Jahn’s home was full of Divine Artists he had selected from the academy. The layout of the home was similar to that of his brother so there was a large, square table separating Jahn from the students. “I’ve brought you here because there is an important matter that must be done. The villager known as Noki has brought great shame to both Watercliff and the Okari name. You are to bring him back to the village so that the execution can be carried out.”

“But uncle,” Mion said, “he’s a nobody. Executions like that are reserved only for Divine Artists.” Mion had a red chimera pelt covering the upper right half of his body and an accompanying pelt around his waist. “ That Null deserves death by my hands.”

Mion’s lackeys stood behind him in agreement, along with the six other Divine Artists. One of them, a light-skinned girl with curly brown hair and amber eyes, spoke up. “Head Chief, I must agree with Mion. Wouldn’t it be simpler to just kill him and bring his head back as proof?”

“You don’t need to worry about the details, just be sure to bring him back alive.” Jahn circulated his Tera and laced it with his intent. “Is that understood?”

“Absolutely,” the girl said as she immediately bowed. Sweat formed on her brow and her breathing caught. The other Divine Artists bowed and hung their heads down so as to not show the discomfort on their faces.

“Good, now prepare yourselves. You are to leave immediately.”

The room cleared out except for Mion. “You promised that I would have had the chance to kill Baira, and now she’s gone.”

Jahn ignored his nephew’s complaints. How had it all gone so wrong? All of his planning and dealing was just eradicated in a matter of moments. His brother was supposed to die fighting the scourbeast he had been training in secret; a particularly nasty experiment of his that imbued a scourbeast with the properties of a living chimeric beast. He was fortunate that Bain was still recovering Tera from building the barrier, otherwise he would have sensed the gap he had placed in the barrier to allow entry in the first place. It would take months to create another scourbeast like that, and he wasn’t sure his partner would take too kindly to his failure.

“Uncle! Did you hear me?” Mion was standing next to Jahn , “ a guard just stopped by and said Kolo Amani hasn’t been to her quarters.”

Of course she hadn’t, she’d be a fool to do so after insinuating she knew of his scheme. “The Kolo will be dealt with by me, you are to go and bring the boy back.”

There was a finality in Jahn’s tone that told Mion to drop the subject. Mion was an arrogant boy that viewed the world like most Divine Artists in his village; the strong make the rules and the weak follow. Living by that motto, if anyone who he perceived as weaker than him dared to give him orders, he’d brutally remind them the way of the world. It is that logic that prevented him from pressing his uncle further; that and the fact that he viewed his uncle as more of a father than his own. He had gone with the plan to attack the village, knowing full well that his father could die, because he believed in the future his uncle had promised; one where those who were weak were excised from the village.

“I will find him,” Mion said,” and I will bring his broken body back to the village.” Mion took one step and was at the entrance of Jahn’s house. He turned around, bowed, and left in an instant.

Jahn stood up and walked to a hidden door within the wooden wall, He placed his hand along its surface and channeled his dark green Tera into it. The door opened to a room covered in endless black and purple mist; signs of forbidden Tera being used.

“I’ll need more time, there’s been a complication,” Jahn said into the swirling void. There were no words relayed to him, only intent. It felt like hot coals were pressing against his skin as the mist snaked around his body; they were disappointed. “I’ve made so much progress! Once I retrieve what’s been taken, we can continue with the plan.”

The mists swirled around him and now Jahn felt as if miniature Ice Spirits were climbing up his spine. “Please, I am loyal to your mission, I just-” The mist burrowed itself inside of Jahns body and overpowered his Mind Kulda. It felt like a steel blade was running across his brain. He was helpless to stop the mist from seeing everything going on in his mind; the more it dug, the worse the pain felt. The only solace Jahn had was the fact that he was a Greater Iron Soul, his mind had been fortified to handle intrusion and not break. Still, the searing pain was quickly testing his tolerance.

Suddenly, the searing of his brain stopped and he was overwhelmed by a sensation of calm. New thoughts were planted in his head and the mist ejected itself from his body. “Yes, I see now, that is an excellent plan. I’ll make the arrangements.” Jahn walked out of the room and the door behind him closed before melting back into the wall. He then let his Tera explode around him, sending everything around him blasting away. Anger laced the energy and a few of the villages a hundred feet away dropped to their knees in a panic.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

Jahn quickly regained his composure and went to summon a messenger.

Noki took in a deep breath as he sat on the black stone of the cavern with his back against the wall. He had somehow survived being pursued by four Iron Body Soul Artists and was grateful for his ascension. His old body wouldn’t have even let him see their attacks let alone allow for him to escape unscathed; well, relatively unscathed. One of the guards managed to cut him in the thigh and the other in the right shoulder, which is why he was now recovering in the cavern instead of completing his escape.

