Hello Readers!

It has been a while since the last chapter.

So here is the promised chapter that will reveal a bit more of Calb's secret and what is really going on with his body. Enjoy! :)

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It has been 4 months since Calb was taken in by Taron to learn the way of the martial artists. Calb realized real quickly that the life of a martial artist in the world of magic was not as easy as he would have guessed. Having lived a military lifestyle for most of his previous life, he was not foreign to a life of discipline and training. However, his new life in the world of magic as an apprentice martial artist proved to be challenging in that his new lifestyle required discipline of a different sort.

Gone were the days where he could get a meal simply by just pressing few buttons. But instead, he had to learn how to cook, as he and Serina took turns cooking. The problem with that arrangement was that he had never cooked before in his life, not to mention his lack of familiarity with the cooking utensils and unfamiliar herbs and spices of his new world. What resulted was that when he messed up a meal, he was forced to eat the messed up meal for the next few meals by himself while Serina and Taron enjoyed newly cooked meals properly made by Serina herself. Why? Food was not so plentiful out in the mountains, as he was accustomed to, while in space, as an all important, legendary Commander Calb Colbert. There was no wasting of food allowed, especially when he was, now, a lowly junior disciple, a peon, with less than adequate amount of mana to the point of being a cripple! Almost.

He missed the technologically efficient beds that healed away the aches and pains of the day prior by simply sleeping away the pain to wake up the next day all refreshed. Not only had he had to sleep on the hard floor with bare minimum cushion, his aches and pains from the day prior only added onto the ever increasing toll on the body brought on by new aches and pains of the brand new day. To Calb, a man that was 70% machine before he came to this new world where he is, now, 100% flesh and bones, the daily aches and pains of training seemed like a long forgotten nightmare revisited.

Of course, problems relating to basic necessities of life, above, weren’t the only things Calb missed. He missed something that is only allowed in the weightlessness of the outer space. He missed pressurized thermal bath chambers which allowed him to get a nice, refreshing warm baths while gently floating in midair, as his bath, now, consisted of sitting underneath a cold waterfall, as a training method to trying to learn to utilize mana to instantaneously convert cold water into warm water. The problem with this arrangement was the fact that the water was not stationary, as they all had to flow downstream. That meant, no matter how much he converted the cold water into hot, unless he was able to instantaneously convert it, he would gain no benefit from the newly “warmed” water, as it would be downstream of him, already, by the time he could properly enjoy the warmth.

Any sane, intelligent individual would know that such task was impossible, but that would be the case of an individual living in a scientific world. Calb was, now, in a world of magic where greater acquisition of mana depended upon him being “in tuned” with the nature. So what does that mean? Of course Calb had no idea what that meant, as he had been pondering about that concept for the past 4 months. However, he did make a slight progress in that he had learned that his initial understanding of the problem, as presented above, was not quite correct.

Initially, he was brooding about how to turn the cold water into warm water, which was logical. However, as already mentioned, logics of the scientific world does not necessarily work in the world of magic. Once he understood that concept, he was able to realize that he was going about it all wrong. What he should have been focusing on was the question of, “How to make the cold water not cold?” If said in another way, the question would be, “How to make it so that coldness of the water is not felt?” If taken even further, “How to make it so that the coldness of the water is felt warm instead?”

This is where the concept of being “in tuned” with the nature is so paramount. When an individual is “in tuned” with the nature, affects of (coming from) the nature, produced/introduced upon the individual, is not effect, but it becomes affect, as the said individual is now one with the nature. In other words, whatever affects the nature affects the individual. If taken a bit further, whatever affects the nature, an individual that is one with the nature can make it so that the affect is reversed.

So, for example, water from the waterfall is cold, and for, whatever the reason, something affected nature to produce that cold water. As a recipient of that cold water, upon the body, an individual that is one with the nature will naturally feel the coldness of the water, as the individual is also affected by that something. However, since the individual is one with the nature, that individual can negate that coldness by way of obliviousness. In other words, ignoring the temperature sensor, just as how an individual can sense clothing on his/her body, but do not sense it constantly the whole time s/he is wearing the clothing. It is only when the individual focus his/her mind on the clothing does s/he sense the clothing.

