-Energy Manipulation-

[A technique exclusive to Demons and Half-Demons.

It uses a different form of energy from regular magic, that is

only visible to them. Techniques that use it include Demon Sheath and Acceleration.]

From the start, the battle of Arel Anur vs. VX had a very different air than any previous fight. Before the two even drew their weapons or threw their first spell, you could practically feel the power emanating from them, creating an invisible, and incredible pressure throughout the arena. Arel’s expression was a lot more serious than it was during his battle against Sarii. It dawned on me that he hadn’t taken her seriously at all, and much like Oroske does when sparring with me, he held back a lot.

Arel’s first move was also quite different, and sparked the interest of myself and the group I sat with. Rather than pulling his sword from its sheath like he had earlier, he instead traced the length of his weapon, and with a flash of red energy, summoned it to his hand.

“A human that can use Demon Sheath,” Nadred commented, “I’m a bit impressed. I wonder what else they’ll show us in this fight.” When I asked what he meant, he explained that the final fight of the tournament is typically a showcase of the most recent advancements the school has made in magic research, in addition to a show of how powerful their top students are.

According to Oroske, “Humans usually aren’t able to use Demon Sheath, or any Energy Manipulation techniques like that, as they are completely incapable of seeing the energy used. However, with enough time, dedication, and determination, they can get a feel for how to use it without seeing it. They do have to be taught by someone who can see the energy, whether it be a Demon or Half-Demon.”

VX mirrored Arel’s actions, summoning forth a weapon that matched his armor; sharp lines that made a unique shape, a black, jagged blade with a blood-red cutting edge. He pointed the blade straight at Arel, and a salvo of flaming lights shot toward him, moving so fast I could barely track them. The shots exploded upon contact, creating tons of smoke and kicking up dust.

As the smoke cleared and dust settled, Arel was revealed with his usual barrier of anur, escaping the blasts with not even a single scratch. He stood up straight, dropping his barrier, and flipped his sword into a reverse-grip hold. He held his left hand up to the gem that was used as the weapon’s pommel, and began channeling Aether into it. A series of those complex circles appeared around the gem, creating an almost complete sphere around it. Several of them shot out, roughly half of them, and formed small rectangles on either side of the arena, each at slightly different angles, and progressing in height as they approached VX.

Arel flipped his sword back around, and prepared for a dash. With a large burst of wind at his feet, he launched himself forward. Not towards VX, however, but instead he opted to run along the rectangles he had just created.

VX swung his blade, once again releasing a barrage of small fireballs. Rather than target Arel, however, he targeted the platforms. He destroyed several on each side, seemingly choosing at random. This caused Arel to have to switch sides, or skip over platforms on his way towards VX, who, beyond destroying the platforms, allowed him to not only reach him, but get to the platforms behind him. From the rear platform, a thin white wire appeared, going from Arel to the floor on the opposite side of VX. He dashed along the line with impressive speed, swinging his weapon at VX. However, he landed on the opposite side without even making contact with VX, who had seemingly disappeared entirely as Arel swung through him. VX then reappeared behind Arel, who was looking at where they used to be.

With Arel seeming like he wouldn’t be able to get away or put up his defenses fast enough, VX swung their blade once more, releasing the same flares from earlier. What happened next happened so fast I couldn’t actually see it, but I felt two shockwaves in quick succession. Once again the flares kicked up lots of dust, and when it cleared, instead of revealing Arel having just barely managed to block, it revealed nothing. Arel was nowhere to be seen.

He reappeared on the opposite end of the arena, back where he originally started. He had an incredible amount of energy flowing through and around him, with a gray aura surrounding him. His eyes were closed, and there was such a potent lack of emotion in him, I could sense it from where I sat.

For the first time, VX spoke, “Very well, we’ll finish this quickly then.” Their voice was both masculine and feminine, and sounded almost like multiple voices speaking at once. I hadn’t heard anything like it before.

“Impossible,” Oroske said, almost angrily, “How could Humans possibly learn to use Acceleration, especially to such a high degree?” He quickly performed Acceleration himself, causing another small shockwave next to me. All around him, small, blue lights began floating.

