My protest to Nicanor that physical training takes time away from developing magical prowess soon fails to hold water. The constant exercise on the road shows me the error of my ways as my muscles and tendons are punished, refined, rebuilt. I’m stronger than ever, surprising even my brother the last time we wrestled.
The memory of Mikko’s eyebrows raised in shock when I flipped him makes me smile. He’d wasted no time pinning me afterward, but I’ll take whatever victories I can get right now. Heaven only knows how long I’ll struggle to win against Nicanor. Fighting him feels like trying to dig up a mountain of solid rock one tea-spoon at a time. At least my Skills are also advancing, no doubt thanks to the constant practice while we run and spar.
Like every day for the last three weeks, I find myself running after my new trainer with a heavy rock in each hand. Breathe for a four count. Hold for a four count. Release for a four count. Hold for a four count. Breathe—my thoughts echo Nicanor’s commands as I move, and I refuse to break the pattern no matter how much my lungs scream for air.
[Vitrification] transforms the rocks as we race up hills and across plains, but I’m manually modulating the magic, limiting the transmutation to a thin layer of glass at a time. Stumbling down steep, rocky ravines and scrambling back up fallen logs slippery with the spray of river rapids forces me to split my attention between running and magic, and I’m falling behind my relentless trainer.
I set my jaw and pick up the pace. Nicanor won’t be able to outrun me forever. I’ll catch him before dinner. Once I have enough glass, I’ll recreate the last three of my animated flying creatures. I need to replenish the rest of the golems I lost at sea while fighting the terrifying [Death Mage] Tapirs.
A rock smacks me in the chest.
“Unsporting!” I shout, twitching out of the way of the next pebble the irascible [Spear Commander] throws at me. I avoid the next half dozen flings, but I’m more embarrassed than annoyed about the first hit. I let my focus drift. Can’t afford to slack. No time, not if the rumors Nicanor’s guards were murmuring about are true. Agents among the Royal army are “randomly" testing allegiance, taking over from the [Inquisitors], who have always served the realm and not a single interest.
Not that the [King] is likely to agree with my analysis, I admit with a wry smile.
Subdued laughter floats back to me on the breeze, but the barrage of rocks stops. The [Spear Commander] has made his point. My focus sharpens, and I flood my body with as much mana as it can handle, trying harder to catch up again. Nicanor sets a hard pace, upping his speed by nearly half again each week, and my veins burn with the effort of keeping up. I can’t believe I thought I’d outshine the old soldier just because my mana reserves were far deeper and more potent.
Twenty minutes later, he takes pity on me and settles into a jog that’s still as fast as the average horse galloping. We never stop moving completely. This is simply his version of taking a break.
“Make the rest of your creatures when we return to camp tonight,” Nicanor instructs, nodding down at the half-formed lumps of glass in my hands.
“I can multitask. Just lost track—”
He shakes his head. “This isn’t a reprimand. I need you to make weapons instead. We’re far enough from camp to go through a few forms.”
He’s sparing me the prying eyes of his bodyguards, who like giving me pointed feedback on my losses to Nicanor. The sparring matches are a nightly ritual, which means I’m subjected to their heckling just as frequently. Locked out of my more destructive magic, I’m finding that my martial fundamentals are decent, but inadequate against a trained warrior.
I nod and unleash the constraints on my Skill, shifting the remaining rock into glass in the blink of an eye. The raw material floats upward as I consider my armaments. Magic pools around me, so thick it almost congeals in the air thanks to my compressed Domain, and I imprint the shape of a sword and shield on the glass. In a heartbeat, weapons emerge, ready to use and sturdy enough to hold up in a fight.
Unbreakable ensures that the paper-thin rondell shield will hold up to the vicious cuts and thrusts of Nicanor’s spear, while sharpness promises to leave at least a tiny slice on his unnaturally-tough skin if I can get past his guard.
If.
Rapid-fire lunges test my stance. I catch each probing attack on the shield I created. My hands sting with the vibrations, but I keep the shield up over my eyes and crouch, bracing. The shock of impact shoves me back a step with each stab. Nicanor hits like a runaway bull, but the worst part is I know he’s just warming up. His body is coiled like a spring, tight and compact, leaving me without a target.
Not that I have time to counterattack!
Dancing around me in a graceful semicircle, he tests my defenses with strikes that flash in the late-afternoon sun. Each bone-rattling strike requires mana to withstand; without constant empowering magic to strengthen me, I’d break a bone or tear a muscle. I know from experience. Only a Menders outpost nearby saved me from lingering damage.
