The three people continuously argue about how they should treat their savior Niko. Niko on the other hand isn’t interested in the conversation and starts to walk over to one of the dead goblin creatures.
Beginning his examination of the thing, Niko finds out that even though it has the body of a child, the goblin’s muscles are well toned and extremely defined. Also, looking inside of the head of the goblin, its brain is much bigger than Niko thought.
For such a small creature that is in its primitive stage, this goblin thing seems to have a well evolved brain that can give it the ability to think complexly and have amazing motor functions, but there seems to be something on it.
Continuing his search as the screaming keeps getting louder beside him, Niko finds some sort of circle with incoherent words on the brain of the goblin.
Even though the goblin is dead, this bright circle remains which baffles Niko as that means that something external from the goblin itself is keeping this circle active.
Niko’s hand reaches down and into the mashed brains of the goblin where the circle is but his hand simply passes through it, which confuses Niko anymore.
As his hand pass through the circle, it pushed a piece of brain aside and a glint of something shiny within the goblin’s brain catches Niko’s eyes.
Reaching further into the Goblin’s brains, Niko gets a firm hold of the small object and pulls it out of the pile of brains.
Niko sees a crystal like stone in his hand covered in blood, which he pulled straight from the goblins brain.
From his video game playing days, Niko assumes that this is some sort of loot drop that someone receives from a monster that they kill.
Niko wipes off the crystal with his shirt, staining the shirt in the process but there was already goblin blood all over him, so Niko doesn’t mind.
Niko pockets the crystal and gets up. Looking towards the three people he had saved, they are quiet now and have come to a compromise.
“So?” Niko says as in implying that he wants to know what they plan to do from now on. The kid named Evan is the first to speak up.
“First, we would like to introduce ourselves. I am Evan.”
The kid points towards himself.
“This is Emily.”
The kid points towards the woman with a rapier and recently battered armor.
“This is Belle.”
The kids points towards the woman who used fists to fight, who sits on the ground dejectedly.
“Yeah, I got that. I am Niko. All I want from you all is the way towards the exit of the cave, I seem to be lost.”
Niko’s bluntness catches the others off guard. Evan coughs to clear the atmosphere and starts talking once again.
“Well, *ahem*, we know the way out and we can take you there, but we need to complete our mission before we can leave this cave.”
“So what you’re saying is that I have to help you with whatever god knows what and then you’ll take me to the exit?”
Evan is once again caught off guard with how blunt Niko is and wryly smiles.
“Yes.”
“What is in it for me exactly?”
Niko narrows his eyes as these people most think he is dumb.
“We take you to the exit.”
Belle is the one to speak this time, albeit in a quiet voice. Niko looks at all three of them like they are dumb before chuckling and shaking his head.
“Well, whatever it is that you have to do, I believe you guys can go do it. If that’s my only reward then I’ll just be on my way and find my own way out.”
Emily’s eyes go wide as Niko starts to walk towards the darkness.
“Wait you can’t, you’ll die!”
Niko laughs and shakes his head again.
“I’m not dumb like you all, I can hide pretty well as you all know, plus I can tell you all are terrible at fighting compared to me.”
Of course this was all a bluff as Niko had no idea where he was, how to fight, or even how to use magic or whatever it is called that the kid used on Belle.
Evan bites his lip as he seems to think this is the truth.
“Well what can we give you as a reward, we don’t have much money and we don’t get a prize for our quest, so what do you want?”
Niko smiles as he thinks to himself, ‘Got em’.
“Well, in my village no one could use that power you were using when I saved you, so no one could teach me. Could you maybe teach me the basics?”
Evan’s eyes go wide and he smiles.
“You mean magic? So if I teach you the basics of magic then you’ll help us?!”
“Also show me where the exit is.”
“Deal.”
Evan is quick to make a deal with Niko and commands for each girl to take a direction of the cave and stand guard. Belle takes the way to Niko and Evan’s right, and Emily takes the left.
With both sides of the cave being covered, Evan begins to lecture Niko quickly about the basics of magic.
Niko is surprised as to how mature this kid is, while being extremely gullible and innocent.
After about 10 minutes, Evan finishes the lecture and Niko has a grasp about how magic generally works here.
