CHAPTER 12 - THE LONG AWAITED II
It’s been a day since that night. To be honest, I stopped meditating and instead became reluctant on it, so I practiced on my combat skills in the meantime.
I had a sense of fear, for not being able to ascend higher in the mana core stage. The same exact thing happened to me in my two years of training with Mordain in the Beast Glades.
After so much meditation and dedication towards it, I never felt an increase in my mana pool or spells. Everything was the same. Letting it on the side of my mind, I focused on my physical training for some time before I got some results back.
Eventually I reached where my goal was, but now my goal lies higher.
And for that to happen, I need things to go the way they are supposed to go. So I began taking morning walks and afternoon walks all over the Grand Mountain’s side where cliffs are stated to be sighted. I even go past the path they are set and look around a mile or two before settling that today wasn’t the day.
Repeating that same routine for some days. Hope falling low and thinking that going back to my family right now was going to be the best option or going to the Beast Glades where Mordain resides.
Loud echoes of yelling orders and fluctuations of spells broke loose on the path above me. The sound of metal hitting each other, allowing for a unique and cursed noise of chattering metal.
It was today.
The day that I would meet the protagonist and set the gears in motion as the story goes.
I wanted to go up there and at least watch it but I couldn't give away my cover like that. With my curiosity in check to some extent, I patiently waited at the cave I was staying at, packing up everything I had as belongings.
When I finished. The battle still had been going on for some time.
The feeling of anxiety and anticipation that was hanging on my chest and shoulders by a thread. Because everything—and I actually mean everything—must go through it like in the story. Anything more or less might damage or even corrupt the future of Arthur’s life or even the whole continent together.
So, I stayed a couple of miles away from the cliffs and mountains. Injecting mana into my eyes, fueling them with the adrenaline of magic, unlocking the advancement of sight. It was something similar to a binoculars but instead all I had to do was just some mana and calculatedly, enabled my eyes to see farther than normal.
Sitting on a branch of the tallest tree there was around, focusing purely on the battle’s aftermath. No mana beast or something bothered me while I was watching.
Of course, if something stronger than an E-ranked beast tried to attack me, the best I could do was run.
Again, I wasn’t confident enough to fight a monster who has lived on experience battles in the beast glades, perhaps even use affinities in battle for its advantages, while I can’t even use the four basic elemental affinities like before.
I don’t even have a proper weapon to fight a beast.
Haaaa… really, I have come here unprepared.
Ignoring my own thoughts at the moment, pushing away my depression and insecurities, I refocused on the battle. And to my surprise, there were two extra people in there.
“James… Mia…”
How? Why?!
My two parents were here with the Twin Horns, traveling with the Leywins to Xyrus City. What for?
My best bet was that they would stay on Asher for some time, perhaps having another child now that I couldn’t go back to them yet.
Fate has really thrown a twisted joke at me.
“Why is everything changing!?” I said, annoyed at the current situation that was putting my own family at risk for the sake of the story’s sake and motions. And I wasn’t going to let that slide.
Not caring much about my own life, I jumped off the branch I was sitting on and headed towards the cliff.
Mana beast waited for my descent like hungry piranhas in the river. Eagerly awaiting, they activated their magic as they saw me coming down. Reacting like their normal habitats, two giant looking bears attack the other small creatures, spreading dominance over the prey.
Having mana imbued into my body to cushion the landing, and I had my healing emitter power as well, I still looked at the giant bears and landed on the bigger one who was attacking the rest while the other bear—which I thought was the mate—watched carefully where I wanted to land.
On my way down, I broke a branch and imbued mana into it. This is the only thing I could use right now. Something is something, I can’t complain when my family is in danger. I thought, being four feet away from the hungry and irrational beast.
In the most cold icy and unemotional voice, my brows down, I said, “Move.” Ultimately having the branch covered in mana and holding it up as high as a four-year-old child could, signaling to the beast that I would kill it if it were in my way. And even if it didn’t work. I wouldn’t ask twice before I took action.
Right now, my family’s life was on the line. One part of me told me to leave it and see how things play out, while the most conscious and logical one said that nothing should happen to either my family or the Leywin’s.
And then, there was the most obvious thought. Saving my family and breaking the rules of the world by jumping in there, unleashing a barrage of elementalless attacks.
I was stuck in a dilemma that brought both consequences and cause.