Abruptly, the pressure relents. I gulp in a breath, shifting my stance and sliding into the soft, floating through my long-neglected practice of the footwork of the golden eagle martial style and striking back with a blur of overhand cuts. Weathering the [Spear Commander]’s opening onslaught of blows marks a new milestone in my training, but I’ll not rest until I give as good as I get.
[Fault Finder] activates for a split second, piggybacking on the back of my Domain to work at a distance. Mana sings, and I accelerate forward on empowered legs, led toward the potential weak spot in his stance my Skill says might break with enough force.
The blade clangs off the haft of his spear so hard that it shakes itself to pieces, fracturing into dozens of glittering pieces despite the unbreakable imbuement. I growl in frustration at my Skill failing.
“You’re holding up suspiciously well,” Nicanor drawls. His eyes crinkle, showing off a tiny network of lines brought on by his slight smile. “Stopped training your other Skills while we fight, I take it?”
“Guilty,” I admit. “Doesn’t seem to be working, either. I should have kept pushing them like you suggested.”
“Sure it’s not working? I’ll need to mend my jacket,” Nicanor says, tapping a finger to the rent in his jacket where I’d attacked him.
“But you blocked it!” I say dumbly.
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“Burned a defensive Skill for the first time in our fights,” the [Spear Commander] grumbles. He plants the butt of his spear on the ground. “You’re improving, Nuri. Bleed me twice more and it will be time to head back to camp.”
The words scarcely leave his lips before I lunge forward, striking out with my shield while I try my latest trick. Overcharging [Greater Heat Manipulation], I forcibly melt the entire shield as quickly as possible, holding the glass in place with my Domain so that it doesn’t explode under the intense surge of mana. Blinding flashes accompany the burning heat, like a second sun made manifest between us.
The remnants of the shield shift into a slender lance, pressed into shape by my Domain as I bear down on the glass. I don’t bother to call on unbreakable, opting only to drench the working in sharpness. I won’t need it again if my plan works.
Nicanor’s spear whips around to intercept my strike, moving too quickly for my eyes to follow. I track it through my Domain, all too aware that my desperate speed is still too slow. It smashes through the glass spear, shattering it instantly.
He shifts his weight at the last second as the needle tip continues its furious momentum, born along by the force of my will. Technically, I’m cheating, using magic to complete the thrust, but it’s only for a heartbeat.
My gamble pays off. A small starburst of red blossoms on his shoulder, and he hisses in pain—real pain—for the first time since our fights began.
A second later, he rolls his shoulders and grins. It’s the last thing I see before tumbling head over heels and colliding with the ground a dozen paces away.
Every fiber of my being screams in sure anticipation of agony, but as I draw in a deep, shuddering breath, I realize that I’m relatively unharmed. Oh, the blow stings, but he didn’t break bones or sever joints.
I got off easy.
“Risky. Now you’re unarmed.”
“Against anyone else, that’s a killing blow,” I venture, knowing it sounds an awful lot like an excuse. I drag a fallen branch closer to me, preparing to cast [Vitrification] on it and prepare a defense against his inevitable attack.
Ever full of surprises, Nicanor tosses his spear aside and flops to the ground, groaning as he sprawls out and massages his shoulder where I stabbed him. “Wish I could gainsay you, but I can count the number of warriors who’d survive that on two hands. You’ll owe my guards an apology when we return.”
I raise an eyebrow. “Does that have something to do with the pulse of mana that shot in their direction when I hit you?”
He nods, a strikingly heavy look on his face. “They’re [Honorbound Bodyguards]. That’s not for show. We’ll have to find another Mender, or pick up a healing salve in the next town.”
“Damage redirection?” I ask, although it’s more of a statement than a question. Nothing else fits his description.
“A life for a life,” he says.
The solemn statement hangs between us. I shiver involuntarily as fear grips me. “No. I didn’t—they’re going to be all right, won’t they?”
“Injured, not dead,” Nicanor confirms after tilting his head to the side for a moment.
I slump back in relief. I’ve got enough blood on my hands lately; I don’t need to add more from my allies. If [Chief Inquisitor] Xharrote is right about Tapirs returning and the impending war against the loyal factions, then we’re going to cut through lives like a farmer’s scythe through wheat.
“Glad to hear he’s not dead,” I get out after a hard swallow.
A hint of a smile. “Same here.”
I smile back at the usually-reserved Commander, who’s climbing to his feet, his spear twirling in his hands. “You know, I don’t feel like fighting much anymore.”
“Fine. You’ll need to hit me four times next bout,” he says, scowling at giving up the spar before I reach the requisite .
The menace rolling off him is palpable, and I take a step back before firming my resolve and squaring up, lifting my branch up defiantly. It’s sparse and mostly stripped of bark, with only a single leaf still clinging to tenuous life.
