64. Military Grounds (Patreon)

The group and I found ourselves in a sea of blue, purple, and violet (with a few hints of pink) next to the real sea. Hundreds of ellari were present at the Lan’el military training grounds. The academy had organized a military march with the students of the middle courses. We, in the ninth year, were the youngest bunch.

A handful of colorful people dressed in military uniform toured us through the training grounds. Funny how this district had been a commercial port only two decades prior. Our lovely meritocracy had repurposed it into a dockyard after the Wyrm’s Landing, only leaving a few spots open to the public like the floating boulevard and gondola ride that Marissa and I once went.

“Come on, children! Follow the staff!” Sylvia happily ordered as the monitor of our year.

We were guided to an open field where a woman in a stand referred to us. She wore an imposing military uniform dyed with black and dark blue colors. The only lively touch to her clothing were the violet shoulder pads that indicated her as an arcanist and the multiple medallions marking her rank. A rank I couldn’t distinguish because I knew nothing about military rankings or symbology.

“Salutations, students of the Academy of Ferilyn.” Unlike her mighty presence, the woman’s voice was sweet and welcoming. Yet the indomitable image didn’t break. “I’m Sergeant Major Kalyd, also known as the ‘Arcane Veil’ codename by others.” Whispers filled the student multitude. Apparently, she was a big deal.

“Who’s she?” I whispered to Adrian, who was the most informed on the country's armed affairs.

Adrian whispered back in surprise “Don’t you know?” I swayed my head in negation. “She’s the one that maintained all the barriers and shields on the Lan’el district against the dragon’s attack twenty years ago.”

I recalled the day the sky rained fire. The three most prominent figures in the airborne battle were the dragon general that assaulted the city, the electromancer that confronted him in a duel, and the arcanist who stopped the Meteor Shower. 

Oh… so she was that flying mage. To be honest, it was impossible to discern anything on that day except the neighborhood-seized reptile.

“Ahem.” Kalyd cracked her voice, making the silent cacophony stop. “Today we are reunited here not only to instruct you all on one of the pillars of the modern Ferilyn that is the military, but also reminisce the dark events that occurred right here two decades ago.” Her voice sounded truly pained, not an act of a rehearsed script. “Let us reflect over a minute of silence for those who have fallen.”

I examined her soul to find one of a kind. I wasn’t surprised by her staggering amount of mana on her soul pool (an exorbitant amount for an arcanist, and certainly for one of my level) but by the colors of her soul. Every soul had a glimpse of black, no matter if it was a child or an elder.

But the Sergeant Major’s soul was purely white, only some hints of violet tainted the view. It sprung some dear memories; I almost recalled the enchanting voice of the Lady of the River of the Damned as I observed her almost pure soul. It was even more unique considering she was a soldier.

You wouldn’t expect a military woman to have a (mostly) untainted soul.

“The teachers of the academy and our staff have organized a friendly sparring between our most proficient recruits and the elected students.” Kalyd continued calmly after a minute of silence. Or at least that was what appeared to everyone else. I could feel her spirit weeping. Unlike me, I believed she was a truly pure soul. “Though the teachers have selected the participants, I have been notified students themselves are allowed to choose classmates to also join the spar.”

I instantly felt hundreds of eyes upon me. That was right, hundreds. 

Not only my friends looked at me, and not only my classmates, but my whole promotion. There were even people from different years pointing at me with their eyes, damn it, teachers also joined the query.

My fighting capabilities were known thanks to the weekly combat classes and the occasional appearance at the academy training grounds. But I felt the emotion behind those gazes, some people still reminded my cold-blooded duel from nine years ago. I didn’t want to be or look like that. I was a scholar, not a fighter. The only reason why I usually came on top was because of my plentiful unfair advantages, not because I liked or was good at fighting. Marissa and Adrian far surpassed me in that field.

I ignored the ever-present eyes, wishing that they would disappear as I focused on the arcanist before me. I wasn’t in the mood for fights, and I was interested in the woman who they called the ‘Arcane Veil’.

Kalyd looked back at me, not because she noticed her soul being tempered or my attentive gaze, but by the fact that people still didn’t stop looking at me. 

Can’t you get the memo?

