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Chapter 37- Where a Trial begins

Alforien Alford (Brick)

I stepped through the golden doors of this new room, fully expecting to see some gaudy stage or ceremonial altar. All ceremonies had them after all, and the Arlford family had proved itself to not be an exception.

Instead I got a somewhat plain textured, yes textured room. THe entire room seemed to be covered in carpet. Though it seemed that only the bottom portion was truly carpet, the ceiling and wall had been painted. But why and how were they painted to look like a carpet?

Was this a part of the Ceremony? Would the floor change on itself? Like one of those anti-gravity rooms where everything was the floor and you just floated there. But that was illogical, right? Why...I should just ask Meemauy

“Meemauy, why are the walls painted carpet?” I asked

Meemauy’s face soured, and she said “Because the damned little squirt keeps painting them so.”

“Who is the squirt?” I asked, wondering what kind of creature a squirt could be.

“Someone you should never know. But you probably will. Come on, let’s head over to the real ceremonial room”Meemauy answered, her face still scrunched up in disgust. Why was there a room like this here? And why was Meemauy so disgusted by it? Sure it was unsightly to look at but it wasn’t that bad. Right?

I followed Meemauy into another room, this one more similar to what you’d expect from the normal ceremonial room. Though instead of an Altar it had a bed. That was...worrying. But maybe the ceremony put you in a fever dream?

“Lie down on that bed, someone will come to get you in a few minutes. Don’t talk. You are kept in the dark about the Ceremony on purpose, the System reacts to your own thoughts and we don’t want it to stop you.”Meemuy said as she pointed me towards the bed.

I climbed on to the bed and lay there in wait for something to happen. I wanted to look around a bit, get a feel of the room, but feared that my moving about may interrupt the Ceremony. Then I remembered that the Ceremony required a potion. That meant that I could look around freely.

I then occupied myself with checking out the room’s various features, it was largely empty except the bed and a single lamppost that cast some light into the room. Coloured in what seemed to be sand brown, the walls gave the room a definite desert-y feel.

I had never truly been to the desert but the fact that so many of the Desert Lords that had visited the palace had demanded such shades in their room has led me to believe that it reminds them of home.

Either way, the colour matched nicely with the beige floor, even if beige was a more wall colour. There was only one main window out of the room and that to was covered in drapes, though it was quite useless too, giving no light, it at least made the room feel less like a dark summoning chamber from those old Earth books.

The ceiling though had a most puzzling array of ornamentation. Yes, ornamentation on it. There were necklaces that held large gems hanging from the ceiling. There were rubies, emeralds, opals and every gem you could think of. Perhaps they were skill holding gems? The card said they existed.

Now that I think of it, they could be Mana channeling artifacts. They did look like a set. A Ceremony would need a source too...that must be it!.

By the time I had finished surveying the room, a man had arrived with some kind of flask. For some reason I had expected him to be wearing a black robe and hoodie, not the usual T-shirt and pants.

The man held the flask to me, making it clear that I was to drink it. Remembering Meemauy’s words, I obeyed and gulped down the contents. They were somewhat sweet, with a bit of a throat burning taste. Not too bad.

What was bad was the sickness that immediately took hold of me and I passed out.

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I woke up in a some kind of illusory space. Why was I so sure it as an illusion? It was because I was standing on thin air and all around me long swirling lines of blue light flowed illuminating the area. It was a beautiful otherworldly scene. Very different from what I’d come to expect on Algrea.

So it made sense that this was an illusory space not on Algrea. I walked toward one of the lights, wishing to explore it. It was not as far as the others and was noticeably dimmer and shorter too. It was thus the best choice for me to see if they were dangerous.

Stepping in I found that it was not dangerous, in fact it changed nothing at all. If I didn’t see that blue all around me, I’d think that I had never stepped in in the first place. A puzzling predicament to be sure.

I walked ahead, attempting to exit the space. It shouldn’t be to far after all. To my shock however, I found out that I couldn’t. Walking only took me farther into the light, A light that was supposedly thin.