Not everyone can use magic, but if you can, then somewhere in your body is a catalyst for magic. This body part is the input and output. If it is your right arm, then magic gathers in your right arm and is cast from your right arm. If you lose your right arm, then you can no longer cast magic and are considered a cripple.
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There are some items that can work as a catalyst in place of your body part, but these items are few and far between. Evan doesn’t have an item like that but his staff boost his output of magic slightly.
Also, everyone is born with an affinity to a certain kind or kinds of magic. In Evan’s case, he can only use healing magic but his affinity for it is low so he can only go so far with it. Now, Evan is explaining how to find out which body part in your body is the catalyst.
“Sit down likes this and close your eyes.”
Niko sits down beside Evan and closes his eyes like Evan instructs.
“Now I will be touching your body and it might hurt but don’t be afraid, I won’t harm you.”
Niko nods his head but slightly opens his eyes enough to see Evan but not enough for Evan to notice if his eyes are closed or not.
Small green lights flood to Evan’s hand and he reaches out towards Niko. Seeing that the kid doesn’t have a weapon, Niko completely closes his eyes and calms his mind. As Evan touches Niko on his chest, Niko can feel a cooling sensation enter his body and begin to float around.
Silence permeates the cave as Niko and Evan are in full concentration mode. The cooling sensation goes around Niko’s blood stream before it finally finds its way to Niko’s heart.
Instantly, Niko’s heart starts to beat fast and all of the coolness is brought to Niko’s heart and absorbed by it hungrily. On top of that, more cool feeling sensations come from Evan that feed Niko’s greedy heart.
To Niko this feels amazing, but to Evan this is horrifying. Evan tries to pull away but no matter how hard he tries, Evan can’t. On top of that, Niko seems to be forcefully pulling out mana from Evan.
Evan’s mana pool is not that big to begin with and as Niko takes more and more of it away, Evan can feel his consciousness fading.
Right when Evan was getting ready to pass out due to mana draught, Niko’s heart stops taking mana and explodes with power. Bright yellow clocks form behind Niko and nearly fill the whole cave system with light.
The nocturnal creatures within the cave start rampaging as the light burns their sensitive eyes. The light also manages to make its way outside of the cave and shoots a beam of yellow aura into the sky, bathing the entire area within a mile in blinding light.
Even the monitors that the panel of judges are viewing seem to be useless as the light causes Niko’s whole monitor to be solid white mixed with yellow.
Some of the judges stand in surprise, other judges are not surprised at all as they have witnessed how strong a chronomancer can be.
Even the fairy that only wanted to sleep woke up and stared around in surprise.
After a solid minute of blinding light, the light started to condense and rushed back towards Niko’s body.
Niko was unaware of all of this as he was feeling complete bliss that numbed his mind.
Once all the light re-entered Niko’s body, a loud poof emitted from within him.
Niko opens his eyes and it’s like he has a whole new body. The coolness now has a shape and it is in the shape of malleable matter that Niko can play with on a whim. His blood stream is full of mana and it seems to be seeping into his very core.
With each pump of his heart, new blots of mana appear that are being sucked in from the outside world. Niko looks around and can streams of mana flowing within the cave system they are in. The mana floats through the air effortlessly.
Niko is wide eyed by the spectacle of a white river of light flowing through the cave, but when Niko looks around him, he is stunned.
Everyone around him is asleep or knocked out, Niko cannot tell, but what really stuns Niko is that he can see in the darkness clear as day.
Niko remembers there being only a small torch near the group as a source of light but now Niko can see all the way down the cave until it bends to the right.
Niko gets up and his body feels lighter, and he knows that his body can now achieve speeds that was not possible before.
Is this what it is like to be able to use magic? What a wonderful spectacle!
Niko has a wide smile on his face and he picks up his old longsword.
Well, I’ll stay on guard until these three wake up, especially since the little one is the reason that I’m like this now.
It isn’t long before Evan wakes up after passing out once Niko nearly sucked all the mana out of Evan. The young boy rubs his head and looks around disorientated, unable to remember what has happened to him.
All Evan can see is darkness unfortunately. Evan does a short incantation and soon a soothing green light emits from Evan’s hand, lighting up the boy’s surroundings.
