Chương 7: An Auction?
"97… 98… 99… 100!" I huff out as I swing my sword down for the final time, before ungracefully flopping onto the ground in my meditative position. Not much has changed in my routine in these past 6 months since the agreement with Kaspian. However my core now sat at solid yellow and was inching closer to the light stage.
My sensitivity to mana also increased with my breakthrough into yellow, but for some reason I still couldn't figure out how to unlock the deviant forms of wind and fire. My flames I could already increase the temperature to the degree of them turning blue, but lightning seemed to elude me. As well with sound for wind, just knowing how sound waves worked from my previous life didn't seem to help in figuring out how to use it.
However with this intense training also came the benefit of becoming more and more efficient with with my wind and fire magic. Also with my core at yellow the distinction between augmenter and conjurer has shrunk. I can form and throw small fire balls or unleash blades of wind, but they come with an increased mana cost compared to my normal augmenter style moves.
One major thing has changed in these past months though. I've been spending more time with my family, while this does mean not as much training that just means I had to up the intensity. Mana truly is a wondrous thing, exercises and training routines that would most likely kills adults from my past life has become my norm.
Even if you're not an emitter pure mana seems to still have a healing factor to it causing wounds and injuries to heal far faster than someone from earth would think possible. This factor only increases with my core purity, so I've been able to push my 4 year old body to the limit each day. My wind magic has become my best friend for this training.
Weights aren't really a thing here, so besides finding heavy objects to carry around, the only way to get stronger is body workouts. Running against what feels like a heavy wind produces much of the same effect. Same with wind pushing down on you while you're doing push-ups. Needless to say I can use wind to a terrifying degree, it's almost to the point of my mana rotation to where I just use it unconsciously.
I can also technically fly, I say technically because it's more like running on air at the moment. I form these sort of wind platforms under my feet and direct the airflow around me so that I face no resistance. This allows me to leap off one platform and glide to the next. Like I said, not exactly flying but it opens a lot of avenues for not just movement but combat too.
My thoughts are interrupted by the sound of even and measured footsteps, the steps of a noble and steps I've come to know well. My father, Vincent. Standing up I dust myself off before turning around to see him smiling at me, and I return it with one of my own. I got to speak, but check the sky first, it seems it's still morning. He usually waits till after lunch to check on me.
"Good morning father. Is there something you need?" It came out a bit more guarded than I intended, but truthfully I was just confused at seeing him here this early. Sometimes they would sit off to the side and watch, but this is the first time he actually interrupted my training.
"Not quite something I need, but I had a question for you or rather an invitation." He's says sort of vaguely and I can only give a confused look in return before nodding for him to continue.
"Very well, the 6th annual Helstea auction is going to be held tomorrow and I was wondering if you would like to come with us, as a family. I realize we haven't asked you to come to the previous one as you had only been living with us for 6 months at that point and we didn't know if you-" I held up my hand to stop him as he was entering in to one of his rambling moments. I had to quickly start speaking though because his face turned sad expecting me to turn him down.
"No need to be sad, I would be happy to come. You just ramble when you get nervous." I say with a bright smile on my face. His face lights up and he steps forward to hug me, but I take a step back.
"I'm rather sweaty you might not want to do that." He looks me up and up and down before following through with the hug anyways.
"I'm happy you're coming with us, son. I can always change clothes anyways. Now then I have to go tell Tabitha the good news." He says as he begins walk back towards the house, only to turn around and give me a sympathetic look.
"You may however want to go ahead and wash up because I'm sure Tabitha is going to want to make sure you are dressed… appropriately." He finished before heading back to the house. My sweat turned cold at the thought of another shopping day, but resigned myself to my fate as a favor to my mother.
Thankfully I have Lilia as a sister who loves clothes as much as Tabitha, but she still sometimes wants buy me clothes and becomes sad when I try to avoid the shopping trips. Sighing to myself I make my way into the house and head straight to the bath that the maids keep ready for me.
I always tell them that I can make and take the bath myself, but they always insist so I've given up on trying to stop them and compromised with letting them wash my hair. Plus I don't know what they put in the water, but it leaves my skin feeling smooth, and smelling great.
My hair though seems to be the envy of the ladies of the household. Maybe it's just genetics, maybe mana, or maybe it's just because I'm like a reincarnated protagonist.
(*Author sneezes*)
But my hair no matter how much I sweat or dirty it, after just one wash it's back to perfect straight, sleek black sheen. Bangs swept out of my face and it's not unusual to see my hair pulled back in a loose ponytail. This caused the ladies of the house to despise my hair almost as much as they fawn over it.
I've been unfairly forced into various girly hairstyles, and if I tried to stop it little Lilia would begin to cry and sadly that's something couldn't over come. Tabitha has taken advantage of this fact and will use Lilia to guilt me into a great many things, which to my dismay usually involves dressing up and different hairstyles.
