Four days off of Zycor’s gauntlets being completed, Mylon awoke to find himself alone in his room. He slid out of bed and looked over at the room’s only table. He walked over and picked up the note lying on it. It was from Baz letting him know that ‘the arena calls for its champion.’ With a sigh, Mylon got dressed in light clothing and decided to explore the village to investigate all of the technology and magic used in it. He went to multiple shops learning about the different intricacies that go on in making the technology used in the village.
Looking into the street lamps, he learned about the whole process. The blacksmith makes the posts’ base and the vents and pipes in them. There is a rune smith, a practically extinct profession that the village is trying to revive, that installs various runes of fire, water, and light. Then it is sent to a glassblower who makes the glass for the lamps. Then they are sent back to the blacksmith to be put up.
While Mylon wandered around, he heard a commotion going on in the center of the village. As he made his way towards it, he stopped a passerby and asked, “Excuse me sir, do you happen to know what is going on over there?”
The man cheerfully answered, “Oh, you must be a traveler! You see, every once in a while here our scholars will go to the middle of town and begin to discuss magic, magical phenomena, along with theories and hypotheses regarding them. There is a lecture portion where the speaker will teach about these concepts and add in his own thoughts towards the end. When he is finished with the lecture, it becomes an open discussion meant to encourage others to ask or even attempt to refute some of the lecturer's claims. This is all in an attempt to further our potential understanding of magic. If you are interested in magic, then you should go check it out!”
Mylon’s eyes lit up. He thanked the man and hurried off towards the center of town. Approaching he couldn’t help but think, “I can’t wait to hear what they are talking about! Maybe I can learn something about wind magic! Or maybe something even more interesting!”
With the open town center now in full view, he noticed a crowd standing around a slightly raised podium. The man standing at said podium seemed to be the one leading the discussion. As he got closer, he saw a familiar face. “Is that Aisha? What is she doing here?”
He approached her and inquired, “Now what are you doing here?”
Without breaking her attention from the lecturer, she responded, “I heard the current lecturer was going to talk about awakening. I have always been super curious about it, especially considering there are few documents on it.”
“And you think the people here will know more about it?”
“You of all people should have noticed the advanced state of this place, Mylon. Surely they could know more about the phenomenon than we do!”
Mylon turned his attention to the lecturer, an older man, who had finished his preparations for the lecture. He began to speak, “Alright, well, I suppose we should start now, yes? I am sure most of us are familiar with awakening to some degree, but seeing as how there are quite a few travelers here, I shall refresh. Awakening is the phenomenon that occurs when a person is in extreme danger. However, the conditions go beyond this. The body, both the conscious and subconscious mind, along with a person's soul shard must all be in a state where they collectively agree on this extreme danger. A person’s death is not enough, it must go beyond this to qualify. Although it is not clear at what point the conditions are met, we know from those who have awakened that a situation akin to the world, or their own metaphorical world, was in danger. The estimated chances of meeting the requirements are, conservatively, 1/10,000,000. Assuming the conditions are met, a person's body will be enveloped in pure, divine mana as their body is torn apart, their soul shard fractures into pieces and their mind is temporarily seized by the goddess. There are three endings that can result from this point. The first is death, which is the most common result. The second is survival, but through a failed awakening. The individual has to go on living, crippled and with a cracked soul shard, preventing them from ever using mana again, and slowly being poisoned by the leaking mana. The third result is survival through a successful awakening. According to those who have bore witness to this event, ‘there is no known force aside from the goddess that could stand against a newly awakened individual.’”
The man paused as the crowd murmured and talked quietly.
“This is actually pretty interesting, huh Aisha?” Mylon whispered.
Aisha, seemingly annoyed, replied, “Sure, but this is all basic information.”
Mylon remained silent. Aisha glanced over at him and sighed. She gave him a pat on his back, “Hey, sorry. Honestly, it might just be me who could call this ‘basic information.’ I sometimes forget how good of an education I got.”
Mylon smirked and wrapped his arm around her neck, “Apology accepted, ya squirt.”
The lecturer flipped through his notes a few pages and began again with a cough, “Ahem, continuing on, awakening increases a person’s magic capacity tremendously. This is due to the body no longer containing a soul shard to convert mana, but instead using the entire body to convert and house mana. According to the information we have obtained from awakened, there were also extreme increases in their magic affinities, proficiencies, and potency of their magic. And to top it off, all awakened receive a personalized skill from the goddess. It is unclear how this ability is chosen, however, what is known is that they do not conform to the system of magic. In fact, it wouldn’t be a stretch to classify these skills in a system all their own. But enough of the explanation, now for the part I am sure most of you have been waiting for, my own theories and thoughts.”
