Chapter 6

The Training Begins

A carriage was being led by a pair of large well-bred horses towards a mansion that exhibited a breath taking landscaping. Shining with a brilliant lively green, there was vines that trailed up the side of the building and the trees were obviously well kept and maintained.

The architecture of the building itself resembled a gothic stone structure with pillars and beautiful glass windows. But it had decorative lanterns hung up everywhere needed, and lively carved designs with wooden effigies.

The roof was made of ceramic tiles and in each of the corners of the roof they were slightly inclined upwards with powerful carvings lined at the edges.

The carriage driver couldn’t help but gawk at the impressive structure as he approached. After he had the carriage stopped, a blonde youthful and developing woman hopped out of the carriage and walked towards the mansion. She wore rather exquisite and powerful clothing and walked brazenly with an odd unyielding strength.

The clothing she styled had finely knitted linens and wools that were bound together to make a green blouse and leggings. Rare furs and leathers formed the boots and corset that bound against her tight figure.

Yet the most striking part of her figure was the broach that held together a green hooded cape around her. It was there that she displayed the symbol of a warrior. The green cape and broach that she wore was a symbol of the mighty and powerful Valburg Academy.

This stunning beauty was Rana, and she was returning from the academy which she attended. But upon opening the doors and entering the living room, the owner of the residence was deep in conversation with Vanrus.

The landowner of the residence was a rather power figure known as Duke Chalmon of the clan Fortis, third in line for the throne. He was a thin man with short well-groomed blonde hair and displayed extravagant clothing. Yet, such an important man was speaking intently with Vanrus for some reason.

Rana didn’t bat an eye over this scene, because she recently discovered that Vanrus was truthfully related to Azon and both men were in fact from clan Fortis. Even though Azon did not know Vanrus, because of his exile, Vanrus was quite aware of him. This was precisely because Azon left quite the footprint within the clan’s history.

Breaking their conversation, Rana was walked towards them, and Vanrus casually stopped her by asking, “So how did it go?”

Smiling, she said, “I have just entered the second rank. They helped guide me and I was successful in unlock the mysteries of all my senses.”

“Congrats Rana, you…” Vanrus started to say.

The duke Chalmon quickly interjected before Vanrus could reply fully, and said, “Amazing, simply amazing!! To think that a ten year old has surpassed into the second ranking so quickly, there is no words to explain how profound that is. You are certainly worthy of being Azon’s foster child.”

Looking over at Chalmon, Vanrus could only nod in agreement. The smugness Rana felt was not little and she grinned heartily at their responses. The truth behind her eligibility to even attend Valburg academy stemmed from both Azon’s claim as her foster parent and the backing of the clan Fortis.

If it wasn’t for Azon flexing his connections and Chalmon accepting his request, there was no way she would be where she was now. Rana was rather intelligent and understood this was no easy task. She figured Azon must have paid a heavy price for her to attend the most well renowned Warrior academy.

Slightly curtsying she showed her respect to both men, and said, “Uncle… patriarch… I think I will take my leave and study my improvements now.”

The Duke was obviously not a simple man and was not only third in line for the throne but actually the patriarch and leader of the current clan of Fortis as well. At the same time, while Vanrus wasn’t necessarily her uncle, she still treated him as such.

Sizing her up a minute, Chalmon nodded and said, “Mmmm… indeed that sounds like a good idea. I want to see you rise even higher only then will I be satisfied.” Chalmon laughed wholeheartedly after his remark and watched her leave.

Now that Rana had left, Chalmon turned back to Vanrus and said, “It would appear Azon’s ascertainment has paid off. We have invested heavily in her and she has indeed exceeded expectations. Just where did he find this girl?”

Almost perspiring, Vanrus said, “Ah… this…” he started but was hesitant to answer.

Obviously Chalmon was not a patient man, and cut Vanrus off again by saying, “Don’t tell me it was from that village raid that has been causing the current debacle as of late?”

Sighing heavily, Vanrus nodded and said, “Indeed, it’s the very same. We had no idea about Novaron’s disciple, Amron, which was located there.”

