<Just right! You'd be surprised how much trouble some people have with that.>

Then, Gold starts to unwind from Scour's arm, expanding over their underlayer, up to their shoulder, across their chest and back, down their other arm, waist, and legs, forming a third layer between the other two. Then, it fills out. Not a lot, but enough that Scour can feel something depth of cushion if they test, and noticeably alters how the overlayer flows around them.

Finally, having woven itself into a fabric, Gold slides up over Scour's face. Oddly enough, their vision is completely unobscured even though Gold didn't leave any eye-holes, nor is their breath hampered by the cloth over their mouth and nose.

<So, want to stick with the solid gold look, or figure out something else? I can mimic just about any other thread if you give me an example.>

They shiver as Gold slides over them, and then touch their hand to their face in wonder.

<Oh! Let me see,> they say, picking a cloak off of the mirror on the back of their door and tossing it on the bed. <How about mimicking the undertunic, so that it looks a bit as though you're of one piece with it?> they ask.

The figure in the mirror stares at them. They strike a pose, seeing how the robe fits over them.

<And could you, uh, maybe broaden my shoulders a little? So that I have an even more obviously different silhouette, I mean.>

Gold does so, on both accounts. <Though, I can't actually make your arms further apart. That's a bit more invasive than I can manage at the moment. Actually mucking about with their wielder's physiology is more Needles' thing anyway.>

Scour looks at the figure in the mirror for a moment too long, before tearing their gaze away and stepping lightly out into the hallway.

<No, my arms are fine where they are,> they agree. <But the robe is loose enough that I don't think there's an obvious discrepancy.>

They trot up the stairs to the front door, open it, close it, and then walk much more lightly up the next flight of stairs to the roof. It's a small roof, smaller than the rest of the footprint of the apartment and shared with one of their neighbors, but it provides a good view of some of the taller buildings to either side.

<Alright! Let's try this,> they say, throwing Gold out towards the bottom of a porch and getting a running start.

And off they will go! With Gold giving them full-body support through the padding, including a little bit of course-correction on top of Scour's own growing skill, it might actually be easier swinging between buildings than it was back in the training room, and getting even easier after every swing as a natural sort of rhythm forms.

There's also something special just about the experience of not-quite-flying through the streets. It's not anywhere near train-speeds, obviously, but moving with your own body is just something entirely else.

They steer towards the city center, where the taller buildings twine around the city's supports. Scour has never been all that good at martial skills, not compared to their classmates, but something about swinging above the city like this feels so natural that they are taken completely by surprise when a joyous laugh leaves their lips.

They circle around the academy tower, swinging off of the bell tower, before sailing out into the air above the market. They gather a loop of Gold and launch it up towards the bottom of the train station, swinging down the unobstructed length of the market's broad street. Their momentum sends them high into the air over the western end of the city, and they have to execute a careful series of loops around one of the bank buildings there to bleed off speed.

Eventually, they stumble through a slightly too fast landing on the roof of an arbitrage firm and flop onto their back.

<Oh, that was brilliant!> they say. <I don't have the words. Wow.>

They take deep, even breaths, too well trained to pant after their exertion.

<I'll get up in a moment, I just need to catch my breath. How does my form seem to you, Gold? I would appreciate any pointers you can provide.>

It's always so good to see a wielder experience the world in ways they wouldn't get the chance to otherwise.

<You're a natural, honestly! I've been correcting you a little, but after getting any given adjustment once or twice, it seems like you pick it up without even really thinking about it. Which is good, for high-speed movement you need that sort of a bone-deep intuition. Managing your momentum is good to look out for, especially once we're properly flying and doubly so when we're dealing with higher gravity, but I bet you'll get the hang of out with just a bit more practice, going from how quickly you're improving.>

Maybe this is what Mother meant when she said that if they just kept trying they would find a style that they 'click' with. Scour doesn't know whether she would disapprove of a style so restricted that it depends on a specific miraculous artifact from beyond the world, or be relieved, that Scour has finally found something that works for them. They bask in the feeling.

It's reckless, and it's going to mess up their techniques class tomorrow, but they don't care. They take the sunlight that has soaked into their bones over the course of the last day, and they collect it, pressing it into their soul. Different people use different metaphors -- some people liken it to inscribing symbols, or to aligning iron filings with a magnet. Scour thinks of it as pivoting a vast ship sailing through a dark ocean. Gentle touches that nonetheless pull their soul around to a course of their own devising.

In this case, they're not reinforcing one of their existing techniques, but nudging in an entirely new direction. Putting a metaphorical spin on their story.

"Sunlight Scouring the Unworthy From the Face of the World is good with connections," they tell the universe. It's a tiny amount of power, and a very general emphasis, too broad to be called a specific technique, but it's symbolic. A start down the path of becoming someone who can wield the Golden Cord.