Kared followed suit, and as they had during our fight with the Necromancer the night before, her eyes glowed a bright, lavender purple. I could tell Jarou wanted to do it as well, but Nadred stopped him, telling him he needed to rest his body, and get more practice. I wanted to as well, but hadn’t even begun learning how to properly. Afterward, Nadred used Acceleration as well, gaining a simple white aura around him. The other Half-Demons in our row used it as well, and across the arena, I could see a few people who were using it as well.

VX then Accelerated, a vicious aura surrounded them. Blue orbs, just large enough to be made out from a distance, orbited close around their sternum.

From this point on, all I could see was flashes of blue and orange light occasionally clashing, with other colors occasionally flashing as they used offensive magic. After we returned to our hotel later that night, Oroske explained everything Jarou and I missed.

From what Oroske told us, the fight was being fought in much the same way as earlier, even including Arel’s trick with his platforms. However, they were attacking much faster, and using stronger spells. VX started bringing out these orange-gold colored chains, which had spikes at the end. From what Oroske could tell, they were made entirely of magic, though it was a type of magic he was wholly unfamiliar with. It was those chains that would end the Acceleration-based phase of this fight.

From my perspective, it ended quite suddenly. Arel was caught mid-air with one of these chain’s spikes lodged in his chest. It didn’t look as though he was bleeding from it, so perhaps it was not actually a physical chain? Getting hit with it seemed to stop him in his tracks completely though, and he fell to the ground with a thunk. Once he was on the ground, VX came out of their Acceleration a lot more gently, slowing themself down slowly.

As Arel tried to stand back up, the chains multiplied, and tied him down, locking themselves into the ground. The most he could manage was to get into a kneeling position. His breathing was heavy, and it was clear the end of the battle was coming soon.

“Let’s finish this,” VX said again, their strange sounding voice, or voices, echoing throughout the arena, as the crowd was silent. “No hard feelings if you die, right Arel?”

Arel simply nodded.

VX raised their sword into the air, and a large, very complicated circle began to appear in the air. The central pattern, that the rest of the interior pattern followed along, seemed to be a twelve pointed star. And at the tip of each of those points, another, smaller circle appeared, each with a five pointed star within.

“Incredible, how can one person manage that much?” Kared commented a few seats down from me.

As the circle completed, it’s extremely complex design filling the space between the outer circles and the stars, ZX pointed their sword once again toward Arel. A single word rang out from their voices, “Arciin.”

The entire arena began rumbling as a massive ball of energy began to emerge from the circle. The entire arena seemed to get dimmer as well, as though the energy for the lights was being sapped by the ball.

Arel was still chained down, seemingly resigned to allow whatever spell was coming his way to wipe him out. But then, he gathered up what strength he had, and thrust his sword into the ground, and began casting a spell. A massive white circle appeared under him, before disappearing. After it disappeared, several smaller, but still large circles appeared in front of him.

At that moment, the ball suddenly erupted into a massive laser, covering the entire arena, and slamming into an invisible wall just before reaching the audience. And one by one, the familiar sound of shattering barriers rang out from inside the beam. Until finally, the beam dissipated, after a moment of silence.

None of Arel’s barriers remained, and his body lay flat on the ground, held down by the orange chains. Though he didn’t move for several seconds, it seemed he held onto his consciousness by some miracle. He simply gave a thumbs up in VX’s direction, before finally going unconscious.

The bridges to the arena reappeared, and the announcer spoke, “Ladies and gentlemen! Today we have a special guest to announce our victor! Introducing the Guardian of Prophecy, Naen!”

A man with long, golden swept back hair and emerald eyes walked out, wearing a white trench coat and shoes, accented by gold trim and black gloves and shoes. The majority of the crowd was going wild. He looked like he was at most in his late 20’s, not at all like I expected one of the Guardians to look. If I recalled my history lessons properly, he should have been well over 500 years old.

When Naen reached the center of the arena, he dramatically bowed before speaking. “This concludes this year’s Tournament of Towers! Once again, VX reigns as the champion!” He grabbed VX’s wrist and lifted it in the air, signifying victory. “This year at the School of Towers Academy has been a special one, and I think every contestant has shown off everything they’ve learned quite impressively. I hope you all enjoyed the show, and be safe on your travels home!”

“I think I know why we were invited here now, at least.” Oroske spoke, glaring down at Naen as he left the stage. A small medical team came in after he left to collect Arel, and VX left the arena silently. “Let’s get going.” Oroske stood up, and gestured for everyone else to do the same.

