----- Flashback-----

[ Day 78 in Mander

Veinham Training Zone ]

Squish. Splash. The sound of yellow dwarf Rain Dragon boots kicking water up from the puddles was barely audible over the sheeting rain and wind.

“Now jump Benny,” Master Edwards said.

Benny jumped into a two feet wide puddle on the uneven dirt ground, like falling into quicksand, his whole body quickly sunk into the puddle. A few feet away, Benny’s face emerged out of another puddle. His face was full of wonder. “That was awesome! Try it, Henry!”

Henry nodded and ever so slightly, dipped his boot into a puddle.

Master Edwards smiled and turned over to the lanpo tree.

15ft up - Jamie, enveloped in mana to keep herself dry, was in the midst of pulling herself up an old branch of the lanpo tree. He heard the old branch cracking over the wind and rain, and thought to himself…She is going to learn why it is necessary to use mana to lower the volume of the rain and wind so that she can hear her surroundings better. Her mana control has improved, but it is still lacking when it comes to how she controls its distribution for strategic use.

Snap! The branch broke, he chuckled as she clumsily reached for any random branch to prevent her 15 ft fall. Before hitting the ground, she finally managed to grab a hold of a branch. She expelled mana into her legs and arms for an additional boost and swung herself on top of a bigger and sturdier tree branch.

He turned his attention back to the boys. Both giggled with glee, as they jumped into a puddle and bounced out of another puddle a short distance away.

“What have you learned?”

“These transport enhancement boots are awesome!” Benny said.

“Awesome!” Henry mimicked.

“How are your mana levels?”

“Barely tapped,” Benny said.

“Barely!” Henry mimicked once more.

“Jamie, come down,” Master Edwards said telepathically.

A few minutes later…

“Today, we will go over Ender.”

Benny turned to Jamie, “Watch this, it’s super cool!”

“Cool!” Henry shouted and started to jump up and down.

“Focus.” Master Edwards said and motioned Henry to calm down. “Now, in Mander, someone can retire pretty comfortably if they manage to get a mage’s body, the fresher the better of course.”

“As Veinhams and..” Master Edwards looked at Jamie, “a chosen individual. Your body is worth tenfold. If a time comes when you’re captured and escape is unattainable, you must evoke a self-destructive spell, we call it, Ender. This must be done to keep our family’s secrets and also allow your soul to pass on. Otherwise, you could be stuck in this realm for eternity.”

He looked at the boys, “Benny and Henry, you already have Ender cast in you. That and an extra boost of mana to help you activate it. The extra mana was imbued in you from the day you were in your mother’s womb, for reasons we won’t go into now. And I know it was perfectly done because I did it.”

Master Edwards grinned. He looked at Jamie. “As for you, General Ames will assist me in casting Ender in you, once your body can support it.”

Jamie nodded, and thought, a suicide spell? Great! Why not?!

“Today, I will demonstrate how you can activate Ender. Regardless of how low in mana you are, even if you’re on your dying breath, or even if you have an unyielding binding spell cast on you, as long as you have your mental facilities, you can activate it.”

“What if the General goes against it?” Jamie asked.

Master Edwards frowned. “That is something to give thought to. Assessing the strengths and weaknesses of your spells relative to others of varying power levels will sharpen your wits during battle. That is an excellent path to be on.” He paused. “I haven’t given that much thought, though I suspect you will still come out on top given the nature of the spell. However, he’s a crafty one.”

“What if they somehow make us unconscious?” Jamie asked.

“That’s right, nothing can be done then. Veinhams have already encrypted our body’s charms and imbued spells, Ender is just a precaution. However, if someone somehow managed to get ahold of you, they would probably want you alive, like I’d mentioned, a person’s body is more potent as an ingredient the fresher it is. And nothing beats a living sacrifice or forced living one.”

Master Edwards gave Jamie a thumbs up. Jamie forced a smile in return. He started to do that more recently... I wonder if he thinks I'm stupid and is trying to encourage me. Do I come across as stupid to him? Do I come off as stupid to everyone? she thought. Memories of herself being a little scatterbrained fluttered in her mind. Well, there was that time I forgot to drink a healing potion because Benny was showing me how to make hot chocolate straight from a cacao seed... and that incident almost cost me an arm. But it was really cold in the mountains... There was that time-

"Jamie."

"Sorry."

"As I was saying, if captured, lock your mind immediately to prevent it from getting hijacked. Terrific point Jamie. Boys, you must follow Jamie's lead, and ask questions to deepen your understanding. BUT, don't drift off like she does."

Jamie pouted her lips and looked down at her feet.