Infuriated Chalmon clenched his fist and cursed, then said, “That man causes me headaches constantly. First he caused that problem, now this problem. Does he want to watch our clan to collapse?”

Before Vanrus could utter any further words to respond, Duke Chalmon again quickly spoke preventing him from speaking.

“Ah… that reminds me didn’t you say that he had a baby boy that he was rearing?” Chalmon asked inquisitively.

Vanrus combed his hand through his hair, brushing back his long blonde hair behind his ears, and said, “Yes, father, he had the baby with him during the village raid. I can recall that the village raid was instigated by the sighting of a divine artifact. But we never did find it and Azon took the child from the man after killing him, in recompense for what he wouldn’t tell.”

Surprise rang in Chalmon’s voice as he said, “What??!! Why on earth would he take a baby boy from that village?”

Shrugging his shoulders, Vanrus shook his head and said, “Even I am unclear, but he does seem to be a rather special child. He grows fast and has an intelligence many cannot boast the same. In the correspondence letters that child writes to Rana, he seems more literate than you or I”

Surprise showed on Chalmon’s face but thinking things over for a minute, he sighed and said, “I can see Azon is trying to restore his ruined name through these children. If only he could have not killed that man from the Kyros clan.”

Irritation was a light way to state what showed on his face, and throwing a mix of anger into his voice, he said, “It was already difficult enough for him to maintain his position when all the other families were clamoring over his misdeed.”

Wanting to spit in anger and disdain, Vanrus retorted, “You mean when he stole those forbidden techniques that we five great families hold dear? That was more than a misdeed but should have resulted in death.”

Chalmon nodded, and his tone lightened and became reverent while saying, “Yes… but the great ancestor recognized his talent, and regardless what we families said, he still stowed upon him his previous rank, title, and placed him into our clan. But after that incident even our ancestor, with his great might, could not oppose the church’s demand of his exile.”

Smirking at the irony, Vanrus said, “Indeed, who could have known that the man he killed was a disciple Teronus was considering taking in?”

Clicking his tongue, Chalmon replied heatedly, “Teronus… That man, just because he is originally from the Kyros clan, he causes so many problems for us. He uses his sway with the church to knock down our clan’s promising star and is probably laughing about it.”

Vanrus snorted, and obviously wasn’t swayed by the promising star remark and instead said, “It’s understandable, Azon was about to be accepted as a disciple himself by Zepharoth. The Kyros clan couldn’t have that, and removed him as an obstacle.” Nodding and agreeing with that thought process, Vanrus smirked.

Not enthused by his son’s adamant hatred for Azon, Chalmon said, “Don’t remind me… if only we could also have someone enter the church’s ranks, we could have our clan become a threat against the other four.”

Smiling, and waving off the previous statement, Vanrus said, “Don’t be disheartened father, although the techniques that fool gave me, I cannot comprehend, perhaps with Rana’s talent, she can.”

Glaring at his son, Chalmon said, “It’s not just the Crimson claw technique that makes that man frightening, it’s the other one that even our ancestor was not able to master. Do you truly think this girl can master either?”

Shrugging, Vanrus honestly replied, “I don’t know. Hopefully time will tell. We can only put all our resources into cultivating her.”

Chalmon pursed his lips and said, “And what about the boy he is raising?”

With a short bit of laughter, Vanrus sneered and said, “If she truly can achieve our ambitions, I say let’s get rid of the extra variables.”

“Variables?” Chalmon questioned.

An evil smile appeared on Vanrus and he said, “Azon and the boy, of course.”

Unconvinced Chalmon thought for a minute, “Hmm…” then shook his head and replied, “Not yet we still might have use for Azon when the war comes.”

Sighing, Vanrus could only give up and said, “As you say father. I believe supper should be ready soon, let’s enjoy the company of our fine young lady and hear about her day.”

They had servants that would serve at set times during the day, and the time for dinner was close approaching. So finishing their discussion both men walked toward the dining room area to see if supper was about to be served.

Many Kilometers away, in a quiet forest elsewhere, Azon was sitting underneath a tree. He was enjoying the shade it provided and couldn’t help but chuckle as he watched Ornias run. It was precisely because his adopted son was able to do what he thought was impossible for a five year old that he was forced to train him.