So does it mean that the secret to being in tuned with nature, with the respect to the coldness of the water, is ignoring the cold? No. When an individual is one with the nature, one does not have to consciously ignore the cold, just as an individual do not consciously choose to ignore the sensation of clothing.

No, it just happens.

In summary, an individual with individual consciousness joins collective consciousness of the nature to become the new collective consciousness, and the process of ignoring the cold is done while still part of that new collective consciousness, not the individual consciousness before the “in tuning” with the nature…before becoming that new collective consciousness.

Understanding of this concept of joint consciousness is the reason for the disparity between two individuals where one believes nature is alive with a soul of its own versus the other not believing in nature’s soul. In other words, one must first accept the fact that nature (or the whole Plane) is a sentient being with its own soul, before one can truly be “in tuned” with nature, and it is that “in tunedness” that determines how readily nature’s mana enters an individual and infuse with the individual, rather than simply passing through an individual. So the disparity of the two individuals is clear in that former will gather mana more optimally, versus the latter that do not believe in the nature’s soul.

If looking at this from relationship point of view, being in tuned with nature, or that of a Plane, is a fellowship shared between two souls at the most intimate level. With that said, would it be so difficult to understand that mana shared between two souls would be so much more efficient and abundant between two souls where the fellowship between the two is at such intimate level versus fellowship with others where the fellowship is not so intimate? The former is a fellowship established after both accepting each other as sentient beings whereas the latter is a fellowship established where the one side does not accept the sentient status of another. How can there not be such drastic disparity between the two different groups with regards to gathering and utilization of mana?

With regards to above, Calb, unfortunately, has not made much progress. Though his hard work at learning to meditate paid off greatly in that he had learned to sense, gather, and utilize mana, he still was nowhere near proficient at it like that of an average martial artist, and compared to a master level martial artist…, he has got a long way to go yet! Of course it could be understandable if looked from the stand point of an individual that had lived, practically, a lifetime in the world of science to only just started to live in the world of magic four months ago. How easy is it to forget about laws and logics gathered through one lifetime to start over in a new world that had new laws and logics of its own? It certainly was not easy for Calb.

On the bright side, Calb has progressed fairly well in terms of his martial arts training. It turned out that Serina wasn’t all giggles and fun. When it came to martial arts, she was very serious and it reflected in the amount of effort she put in during her training hours. It can be assured that her seriousness had a positive impact on Calb. He couldn’t afford to be outdone by Serina. Calb wanted her to see him as her equal, not as someone that had to depend on her for safety.

Of course, from a shallow perspective, such decision could make Calb seem like that of a man that didn’t want to be taken cared of by a woman, but the motivation behind Calb’s mentality was far from that. As Calb saw it, Serina was someone he wanted to protect. Again, his desire was not stemming from a male’s egotistical stand on “needing” to protect his “woman.” No, his desire stemmed purely from his equalitarian view on relationship, but not necessarily based on what is traditional. From his stand point, he believed that a man and a woman both had an obligation to protect each other. That means whenever they are in danger, it is not Serina that does all the protecting, but Calb must be able to hold his own and come to her aid if the situation allowed, and vise versa. In other words, Calb wanted to be someone that Serina could also depend on for her safety. Calb wanted a mutual respect to be the center point of their relationship.

Over the past four months, Serina and Calb got to know each other well, and once Calb digested all the different way of doing things, as well as some improvements in his mana manipulation and his martial arts training, he became more talkative and relaxed enough to joke around with Serina, but of course, no one was more laid back and cheerful than Serina. Calb enjoyed that aspect of her the most, and he was evermore thankful of his second chance at life as a result.

As for hunting, Calb was appreciative of the fact that he was the one that was hunting the animals instead of the other way around. In fact, he has become proficient enough that he was capable of going out to hunt by himself, but for the sake of training, Serina usually went out with him. Currently they were on their way back from two day’s hunting trip to the northern side of the Imea Mountains. They had decided to take a little breather to give Calb some chance to rest, as he ended up hauling all the games that they caught because he had lost a bet to see who would catch the most by the pound.

