CHAPTER 28

As the disciple and the master stood opposite of each other, both looked at each other with a daring glare, as to see who would move first. Surprisingly, the disciple broke his glare, and his expression changed to a questioning one.

“Orthrus, if mages can unlock the third skill slot if they absorb a lot of an affinity, what about aura users? They normally don’t have an affinity, right?”

The master sighed, and said with a heavy tone: “There really isn’t a limit to your curiosity. Okay, I will answer your question, but this will be the last one. If you still don’t understand it, let me spell it out for you, the third skill slot depends on the strength of the energy that the skill ring and the core of the mana signature are made from. Affinities are normally ways in which pure mana can strengthen itself, affinities are armaments that pure mana can make use of. We guide that mana, either with or without its armaments. Aura users let the mana flow through their body, and normally store it in there. They use it to passively boost their abilities, or actively if they can. Does that answer your question?” Orthrus said with an irritated tone.

“So, aura users can get the third skill slot in their first ring, by getting to higher levels, and having their soul and eventually their mana signature become attuned to the energies that reside in their body?” Daelyn said with a thoughtful voice, as he awaited his master’s confirmation on the subject.

“You’re quite smart for a three year old, you know that? Anyway, it’s normally more common for aura users to have a third skill slot, because the energy in their bodies passively attune their soul and their mana signature. While mages also have some form of passive attuning, aura users have a much greater variant of that, since their energy isn’t holed up in one place like a mage’s mana core.”

Orthrus turned his attention towards Daelyn as he finished his lesson. He looked upon the young boy with a stoic expression as he straightened his back, and stood up right. He towered above the young child with his above average length of 190 centimetres. He was quite the imposing presence, and to embellish his presence even more, he spoke with a stern yet calm voice.

“Now, it’s time to start your lesson. I will explain what you’re going to do before you start, so that way it will be a bit more clear what is going on. First, you will use the empty mana crystal that is lying beside you, then you will siphon your blood mana into the crystal, make sure that you do not put too much in, otherwise the crystal will break, and finally, you will create an aura inside the crystal. I presume you already have some of the basic information about creating an aura from immersing yourself in the mana signature. You did immerse yourself in the skill, right?”

His question was met with a nod, after which he calmly continued.

“Good, that will make both the siphoning and the creation of you aura easier. If you’re wondering why we’re training auramancy. It’s because you seem to have a knack for it as you did it on instinct in the dungeon, and both auramancers and blood warlocks focus on one thing, efficiency. They both hate to lose any mana to a slight imperfection, and focus on using their energy as sparingly as possible, since it would be quite troublesome for both to focus on power instead of efficiency. That is especially true for you, since you’re the combination of the two.”

Daelyn looked at Orthrus with a questioning gaze, before saying: “So, if I could choose between a smaller more efficient spell, and a larger more costly spell, I should choose for the smaller spell? Then what is going to defend me if I don’t have any magic for that?”

Orthrus’ stoic face formed a smile, a smile that betrayed his both his excitement and his obsession with the subject, as the smile seemed to belong to belong to a demon obsessed with slaughter, instead of a sun elf, and with while he tried to withhold his emotions, they were clearly heard in his voice as he sounded like an excited yet terrifying child: “For that, you’re going to use the specialty of dark magic. You’re going to make minions! You can either do that with necromancy, chimeramancy, rot magic, or some other kind of dark magic that spawns or creates minions. I already told you that you’re going to learn necromancy. When are you going to learn to listen, child?”

Orthrus sighed, before saying: “Either way, we have been talking too much about the future. Start by drawing on the powers that inhabit your body, enter a state of meditation, and feel the magical energy stream through your body.”

Daelyn listened to Orthrus, and calmed his mind. He emptied his mind of thoughts, he spread his awareness inwards as he tried to scour the insides of his body, he remembered the map of his veins he had made earlier, and followed it. He quickly found the energies coursing through his body, he felt them pulse as his crystal heart pumped them through his body, he felt the duality his blood was in, it had both a physical form, and a form of pure energy, made possible by the continuously flowing of his blood, and his crystal heart.

He felt the energy in its whole, and tried to influence it. He tried to direct it, he tried to have it bent to his will. He tried to direct it towards the crystal in his hands, but he felt great difficulty doing so. He felt that the energy wouldn’t move, no matter how much he exerted his influence over it, no matter how much he willed it, it did not budge. It seemed like it could only move inside of his veins, and as he was becoming more and more frustrated, he realized that he was an idiot.

