The Beginning After the End: Book 7: Divergence

by TurtleMe

Boo, who had been watching from beside me, tilted his head in curiosity at the flaming beast. Some of the noble kids let out gasps and their instructors shushed them and tried to explain what I was doing.

  “Your offense is good, Ellie, but what happens when a spell that you can’t just shoot down with arrows comes at you?” I called out.

  Ellie just grinned confidently as she drew her bow. A shimmering, white arrow manifested nocked to the bowstring. Just before she loosed the mana arrow, a slight undulation rippled across the shaft.

  The arrow shrieked as it flew toward my fiery copy of Boo. I had expected Ellie’s spell to simply pierce through harmlessly, but as it impacted my spell, the entire arrow exploded in a ray of light, dispersing the flaming beast.

  I blinked. “That was—”

  “Impressive? Superb? Jaw-dropping?” my sister finished, her eyes twinkling.

  “Not bad. It was not bad,” I said, rolling my eyes.

  “Mhmm.” Ellie put on a dignified air, trying unsuccessfully to hide her self-satisfied smile.

  As the day went by, I moved on from conjuring elemental targets to testing her body’s defenses. Ellie’s ability to conjure a protective layer of mana over her body was flawless, and fast enough to rival some of the upperclassmen I had seen at Xyrus. Due to her unnaturally intricate control of her mana, she was able to layer mana over specific portions of her body almost instantly and create a fairly durable protective panel.

  I put the scabbard of Dawn’s Ballad, which I had been using to spar with Ellie in close range, back inside my dimension ring. “Did you learn close-quarters combat with your bow from Helen too?”

  My sister plopped down on the ground, sweating and panting. “Yup… I read a couple books that helped too.”

  “Most archers carry around a dagger or even a light sword for close combat,” I mused. “But since your archery doesn’t depend on you drawing an arrow from your quiver and nocking it before firing, learning how to fend off a few attacks in order to give yourself some space for a quick shot was the right decision.”

  “Your compliments seem… somewhat dull,” my sister said in between breaths.

  “Because that wasn’t a compliment. Don’t get ahead of yourself,” I said, smirking. “We’ve only been drilling for a few hours. Your stamina needs improvement.”

  “That’s… not even fair,” Ellie huffed.

  “What your brother means to say is that he’s very proud of your growth,” Sylvie comforted Ellie with a smile.

  “Woah, no verbally expressing my thoughts!” I protested in mock outrage.

  “This was rigged from the start, anyway.” Ellie stuck out her tongue. “I mean, how can you dodge an arrow fired at point blank range—repeatedly.”

  “White core—Lance—I better be able to dodge a few arrows at least, right?”

  My sister narrowed her eyes. “You didn’t even break a sweat.”

  “You’ll get there with enough training and experience,” I replied.

  Ellie glanced to Sylvie before looking back at me. “Speaking of getting enough experience, I was wondering if I can maybe… you know…”

  I raised a brow. “I know… what?”

  “N-never mind,” my sister muttered.

  “Ellie,” Sylvie chimed in, shaking her head. “Just say it.”

  “Does this have anything to do with what you two were talking about before I came back from my… meeting?” I asked.

  “I want to start helping out in the war!” my sister said, unable to look me in the eyes.

  Even though I saw this coming, my heart still sank.

  ‘Arthur…’ Sylvie sent, feeling my emotions.

  “You said it yourself—thought it yourself—that I was a lot better,” my sister continued when I didn’t answer. “I’m confident that I’m better than a lot of the soldiers that have been assigned to squads. I’m okay with being in the reserves and since I’m an archer, I’d be in the rear anyway so—”

  “Ellie,” I interrupted, kneeling down so I was eye-level with my sister.

  With a wave of my hand, a barrier of wind surrounded the four of us. I didn’t feel comfortable having others listening to family conversations.

  “I’m not saying no, but I’m also not sure if I’m allowed to make this decision for you. Mom and Dad aren’t here, and to be honest, we haven’t exactly been on the same track these days,” I said.

