Nero did not consider himself prideful for having a high opinion of himself. The distinction between confidence and overconfidence is that confidence is based on empirical evidence and historical proof, whereas overconfidence is based solely on emotions.
Nero had, ti and ti again, proved himself to be exceptional in various fields. He also had countless advantages over others, which included the fact that he was highly disciplined and strong willed.
With that background knowledge, it was a fair estimate to say that Nero would be able to handle himself better than others in a given situation. In the case of pain, especially, he was confident, for he exposed himself to great pain every ti he trained.
Not only was it extre physical exhaustion that he subjected himself to, but there was also the emotional equivalent of forcing himself to do things he knew would hurt, only for a long distant dream or goal he had no way of knowing he would ever achieve.
So when the pain ca initially, he handled it well. But in this one situation, Nero had overestimated his ability, simply because he did not understand the situation well enough. It was not that he was being exposed to pain, no. It was that he knew nothing save pain.
His mind was incapable of thought, since it was consud by pain. Ti beca an abstract concept, since the passage of ti beca irrelevant. The past was pain, the present is pain, and the future would be pain. Without any distinction between the three states, what was the point of distinguishing them?
He had no self awareness either. There was no Nero to exert self control, or consider things such as the difficulty he would present to Gabriel for further injections. No, his brain had no spare capacity to consider such things.
It was doing its utmost to fully comprehend, and then experience, the pain that Nero was going through.
Gabriel had said that he wanted to rip his throat out, but Nero had not even enough thought power to consider such forms of death, since the pressure he was experiencing was far greater than anyone else.
Yet, like the flip of a switch, the pain ended, and a strange force took hold of his brain, and reached deep inside of it. It swept through the ocean of pain, diminishing the mories as if they had existed many years ago, casting a cloudy filter over those mories.
Instead, it took hold of the being that was Nero, at least before he experienced such terror inducing pain, and wrapped itself around him, as if to protect him from changing.
With his mories of pain slowly fading away, and his very being artificially entered into a state where he could not experience any character growth, the trauma of such indelible pain slid off him like rain sliding down a pane of glass. He could see it, but even if he tried to touch it, he would only touch the glass, not the rain on the other side.
At the sa ti, his brain was experiencing life as it was normally. Yet having just experienced such extre pain, normal itself was greatly euphoric, as if it was the best feeling in the world, which filled Nero with a sense of glee.
Nero smiled as he looked up at Gabriel, and then focused on his innate card deep in his chest.
The card had experienced the slightest bit of change.
Na: Cryofla
Image: A large, deep blue fla
Type: Innate
Star rank: 0
Ability: [The Cryofla burns with a hue of brilliant, deep blue, its flas shimring with icy tendrils and frosty wisps. Instead of consuming fuel and emitting heat, it consus only heat and produces aetheric flas, leaving behind a frozen kingdom instead of soot and ash.]
Flavour text: "The death of a Kolari is written, and it is on the battlefield," - Marilyn Grant
For a mont Nero was confused. It seed like nothing had changed. Yet his current state, Nero had eidetic mory of everything that happened before the 'pain episode' which was, even at this mont, continuously fading from mory till he could barely recall it. As a result, he recalled word for word what his card used to say.
It used to read, 'The Cryofla burns with a brilliant blue hue, its flas shimring with icy tendrils and frosty wisps. Instead of consuming fuel and emitting heat, it consus only heat and produces more flas, leaving the target frozen whole instead of ash.'
There were a few changes. First, the colour seed deeper, for whatever reason. Second, instead of producing more cryoflas as a result of absorbing heat, it only produced aetheric flas, whatever that ant. Lastly, instead of leaving behind a frozen target, it left behind a frozen kingdom.
Nero analysed the differences, and imdiately got to the crux of the matter. His flas did not gain any new abilities, likely, and instead just grew stronger in effect! It would need to be tested to be sure, but it more or less seed like that was it.
"Gabriel, my innate ability grew stronger!" Nero exclaid, wearing an ecstatic grin. It felt like he was having the best day of his life, while at the sa ti it felt like he was looking at the world through a special lens.
Was this what it felt like to be drunk or high? Why was that outlawed? This was great!
Then he realised that Gabriel was looking at Nero glumly, with a black eye and quite a few scratches on his face.
"Oh no Gabriel, what happened?" he asked. "Were we attacked? Don't worry, with my new ability I'll kill them all!"
He raised his hand, as if to display his newfound power, yet nothing happened. He was just holding out his hand in front of him like a kid pretending to be a superhero.
"Forget it," Gabriel said as he suppressed his dour mood. "Focus on recovering your ability and let's get out of here. I think I might be beginning to develop so anxiety - the fog is making increasingly nervous."
Nero looked at his friend, wondering how he could possibly be in such a bad mood during such a wonderful day. Then he looked at the fog, and sothing deep within himself trembled, as if it sensed sothing imnsely dangerous.
Yet in his highly euphoric mood, even danger felt exciting and thrilling!
But while he was going through a rush of emotions, his decision making processes were not compromised. He knew what was important, so he quickly began working on regaining full control over his ability.
At first he was unable to produce any flas at all, at most releasing a few sparks and embers. But the more he practised, the easier it beca, though he noticed a distinct difference in the use of his ability. Producing flas had beco significantly more difficult, and it was not just due to him needing to relearn how to control his ability.
It was because the flas did not innately produce more flas as a result of devouring heat. So every single fla, he had to use his own aether to create them.
It seed like he had suffered a loss. But the truth couldn't be further from the truth. He snapped his fingers and a tiny fla appeared on his fingertip, almost like it had been lit on a tealight candle.
The srising blue fla stood steady on his finger, not dancing or moving about, yet the temperature of the room began to drop drastically. Frost began to appear on the floors almost instantly, and Gabriel who was nearby felt a chill travel down his spine! He had to coat himself in red sand to keep himself from feeling cold.
Yet Nero felt none of that. No, all he felt was the single fla, its life fueled from his aether, greedily devouring all the heat around it. As it did so, the colour in the fla beca deeper and deeper, with tiny blue embers beginning to rise from the single fla, almost making it look like the fla was shimring. The more heat it devoured, the stronger his fla was becoming!
Yet before he could see what the fla turned into, Nero snapped his finger again and closed the fla.
He turned to look at Gabriel, the massive grin on his face suddenly fading. He was still feeling euphoric, but now he was returning to his normal self, which ant he was less easily distracted.
"The fog is extrely dangerous," he said, stating the obvious.
"Yes. Yes it is," Gabriel replied.
Whether it was because they had experienced a change, or the fog had, was unknown. But what mattered is that the both of them suddenly felt grave danger from the fog, and could not, for the slightest mont, consider spending more ti there.
Even though Nero was not completely used to his ability, he did not want to waste more ti here. They imdiately gathered their stuff and departed.
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