I casted Concealment inside of my soul so no mages, especially arcanists, sensed my magic. This way, at least I could lose some attention. It was an interesting spell, it literally erased your existence to those who weren’t looking at you. Soul shenanigans. Don’t ask me how it works. Not even the most knowledgeable mystics can answer that.

People finally gave up and started looking for other candidates to participate in the friendly sparring. Why did they stop noticing me if the spell only affects those who hadn’t acknowledged you in the first place, you ask? Well, that was why Concealment also made you harder to remember and identify, literally banishing your existence from people’s minds. So, even if they were looking at me, they lost interest slowly.

I sighed in relief, but also exhaustion.

“I noticed your soul magic.” Marissa whispered to my ears.

It sent shivers down my spine. Not only ellari ears were sensitive (especially mine as they were longer than the average, yet thin) but I could feel her breath striking me. It was frightening how keen had become Marissa toward soul magic.

“You should’ve participated.” She continued.

“But I didn’t want,” I replied with the same tone. “I could say the same about you. So, shush.”

“While the students arrange their chosen participants, please follow me to the exhibition grounds.” The Sergeant Major stepped down from her stand and lead the masses. 

A few soldiers surrounded her as a guard, which was strange because a person like her could probably win against everyone present there. Maybe not at the same time, but still possible.

This arose a question. Her soul wasn’t protected, so in theory, I could beat her with my uncommon magic. She was a veteran soldier and an eleven-star arcanist, by the looks of her mana pool and passive low-power barriers (which were even stronger than my active ones), while I was a novice ten-star mystic. There were a lot of ifs, but as a nine-star arcanist, I could defend myself against arcane attacks, unlike her that didn’t possess any spiritual protection.

It would be an interesting match, nonetheless.

Calling it an exhibition grounds was a bit of an understatement. The place was more like an amphitheater than the training grounds we had at the academy. An arena where fighters could battle to their heart’s content.

The academy students were situated on the west, while the military stood on the east. The sea was to the north of the arena, the same as the dome’s wall.

“Let the demonstration begin.” Sergeant Major Kalyd announced to the spectators with a powerful tone.

Two unknown men appeared on the ground, one coming from the east, the other from the west. The west one’s school uniform told me he was at the end years of the academy, around the forty-slash-fifty-year mark in age. The easterner wore a black military uniform as the Sergeant Major, only that he was devoid of medallions.

“Swain Heil.” The student presented himself with a half bow. “Fourteenth-year student, geomancer.”

“Ikail Natas.” The military man replied with the same mannerisms. “Private, hemomancer.”

Hmm. I wasn’t the only one surprised by this. Blood magic was truly rare, even more than soul magic. A mystic like I wielded their soul as a weapon, hemomancers did the same with their body, more specifically, their blood.

I wouldn’t classify the school as weak, but it did have its disadvantages because of its requirement for blood to be used instead of mana. A strong point was that it required a lot less mana than other magics, similar to my soul magic, but even cheaper. It obviously still needed mana to work, because if not, it wouldn’t be magic. 

A soldier with hemomancy seemed oddly suitable. Battlefields were bloody places after all.

Once the whispering had come to tolerable levels, the Arcane Veil talked. “You can start.” Her voice was low, but as she dropped her words, the multitude silenced themselves and focused on the duel in front of them.

Mystic’s Dominion allowed me to examine the fighters’ souls before they delved into combat. The geomancer’s soul was common, some white and grey with glimpses of black. What shocked me was the imagery that his rival presented.

Crying crimson rage tainted his soul, an unstable spirit in constant movement. Dark spots, deeper than the void itself, were his soul-eyes. Not even in the River of the Damned I had seen a soul with such levels of corruption. 

It was a shock considering the calm and peaceful mask he wore. How could there be such dissonance between one’s soul and body? Was all of it a charade? A mask of sanity disguising the inner madness? My soul-seeing had proven to me that personality and spirit were correlated, so I couldn’t believe such a broken soul was able to act as peacefully as it was. 

That was before the combat started.

Swain, the geomancer, began tempering the sand and dirt around him, but he wasn’t faster than Ikail. Blood sipped from his wrists, forming a coat of magenta on top of him. I still couldn’t get used to the fact that ellari blood was magenta.

