Chapter 61

“Did you get what you wanted?” Xan asked as we made our way back to the Inn, hopefully.

“You walked out without even knowing whether or not I got what I wanted? It was the whole point of us being there,” I said.

“I might have gotten carried away a little,” Xan said in what I would could consider an embarrassed voice for him.

“Might? A little?”

“Just answer the question, did you or didn’t you?”

“He said he can enhance the durability of my staffs at fifty-gold a piece,” I replied.

“And…”

I looked at him accusingly, “I don’t have that kind of gold. I’ll find another way to get the staffs to work.”

“But I was there, why didn’t you ask me to cover for it?”

“And increase my debt to you?”

“Investment,” he pointed out.

“Whatever, it’s already above six-hundred golds. Anything less of the finals, and I’d still be in debt. I can’t have it go any higher.”

I couldn’t believe that I had readily agree to the so called investment, especially after swearing off any such debts after the Baronies fiasco.

“You added the book and pen?”

“I failed to pay for the meal.”

“Ooh… right. I didn’t realize you were that low.”

“I’m always that low.”

“But I’m taking care of the armor,” he said as he looked at the puncture in the torsoplate. “No arguments about that, though I would have preferred to take care of the weapon. It’s the more important element.”

He stared at the puncture again before shaking his, “How was your fight easy? First you broke your staff, then you got skewed through the torso, what else happened?”

He turned to me then, giving me a very serious stare, “What exactly did you do to your opponent that made the spectators think the fight was easy for you? Because looking at the evidence, it looks like you were the one getting battered.”

“You know spectator views are always in favor of one competitor or another, you just happened to sit across one who favored me,” I told him.

Just the mere thought of someone rooting for me, an anonymous blob of flesh out there thinking that I was a great fighter had me belching. Boni and the others was one thing, I had gotten used to them, developed something akin to a bond, so I expected it. But these others, it just felt all wrong.

“Wait, why bother with the armor? It barely did anything for me in that fight,” I said when I recalled what he had just said before the topic went to how easy, or not, my fight had been.

“It’s not that it didn’t work, it just that it met with something it was completely weak against,” Xan said.

“Weak against? You mean the icy cold projectile?” I asked for clarification. I didn’t know squash about armor, and I wasn’t going to pretend otherwise.

“The way you explained it, I think it was a combination of both a physical ice and a Mana attack, both of which your leather armor couldn’t do anything about,” he said.

“I don’t remember explaining that to you,” I said, and I was sure of it. It hadn’t been that long, I would have remembered, right?

“Someone did, what does it matter?”

Accuracy, factuality and truth; the tenets of a peaceful, stress-free life.

“So, what can it protect against?” I asked.

“Hmm… I’m not sure,” he simply said.

I looked at him flabbergasted, what kind of answer was that. “Why did we purchase it then?”

“You’re the one that wanted it,” he replied.

I couldn’t believe it, some of the debt, investment, I had incurred was completely worthless to me. I felt like bludgeoning myself to death. Why? Why do that to myself? The debt, not the bludgeoning.

I stopped at an interjection that I knew would take me to the library, “I think I’m going to the library.”

“Now? What for?” Xan asked as he came to a stop near me.

“I need to find a way to do something about my staffs before the next fight,” I said.

“Right… but can’t you have a meal before you go? You know how you get immersed in there, you might forget it altogether.”

“I’m fine, besides, I don’t plan on staying there for long,” I told him.

“That’s what you say now,” he said, but he gave up arguing further, instead saying, “At least give me your torsoplate so I can have it repaired before your next fight.”

“Hee! But then I will be walking around naked,” I exclaimed.

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“Stop overacting, you won’t be naked, you’ll have your shirt on.”

“That’s being naked to me,” I countered. With the hole left by the icy projectile and the blood stain around it, it was most definitely worse than walking around just in my shirt.

In the end, I ended up going to the Inn, first to change to more street appropriate clothes, and hand over the torsoplate to Xan. Since I was there, I decided to have a light meal before heading over to the library.

My goal in the library was singular, to read on how to make my staffs as hard as steel. There would be no looking at cool pictures in the books, or reading about stories of persons past. I quickly picked up the books I wanted and secured myself a cubicle and dived in.

Making my staff more durable wasn’t that hard, especially if you had already managed to learn to create Mana channels it, which I had. The problem was with the level of mastery required in Mana channels for me to be able to reliably use them for something like what I wanted.

But even with such a drawback, I still pored myself into reading about it, with the belief that it wouldn’t hurt to try. I was already set to lose a staff for every fight or so, I hadn’t even figured out why the first one had broken. Maybe it had been managed poorly, made from an inferior wood, or maybe I had used it improperly. It could be anything really.

I read about all the intentions that were necessary to achieve the end results I wanted, how to picture and visualize them, and how to correctly use that Mana in the staff. The book claimed that it was best to use Mana that already had all those intentions imbued into it to create the base Mana channel framework in the staff. In other words, I needed to build the staff from the ground up already investing in the qualities I wanted in it.

