Sunlight streamed through the window, drawing a bright edge across the living room floor.
Ponzu closed her eyes and tried to send commands to her bees through her Nen.
Fly forward.
Two bees took flight, flew half a meter forward, and stopped.
Come back.
They flew back and landed on her finger.
Ponzu opened her eyes and smiled.
"It worked."
Odin nodded. "Keep practicing. The keys to Manipulation are control and feedback. You can control them, but you also need to receive feedback from them."
"Feedback?"
"Yes," Odin said. "What they're doing, what they see, what they feel. Being able to sense all that will help you improve a great deal."
Ponzu fell silent for a few seconds.
She more or less understood control, but feedback?
She looked at the two bees on her finger.
They were licking her fingertip, their tiny mouthparts moving.
She closed her eyes and tried to sense them.
She felt nothing.
Her Nen was still there, enveloping them, but she couldn't sense what they felt.
She opened her eyes.
"I can't do it."
"Take your time," Odin said. "It's only been a few days."
Ponzu nodded and kept trying.
The days passed.
Every morning, Ponzu got up, washed, ate breakfast, and started practicing.
She released the bees from her hat and let them fly around the room while she sat at the table, enveloping them in Nen.
At first, she could only control two.
She made them fly forward, fly backward, turn left, and turn right.
Then came three, four, and five.
By the seventh day, she could control ten bees at once.
But she still couldn't sense any feedback.
She tried all sorts of methods-sending Nen into the bees' bodies, wrapping their antennae in Nen, and keeping Nen on their wings longer.
None of