Well whatever, I was getting out of here no matter how much I had to walk, I didn’t really have a chicce in the matter after all. As I was walking, a voice suddenly boomed from before me,” Beware challenger, you enter the Trials of War” it said

So it was a trial system? And each light was a gateway to a different Trial? I did not really have the answers. What I did have was a Trial to give. I stepped into the Trial cofident that I would ace it. After all, I had a lot of experience with war.

As soon as I continued walking, I found myself face to face with a large pair of legs. Above me the sound of swords clashing could be heard. I looked up to see two large brawny men clashing swords against each other, The swords were crude, roughly forged, perhaps the- “oof” I cried out as I was sent flying, apparently the leg of one of the fighters had clashed against my body and sent me flying.

I had seen enough fights to know that there was no way that the fighter missed me, I quickly summoned my Mana and sent a fireball in his direction and then teleported out. Sadly I had little sense of direction and ended up teleporting right in the middle of another battle.

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Out of the frying pan and into another it would seem was my situation. I immediately moved out of the way, casting Earth to shield me from any incoming legs

The motion of Earth walls forming got the attention of the nearby fighters however and caused me to be the victim of several attacks as the fighters reacted against the threat.The Earth shield soon crumbled before the might of the attacks, but it gave me enough time to form defenses.

Space cracked around me, mists of Chaos crept forth and Grandmist crept along the borders, preparing for surprise attacks. It was a decent defense, it wouldn’t stand up to most Graders, but the elemental mix would hopefully delay long enough for me to teleport out.

I heard gasps all around me as the fighters realised that I had cast spells, I wondered what they thought of it.

“A spirit child!”

“More than one element”

“Which Kingdom is he from”

“We are in the middle of a battle!kill the enemies”

“Who brought a child to the battlefield?”

All kinds of voices could be heard sounding out, I even heard the clash of swords and screams resume for some time, but it was quickly silenced. Whether on purpose or not, I had brought this battle to a halt.

“Who are you child, where are your parents?” A man called out to me, crouching to get to my height.

“I am Alforien Arlford. Who are you and where is this?” I asked, acting like a child putting on a brave front. If they saw me as defenseless then it would be a surprise when I could defend myself a bit.

As soon as I finished speaking the battlefield grew tense, a part of the men surrounding me suddenly drew their weapons and stood around me as if protecting me.

“It's one of those Royal bastards from the Kingdom of Mauhreia! Kill that bastard Musin’s descendents! Hang them all!” a voice was heard from within the fighters as a large number of them advanced towards me shouting loudly

“Kill! Kill! Kill!”

Name

Alforien

Gender

Male

Species

Banmeru

Age

7 months

Titles

Heir candidate to the Earl of Cristanfor, Noble of the Kingdom of Mistrane,Count of Launeior ,Transmigrator

Class

[The Known]

Skills

[Otherworldly mana manipulation] [ Force of Will] [Conversion]

Stats

Strength[The amount of brute force one can use]

112

Endurance[The amount of time one can work continuously]

148

Flexibility[The range of movement of the body]

102

Precision[The accuracy of one’s movements]

106

Perception[The ability to notice nuances and advanced concepts]

133

Intelligence[The ability to comprehend the advanced concepts]

133

Wisdom[The ability to effectively use the concepts]

133

Aura Force[The ability to force your will on your surroundings]

119

Combat[The speed of one’s reactions, ability to process situations and other general combat abilities]

115

Magic Affinities

Fire[One of the greatest sources of Light and Heat in the universe, you have Greater Affinity for Fire]

97.14%

Earth[Essential for life, earth is what renders things solid, you have a Greater affinity for Earth]

99.87%

Mind[The consciousness and its relation to reality, you have Lesser affinity for Mind]

17.35%

Chaos[Everything shall be anything but what it should be, no thing shall remain as it should, you have a Lesser affinity for Chaos]

19.76%

Grandmist[The base substance that all subatomic particles are made off, you have Lesser affinity for Grandmist]

27.39%

Space [The building block of dimensions, you have an Outrageous affinity for Space

199.998%

Time[A mysterious force, you have a Minor affinity for Time]

01.15%

Will [The force that propels you through life, you have Minor affinity for Will]

9.81%

Force[The building block of Kinetic interactions, you have Minor affinity for Force

9.81%