Swords of Seven Fall Academy is an academy led by 3 Elves in order to teach their children about the Seven Fall sword style, inspired by the fall of stars in the night. The influence of the seer has crept more in the northern parts of the land, infiltrators, abominations and demons are on the prowl. The fearful ends of these destroyed villages are that nobody knows that they are destroyed, illusions, careful planning and integration, and finally mind control are such a powerful and subtle force that these people may meet their ends not at the edge of a blade in broad daylight, but rather in a grave they had dug themselves.

These mass-graves are simply dubbed "meat pits", demons prefer the meat of humans to be rotten and maggot infested, and meat pits allow them to be sustained increasing the size of the seer's army. Trolls, Warlocks, undeath Colonels are the main front of this force. Trolls are large furry creatures, with features similar to that of humans, their looks would be considered to be quite beautiful in terms of symmetry, but they are rather idiotic. Warlocks are simply humans that control arcane power, they have the ability to summon more Trolls, the warlocks' appearance is rather modified by their arcane power, large folds of flesh slowly grow underneath their armpits, this is because they dabble in a type of magic that's very powerful, some have other conditions which they need to fulfill if they want to cast spells. These folds are like normal skin, but cannot be cut unless the warlock wishes to be crippled. The more a Warlock uses their power, the more powerful they get, but the longer the skin underneath their armpits get, and the more smelly they get when they sweat, other conditions are also amplified, a warlock may for example forgo the pains of disfigurement, but they'd need to use double or even triple the amount of mana or whatever resource they've converted it to. undeath Colonels are a type of undead minion specifically conjured by the seer, the seer has picked them to lead his army, normal undead would eventually be discovered, but these elites are quite sneaky. When the seer had first conjured them, the seer had almost been overwhelmed and been used to breed more undead. Luckily the seer banished those to the abyss, afterwards they were mostly reserved for distances that the seer couldn't control expanding the area of influence. Minor demons were skipped by the seer simply for the reason, "They are so tiny, so garbage, that I'd rather just throw shit at the world and let it conquer itself".

The Swords of Seven fall's style includes the following moves: [Fall], [Descend], [Crumble], [Stagger], [Advance], [Slice], [Bleed]. Fall builds up the momentum, Descend uses all the momentum, Crumble makes the moves smoother, Stagger allows the moves to be faster, Advance allows for an advance during the battle, Slice cuts open an enemy's skin, Bleed allows that skin to bleed. Forestalling Bleed will allow for a burst of blood to spurt out of enemies. The Swords of Seven Fall have a history of going in for a few attacks, backing off and watching enemies die, this sort of fighting is rather viscous, but blends in with their bloodline. The masters of the academy come from a long line of sword masters that were considered elites in the time of yore.

Now Angus found himself struggling up a path, hoping against all hope that these sword masters had at least decayed to the point that they wouldn't immediately skewer him on sight. His hair was starting to grow a bit long, it had normally been quite short, but now it was shoulder length, the various bits of small exercises he had done had buffed him up, his shoulders grew wider, his biceps and triceps felt invigorated. He also felt like he didn't need to resort to trickery anymore, though it was much harder to get away with such a big frame. He had ran into some other followers of the seer, but he had beaten them up quite soundly. One of them even used the wrong spell on him causing his private limbs to grow a bit, he was just glad it hadn't caused him issues while trudging through the jungle. His new package had made his self confidence rise through the skies. His shirt was replaced with a patchwork of vines that were tied around another, some had broken and more vines were used, those had also broken and some twigs, vines and scraps of cloth were used for reinforcement. This had led to him walking around looking like some kind of barbarian or fool. He felt a bit of both, if he had only used slightly better knots and some braiding, he would've been fine, but no, he just had to wantonly tie things around himself until he looked like some kind of jester. He also now had a makeshift hatchet on his back, along with a trowel on his pants. He made sure to keep his trowel safe because it had helped him to dig spits in the ground. Him being 17 now had helped sculpt his face into an even more handsome one.

He now looked like a true outdoors person, and he was quite glad. He would even stop a few times to help squirrels gather nuts more efficiently, going as far as to give them tips on where to store them. He found it a bit weird that he could communicate with animals, but he brushed it off. He had also found that after a while of shifting his perception between the beautiful world of illusion and the wretched one of dark reality, that he was able to stay at a perfect middle, meaning that he could see the two shades of the world, his perception would swap between the two until he would see the truth. The truth was situated in the middle, although both were true in the end, they showed different interpretations and emotional attachments between them. The beautiful world loved death, the wretched one loved companionship, the beautiful one would twist companionship until enemies formed. Both these worlds would manipulate the populous at different times to get the best result. He had worked his bloody ass off to get some villagers to see the truth, but some of them still kept to the illusion. His lucidity regarding his nails and bloodlust has also gotten under control, and he felt stronger for it. The people he had seen had gotten stronger in different ways, some stole from the illusion to hide their villages, some stole from the wretched side to gain destructive power. He had stood away from those.

