“No objections,” I said. Vijay blinked in surprise.
“All right, you three go train. Don’t waste your time doing frivolous things. Hero Vijay, follow me.” Officer Dereck then proceeded to drag the Indian boy into one of the stone buildings surrounding the courtyard.
I watched them go. In truth, I had a lot of objections to Vijay being our leader. I didn’t trust in his judgement, he wasn’t very charismatic, he was too self-absorbed, and he didn’t like me very much. However, fighting him would garner his ire, and a stewing Vijay would tear apart our team’s ability to cooperate.
It was better to pacify the man by giving him a win. Besides, I didn’t have the time to spend training the [Leadership] skill. I needed every bit of time to increase my chances at survival.
“What should we do now, guys?” Lily asked excitedly. “Now that the boring stuff is over, we can do anything!”
“I’m going to train,” Gyeong said.
“Aw, that’s boring. You do nothing but training,” she complained.
“Officer Dereck told us to train. Maybe you should train more in general, Lily,” I offered sincerely. Lily’s [Spirit Archery] seemed to be less reliant on energy pools than the rest of us, able to be used even before Lily had any other skills. As a consequence, she slacked off while training.
Technically, Gyeong and Vijay’s skills also didn’t need energy pools to use, but in practice they did. While Gyeong could extend his weapon using [Helix Staff], it needed aura to deal damage. Meanwhile, Vijay’s [Infinite Magic Compression] acted on other magic, which would require mana to cast.
“I’ll meditate later,” she harrumphed. “I’m taking this seriously too, okay? But working nonstop is bad for you. We just went through two hours of training, dude. Relax.”
Most people felt that way. Not me. My family had obsessive dedication in spades; if they didn’t, we’d have stopped trying alchemy ten generations ago. Even after my parents were killed in a black powder experiment gone wrong, I kept at it undeterred. That’s what it meant to be a Flamel.
I wasn’t going to let laziness mean the end of my ancestors’ dream. Achieving immortality wasn’t enough- I had to live long enough to experience its effects.
“No can do, Lily.” I said, before pivoting to face the. “Gyeong, why don’t we spar?”
“Very well.” He nodded, following me to a more open area of the courtyard. The camp was minimalistic and didn’t have much open space inside the stone buildings, so all physical training was done outside.
From there, we started sparring. While we both used training staffs, Gyeong and I pretended that mine had the extra adornments of a halberd. This let my [Halberd Lv. 4] skill trigger, guiding my movements as normal but with a reduced power boost. I charged, swinging wildly in an attempt to overwhelm my opponent. Gyeong deftly redirected my blows away from himself, unperturbed.
If my speed wasn’t enough, I’d go for strength. I gripped near the bottom of the wooden staff with both hands, heaving it down in an overhand blow with all my might. In response, Gyeong half-stepped out of the way, except he purposefully let my staff hit the end of his. The Japanese boy borrowed the force to twirl his staff with devastating speed, cracking me in the ribs.
I gasped in pain, my breath forcefully expelled from my lungs.
“You must be wary of both sides of the staff; this is the advantage a staff has over a halberd,” Gyeong lectured.
I never stood a chance against him. His [Staff] skill had to have been level seven, and yet he fought like his skill level was much higher, raw technique guiding him to better paths than [Staff Lv. 7] recommended.
“How are you so good at fighting,” I panted, hands on my knees.
“My father trained me from a young age in the way of the staff. Are you good to keep going?” He asked, concern evident on his face.
“Yeah. But let’s put our armor on this time,” I decided. Gyeong nodded and walked to our room while I recovered, coming back out with both our armor sets. I thanked him and started the laborious process of strapping the many metal pieces to me.
Once finished, we crossed staffs again. With a loud thwack, Gyeong hit me in the shin, and the pain was more manageable with armor. A couple seconds later, his staff thrusted into my stomach, making me briefly taste bile, but I stayed standing. He stopped after every hit to check in on me, yet held back nothing in our clashes. Even with armor, the physical impacts jarred me.
I learned a lot from those clashes. Gyeong wasn’t just beating me up; every injury he inflicted was designed to teach me a lesson. Quickly, his guidance made me pick up on tricks that my low-leveled [Halberd] skill didn’t know about. It was worth the pain.