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The man flipped through his notes again, giving another moment of thought to the audience. Once he found what he was looking for he began, “Right then, I was looking into the restrictions and conditions to awakening. As I did, I searched for any similarities between previous awakening initiations. I sifted through countless eyewitness accounts, as well as accounts from successful awakened individuals. The more I read, the more I thought about a possible way to trigger an awakening. From what I read, high stress situations seem to be the condition required for the mind requirement. Severe bodily injury of the body seems to be the condition required for the body. And for the soul shard, it seemed as though it needed to reach its limit or be sufficiently damaged. So, in theory, should someone be able to replicate all three of these conditions, they should be able to trigger the awakening phenomenon.”
Aisha spoke up and asked, “In that case, should someone be able to meet these criteria, would their success rate go up at all?”
The lecturer thought for a moment, answering, “That is a good question, lass. It is possible that the failures that occur during awakening may occur due to one of these conditions not remaining within a threshold. In that case, it is possible that this method could increase a person’s chances. However, it is also possible, the person’s body just couldn’t handle the immense strain placed on the body. If that is the case, then I do not think this method would go the way you want it to.”
“Fascinating… Thank you for the lecture.” Aisha responded, deep in thought.
The lecturer chuckled, “No, thank you for asking such an excellent question!”
Aisha and Mylon stuck around for a little while longer, but the conversation soon spiraled way off topic. At that point, the two of them left together.
“Well that was interesting. Certainly got more out of it than I thought I would.” Aisha mused.
Mylon concurred, “Yeah, I learned quite a bit from him. I am curious to know what else he may know.”
Aisha pouted, “Hey, you have a wealth of information right here, you don’t need to ask some old geezer…”
“Haha, I suppose you are right! So tell me, what do you know about wind magic, professor Aisha.”
Aisha stumbled over herself, nearly falling down, upon hearing his comment, “Who told you about that?! Wait… I’m gonna kill that idiot, I think all that lightning fried his brain!”
Mylon chortled, “Go easy on the kid, Baz and I are the ones that pressed him about it!”
“Baz knows!?!”
Mylon laughed harder, Aisha following suit soon after. As the two caught their breath, Aisha commented, “I don’t think I have ever seen you laugh that much, if at all.”
Mylon’s face was slowly overcome with an intense look of sadness. “Yeah… it’s been hard to do so for some time.”
He turned to Aisha. He looked as though he might break at any moment. He continued, “So thank you for always keeping my spirits high, even if it doesn’t seem like you do.”
Aisha felt a twinge of pain in her heart, but composed herself to be strong for her friend. She lightly pushed on his chest and giggled, “Woah there you walking armor stand, I thought not showing emotions was a part of your self assigned, inanimate character!”
Mylon chuckled, lightly pushing her back, “Are your eyes working today, miss wolf girl? I am not wearing my armor today!”
The two continued to laugh, Aisha chuckled, “And here I thought we were the mature ones holding this group of idiots together, haha!”
Mylon joked, “Well, we are traveling with those ‘idiots’ out of our own free will, so we were bound to pick up on a little of their immaturity.”
“Yeah, but they are our idiots.”
“They sure are, and I wouldn’t have them any other way.”
“Speaking of them, where is our half orc friend?”
Mylon sighed, “Ah, him. Probably off at the arena. Again. Winning. Again.”
Aisha cocked her head in confusion, “Why do you say that like it’s a bad thing?”
“Because it is a bad thing. He hasn’t lost a match yet. They even gave him the nickname ‘The Orc Typhoon.’ I swear this is going to go to his head…”
Aisha began laughing at the nickname, “What a ridiculous name!”
“And what about our zappy friend?”
Aisha’s laughter slowly tapered off. She too sighed heavily, “Still training with that Lathal guy.”
“Are you feeling lonely since he is spending time with someone else?” Mylon teased.
Aisha blushed and looked at the ground. She then nodded her head. This act caught Mylon off guard, “Oh wow, you actually admitted it. So… have you come to terms with how you feel finally?”
Her blush deepened further, “Was I that obvious?!”
Mylon chuckled, “With how long we have traveled together, I think it would be stranger for me to not have noticed. One of the ‘mature’ ones, remember?”
He let out a light sigh and put his hand on her shoulder, “Don’t be so embarrassed, unlike Baz, I won’t tease you about it, much. Plus, you know I got your back, so don’t worry.”
Aisha silently nodded, pressing her head against Mylon’s abdomen. Surprised at first, Mylon chuckled as he comforted her, “You can’t hide forever. But for now, I suppose big bro Mylon can make an exception.”