At first, he was shocked by his accomplishment, but after he talked to Cecilia, he discovered that Ornias had terrifying mental prowess, and he started to understand.

It was discovered that Ornias could devour information at a fast pace and not only understand the concepts it explains but also be able to formulate ways to improve the initial concept. He could do this by combining information he had learned about another subject with that concept.

Yet the worst thing for Azon was that Ornias was even able to use some of the initial methods of the Laws taught from the books. While books could make you understand principles of the Laws, as he saw it, they meant nothing unless you trained your body to act accordingly.

A good example would be when a technique is used that strains the body when the body doesn’t have the capacity to handle the backlash of the strain. This would end up ultimately destroying that person’s body piece by piece, and was not worth it. So he was of the mind that the body needed to be trained first, otherwise the body couldn’t handle the task.

With these thoughts in mind, he decided that he would make Ornias do gruelingly ridiculous endeavors in order to enhance his body. He also forcibly required him to not use any understandings from books and strictly use his own natural born talents.

If Ornias was caught using any technique he would be punished accordingly. The only exception to this rule was the Breathing technique that he was allowed to continue practicing. This helped tremendously because it was at such a high level.

After setting all those rules in place, Azon tasked him to run in the same circuit continuously around the Fengle’s Grove encampment from dawn to dusk. Ornias wouldn’t be able to run as fast around the encampment without using the initial steps of Laws of a warrior and instead would have to rely on his own natural strength.

It was Azon’s intention to break his confidence and be able to remold the broken Ornias into an impossible tool of absolute power. Sitting underneath that tree, Azon could only cruelly smile as he thought of what he had in store for Ornias in the coming months.

After the sun started to go down on the first day, whilst pushing himself, Ornias was rounding upon his eleventh circuit. Although he utilized his breathing technique, that was indeed incredible, he couldn’t seem to fix the muscle soreness in his calves and thighs from the all day running.

Coming nearing the end of circuit, even though his muscles were sore, he persisted with a straight face and continued running. It had been nearly fifteen hours since he started to run and he felt fine other than the soreness in his legs.

Crossing the last bit of distance between them, he stopped in front of Azon and placed his hands on his knees to rest. Without running anymore, the tempo was broken, and Ornias couldn’t help but breathe sporadically.

Exhausted and breathing heavily now, Ornias said, “It would appear the sun is descending, and I ran from dawn to dusk like you asked.”

Just after he finished talking his stomach growled which startled both men. Originally, Azon had plans to say some harsh words and had part of a mind to make him run one more lap. But with the growling stomach disturbing his thoughts he could only laugh instead.

Seeing Azon bust out laughing, Ornias rubbed his stomach and couldn’t help but join laughing. He lifted his head up in the air chuckling and said, “Seems I am starving.”

Smiling and waving off his previous evil notions, Azon said, “Alright, lets have Cecilia make us something. I haven’t eaten as well, so I’m also starving like a wolf.”

He paused a brief moment then his tone changed, and he said, “I want you to start practicing more of those book techniques on your own. I will not permit you to use them during training but I want you to be able to utilize the basics.”

An aura of seriousness expounded of him as he said, “If you use them during training, your body will not improve much, and I cannot in good judgement allow you to do much more with such a small framed figure that you have now.”

Reacquiring his initial hearty smile and demonic attitude, he said, “Afterwards I want you to get some rest and you will run this again and again till you can match an hour time frame with a single lap like you could using that initial technique from your book.”

Ornias smiled, rubbed his nose, and acting cocky said, “Of course father I will train hard to be a son you can be proud of.”

Azon smiled back but saw the haughty attitude coming from the boy and slightly frowned. This is why he was harsh, since he needed to make Ornias want to beg for lighter training or else this boy will always have an overbearing attitude towards others.

While indeed he was a genius, it was getting to his head, making him rather cocky. What Azon desired was a calm collective Ornias, not an impulsive brat who will get himself killed facing the real world. With that he sighed and led Ornias back inside to eat.

After eating, Ornias went up to his room and recalled what Azon said to him. With but a simple thought, he pulled out a memory from his mind and sorted through it till he found the information he wanted.

