Inscriptions can be used for many things from making powerful weapons that cultivators can use in battle to simple items that can be found in most households. Inscriptions are made by carving certain patterns into the object and powered by a specially prepared Beast Core. The power of the inscription is completely dependent on the Beast Core used and more powerful inscriptions will require Cores that used to contain a certain type of Elemental Mana or even multiple Cores so making sure to use the correct ones for that item is important. The people who make inscribed items are known by a few names but the most often used one is simply ‘scribe.’

-Excerpt from Telram’s notes on Inscriptions.

Telram followed Gerry through the house and into a large room that had more books in it than he had ever seen in one place on Nerrus, he knew that there would be more at the Halls of Heavenly Knowledge, but he hadn’t had time to see them and stopped as he looked around in awe.

Gerry noticed that he had stopped and turned towards the boy who stood there with an awestruck look in his face as he stared around at Gerry’s collection.

Gerry smiled, he knew what Telram was thinking and when he had brought him into the room he had already planned to allow Telram to have free access to all the materials in this room, so he was happy that Telram seemed to be as interested as he had hoped.

“This room contains a copy of almost every cultivation technique or Martial Art that I have studied in my life, there are a few that Irian refused to allow me to copy for my own use, but most are here,” he explained.

Telram’s already wide eyes grew even larger as he looked around, he knew there must be hundreds of books stacked neatly on the shelves that lined the walls. If he could read all of these would he be able to find a way to cure his mother?

“Feel free to come here whenever you like,” Gerry continued. “I want to know what you can do with a level of resources as close to that of a noble as I can give you.”

As he said this Gerry’s face grew serious as he though about what had happened to Lily, what he was about to say would land him in a lot of trouble if someone heard him.

“I think you could be the one who can change this world for the better…” as he said this Gerry turned and walked over to a window to stare out over the city they lived in.

Gerry hadn’t always been a scholar, in his youth he had worked for Lord Irian’s father as a Combat Scribe who controlled a small army of combat puppets. Much like the training puppets he made now, combat puppets were able to use whatever Martial Arts had been programmed into them but unlike the training puppets they were considered disposable and most of the Mana from the Beast Cores that powered them was used to increase their strength, instead of the repair abilities of the training puppets. This meant that they made nearly perfect weapons allowing Gerry to defeat opponents with a higher cultivation than his own.

Palamar had been little more than a town in those days, but Irian’s father was determined to increase his lands and power by any means necessary, and many innocents’ lives had been lost to both the wars with neighbouring cities and expeditions into the ancient ruins that they found. It was inside one such ruin that Irian’s father found a cache of ancient cultivation techniques and Martial Arts that allowed him to establish a small empire of his own. It was also then that Gerry realised the sort of man he was working for, when the guards that had accompanied him and Irian’s father had been ruthlessly sacrificed for the sake of gaining these treasures and upon their return to the city he had decided to become a scholar to try and make up for the part he had played in what had happened. Irian’s father had not been pleased but as Gerry’s knowledge of cultivation and Martial Skills grew he came to accept the man’s decision and the two had come to an uneasy truce.

After Irian had become the lord of the city things changed, Gerry was watched far more closely than before, and Irian tried to force Gerry to take his cousin Pavel as his disciple Gerry had refused, he had already found the only person he had wanted as a disciple in Lily. When he found out Irian had been furious and since then had had it out for both Gerry and Lily until the situation had culminated in the crippling of Lily’s cultivation and her subsequent illness. Gerry had been unable to do anything for Lily as head scholar, something which had depressed him greatly as he had taken the position so that he could help commoners like her live better lives by making cultivation techniques more accessible to them. Eventually he had given up his position as head scholar, resigned to the fact that Irian had no desire to see the common people become strong enough that they could challenge his power, or even let Gerry continue his research into repairing damaged cultivation bases so that he could help his disciple.

This had changed when Telram was born. Telram being born was something of a miracle, with the amount of Mana leaking out into Lily’s body from her cracked Mana Core there should have been no way for her to safely give birth to a child and even if she managed to carry the child to term there had been a good chance that she would die during childbirth due to the fragility of her health.

But his and Aran’s worries had been for naught and Telram had been born safely, he was a slightly odd child to be sure, but he was healthy, and a happy Lily had survived the experience. As Telram had grown he had become even stranger devoting himself to learning instead of playing like most children his age. Gerry had noticed that his Soul Energy was strangely powerful for his age, something that he had put down to the conditions of his birth and had thrown himself once more into his research in the hopes that he could save the young boy’s mother, but Irian had put a stop to that, firing Gerry from his position as head scholar.