We had a much easier time coming in, since a large portion of the audience was already seated and there was a more steady stream of people going in. Now, however, there were a few thousand people all trying to leave at the same time. We slowly, but surely, made our way into the stairway, and out to the foyer area for the arena, moving only a few steps at a time. Eventually, we were able to get on an elevator, accompanied by the Half-Demons from the other Clans. The entire time, Oroske and Nadred had been making small talk with them, discussing various things from Clan specific events, and news from around the world in general.

I half-heartedly listened until finally, the elevator dinged, and the door opened. We piled out, into the large circular room that made up the majority of the first floor. Waiting for us there was Naen.

“Ah, just the group I wanted to see,” He said, his arms outstretched as though to welcome us. “How did you enjoy the show?” Oroske shouldered his way past Wex, without any sort of apology.

“It was impressive, to be sure,” he started gruffly, “Are you the reason we were invited?”

Naen chuckled and raised a finger and shook it slightly, “Perceptive, you Tsumi’s always have been. I am indeed.”

“Was it so we could see you’ve somehow taught Humans to use Energy Manipulation?” Oroske asked.

“That’s part of it, for sure.” Nadred began, “Of course, I’m not going to disclose how we managed it, but you can rest assured: there are only a small few who can as of yet. The Demons’ trademark abilities shall remain theirs for the time being. Nay, while I wished for you to see that, I also wished to speak with you all myself. Things here are quite busy as of right now, but I have some information I would like you all to deliver to your Clans’ leaders.” He conjured up three envelopes, and handed one to each of Wex, Oroske, and Sel’un. “I’d ask you not to open it yourselves, and deliver them as is to your leaders. Their cooperation with the matter detailed within is very important to me, so please make sure it is delivered quickly.

“But for now, I must get back to work. Do take care on your way home.” Naen said with a wave of his hands, as he walked towards the central room in the large hallway.

“Ugh,” Wex complained, “What a creep.” Her Incol comrades nodded in agreement. “Well, it’s been a pleasure meeting you all, perhaps we’ll run into each other again sometime.”

“Likewise,” Oroske commented.

Despite seemingly having said our goodbyes, the Incol group walked awkwardly with us until we got to the edge of the hill. Sel’un parted ways inside the tower, exiting through the opposite entrance. We said our final goodbyes when we reached the bottom of the hill. They continued on, probably turning down a street down the ways a little. We pressed on the way we came back, eventually returning to our hotel.

The tournament ran all the way until three hours past midnight, and the sun would rise in another five. Despite this, the streets were still packed with people and vehicles, and continued to be throughout the night.

Back in the hotel, Jarou and I asked about how things went in the fight when they started using Acceleration. After explaining, Oroske sent us into our bedroom, while the adults would stay up longer chatting about various things, presumably with their ‘adult drinks.’

However, Jarou and I weren’t quite tired enough to sleep, seeing as we had both slept most of the day away. So, instead we chatted the night away. We sat in front of our window, looking at the School of Towers, and talked about the fights, and how much further we had to go. He helped me begin to learn Acceleration myself, at my request. I wanted to surprise Oroske by learning something on my own.

Eventually, we began to feel tired. Just as the sun was beginning to rise, and the sky beyond the tower started getting brighter.

“Ahh,” Jarou sighed, falling back on his hands as he sat, leaning back quite far, “I would love to go to the School someday…”

I laughed, and agreed. “Bet you I could beat you to the top,” I joked.

“Yeah, right,” he nudged me with his elbow, temporarily messing up his balance. “Given the chance to go, I wonder if I’d be able to leave the Clan.” He seemed to be thinking about it seriously.

“I would,” I encouraged him, “You could tell Danfis something like ‘it’ll make me a stronger Hunter,’ and I’m sure he’d let you go.” I was half joking, but I made myself curious if that would actually work.

“Yeah, probably,” he chuckled, “Though, not like they’re accepting Half-Demons right now anyway.”

“Sadly,” I said through a yawn, as the sun started peering through the towers, hitting my eyes directly. “Should probably get some rest, gotta return to the Clan today, right?”

“Yep, we probably should,” Jarou forced himself to his feet, and helped me up. I promptly face planted on my bed, and quickly fell asleep without even getting under the covers.