This was a frightening ability of consolidating the mind, and was primarily used by extreme experts at high levels. Yet he was able to do it at his young age since his mind was so powerful due to the melding with the divine artifact.

Sorting through the information, he chose a technique that would help him greatly from the book of the laws of a warrior. He shouldn’t strain his body at his age and decided to choose a technique that didn’t undermine him for his youthful and weak body.

The technique he selected was called the Stratum Corneum defensive membrane. The technique stated that the individual only needed to imagine a membrane of skin surrounding the outer body protecting it like a defense.

This was in fact a skill to toughen the skin on the body to a degree and enhance its defensive capabilities. Closing his eyes and entering in a meditative state, he recalled what was written in the book and followed its procedure.

First, he thought of a thin skin-like membrane of strong defense surrounding the entirety his body and surged that thought throughout his mind. After visualizing it, he tried to focus the thought on just his right arm.

Opening his eyes, he stared intently at his right arm, while focusing on his skin, and thought of a membrane protecting it. The muscles on his face tightened in concentration and he slowly started to feel the skin on his right arm tingling almost like he was growing new skin.

The sensation he was experiencing is the same as when you are sunburnt, and the dead skin is falling off, and new skin is being formed. While thinking of having tougher skin, a slivery shine started to sparkle on parts of the skin on his arm. It started to shine on his forearm first and began to encase his entire arm very slowly in the silver membrane.

Strain couldn’t help but be expressed on his face as he pushed harder trying to envelop his right arm in that silvery shine. Slowly covering his entire arm, it moved down from his forearm to his finger tips and also worked its way up to where his arm connected to his shoulder.

After succeeding, he relaxed his facial muscles from the deep concentration and he felt immense mental exhaustion from focusing on his right arm. However he smiled and was quite satisfied with the result. Looking at his arm, he saw it was fully encompassed in that silver membrane, and content with his progress he went back to reading the text.

What takes most practitioners months to just envelop one limb in the Stratum Corneum technique, he was able to do in the matter of an hour. Once someone puts a membrane on a body part they can spread that membrane to the rest of their body slowly and this process would take almost a year, for most individuals.

According to the texts, after enveloping part of the body in the defensive membrane, he no longer had to exert much effort in putting the membrane on his limb anymore, and could use the technique with but a thought.

There are also higher tiers of defensive technique. Silver was considered the lowest and was used by warrior ranks one through three. Once reaching the fourth rank, attacks could easily pierce through the membrane and so they would need to form a stronger layer that would be the color of jade.

This layer would be enforced on top of the previous one and upon reaching the seventh rank the final layer would need to be formed. The seventh ranked layer was an Azure blue in color and was considered the strongest.

Gaining an understanding for the new technique he had start to practice, he felt satisfied for tonight and plopped down on his bed and fell asleep. Tomorrow would be another long day of running and he knew he needed his sleep.

As soon as the sun rose up, Ornias woke up with it, and he started to run around the encampment again. This became a routine for him and every night he would continue spreading the membrane on his body and everyday he would run.

Just like Rana, the men within the camp became accustomed to Ornias, and even cheered him on as he ran. After a week of persistence he was able to encase the defensive membrane all over his body and he had also to complete thirteen laps in a fifteen hour time frame.

He had seemed to make vast improvements constantly, and decided to train in another of the initial laws of the warrior. Although Ornias could perform the defensive membrane technique, most people needed to be at the first warrior rank to be able to utilize it.

This was because it wasn’t until the first rank that an individual would be able to gain a great understanding of the body. He had an exceedingly powerful mind however, which made up for the lack of knowledge of his body. Using his powerful mental prowess he could enforce a membrane on his body even without directly understanding behind the process.

Normally, it would be extremely taxing on the individuals mind and so far only four recorded people in history have been able to form a defensive membrane on their body. All four individuals used just their mental prowess to form them and were not even within the first rankings of a warrior.

Sitting in his room again, he flipped through more techniques, but most required him to be a ranked warrior, and since he was not, he could not train in them. Sighing and pushing all reason out, he decided to go back to the law which enabled him to enforce more power into his limbs.

