Chapter 8

Insight

Iris snapped her fingers, calling three servants into the room. They were all dressed in formal attire, two butlers and one maid. They entered the room and bowed reverently towards the members of the council.

"Take them to the infirmary," said Iris, dismissively. The servants gently hoisted the children out of the room, closing the door behind them.

Claudia lay reclined on her chair, amusingly twirling a quill through her fingers. She had seen many things in her long life, but even amongst them these children had been most intriguing. They each possessed a special skill, traits that were usually reserved for monsters, but what made them really special was that their skills were outside the four elemental pentagram. Healing. Mind Reading. Nullification. What kind of powers were these?

Claudia revealed a row of razor sharp teeth and a grin that ran across the entire length of her face.

"They are gifted. I'll give you that."

Kolfecg lumbered in the shadows. His hideous form hidden by the darkness.

"Gifted, but not tamed," said Kolfecg. His eyes lingered on the children as they were taken away. "Why didn't you cast a compulsion spell over them?"

Iris scoffed. "I want my prodigies to be intelligent not broken. The conditioning had to begin after their awakening. Otherwise, they wouldn't have visions."

"They also visited the painted world," murmured Saeda. Her many arms forming a question mark behind her. "I thought we had forbidden all contact."

"An accident. Nothing more," said Iris, indifferently.

"I have trouble believing that...but very well. And their cultivation?"

"We will be taking the Nidara Pass up to the 47th Dungeon. There are herbs that I will be taking along the way. I trust none of you will interfere."

"Hueh~. Is that so?"

"As disagreeable as ever," said Lupites, stroking his chin. "they are physically inept. Two of them didn't even last a minute against the legion children, much less my own disciples."

Iris's eyes narrowed. Her voice held a definite chill.

"We can discuss this at a later time...If you still find me training them so disagreeable."

Lupites grinned, readying his weapons underneath his cloak. Across from Lupites the silhouette of a massive suit of armor raised its hand.

"Make them ready in a year," said Terenias, "Get them ready or we will divide them."

Terenias opened the palm of his hand. In his palm there was a pile of red dust. He blew the dust into the air, revealing the image of a battalion of knights all of which were riding donkeys. They were headed into a nearby town, one surrounded by fields of wheat.

"The Knights of Lukoil have started to investigate our activities. No doubt in response to someone's favorite disciple."

Terenias briefly glanced at Kolfecg. Kolfecg shrugged with a light chuckle.

"Lupites do you have what I need?"

"Of course," smiled the hooded man, stretching out his palm. A bright blue shard glowed in his hand.

"A fragment of Myriel the Mirror Sword. Blade of the Water King."

A tendril of darkness rose from the ground and picked up the blue shard, dropping it in Terenias's hand.