It was at this moment, that Master Edwards noticed Henry, who had created a mana shield over himself and a small fire, the boy was busy heating his massive one-foot, chocolate-chip and cream swirl cookie. Henry poked at the cookie, patiently waiting for its center to turn gooey, He noticed the glare and looked up at Master Edwards smiling.

Master Edwards looked at him and briefly closed his eyes. So this is how he uses his only heat fire gift...He is just a child, just a child, he repeated to himself.

Master Edwards cleared his throat. “For the easier activation method, the spell should be activated in a location where mana is most concentrated. Where do you think that is?” Master Edwards looked at Jamie,

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“The palms?”

“The wrist!” Henry shouted.

“Thanks, smartypants,” Jamie said. Henry smiled widely. Jamie laughed, that’s not a compliment. Her laughter was joined by Benny as well.

“Focus now. Very good Henry, now watch carefully, I’m going to clone myself using the wavefunction replication method. While this is a more costly technique - in terms of mana consumption, than the standard method, it will allow me to copy over a weak imitation of Ender.”

Master Edwards whispered a spell, pressed his right hand over his heart, and drew out what looked like a glob of his soul. Then with his palm, he pushed the glob away. The purple-tinted translucent glob floated a few meters away when jabs from within could be seen. It looked like someone was in the glob trying to get out. Then the translucent glob layer shrank inwards, resulting in a Master Edwards clone with his same dress. To even a trained eye, this cloning process occurred within a blink of an eye.

“Remember, there is no coming back, the spell requires your life’s energy to work. In exchange, Ender can also eliminate your enemies for you, so use it wisely. Now watch closely.”

A dagger shot through the rain in the direction of the clone. It raised its wrist upward and deftly caught the small dagger thrown to it by Master Edwards.

Then the clone swiftly sliced across its own radial artery on the left wrist, and blood jetted out.

“A cut to the radial artery can kill you in as little as 30 seconds or even less in some cases, you MUST cast the spell immediately or it will all be for naught.”

He turned to the boys, “Henry you know this already, but Benny, being young, we’ve already sealed extra mana on both your wrists,” the boys looked and touched their wrists, “…to help prolong your life to ensure you’ll have enough time to cast the spell. Now, you must memorize the spell.”

As raindrops bounced off their mana shield…Jamie and Benny listened closely to the spell cast by the clone, then watched wide-eyed, open-jawed at Ender.

Woah, Benny wasn’t lying, Jamie thought.

----------------------------------------

Present Day…

[ Inside the Veinham Barrier

Day 1

Cave 3 (near the entrance)]

A cry of pure agony filled the cave. Henry screamed hysterically as tears gushed from his round eyes, “I’ll die with you monsters!!!”

The shapeshifters continued to laugh.

Henry held out his cute chubby toddler hand, and slashed his left wrist, precisely on the radial artery.

Henry’s blood jetted out. He closed his little eyes and whispered the Ender spell, “Great Demon Dragon, hear my plea. Kill all that surrounds me and I will pledge my life to thee.”

From Benny’s bleeding cut, hot lava erupted out, it splashed onto the cave’s walls, bubbling and sizzling. Then a three-horned, blue-eyed, midnight-black dragon slithered out breathing hot larva, it grew in size and barely fit inside the mouth of the cave, a height of 74 meters.

The shapeshifters peed themselves as they watched. Then as fast as the dragon appeared, the little boy before them and the dragon melted and then disappeared before their eyes. A rainbow bracelet remained, then it too shattered and disappeared.

“It’s an illusion,” said the 10 ft shapeshifter.

Vano, the small shapeshifter, looked at the massive hole in the cave from where the dragon spat lava, it was still sizzling. Also, there were still small holes created by lava hitting various locations, steam was still emitting from them! Vano swallowed his spit.

The 10ft shapeshifter looked down at his feet, expecting to see the shattered remains, but it too had vanished. The 10-footer grinned. “The babies are mages. I see now, that’s what the witch wanted. Get the others and spread out. We need them alive!”

Further down from the entrance, in a small crevice of the cave, behind a boulder, a transport portal opened up and two small feet walked out.

Teary Henry attempted to hold his brother steady but was not able to, as a result, bloody Benny collapsed onto the dirty cave ground.

“Get me a healing bracelet,” Benny whimpered, as he lay on the ground, unable to get back up.

Henry quickly reached into his side, a transport portal appeared, and he pulled out a small golden embroidered sachet. He rummaged through it.

“Blue with white crosses,” Benny reminded him. The left side of Benny’s head, where his ear should’ve been, was bleeding.

