Chapter 18 – Fortune

“When you stare too long into the abyss… it reaches out to you…” A voice rang in the cold distant darkness.

“Redius…”

“Every relationship is reciprocal… even with the elements…” The voice continued to echo as a blinding light invaded and fought back the darkness.

Redius opened his eyes to a dimly lit place, rock stagnates protruded from the ceiling he was looking at. He tried to recall what had happened, his last sight was the sabretooth nearly killing Ji. Ji? Where was he?! He attempted to get up, only to be greeted by an incredibly sore pain from all over his body. His head raised and fell twice as hard.

“Urgg…” he groaned in pain as he tried to turn his head to look around.

“Ji ji!” A noise soon came from a distance not too far away. A white figure appeared in the corner of Redius’ eye and soon licked his face continuously. He smiled as relief fell into his heard, Ji was alive and well.

After a long time of nudging and licking Ji sat next to Redius’ head, gesturing and making noises as he played out what happened.

“Ji ji ji!” he said as he stood on his hind legs and waved his arms about.

“Ji ji, ji! Ji… ji!” He continued as he got into various stances and jumped about. At first, Redius’ found it hilarious at the sight, then as Ji continued, his expression darkened slowly, and soon he was left pondering as silence once again returned.

Apparently, Redius’ went into a frenzy and miraculously defeated the sabretooth, but with a great price. According to Ji, dark elements engulfed him and he was able to summon immense power. But his consciousness couldn’t handle it and he was fighting instinctively. After the fight, Ji couldn’t even get near Redius as every time he did, dark tendrils would appear from the thin layer of dark element around Redius and attack him.

It wasn’t able to distinguish from friend or foe, until finally, after some time, Redius dropped on the floor. His magical power exhausted. Only then could Ji grab Redius and escape from the place. Luckily their pursuers didn’t even once think that Redius would enter the epicentre.

Redius looked at Ji and smiled conveying a thank you as Ji proudly smacked his chest before once again guarding the entrance.

Ji had told him that they were currently in the sabretooth’s cave. His so called lair. It was the safest place to be as no other monster would intrude onto his lair. Although now that the sabretooth was dead, things could change. But Redius didn’t have time to even think about that, he needed to get better.

He quickly examined his inner body through the elements and couldn’t hide the shock he saw. His diatis crystal, his ice,

fire, darkness crystal and his ele centre all were completely discoloured and held a tiny crack in the middle. Panic hit him as he tried to get up. But once again, pain overwhelmed him and sent him back groaning into position.

Unable to move, he slowly gathered his mind as he attempted to gather the elements, which to his relief worked but far far slower than previously. Even slower than an 1st stage apprentice. But at least it still worked, he had hoped.

Then he suddenly remembered something, his master. He summoned what little power of diatis he had into his ring. And brought out a vial of pills inside. He remembered back in the ravine as his master explained all of the pills to him. The ones he had taken out, was a pill to heal the damaged centres of a knight and magician.

Ji almost instinctively came over and brought the vial over to Redius’ head and opened it as a potent smell of medicine filled the cave. He popped one into Redius’ mouth and closed it.

As soon as Redius swallowed the pill, he could feel a warm trailing down into his stomach and finally towards his ele centre. The heat grew more and more intense, his face contorted with pain as he groaned, turning back and forth only to feel more physical pain.

This process was not a short one at all. It took a whole day for the heat to dissipate and for Redius to finally relax. If any top initiate class meditros were here, they’d be shocked at the sight of the pill. It was far more powerful than anything they could’ve created. It could not have been found in a city has small as Darabas.

Redius drenched in his clothing, once again view his ele centre, and to his joy, the crack had mended and a slight colour had returned to it. He smiled as he laid unmoving and gathered the elements into his centre to regain his aura. After a couple of hours, his centre was filled with elements again. His aura was back at his full capacity, but this time, with even more. He deduced that perhaps when his centre was shattered and mended by the pill, the power of the pill was so great that it forced itself into the centre creating a bigger and stronger centre.

If that’s the case… Redius thought as a plan came to mind. Risks separated the successful and the nobody after all. He smiled as he sat up, his bones cracking having been the first time he was moving for a long time. By channelling the elements through his body and in addition to taking a healing pill, his injuries were healing and he was able to move his body slightly.

