Chapter 14

Frank waited, wondering if this was all a joke. One sick instance of gallows humor, before he had the rug pulled out from underneath him. Then just as he felt all eyes on him, Holsy began drawing even more attention to him, by talking.

“Ladies and Gentlemen,” Holsy began his voice booming loudly in the open gymnasium. “You all might be wondering who this new person is, having never seen them in your school before. Yet, here they are now, standing patiently, waiting in line for our assistants to change out the old power cells used to speed up your awakening, and changing them out for two new fully charged power cells.”

With that Holsy then pointed off to the distance where a guard and Luther were both actively engaged with disassembling the old power cell and replacing them with two new ones.

Seeing the changing of cells, Frank felt momentarily flummoxed by the actions, as he couldn’t quite understand why such actions were being made.

“Well let me explain to you, what you are about to witness. This is the culmination of hard work, perseverance, and tenacity. See that boy before you, the one that looks like he’s a dwarven cultivator, that kid did the impossible. Or rather, he did what many of you would consider to be impossible. What am I talking about?”

Slight pause.

“I’m talking about the fact that this boy managed to get to Tier V in cultivation.”

Murmur.

With that the students who had been silent all began to make minor ripples of sound that all added together to form a wave of unintelligible noise.

“Yes, you are going to witness part of the graduation ceremony for someone who is able to enter into the upper-level martial academies.” Holsy said, pointing high overhead indicating the upper levels of civilization that lead to the surface.

“But unlike all of those rich and noble brats who come from generations of wealthy cultivators, this kid did it on his own. Not only that, but he is one of you, from down here. Let this moment serve as a reminder of what you are capable of, what we all are capable of, when we truly put our minds into improving our standing in life.” Holsy stated, the crowd started to go wild, but before they could do anything, Holsy looked back at the two who were changing out the power cells.

The guard on duty gave a thumbs up, as Luther got up, and turned to face Frank. There was a slight sneer on Luther’s face, but before Frank could say or do anything about the look, the boy returned to his fake placid face. This was the face that Frank knew all too well, the face that Luther often used when he was either hiding the fact that he had done something wrong, or was about to do something wrong.

Seeing that face, Frank felt a twinge of worry course through him, but instantly let the feeling go, for he knew. Somehow, he knew that nothing too dangerous would happen, for now. With that revelation, Frank took this as a sign that Luther had in fact put the pieces together and had figured out who Frank was. The fact that Frank was a walking, talking conviction wrap waiting to happen to Luther did not escape his attention. If Luther had made the connection from Holsy’s little speech, Frank knew that Luther would take action in some way, trying to get him to remain silent on the events that transpired after his awakening.

Yet, Frank knew that despite how brash Luther was, he would never do anything so openly as to attack Frank while in front of so many witnesses. For Frank knew Luther’s true being, the fact that he was deep down a coward. No, if he was to strike at Frank it would be as Holsy already noted from the shadows and when Frank would least expect it.

“Come on kid.” Holsy stated, gently placing a hand on Frank’s arm and guiding him to the awakening stone. A stone that glowed brightly with a rainbow of colors and textures.

As Frank approached, he could feel and see the ambient energy all but thrumming in waves from the stone.

The stone was so bright, that it seemed to blind Frank, until like a moth, he was drawn to the flames of energy. For a moment the whole world shrunk until it was just Frank, the glowing ball of endless energy, and Holsy who was still talking.

“All right, normally this is done in private as this can be painful for some who are not ready. Basically, this is the last time we can artificially inflate your cultivation Tier with energy. The first time was during your actual awakening. The reason why we wait until after Tier V of cultivation is that after Tier V you can awaken an affinity to a second element. Our scouts note that you have already shown an affinity to Life Energy, these will help you heal yourself, regrow limbs, and maybe eventually be able to speed up the healing processes in others. Due to how dense green energy is, almost all abilities one can gain from this source of energy are all F-Rank. Even with awakening a second affinity, your primary will still be Life energy. So don’t think that this will change that ranking.”

With that Frank felt his shoulders drop just a smidge. While he had come to a somewhat similar understanding from all of Holsy’s veiled statements over the morning. Only now, having it spelled out for him in no uncertain terms did the full weight of these words truly hit him.

“That said,” Holsy continued, speaking lower now so that only Frank could hear this next part. “Out in martial academies, what you started out at means nothing. In fact, the fact that you managed to work your way out of here by yourself as an F-Rank, that will mean more going forward than having been born with S-Rank abilities.”

Frank had also understood that last statement, but then a new thought hit him.

“What is this martial academy that you keep talking about?” Frank asked.

Pausing, Holsy suddenly looked at Frank like he had three heads, then shaking himself he realized. “They really don’t teach you anything down here do they?”