Henry rubbed his little hand across his face to wipe off the tears mudding his vision and continued to look. Then his eyes brightened and he pulled out a healing bracelet.

“Put it against my ear,” Benny instructed. Henry placed the bracelet against Benny’s right ear.

“The bleeding ear,” Benny said and even managed an eye roll.

“Sorry!”

“You enter the code, I don’t have any more mana.” Henry placed his palm over the bracelet and entered the code using his mana.

And like that, the bleeding stopped, but Benny’s ear was still missing. Benny crawled over to the boulder and rested his head. “Water.”

Henry again reached inside his side, and this time pulled out a water-caterpillar. He rubbed the water-caterpillar from its head to butt. The water-caterpillar smiled and was passed to Benny, who drank from it.

Henry sniffed his snot in. “Let’s go home,” he whined and rubbed his teary eyes.

“We can’t. I used up all my mana and even sacrificed my ear to use wavefunction replication to clone you so that your clone can activate Ender. If they catch up, we’ll have to really use Ender.”

Benny stared down at his feet. Droplets of tears formed little wet drops on the ground.

Benny smiled proudly, “I sure fool them though.”

Henry started to cry, he was joined by Benny.

Benny wiped his tears away. “Be brave Henry. We just need to meet up with Jamie. Did you pack any transport bracelets?”

“No. We have healing and snack ones.”

“Give me the sachet.” Benny looked through the small bag and then sighed. He took another gulp of water. “I should’ve packed myself. I already used the transport bracelet Jamie gave us for our escape.” Benny looked up at the cave ceiling, “Wait, are you wearing the charm Mom gave you?”

“Yes.” Henry looked down at his turtle jade necklace, lined with platinum.

“Release it, it can carry us.”

“How, I-”

“Shush” Benny said, he grabbed Henry and held his hand over Henry’s mouth. They sat as still as can be, in silence as footsteps approached.

[ Inside the Veinham Barrier

Day 1

Cave 3 (tail-end of the cave)]

Now I just need to break the mana lock. Jamie looked at the locked chain and back at the women within. She smacked her lips. Why do I have a gut feeling something is up? What is this feeling? Jamie’s brow furrowed.

Jamie quickly turned around and her eyes zoned in at what seemed to be just the wall of the cave. She flung her dagger at it, and with her other free hand, raised her palm to open a transport portal.

Instantly, a highly feminine voice said telepathically to a total of 5 contestants, “She’s detected Emo’s bloodlust! Pin her down!”

The very wall Jamie threw the dagger at, as the dagger grew closer, a hand snatched it midair. Contestant #20, Emo emerged from the shadows of the cave wall. She too wore the blue futuristic bodysuit like the previous contestants Jamie had killed.

As Jamie’s portal opened, a mana thread came from the opposite direction of Jamie, and rammed through it, piercing the core, shattering the portal. Jamie dodged to her left to avoid a mana thread from hitting her. Then, like clockwork, mana threads from various positions including from the women in the cage homed in on her.

Jamie managed to dodge or cut them all down with her ax. Damn it, do I fight or flee? she thought. How do I get out of here? I can’t keep cutting mana threads, they’ll attach soon!

Jamie threw her smokescreen bracelet and then made a run for the left tunnel.

“Get in the star formation,” the same highly feminine voice said telepathically.

“Oh no, you don’t,” said contestant #21, a blonde in high pigtails, also dressed like the previous contestants. She raised both her hands, palms towards the left cave tunnel exit. She grunted as the ground beneath the cave exit started to rise up.

Jamie continued to run for the exit, I can make it! Shit!

Jamie had run straight into the classic taut horizontal string snare, and tripped. Jamie tumbled and attempted to jump back up, but instead of just seeing the dingy cave ceiling, a massive mana net greeted her. Jamie pushed mana to her legs, move, move to dodge it, she told herself.

Jamie pushed off her left leg and into what was supposed to be her escape, but a million eyes stared back at her. The eyes shot out mana needles. Shield! Shield! Jamie thought.

Although Jamie's mana shield absorbed most of the needles, a few managed to penetrate through. Jamie pulled out a needle from her arm, a purple substance dripped from the needle, and she fell to the ground. Poison, seriously? Jamie thought as she locked her mind before she lost control.

“Bind her down, just in case,” a voice commanded. Immediately mana threads criss-crossed Jamie’s body until her body was cocooned by mana threads.

Okay, I’m officially in trouble… I can’t move, Jamie thought.

The point of a sword touched Jamie’s face, and a thin stream of blood trickled down her face from where the sword had cut her.

“So you’re the Vaseland,” a very feminine voice said matter-of-factly.