Kala and I walked around the camp towards where Velshi set up shop. The medical tents were less busy today, which I suppose would be good if those people were able to walk out on their own. We went behind the tent to Velshi’s little makeshift room in the side of the volcano. Sweeping away the cloth divider revealed my new teacher mashing some herbs into a paste.
She turned away from her work and saw us standing there. “You’re a little later than I expected. Did something happen that delayed you?”
I stuck with the same story I used with Sert. “Just slept in a bit to heal from your previous lessons.”
“Recovering or not, I expect you to arrive in a timely manner from now on.”
“Sure thing.”
She gave a nod, gesturing for me to sit. After I took a seat, she turned to Kala and made a gesture off to the corner of the room. Looking to where she pointed revealed another chair waiting there. “I acquired another chair for you to use freely. If it is uncomfortable, I can request a different one.”
Kala dipped her head in appreciation and took a seat. Now that everyone was situated correctly, Velshi began her tutelage. “Now that you know the basics of using your energy, we will begin with the use of rune inscribed objects and crystals. The process is similar to storing your energy inside of an object but now there is an extra step. After allowing your energy to flow into the apparatus you must then direct it to perform its given task in a specific manner. Say you want rune scribed metal to start producing heat, you must be conscious of the temperature and radius you desire the heat to be in. Should you attempt to use it without these measures you could quickly find yourself with melted slag instead of a useful tool.”
“So accuracy is key in this case?”
“Exactly.” She reached over and picked up a fist sized crystal from the table. “This crystal will induce a numbing sensation to wherever it is directed, very useful in our line of work when trying to ease the pains of a patient. I want you to try and numb your hand and your hand only. You will not stop until you are successful.” She handed me the crystal and then flipped over a newly acquired hourglass before standing. “Begin.”
I set to work on using the crystal, pumping magical energy into it. I felt a difference from when putting magic into a basic crystal. As soon as the energy entered, it started bouncing around excitedly, like it was itching to do something. Velshi stalked around me, observing my progress with the tool. Now that I had the energy inside the crystal and ready for use, I tried to draw it back out and command it to numb my other hand.
It reentered my body and melded with my calm magical energy, almost completely disappearing back into the flow. The only thing I could feel was a slight skin crawling sensation then nothing. The sensation reached my hand, then I heard Velshi speak up from behind me.
“That’s a fail.”
I was surprised by the sudden failing grade and turned to her. She was standing there, looking at me with a hint of disapproval. “What? Why?” I asked her.
“That you even need to ask is the reason why. I just pinched your collarbone, and you didn’t even realize it.”
“What?” I poked my shoulder and sure enough, I couldn’t feel anything there. In fact, most of my upper body from one hand to the other was completely numb. “Why though? I thought I was doing it right and directing the energy.”
“Yes, you properly moved it throughout your body. However, once mana enters a rune carved object it immediately becomes a spell of its own and takes effect. If you draw the power out of the object again for use, then you must contain it as you move it else it will bleed its power all along the path it takes. Cut the flow and wait for feeling to return before trying again.”
There’s the catch. I thought this was a little too straightforward. I waited for sensation to return to my upper body before giving it another go. The problem with this was that when the magic reentered my body, it was lost in the flow inside of me. I had to find a way to pick it out of the rest of my magic before it could be properly isolated.
After every attempt Velshi would give me a quick jab of her finger or pinch of my flesh. It would probably have been quite uncomfortable, but I didn’t feel it at least, though the objective was to feel it. This problem had to be solved if I was going to proceed. It was the same hang up every time. By the time I tried to contain the magic that was pulled back into myself, it had already diffused into my body. It was like trying to take paint out of water.
The hourglass had already emptied most of the way and I was still scratching my head. Working with the idea of literal magic wasn’t helping, so I tried to simplify it into something relatively familiar to me. The runes had been previously likened to a type of programming language, so I started thinking about it like that. Not that I was tech smart, but I knew more about computers than magic.
I need to contain it. What do you do when you want to contain a computer file? My little analogy actually bore fruit as an idea sprang into my head. To transfer a file sometimes you have to zip it up before sending it off, so it’s the right size.