Not to be beaten, Serina made sure to put in 100% effort in catching her share, thus, Calb never had the chance in the first place. Feeling sorry for Calb, she had suggested a little meditation break to give Calb excuse to rest, but he ended up falling asleep instead! Today wasn’t meant to be Calb’s day, as Serina just gained another little thing to tease him about.

“Calb! Get up you sleepyhead!” Yelled Serina. “It is about time we head back!”

“Oh, sorry Serina, I fell asleep a bit. I don’t know what was wrong with me.” Calb quickly pushed himself off of the tree that he fell asleep on, and knowing what was to come, he immediately added, “It must have been all the extra weight I had to pull since someone was very adamant about not losing today’s bet. If I didn’t know any better, that someone was still bothered about losing the bet to a rookie last time. I didn’t realize that person was such a sore loser. I think I may have to reevaluate my opinion of that someone…Hmmf Hmmf...” Calb acted aloof as he looked away into the horizon to drive in the finishing touch to the countermeasure to Serina’s would be thwarted tease.

“You think you pulled one over on me huh OLD MAN?” Serina had taken notice of how, recently, Calb had been a bit sensitive in his reaction whenever she called him “old man.” She was sure that it didn’t bother him before, but something changed in him to be a bit more self-conscious about it. She didn’t want to pull this weapon out, but since she was denied of her chance to tease him, she couldn’t help it.

“I’ll have you know, that no matter how heavy the load, if you had better efficiency in manipulating your mana, it wouldn’t tire you out as much.” She straightened herself a bit more to pull out her next weapon, “Do you want me to show you how it is done? I will pull the load rest of the way, and you can see for yourself how much of a difference a more proficient mana manipulation makes.” Now that she had delivered her punch, she knew that Calb was lost. She looked at Calb expectantly, and not to be denied, he took the bait.

Calb held his hand up with his palm facing her and said, “Nope. It is not necessary. A bet is a bet. I won’t let you pull an inch of what is supposed to be my loss.” He got up real quick to grab the games and started walking again. He knew in his heart that he had lost this little battle of the wits…again. He helplessly shook his head, subtly, thinking about how Serina got her thumb all over him, but at the same time, he laughed in his heart thinking about the joy of his life.

As for Serina, she appreciated Calb for being a good sport. In the past 4 months, Serina found that Calb was different from other guys she had met in the past. It was not just the fact that he represented a male from whole different world with whole new set of values. She saw in Calb a gentle old soul that seemed to look through the general façade of everyday life that everyone hides under to see the real person behind the mask, and he treats everyone according to their real self. Of course, the fact that he had been a 90 years old man in his old world had no bearing in the “old soul” that she saw in Calb because in terms of actual age, their souls didn’t differ much due to difference in the rate of physical growth between the two worlds. No, she was thinking such in terms of quality of his soul, as if maturity was added unto Calb’s soul. The fact that he let her win this little banter of the wits with such giving attitude was a plus in her heart toward Calb.

She quickly caught up to Calb and asked, “So what were you dreaming about this time?”

“Huh?” Calb looked surprised. “How did you know I was dreaming?”

“I just took a wild guess, you see. For some reason, watching you sleep today reminded me of that time when we first found you sleeping on that boulder. I didn’t tell you this before, but you were drooling while you were sleeping with your mouth open. You looked quite silly that time, you know, and you had the same look just few minutes ago that took me back to that time. Maybe I should call you Mr. Drools from now on huh?” Serina giggled while looking at Calb questioningly.

“No..no. I don’t think I can take another nickname from you. You have come up with enough as it is,” replied Calb with an uncomfortable laugh, thinking about how pathetic he might have appeared to Serina.

“I dreamt of my military academy days.” Calb quickly continued on with Serina’s original question to bury the unsightly reminder of his uncoolness of few minutes ago.

“Academy days huh?” Serina looked at Calb with interest.

“Yeah, it was when I first got in the academy. I had no idea what I was getting myself into, but I just knew I had to get in. There were many of us that signed up, and they had many speakers talking to us on the very first day. I thought I was gonna die of boredom, but I got through it. I don’t recall much, but I do remember this jerk of an instructor that was talking down to us, and he was talking to us about our PI…our wrist pads with some neat…umm magics…in terms of this world’s way of speaking I suppose.”

