“-ah…”

Too tired to think.

“-oska…”

That sounds like my name. Who’s calling me?

“Roska,” a voice gently repeats.

There’s something holding my shoulders, gingerly shaking me. My body stirs as I begin to wake. Thoughts form with less difficulty as consciousness returns. I let out an involuntary groan.

The first sensation is pain. A dull ache in the muscles of my back and neck. I’ve dealt with much worse, though.

The Anima within me stirs, and I begin the slow process of reconfiguring it into a more efficient form. Anima is an incredibly versatile form of energy, with a nearly limitless number of applications.

Knowledge, guidance, and purpose. Provide Anima with a goal to fulfil, the methods by which to accomplish the goal, and the knowledge necessary to understand and carry out those methods. This is the fundamental process for using Anima to affect the world. The amount of information, the clarity of the instructions, and how well-defined the outcome is all effect the amount of Anima required.

Relief spreads through my back, and the pain slowly begins to recede. I open my eyes. Von is crouched next to me with a concerned expression. Behind him, the sky has returned to normal; the illusionary cage and twilight backdrop dispelled, revealing clear blue skies and the midday sun.

“Did,” I pause to cough, the inside of my mouth dry and coated in dust. “Did we win?” I ask, my voice hoarse. I know it doesn’t matter, but I would be miffed if we lost despite all our hard work.

Von beams at me and nods. What a crazy kid. He has quite a few personality traits in common with Cadius, that’s for sure. Really, who’s stupid enough to get in a fight with the Boulder Breaker? I hadn’t even taken a direct hit, but I was still knocked out. And Von isn’t even that much tougher than I am.

This is one hell of a debut. ‘New recruit and his provisional team bests the Oliver the Breaker.’

“You’re nuts, you know that?” I shake my head.

“I hear it every day from Lloyd.”

The pain had subsided enough that sitting up wasn’t too arduous. “Von, are you ok?” I ask. There was little chance he wasn’t, he had been right beside me when Oliver shattered that wall.

He hesitated before answering, “Yeah, my back hurts like hell, and I think there’s some bruising on my leg.” He pulled up the left leg of his pants. The skin just below his left skin was starting to turn a sickly purple-yellow.

“Let me fix that. Just sit still for me,” I said.

“Uh, sure.”

I raised an eyebrow at that. Does he not know about other uses for Anima? Who’s the idiot training him? With those thoughts at the back of my mind, I repeated the process of turning my Anima into a form that speeds up the body’s natural healing process, making sure to install knowledge of human anatomy rather than Ratatoskr anatomy.

I saw a figure in my peripheral vision. Oliver stood a few feet away, silently watching us, his expression stolid.

I placed a hand over the bruised area and focused, moving the Anima from my body and into his. There was a faint, soft blue glow where small bits of my Anima failed to enter his body. Tsk. My concentration must have slipped for a moment. The moment the glow had appeared, Von went completely still.

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Really, I’m going to slap whoever was in charge of that boy.

As a scout, it’s my duty to guide my team. I reveal the way forward and dispel the fog of ignorance clouding our path. “Von,” I begin, still focusing on healing his bruises. Using Anima on someone else is more taxing than using it on yourself. As far as I’m aware, no one knows why, that’s just how it is. “Anyone can use Anima, not just demigods, Apostles, and Attendants.”

“Wait, so, um…”

I kept silent, waiting patiently for him to gather his thoughts.

“Uh, let me start with this question. What are the powers I’ve been using called?”

That’s a good question, but I think there’s a fundamental misunderstanding here. Best to correct that now. “Hmmm. Let’s review the basics first. Anima refers to the essence of the soul that can be molded and given form. You can just think of it as a form of energy that beings in this realm can freely manipulate.”

Von nodded. Good, at least he knows that much.

“What I’m doing now doesn’t have a proper name, it’s just an application of Anima. The unique power held by Demigods, Apostles, and Attendants is referred to as an Imperium, or Imperial Anima. They are the culmination of their aspects.”

I pause, noticing I had wasted quite a bit of Anima after losing concentration. Bah. I steady my breathing, recentering myself before continuing. “Blessings are single-faceted Imperium. They typically cover just one application of an Imperium. In Oliver’s case, he’s able to use visual illusions, but only for objects that he’s touching.”

I finished healing Von’s leg, then instructed him to remove his shirt so I could take a look at his back. We continued our conversation while I worked.

“Ok, so I’m assuming you can’t make illusions like I can. Why is that? Wouldn’t you be able to learn how to do it with enough practice or something?”

I shake my head, “No, I don’t have an Imperium, or a Blessing. You see, Anima must follow the natural laws of reality like everything else. What you can do with Anima has to abide by the rules of this world. The exceptions being Imperium and Blessings.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Let me give you an example. Lloyd can literally grab a person’s shadow and tear it from the ground and give it a physical form. A shadow is just the absence of light, it doesn’t have a physical form. You can’t normally do something like giving substance to an object with Anima. Imperium break the laws of this realm. Sure, maybe there’s a way to imitate some Imperium, but they would all consume far, far more Anima to achieve even a vaguely similar effect.”

“Ok… But wait, how are you healing me?”

“Hm?”

“Isn’t that breaking the rules? I mean, you can’t normally just… fix people, right?”

“Well, I’m not fixing them, actually. I’m just helping the body fix itself and speeding it along.”

“Oh.”

Von sat in silence as I continued to work on his back. There weren’t many visible bruises, but that didn’t preclude internal injury. As a precautionary measure, I went ahead and treated him for any internal bleeding and bruising as well. Between healing myself and Von, I’ve drained about half my total Anima capacity.

Von looked up at Oliver, who had been standing there, staring at us this whole time, not saying a word. “So, uh, is there something you want to say?”

“Get stronger,” Oliver bluntly stated.

“Er, ok?” Von gave a perplexed look.

“Also, here,” Oliver pulled out a small bag, “Give this to that teammate of yours, Hartwin I think his name was.” He tossed it at Von’s feet. From the shape and sound it made, I could tell that it was filled with coins. Oliver didn’t even wait for a reply before he walked away.

“…Really, what a weirdo,” Von commented.

You’re one to talk! I kept that opinion to myself, though. Don’t want to diss my future employer.

By the time I finished up Von’s treatment, Hartwin showed up, his shield sporting two new dents, one of which was as big as my head. I treated his injuries while we talked.

When I asked how he had found us, he said he had heard an explosion in the distance and figured it was likely Oliver, judging by the direction he had fled and the strength he had displayed in their fight. Hartwin was in better shape than I had expected judging from those dents in the shield.

“Still, I can’t believe you took a full power blow from the fucking Boulder Breaker,” I said to him.

“Hm? Boulder Breaker?” Von asked.

“Oliver’s unofficial title. You saw what he did to that wall, right? That’s why he’s called the Boulder Breaker, or Oliver the Breaker, depending on who you ask,” I answered.

“Oh. Well, shit. I wish you told me that earlier. I would have stayed the hell away from that freak.” He paused, then said, “Whatever. C’mon, we gotta go register for the next round.”

Sorry, Von. Sometimes, the quickest way to get to know someone is to watch them handle a stressful situation. This was about as safe of a situation as there is while still being stressful. Oliver would never even dare seriously hurting Cadius’s Apostle, but he wouldn’t go easy on him. Von, in my opinion, is most certainly worthy of the position. He’s a bit overconfident, but that’s part of his charm, I think.

The only thing I can do now is to continue marketing myself to him in hopes that I can make the cut. The kid’s going places, and I want to see his story from start to finish. There’s not a lot else that’s more interesting than that.