Like a trial, it was me being the judge whose job is to make the best decision for the criminal in front of me. Either let him go with a federal fine, or give him the penalty of life imprisonment with a death sentence.
The first bear growled at me with pure bloodlust, it had already set its eyes on me as its prey, and there wasn’t anything that was going to stop it from making that a reality. However, my strength didn’t lie on mana itself but it had too now that this wild bear was above E-rank, a creature that I decided to kill.
Aside from it being in its natural habitat to hunt for food, I pitied both bears, because it chose the wrong person to hunt. Though I pitied them didn’t mean that I was going to let them live and forgive them, no. They were standing in my way to my family’s well being and that wasn’t something I was going to let slide.
Death is too little for them…
Landing a few feet away from the first bear’s face, I injected mana into my legs once more–perhaps even more than before–and jumped behind them. With the second bear occupied with the rest of the mana beast, it was a blessing that I was facing only one bear at a time. But like how the saying goes, “It was easier said than done.”
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The large bear that was clawing away at the tree, hoping for my downfall, turned–slowly–towards me. That. That was my chance to get it off guard.
Knowing its blindside, I rushed without hesitation. Pushing back my “weapon” into a slashing position, I saw how the bear was already halfway to face me, but it was too late. I had already used my mana to support and boost my legs to be faster, simultaneously, keeping my concentration on my “weapon”.
I slashed the back of the large dark brown bear, jumping moments before it decided to throw a claw cut that destroyed a thick large tree behind me.
“That would be me if I’m not careful.” I thought, feeling the rush of adrenaline and nervousness enter my veins after the first cut I landed on the bear. “Shallow!”
Of course it was! I am only a four-year-old child, Luke Hodges! Remember that!
While scolding myself for being arrogant, the brown bear attacked again, this time using both foreleg paws. A slight glow of red mana blended on the large sharp claws as it crossed both hands in an X slash.
I barely dodged the attack, scraping my leg, cutting a piece of my new outfit I had received from Mordain when I graduated from his “training course”. Small but constant, the red liquid rapidly tried escaping my leg like it was evacuating from an earthquake that was 4.0.
Noticing my injured leg. The large bear roared louder, almost declaring like I was to give up and just die.
When that thought entered my mind, I couldn’t help but to smirk off and display a certain finger to the mana beast. “In your dreams, you raging over size mut.”
Enraged upon hearing my words–which I didn’t think the bear would understand in the first place–charged towards me like a bull. In my mind, I imagined the strong but improving heal of my deviant affinity. The glowing white soft light turned green and healed my injured leg, instead of charging towards the bear like-bull.
I hid behind a tree, hoping for mere seconds of calmness before my next set of actions. It was my first time fighting something like this, so my experience with them wasn’t little to none. I needed a plan that was going to help me defeat this bear, then I would use the same plan to deal with the other. I thought, checking the surroundings for the charging bear.
As I peeked, the bear was already seconds away from impacting the tree I was hiding behind. Instantly I backed off, hitting my back into another thick tree that I forgot was there because of my sudden panic towards the sudden hit.
The tree fell, loudly enough to scare small animals that were already hiding from the bears in the bushes. As well as other aerial type animals like birds and crows, something that I found interesting since I’ve been here in Dicathen.
But now is not the time to be amused by other creatures…”Not when I have the oversized mut in front of me.” Simply put, I wasn’t still putting down the topic of the similar looking creatures in my world and this world, there had to be a connection, is what I had thought.
A loud enough roar echoed in the forest. But not loud enough for Arthur and the Twin Horns to hear. And if they did, they probably thought that there was a battle between the beasts for hierarchy or something in that path.
While he needs to focus on his “battle”, I need to focus on the one in front of me. To be able to defend myself now and need no one in the future seems worth it but I would end up alone. Again. If I am able to be someone that Arthur could rely on, then so be it. Or on the other hand, if I were to become one of the pinnacle pillars for this continent to help Arthur’s ease and stress, then so be it.
After all, I had made my resolution when I went back to Earth, and to whoever was the bastard that killed me, I am thankful for this second opportunity, one that I won’t waste.
A sense of emotions revolted in my body, making me–unknowingly–smirk once again. I was on the brim with arrogance and confidence, something that I thought I wasn’t going to have while growing up in Dicathen.
At that moment, I gripped the branch tree tightly while pushing more mana into it. If I was right… this should work!
