Capítulo 11: Chapter 11 : An Explanation and Realization
Life in the academy has been the same since Vega was back. The sound of murmurs from apprentices walking about was comforting. Occasionally, a slight pressure passed by them, and a group of apprentices bowed. But sometimes stronger occupants felt a disturbance of mana. It could be a spell gone wild, formations being activated, or breakthroughs.
Vega grimaced, holding the prickling sensation all over his body. His clothes were drenched from the sweat all over his body. The pain was worse than when he had to lie down for days after running around the city chased by guards.
After hours upon hours of sitting cross-legged, holding the pain, the pain dissipated, and Vega shivered. His body relaxed. Joyful sensation replaced the pain. A sound escaped his mouth, enjoying the sensation that arrived afterwards.
The first thing he noticed was his mind was free and open. Some old memories rushed back to him. Some he had forgotten, some not important. He remembered Wyatt's frown. The slight grin on Dion's face when calling his name. The twitch on Master Grondor's eyes every time he saw some beautiful girls dipping their hands into the testing basin. The time he had to eat rotten food from the trash.
Standing up, he stretched his limbs where his bones cracked gratefully after sitting on the hard wooden surface for too long. His stomach screamed for food after locking himself in his room for three days straight. Approaching the door, he grabbed his pouch with the two magic crystals he gained from killing the girls while on his mission hunting the scarling. First, he needed to submit the shell. Even though he was not the first one, he could gain contribution points for scarling shells that were always in high demand.
When he opened the door, he felt a blurry knuckle-shaped shadow knock on his forehead.
"Oops, sorry," an apology came from the figure standing by the door.
Vega looked at the beautiful girl while rubbing his forehead. Finally, his face lit up, recognizing the person standing by his door. Of course, he remembered the girl well, with light skin and a smug expression, Vega remembered the girl as the princess who offered him a new way out from his past.
"What do you need, princess?" He knelt down. Not knowing how people here greeted a noble, he used a standard greeting he had learned in the city.
"No matter. Follow me," Vin said, walking away.
She led them to follow the pathway toward the port while grumbling the whole way. Vega occasionally heard the words 'not worthy' and 'useless' in her mouth. They passed the testing basin he remembered the first time he was tested here. Master Grondor was not there but he remembered the basin that now stood alone amidst the tall trees.
Vega also didn't forget the line of soulless people bowed to Vin along the way. He even noticed the other initiates who had failed the test in his batch. He finally saw a couple of pairs of young kids around ten years old playing Rodarkh.
Vin finally stopped around a tall couple stories house made with a simple wood. Vega felt a strong mana circulating around the area, complete with a couple of lines engraved on the stone path circling the house. After Vin took out her medal, they waited a couple of seconds before a huge intricate door swung open by itself, showing a dim room inside. Bowing, Vin went in. Vega didn't know what to do and chose to stand outside, bowing.
"You, come inside too!" A melodic voice from a woman followed by a slight disturbance of the air.
Vega felt the vibration in his stomach, chest, and throat. He gulped, swallowing his saliva, and went inside. The first thing he noticed was the sheer size of the carpet laid on the floor. The dark blue color was calming reminded him the time when he was tossed around inside the barel in the middle of the ocean. Vega noticed the room was decorated simply with one huge table on the back of the room with a tea set giving a strong scent of jasmines and tea, one shelf filled with books, and a set of pillows laid on the carpet. The sound of beautiful music spoils his ears. Finally, he saw the elder sitting straight on one of the pillows observing him. He heard a faint sound of a harp playing in the background, calming his nerves.
"You can hear it," she said without asking anything.
The statement shocked Vin. She glanced at the boy and frowned. Vega nodded, isn't everyone can hear the sound?
"I heard you use that meditation. Can you hear the sound inside your body?"
Vega nodded again.
"Come," she said, staring at Vega.