The people of this world were too dependent on skill levels. It made sense; once weapon skills reached level twelve, they became so good that mundane technique improvement was pointless. However, at lower levels of the skills, a warrior could fight above his skill level. That was especially valuable to me right now, given that I was starved for XP.
In my haze of dipping stamina levels, I saw an opening and took it. Gyeong had overextended his staff a bit too much, leaving his side vulnerable. I thrusted forward, stabbing with what would’ve been the spike of my halberd. To my surprise, it actually landed- except it didn’t do any damage. My staff stopped dead in its tracks as if I’d hit a mountain instead of a human.
Gyeong wasn’t even pushed back. I didn’t even get time to understand what happened, as Gyeong took advantage of my shock to slam his staff into my shoulder, knocking me off my feet. I hit the dirt face first and groaned.
“Perhaps that was a bit unfair,” Gyeong said, frowning. “Taking advantage of your inability to harm me was disrespectful. I apologize.”
I crawled back to my feet, using the staff to help me up. I sighed in annoyance. “You baited me?”
“Yes. Orichalcum is quite a good metal.”
I understood what he meant instantly. Like my halberd, our armors were made out of an orichalcum-steel alloy. The special material channeled aura easily, letting us pull off techniques we couldn’t normally. In this case, the armor could absorb aura and form a mimicry of the [Aura Shield] technique at first cycle (50%) proficiency.
[Aura Shield] was a vital technique for aura warriors, and its acquisition was the minimum requirement for an aura-track recruit to graduate from training. The technique let aura users form a shield of aura around their body, warding off incoming damage. The most special effect, however, was that mundane damage was extremely ineffective against an aura shield.
Aura Shield Prof. X Difficulty: 500 Requirement: AC lv. 10 Allows for aura to be focused on the skin to create a shield. This creates a base health pool (HP) of X*(aura), for aura used. It is very effective at stopping mundane attacks. Piercing attacks may pierce the shield. Proficiency affects speed of formation and dissipation of the aura shield. Consumes (aura) stamina on creation and dissipation, and a drain of (aura) stamina per minute to maintain the shield.
At lower proficiencies, it took time to gather aura into a shield. This meant an aura warrior had to create the shield in advance, tying up the aura and preventing it from being used in other aura techniques. Moreover, holding the shield had a high stamina cost.
At the later proficiency cycles, such as cycle 6 at 98.4% proficiency, a user could strengthen their aura shields mere moments before impacts, lowering the drain from maintaining the shield.
Although the armor only reproduced the technique at 50% proficiency, it was still enough to nearly nullify the impact of my staff. Since I couldn’t mimic [Aura Strike] without my orichalcum-alloy halberd, I’d need to use [Aura Punch].
[Aura Punch] and [Aura Strike] had a two times damage efficiency compared to what [Aura Shield] blocked. Therefore, since Gyeong and I had equal stamina pools, I could theoretically exhaust him by spamming [Aura Punch]’s, if I could get within grappling range.
The problem, however, was that I couldn’t use [Aura Shield] like Gyeong could. While orichalcum made aura control easier, my base [Aura Control] skill was still level 5, which limited me. I didn’t have the control to feed my aura into my whole armor set; at most, I could send a stream to my chestplate. This left every other part of my body vulnerable.
Gyeong ruthlessly took advantage of this deficiency of mine. He struck my shins, arms, and once even my head, while all my staff blows were nullified by his aura shield. Every time I tried to get into a close-range grapple to use my [Aura Punch], he would knock me away with his staff. Once, the nimble boy even pushed off the ground like a pole vaulter, soaring away to quickly create distance.
Finally, I was done. I gave up and conceded the spar. “This would be so much easier if I could use my orichalcum halberd,” I noted afterward. That’d let me mimic [Aura Strike], enhancing my weapon blows with aura.
“Then I’d have my adamantium staff,” Gyeong countered.
“Unfortunately,” I conceded. Adamantium was even more valuable than orichalcum, and Gyeong’s staff was made of it purely. It wasn’t an alloy like my halberd. The legendary black metal had disruptive effects on aura and mana control, letting it dissipate techniques and pierce through aura shields.