“Oh? Why don’t you tell me about it. What did it do?” Serina’s interest clearly peaked when she heard Calb mentioning about “magic” of his world.

“Well, it was a small metal device that everyone wore around their wrist, but I had it implanted in my wrist instead. They said that by having it implanted in me instead my device would function better than others, and boy, were they right.” Calb was about to continue with the explanation, but he realized that he had a rare chance to make himself look good in front of Serina so he went on a little tangent. He straightened his body and said, “They told me I was special you know. No one but me was able to have that device implanted into the wrist because it would not function well in others. As such, on the very first day, they had assigned everyone else to sleep at some poorly taken cared of building while they gave me a fancy place…”

Before Calb can finish patting himself on the back, Serina elbowed him and said, “I asked you to tell me about the magic device, and not about your ‘oh I am so special’ speech. Do you think I care one way or another about how you were so special in your old world? Huh, oh Legendary Commander Calb Colbert?” Serina gave Calb one of her teasing, “I don’t care” look.

“As expected of you, you won’t even let me look good for even a second before you have to knock me down huh?” Seeing Serina continue giving him her “I don’t care” look, Calb shook his head with a sigh. “Right…the magic device….” Calb resumed talking about the PIDO and its functionality to Serina as they continued their way back to their little hut in the mountains.

In a darkened room sat an old man facing a little hole in the floor, and in that hole was faint light of 5 different colors that escaped out of the mouth of the hole. The old man stuck his hand in the hole to retrieve the object that was emitting a green light, and what he brought out was a scroll. On that scroll was a bright green cord of light that kept the scroll bound, and with a light tap with two fingers on the cord of light, the light broke and the scroll opened on top of a table next to the little hole in the floor. Then, suddenly, what was, once, a blank paper lit up with colors and what resulted was a drawing with blue background and 5 islands.

Taron looked intently at the 5 islands and after a brief scanning, he again tapped with his two fingers on one of the islands with a beacon, and the island with a beacon expanded while the other 4 islands gradually shrunk and shifted to the corner of the scroll. On top of this newly expanded island was a word Dan, and inside of the island were drawings of 5 towers spread around the island. The beacon of light was right on top of one of the 5 towers.

“Marina, what are you doing over there? Your daughter is nearly ready to leave this continent to look for you, thinking she will find you in one of the four continents, and yet you are not even on the same Plane anymore. Are you on your way to God’s Courtyard? You had told me you wouldn’t go further than the Plane of Magic, but you are now on the Plane of the Beast! What is going on in that head of yours…, and what is Hernig doing? Trouble’s brewing Marina, in all of the Planes. You had better find Hernig soon before things get too big for you two to handle!” Taron couldn’t help but to worry about his daughter and his son in law Hernig.

Taron, as an overseer of the Intercontinental Tower, had the means of tracking everyone that he had given the Blessing of Ascension, and even though anyone with the means of challenging the tower can utilize the tower, only those with the Blessing of Ascension from the five continents had the means of traveling to the Plane of next level. Naturally, Taron gave his Blessing of Ascension to his daughter that went looking for her husband. However, in case of Hernig, Taron had somehow lost all trace of his beacon. It was a result of a very rare malfunction of the tower where the traveler gets sent to another Plane without getting all the required Blessings of Ascension. In such occurrence, due to break in sequence of the Blessings, any trace from the Blessings prior to the malfunction gets erased. Unfortunately, for Hernig, the malfunction happened with the very first Intercontinental Tower that he accessed. That means, even before he had the chance to explore the other 4 continents of the Plane of Martial Arts, he was sent to another Plane! That meant Marina was faced with overwhelmingly time consuming task of visiting every single overseers on all the other Planes she visits in order to pick up the trail from where her husband left off!

“Grandpa, we are home!”

Caught off-guard, Taron quickly rerolled the scroll, and with his thumb, he circumscribed the scroll to recreate the green cord of light to reseal the scroll. Once that was done, he quickly returned the scroll in the hole, and he placed a palm of his hand on the opening of the hole to close the hole to resemble that of a solid floor again. As soon as the floor returned to its original arrangement, Taron sat in a meditative posture, and leisurely turned his head to the door when Serina opened the door to his room.