Vega looked at the elder and finally braved himself. Every step he took activated the sound inside his body. On the first step, the base of his spine tingled. On the second step, a sharp heat around his genitalia. Third, fourth, fifth, his stomach, chest, and throat burned. Sixth, a pain on his forehead. Finally, on the seventh step, his head felt like bursting. The room around him spun. His vision became blurry. He felt very light.
A firm grip around his wrist, and everything went back to normal. He felt the delicate and soft palm touching him. Finally, the unfamiliar room graced his eyes.
The elder was still staring deep into his eyes, "Exceptionally clear," finally releasing her grip, the intense feeling around him vanished.
Vega frowned and looked at the elder. "What happened?"
"No matter. Vin, you told him."
"Yes, elder. Dion was taken by the practitioners. He was on his mission killing a scarling then his signal disappeared," Vin paused, letting Vega digests the information first.
Vega looked at Vin. "What…" before he finished his sentence, his mana acted on its own . Slowly the air swirled inside the room. Vin heard a sharp howling nose and closed her ears, grimacing. Paper flew, and a set of ceramic teapot and cups fell and clattered on the floor.
The elder acted. A zither suddenly appeared and landed on her lap. Beautiful notes soon followed. At first, the melody was slow, but after, it got faster and faster. The air around the room slowed down, and her papers floated down.
A relaxing sound made Vega able to breathe again and forgot the experience and the feeling he was in. Looking at the state of the room. He saw the ordinary simple room now looked like it had just survived a catastrophic accident, complete with Vin as a victim lying unconscious on the floor. "What happened?" Vega asked, still looking at the princess with an empty look. Yes, he was spiteful of Dion because he was a noble. But with time he finally accepted the kindness and now his friend was gone without any news.
Laying the zither on the floor, the elder looked at him with her cold face and explained, "Emotion was a very strong feeling. You just broke through. Your soul is stronger than your mind. When your emotion surpasses a certain threshold," she looked around the room, pointed at the broken tea set especially. "This will happen. Remember to change it later," she joked still with her cold face. "The exercise you do was originally mine. You need to exercise your mind more to handle the change in your soul."
Vega was really embarrassed and promised himself to replace the broken ceramic. "How do I do that?" He clearly remembered one of the ways to increase his mind was to play Rodarhk taught by Wyatt previously.
"Be my apprentice, and I will teach you what I know," she said.
Vega looked confused and finally accepted the offer.
"Don't worry about Dion. He is safe learning the way of the swords. I met him while chasing away the practitioners from their places around this island. When you meet him again, I'm afraid that you won't fight on the same side."
After the conversation and Vega got the symbol of the elder, she tapped Vin's forehead. The princess woke up, looked around, and finally felt embarrassed. His new mentor told the girl similar information about Dion. After that, Vin excused herself.
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After Vega had his full, he asked around about the weird house around the port. The apprentices he knew mostly knew straight away, telling different stories about a weird elder living there.
Based on the summary of all the weird stories from the other apprentices, his new mentor, Professor Addilyn, was someone famous. Not only in the academy but also in the whole adept community in the Islands. She was one of the adepts who earned the title 'professor' when she was only just level one adept. Yes, she was late compared to her friend, but after she broke through and earned the title 'adept', she managed to defeat the more experienced adept.
Vega promised to work harder because it would be a disgrace not to follow in her footsteps. So, the next day after, he went to the library and borrowed one defensive spell and one offensive spell. It cost him about two hundred points, so his earning from the scarling shell dropped to only about three hundred twenty points. Looking at the number on the medal, Vega sighed. Based on his knowledge of killing the creature, he needed more than his illusion to kill a simple creature to gain his initial points.
At his room, after setting aside all the papers for his new spells, Vega reached for his new medal. This one with higher quality and bore a symbol of a strange bird. He closed his eyes and imagined Dion's face and tried to connect with his friend. He prayed to any beings he believed in and even called Mernoralin's name several times. He waited for minutes, but he didn't hear any answers. Dispirited, he opened his eyes and put back his medal.