This technique was hazardous to an untrained body, but he didn’t care, and since he couldn’t use this technique during training with Azon, he desired to understand it on his own. Slowly he put his mind to the task, and tried to focus his mind on his legs again.

He thought of putting more force into it, and thought of it moving faster, just like he did when he first used it. Raising his leg, and quickly tightening the muscles in his leg, as he kicked the air, it made a powerful whoosh sound.

“Just like this…huh” Ornias said with glee glimmering in his eyes.

Irresponsibly, he continued the laws of strengthening limbs that was supposed to be a technique for ranked users. Yet he still wanted to pour more and more mental power into his kicks.

Sure enough, they began to increase in speed and power. The kicks started to make whistling noises due to his body being slightly conditioned with running.

A full two month passed in this manner and now Ornias was actually able to run twenty five laps in a day. His legs were sore and tired from running during the day and practicing kicking at night, but it didn’t seem to bother him.

Now that he reached the first goal, Azon wanted him to be able to run fifteen laps by noon now and he still had a ways to go.

At night he continued practicing the strengthening of his legs and they started to cause ripples in the air. The air surged in all directions away from his kick which gave an idea to Ornias. Using his kick could he enforce power into it and make the wind move in a direction of his choice.

He contemplated over this and started to practice harder. Three more months passed by and Ornias was now able to run fifteen laps by noon, and since he reached the second set goal he reported to Azon again.

As always, Azon was usually in meditation sitting underneath a tree he seemed to favorite.

As Ornias approached, Azon looked up at Ornias standing in front of him and smiled while saying, “Good work these past five months.”

He looked at Ornias extensively and noticed muscles starting to develop on his calves and thighs. This was the mark of the training proceeding smoothly and made him excited.

The man’s eyes shined with an evil light, and he said, “Now you will continue running fifteen kilometers every day, and I expect the time frame to get even shorter. However, on top of that you will add more training to it.”

He had a sinister smile and said, “You will do squats till the sun drops down, and whatever your highest number of squats is by the end of the day, you will use that number to be your basis, and complete it in four hours.”

Shock and dismay sprang on the boy’s face. Completely unsatisfied with the ridiculous request he quickly started, “That is absurd.”

He snorted and with disgruntled anguish said, “That is a high demand you know, and all I am doing is training my legs! When can I train my arms or even learn the how to pass to the first rank of a warrior?”

Azon glared at him and said, “Boy you will do as I say and do not skimp out! The most important aspect is being able to save your own life and you will need strong legs to run away! Do you want to die a dog’s death?”

Relaxing his face, and calming down, he reconsidered what Ornias said and then he sighed.

Slightly retracting the previous statement he said, “However it is true your legs are indeed being too focused on. So I will start a course for your arms and the rest of your body. But you will have to alternate between them.”

Mulling over ideas for some time he then said, “Alright here is how it will be, you will do the squats finishing today off. Then tomorrow I shall train you to do arm exercises. We will have you do legs, arms, legs, and the day after that I want you to work on the core region of your body.”

Satisfied with his own decision, he nodded in agreement with himself, and said, “You will alternate every day between arms, legs and core strengthening exercises. Once you hit my goals I have set for you, find me and I will increase the amount or I will give you further instructions.”

Ornias seemed to like this decision better and happily turned away and started his squats, persisting all the way till the sun went down.

When the sun disappeared he angrily sighed and said, “That demon, Nineteen thousand and twenty one every other day! What a pain!”

Tiredness was an easy way to explain how he felt since his legs felt wobbly from running and doing squats all day. This was a first for him since his breathing technique was so good he didn’t need to worry about getting oxygen into his muscles. But this didn’t stop the ache and pain from the constant strain of an all-day workout.

Heading back to his room, he finally was able to kick the air with his foot and make a ripple sound forcing the air to push forwards with his kick instead of every direction. If he would have used this technique with his palm it would have been known as palm blast, and was actual taught at many prestigious academies for warriors.

Yet this technique he developed was unlike the academies techniques. Because he could do this same technique with his foot and he didn’t seem to need to do it with his palm.

