true but the vegetation never hurt anyone willingly. A poisonous berry didn't develop toxins inside the sweet fruit to kill people - just like an animal won't attack until it's hungry, threatened, or protecting its young. And yet they were often blamed for their nature... For nature that never meant any harm but responds to being tempered with like any other feeling and sensitive organism.

Her thoughts seemed to be drifting in a weird direction. Ayu sighed a little and rubbed her temple, still not opening her eyes. She was here, on West Continent. Under her was Korin Forest and around that plains, wastelands... The limitation of her senses was something she wished to get rid of for a long time now. It was time to practice pushing those boundaries to as far as she could. More and more. And maybe she did? Because Ayu realized that she was able to differentiate energies from each other and she, with corners of her mind, could spot the fish deep down in the waves of the ocean. They were far to the south, below, but their tiny signatures were something she could not mistake. After all, she used to spend some time in the waters near the East City. But that wasn't enough proof, no, she had to try harder...

So the next hours she spend with sweat on her brow, trying to track people she knew, people she might be able to recognize by their energies alone. Callion was out there, training far away from the Lookout... His life signature was so strong it was hard to mistake, burning strongly in the distance. She could of course sense Dende and Mr. Popo inside the ancient temple, Cress and Celric playing down under the Korrin Tower. Terra was out here on her little adventures, somewhere near the East, next to their home area - it was the place she was most familiar with after all. Next... Ayu didn't spend a lot of time with them but maybe she was able to pick up Opherla's energy and Serena's too? They both were honest and cheerful and their Ki reflected that. The more she tried the easier it seemed to become but the level of focus required was something else. No doubt why she was sitting in the same spot for half of the day while her mind was out there wandering. Ayu needed to polish that skill if anything. It was one of many, many things that she put in her plans.

But perhaps, while she was practicing, the range of her Ki-sensing abilities widened enough. How else would she be able to reach every corner of Earth this way? Ayu might have not been the warrior type but taking one step at a time would make a steady pace of growth. And growth she needed badly.

As long as she was able to sense the overwhelming population on Earth, and tell apart one person from another, that was enough. For now and for this planet that is... Because when it comes to being prepared for the unknown she could never say that she did enough. There was always more to do - and more to learn.

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Power Level - 288,912
Word Count - 1,080
Technique - [ST2] Energy Sense - 1TP