Chapter 6 The Gift

"You will help me navigate this sanctuary of yours , while I will contribute the most valuable thing I own...

Myself..."

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"How is a human like you, worth spending my time, helping you." The Wa Shin Tong responded. He tone had changed from amused to, angry in an instant, which would have surprised Kypher, if not for the fact he expected this outcome.

"Well one thing I am able to do is this." The owl looked around and felt the air in its library shift.

"An air bender, and a somewhat weak one at that. What? Was this supposed to impress me?" It seemed the owl was a bit impatient, as it thought the human before it was only wasting time.

Then suddenly out of nowhere, a small wisp of smoke started to originate out of Kypher's hand. He was slightly afraid of the owl reaction, to the fire, so he chose the next best thing to prove, elemental prowess. Smoke

What Kypher was doing was very dangerous. If the guardian suddenly decided to kill him, and dissect him he would not be able to resist, even if he tried. He knew he could have taken the easier path and could have just given a tome with martial techniques, however he also wished to become friends with the spirit, so he had decided to reveal his biggest trump card.

"hmmm 2 elements, in one body, without a spirit to guide it. Interesting... very interesting." The owl spoke to itself.

"If you help me and answer my question whenever you can I will let you study once a month. Do bear in mind that, I will have to leave at some point, so no irreversible damage, like dissection. Do we have a deal?" Tension rose around them.

"Hmmm." The silence around the 2 was almost tangible, while the tension could be with a butter knife. However after a few seconds, " Very well. I accept." And just like that the tension disappeared "Although I should mention that I am aware that you may have been able to to present something else. So why did you reveal this to me?" It asked in all seriousness

"I wish to become acquaintances, maybe even friends at one point. There are hardly any people I could trust my secrets with, I wish to at least have a friend i could talk to about my problems." Kyph answered with a heavy heart.

It was true though. During the past few years, his parents had brought many children to play with him, but none were able to become friends with him. Kypher wasn't sure why, but credited it to his maturity. He was too mature for his agemates to associate with him.

"Very well. Now, what do you wish..." This brought him a sense of Déjà vu. It was ironic.

"YAY! Ok so, I need, fire bending techniques, air bending techniques, as well as chi blocking techniques. Also do you have a place I could train these techniques. We don't want to harm any books, now do we?" He was super excited. It was like he was a kid at a candy shop. He was surrounded by a treasure trove of knowledge, and he could access it all.

Although he had hated studying in his life, he was in a world with cartoon logic! He could bend the elements to his will. A thought popped into his mind after a while though. He should first learn the basics of bending, and what other way to learn chi-flow that to know how to block it.

"No, wait. Lets start with chi blocking first. It best to have a solid foundation before I start bending." He decided.

"Wise decision. Follow me" Wa Shin Tong turned to the left and started walking away, from Kyph.

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Wa Shin Tong was surprised at first, after seeing the human. It was rare to see such individual who truly wished to sought after a way to protect instead attack. And once the human gave in and told owl the reason why he exposed his secrets, Wa Shin Tong was surprised and felt entertained by having a human friend. Usually the human visitors would, just take the knowledge then leave, so this was a first for it.

However soon it realised, the human something very special, The scholar wasn't talking his dual bending, but about his will to learn, and his comprehension speed. In just a year after arriving the human, no... Kyph, had managed to learn chi blocking, an insanely difficult technique that required more than theory memorization and talent, but loads of hard work. To get to the level Kyph had reached it would usually take a human at least a decade to do so.

In addition, his bending skills did not fall behind, he even invented new techniques that he let Wa Shin Tong record and store. The guardian asked him why he allowed it to record them. Kypher's reason was quite simple in reality... "They were friends" was what he would usually say.. This was a new feeling for the scholar. A person who wanted to associate with him for no other reason than, that he just could.

In addition it had tried its best to analyse Kypher's physique, how the chi- flowed inside of him, and had written a tome about the possibilities of dual bending. Kypher, of course, was the first person to read the book, which analysed him in excruciating detail.

After a few more months, Kyph had tremendously changed. He was no longer a short scrawny kid. He looked like an exact replica of Gojo, only a lot younger, and more chiselled. A few days inside Kypher had found a tome which instructed on ways to reach a peak human physique. The other effect the technique had was it allowed Kypher to manipulate chi in his body easier.

Ha had reach a bottleneck though.

After a few weeks of mastering internal chi-maniulation, he had tried to manipulate the chi in the air, but failed miserably. It was unstable, and he could not control it. Wa Shin Tong said that it came from experience, so Kypher just moved it to the back of his mind.

Currently, its been 3 years since he had come to the library. He had visited the old redneck innkeeper every month collecting a crate of supplies and visiting his old ostrich horse, back in the shoreline port. He also had checked on the locations of the main cast. Everything was going well. except of one thing. He ran out of interesting things to learn.

Right now, he was just browsing about trying to find something new when all of a sudden.

"Can't find anything interesting to learn?" The owl's voice appeared behind him. It had freaked him out a butt load of times but he got used to it over the time span.

"Yeah... I read most of the fire bending and air bending. I even finished some shelves about water bending and earth bending. I am confident, I could beat an earth bender or water bender with his own respective combat art without using bending. I'm still struggling to use Lightning bending, but that's something have to learn through combat. And I already started learning lightning redirection. I have memorised most of the useful arts possible. The only thing that is left are miscellaneous stuff, like plants, animals and tea-brewing." Kypher started to complain. This made the owl a bit exited about what it was planning.

"If I remember correctly, you humans usually celebrate your day of birth. That correct?" The owl asked with some slight amusement in its voice. Kyph just nodded while still looking down. He was truly bored."Then I guess I'll give you a gift." This made Kypher's head whip towards the towering owl which was holding out a singular, dusty, and archaic book. "You once mentioned that, sound is an sub-element of air that you wished to learn. After looking around I found this stashed in a corner. It was written by a monk a millennium ago. It was one of the first books to find its way here."

Kypher just stood there in shock, his gaze alternating between the millennium old book and the overgrown owl. He reached out and grabbed the book then slowly put it on a bookshelf next to him. Then turned towards the scholar and... hugged him.

It was Wa Shin Tong's turn to be surprised. This was the first time it was hugged in its lifetime. It usually is cold towards people and they fear it. This allows the guardian of the library to have a quiet environment where it could study.

The hug however was a strange feeling. A warm one.

"Thank you..." was all Kypher said before turning around and carefully grabbing the book. Then he started running towards the training room as fast as possible. After all... he had a sub-element to bend...

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Hello dear Readers

I did say that, I have plans for the owl. They are friends and they will stay friends. Maybe brothers. Hard to decide on that one.

Special thanks to

-Wynter_01

-Nubbie2

-Shadow1609

-DaoistTFzgBT

Cya tomorrow...

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