I still hadn’t seen it in action, so I didn’t fully understand the intricacies of its effects, but just the basic description painted Gyeong’s staff as a monster to deal with. It made me wonder if the emperor ordered this staff made just for Gyeong, or if it was a legacy item from a previous era.
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As I disassembled my armor, I took the opportunity to pray to the goddess to show me my skill list. I quickly noticed a change, which sent me bursting in joy.
Halberd Lv. 5
My [Halberd] skill had leveled up, the session pushing my total hours training the neglected weapon skill to just past 32. I immediately thanked Gyeong for teaching me.
“It was a just spar,” he deflected, turning away from me while he took off a layer of chainmail.
“No, seriously. This helped me much more than it helped you. Thank you,” I said sincerely. The boy winced, which was not the reaction I was intending for.
“…do you not like being thanked?” I hazarded a guess.
“It’s just, I- sorry,” Gyeong apologized, stumbling over himself.
“No need to apologize,” I reassured him.
He stared at the ground for a few seconds, collecting himself. Finally, he spoke. “I’m sorry. I have bad memories regarding thanks after sparring.”
I hummed encouragingly.
He continued, “My father would ‘spar’ very harshly with me, injuring me frequently, and he’d always force me to thank him afterwards.” Gyeong gained a far-away look to his eyes.
“That’s not okay,” I said. Mentally, I started to connect a few dots. The startled, frantic way Gyeong woke up, the almost militaristic way he followed orders- things finally made sense.
Gyeong firmed up. “I hated it. I hated it so much. There was never anything I could do about it in the past. Now, however, Castelo has finally given me a route for closure. I can become the man my father never was, and for that I’m grateful.”
He was far nobler than I was, and also more indoctrinated. Case in point, Gyeong was attributing thanks to the Castelo empire, not the Holy Goddess that had granted him his hero skill and brought him to this world.
Like the other heroes, Gyeong had vowed “I do,” to the emperor’s question of “Will you pledge allegiance to the cause?” The cause was implied to be defending the empire but technically was unspecified, so I was surprised the other heroes had any autonomy at all.
Already influenced from their oath, six months of propaganda only compounded the effect. With their guards down, they wouldn’t be constantly questioning everything they were taught, which resulted in an insidious shift of their subconscious bias.
Perhaps it was cowardly of me, but I didn’t try to disillusion him.
“Yeah. It’s nice that we can actually make an impact,” I parroted.
The conversation died there, both of us retreating into our own thoughts. Eventually, we said our goodbyes and went about our individual ways.
Now that I was alone, I had more freedom than I’d ever had in this world. The two masters were otherwise occupied, I didn’t have to worry about palace spies, and Officer Dereck was busy with Vijay.
It was the perfect opportunity to enact stage two of my plan.
I found the kitchen through a side door next to the cafeteria serving line. The room was massive, with various pots simmering with stew and butchered meat hanging from racks on the wall. Lunch was almost ready.
A man with flour-caked hands noticed me. “Hey, you! What do you want?”
“Looking for some charcoal,” I replied.
He raised an eyebrow. “Charcoal’s needed for cooking food. Aint no space for waste.”
I lied, “Yeah, but I need to increase my attunement to fire.”
The cook rolled his eyes. “Then get some wood from the stock.” He pointed to a door. “Or, better yet, wait until evening when you mage recruits are supposed to train your elemental attunement.”
“I’d really prefer charcoal though,” I sidestepping his other comment. “It makes less smoke. I’m not attuning to smoke, am I?” I added sarcastically.
“No can do,” the cook said with finality. “Now get out of my kitchen.”
I sighed and followed the door he showed me, which took me outside where a huge stack of cut logs dried in the sun. I got the sense that the cook hadn’t recognized me as a hero, which was a new feeling after living in the palace for so long. Maybe I could’ve gotten some charcoal if I used my status, but that also might’ve made him spread rumors about what I was doing.
Besides, I could make charcoal on my own. I’d done it plenty of times for my alchemy research back on Earth.