The image of a powerful mage wearing a cape of magenta was… uncanny. It felt like a child’s drawing of what a cool mage should look like, but only had pink crayons.

The hemomancer rushed towards his enemy as more and more blood began accumulating on top of him. He surely possessed a spell that helped him with blood regeneration, because he already wore tens of liters as a rough and menacing armor that constantly shifted around his body.

A pillar of sandstone appeared below the bloodied knight, though instead of causing any damage, he used it as a boost and rose up to the skies. Ikail morphed part of his blood coat into bat-like wings, helping him soar the skies.

His current figure was as creepy as his soul appeared to me. If they told me no younger students had come to this exhibition just because of him, I would believe them. The malleable armor shifted between thorny plates and distorted maws. It wasn’t what you would use as armor. If you were sane, that is.

Taking advantage of his enemy’s compromised position, Swain unleashed lances of rock against the private. Even though they were a handful of ellari-sized projectiles, Ikail quickly converted his armor into lances of his own.

The hemomancer’s lances were connected to him by a string as thin as a vein, meaning he wasn’t going to dispose of his blood. His ammunition was scarce after all. Both lances, liquid and solid, collided.

One would expect the rock projectiles to pass through the blood defenses, but we lived in a magical world, and subversion of expectations was our whole deal. The rock lances shattered upon touching the blood ones, leaving them unscathed. A few drops of blood skittered on the ground, meaning Ikail had at least lost some ammunition.

That didn’t phase him.

He converted back some of the lances back into armor in a blink, still leaving some of them up. The moment Ikail touched the ground, two enormous rock hands rushed to him to flatten him. Two lances shapeshifted into round shields, which stopped the titanic crush without a problem.

While the hemomancer’s face was completely neutral, his soul was grinning like a devil. I wondered about his elemental affinity. Hemomancy was a chimera of a school of magic that used diverse elements like Nature, Body, and Soul, if I remembered correctly. Looking at his soul, I could already discard the latter, no mystic would let their soul corrupted as it was.

My guess was between Nature and Body. Despite his unstable soul, he had complete control of his expression, so maybe he did have a Body affinity. Or perhaps, he had a Nature one. Nature mages were normally serene in nature, as they take the forest part of Mother Nature. But instead of inheriting the peace of the woods, he could have taken on the rage of the volcanoes, judging by his soul. Or maybe even animalistic features, as Nature affinity not only was limited to flora but extended over to fauna as well.

Whilst I was distracted by my guessing, the combat had progressed further, with the geomancer and hemomancer establishing close quarters.

Alike his opponent, Swain had covered his body with rocks, giving him sturdy armor. Ikail had forgone his wings and lances for thicker armor and bigger gauntlets. It seems both were eager for a physical exchange.

Earth was the most prolific of melee affinities beyond the aforementioned and self-describing Body. As Earth took advantage of the surrounding ground and had the ability to transform dirt into rocks, then manipulate them telekinetically, geomancers were a dangerous foe at close quarters.

Ikail started the exchange, throwing a haymaker at Swain with his colossal blood gauntlets. Punches evoked more punches. Violence was answered with more violence. Their attacks were so powerful that the ground vibrated, chunks of armor flying with every hit.

Rock and blood littered the ground. Dust and vaporized blood filled the air. It was difficult to see the arena as the debris occluded everyone’s vision. Even with my Soul Sight, I couldn’t catch a lot of the details.

They didn’t stop their onslaught even after the arena became a mess of magenta-colored pebbles, hit being answered with another. Swain’s face was plastered with a smile typical of a battle maniac, Ikail’s face remained passive. Another clue that he may be wearing a mask. The lack of any expression was more unsettling than the frenzied visage of the geomancer.

But though his expression was neutral, Ikail desired to end this exchange. Every last drop of blood reunited on his right arm, and in a flash, faster than the tired geomancer could react, Ikail unleashed a devastating punch.

Swain flew across the arena, impacting against the wall where the academy students watched. While I didn’t have a line of sight, Mystic’s Dominion told me that his soul was still linked to his body, meaning he was alive.

“Winner, Ikail Natas.” Sergeant Major Kalyd announced without a shed of emotion in her voice. It would seem she hadn’t taken any pleasure in this bloody show. 

Neither had I.