“What are you doing in the dark grandpa?”

“Oh, I was just trying something new. I was trying to see whether I could find a better way for Calb to improve upon his meditation. Of course, it may be still a while, yet, before he can actually utilize it, but preparation never hurts!” Like a seasoned master, Taron turned his little excuse into a note of a lesson.

“Phmmf! Who do you think you are fooling grandpa? You were asleep weren’t you?” Serina shook her head with a sign of pity, and before he could respond, she turned around and yelled to Calb while in the process of walking out to the yard. “Calb, guess who else was caught sleeping today? I must say, master and his second disciple are like two peas in a pod. What is our martial arts world coming to when both master and his disciple feign meditation while sleeping?! Shame on you grandpa!” Serina’s justified tone of reproach echoed inside Taron’s room.

Normally, when hearing a report of one of his disciples falling asleep while in meditation, he would get in the mood for a little punishment, as such is one of the perks of being a master, but today, he was caught in a bind where he couldn’t afford to dish out punishment to Calb, as he had just been, groundlessly, accused of doing the same!

“That little brat….” Taron could only shake his head in shame with a laugh.

“Alright, Calb, show me how much you improved this last week. I want you to spar with Serina.”

“Yes sir!”

“Yes grandpa.”

The two disciples stood in the grounds near the waterfall where they normally practiced their martial arts while Taron was sitting on a simple chair to observe the two. Even though Calb had made some progress, the difference in their levels was still obvious, therefore, the object of the spar was for Calb to land at least one hit on Serina. However, Calb would get the first two attacks to start off the spar. Thus far, Calb was only able to infuse his staff with enough amount of mana to defend adequately without being outstripped by Serina, and also, though he would be frequently pushed into a corner, he was able to offer up some counters to some of Serina’s attacks.

The two sparing partners faced each other. As they got in their attack stands, Taron immediately started the match with a yell, “Start!”

Not missing a beat, Calb rushed at Serina with the pointy end of the staff. As if anticipating his move, Serina half-stepped to the left and swatted down at the tip of Calb’s staff. Her goal was to try to knock his staff down to the ground to fight off his first attack, but unexpected happened. She was expecting some resistance to her downward movement of the staff, but she hardly felt any resistance, but what she got instead was an ingenuous adaptation on Calb where, using the inertia of the force, he dug into the dirt, and while still hanging onto the staff, he flung himself, feet first, to Serina, trying to catch her off-guard.

To dodge the attack, Serina also followed through on her staff stroke, and she too, using the tip of her staff as a fulcrum, initiated a cartwheel, but she did something additional in that she caught his feet in between her two legs and brought him to the ground with his face on the ground. Once she had him on the ground, she immediately, intending to strike back, struck down on his back with enough force to knock him unconscious.

Calb, on the other hand, had no idea his improvisation would be countered so easily and was in, somewhat of a daze, but something told him he was about to be hit in the back, and not being completely out of option, he blindly brought his staff to his back with both of his hands just in time to block the finishing blow!

THUD!!!

“Stop!” Yelled Taron. “Serina’s win! Break up and go back to the starting position!”

Both combatants returned to the starting position.

“Start!”

This time, Calb ran with his staff in the diagonal position, and as he got closer to Serina, he brought his staff back as if he was about to do a simple diagonal stroke with his staff, but instead, when his front tip, the attacking tip, reached his rear at the apex of his rewind, he didn’t swing forward, but instead switched the attack pattern to that of a poking the face with the back end of the staff.

It seemed like a good attack pattern, but unfortunately, Calb was too wide open, and all Serina had to do was duck while bringing her staff for a horizontal swing, and it was her win again.

“Stop!” Yelled Taron. “Serina’s win! Go back to the starting position!”

“Start!”

This time, both combatants rushed to the middle. Calb had his staff pointing toward his front, near the ground, in diagonal fashion that would allow him to swing his staff up instead of from top to bottom. Serina, on the other hand, charged with simple pointing of her staff to Calb’s stomach. It was a probing stroke. As he already had his staff ready for an upward sweep, that’s exactly what he did. He hit Serina’s staff hard from the bottom, hard enough to open up her defense. Once he did that, he followed through with a reverse kick aiming at her stomach, but she blocked his kick with her staff and allowed the kick to send her back to allow some distance between the two.