Over the course of multiple tripes, I spirited off a large chunk of chopped wood to a secluded area I’d found beforehand: a small alleyway formed between a few of the intersecting stone buildings. Most importantly, it was next to the kitchen, close enough to a chimney that any smoke I made wouldn’t seem unnatural.
Still, the area wasn’t as secretive as I wanted, as this camp was small enough that soldiers would still walk by from time to time. Therefore, I took preventative measures. For the first time, I used my [Light Illusion Prof. 50%] technique in practice, with the aim of hiding me from notice. However, that was harder than it sounded with my low technique proficiency.
I couldn’t make three-dimensional illusions yet. Anything I made would lack depth, so trying to create an illusion of an empty alleyway would fail. I could cover up the entrance of the alleyway with a fake wall, but that could easily be exposed by a soldier with competent memory.
Instead, I created a blanket of black enhancing the shadows starting halfway into the alley. With the bright noon sun ruining any passerby’s night vision, they wouldn’t have the precision to spot my shadows as darker than they should be.
The illusion cost me 80 mana to make, twice the optimal cost because of my 50% proficiency. Generally, illusions had an upfront cost, and required that same cost every hour to maintain. Basic two dimensional illusions, like flat colors or a shadow blanket only cost 40 base mana on average, while a complicated, detailed work of color would usually take 200 mana.
That wasn’t even going into three dimensional illusions, which costed a ton more, and moving illusions, which were basically impossible.
Just a basic shadow illusion, however, barely dented my mana and mental focus pools.
I quickly started the process of making charcoal. First, using [Elemental Magic Lv. 3] to slowly move dirt, I made an earth-mound kiln. The kiln was a large, hollow mound of compacted earth with a few holes around the bottom and top that would provide a limited airflow.
From there, I placed some of the small, thinner sticks at the bottom of the kiln, which would act as kindling to start a fire. I looked around, nervous. Here was the crucial moment. I was about to start a fire, one of the most noticeable things I could do. I hoped my shadow illusion was up to the task.
I dredged deep into my [Elemental Magic] skill to form a small candle fire on the tip of my finger. Instantly, my mental focus started dropping rapidly. Fire was the toughest to attune to out of all the four basic elements, because the attunement process required being surrounded by high amounts of the element. Consequently, it took all my focus and a huge portion of my mana to keep only a small flame going.
I quickly touched my fire-finger to the sticks and prayed they would be set aflame before my focus ran out. Thankfully, with a small crackle a stick started to burn, making me sigh in relief. I cut off my candle fire and grasped the stick delicately, using it to spread the fire to the other sticks.
Once the fire got going, I waited a minute for my focus to recover before continuing.
The next step in the process was to layer hardwood on top of the fire, filling up the kiln. I did so, placing all the chunks of wood I had into the earthen contraption. Finally, I used my earth manipulation magic to seal off the top, except for a few holes.
Flames quickly starting spurting out of those holes as the fire spread to the hardwood. Gases and volatile compounds were expelled from the wood and ignited, while steam wafted upwards in puffy clouds.
I took a step back and calculated if there would be a problem. Thankfully, the steam clouds weren’t very noticeable compared to the smoke coming out of the chimney nearby.
I also briefly exited the alleyway to see if my shadow illusion smothered the bright fire. To my relief, it did. My high-leveled [Illusion Magic Lv. 7] skill multiplied my illusion’s masking ability by 1.7, giving it enough power to hide a few spurts of flame.
Satisfied in the safety of the kiln, I decided to leave the area. The charcoal would take hours to finish, as the heat in a low-oxygen environment burned away volatile compounds and dehydrated the wood. As long as the oxygen flow was restricted, the actual charcoal itself wouldn’t burn away as well.
The longer I stayed hidden, the more chances of someone coming to find me, so it was better for me to leave. Besides, before I left I recast the shadow illusion with as much mana as I could pack into a single spell, increasing its duration. Incorporating [Mana Control Lv. 6] and [Mental Focus Lv. 7], that limit was a hefty 1.6*7^3, or 548, the maximum mana I could spend before using up all my mental focus.