He mused that the seer's main goal was likely to get everyone to build on his or her spell, the seer would then draw upon the entire world using these puppet strings making the people become their own illusion. It's quite a clever ploy, but he was already tracking the bitch down. His life had become a lot harder and uncomfortable, he needed power, but he wouldn't screw around with the devil's machinations, he would rather put an end to it, so that he could live out what remained of his life in normalcy.

The Seven Fall Academy at this point in time had 200 students, they were divide into classes based on the number of moves they had mastered the mastering one stance was dubbed as "S One", two as "S Two", the actual strength of the students were anyone's guess. Some "S Four" students were able to get decimated by "S One" students, but this is usually because their comprehension of the style was dim. Mastering a style and Mastering the soul of a style were two completely different realms. But an "S Six" or and "S Five" student won't ever lose to any students below an S of Three, this is because they had already touched upon the true soul of the style The instructors each had mastered all moves and understand the soul of them all, the one who understands the most is the leader of the academy, the naming of "S" was considered redundant quite soon and wasn't used after the first thirty years that the school was in action, only occasional jabs were made at the initial idiocy of it.

Stubbing his toe Angus looked up from his reverie, he hadn't had anything to eat in hours and he was sweating. Stoically he caught a rabbit on the side of a road and started kindling a fire, he then cleanly cut off the rabbit's head and took a nearby twig and with some cuts and prodding he managed to get a spit through. "Finally, some food." He spoke to himself, unaware of how insane he looked. It didn't take long for the rabbit to be roasted which he then munched on before adding salt, herbs and pepper. Taking another bite he frowned. "Should've added it before roasting it." He muttered and then started eating his horribly cooked spit-roasted rabbit. He ate around the guts and he almost swore that he would do better meal prep next time. At least he was getting closer to a nice warm bed, delicious alcohol and beautiful women. Unless the academy he heard from is run by monks, which would cause him to curse his father and mother's name for condemning him to such a pitiful fate. He was already on the main road to the Seven Fall academy, where the Stars reside. He had momentarily thought of fighting them, but considering his lack of mastery of any kind of weapon and his very lacking combat instinct, he'd just get his skull caved in.

He stood up and walked. The gate to the institute was quite nice, it was made from magical spruce, he discovered this because it looks like spruce and when he touched it, he got an ice spark. The buzz felt nice, so he kept buzzing himself. This had earned him weird looks from the other attendees so he stopped and got back in line. He ended up being thrown to the back because he had "cut" back in line after his very short buzzing episode, but it was his first real physical experience with magic, besides the illusion world, which seems to be non-existent here. At some point reality kind of got iffy and he had gotten motion sickness until he stepped past that gap.

Finally reaching the front of the line again, quite fed up at this state, they simply looked at him funny, wrote down some stuff and let him through. "They" being a short man with a comb-over hairstyle and a short elf woman with piercingly brown eyes. He had almost gotten his ass whooped because he stared into them too long. Coughing awkwardly he kept straight until he was inside. It appeared quite different on the inside compared to the outside, the architecture consisted of trees and bricks, trees seemed to be hollowed out and bricked seemed to be infused into the bark. The trees were quite gigantic so it seemed feasible. Who would want to live in a tiny bamboo reed? Utter stupidity. The capital of this tiny city seemed to be the academy. Had they built a renowned academy then expanded further? He kept that notion and went with it, it didn't matter much in reality.

Stepping up the steps of the main academy, he had just casually walked to. He had to contain himself from simply slapping random people who looked at the shitty hatchet carrying hobo strangely. He squinted at his new unwanted fanclub, otherwise it was smooth sailing until he got to the receptionist. She seemed quite the relaxed elf, all of them were relaxed, but she seemed extremely relaxed. His eyes short to the chair. That must be it. Extremely comfortable chairs, magical shit cooling down the room, polite people talking to her. Fucking dream job. He felt his anger rising, hair standing on end, he caught himself and calmed down. Ruining someone else's day because you found them enjoying life more than you, is an assholish move. He wouldn't stoop so low.

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"Madam, is there a chance I can apply at this academy?" She looked up still smiling. "Sure sweetie, just go down the right hall and keep straight. You'll meet the master, the principle of this academy and he'll get you sorted." He was confused for a moment. "He deals with new students, I just deal with admin stuff." His eyebrows jumped up and down and he nodded. They seemed to enter the same wavelength.