Not wanting to allow the space to be created, Calb continued on with the kick by bringing tip of his staff in a reverse thrust, followed up by diagonal slash...,and that was the end of his assault. Serina solidly blocked his slash with a slash of her own, but her slash was made heavier with her mana. Calb was forced back with recoil hard enough to nearly jar his hand, and just as he was about to bring his staff back for an attack, he realized that he didn’t have any room for attack. All he could do at the moment was to block…, and block…, and block.

Calb was getting pushed and he hands were keep getting jarred with each block, and he was trying all he can to infuse as much mana as he can possibly muster, but his mana store was nearly running dry. With every stroke that he blocked, he exhausted big portion of his mana, and he knew deep down that he would soon lose the grip on his staff!

Serina knew she was tiring Calb down. She had always known that once she started to attack with mana infused staff, he would be easily pushed and forced into losing his mana store. She struck left! She struck right! Soon she was just swinging her staff left and right in perfect rhythm without a worry of counter or solid defense. It was just a matter of time. She felt sorry for Calb, but battle was a serious matter, and once he had lost his edge and rhythm for defense, that would be the end, a routine ending…, just like all the other spars they have had up to this point.

Calb knew he had finally exhausted all of his mana with that last block. Now, all he had left was pure physical power, whatever that was left. But he didn’t want to lose like this again. Granted this was just a friendly spar, but he didn’t want to lose as if he was a simple sparing dummy for Serina to bash near the end of a workout. He wanted to, at least, lose because he lacked skill, but not because he simply ran out of juice! As he was thinking of all these thoughts, he saw Serina staff coming at him from his right, and his luck was so miserably bad that even his supposed last attempt at blocking with all his might….is to be done with his non-dominant arm!

Not wanting to give up till the very last moment, he focused all of his will on this arm! He would exhaust all of his remaining energy on this one last block! Calb screamed at his left arm in his head. “Left arm…”

“DON’T…”

Taron’s eyes opened wide! He was expecting the usual end to a sparing match, but after Calb exhausted all of his mana, and was now struggling with his last ounce of strength, he started to see something unusual. As Calb swung his left arm forward to block Serina’s stroke one last time, Calb’s left forearm was shining with a bright flow of mana like back at the mountain path where he first met Calb! But this time, the brightness was twice that of the one on his neck. It was more concentrated, and its flow was so much more intense!

“FAIL ME…”

Though Serina was not as sensitive as Taron, and thus, couldn’t see the mana flow, she sensed something was amiss. She was pretty sure that this stroke would be the stroke that would make Calb lose his staff, and thus, end the spar with another win under her belt, but she felt uneasy somehow. Why was she feeling this mana flow!? She saw her staff heading in the perfect line, with the perfect power, and with perfect accuracy, but when the two staffs met…,

“NOW…!”

>>>>

Serina’s staff split into two! Small wood fragments burst out to the side, and the upper portion of Serina’s staff flew straight toward Taron to land right below his feet. When Taron took a look at the broken upper portion, he saw that it was nearly cleaved in two with very minimum splinters, as if Calb’s staff pulverized the whole section of the staff into powder as it pounded through the opposing wood.

“What was that!?” Serina had lost grips on her broken staff and fell forward due to sudden absence of resistance from Calb’s staff as it, practically, mulched through her staff. She looked around to find her grandpa with wide eyes and Calb with his butt on the ground looking dazed. She noticed him looking at his left palm, as if he couldn’t believe the sudden power surge from his left hand, but she quickly realized that he was looking at the wrong side. She saw some kind of elongated black crystal drawn on outside of Calb’s forearm, going down the length of his left forearm to end at the back of his wrist.

“Calb, what is that thing on the back of your forearm?” Serina pointed at the drawing that she just spotted.

“Huh?” Calb was puzzled as he looked at his forearm. “T-this is…this is a PIDO!?”

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There you have it folks!

-----MooShoo-----