He had felt the walls that obstructed the energy from leaving his body before, and he realized how to overcome them. He focused the energy around his right wrist, feeling that there was a weak part there, and forcing the energy through the thin film that separated the energy from the outside world.

He felt pain from trying to force his magic through the thin film, and the pain would not subside until the energies were through the film.

As he pushed more and more energy at the film, it finally broke. He felt warm blood on his wrists, and he felt the energy and blood course out of him. He felt that the film had been broken, and he felt that he could finally use his energy, so he directed it at the crystal.

He felt the crystal’s outside, and he directed his energy towards it. The crystal had a film comparable to his skin, so he gathered up his energy, and just as he was about to bent the thin film to his will, to take over the thin film that separated the empty crystal and his energies. He directed the energies to break the barrier with an all-out assault, and he was about to try and break the thin film surrounding the crystal, until he was rudely pulled from his preparation by Orthrus.

“Wrong! Prioritize efficiency! You can’t overpower everything, don’t mindlessly attack it, form your energy, and strike! If you’re going to try and overpower everything, you will die before you become something that even resembles a true master of the dark arts.” Orthrus said with a calm yet commanding voice.

Daelyn heard Orthrus’ scorn echo through his mind, as the energies stopped, and his blood was suspended in the air. He once again realized that he was an idiot, as he realized his mistake. He had focused the energy just before to break through the thin film that separated his mana and the outside air, he had achieved this by bundling up his energy instead of spreading it out, and he was doing the opposite of what he had done before.

He quickly took hold of his energies, and directed them towards his middle finger. He formed his mana into a spearhead, so he could penetrate the thin film, and invade the empty mana crystal.

He sent out his energy towards the empty crystal, and felt the spearhead collide with the thin film for a second, before it caved in under the pressure, and a small hole was formed in the film. The hole was being widened by Daelyn’s assault, until it was able to let the energy through. Daelyn felt his energy invade the inside of the mana crystal, and just as he thought that he had succeeded, he heard Orthrus scorn him once again.

“You’re not done yet, shape the energy into a ball inside the crystal.” He scoffed at Daelyn.

Daelyn’s mind was already greatly strained by this simple exercise, so he was wondering how the old dog thought that he could possibly continue. However, before he voiced his irritation, he remembered a piece of wisdom he had acquired through a lot of pain during his awakening. This kernel of wisdom had cost him a great deal, and he would remember this for the rest of his life, as he knew it to be true. It resounded through his mind as he was about to scoff at the old man, and quickly mad him change his tone.

Power comes at a price.

If he wishes to become strong enough to do what he wants, to become strong enough to explore this world freely, he would have to pay the price. He ignored the minor migraine, and continued with the exercise.

He felt his energy in the mana crystal, he felt it slowly start to fill up the empty mana crystal. As there was enough energy in the mana crystal to create a small aura, he exercised his will on it, and tried to mould the energy to fit his desire.

He tried to shape it into a ball, but he felt that the energy wouldn’t budge inside of the crystal. He did everything he could to gain access to it, but he felt that it had been disconnected from his body, he felt that the energy inside the crystal had been released from his reign, and he couldn’t get it back under his control.

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This greatly irritated Daelyn, as he was confused why his mana had left his grasp. He tried to get the results by repeating the process another time, but it only served to siphon more mana into the mana crystal, and leave him with a hungry and tired feeling, while the mana in the crystal had still left his influence, and now only supplemented the already present mana in the mana crystal.

He couldn’t understand why he had lost control over it, but he was quickly corrected by Orthrus.

With a factual yet disappointed tone, he said: “If you’re wondering what you did wrong, I will tell you. Those energies aren’t yours anymore, they now reside in the mana crystal, and you would need to expend more of your own energy to make that energy do anything. Now, what did you do wrong? If you can answer that question, you’re already a step closer to becoming a competent mage.”

Daelyn was a bit startled, as he had exited his meditation like status to listen to Orthrus, and he did not know the answer to his question. He did not know why he had lost control of his magic after he sent it into the mana crystal, and he didn’t know how he could relegate the possibility of that happening again.