Initially, mana could be imbued into weapons to dull them, making them non-lethal–or at least that is what I know. Whatever, Turleme knows about the mana system or structure, is completely unknown to me or the readers that are not his direct people. So, my plan during those two years under Mordain’s training, I was trying multiple things at a time. Mana enhancement, mana deterioration, mana exposure, ect.
I didn’t get any leads at that moment, thinking that perhaps it had something to do with my core stage or mana pool. Affecting those areas, the must I could do was something Arthur or Grey, when he was in Alacrya under the trials for the keystones. Specifically, there was a part where he didn’t know how to form an aether weapon, however, when learning directly from a holographic Djinn, he was able to use an aether sword. And that is what I want to do, but with mana.
In conclusion, it was a failed experiment, taking up to 6 months of non-stop concentration even when my mana core went up a stage but completely hit a wall that I, right now, can’t overcome.
So instead, I tried something else, leaving that experiment on hold for the moment and focused on an entirely new structure.
Mana roamed the wooden “sword” with excitement. The bear in question was now cautious of my actions and didn’t rush instantly even when I closed my eyes. Concentration was one thing, but to leave my whole body defenseless was another word for crazy, if I do say myself.
Complaining wasn’t an option for my family. And I could use my healing factor as well, so a couple of injuries shouldn’t be a problem, I think.
The mana that flowed into the “sword” couldn’t find a place to stay put, more like the shape of its decision was sloppy and uncomfortable for it. That is when I come in, using my mind to guide the mana into a type of shaped, sharp position, would give me the results I need.
On the outside, I felt mana rile up next to me.
An attack from the bear? Already?!
Cutting my concentration short. I had no other option but to move locations, somewhere else to continue my work—if that was possible.
Another X crossed ability was headed towards my direction, cutting and destroying anything at that point. Many small creatures that didn’t escape due to the bloodlust the bear radiated through their body, died, being killed by the attack. Cutting them into small little pieces and some just turned into red or green mist.
It was evident that the bear’s technique wasn’t very effective when it came to consistency in terms of how it was used. That was one advantage I had. A cooldown on that strong attack.
I could use that time to finish my mana blade thingy… I still didn’t know what to call it but it was all I could think of right now.
It was half way before I broke my concentration, all I needed was to get the correct amount of mana and balance into creating an edge for me to cut that oversized mut along with its mate.
The building of mana was like Tetris, simple but very easy to make a mistake if I didn’t pay attention to the mana edge. Small little white fragments of mana formed into what you can call an edge—even though it was a little dull.
“Something is something, I mustn’t complain now that I have a “proper” weapon to deal damage.” I said, hinting the excitement in my voice knowing god damn well that I was just seconds away from failing this experiment.
One more time, I infused mana into my young little legs for support when it came to dashing in an all out attack. Of course there was a valid reason as to why I didn’t run instead, and that was because of their core.
If I were to kill a mana beast, there was a chance to get a core, possibly a beast will. But all I needed was the core, in which they store mana, maybe that will help me break into the next core stage.
Seeing my own accomplishment, the brown bear ignited mana into its left arm and not on its right one. Confused by its sudden acceleration in its mana attack, I decided to rush out of its sight and into the side, hoping for an opening that I could abuse.
Having a large body, it was slow when turning. Not knowing where I went, it turned its head to everywhere desperately trying to find me.
It was going to, because it had tunnel vision on the ground and not at the top of the trees. That’s where I was at. Jumping from the tree to its back, cocking my hand back while aiming for the shallow area where I had wounded it.
However, this time it wasn’t going to be shallow but rather a deeper cut, a serious blow.
My branch not only cut through its hard fur but also went through, slashing five inches down. Destroying its spine, the bear was no longer the danger.
It was handicapped from even feeling its bottom legs. Howls of pain and suffering were the most frequent symptoms that followed after the attack. It is calling for a mate. I thought, nonchalantly.
If I was wrong, it would perhaps not only call one but multiple of I didn’t kill it now. Something that couldn’t happen. Not because I wasn’t sure if I could kill the others but because my mana wasn’t going to last long enough for me to fight, and I had to worry about my family’s safety.
Hearing enough of the bear’s cries and coming into a straight decision. I readied my weapon to stab the head of the animal before a heavy body attack hit me.
Sending me flying through the woods, hitting one of the trees, destabilizing my dominant arm. I let out a cry of pain. It was my first time being in this type of pain.
“...What!?”