He first looked at the new spells he had gotten. Unlike his first spell, the one he got automatically from his meditation exercise, these were only several papers with weird symbols that seemed familiar to him. Knowing that he had forgotten some of the symbols, he decided to follow the instruction from the library first before trying to decipher the meaning behind it.
Slowly he copied the symbol on an empty page in his book. It took him a short time to copy all of the symbols. After he finished, he scanned his work several times, matching the papers and the copies were all similar. After that, with a grimace, knowing that he had wasted his points for papers that at the end he had to burn. The ash flew around the room, making him cough. He was still hesitant doing the same thing with the rest of the paper, but the blood vow and the instructions from the library master was apparent. "Burn the spell after copying. If I found the paper fall into someone else's, the consequences could be fatal."
What should I do now with the weird symbol? Vega scratched his head while he tried making sense of all the odd squiggly lines on the book. But then, he wiped his eyes, blinked several times, and looked at the book again. He thought he was hallucinating, but the symbols suddenly danced together on the pages.
After a while, under the symbols existed some descriptions. Even though he was a little surprised at the new things happening on the journal, Vega decided to put it aside first. Now he needed to focus on his fist spell. The instruction was clear. He followed what was written on the book and closed his eyes. After visualizing the model of the spell, he activated his mana. And without effort, he could activate the spells right away. Still, he had to focus more because the two-dimensional model for his new spells was harder to visualize. It took him four minutes to finally feel the model was clear in his mind.
The attacking spell was basically using the knowledge of the wind he had previously and changed it into a solid form. The wind turned solid and slashed fast, making a scratch on his wall. He tried the spells several times and found the hidden ability of a second level spell. Concentrating more, he could change the wind's direction and how long or little the blade was.
After several tries, the wind blade could only be extended for about thirty centimeters before it dissipated and the solid form broke down. The furthest direction he could activate his spell was about four meters, longer than his first audible sword slash that could only reach two meters around him.
The second spell was a defensive wind barrier that reduced physical or elemental attacks coming to him. It could also slow an attack down, making it easier for him to dodge an attack. With this, he could definitely be able to kill a scarling by himself, even though it would take a long time to tire the scarling first before delivering his last blow.
Lucky that he didn't need time to decipher the symbol one by one from the library, he finally looked at the magical book before him. He thought that the library would only give him a journal for him simply to take notes. But the dancing words made him question his earlier judgment. He remembered Dion saying something about blood and magical items. Remembering the smiling face of the noble again, Vega's eyes started to water.
He remembered the first time Dion and him visited the library. When they separated, Vega felt a prick when he brushed his hands over the book on the library. He felt an instant connection with the empty book, even though he hadn't figured out what the book was for. He thought the effect was to make the book personally his and can't be read by other people. But the experience proved him wrong.
He tried several ways trying to write a weird symbol on the book, but the book didn't show anything else. But when he thought about the sigils he saw engraved on the stone pathway encircling his mentor, he saw the letters on the book dance again. He saw the symbol suddenly appear with one meaning under it. He now remembered the knowledge he had gained from Wyatt and flipped the page over.
The list of symbols he learned from Wyatt was still there. The other symbols he saw didn't appear in the book because the book didn't have information about the other symbols. He tried again thinking about a name of a plant he knew, the book showed him the complete description on the plant and its properties.
After trying it several times, he understood that the book could help him search for anything he had written beforehand. It would help him tremendously in searching knowledge because unlike Wyatt, he was quite forgetful, and another apprentice needed longer time to find correct information on their notes.
That night, Vega was awake the whole night and skipped his meditation practice to fill the book with the knowledge he could recall but forgot to note it down on the book. Starting from the knowledge of the names of the people in the academy, the ugly drawing of a simple directions in the academy, and the places he went through went trying to kill the scarling.
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