Nicanor laughs. “Put away the stick, boy. Your fighting spirit is improving. We’ll jog back instead of running. We’ve got to discuss your Skills.”
That catches my attention. My voice cracks like I’m a half a decade younger, betraying me in my excitement. “You heard back from Central?”
“Just before we left,” Nicanor confirms. “I intended to dangle that discussion in front of you as a carrot so you’d fight harder, but that last attack actually caught me off guard. I didn’t know you could reshape your glass that quickly. Will we have to update your Skill list already?”
I shake my head. “No [Glass Manipulation] to go with my [Heat Manipulation], unfortunately. That would be convenient, but I had to freeform the glass.”
Nicanor grunts, sounding impressed. “You melted it down and reshaped it on the fly?”
“Yep. Takes a lot of focus, though. I don’t know if it’s viable in a fight other than as a surprise attack right now,” I say as I walk faster, breaking into a trot to keep up.
“Once we rank up your Skills and you break through, then I imagine you’ll have an easier time of it. Save it for a finisher until then.”
I pick up the pace as we hop down a sloped field of shoulder-high boulders strewn about the path, the remains of an old rock slide most likely, and draw abreast with Nicanor. “Acknowledged.”
He grins at my sidelong look, no doubt noticing how twitchy I am. “Getting anxious?”
“Stop drawing things out. I thought Ezio had a flair for the dramatic, but you’re ten times worse.”
“Excellence in all things,” he replies, nodding happily. “Fine. Here’s the recommendation from the Skills specialist I contacted. It won’t be easy, and you’ll lose a few minor Skills, but the extra pressure the new ones will exert will more than make up for the trade-off. Take a gander.”
I draw in a sharp breath as a ghostly page hovers in front of my sight. Whatever message Nicanor received must have been highly magical, and likely encrypted for Royal army use only. I’m amazed that the spell is flexible enough to allow him to share an ethereal copy.
I read through the recommendations in a rush, barely keeping an eye on the path ahead of me as we meander through a forest. Tripping over a root right in front of Nicanor would be an embarrassing way to end this training run, so I slow down a bit and take in my surroundings even though my focus is on the list of Skill combinations and annotations, which opens up possibilities I’ve never dreamed of before:
NURI SHAHI SKILL LIST
[Greater Heat Manipulation] + [Quick Cool] (Greater control and strength.)
[Arcane Domain: My Eyes Shall Pierce the Veil] + [Fault Finder] + [Legacy of the Scalpel] (Impact the physical and metaphysical world through forcible use of Domain — attack vectors possible.)
[Glass Animation] + [Adjuration of the Phoenix] (Explore mana bonds and golemancy.)
[Sanctuary of Glass] + [Greater Endurance] + [Lesser Resistance: Mental Strain] (Body tempering applications in combat in addition to battlefield shelters. Powerful potential for surviving attacks!)
[Artisanal Acuity] + [Compositional Analysis] + [A Perfect Prototype] + [A Master’s Touch: Thirty Seconds of Greatness] + [Vitrification] (Likely to earn a manipulation Skill; extreme combat potential based on classified autopsy reports of the disgraced unorthodox researcher known as Scalpel.)
“Five Skills seems low to exert enough pressure,” I say after we put another mile or two behind us and I have more time to process the information. “Will I still be able to push into the Second Threshold?”
Nicanor grunts in affirmation. “It would be for the average person, but each one will be a greater Skill at the peak of Gold or even crossing the line to Platinum, considering their unique nature.”
“Central didn’t recognize them all?”
“With respect, we don’t usually analyze crafters,” Nicanor says, turning to smirk at me. “The ranks are my colleague’s private guess, off record. And no, I didn’t pass along the exact ranks, in case our transmission was intercepted. I’ll bet they’re close.”
I nod. “Spot on. A few are higher caliber. I might be able to hit mid-Platinum with some of these combinations. You know Tapirs already has a dossier on me, though. Why would it matter if he knew my exact rank?”
Nicanor doesn’t answer right away. He picks up the pace, running after all, and we move in swift silence for a time.
“We’ll mask your strength with an artifact. Best to keep you our hidden blade,” Nicanor says at last. “Now look sharp. We’re almost back to camp, and you’ve got an army of golems to create. Get a bird in the skies and scout ahead. You owe us another visit to a [Healer].”
Despite how guilty the reminder of the [Honorbound Bodyguard]’s wounds make me, I can’t help but puff out my chest in pride at my progress. I nod toward my brother and the Linas in greeting when we find our squad set up for camp in a forest glade. A smile twitches on my lips. Today, I cut Nicanor.
Tomorrow, I’ll make a [Death Mage] bleed.