Excited, I went back in for another attempt at it. This time, before taking the energy back into myself, a small portion of it was corralled and put into its own little bubble. When it was pulled back into my body, I could now clearly feel it compressed and moving throughout, securely wrapped up and waiting to be used.
The skin crawling sensation creeped its way through my body. Velshi gave me a jab on my upper arm, and it was noticeable this time. I purposely reacted to it to let her know that I did feel it and she hummed from behind me in acknowledgment.
After my little magical package was delivered to where it was supposed to be, I popped the bubble and let the spell take effect. I lost all feeling in my hand, creating a sensation as if you slept on it wrong and it just becomes dead weight to the rest of the body. Velshi came over and seized control of my hand.
“Turn away.” She instructed. I complied and turned my body and head so I could no longer look at what she was doing. “Do you feel anything?”
“No, nothing.” A few seconds passed after that.
“How about now?”
“Nope.”
“Good, now keep looking that way while I heal you.”
“Wait, what?” I instinctually tried to look but was intercepted by Velshi’s hand that pushed my head back away.
“I said don’t look.”
Dread curiosity was really compelling me to see what she did to my hand, but I forced myself to keep staring at the wall. Kala was sitting in the corner of the room and her face was slightly disturbed. Now I really wanted to know.
“There, all better.” She said after a minute. I took that as my cue that I could look at it now and returned my gaze to a completely normal hand. Flexing my fingers revealed that everything was working like normal, so I decided to ask about what happened.
“What did you do that required healing?”
“I slowly bent your index finger back until it broke.” She stated casually.
My eyes widened at both the statement and the way it was delivered. Unconsciously I found myself rubbing the finger in question. “Was there a reason why you needed to break it?”
“You could be trying to tough it out or have very flexible fingers. Few people could have a finger broken and not react in the slightest. Don’t worry, everything is healed and there shouldn’t be any problems, no harm done.”
A little harm done! You don’t just break someone’s finger and expect them to be okay with that. I just sighed and balled the hand up into a fist a couple of times to get rid of the strange phantom sensations. “You’re teaching method is a little violent, you know that right?”
“It was how I was taught, both before and after committing myself to becoming a healer. A little pain now to prevent death later. As I said previously, we have no time to leisurely introduce you to the subject. You must learn quickly, and I must be thorough in my teachings, else you will find yourself in a situation you weren’t prepared for. Being unprepared could cost you not only your life, but the life of those around you.”
She continued on. “Good news is that you won’t have to have that happen again, you passed the test. I must say you are quite quick at picking up the concepts. Most will try to brute force magic to get it to do what they want, and while that may work for some cases, you can achieve a much greater efficiency if you only think about how best to complete a task without wasteful effort.”
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Lesson within a lesson then. I nodded thoughtfully at her offered wisdom. It seemed dedicating some consideration to the execution of the task beyond just simply being a means to an end would be helpful in the future.
Velshi continued after giving me a moment to mull over her words. “Since we are on the subject of runes, perhaps learning to read and write them would be a good use of the extra time you have created.”
“Sounds interesting. Let’s give it a go.” Programming magic sounded like a nerd’s dream job. I wouldn’t deny that I was curious about how far the possibilities could go when it came to its applications.
“Firstly, can you read?” She asked me.
“Uhm, no, not any language of yours I think.”
“Hmm, well, it may be slower, but you can still learn something.” She collected some parchments from the table and laid them out for everyone to see. Each page was covered top to bottom with different runes as well as some writing underneath that probably said what they were for.
“Runes are a language all their own, each one representing a different object, concept, or task. For example...” She pointed to three different runes on the list. “You have body, pain, and reversal. These three runes in conjunction with one another would give you a very basic version of the crystal you just used. The more specific you are in the writing of the runes the greater the potency and the more directed the effect will be. If you had used a crystal with only these three words, it would numb your entire body no matter how well you contained it, for it will attempt to do exactly what it is told, nothing more or less.”
