Full of righteous indignation, the Owner had no fear of offending the Elder. Instead, he grew even more confident. His tentacles twitched slightly, and he secretly sent a prayer to the Mystery. If a fight broke out, he would be ready for it. No, he was more than ready for it, he was waiting for it.

  “Then perhaps you know something I do not, little one. Please, tell me about the power of your body, and of what you have accomplished with it.”

  The Owner was a bit disappointed he was not going to have the opportunity to test his mettle against the Greatest of the Sil’piceus in a physical confrontation. Maybe that would come later, but for now he calmed himself down and thought about how best to enlighten his opponent.

  “I am strong. Strong enough to break the thickest shells, fast enough to catch even the most nimble prey, durable enough to withstand dozens of tentacle hits. I am so powerful, I have outgrown the needs of traps!”

  To prove his point, he lifted one of his tentacles in the air, pausing for a second before lashing at the ground with all of his strength. The resulting impact shook the earth, aptly demonstrating how deadly such an attack would be.

  And yet, the Elder remained impassive, unsatisfied by this display of power.

  “So you are strong, stronger than anyone else. That is impressive, and I can understand why you take so much pride in that fact. What I do not understand, and what you have to explain to me, is why that strength is important? Why should I not take just as much pride in being the weakest Sil’piceus?”

  This time there was no pause for reflection, no careful choosing of words. There was only an instinctual answer, an attempt to express what was common sense to him.

  “Because being strong is good! It will lead our race to greatness! It has kept me alive during my journey. It lets me go faster, it lets me find water easier, it lets me defend myself. Most importantly, it lets me hunt, giving me freedom from troublesome traps. A weakling would never survive alone in the plains, but I have!”

  Despite how agitated he was feeling, the Owner did not continue waving around his tentacles uselessly. It served no purpose, and he had learned a long time ago the importance of conserving energy.

  “Yes, being strong has given you advantages, but the same can be said of my weakness. I need less energy to maintain my body, and am often given priority to feed. Why should I wish for anything else? I can argue that my weakness is just as useful as …”

  The Elder stopped mid-sentence, reconsidering his points.

  “My apologies, it seems I am derailing the conversation. Perhaps my initial question was flawed. I do not doubt your strength, nor do I doubt that it has been useful for you. I know you have done a great many things that I could never hope to accomplish. I know all of that and more, but quite frankly, I don’t care.”

  He gently waved his limbs around, pointing at the members of his group. They were all attentive listening to the conversation of the two Titles individuals, not daring to intervene.

  “You have found your path, but how is it helpful to the community? Your strength is admirable, your acts memorable, but do they matter? The tides of time will one day engulf you, dissolving your renown strength to nothing. When that time comes, what will be left of those achievements, and what can be built upon them? What will our descendants have to thank you for?”

  The Owner quietly thought about that, his body frozen as he pondered over the meaning of his strength. Deep inside, he still believed it was important, and that the Elder was wrong to dismiss it so casually. He just did not know how to express that feeling, much less explain it in a convincing manner.

  “My mission would have been impossible to accomplish without my strength. My contribution to the race is the Mystery, which is why I have been granted a Title.”

  He was slightly ashamed of what he had just said. He believed in what he said, but the argument felt so lackluster when compared to the Elder’s attack. He was a newbie crossing blades with a master, and his inexperience was painful.

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  “Your Title has nothing to do with your strength. You are called the Owner because you discovered the Mystery, and was entrusted with it. Ultimately, it is not your strength or courage that is revered, it is your luck. Some could say that your strength has instead been a hindrance to your mission. Without it, you would not have been confident enough to venture alone in the wilderness, and I would have held the Mystery a thousand cycles ago. Once again, your luck would have been more valuable than the power of your body.”

  The Owner shifted uncomfortably. He was rediscovering an unpleasant feeling, one he had not felt for a long time. He was losing, fighting a losing battle against a much more skilled opponent. He belatedly realized that despite his appearance, the Elder was far from harmless. He simply used words as his weapons, and was terrifyingly effective with them.

  “You previously mentioned you believed your strength was the future, a new way forward for our glorious race, but are you not instead forgetting our past? You want us to abandon our greatest advantage and regress to our primitive beginnings. Every common beast can hit an approaching enemy. Every common beast knows to run away from a predator.

  For the first time, the Elder left his calm and composed state, his energetic voice conveying unending passion. This was his greatest pride, his greatest strength. It was with a ferocity matching that of the most savage beast that he proclaimed his beliefs.

  “Only we, the Sil’piceus, have surpassed those lesser compulsions, and have learned to leverage our intelligence, letting nature work for us instead of being controlled by it. You say you are the strongest beast, and you are right, you are. But you are also so much more than that. It is your mind that lets you use your strength more effectively, your intelligence that lets you defeat stronger opponents! Most importantly, you cannot pass down physical strength, but you can pass down knowledge and inventions, advancing our entire race!”

  The Owner did not know how to respond. He was not convinced, his belief in himself had not been shaken, but he had lost this battle of words. This would not be their last fight, and he would do his best to win the next one, but he had nothing to turn the situation around right now. He was defeated, and had the pride to admit it with dignity, and ask for advice.

  “You are right. My Title comes from my luck, not from my strength. Is it really a burden? Is my path a dead end? Do you truly believe that it is a regression to an inferior state, instead of an advancement? That all my efforts so far have been in vain? If so, what should I do now?

  As if waiting for those words, the Elder’s entire temperament shifted once again. Gone were his overbearing intensity and his uncaring impassiveness, replaced with thoughtful benevolence. He was a caring mentor, showing the way but letting his student explore it by himself, full of good intentions.

  “Of course not. I can see that you do not agree with me, and you do not need to. I may not believe in your path, but that does not mean that you should abandon it. Rather, now that you understand your limitations, you can work to fix them, and prove my words wrong.”

  The Owner was surprised by the Elder’s sudden change. He was expecting him to continue his criticisms, taking the opportunity to finish off a defeated opponent, like he would have. On the contrary, he felt nothing but care and worry from his adversary.

  “Your mission as the Owner has been fulfilled, and you are no longer needed. Now, you can either retire and spend the rest of your life living normally as any other. You can join my pack, guarding an object that is under no threat, waiting for the day you get unlucky and die of thirst.”

  He had never thought about that. His decade long goal was to complete his mission, and he had never thought of what would happen after that. He was not like the other Titled individuals. He had not invented anything, and could not continue to improve. His mission had ended, and there was no more to do, expert perhaps guarding the Mystery.

  He tried to imagine returning to his idle life of waiting for prey to fall onto his traps. He tried to picture himself being part of a group again, always having to slow down to let them keep up. It felt so appealing, so boring, that he knew he could never accept to live that way again.

  “I know you will never be satisfied with that. You are held high under Heaven's Eye, and will never accept mediocrity. You need a new mission, one that will not expire. What I want you to do is to refine your path, and make it something that can be passed down, so that all Sil’piceus can profit from it.”

  He felt the reassuring touch of the Elder, promising him that this was not the end, and that greatness was still attainable.

  “The fact that your strength currently serves no purpose is not a criticism of your path, It just means that you have not yet traveled far enough on it. You are a pioneer, and no one can show you the Way. I can only say that what I value is not your physical body, it is the way you control your body, making the most of your strength. At the end of the day, is that not another application of mind over matter? What you can contribute is not the transient strength of your tentacles, it is the techniques for us to do the same.”

  There was a hint of finality in the Elder's next words.

  “Do that, create something permanent, and perhaps you will be the first of us to earn two Titles.”