He thought that the magic was a part of him, and he didn’t know how it could just suddenly leave his grasp, as he regarded it as a part of him.

Daelyn racked his mind over what could have happened. Did the mana crystal tap away the energy, did the energy leaving his body constitute for him losing control of it? While he could understand to some extent what happened, he couldn’t figure out how to fix it.

As Daelyn was straining his mind for solutions, Orthrus quietly watched. He recognised his student’s troubles, but he did not interfere. He had already given his student a lot of advice, and he wouldn’t grow if everything was handed to him on a silver platter. There was a price to pay for power, and his student would need to learn that.

He saw his student struggle with the problem, and decided to give him some advice to progress in the end. Spoiling him would be bad, but not giving him a path to progress on would be worse.

With a cold tone he said: “Daelyn. If you can’t figure it out, don’t try too hard. The answer isn’t going to come if you don’t have an idea on what to do. Try and meditate for now, that will clear the mind, and it will allow you to observe your energy more. Either way, the answer is right in front of your nose, you just need to find it. However, before you do that, bandage yourself up. There are some bandages in the chest.”

Daelyn intently listened to Orthrus’ advice, and quickly took it, as he saw that the blood flowing from the wound he had made. He started by controlling his blood flow to stop the bleeding, and he slowly made his way over to the chest, as it was taking quite a toll on his mind.

He felt that using his mana and moving at the same time, was very difficult. He noticed that dividing his concentration between influencing magic, and moving his body was very difficult, as he couldn’t handle both at full throttle at the same time.

Suddenly, he remembered something, he didn’t need to bandage the wound! He could use the magic he had used when Ania stabbed him to heal himself.

He was a bit sad as he was already very close to getting the bandage, he was still excited at the prospect of using his magic. He remembered the process of natural healing, and he tried to apply it once again. He remembered that he had to coat the wound with fibrin, and then accelerate the process of mitosis.

He moved the energies in his body to his will, and he willed them to carry out the process. However, he quickly noticed that it was far from easy. He needed to stimulate the fibrinogen to create fibrin, but he had no idea how to do that. He couldn’t figure out how to let the protein create other proteins, but he did want to finish the process, so he decided to overlook the coating of the wound for now. He reasoned that it couldn’t be such an important step, as his bodily fluids would clear out most of the bacteria.

He went on to regret that, as the body couldn’t clean the wound correctly, and as Daelyn was accelerating his natural healing process, the wound got infected.

The rapid regeneration of the cells caused the infection to rapidly spread as it was fed by Daelyn’s blood and magical power. As the process stopped, the flesh had become a mush of green puss, and Daelyn felt great pain from it. He voiced his pain by groaning loudly, Orthrus heard this, and walked over.

“How in the hell did you do this? I said get some bandages, not infect yourself with a deadly virus!” He said with an agitated and astonished tone.

“Either way, I hope you learned something from this,  you can’t use magic for everything. Now, we’re going to have to remove the infected flesh, and then let it heal, naturally, understand?” Orthrus said with a wicked smile on his face.

Daelyn gulped, but quickly complied, as he had read about the different diseases that inhabited the world, and he did not like their descriptions, much less being inflicted with one. Little did he know, Orthrus liked to be sarcastic, and had a habit of being a bit dramatic.

An hour and a gruesome surgery later, the infected flesh had been removed, and the wound had been tightly bandaged together with some herbs that would prevent further infection, and help the natural healing process.

Orthrus had hammered those three words in his head by the end of the hour, as he kept emphasizing the word ‘natural’ to make sure Daelyn didn’t do anything stupid, again. He was quite agitated, but he noticed a change of expression in the boy’s eyes, and his demeanour quickly changed from sour to stoic, as he directed his attention towards his student.

Daelyn had a fearful look on his face, as his attention seemed to be centred on the wound on his wrist, and his eyes seemed to be apprehensive about going on, as they did not exude the same excitement and anticipation they had before.

Orthrus saw the fearful expression on the boy’s face, and said with a calming and reassuring tone: “I know it is quite scary, and painful, to perform such an experiment. But don’t you shouldn’t be afraid of it, experimenting is what helps one gain power, and it broadens one’s understanding of their magic, or of a concept this world, or an individual runs on. Experimenting is a good thing, but you should always be careful what you’re experimenting on, and what your experiment entails. Understood?”