  “You guys still haven’t made up since you left to go train?” my sister asked, concern laced in her voice.

  “You knew?”

  “I’m young, not dumb,” my sister said, frowning.

  “Right. Sorry.”

  I looked at Sylvie, who simply gave me an encouraging smile. Letting out a sigh, I gave in. “How about we go on a mission together? If you do well, I’ll give you my blessing. I can’t speak for Mom or Dad, but I won’t hold you back on it.”

  “Okay!” Ellie beamed. “Thank you.”

  ‘That was very fair of you,’ my bond approved.

  I shot Sylvie a smile before standing back up. “Anyway, since that’s out of the way—Sylvie, it’s your turn.”

  207

  Coordination

  Although my bond had the appearance of a little girl even younger than my sister—if you disregarded the horns sprouting out from her head—she was still an asura.

  After having the guards clear out our small audience, none of whom appeared interested in continuing their training regardless, I began pouring mana into the large mana crystal responsible for powering up the defensive mechanisms within the training grounds. A low hum reverberated throughout the cavernous room and the walls and ceiling glowed dimly.

  I allowed my sister to stay with us in the training room, but I had her stay near the entrance, behind Boo, in case one of our spells accidentally flew in her direction.

  “Do I really have to stay this far away when you two are just practicing? I can hardly see you, even with mana-enhanced sight!” Ellie complained as she peeked her head out from behind the huge bear.

  Ignoring her, I continued to stretch, taking extra time to stretch out the muscles of my legs.

  “Are you not going to stretch? Do you even need to stretch?” I questioned my bond, who was standing perfectly still, watching me.

  “Considering I can barely use this body for basic daily functions, I’m a bit hesitant to try anything more,” Sylvie replied, frowning.

  “Better to practice now than in the middle of battle, right?” I countered, balancing on one leg as I stretched my aching thigh.

  Sylvie huffed but did as I suggested. She attempted to mirror my pose, only to stumble. After a few more minutes of her wild gesticulations, frustrated sighs, and the occasional tumble as we went through a series of stretches, we began our training.

  “So, how do you want to go about this?” I asked. Having only seen her use her dragon form to fight alongside me, I had no idea how she planned on fighting in her humanoid form.

  “Stay still for a bit,” she replied, raising her arm and pointing an open palm in my direction.

  My eyes widened in surprise as a missile of light flew from her palm, but I quickly coated my hand in mana and swatted the missile away.

  “A mana arrow?” I looked at the shallow cut on the side of my palm. Despite the spell’s similarity to Ellie’s mana arrows, Sylvie’s attack was much more dense—almost solid.

  “Ellie’s use of elementless mana gave me a few ideas on how to best take advantage of my traits,” she answered, sending another arrow of mana my way.

  This time the arrow—or more accurately, the harpoon, considering the size of the shining projectile—moved in a slight arc rather than in a straight line.

  I made no attempt to block or dodge the incoming spell this time. Instead, coating my hand in a thick layer of mana, I snatched Sylvie’s mana harpoon out of the air.

  The speed of her spell jerked my arm backwards, but I held on firmly. I had expected the projectile to disperse immediately, but it r
emained in my hand even while I gripped down on it with a force sufficient enough to shatter stone.

  Although Sylvie may have gotten the idea for her attack from watching Ellie, the composition of the two spells couldn’t be more different.

  The raw power of the spell isn’t that high, but in order to pack so much mana this densely into this form so quickly…

  My mind wandered off as I contemplated the possible applications of my bond’s magic. By the time I looked back at my hand, the mana arrow had disappeared.

  “Mana manipulation for dragons is limited to pure mana only, right?”

  “If you don’t take into account my race’s ability to manipulate aether, yes,” Sylvie said. “Although there’s something else…”

  “What is it?” I asked, curious.

  “I’m not quite sure myself. Having spent some time in this form, I’ve been able to get a better grasp of my core, yet there’s a part of it that I still can’t seem to access,” she answered.