The feeling of directing the sunlight is just a little different, from how it normally is. The currents of the water and the wind of that metaphorical sea are flowing just a little differently, a little more favorably. That inkling of sunlight goes just a bit further than it should. Still not enough to make it something momentous, but enough to notice.

<Oh, huh! Was that you?> they ask, pulling themself to their feet.

They look out over the edge of the roof, and start plotting out a course that focuses more on tricky corners than just on aimless wandering.

<Quite possibly! Wielders aligning with me has had a whole bunch of interesting side-benefits due to interactions with the local ontology before.>

<Huh. And you don't know exactly what they are because ... this world's magic is unique?> they clarify, shaking their arms loose.

They jump back out into space, starting to execute their planned course. It takes them looping around to approach the Academy again from the north.

<Every world is unique! Not all of them have anything they like to call magic, but they're all different from one another, even if some are more similar and some are more different. Even the worlds that are really similar on the surface have a different sort of texture to them, and since that sort of textural layer is also where alignment happens, even worlds that seem basically the same at first blush might lead my wielders to have very different experiences after they've aligned with me>

<That's really interesting,> they say, rapidly popping back and forth between two buildings. <You said you got here by being summoned -- is that how you usually move between worlds, or are there other ways?>

<Summoning is actually pretty rare! For me at least. Normally what happens is that after we get aligned enough, my wielder starts exploring other worlds with me until eventually we encounter something that we're not powerful enough to overcome and we get separated.>

<The idea of visiting other worlds sounds amazing,> Scour remarks. <One step at a time though, I guess.>

They spend another hour practicing, until the late bell chimes, before turning and heading for home. They cool down on the roof. They slip in quietly, return to their room to change, and then pop back up the stairs to open and close the front door.

They say goodnight to their parents, brush their teeth, and retreat to their room.

<Goodnight, Gold> they say. <Sleep well. Wait -- do you sleep? If you want to, uh, read my textbooks or anything I can leave the light on for you.>

<Goodnight Scour, and no, not at all really! I also don't really need light, or for the book to be open, to read, since I'm just looking at the conceptual network of meaning that the writing is an encoding of anyway. I appreciate the thought, though!>

Scour is too tired to spend long spiraling about yet another bizarre overpowered ability.

They sleep deeply, their dreams full of swinging and soaring.

The feeling of magic falling from the sun wakes them, and they swing out of bed to get dressed for the day. They exchange good mornings with the Golden Cord before stumbling upstairs for breakfast. Breakfast is yogurt with granola.

  "Study hard," their mother tells them, as they step out the door.

"Yes, mother," they reply.

The journey to the Academy is much slower at ground level, dodging around the early-morning bustle.

<What did you think of the book?> they ask the Golden Cord as they step out of the way of a messenger on a bicycle.

<It was interesting! Most of the physics is pretty familiar, it's not very far from the world where my Master first found me, and quite a few worlds I've been to since then. The anatomy stuff was also pretty familiar, especially in light of how your local magic works. It's a surprisingly common pattern for worlds, at least that I've visited. Also, having learned a bit more, I am very confident that our alignment will make you better at incorporating new concepts into your magic, even if we don't do anything cheeky like using me as a sunlight funnel.>

Scour thought that they were done feeling vaguely overwhelmed at the Golden Cord's claimed capabilities.

<Because ... being aligned with you lets me 'connect' to concepts more easily?> they ask. <That's ... I mean, there are basic techniques to make your soul more malleable that everyone learns as one of their first techniques. But they're not super effective past a certain point, because you get diminishing returns. And if you go too far, your soul can become fragile, which is its own problem.>

<Yeah, I can see how relying on your own techniques for that could lead to you getting sort of overstretched. That will probably be a lot less of a problem for you now, even if we get separated. Maybe not completely negated, but significantly mitigated, and more so the more aligned we get.>

<You,> they tell the Golden Cord, <are the best thing to ever happen to me.>

They push through the last of the crowd, and bounce up the broad steps of the academy.

<If the stuff in my textbooks was already familiar to you, I'm not sure how interesting my classes are going to be,> they warn. <First up is physical development and martial arts, because they want to hold it before the heat of the day. The rest of the day after that is lecture, though.>

<Fair enough! I'm not quite as patient as Mountain, but I also don't make a habit of constantly accelerating my own time-perception as much as possible, so I think I can handle waiting through your classes. Plus, since we can communicate silently, we can always chat when you have some spare time without giving anyone any weird ideas.>

<Sounds good! And I can pick up other books from the library at lunch if you want more to read,> they reply. <We've got a few minutes before classes start, though. Is there anything you want to chat about while we wait?>

Scour enters the Academy's courtyard, picks one of the mats laid out on the grass, and starts gently stretching.