After this occurred Gerry had given Lily a basic cultivation technique in the hopes that Telram would prove himself to be as talented as Gerry had hoped and he would be able to use his powerful Soul Energy to help Gerry create a technique that would allow them to fix Lily’s Mana Core. Gerry knew that it was a long shot, but Telram’s Soul Energy was almost as powerful as his own even at the age of eight, meaning that if Telram grew more powerful Gerry should be able to use his expertise to help him create a technique that Telram could use to repair Lily’s Core.

Gerry shook his head to clear his thoughts and turned back towards Telram who was looking at him with a worried expression on his face. Gerry smiled reassuringly he had been staring out the window for almost ten minutes as he relived some of the worst memories and hardest decisions of his life. He only regretted that he would be getting the boy standing in front of him involved in what could be a very dangerous vendetta as Gerry had no plans on letting Irian continue to grow in power any further than he already had.

“Sorry Telram, I got lost in my thoughts a little,” he said smiling wryly at the boy who was still waiting patiently.

He walked over to one of the bookcases and pulled out a battered book, Gerry had written it years ago, it was a copy of one of the Martial Arts that he and Irian’s father had discovered in those ruins all those years ago and Gerry had made this copy in secret, a small rebellion against the man he had once trusted.

Telram took the old book from Gerry and read the cover out loud.

“Ferocious Beast Claws,” a slight chill ran down his spine as he read these words, he looked up at Gerry.

“That Martial Art is the most powerful Human Realm Martial Art I have ever seen,” Gerry said. This may not seem very impressive but Human Realm Martial Arts served as a base for more powerful ones with many cultivators creating their own moves based upon the Human Realm Martial Arts they were most familiar with when they reached the Ascendant Realm, these skills were infused with the Elemental Affinities of the cultivator allowing them to grow alongside the cultivator more skills from any other Martial Arts that they learned slowly being added to them. This was how new Martial Arts were created, allowing a cultivator to create their own fighting style suited to themselves, more powerful than one that they simply learned.

Telram slowly opened the book and started reading.

Ferocious Beast Claws was an extremely aggressive fighting style that used attacks that could crush an opponent’s limbs with a powerful grip or slash at them with fingers that had been strengthened by Mana. There were far more Skills that required the use of Mana than any of the Martial Arts Telram had learned so far leading him to believe that this was the difference between lower and higher ranked Martial Arts.

He looked up, “Gerry what’s the difference between a Human Realm Martial Art and an Ascendant Realm Martial Art?” he asked.

“When a cultivator reaches the Ascendant Realm, they can start to use Elemental Mana,” Gerry explained. Telram nodded he had already learned about this.

“So, an Ascendant Realm Martial Art is one that uses at least one of the Elements that the cultivator has an affinity for, like my Invisible Wind Blade.”

Telram had already guessed that this was the case, but he was happy to learn that his guess had been correct.

“At least, that’s normally the case, there are some Martial Arts that still use normal Mana or Soul Energy, but they’re only considered Ascendant Realm Martial Arts because most people at the Human Realm don’t have enough Mana or Soul Energy to use them,” Gerry continued, smiling to himself.

This was the case for most people but Telram was different he had more than enough Soul Energy to use most of the Skills and Martial Arts that Gerry knew of and his Mana Core could hold far more Mana than someone of his rank usually could, at the moment he still didn’t have as much Mana as someone in the Ascendant Realm but as he added more layers to his Mana Core that would change.

Telram nodded silently as his eyes started scanning the pages of the book he was holding. Ferocious Beast Claws was far more complicated than either of the two Martial Arts he already knew. It would also be a long time before he could use a lot of the techniques as most of them required his hands, especially his fingers to be far stronger than they were now, even before he learned the techniques that required him to enhance them with Mana.

Gerry shook his head as he watched the boy become completely absorbed in the manual he was reading, even he wouldn’t let his guard down as much as Telram had right now. This would be something that they would work on while Telram trained, Gerry had many books on a wide variety of Martial Skills in this room including some on sensory techniques, he would have to make sure that Telram read these as well so that he could react in any situation. If he was going to go against the city lord’s wishes he could be attacked at any time, it wouldn’t matter to Irian that Telram was a child, Gerry knew all too well that Irian’s father had taught the boy not to hold back no matter who his opponent was.

Gerry took some books from the shelf and put them on a nearby desk in the hopes that Telram would see them when he finally stopped reading through the manual before leaving the room.

Hours later Gerry returned to discover that to his surprise Telram had not only finished the pile of books that Gerry had left out for him but had left the room to retrieve his writing materials so that he could start making his own notes.

The boy’s appetite for knowledge was intimidating, Gerry knew that these books were difficult and boring to read, he had expected Telram to have given up on reading them all in just one session and had started cultivating but even now Telram hadn’t so much as noticed that Gerry had entered the room so absorbed he was in his work.