  “Maybe you’ll be able to access it once you grow stronger,” I said. “For now, let’s see how versatile your control over pure mana is.”

  I launched a dozen fire arrows with a swing of my arm. The streaks of fire fanned out, converging on her from all sides.

  A shimmering barrier of light enveloped Sylvie, and for a moment I lost sight of her as she was engulfed in fire and dust. Once the flames died out and the dust settled, I could see her standing at the center of a scorched patch of dirt, arms crossed. She yawned.

  “Try to create individual panels to block each projectile,” I barked out, sending another wave of fire arrows.

  Sylvie’s brows knit in concentration as she managed to conjure a large sphere of pure mana from her palm that separated into multiple panes to block my spells.

  By then, though, I had already closed the distance between us and had the broken blade of Dawn’s Ballad pressed against her arm. Rather than flesh, my blade met a patch of black scales that appeared from beneath her skin.

  Despite my attack’s failure, Sylvie seemed genuinely surprised by my follow-up.

  I sheathed my broken sword and waved her over to provide my evaluation. “Your control over pure mana is excellent, and, considering how dense your spells are, it seems your mana reserves are quite large. Your body innately provides good physical defense even if you are a bit slow.”

  Although Sylvie held in her smile, I could tell through our mental link how proud she was feeling.

  “Still, I don’t think your attacks are strong enough to threaten retainers and Scythes,” I continued. “What else have you noticed about this form compared to your draconic form?”

  Sylvie thought for a moment. “My innate defenses are a bit weaker in this form. You held that strike back, but if you had attacked me seriously with Dawn’s Ballad, I would’ve lost a limb.”

  “Good to know.” I nodded. “Anything else?”

  “My control over mana is better in this form, but my dragon form allows me to utilize more of my mana in a single breath—albeit a more unrefined form,” my bond explained, twirling several orbs of mana around her hand as if to emphasize her point.

  “I see,” I muttered, taking a few steps back. “There are a couple more things I want to test out, Sylv. Can you conjure a square pane in front of me?”

  I could feel her curiosity flare up, but I hid my intentions as best I could.

  With a twitch of her wrist, the spheres of mana that had been orbiting her hand shot out and converged into a bigger orb before flattening out into a square.

  “Keep it stable,” I ordered, cocking my fist back. I punched Sylvie’s panel of mana, and, while it trembled from the impact, it stayed where it was.

  “What about distance? How far out can you conjure a spell and keep control over it?”

  In answer, Sylvie stretched out a hand and willed away the panel of mana I had just punched. The spell rounded out into a bubble as it hurled toward the back wall of the room. Sylvie then closed her outstretched hand into a fist, suspending the orb in midair.

  “Move it left,” I said, concentrating on the shining orb.

  Upon Sylvie’s direction, the orb easily darted left, stopping just before it hit the wall.

  “Bring it back, change it into an arrow.”

  I led Sylvie through a series of exercises, gradually adding more orbs for her to manage. We kept going until there were ten orbs, five of which I had instructed Sylvie to change into flat panels. By the end of the drill, Sylvie was sweating profusely, but I had a pretty good idea for how we were going to coordinate in battle.

  Four days passed in the blink of an eye. I spent a majority of the time in the training grounds, drilling with Ellie and Sylvie until they were both mentally and physically drained. It was a great change of pace for me as well, and I felt my control over the mana being refined by my white core steadily improve. While Sylvie had yet to unlock more of the abilities hidden away in her core, and we hadn’t had the chance to practice any sort of coordinated fighting together, she and my sister still improved greatly under my scrutinizing tutelage. After our morning drills—target practice for my sister and multitasking with mana spheres for my bond—we took a break.

  Sylvie, Ellie, Boo, and I rested near the grassy patch beside the pond, eating sandwiches provided by the castle cooks.

  “Hey, Art,” my sister said as she absentmindedly picked the vegetables off her sandwich. “What would you say are the biggest drawbacks of fighting using pure mana? From what I’ve seen while watching you and Sylvie practice, her spells seem really versatile, even against all your elemental attacks.”