I considered the crystal I had just used and how it was scribbled with dozens of runes, all designed to apparently focus its function. She started to walk me through all the runes on the list she had, explaining each of their uses and how they might combine with others. She quizzed me a couple of times about what she had shown me to see if I was paying attention. The weird language was somewhere between Chinese and Japanese, though blockier, with straight lines being favored over curves. That was most likely a practical choice as it had to be chiseled into things.
We burned two hours going over all the runes on the list. In that time, I had got maybe half of them on a single page memorized, though would probably forget some of them over the course of the day. I definitely would need more practice with this if I was to learn it in its entirety.
After the third hourglass had been run dry, she suddenly halted in her instructions. “Alright, step outside, I will be there in a moment.”
“Huh? Sert said you wanted four hours with me, it's only been three.”
“And I will get that fourth hour, we will just be spending it doing something different.”
I was curious, but decided to wait outside as she asked while she cleaned up a few things on the desk that we had been using. Kala followed me out as we waited to see what she was going to do next. After a few minutes she emerged from her room, carrying something made of wood.
There wasn’t enough time to see what it was before she tossed it at me. I caught it out of reaction and now saw that it was rough cut wooden sword. She held one similar to it as she strode out into an open area. She pivoted back towards me and held her sword up in an almost casual manner.
“Come, attack me, I want to see how you use a sword.”
“Wait, I thought this was magic class.”
“It is.” She replied plainly.
“Then why are we sword fighting?”
“Tell me, how do you plan to repel someone charging you down with a weapon?”
“Uhm, ideally with one of my own, I guess.”
“Exactly. While magic is a weapon for some, as a healer your combat potential is the weakest out of all the vocations. You may be able to use it to extend the amount of time you can stay fighting a little, but if you plan on surviving you must learn how to use another weapon. So attack, let me see what you got.”
I understood what she was getting at, and frankly my plan for combat was to just keep coming at them until they were worn out or dead. Not exactly a foolproof method, and likely very painful. I approached her and got into what I thought was a good ready stance for bladework. It then occurred to me that while she was a healer now, she used to be a soldier, a pretty damn good one too. I am so going to get my ass kicked.
I sighed and readied myself. If this was going to end with the shit getting kicked out of me, I would at least try to get a hit in on her. Focusing on my target, my grip on the sword tightened. The plan was a simple vertical slash aimed at her shoulder or neck. She would undoubtedly block it, in which case I had to be aware of where her sword was going to be and dodge her counterattack after that.
As prepared as I would ever be, I sprang forward in a burst of motion, going for my chop. Her sword came up to intercept, and just before they touched, she stepped to the side and dipped her blade at an angle. My attack slid off her defense as my momentum continued to carry me a step forward. Before I could recover her foot came around and kicked my legs out from under me. I dropped like a rock and right onto my back. She pressed the tip of her blade against my chest to signify that she had indeed bested me.
My body slumped and went limp, disappointed that I couldn’t even last longer than a single hit. Instead of gloating or saying anything about my performance, she took up her position again. “Get up, try again.”
With a groan I got to my feet again, moving back to my starting position. So, charging in as quickly as I did wouldn’t work as it would leave me completely off balance. Maybe if I went for a stab instead of an all-in attack I could recover fast enough to retreat? It was worth a shot at the very least.
I adjusted myself for the new attack while Velshi just stood there and waited. She seemed so open, and at the same time an impenetrable fortress. Figuring this would just have to come down to trial and error, I stepped in to take a jab at her.
She swept her sword in front of her in a counterclockwise motion, batting aside my thrust. I quickly stepped back to try to avoid retaliation, but she followed me. She shot forward after my retreat and swung her sword downward at me. My own was raised for a block and they collided, locking together. She raised an eyebrow at me, looking a little surprised, but I realized she swung with only one hand too late as she used her free appendage to grab hold of my wrist. Now that she was in control of my weapon she pulled and twisted me off balance before angling her sword till it was pressed against my throat.
