"Cyril's light, my head hurts!" Alicia grunted in pain as she awoke in the carriage. the darkness encompassing her sight as usual, say for the carriage driver and a fiery red core sitting opposite her.
"Good morning to you as well Alicia, how are you feeling?" Chara asked whilst looking over her hungover companion, snickering at her self-imposed pain.
"I feel terrible, is this what wine does to a person?"
"You can say that, some people have a higher or lower tolerance to alcohol, and it seems you are of the lower tolerance." Laughter followed Chara's explanation as she saw Alicia's reaction to her words.
"Shut up Chara! You are probably also bad with alcohol." Alicia interjected, a blush was visible on her cheeks and ears.
"On the contrary my lady, nobles train their children to handle alcohol with grace, so I would be fine even if you drank me under the table." Alicia ignored Chara's words, instead asker her companion their current whereabouts.
"We are a few hours ahead of our journey, since a lady fell asleep during the waning hours of the night we headed of earlier than excepted, we are to arrive in two days." Chara's grin went unnoticed by Alicia, muttering to herself Alicia instead grabbed her book hanging by her waist and began tracing the runes. Chara was intrigued by Alicia's way of reading the book and asked her what she was currently reading.
"Currently its a theory regarding advanced tiers of magic, so called fusion magic."
"Fusion magic? what is that?"
"Its basically an advanced form of magic theory, its not utilized in current practice since the idea is still in theory, but according to some scrolls we found in the academies library my theory should work. Ice magic for example is a form of advanced magic, since ice elementals and ice dragons exist, leylines of ice must exist to inhibit their bodies." Alicia explained as she furrowed her brow and concentrated on tracing the runes on the page, not seeing Chara nod in confirmation at Alicia's explanation. But one word stuck out in Alicia's explanation, Chara asked, "Leylines, what is that?"
"I don't know much about it, but the short explanation is that they are similar but opposite ti winds of magic. Your connection makes you have an innate connection to the wind of fire and it makes you feel when a cluster of fire essence is nearby, correct?" Alicia asked Chara whilst finishing tracing the last word on the current page she was reading.
"You are indeed correct, fire essence seem to bounce around me in joy, but water essence not so, its like walking with the current and against it as a comparison." Chara agreed with Alicia's explanation, her silence motioned Alicia to continue explaining.
"Advanced forms of magic are like that, but instead of winds of magic they are leylines underneath the earth. One of the scrolls defined them kinda like ore veins in the earth, but instead of spanning a few dozen meters they encompass the entire earth in an asymmetrical grid, nourishing the world whilst forming fauna correlated to their type of essence." Alicia explained. "However, most of this is just theory, the practical application of fusion magic is in the dark not seen since the gods battled their enemies."
"And you are trying to form this magic?" Chara looked at her companion in surprise.
"Well of course, since I have these shards embedded in me already, it would be a shame if I didn't utilize them." A grin appeared on Alicia's lips causing Chara to laugh.
A few hours passed, Chara cleaned her sword whilst Alicia continued to trace the weird looking runes from Chara's perspective. Suddenly the voice of the carriage driver called out to the duo that they will stop to feed the horses and eat their lunch. Helping Alicia out of the carriage they settled down beside the road and Chara watched on as the carriage driver fed the horses and took a short nap, his tired body aching from the constant sitting for hours at end.
"Why so quiet Chara?"
"Nothing just thinking."
"Okay, do want to help me practice my theory?"
"I guess, we have some time before we are departing. What do you need help with?"
Smiling in appreciation of her help Alicia explained her theory. "From my research and this book, I should be able to harness the leylines using my mana core to utilize their essence, but we have to test a few things first." As Alicia explained she suddenly clapped her hands together and Chara looked on as a meter long rod of pure iron appeared from her hands, gently spinning the rod in her hands Chara looked on in surprise and awe.
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"Alicia, what is that?"
"During one of our study nights I read in one of the books that earth mages could harness not only the earth but also the essence of earth itself, such as iron, gold and other metals."
"That is incredible, but won't that have terrible repercussions on the economy?" Chara asked worriedly.
"Not really, most kingdoms have their currency minted by a select few mages, and each coin have their essence traced on the coins, most merchants have learnt the accepted coins. Coins created by this would have my essence and therefore not accepted in trade."
"I understand, but why is there a gemstone on one end of the rod?"
"I wanted to test my theory. This gemstone is of the same origin as the ones on my body, Professor Cael gave me a dozen of these to train my supposed dual affinity. My theory is that this gemstone can sense the essence in the winds and leylines and therefore sense if a wind of magic or leyline is nearby."
Chara nodded as she looked whilst Alicia slammed the rod down into the ground, conjuring an array around the rod in the wind of jade, a multitude of colors began shimmering as The rod began humming in a low reverberating tone.
"Chara this is where I need your help, you have to tell me if there are any changes in the crystal or the array."
"Okay, leave it to me!"
Chara looked on as several magical arrays appeared around Alicia, as strands of different colors of magic began swirling around the rod, feeding the gemstone.
"How can she control and conjure different winds of magic at the same time, how insane is her concentration?!" Chara thought.