He reached for the vial and popped another pill into his mouth as he channelled the warm energy to his diatis crystal, and endured the familiar pain from the extreme heat it gave off.

First, if any high level Meditros or magicians or knights were here, they would call him insane, especially his master. The risk involved in healing a cracked crystal or centre was high enough let alone forcing more power into it and expanding it.

Secondly, the degree of control over it to not let it explode and kill themselves is tremendously high. Plus the ability to endure the extreme pain for hours. Only someone of fierce determination and will could accomplish it.

Thirdly, it wouldn’t always work. It included an element of luck. Being ballsy enough to crack your own crystal or centres were needed and the fact that not every advancement was capable of expanding it. There needed to be a perfect time and opportunity. Too high a class or too low would leave you dead. It all depended on the person. Not even his master knew. But Redius had managed to come across it by accident.

Days passed as Redius continued this process, four days… seven days… two weeks… And then on the 20th day, a huge force burst out from the cave blowing away everything in it’s path. Redius took a deep breath as he opened his eyes, a grin on his face.

After spending a tremendous time in pain and agony, he finally mended the cracks on the crystals, and after some time, he had filled them back up with power again. All of them were much bigger and powerful than they were previously. And as luck would have it, the battles Redius suffered provided a way that Redius needed to advance into the 3rd stage of disciple class. His crystals and centre again got a little bigger in size and turned a deeper colour than before. He could feel power surging through him, he was at least 50% stronger than he was previously.

With his body healed and in full condition, he cleaned himself up, donned a new cloak and left for payback.

“ji ji!!” Ji grabbed Redius’ collar as he was about to leave the cave. “Ji ji ji!” as he gestured towards the inside of the cave.

“Stash?” Redius asked to which Ji nodded.

Apparently, the sabretooth’s stash was somewhere inside the cave. Having spent all his time recuperating, Redius hadn’t looked around much.

He headed back in and quickly expanded his sense field, now at a range of 70 metres. He quickly found a hidden part of the cave and entered seeing a small area with multiple piles of different herbs of different classes. Monsters too required power to advance, but their way of gathering the elements were much slower than humans. Though their physical traits excelled. One of their ways to increase that speed was through herbs, although they could not create pills like meditros, they ate it raw for the power contained.

That was also a reason why Ji loved Redius’ pills.

Redius gathered them all into his ring without looking much and headed back out the cave. As he was about to step out, he paused and returned to the middle.

Now that he was more powerful, he needed to learn more ways to control his magic. More spells. He took out a scroll from his master and placed it in front of him. He read it once, completely memorized it and placed it back into the ring.

He closed his eyes as he concentrated and gathered ice elements in front of him. They formed quickly together then dissipated. Again and again they continued. It was simple exercises that his master had created to help control the flow of magic. Imagine a magician able to use 1 of his power to create a spell as power as another who used 5 of their power.

“You are your own building block Redius.” His master would say. “Only when your grounds are strong and steady, and your tower rise further into the sky.” He would never forget his master’s teaching.

Soon, he sat and trained in a spells and aura techniques due to his advancement. Some of which he trained were:

tiny ice balls with an immensely strong structure, able to fly at great speed penetrating opponents and exploded from within them into spikes if need be

chains of fire forming a prism and engulfing the inside with fire

An aura technique his master obtained, a special way of channelling aura into the user’s leg to increase the speed drastically

A sword technique that seemingly creates ten real sword after images

Spells were easily created by magicians as they commanded the elements. The better one controlled them, the more complex and powerful spells one could command. Thus it was all a matter of the power one had and the degree of control one could use. This is normally increased by advancing into another class or by extreme training.

Most often, magician’s would create spells and train their muscle memory into creating it for easier use in battle.

As for Aura techniques, these were certain forms that a knight would practice to better release the aura outside their body for an attack.

Redius smiled as he trained hard in the cave. He smiled because he thought of the household families.

What would happen if they knew that it was because of them that allowed him this much progress?

*Author's note - I'm a bit busy lately getting back to working for university. Chapters might be coming out slower.