Gerry grumbled to himself as he looked around the room, the floor had been covered with pieces of paper that still had wet ink on them leaving him with no way to get to the desk that Telram sat at, his brush flying over yet another page as he continued to read another book that he had laid out in front of him. Every now and again Telram paused to chew on the end of his brush as he checked his notes causing Gerry’s eyebrow to twitch at the faint crunching sound, at this rate he was going to chew that brush to splinters before he finished taking notes.

Raising his hand Gerry conjured a tiny ball of Air Mana which he sent flying towards Telram. The various papers rustled faintly as the orb passed overhead causing Telram to frown slightly at the unexpected sound.

As he looked up the slow-moving ball of air smacked him in the face causing him to swear in a language that Gerry had never heard before. Telram rubbed his face as he glared at the old man, while the ball of air had been to weak to be considered an attack it still hit with a similar amount of force to a light slap.

“What is it Gerry?” he grumbled.

Gerry looked pointedly past the boy at the open window and Telram turned to follow his gaze before freezing, before he had realised almost the whole day was gone and it was starting to get dark outside.

Telram leapt to his feet and used his Graceful Mist Step to avoid stepping on any of his painstakingly made notes as he made his way to the door, he had already spent one night away from home and formed his Mana Core while he had been away. He was certain that if he didn’t come home tonight his mother wouldn’t let either him nor Gerry hear the end of it.

“Sorry Gerry, I lost track of time,” he gasped when he had made his way to the door.

“Well we’d better get a move on, you don’t want to see what Lily is like when she doesn’t get her way, it ain’t pretty,” Gerry said waving off Telram’s apology, he had lost track of time while studying cultivation techniques himself, so he couldn’t very well scold Telram for doing the same.

“Oh, believe me, I know,” Telram said, cringing as he remembered the many times that he had gotten into trouble growing up, he couldn’t believe that it had gotten so late, but he had mad e a surprising amount of progress towards a few things that he was interested in researching.

“Do you mind if I leave those there?” he asked gesturing at his notes.

Gerry looked at them in irritation he didn’t really want to leave them scattered all over the floor, but he knew that they didn’t have time to clean up the ones that had already dried.

“It’s fine,” he sighed. “Just come back and pick them up tomorrow.”

Telram nodded obediently as he followed Gerry out of the house, he wouldn’t want to essentially be unable to enter his own study either, but they were running late as it was.

His study session had been quite fruitful he had discovered a lot about various techniques including one type that he had found very interesting due to the lack of a single complete technique.

“Gerry why isn’t there a complete version of a body strengthening technique in your library?” he asked as the two hurried down the street.

Gerry froze momentarily, body strengthening techniques were very rare due to how dangerous it could be to have a constant flow of Mana running through the human body, what few examples he did have were incomplete because he didn’t think that the risks involved were worth what could be gained from any of the techniques he had studied and he said this much to Telram as he started walking again.

While Martial Arts usually did have body strengthening exercises most of them didn’t require as much Mana as a true body strengthening technique which often required a cultivator to use even more Mana than what would leak out from their Mana Cloud before they formed their Core to strengthen the body.

Telram rubbed his face, body strengthening techniques could give a cultivator a large advantage over an opponent that didn’t have one and could even level the playing field between a human cultivator and a Mana Beast. Mana Beasts naturally had far more powerful bodies than human cultivators and body strengthening techniques often used a Mana Beast as a base, mimicking the way Mana Flowed through them strengthening their already powerful bodies further, like the way Graceful Mist Step was based off Willa’s movements. With his powerful Soul Energy, it would be far less likely that something could go wrong so the idea of body strengthening techniques was very enticing to Telram.

Gerry glanced sideways at Telram’s face wondering whether he should mention that the cultivation technique that had left Lily’s cultivation base crippled had a big body strengthening component. Cultivation techniques for the Ascendant Realm often had various other techniques that went along with them such as the spear technique Aran uses.

But upon seeing the determined expression on Telram’s face he decided against it, if the boy believed he could successfully use a body strengthening technique even after Gerry had explained the dangers he was willing to trust the boys judgement he had proved that he was intelligent enough to make his own decisions and determined enough not to let anyone change his mind just because someone told him to. He was a lot like his mother in that respect.

Gerry smiled fondly down at the boy as they turned down the street towards his house, remembering all the times he had gotten into arguments with Lily, perhaps the most memorable of these arguments was the one involving the man who stood waving at them from just outside Telram’s house.

Gerry grinned and waved back at Aran, he hadn’t always liked the sometimes-immature man, but he had to admit that he truly loved Lily, not many men would have stuck by her after the incident, but Aran had done so without hesitation.

“Come on in you two we’ve been waiting!”