Something was wrong though.

Between running for his life and swimming to reach his secret tunnel, Noki should have been exhausted. Earthen Soul is the lowest level of ascension so even if he was vastly stronger and more durable than before, he was still two levels below the guards. What’s more, the wounds he suffered weren’t healing at all. “I don’t get it, I can get stabbed in the chest and be fine, but a few cuts on my body and I’m hiding in a cavern?” Noki tried to stand, but the pain in his arm and leg hadn’t subsided. There was a trail of blood starting from the lip of the small pool of water, all the way to where Noki sat. The white of his wounded arm and leg were dyed crimson.“There’s definitely something up with these wounds, the bleeding stopped but it still feels like I’m being cut.”

Noki closed his eyes but didn’t engage in any meditation;instead, he focused on the lessons the other Amani had taught him.

“There were three main kuldas,” Amani said,” Mind Kulda, Body Kulda and Spirit Kulda. Mind and Body Kulda form at the same time since they are inextricably linked and both need Tera for them to work.”

“I thought the cores were made of Tera, shouldn’t they always be working?”

“I don’t know what you’re saying but I can tell that you’re interrupting me,” Amani said, “I didn’t have the time to make this memory construct intuitive so don’t ask questions.” Noki grunted but allowed for the lavender construct to continue. “ When you ascended, you developed a Mind and Body Kulda, though for some reason your Body Kulda seems to draw in more Tera naturally than your Mind. As the name implies, Body Kulda pertains to the physical side of things and uses Tera to enhance your overall body; think reflexes, strength, recovery, any physical ability.”

“Oh, so then if i put more Tera in my Body Kulda, I can increase my physical ability even more?” Noki had said that more to himself than Amani. It had never occurred to him that his Earthen Soul was capable of getting stronger without ascension to Stone.

Amani repeated her warning message before continuing with the lesson. “ Mind Kulda is what allows for your senses to be heightened in a more abstract sense. It allows not only for Divine Arts to see scourbeasts and other spirits, but also makes it so you’re able to grasp concepts quickly. Together, the two feed into each other and allow you to use traits of one with the other. For example, Divine Sight uses both Body and Mind Kulda to give you greater clarity in both the abstract and the physical realm.”

“That’s it!” Noki thought to himself as he let the memory fade away, “ I should be using Divine Sight.” Now he used River Circulating Meditation to send his Tera to his mind. It took him a bit longer to do without the influence of the Memory Construct to guide him, but when it finally reached the purple core at the base of his skull, he opened his eyes and the world came to life with Tera.

The nearly pitch black cavern was now only dimly lit and Noki could see as if he had spirit bulbs with him. Brown and green Tera rippled from the cavern floor and walls and flowed into the blue Tera of the lake. White Tera was streaming from the surface of his skin like steam and was mixed with a pale orange. Noki followed the streams of orange Tera back to his wounds and saw a thick patch of orange covering them. It looked like someone had condensed a flame into an ointment and rubbed his wounds with it. He placed a hand over his thigh and could somehow feel a warmth coming from it.

“This has to be what’s causing the pain, no doubt about it.” Immediately Noki encased his body in his Tera and guided it towards the injured spots. He had no knowledge of using Tera to heal his wounds, but he did know a thing or two about treating physical wounds thanks to years of dealing with other Divine Artists. “It's important to clean wounds first before dressing them, at least that’s the case for physical wounds, so if I can clear out this…foreign Tera, I should be able to…”

Noki emptied his Body Kulda and sent it all throughout his body, since he lacked the control to send it only to the afflicted areas. Once the Tera reached the wounds, he encased himself in Tera and slowly ate at the foreign Tera with his own. The orange Tera broke down into dust and drifted in the air before completely disappearing. Immediately afterwards, the wounds on his arm and thigh began to heal. “Finally,” Noki said as he braced himself against the wall and climbed to his feet, “I can get out of here now.” He knew he needed to meditate in order to cultivate more Tera into his core, but he also knew that the guards would eventually find this place after what he just did. Noki hated the fact that he still couldn’t fight back, at least not against Irons, but used that anger to steel his body and make his way to the end of the tunnel.

Months ago, Noki had decided he would leave the village and find someone to teach him the ways of the Divine Artist. He had secretly found this tunnel and began digging with his hands each day for hours while everyone else was at school; it was why anytime he met with Baira, his hands and arms were covered in cuts. Baira had followed him once and together they found a secret stream that led to a different side of the Red Forest, though at Baira’s behest Noki didn’t follow it out of the village. He stared down the man-made slope and heard the flowing waters of the river beneath. Taking a deep breath, Noki leapt into the river below and rode the current to the Red Forest.