The Grey Wizard studied Gael for a long moment before speaking.
"Place your hand upon the ground."
Gael blinked.
"That's it?"
"That is enough."
Gael stared at him and let out a small, doubtful laugh.
"Are you gonna give me a shovel or what?"
The old man's expression did not change.
"Place your hand upon the ground."
Gael sighed dramatically before kneeling and stretching out his arm.
His palm pressed against the cool earth.
For several seconds, nothing happened, and he began to look up again.
"See? Nothing—"
But the words stopped as something shifted.
It was not something happening around him, but rather something happening inside him.
A strange sensation spread through his mind, as though something long buried had finally stirred.
He felt a sudden recognition, like remembering something he had always known but had somehow forgotten.
His eyes widened as he became aware of the ground beneath his hand in a way he had never experienced before.
He could feel every grain of soil pressing against one another, every stone hidden beneath the surface, and every root weaving through the earth below.
Beyond that, he sensed something else entirely, a hidden space that was silent, vast, and unmistakably his.
Knowledge flooded into him without words or instruction, forming pure understanding rather than explanation.
The earth beneath him appeared divided in his perception into countless invisible sections, each roughly half a meter in length, width, and depth.
He knew instinctively that he could move these sections, store them within the hidden space, return them whenever he wished, or reshape them into new forms.
The realization felt completely natural, as though he were remembering a skill rather than learning a new one.
Yet alongside this understanding came rules that felt just as absolute.
He needed to be touching the ground for the gift to function, and the sections he manipulated had to remain connected to the earth.
He also understood that the gift would only accept non-living matter.
It would respond to soil, stone, sand, clay, wood, and plants that had already been separated from life, but it would reject anything truly alive.
People, animals, monsters, and living creatures were entirely beyond its reach.
The certainty of this rule was not something he questioned, as it felt embedded within the nature of the ability itself.
Gael focused without fully thinking and willed a section of earth away.
A perfect cube measuring half a meter in each direction vanished from the ground, leaving behind a clean, precise hole.
He stumbled back in shock as he realized the earth had not been destroyed.
He could still feel it, resting within the hidden space that belonged to him.
Instinct guided him to reach for it again, and the cube of soil reappeared beside the hole with a heavy thud.
Gael stared at it in disbelief before looking between the earth and the empty space it had come from.
The Grey Wizard smiled slightly and said, "You found it."
Gael barely registered the words as his attention remained fixed on the ground beneath him.
The cube itself was not the true essence of the ability but only its simplest expression.
He now understood that he was not limited to single shapes or perfect blocks.
Instead, the sections acted as building pieces that he could combine in any way he could clearly imagine.
If he wished, he could take two connected sections, or ten, or more, forming squares, rectangles, trenches, or even staircases.
Any shape was possible as long as he could clearly visualize it in his mind.
The limitation was not strength or effort but clarity of thought, since the gift would follow his intent with absolute precision.
A simple hole required almost no thought at all, while a staircase demanded structure and attention, and a winding tunnel required careful mental construction.
The gift was not testing his power but his ability to imagine and define space itself.
A slow grin spread across Gael's face as he looked down at the ground and understood the possibilities before him.
The Grey Wizard noticed and asked quietly, "You understand."
Gael nodded once. "Yes."
"And what do you understand?" the wizard asked.
Gael looked out across the earth, already seeing possibilities forming in his mind, and replied, "My power is not really about moving dirt."
The wizard's eyes gleamed faintly. "No?"
Gael shook his head. "It is about shaping space."
For the first time, the old man gave a quiet laugh of approval and said, "Good enough."
Gael's gaze returned to the ground as his thoughts began to race ahead of him, already imagining trenches, walls, ramps, pits, tunnels, and countless other structures forming beneath his control.
The gift had already given him everything he needed to use it.
The rest would depend entirely on how creative he could be.