Eventually he wanted to be able to apply this same principle to his fist, knee, elbow, or even a weapon. Therefore this technique he developed was actually his own variation and he decided to call it the whirlwind force.

Several more months passed, and Ornias became six years old. His birthday present was Azon forcing him to do the same pushups he taught Rana for arm exercises. On his birthday, of all days, he had to do push-ups with a large boulder on his back, weighing the same as when Rana first started as well.

Following that, the regular regime he did for the past several months consisted of him bench-pressing a rod that held two buckets on each end. Those buckets carried stones weighing twenty-five kilograms and he had to balance it while bench-pressing, adding considerable difficulty to the challenge.

Lastly Azon required him to put his hands in a basin with fiery hot coals. He had to put his hands all the way to the bottom them pull them back out. After that Azon instructed him plunge his hands into a basin of sand and transition constantly back and forth.

One was hot and burned the hands and seemed to scorch the flesh. But it made the skin tougher and got him accustomed to pain. The other was cold and rough whilst scraping against a hand that was burning not too long ago.

This method forced his hands to become perilously strengthened and tough. So in a year’s time, if he was to use his fingers, he could pierce through flesh easily. This finished off the day and Ornias was too tired to read and fell asleep immediately.

When he woke up he did his leg exercises and finished the day off again too tired to feel like reading. On the day he was to work on his core region Azon made him do sit ups and crunches to strengthen his core.

Doing these exercises he eventually would work out nearly every major part of his body. So far doing the core was his favorite day since it was the easiest on him and he found after the day ended he was in the mood to read again.

While strengthening the rest of his body he decided to enforce power into the rest of his limbs just like he did for his legs. In the end he would be able to perform the Whirlwind force technique with every part of his body.

Late arriving news of Rana reaching the second rank arrived and this motivated little Ornias to push himself even harder. Writing a happy ninth birthday letter to her, he congratulated her, and told her he would try to catch up to her.

He quickly began to be able to lift more and do more over the course of the next four months. The growth speed he exhibited was absurd and he could bench seventy-five kilograms in each bucket now and had a boulder that weighed a hundred and twenty on his back.

As Azon lay in bed still awake, he was pondering to himself. Ornias had already surpassed the threshold of the first ranked warriors in training and possibly even the second ranked warriors.

This was an amazing feat but he sighed and thought there was nothing he could do since Ornias was too young to have a trial of the mind. Trials of the mind have never been recorded to come before eight years of age, and Ornias was only six, albeit an impressive six year old.

Unsure of what to do for an impressive youngster, Azon turn over and fell asleep to debate over it when the time came. In the room down the hall, Ornias was still up studying.

Absorbed, he sat on his bed, and skimmed through the books in his mind debating what to practice next. In the end he decided to train in the laws of magic since all the rest of the laws of the warrior required him to be within the first rank.

To use magic, it was important to first mediate and focus on your surroundings. Setting a rhythm to his breath, he arrived in calm state of mind, and continued to read the next portion of the laws of magic.

The book stated that all around him the magical elements of the world existed, and to use the magical essences he would need to gather the force of the elements within his mind, and form it with a thought into a tangible object.

The easiest way to do this is to calm the mind, and focus on the surroundings. Upon reach a heightened state of the mind, only then could an individual sense the elements around them. The greater the individual’s potential in melding magic, and their mind, the more readily they can feel the power of the elements around them.

Calming himself, Ornias sat attentively and was prepared to feel out the elemental essences that was located everywhere in the world. Yet, what the book didn’t state was that making contact with your first magical was very dangerous to do alone.

To form the initial connection with magical essence and achieve the first ranking, usually the assistance of a fellow mage is needed. This is because it is far too dangerous otherwise to tap into an elementals power.

With the aid of a fellow mage he can guide the individual safely to form the first contract with an element. If an individual tried to form a contract by themselves it is dangerous, and the elemental energies that they try to communicate with their mind, almost always will create unstable vortexes of raw elemental energy that can cause disastrous explosions or other ill effects.

But Ornias was unaware of such catastrophes that could occur. The book he had was a simple book and didn’t explain the dangers properly, so he proceeded anyways.