Frank just shook his head, not quite knowing how to answer that question.

“Well, once you awaken your second affinity you will effectively have two different schools of power to pull from. Individually they will be powerful and fairly linear with what you can and cannot do with them. That is why we for the most part let all students who don’t have powers that will destroy the world around them go out and explore on their own. Then when they learn their second affinity of power, we let them learn to blend their two powers to form an even more devastating attack. This goes back into the whole team approach to combat that we will preach, as a team of cultivators working together is always more effective than a lone warrior on their own. So too are blended powers more capable than those of the individual components used to create them. That is why this is such a big chance for you. Just go up there and find a second source of power that resonates with you and fill up your body with its power to be at the same level of power as your primary energy source, and we will take care of the rest.”

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Exhale.

Hearing that Frank felt a bit of the tension that had been slowly building within him wash away.

“Good, relax. You’ve got this. This is only a good thing.” Holsy said, patting Frank on the shoulder.

Frank hearing that stood to full height and moved behind the stone.

“Wait until I get off the platform,” Holsy called out half-jokingly as he jumped from the stage leaving Frank alone.

Taking a quick scan around him, Frank saw hundreds of students all watching from beyond the exit line. He saw civilians wearing school uniforms staring on in awe, he even saw the other soldiers looking on with something akin to respect in their eyes. Holsy was the worst, who seemed to be excited for Frank’s success, far more than he felt at the moment.

Realizing he was only delaying the inevitable, Frank steeled himself and then placed his hands on the awakening stone.

Only, out of the corner of his eye did he notice the quick-change wash across Luther’s face. He was in an instant how the boy’s placid face quickly gave way to a half smirk smile that seemed to glow with malice, all but proving Luther’s internal thoughts and deeds.

Unfortunately, Frank had no time to even entertain why Luther was so excited for this moment. Holsy was here, if Luther did do anything stupid, Frank was certain that he would strike down the boy before he got close enough to use his banshee powers.

Frank felt a full gambit of energy fill him, slightly hot and citrusy orange. He felt the golden rays of yellow that made Frank imagine what sunlight must be like. He felt the fiery controlled heat of fire. The cool breezy quality of light blue. The deep rhythmic wave like fluctuations of dark blue. Then he felt the deep caressing cool feeling of green energy.

Having heard Holsy’s explanation of green energy, Frank couldn’t help but agree, green energy was dense in a way that spoke of the gregarious nature of the energy. The way the energy needed to be around more of its kind. His body instantly pulled in string after string of green energy, slurping it down like he was a starving man who just found an oasis. While it had just been moments since he last managed to breakthrough, his body was now and would seemingly always be hungry for crisp green energy, the energy of life.

Then he felt it.

A slight shiver ran down his spine, as he felt a dark ominous aura in the energy. Dark and violent, yet somehow familiar.

Breathing heavily.

Frank felt an unmistakable fear growing within him, as he felt a new more powerful energy that seemed to cause all other forms of energy to tremble in its wake. No, not more powerful, just contrary.

In his mind, Frank could feel the difference between this new form of energy and the others. While the other energies had all been able to be touched within his body, without too much hassle. This new form of energy was deep, undeniable, and above all unavoidable.

The dark energy was seemingly drawn to the light within his body, particularly to the green energy.

HUH!

“How could this be!” Holsy shouted.

Outside of his body, Frank heard people shouting and yelling, but they were distant screams.

“Get him down, he will die.”

“He is already dead. The darkness has him.”

Ominous words rang out around him, but Frank focused on the moment. He was not afraid of this new source of energy, in fact, he now realized why it felt so familiar, as he had bathed in it his first true night as a cultivator. Mentally, he realized this was the same corroding energy that he had been accosted with inside the mouth of the giant serpent he killed.

Just like that first true night of his baptism into the world of cultivation, Frank felt a life versus death battle raging inside him. He felt the dark energy take root within his body, slowly corroding everything around it, only to be recreated in an instant from the glowing green light of Life energy.

Screaming.

Distantly there was screaming occurring, but that was distant. It wasn’t until he felt a bit of his internal healing energy being redirected to his vocal cords that he realized that the sound of the screams was coming from himself.

Suddenly in a brief flash of insight, he knew what had happened. His mind began working overtime as it began piecing together all the different images of what had happened. Everything from Luther’s angry stare, to his being put into his place by Holsy. Then his subsequent smirking after he had finished changing out the power cells, to his unmistakable glee once the whole second awakening process began. Luther had done this, set about this level of pain on him.

Frank was dying, he knew it, and his killer this tormentor who had accosted him since his first day of school would get away with it. Just as he had gotten away with killing Scottie and Aaron, two of his lackies who while Frank wasn’t entirely saddened by their deaths, they were just ultimately afraid.