After ten minutes of continuous feeding of mana into the gemstone a sudden change appeared, Chara looked on in shock as the gemstone began glowing a faint light blue color, explaining in surprise "Alicia there is a change, the gemstone changed color to light blue!" Chara looked on as Alicia slowly dropped her concentration a trickle of blood flowed down one of Alicia's nostril.
"Alicia are you okay?!" Chara asked whilst rushing towards the swaying body of Alicia, reaching her Chara gently helped Alicia sit down, letting her catch her breath.
"Is the crystal still shining?" Alicia simply answered, unconcerned by her bodies condition.
Looking back at the iron rod Chara saw the still shining gemstone and answered that its still is.
"The I guess my theory worked." Alicia answered with a small grin on her lips.
"What do you mean?"
"I used my magic to try and fusion create the essence of the advanced leylines of magic. I tried several different combinations but at the end of my current limits I could sense the leyline of ice essence and supplemented my water essence with air essence and successfully fusion created ice essence. Now time for the final clue." As Alicia spoke she began untying her shawl and gently held it in her hand, looking towards Chara she asked if there are any changes.
Chara had become used to Alicia's appearance but became shocked as she noticed two shards shining a different color from the usual colors, one of the shards located at the edge of her right eyebrow and the other one located left of her nose ridge, between the nose and her left eye. "There are two shards in the same light blue color as the gemstone on your rode." As Chara explained Alicia's small grin grew into a full smile, her pearly white teeth fully visible. Chara wanted to ask what this meant, but her question was answered as Alicia wiped away the nosebleed and channeled her mana, sending it to the two shards pointed out by Chara. Two magical arrays appeared above her two palms and out from them two small darts of ice magic formed.
"It worked!" Alicia shouted out in happiness as she stood up, dropping the two spells she hugged Chara and jumped around in glee.
"A... Alicia calm down!" Chara stuttered by the sudden intimate touch from Alicia.
"My theory worked Chara, do you know what this mean?" Alicia asked, but hearing no response from her companion she answered. "This means I can possibly access the other advanced types of magic!"
"Incredible..."
Letting go of Chara Alicia folded the shawl and tied it back on with the help of Chara, holding her hair in place and quickly braiding it into a single braid.
"Thank you Chara."
"No problem, its my duty after all."
"Shut up, you know I feel uncomfortable when you become serious."
"I know, and that's why its funny." Chara explained with a mocking grin on her face.
Relaxing for another hour the suddenly heard rustling from the carriage, notifying them that the carriage driver is awake.
"How was your rest Sir Daimon?" Chara asked in a happy tone as she and Alicia rose up and headed back to the carriage.
"Lady Chara! It was excellent, nothing like sleeping outside, the warm sun and wind gently breezing across ones body, one of the many upsides in this work.
"I believe you, nothing beats this, except for a warm bath and a glass of wine." Chara joked, Sir Damian laughed at her words.
"Should we head on?"
"Of course Lady Chara, we have at least another day of traveling before arriving back at Ave Ludum."
Entering the carriage the trio headed on as the sun passed over the sky, until the last rays of sunlight hit their bodies, stopping at a nearby town to rest for the night. Whilst Sir Damian led the carriage towards the stable where he took of the bridles on the two horses and handed over a large sack of food to the stable master, the trio headed inside one of the taverns, called the singing mermaid to eat dinner and sleep for the evening.
Seating at one of the tables Alicia sat down alongside Sir Damian whilst Chara ordered dinner.
"Excuse me Sir Damian, but what town are we in?"
" We are currently staying in Beldri, a small town just a few hours away from Ruun on horseback."
"Thank you Sir Damian, you have been an enjoyable travel partner these past days."
"Well thank you so much lady Alicia, same to you, I have been wondering, how can you know where I am if you are blind?" His curiosity betraying his usually indifferent manner.
"I can sense mana cores and their essence, so I know you are a knight affiliated with the wind of earth, whilst Chara over there is attuned to the wind of fire."
"Thats incredible..." He spoke as he thought about the different uses of this ability in battle.
"Its great, however, to many core users puts a lot of strain on me and I can't use it to often if crowded with mages or knights such as yourself." Alicia explained and looked over to see Chara walking back towards the party.
"Food will be arriving in ten minutes. here is a cup of ale for each us." Chara exclaimed.
Continuing their conversation the trio had their food delivered by one of the innkeepers and the merrily eat and spoke, after finishing their dinner they thanked the innkeeper for the delicious food and paid for the dinner and three rooms for them. Handing over three silver coins Chara took Alicia's and her keys whilst handing over Sir Damians key, walking up the narrow staircase they arrived at a hallway with several rooms, finding their separate rooms they said good night to each other and headed into their rooms to rest for the night.
Alicia stretched her limbs, sore from the constant sitting, she began untying her bandages and removed her shawl, placing it down on the wooden nightstand she found the bed and tucked herself in.
Circulating the ice essence in her mana core a low chilling sensation coursed through her veins.
"This power can't be shown to the academy, otherwise Chara and I will be in. a lot of trouble." Alicia thought to herself as she let out a loud yawn. "No matter, tomorrow's problems."