First, Evan sees Belle and Emily laying not more than 5 feet away from Evan.
Next, the smell of blood hits Evan’s nose and he soon finds the source. Bodies of goblins are stacked in a pile 10 high and 10 wide, with Niko sitting beside it, his shirt ripped and bloodied. Not a single scratched is on Niko’s skin though and his face is blankly staring at the ceiling in boredom. Evan slowly gets up as his body is still fatigued and recovering from earlier and Niko finally notices Evan is awake.
“Hey kid, you’re finally awake.”
Niko flashes a grin at Evan. Evan flashes an awkward smile back and then rubs his head again.
“What happened, my memory is fuzzy.”
“Well, you went to find out which part of my body was a catalyst, and then I think you found it. I don’t remember much either but I remember all of the sudden waking up feeling different but you guys were all asleep. I decided to stay here and watch over you but while asleep goblins keep showing up and well…”
Niko motions over to the pile of dead goblins with his hand.
“You can guess the rest.”
Evan is shocked about how Niko was able to deal with so many goblins by himself and then Evan remembers that Niko had said that he could survive in this cave by himself, and now Evan truly believes this.
“So you protected us while we slept, but don’t know what caused us to fall asleep?”
“Correct.”
Evan sighes and tries to think of a reason they fell asleep and Evan’s mana is gone, but Evan just can’t think of one.
“Well did you at least find out your catalyst?”
“Yeah, it seems to be my heart.”
“Y-your heart, are you sure?!”
Evan stutters and stares at Niko in amazement. Niko raises a curious eyebrow since he doesn’t understand why Evan is acting this way about it.
“You might have stuttered but I did not, yes it is my heart.”
Evan’s hand touches covers his mouth in amazement and he looks at Niko like he is a god.
“You, you are a Tier 5 Mage! The legendary Tier 5 Mage! I can’t believe it!”
Evan is yelling in excitement at this point and Niko has truly become an icon of amazingness within Evan’s heart. Niko doesn’t like Evan’s reaction though as Niko feels like the kid is overreacting.
“I guess? What does that even mean?” Niko asks, curious on why Tier 5 Mage is so good.
“So the body part that is your catalyst determines your potential in the future. Tier 1 Mages have fingers or toes as a catalyst. Tier 2 Mages have an arm or legs as a catalyst. Tier 3 Mages will have both arms or both legs as a catalyst, while as Tier 4 Mages with have all of their limbs as a catalyst. Tier 5 mages on the other hand, have a vital organ as a catalyst.”
Evan explains the tier system for mages enthusiastically to Niko. Niko still doesn’t get why have a vital organ would change anything.
“So what’s so special about having a vital organ as a catalyst.”
“Well, usually Tier 4 Mages and below have two affinities with magic at most, while Tier 5 can usually use all types of magic. On top of that, each Tier 5 Mage has a special power that is related to the organ that is their Catalyst.”
“Can you give an example?”
“Sure, there once was a Tier 5 Mage who had his stomach as a catalyst. His stomach was equivalent to a black hole and the mage could eat anything. Magic, people, and even light itself. It is said that this Tier 5 Mage could eat a mountain with one bite.”
Hearing that, Niko’s heart skips a beat once finding out just how powerful a Tier 5 Mage can be.
“So what is my special magic?” Niko asks with excitement.
“I… I don’t know. I’ve never heard of someone having their heart as a catalyst.”
Damn, I was hoping he would say something extraordinary. I can ask the fairy if she can find out. She is asleep on my back under my shirt, so I’ll just have to ask her when I wake up.
Niko thinks back to when he got close to the people originally, the fairy had moved from his shoulder to under his shirt and unto his back as to not be seen. No matter how much he moved, she never fell off of her spot either.
GUUUYYAAAAHH~!
A roar emits through the cave and causes Evan to hold his eardrums in anguish due to the power of the roar.
“Well I guess no more time to talk, something strong is coming our way.”
When Niko looks down the cave and puts a little bit of mana in his eyes, he is able to see a dark red mist that has a deadly aura full of strength. Seeing such a strong opponent for the first time doesn’t instill Niko with fear, but instead of excitement for what is to come!