Lucifer awoke to the bright rays of the morning sun shining directly onto his face. A dream he snickered. A dream of his meeting with his teacher had brought him out of the forest and began his education to the broader world outside of the deadly Beast Kingdom. Three years had passed since then and there were many changes that had happened over the long years. Learning of people, language, society and best of all learning about power. His teacher, Eric taught him everything he would have learned growing up in the civilized lands. From etiquette to just about everything else, Lucifer soaked up knowledge like a sponge.
How to speak, what to eat, how to make money and it's uses in society, eventually Lucifer learned it all. Eric took it even farther after that though. History, sciences, literature, mathematics, war tactics, philosophy all got thoroughly pounded into the now nine year old's brain without the least bit of hesitation.
“A commoner commits murder, what is his punishment according to the law of the land?” Eric grilled Lucifer during one of their lessons in regards to society and law.
“Death.” Lucifer instantly replied without the slightest hint of doubt in his voice.
“What if the murderer was a noble?”
“Death.” Again Lucifer answered without hesitation.
“Wrong!” His teacher scowled at him for his failure to answer correctly.
“Imprisonment.” This time Lucifer answered with the penalty for theft hoping that he had only mixed up the two laws.
“Wrong! Correct answer is nothing. The noble has committed no crime.” A startling answer drifted into Lucifer's ears at that moment. He could not understand the answer of his teacher in the least. How could murder not be a crime if one was a noble? It made no sense to Lucifer. “Nobles are exempt from most laws, remember not to stir up trouble with them unless you have sufficient backing.”
A dull nod from Lucifer was all Eric needed before he continued their lessons. Lucifer still remembered that day as he got dressed and cleaned up for the day. It was still one of the harder lessons for him to accept but he still abided by the teachings of Eric without fail.
After three years Lucifer had grown very well, only a few inches taller coming to 5’5” and still maintaining his lean and muscled physique. His hair had grown very long reaching the small of his back even after he braided it and tied the top and bottom off with a thick straps of leather. The once immature face started filling out and his baby fat had burned away leaving only his high cheekbones as well as angular jaw to accentuate his face. The sides of his head were shaved and showed off the sharply pointed ears on the sides of his head. His heterochromatic eyes still were entrancingly beautiful except now they lost their naive sparkle, adopting a more cold decisive look.
Dressing himself in his pitch black trousers before he tied his matching black Beast leather greaves over top of the light cotton pants. Sliding his feet into his boots, he contemplated what he would do for the day. It was the first time he was allowed to enter the human city nearby without his teacher's strict supervision. Selecting a loose fitting white shirt that had a deep v-neck collar, Lucifer pulled the tunic like shirt over his head before he pulled his lengthy braid free of the shirt. Strapping his pair of black leather vambraces onto his arms Lucifer quickly set about donning a thick three point baldric over his chest. The baldric was for holding his long single edged dagger and the short spear he had grown accustom to using over the years. Sliding the meter and a half long spear into the baldric's back sheath was easy with the solid heft of the short spear. Tying the over 20” dagger's sheath horizontally onto the hip strap of the baldric was slightly more difficulty. After a minor minute of cursing and fiddling with the sheath Lucifer finally tied the sheath to his baldric before he slid the straight edged dagger into the sheath that sat just above his left hip.
“What the devil is taking you so damn long brat! I have business to do in that blasted city! Hurry it up!” Eric's one of a kind voice hollered from outside of Lucifer's window almost as if the old man knew exactly when he was finished dressing himself. With a small smile and a slight hop, Lucifer ran towards the open window and leapt outside of it like a practiced swimmer diving into the water. Tucking his chest to his legs, he did a full flip before he righted himself and landed feet first on the solid ground.
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Eric shook his head bitterly causing his curly hair to bounce slightly as he witnessed his student's stunt. The child had always been wild even after years of conditioning and training from Eric, who could only attribute it the years of isolation growing up in the forest.
“Come on brat, it'll take an hour to get there if we run.” Eric spoke as he gauged the height of the sun and estimated the time.
“Wanna race then old man? I say we get there before that church clock chimes ten.” A devilish grin broke across Lucifer’s face as he watched the slight twitch happening in the corner of Eric's eye.
“Alright brat. Let's see what you got!” Eric laughed heartily as he took off before Lucifer could even react. Dust and dirt flew into the air due to the rocket like takeoff Eric used to launch himself faster than the average person could keep track of.