While it certainly is embarrassing and if I could get out of it I would, but the time spent with them is still fun. Not that I plan to start dressing up as a girl or any such nonsense. I mean just the actual time spent in their company where they have smiles on their faces, it brings a certain peace of mind.
As soon as I stepped out of the bath and toweled off I found my clothes already folded up and placed to the side. My usual attire for when we head into the city is black dress style pants, with a white button up shirt that has a black blazer like jacket over it with the sleeves rolled to the elbows. A tie that matches the bright blue of my eyes rests loosely on my neck, and finally I have black shoes.
(AN: yes I know Kuroh has white shoes, read the next paragraph.)
When I stepped out I was met with Tabitha waiting patiently outside with a box in hand.
"Ah Jaron, here you go it's a gift. I had heard you talking about wishing their was some white shoes to go with your outfit, so I had some custom made. They are made from a the leather of a B class mana beast, so they can even be worn when you go on your adventure!" She said giddily while looking at me, but she started to frown when I didn't say anything.
My jaw was dropped as I looked at her holding the box, I had mumbled off handedly one time while we were shopping about white shoes. I didn't even expect her to have heard me. I tentatively reach my hands out and grab the box before looking at the shoes inside, and a smile crossed my face.
"They're perfect." I breathed out and the smile returned to Tabitha's face as she breathed a sigh of relief. I promptly dropped to my butt and began putting on the the new shoes and they fit perfectly. Nice cushioned sole, as expected of a nobleman's shoe and she was right I could feel the residual mana in the shoe from the mana beast. It seemed to also have a cooling effect, maybe it was made from an ice mana beast?
As soon as the shoes were on I stood up and gave Tabitha a strong hug.
"Thanks mom, I love it." She smiles warmly before returning the hug.
"Alright let's get a move on, we need to buy you a nice suit for tomorrow as you'll be sitting with us in a private box with the royal family." I stiffen slightly and I can feel her chuckle. I'm guessing she thought I stiffened because of the shopping, but rather it was because of having to sit with the royal family. What will happen if someone notices that I'm already a solid yellow core mage?
I had mastered mirage walk, but I don't know if that prevents people from seeing my mana core as even I don't know how that works. The only thing I know is that you can't see the stage of someone who has a higher mana core than you, but it never specified if only certain people could see mana cores. I can see mana cores, but I also have to focus on the person not to mention my high sensitivity towards mana.
I pull back from the hug and look up at Tabitha.
"What about my mana core? What happens if they see I'm a yellow stage at 4 years old?" I say worriedly, only to see her smile mischievously.
"Haha, no need to worry about that, dear. Vincent already thought of that." I look at her quizzically before I could ask her to clarify, Vincent came around the corner also holding a box but smaller.
"Jaron, there you are. I've got something for you that you'll need for the auction tomorrow." He says as he passes me a box. I look up at him and then over to Tabitha who just smiles knowingly. Focusing back on the box I can feel the mana of the object inside, it seems to be some kind of enchanted device.
Opening the box reveals a black leather strap, with different designs etched into the soft brown underside. Picking it up out of the box, it try to decipher the enchantments but I haven't studied them yet. Looking at Vincent in confusion, he finally decides to speak.
"It's an enchanted bracelet with the specific purpose of hiding a persons mana core level." He said with a proud look in his eyes and his chest slightly puffed out. My eyes returned to the bracelet as I slipped it on right above my wrist, so I can keep it's range of motion free. It fits snugly with no excess material hanging, it was designed specifically for my arm.
"Thank you so much, dad. Thank you both for these gifts." I say genuinely looking between the 2.
"Alright! Time to go shopping!" Tabitha cheerily exclaims.
"Oh that's right I just remembered I have some important papers to go over, so I'm sad to say I'll have to miss it." Vincent quickly says and I shoot him a betrayed look. He merely gives me a sympathetic look before Tabitha grips my forearm and begins to drag me to the front door. I just accepted fate and hung limply from her grip.
The accursed shopping: 2, me:0
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Author's Note
Accursed shopping claims me as a victim too as I have to go shopping for groceries today. Another time skip, but next chapter will actually be the following day, and I'm even thinking of adding a small little scene while they are out shopping. So rejoice people that were tired of time skips and apologies to the people that want them.
I feel like this story would get boring and repetitive if I just jumped straight into the main story because when that happens I feel like it's hard not to follow Arthur's storyline. I'll do my best to add my own twist to it though. Not as in actually change the storyline, but what Jaron is doing. He won't always be around Arthur, but he will a lot of the time.
Anyways, I'm sure most people can guess what Jaron is going to get at the action. One is obvious, well both are obvious, but the second thing will be something specific.
Thanks for reading.
-SocioPhobia
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