The principle was an elf with long blond hair, a chiselled face, brown hair and long flowing blood red robes. He didn't seem like the angry sort of person, rather relaxed like the receptionist. Angus walked into the room and almost immediately connected the two demeanors with the same aspect of relaxation, his eyes practically bounced from the man to the space behind him, or rather where his butt was. Surprisingly the man wasn't sitting down anywhere. "Are you staring at my rear end, human?" The elf questioned. Angus blushed profusely, sending entirely the wrong signals, before he could speak, the elf spoke again. "We don't teach perverts here, there's a door a hall away that will lead you on a better journey." Angus' embarrassment turned into rage, before he calmed that down. "I thought you were sitting on a comfortable chair, and it being a nice day as it is, I too wish to find the serenity you possess" Angus spoke with an even tone. His rage not entirely gone.

The elf regarded Angus with a new look, "Perceptive. I'll accept that apology." A smile appeared on his face and he held a hand out which Angus shook. At first it seemed fine until Angus found himself kneeling, sweat dripping from his forehead and the elf giving him an evil smile before letting go. "Not too perceptive, it seems." He gave a small laugh and helped Angus up before walking off to a courtyard a little bit away. Angus followed, the elf took up a training sword, made of steel but dulled and handed it to Angus gently before getting in position. "Why are we sparring?" He asked. "You wanted to join, right? This is how you join. We, I, don't take cowards. Now let's go." He walked forward and entered the "Fall" stance of his style. One foot out and his sword close to his chest. Angus just stood there with two hands on his sword, not sure what he's ready to accept, knowing he's going to get screwed, but a determined expression was placed on his face. He would trade his loss in some way, if he couldn't, at least he'll get a nice cool comfy room with a dream job. This was all said to himself as a boost for his morale, he knew half of it was just garbage, but he needed the moral.

Fighting an expert swordsman that has had hundreds if not longer years of practice, with magic beyond his comprehension, ruling a city as the strongest, managing an entire academy that gets praised for the swordstyle for decades. He was way outside his league.

The principle executed [Fall] It was a simple step and slash. Both of them were separated by 50 meters. Angus looked at the principle like one would look at an idiot, until he felt it. A wind, dull likely due to the practice sword, smacked him until he flew a full 10 meters backwards. His nose, and chest were black from bruising, a faint cut made it clear that the sheer power of the slash had allowed it to become concentrated, almost like a sharpened blade. What is sharpness if not a simple reduction in impact area? The attack hurt like a bitch.

Angus tried to get up, but his body kept failing him. He felt tired, weak, and he just kept falling over. The swordsman stepped forward and spoke, "Descend" Angus without hesitation yelled, "I surrender!" He held up both hands and let his blade drop. The principle stopped, then walked over to Angus. "You're one fragile human, are you sure you're not a baby using some strange method to make themselves look like an adult?" Angus grew flustered again, which converted to rage once more. "Calm down would you? It was just a spar." The principle spoke. "It was a fucking beating, and you know it." Angus spoke, almost crying. The principle went over and patted him on the shoulder. "I will allow you to study at this academy as a direct disciple of mine. I haven't had anyone that spoke honestly with me for such a long fucking time." Angus perked up hearing the swordsman swear. "Lhymen, swordsman of the West, leader of Seven Fall Academy." He shook Angus' hand while holding him up with one arm, he then switched to Angus' other arm to make the hold more comfortable. "Angus, family chasee, fast runner of the East." Angus answered with equal pomp. "You heard of the seer" Lhymen asked. Angus nodded. "Our academy was built to counter that fuck, most humanoid races are rather scattered, Seven Fall Academy is one of the more denser areas, it's likely due to our world being quite new." Angus nodded and felt them walking back to the receptionist.

"Principle Lhymen, what was the result?" The woman spoke more respectfully, but the comfort on her face never left her. "Quite good candidate, he retained consciousness after I showed off my moves." The principle Lhymen joked. The receptionist nodded fervently, "He's a direct disciple, registered as Angus, and since he didn't provide a last name, just leave it blank." The receptionist got onto it, then took out a paper, and a vial. "We need your blood, and signature. Blood is mainly for identifying shapeshifters, some races have different talents." She spoke. Angus nodded and supplied both, completing any admin work before he got a key to his room. This is where Angus felt a chill up his back. "Top floor, second room." The receptionist added. Angus simply looked at the stairs, and almost cried. The stairs didn't seem very efficient in any aspect whatsoever. Normally stairs are constructed for as little diagonal travel as possible and more focused on vertical travel, Pythagoras and diagonal lines being longer than straight ones for the same distance destination. Here however there were around 10 rather decently sized stairs that you'd need to hop on to get anywhere, and it extended rather well diagonally. The academy itself was built from a cluster of trees and with infused bricks seemed rather spacious. He could understand why it existed, his legs just became numb when he saw that he'd likely have to jump around 40 times to get up and down.