Daelyn turned his attention towards Orthrus, and listened to his advice. He realized that Orthrus was given him a piece of wisdom, something that he seemed to rarely give, and decided to take his advice. He knew power came at a price, and the bad results from an experiment is nothing more than the value he would have to pay for the power he desired.

He nodded vigorously,  before he turned his attention inwards, as he decided that meditating was the best thing to do at the moment, as rotating the energy through his body would help the wound recover passively.

As he entered his stance of meditation, Daelyn noticed that he could feel all the energy flowing through his body in more detail than before, he felt that he could exert his influence more, spread his awareness farther, and inspect every little nook and cranny of his body in even more detail than before.

He was able to focus his attention on his bodily processes, the slight movements of muscles, the processing of food, and the healing of his wound. He was greatly intrigued by this, as he now could see how the wound was naturally healing, and he could understand the process.

While he couldn’t see every little detail on a molecular scale, he could see how the wound was slowly coated in fibrin, and he could see how the flesh was slowly starting to reform, as the cells were slowly growing and dividing.

He decided to observe the process as he meditated. He wasn’t going to try and create a spell that would accelerate his regenerative abilities, for now. He simply observed the process, and stored the information for later use.

As he noticed that the regeneration of the wound had entered the beginning stages of mitosis, he quickly got bored. He already understood this process, and instead started experimenting with his magic.

He wanted to find out why he had lost connection to his mana in the mana crystal, and he decided to follow the process step by step in his meditative state. He started by gathering energy once again, and he used a combination of blood and energy to halt the healing of his wound, and allowed a small hole to be formed on his right wrist. He could easily channel his mana through there, and he could have it heal later.

He guided the energy and blood once again through the hole, and he focused the energy on his palm. He wanted to gathered the energy in his hand, and he tried to mould it. Surprisingly, it went relatively smooth, he could still influence it like it was still part of his body. He moulded it into a ball, into a small knife, and into a cube. His mind was greatly strained from this exercise, as he had been extensively using magic for the last few hours, but he was trying to find out if there was anything that was different about the mana in the mana crystal, and the mana in his palm.

Suddenly, he found the difference. He found the difference between the mana in his palm and the mana in the mana crystal to be a fairly obvious one, but one that opened countless options for him in the field of dark blood magic. He understood the basic concepts dark mana spells operated on, as he found the differing part between the two mana pools.

He was connected to the mana in his hand. There wasn’t a physical connection, but a connection made from his dark blood mana that extended from him to the blob of mana. He was quite surprised, as it that the connection was made from a very small amount of dark blood mana, and operated through the hole he had opened up on his wrist.

He tried to mould the mana on his left hand the same way he had done on his right hand, he repeated the exercises, and strained his mind even more than before, having his headache grow into a full blown migraine, but he noticed the connection between him and the mana outside of his body , and a difference in the mana required as the blob of dark blood mana was farther away from its point of exit.

While the difference was palpable, it was still there, and Daelyn suspected that it must be because of the connection had to traverse a greater distance before it reached the blob of mana.

He was very excited by this, and due to his excitement, he fell out of his meditative state of mind. He quickly opened his eyes. They had regained the same glint of anticipation and excitement, as they quickly scanned the room for his teacher.

As he was about to voice his excitement to Orthrus, he couldn’t do it, as Orthrus wasn’t there anymore. Instead, Gob was standing in the doorway, and said with a calm voice: “Orthrus already left, he was going to research some more. Now, it’s time for you to go home. It is no good for a child  to use magic so much.”

The goblin quickly turned away from Daelyn, and started walking down the hallway.

Daelyn hurried to his feet to catch up with the six armed goblin, as he scampered over the wooden boards that made up the floor, he was happy. He was happy that he had discovered so much about magic in one day, and while he felt extremely tired from using his magic, he was still happy he had made the first steps on the path of becoming a mage.

His proficiency in manipulating his mana or creating his own aura’s was still far from sufficient to seem competent in any manner, but a journey of a thousand kilometres starts with a single step, and Daelyn had just made that first step. The first step towards magical prowess, and freedom.

However, as Daelyn would arrive at home later that day, he would once again be reminded that a journey wasn’t without its perils, as he saw the journey of his best friend be obstructed once again by the grief he felt from his former family.