"Then let us discuss our plans."

~~~

Iris stood in a room that had been painted white. The walls. The floor. All white. The only thing that wasn't white was the cracks between the floor planks. The children - Grey, Ciara, and Oswin - stood patiently next to one another facing Iris.

It had been a few days after their test in the guildhall and none of them could remember what had happened. They had been told they had passed the test and that the test had tested their mind in some way.

Iris stood in front of them and spoke pleasantly.

"There are many methods in casting magic, but we will be using a method known as sequencing. You channel magic through movement and formulate a spell. It is similar to formations. I will show you."

Iris released her aura. She shifted into a low crouch, moving her hands down to the ground and up to her shoulders. She whirled her arms back and then raised one leg up before sinking down low, near the ground. She did the movement twice. Once with Oswin and Ciara watching and a second time alone with Grey. Allowing him to feel her movement's with his hands.

After doing the movements a second time, Iris released her aura.

The room was transformed into a vast meadow filled with flowers. Grey felt the floor shift beneath his feet. The familiar aroma of earthly dirt and dense vegetation filled his nostrils.

"It is an illusion," said Iris, picking up a flower. "None of it is real. Now let us try something simple."

Ciara practiced with Oswin. The spell was fireball. Fire is malleable, hungry, and insatiable. It is powered by air, so air was the medium used to activate it. Oswin took in a deep breath and placed his hands near his mouth. He formed a fist and blew into his hands. He released his aura. Magic coalesced in his palm. When he opened his hands tiny little lights fluttered into the air and hastily grouped together to form a bright flame.

"Heh," smiled Oswin, goofily.

Grey sat by a corner. He did the motions, but the magic did not gather up in his hands. It sputtered and splintered off into several fragments not making anything at all.

"Trouble?" said Iris, walking towards Grey.

"I can't do it," said Grey. He tried to channel the energy towards his hands, but it wouldn't stick. It was as if he was trying to grab a pile of sand.

"Hmm," said Iris, thoughtfully. She watched the motion that Grey was making. "Grey. Let me ask you. How does sequencing work?"

"Magic is like water," said Grey, remembering his books. "It has no shape. So we have to give it shape, either through words or by movement. And once magic has a shape. We call that a spell. But...even then we need to be able to see to use magic. We need a clear picture of the change we want to happen in our head."

"Yes," said Iris, "There are two parts to magic. There is the mind and body. The mind is called Yin. The body is known as Yang."

"Am I not able to use my Yin properly?"

"No," said Iris, shaking her head. She took a seat, kneeling next to Grey. "that test at the guildhall showed that you have ample amount of Yin."

"Then is it my Yang?" asked Grey. He could not imagine that his body was unfit. He had trained for hours. Running. Jogging. Push-ups. Sit-ups.

Iris looked at Grey. While he had recovered most of his physique since his slave years the boy had a naturally thin and feminine figure. If he wore a wig then perhaps....

Iris ruffled Grey's hair, imagining the look for herself. Grey seemed to realize what she was doing. He gave her an unhappy look.

"Iris...are you imagining me as a girl..."

Iris smiled, stroking his hair.

"I'm not a girl," said Grey, unhappily. He gently pushed away her hand.

"I didn't mean it like that," laughed Iris, "You are quite handsome."

"But in a girly way," mumbled Grey, patting his head. "I need to train more."

Grey turned to leave when Iris placed her hand on his shoulder.

"Grey why don't you mediate for a bit? When a person is stuck on a problem, it is often good to think a back on one's experiences. You meditated at that strange place in the sewers for insight. Why not meditate to think of a way out of your troubles?"

"I will try," said Grey. He sat right back down and turned to face Iris. "Iris. I asked before but what was that painted place?"

"It's a ruin," said Iris. "I didn't explain that before to you did I?"

"No," said Grey, shaking his head. "You said you would tell us later."

"Let's see....Where to begin. Ruins are like dungeons except they hold a mysterious phenomenon. This can be a fog that makes one lose their sense of direction or making things float in the air. They are notoriously rare. Only thirty-five known ruins in the world. All of which require special circumstances to enter."

"Then...What we found was?"

"It is a place known as the Armfell, the land of lies. I know a bit of the story of it, but the important thing to know is that all ruins are recent things compared to dungeons. They are created from powerful events while a dungeon naturally appears every hundred to a thousand years. Many famous battlefields become ruins. Honestly, I did not even think you could enter that place, but you still found a way."

Iris playfully nudged Grey on the shoulder. A little mouse hopped on his head from inside his shirt. It was Ham. She wiggled her nose, having been waken up.

"Now, meditate for a bit. I'll come get you when I finished helping Ciara."

Iris left Grey, approaching a young bouncing girl next to Oswin. Like the boy, the girl had also mastered fire, but unlike him she was using it to burn everything she could see while laughing like a maniac.

Iris sighed and shouted at the girl. "Control! Control Ciara!"

Grey scratched his head, and thought carefully on what Iris had said. Meditate my problems away? It couldn't hurt to try.

"Grey?" said a squeaky little voice. "What are you doing?"

"I am not able to use magic," said Grey with a heavy heart. He was not anywhere closer to saving Mylene or finding who killed his parents. This made him upset, and a little frustrated. "So, I am going to meditate to try to find answers."

"What is meditating?"

"It's..well...here let me just show you.

Grey cleared his mind, and sat cross legged, allowing his hands to drop down to his waist. He focused on an image of his own body. Memories of his experience at the forest. His fight with the slime. His days as a slave. They swirled in a cloud over his head. His mind searched for answers. He remembered his battle music would change every time he healed himself. That his power activated by forcing aura into his body. Body. Mind. Spirit. Inner. Outer. Two pieces of one whole.

"Grey! Grey!"

Grey woke up from his trance. A little mouse bouncing on his head.

"Ham?"

He realized his aura was transforming. It had slithered out of his body, vapors that had manifested into ghostly appendages, imitating the body parts of monsters. He shook terrified, feeling with disgusting clarity the extra limbs. He quickly suppressed his aura, recoiling it back into his body.

"What was that?" asked the little mouse.

"I don't know," said Grey, lifting his hands. "I don't know."

~~~~~~~~~~~

Author's Note

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Hi everyone. I have been taking breaks to get my creativity up. Been having a rut lately, so I've just been working on the back stories for the nations, and a few summaries of what I wanted to happen later. Trying to get back on a schedule for posting, but I've been reminding myself that this is a hobby for me. At least till I get published. So I should endeavor to write just whenever I am able and not to force anything.

In other news, I was reading Mushoku Tensei and it ended! I never though I'd see it end on a cliffhanger. Also, been looking up some books, and old animes I wanted to take a look at. I watched the original Macross Super Dimensional Fortress a long time ago, and figured it might be a good chance to see the rest of the series. Macross Plus, Macross 7, and Macross Frontier. It's really too bad that they stopped making space operas, seems everything with an epic scale ended somewhere in the 80s-90s. I could be wrong though. So I shall search on.