"Now then Angus, why don't you run up and get me a bottle of water from my room." Lhymen stated. Angus felt a headache coming up, but he jumped, and jumped up the staircase. It took him around 15 minutes of jumping and falling to get back, bringing two bottles of water and one secretly hidden in his back pocket, he wanted to prepare for being bullshitted.

"Ah, perfect, why don't you run up and get one for yourself?" The principle asked, giving one bottle to the receptionist and keeping one for himself. Angus simply pulled one out of his back pocket. "I came prepared for this." He stated smugly. Lhymen nodded and patted him on arm. "Preparation is always important, always make sure you have what you need so you don't need to overextend yourself to get it. In battle, abusing the openings in your opponent is more important than any fancy footwork or moves. Unless your moves are perfect and you can overwhelm your opponent." The principle spoke easily and temperately, it was quite soothing to hear and Angus felt less angry at being screwed. The principle spoke once more, "The seven moves of my academy was derived from the seven sword masters that reside here. I'm basically a copycat that somehow managed to steal all their moves while at the same time improving them and combining them. The actual method to use them will be taught if you wish to explore the star affinity as well as swordsmanship. if you do not have both of those, learning the seven fall moves is idiocy and you'll just look like a mouse trying to kill a lion by dancing around it." The principle spoke matter of factly.

He looked at Angus, pleased that he's receiving the information, he then turned and motioned for Angus to follow him, they both walked down the halls until they Lhymen's study room. He motioned for Angus to sit on a nicely cushioned chair, with black leather at the back. With a clap of his hands and a deep he spoke, "Angus, I'm sure you're familiar with talentry and professions, correct?" Angus shook his head, "Never heard of it, I came from a decent village from the east quite rural." He was uncharacteristically polite. The beating from earlier still apparently having an effect.

"Talentry is basically a kind of personal magic system, when you level up you get racial stat points, and class or profession stat points, race levels only level every third of these levels. Talents can be gained by sacrificing stat points in exchange for Talent points." He took a breath and sipped on some apple juice, "What do talent points do? Well, they help you fight better and open your path. Choosing talents essentially guides your history - the experience inside you - to go in a direction where you want it to go. Picking a talent is permanent, skipping talents means that you can't go back to pick them up again. There are five trees that you can go down initially, Warrior, Mage, Assassin, Marksman, Guardian. The benefits are the same for anyone that has Talentry initially at least. The cost for a talent point is 4 stat points, every evolution of your race you get a big bonus of stat points, talent points and stats. My recommendation is to get your stats to a nice base level, then let your talents do the rest of the work for you, also make sure that you will need your talent points in the future, wasting them at any point is quite disastrous, be mindful of your actions, and points expenditure." He clapped his hands again and stood up. Angus also stood up.

"I'd recommend you go meet Kayle at some point, he's also a higher ranking student, but not a true disciple of mine, visit the hall of Gods to see if any accept you, you can get nice professions there as well as a better class if one adopts you, just don't get bullshitted into being a slave, and finally, come over here for a second." Lhymen spoke and motioned for Angus to move forward which he obliged and they shook hands. Angus could feel a tendril of something cold in his veins, he also felt his rage start to rise. Lhymen was fully aware and he seemed ready to smack Angus' skull if something untoward happened. Lhymen says,"Interesting. Greater Primal Affinity of the Wolf, Lesser Affinity of Moon, Lesser Affinity of Water, Rain and Storm."

Lhymen laughed at the end. "You can, if you're talented enough combine those three lesser affinities into an Affinity of Storm, Rain or Water, depending on your history. One might be better for your abilities so keep an eye out. Affinities are important because they determine what you're good at, you can gain Affinities, but you're likely to just pick up an tiny Affinity which can't really grow, talents are an exception as well as blessings, but in general having a tiny affinity is almost a death sentence for a path. Mixing tiny Affinities is also usually pointless to the point of idiocy, it's like combining three drops of water and flicking the slightly bigger drop at a tree, it does fucking nothing. They are good in certain situations, like the tiny Affinity of light which can allow you to read things if you're in a trap or something similar." Lhymen concluded.

Angus walked down the hallway, and went up the stairs, painfully, until he got to his room. He then jumped on the bed and took a nap. Absorbing as much information as he did overwhelmed him a little. He still had no idea how to even access talentry, but he had a suspicion that he could figure it out on his own, or be guided there, by human or God. A deep breath left his lungs before he succumbed to the best bed he had, had in a while. Thoughts of bathing in warm water, and various scenes of swans passed his imagination. The swan from before had left his mark, physically and psychologically. He was just happy that he didn't end up with some disorder or mental damage.