  “Stop picking them out and just eat it,” I chided, gently slapping her hand. “And to answer your question, I can think of three big reasons why most mages prefer to use magic of their elemental affinity rather than just pure mana spells. First, it uses up a lot of your mana reserves.”

  “More so than elemental spells?” Ellie interrupted.

  “Pure mana can only come from your mana core, which—as you know from experience—is time-consuming to gather and purify. Elemental magic does use mana from your core, but it’s also powered by the ambient mana that surrounds us,” I explained.

  Ellie’s brows furrowed as she tried to wrap her head around the concept. “I’m not sure I follow.”

  I thought for a moment, trying to come up with an appropriate analogy. “Ah, so it’s kind of like this. Imagine I’m on top of a snowy hill and I’m trying to hit you, at the bottom, with a snowball.”

  “Why am I the one getting hit?” she frowned.

  I looked at her with a deadpan expression. Sylvie chuckled beside me as she tossed a sandwich to Ellie’s drooling bond.

  “Okay, okay. Please continue.”

  “A mage using elemental magic would first make a snowball with his hands, but instead of just throwing it, he would roll it down the hill so that the snowball picks up more snow from the ground. By the time it hits you, the snowball is the size of Boo,” I continued.

  Upon hearing his name, Boo let out grunt, looking at me expectantly. When no treats were forthcoming, he turned his attention back to Sylvie, who was the only one feeding him.

  “Now, a mage using a pure mana spell of the same power will have to make the snowball and pack it with more and more snow until it’s the size of Boo, then throw it at you. See the difference?”

  “That sounds like a lot of work,” Ellie admitted. “Okay, what are the other reasons?”

  “It’s harder to effectively control pure mana once it’s been expelled from your body, and”—I willed a field of stone spikes to shoot out from the ground a few dozen yards from where we sat—“unlike what I did just now, pure mana spells must originate from the caster.”

  I could tell from the look on my sister’s face that the proverbial light seemed to have lit up in her head.

  “Anyway, since we’ve had a break, why not continue a little longer?” I suggested, getting up.

  “Yes!” Ellie ag
reed, bolting up as well. “Hey Sylvie, can you do what you did earlier and make those moving panels? I want to try to hit them!”

  “Sure. If you shoot some mana arrows off course, I can practice reacting as well!”

  Feeling more content than I had in awhile, I watched the two run off together. Past them, the doors to the training room opened and a single guard came running in. Judging from his expression, I knew whatever he had to tell me wasn’t good.

  Sylvie’s and Ellie’s eyes followed the guard, who stopped in front of me and saluted before speaking.

  “General Arthur! News of a massive corrupted beast horde has come from the Wall. Commander Virion is currently waiting for you at the dock with a team of mages.”

  208

  Enemy Territory II

  CIRCE MILVIEW

  Stooping, I dipped my swollen, dirty hand into the cold stream, relishing the soothing sensation of the icy water on my skin. I scrubbed the grime from my hands and forearms, then my face. Sitting on the bank, I jerked my boots off, then peeled my stinking socks free of my aching feet and plunged them into the stream. It felt heavenly.

  I had told the others a rinse in the stream would revitalize us, but Fane just rolled his eyes and Maeve said it wasn’t worth the risk. Dicathian patrols had passed within a stone’s throw on three separate occasions over the last two days, and the she-demon elf had twice flown over our heads. Maeve was right, of course, so I had felt a little bit guilty when I dropped lightly from the tree we’d made our camp in. I had waited until everyone but Cole was asleep, and he didn’t argue when I ducked away.

  Cupping my hands, I scooped up the clear water and poured it over my cracked lips and into my mouth, which had felt like it was full of cotton for days. It was the first moment of relaxation I’d had since entering the elves’ awful forest. It was impossible to feel entirely at peace, however. My senses pushed out as far as my crest would allow, straining through the enchanted mist.

  I jumped when I sensed a figure approaching from behind me, but it was only Cole.