In that moment, Frank realized that. His mind forced to work overtime to combat the surging pain that was coursing through his body, as two diametrically opposed energies surged about within his body. Frank realized that Scottie and Aaron were just pawns, caught up in a game of survival that had little room for error.

Looking up from the stone, Frank looked out exactly to where he knew Luther would be. The boy had been laughing quietly to himself, his half smirk having expanded to be a full-on smile. At least it had been a smile until he locked gazes with Frank.

As soon as their eyes met, Luther’s face suddenly turned to a look of fear.

Frank didn’t know what the boy saw in him, nor did he really care at that moment. At this exact moment something clicked in Frank’s mind, as his normally calm rational mind gave way to revenge. This was a last desperate retaliatory attack against the person who had wronged him for so long. The person who had tormented him in his dreams. A person who forced him to nearly die dozens of times in the discarded ruins of civilization.

In this moment, Frank felt hatred. Complete and unbridled hatred directed at one lone tormentor. Locking gazes with the instigator of all his pain, Frank focused his mind and felt something in his body awaken. New pathways and circuits for energy, he felt them open up as the new form of energy required new circuits to work independently. The darkness burned as it made its way through his body, but he didn’t fight the pain, not any more. Instead, he embraced it, the way one would grip the hilt of a white hot sword if only to be able to impale that sword into the heart of your sworn enemy. That is exactly what Frank did at this very moment. He embraced the pain, he embraced the feel of corrosion and of death permeating his body. He embraced it all just to deliver one final act of revenge.

They might forget that Frank Fotos ever existed after today, but one person would remember him for the rest of his life.

Focusing his mind and full killing intent on Luther Camello, the source of all his rage, pain, and anger at the moment Frank reached out with his mind and directing the brand new power that seemed to stretch out like an invisible arm.

“What?”

Focusing his will, Frank directed all his energy into one intense beam of pain-infused energy. Then reaching out, he found the now trembling Luther with his energy.

As his energy caressed the body of Luther, there was a momentary delay and give, as if scissors finding a slightly easier way to cut through a singular sheet of paper. Just by touching Luther with his power, he felt the skin and body writhe way.

“AHHH!” Luther cried out in pain, as the full effect of the power that now served Frank listened to him.

Luther stared on with shock and horror at the sight before him.

“DIE!” Luther shouted out, releasing a light blue burst of energy that lashed out towards Frank, only to fall over forty feet short of Frank. Better still, every time the light blue energy of his shriek touched the outstretched line of black energy that now fell under Frank’s control, the light blue stream evaporated as if touching a scorching fire.

Realizing that his attack couldn’t even reach Frank, that Frank had now awoken an S-Rank distance power or maybe even further given the distance that Frank was able to wield his newfound power.

Seeing the look of utter fear in Luther’s eyes, Frank couldn’t help but smile. Suddenly the world burned slightly less. Yes, his body was still absorbing both green and dark energies constantly, but at this moment nothing mattered. The only thing he felt was exhilaration, he would die, but he would take Luther down with him.

“No.” Frank responded, his voice oddly cold and mocking.

“I’ll kill you for good this time…” Luther began, but he took too long, as Frank seeing that Luther was gathering energy around his vocal cords lashed out with his power.

This time there was no resistance, as he felt the energy pulse through Luther’s body, he felt his energy get attracted to the core of Luther. There all it took was a quick squeeze, and the core popped the same way a grape would under such pressure.

Gah.

Luther instantly coughed up blood from the attack as he dropped to his knees. Frank watched as the spark of energy within his body was slowly snuffed out by the dark energy that Frank now wielded.

Frank watched, making sure that the scum bag Luther was well and truly dead. He did not want to have to come back as a venging spirit to finish the job correctly.

People began to go closer to Luther, but each keeping more than a few feet back as they looked at the corpse. Frank, realizing that there might be some hidden techniques unknown to him that could bring people back from the dead, decided to be thorough, and with one last focused attempt. He reached out, then grabbing the whole body of Luther encapsulated it in darkness energy and then squeezed.

Squish.

Dark blood sprayed out on everyone who had gathered near, or not managed to back away far enough in time.

Seeing that the body of his foe and nemesis was well and truly dead, Frank nodded himself, before he let the darkness that had been surging throughout his body take him, as he collapsed to the ground. Letting the sweet embrace of death take away all his remaining pain, fears, and desires. He had accomplished all his life goals, he had reached beyond Tier V, managed to ensure the fact that he would forever leave the slums, and had killed Luther. All in all, it was a good death, one that Frank would have felt satisfied with a few days ago.

Of course, that was a few days ago, as his life had changed quite a lot since that point. Yet, here he was feeling his mind slowly drift away.

Darkness.