Packing a spell with more mana didn’t increase its strength, which in this case was determined by [Illusion Magic Lv. 7] and my technique proficiency. Instead, adding mana allowed the spell to last longer, providing fuel for the 80 mana per hour drain.
Therefore, although I wasn’t skilled enough to maintain a connection to the illusion at larger distances, the spell wouldn’t fizzle out for almost six hours.
I waited a few minutes outside the alley to see if anyone had noticed my large magic use (larger channelings of mana were easier to detect with [Mana Sense]), but nobody came out to investigate. This camp was quite lax, it seemed, which suited me perfectly.
Time passed. I went to lunch, where I met up again with the other heroes. Vijay was there too, and for once he was an eager participant of the conversation- he was loud and proud about his ‘leadership training’. He’d gained the [Leadership] skill and that made him ecstatic.
After the meal, we split up again for individual training. However, as I was leaving the courtyard where soldiers were still finishing food, I was approached by a thin, brown-haired boy.
“Adam?” I asked in surprise. I didn’t think I’d ever talk to the frightful boy again.
“Y-yeah, hi Julius. Can you follow me?” Adam had his hands balled in his pockets, shoulders hunched inwards and head on a swivel. [Situational Awareness Lv. 5] took in his body language and set off an alarm in my head.
“What’s going on, Adam?” I asked gravely.
“Nothing!” he squeaked. “I just need to talk. Please.”
I stared the boy for a long, pregnant moment. Finally, I saw something in his eyes, something intangible that assuaged my fears of immediate danger. [Situational Awareness] calmed down to a low thrum.
“Sure,” I agreed. Still, once we barely turned a corner I stopped him. “That’s enough. We’re out of sight and hearing range.” If anything untoward happened, a whole courtyard of soldiers would storm over with just a yell.
Adam clearly wanted to move farther away from everyone else, but acquiesced when I put my palm on the hilt of my arming sword, subtly pushing him to get on with it. My halberd was strapped to my back, but even with just a sword I was putting a lot of pressure on the boy.
“Okay, okay, I’ll just start speaking.” Adam briefly met my eyes before switching back to staring at the ground. “The r-r-rebellion hopes you’ve had enough time to think things through.”
I’d expected something like this the instant Adam approached me, but the confirmation still sent my heart pumping. Adam was just a random boy I sat next to- I found it hard to believe that he was a rebel plant.
“Are you part of the rebellion?” I asked.
“No! I’m not. Don’t tell anyone that I am. I’m just a messenger,” Adam quickly pleaded.
I connected the dots. An actual rebel plant had seen me talk to Adam, perhaps even heard the question I asked him at breakfast. I’d miscalculated heavily; I hadn’t considered the possibility of eavesdropping skills. Anybody could’ve overheard my unsubtle probing.
Even now, I was making the same mistake.
“You know what? Let’s move a bit further away,” I said. Adam agreed readily, and we relocated to a place twice as far away.
“So? What does the rebellion want from me?” I whispered.
“It’s too late to be relocated,” Adam said. “However, they said you can support the cause in other ways. Specifically, information. The empire has been strictly screening anyone let into the palace.”
I hummed. If lie detection and other intelligence-based skills existed, it made sense that the palace would be impossible to infiltrate.
“What can I get in return?”
Adam replied, “The rebellion can smuggle in some things as incentive. Pretty much anything that’s small in size.” Then, a shadow passed over his face. “Please don’t reject them again.”
“What’ll happen if I do?” I pushed.
Adam refused to elaborate.
Silence was scarier than words. What would happen if I kept refusing to help the rebellion? Would they serve me Adam’s head on a platter? Would they ‘leak’ to the empire that I was a member of the rebellion?
I had to forcefully smother the nausea building in my stomach.
“Fine. Is there anything that could give me a temporary boost in strength?”
Adam’s face paled. “Alchemical potions have been declared heretical by the Church of the Holy Goddess.”
I’d learned that from the Defending Your Family From Heretics book I’d secretly read from the palace library. However, I was a Flamel. Alchemy was my domain, and no church would block it from me.
“But can it be done?”
“…yeah. The rebellion can get you a potion or two.”
It could be done. The only question was whether it was a good idea.