After a few hours in the library, I finally called it quits when I found myself dozing off more than I was reading. With the competition already rolling, I knew I couldn’t afford to not let my body rest when it needed to. I packed up my notebook with the few scribbles I had written on it, and the not so legible scribbles, and made my way back to the Inn. Nightfall hadn’t arrived yet, but it was fast approaching. I quickly had a heavy meal before heading to my room, I didn’t want to wake up in the middle of the night already famished.

…

The following day, I immediately went to the Ithima training facility to work on some of my lacking areas. The first round fight had brought to my attention a few issues, such as my inferior [Strength], I was sure that I had the lowest in the whole competitor batch, my [Agility] too was a bit lackluster, I had felt a little sluggish during the fight. Given, I had been faster and more agile than my opponent, but I was sure that wouldn’t stay the case.

I found the facility empty, either because it was too early, before sunrise, or the other competitors were a little out of it after the first round, highly doubtful. I knew that the ones who had had their fights later in the day might not make it early, but I expected the earlier ones to be there. My fight was the second one, what could be more earlier than that?

After going through a light weight warm up routine, I went through the weights until I found ones that felt like the ones I had used in the field, and then went a tad higher. I was looking to gain [Strength], and that meant working out with heavier and heavier weights. I could barely go through three reps of the weights I settled on, either because I had gone through nearly all the weights below them and my muscles were tired, or I was simply that weak.

After a few sets that worked nearly all my major muscle groups and left my whole body shaking, I settled down to work on my [Mana Cultivation] as my body recovered somewhat. It took me close to an hour before I felt ready for another go at a physical exercise.

I picked up my staff and approached one of the spiked dummies, intending to work on my [Agility]. From the looks of it, I assumed it helped one hone in their reflexes and I needed that, maybe spending all that time in the field hadn’t been good for me after all.

Remembering what had happened with my first round opponent, I began slow and cautious. I knew that the management of the training facilities took into account the kind of damage competitors could deal when they designed and constructed the dummies, but it was possible there were rules against going full throttle on them. Though, I didn’t see how that would help the competitors train themselves.

As time stretched on and the dummy proved itself resilient, I moved the staff faster, adding more and more power behind each strike. I don’t how long I kept going, but I stopped when my staff started producing the same creaking sounds it had during the first round. It wouldn’t do to damage another staff outside the competition. As I settled down for another [Mana Cultivation], I realized that my[Stamina] had also dropped dangerously low. Was it possible to work myself into unconsciousness? I knew of people, and athletes, who put so much effort into doing something until they collapsed from exhaustion.

And that was how Artina and her group found me, deep into [Mana Cultivation].

“Wow, you look like you have been here for hours,” Sunshine said, and it wasn’t like I had been there for hours, I actually had been.

I didn’t even need to look to know that it was her, and that Akos and Mutex were with them too. It felt like I could feel them as they approached me. Maybe it was time I started working on that [Mana Sense] Skill, because it felt like I already had the aptitude for it. Or was that because of that not-dream where I had felt it used? Had I picked up something after all?

“Shouldn’t you be at the Chulu training facility?” I asked, as I kept the [Mana Cultivation] going. I had gotten good enough that I could actually maintain form while I interacted with other people, it was the first time I was testing that though.

“Anyone can train anywhere; you know?” Artina answered as she settled besides me. “What are you doing?”

“Can’t you see? He is tired, so he is taking a rest,” Akos said before I could answer.

“Don’t be an idiot,” Mutex said as she began doing what I thought were stretches.

Wait… what? I opened my eyes to find that, yes, she was performing poses that would help stretch her muscles. Looking around, Akos was just standing doing nothing, again, while Sunshine was lifting small weights.

I shook my head as I returned my gaze to Mutex, “He wasn’t entirely wrong. I am taking a rest session, but I’m also working on [Mana Cultivation].”

Sunshine was on me faster than I could blink. I nearly fell off the bench trying to avoid the weights she still had on her hands, and promptly lost my control in [Mana Cultivation].

“I’ve being trying to master that for over a year now. I haven’t even made it past the basics,” she said as she crowded me. Surprisingly, or not, she was still working on the weights.

“I’m not past the basics either,” I told her as I settled back down on the bench, trying to rein in my Mana. But it was long ruined, and I gave up.

“What’s so great about [Mana Cultivation]?” Akos asked, and if looks could kill, the look that Sunshine send him would have had him drop dead.

“[Mana Cultivation] is—” Artina began to explain, but Sunshine easily spoke over her. I was starting to realize that for some topics, Sunshine couldn’t be silenced.

“It’s the ultimate skill for any Mana user worth their salt. Two fighters of equal Mana pool but one of them having mastered [Mana Cultivation], they could run circles around the other, making them look like lumbering fools. It improves the efficiency of how we use Mana. How do you not know this?”

Akos scratched his head as he smiled awkwardly at her, “Somethings I know, others I don’t. just like you and the details of the group competition.”

“But this is essential for competitors,” Sunshine argued.

“Just as the details for the group competition are,” Akos countered.

“Not exactly, not everyone participates in the group competition,” Artina said as she got up and began her warm up routine. Had she been doing something while she was sitting? Tying up her hair perhaps, or had she come with it already pinned up?

They began working on the weights, though Akos went for the dummies almost immediately, while I joined the others in weight training. I was still several levels below them, but the gap had closed up a little compared to the last time we had worked out together. Not so much for Sunshine though.