Lucifer only laughed louder as he ran after his teacher, blasting through the cloud of dust like a bullet. Instead of causing the same damage to the ground as Eric did, Lucifer seemed to glide over the ground like a skater does ice. Striding across the ground he pushed himself to move as fast as possible in hopes of beating his teacher to the gates of the city.
Vaulting over the large barrel like roots of the massive trees in the forest barely took away from the speed that Lucifer was moving at. He swung his body forward like a monkey to propel himself faster and with his agile footwork he only lost the smallest of fractions off his speed. Sliding underneath a particularly huge chunk of a fallen tree, Lucifer used his hands to throw himself back up to his feet so that he could continue racing after his teacher who still outpaced him by almost 100 meters.
In contrast to Lucifer's astounding agility, Eric used brute force relying on his superior cultivation rank to rush through all the obstacles in his way. Relying on simple side steps to avoid the gigantic trunks of the trees in his way allowed Eric to rush even faster through the woods. Whereas Lucifer needed to hop, jump, skip and so on to navigate through the still shady woods. Keeping his cultivation suppressed to around the same level as Lucifer kept the race somewhat fair. But the innate power of Eric was something Lucifer couldn't match even with his supernatural agility and dexterity.
A clap of thunder echoed throughout the woods as several trees came crashing down. The heaving groans of the sturdy wood gave off a foreboding chill down the backs of many of the forest residents.
“Fucking brat!” Eric scowled fiercely as he dove out of the way of a falling tree. But as he somersaulted over his shoulder a bolt of black and white came whistling past his head. Lucifer had overtaken him just as the tree came smashing down directly where Eric would have been had he not dove to the side.
“Using magic is cheating you idiot of a disciple!” A deafening shout left Eric as he punched the solid trunk with a mighty punch causing a meter wide chunk of the trunk to splinter into dust before he took off chasing after his student.
“Says who ya old fart!” Lucifer laughed as he leapt into the air and spun around launching another bolt of magic at his charging teacher. Reddish gold light instantly condensed into a small foot wide sphere before it went flying directly at Eric.
With a stream of obscenities that would make a sailor proud, Eric covered his body in milky white essence and swung his fist at the incoming magical cannonball. With another crack of thunder, the forest was once again covered by the sounds of falling trees as they were blasted from the force of the explosive magic. The sphere of light detonated right before it connected with Eric's essence infused fist leading to an even bigger reaction than if he had successfully blasted it away with his attack. Lucifer had immaculate control of his prana that gave him the necessary skill to control when and where the ball would detonate. A very basic [Element Blast] spell only downgraded to be used on the fly instead of the normal channeling.
Landing silently Lucifer pushed himself as much as possible to move faster and faster still. He drew the magical essence within his body; prana, to his legs and feet strengthening them superhuman heights. A normally impossible task for most beings in the world; save for beasts and higher lifeforms, Lucifer urged the prana to flow through each of his muscles, trace his bones and flood through his veins and arteries. The magical energy rushed through his hips, quadriceps, tendons, calves, Achilles's heel, arching through his soles and into the balls of his feet before it cycled back to repeat the process again. Deep red gold light faintly shone around his rapidly moving legs as they sped up even faster after being stimulated with prana.
This unique ability of Lucifer was the only way he could match his insane teacher despite the huge difference in cultivation between the two. Eric had a vastly superior strength because of his extremely advanced cultivation against Lucifer who held the more athletic body and only a fraction of the power behind it.
The two chased each other through the forest hurling bolts of magic and cursing at one another the whole way as they closed in on the city at the edge of the woods. It took a solid thirty minutes for them to burst through the edge of the woods and enter the vicinity of the large walled city of Jultán. Lucifer smirked as he saw the giant walls of Jultán ahead of him, without even a glance back at the incoming Eric he gathered a massive amount of prana in his hands and feet.
'Not that spell again…’ Eric turned pale as he cursed in his heart. Knowing exactly the spell his student was preparing to use Eric released his suppressed cultivation and instantly he disappeared.
A millisecond later a large heavy fist came smashing down towards the back of Lucifer's head. As if he could see what was coming, Lucifer lounged forward as he swung his hands backwards. Like a horizontal bolt of lightning, Lucifer went sailing through the air directly at the city. His prana acting as fuel for his blindingly fast blitz to the open city gates of Jultán.
“Why does he want to get there so damn fast? Using a spell like that… He is just like you eh old friend?” Eric muttered as he watched the red gold bolt of light go flying away from him. Running his hand through his shaggy salt and pepper hair, Eric let out a tired sigh before he became hazy and disappeared from sight.