That was the end of that round, basically just as quick as the first but I survived two moves this time so hey, progress. “You’re rather strong, aren’t you? Most your size would have at least faltered under a downward strike like that.” She commented
I shrugged the comment off, not wanting to admit anything about my magically enhanced strength which would raise further questions I didn’t want to answer. She released me and took up her position again. A mirthless chuckle and some loose swings of the practice sword occurred while thinking of ways to change the subject a little.
“No comments on how badly I suck at this?”
“I will not disparage a beginner for making mistakes, it is what you are meant to do. Once you have learned some, then I will admonish you.”
“Gee, can’t wait for that.” I said sarcastically with a half-smile as we got ready for another round. Long story short, this round ended when she caught me on my back foot and essentially pushed me over after a single move. So much for progress.
“I have an idea of where your skill is now.” She stated after I got off my ass again.
“You know, I could have told you I knew fuck all about swordplay.”
“True, but it wouldn’t have told me how you moved, how intuitive you are, or if you are capable of adapting against your opponent. Now that I have seen some of your ability in this regard, I can start correcting your weaker areas.”
She proceeded to teach me in earnest now, starting with my stance. She said that while I started with a decent stance, I apparently abandoned it as soon as the fighting started, which led to me being on my ass. We began with proper footwork, how to maintain a solid stance as you moved, and where to place your feet when approaching and retreating. It almost felt like learning a type of dance, only one that was far more dangerous in use.
After we had done some footwork, she started teaching me defensive postures and how to properly deflect with a sword. There were different positions you needed to be in with both your body and your blade if you wanted to either catch a hit, or let it roll off your blade. If you did a roll when your body was in the wrong position, they could get a glancing blow on you, if you tried to catch the blade when you didn’t have the right balance, then you could be pushed around. It was all very technical, dealing with leverage, speed, and force applied in certain ways.
There was only so much we could do in about an hour, an hour we probably exceeded a little bit. Just as I was starting to get a little winded with all the training, she called an end to it. I stretched a little bit, working out some of the kinks that appeared since she started demonstrating some of the moves with me. She ended the lesson officially with a last little bit of wisdom.
“You should be aware, these techniques that you will learn will help you fight, but they are only really effective in a one-on-one battle. If you find yourself outnumbered, fancy moves, and proper technique will only get you so far before you end up getting stabbed from two different angles. In these situations, it’s best to run if you can, and if you can’t, you fight dirty. Go for the groin, the eyes, throw punches, kicks, and always keep moving. Getting surrounded will end in your death.”
I nodded to show that I understood what she was saying. No matter how many martial arts you learn, most of the rules go out the window when you get into a bar fight. Of course, there wasn’t as much for me to worry about when it came to dying as most others did. Taking a fatal hit wasn’t a big deal, so long as it didn’t immediately kill me, I just needed to make sure my opponent died before me.
“You made good progress today. I think you will have a firm grasp of magical concepts before you know it.” It felt good to be praised for something. Some people would just say that the results of your work are rewarding enough, and while they do have a point, being appluaded by others is still pretty damn satisfying.
Velshi disappeared back into her room with the practice swords, leaving me and Kala to our own devices. Kala came up to me with a smirk. “You know, it’s pretty entertaining watching you get tossed around a bit.”
“Hardy har har, glad my pain is amusing to you. If you’re not careful I'll have Velshi invite you to participate in those lessons as well.”
“I’m more of a spectator.” She said, still sporting that sly smile.
“With that attitude you're practically begging to be a participant.”
She raised her hands in surrender. “Alright, alright, I'll let up. So, what should we do now?”
Before I could even open my mouth to answer, my stomach decided it would provide one for me. It growled loudly as it called out for calories after that light workout session it just went through.
Kala snickered at me. “Should we get some food then?”
“Yeah, that sounds nice.” After my light breakfast, and dinner the night before, I really needed something else to occupy that void in my stomach. While it was doubtful I would get anything of true substance, it would at least prevent my stomach from complaining for a little while. So off in search of sustenance we went, fully prepared and not giving a damn how angry people were. I was hungry and tired from lack of sleep, so not even an army would stop me from getting food right now.