Vonreid stood in the eastern field, among the ruined ground, and the wet soil sank slightly beneath his feet. The candidates and the faculty had all but left, and his mother had also made her way to the carriage.
He now stood beneath the pillars where Raghav was hanged and later turned the tide of the battle, achieving his victory. Vonreid looked up at the pillar before looking at the ground, where a crater had formed.
'Could I have gotten out of the situation like he did, turn the battle on its head and take them all out in one attack?'
"You could not, maybe neither can I." A landed on his left shoulder, Vonreid looked over his shoulder and found his father standing behind him to his right. "You could not?"
King Belreid shook his head, looking at the pole. "I could not."
"Son, do you know what sets the Knight rank warrior apart from a Master rank warrior. It is not as simple as it seems. Mana is a part of all warriors, from the Acolytes to the Grand Masters. It is entirely possible for an Acolyte to possess more raw Mana than a Master; he may even have up to ten times the Mana, but what elevates a Master above the other is his utilisation."
A chuckle was heard from behind as the father and the son turned around. "General! Back so soon?"
General Temis nodded, looked up at the pillars, and gasped amusingly. "I know, we just witnessed that battle, yet this sight makes my heart pump faster. Oh, how I would love to face him in battle. Our swords clashing, until they shatter along with our bones."
King Belreid placed his hand over his son's left ear and pulled him close, pushing his right ear to his torso. "General, can you please not do this while I am teaching an important lesson to my son?"
General Temis raised his hands and nodded. "My Apologies, Your Grace, let me provide some assistance, after all, two's better than one."
Nodding, he took his hand off Vonreid's ear and patted his hair. "General Temis, carry on."
"Very well, Your Grace." General Temis moved forward, standing to Vonreid's left side. He looked over at King Belreid, who gave him a nod.
"Vonreid, as your father has told you, what separates a normal warrior from a great warrior is not how much power he has, but how he uses it."
He clenched his fist as a blue glow engulfed it. "I have twice the Mana compared to your Father, I know a Knight who holds twice that of mine, if we were to fight physically, that Knight will overwhelm me, her strength, speed, and durability all exceed what I can conjure, yet she is a Knight while your father and I are Masters."
The glow died down as General Temis placed a hand on Vonreid's right shoulder. "The reason is simple, she lacks control over it, yes, she can use basic spells such as Mana slash, Mana blast, binding spells and elemental infusion, but she needs to chant them, she consumes nearly triple the Mana that we do in the same spells, at firsthand it seems no problem, but when the fight drags on it becomes an issue, even though she has twice the Mana I do, she will run out of it faster than myself. Her physical advantage cannot make up for this. Overwhelming strength will more often than not fall against precision, adaptability and intellect. We saw a clear example of that just now."
The three stood there watching the pole. It was understandable for the twelve-year-old to be drawn to it, but for two seasoned warriors to feel the same way was a rare sight.
"Of course, not to undermine her, if either your father or I fought with her, we would have to fight tooth and nail to take her down, our physical attacks would fail against her, and we would need to resort to what separates us, our control over Mana, we would have to use complex spells against someone who is naturally unable to use them. But Raghav showed me something today; he could have used abilities that were beyond the scope of his enemies, yet he fought them on fair ground. If someone did that to me, I would feel mocked, my pride as a warrior would be hurt, yet when Raghav did it, I felt no such emotion for his opponents; it felt as if he was giving them honour and respecting them by not using their weakness against them."
King Belreid took a deep breath, looking at Vonreid, lost in the pillars. Belreid stayed silent for a few seconds before nudging Vonreid. "Do you know how we warriors fight at incredible speeds, yet at moments exceed those speeds by hundreds of times? Just like Raghav did when he ran away from the group back to his starting point."
Vonreid's attention was broken from the pillars, and he looked at his father, shaking his head. "Could you also tell me how he fought with his eyes closed?"
"I am not entirely certain, but I can tell you how I would do it. You see, the eyes absorb the light reflecting from the world around us, and it does so instantly; it is our brain that needs to process this information, and it needs time. So when we move at incredible speeds, the things close to us appear blurry because they move past us before the mind can process them, while the things at a far distance behave normally. How do we fix this?"
Vonreid moved his eyes left and right, puckering his lips, before looking at his father with a smile. "We use Mana to enhance our brain's functioning capacity, reducing the time it takes to process the image acquired by the eye."
King Belreid nodded with closed eyes, a smile plastered on his face. "Yes, that deals with half of the issue that comes with great speeds; the other half is friction. If you move faster than sound, you would create sonic booms. These shockwaves are loud to the point that they can stagger you due to enhanced hearing and can disrupt your movement. Hence, we fight at lesser speeds but in the heat of battle, use fast movements to stagger our enemies or create distance between us, just as Raghav did."
He then clicked his tongue, his mouth running dry. General Temis shook Vonreid's shoulder, getting his attention.
"Each person has a limit to how much they can enhance their physical and mental bodies. Remember the Knight I mentioned, since she has naturally larger reserves of Mana, she can enhance her body and mind at a greater level than us, which is why she is faster and stronger than us even though it costs her more Mana than it would cost us to match her speed if we push ourselves, but we would be unable to process things as fast as her and neither will our bodies hold up to that level of strength it will break. Think of this as such, our bodies are balloons, her body was built by The One to house more air, while ours can house less air, but they balanced it out, giving us a better quality of air, that deflates long after the other."
Vonreid looks down moving his tongue between his teeth. "I understand it all, yet I do not understand how he was able to fight with his eyes closed?"
"That only I can tell."
Vonreid's face lit up. He was about to turn around, but two hands fell on both of his shoulders from behind, keeping him straight. He looked up and saw Raghav looking down at him with a smile.
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Raghav stirred awake, he opened his eyes, and found himself face to face with gold, surrounding two oceans. He lay beneath the tree with his head in Aurelia's lap, looking at her face. She looked down at him. Her golden hair falling, acting as a veil, and the ocean blue eyes smiled upon meeting his black ones.
"Welcome back, Hero!" "Thank you, Princess!" He returned a smile and sat up, getting on one knee, extending his hand to Aurelia. She took his hand and they rose together.
He then looked around, observing the mostly empty eastern field except for Vonreid, General Temis and King Belreid standing under the pillars.
He smiled, holding Aurelia's hand. "Let us see what wisdom they are imparting to the young kid. If we are lucky, we might get to hear some of it too."
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"So, you want to know how I fought with my eyes closed?" Vonreid nodded, and Raghav placed his hand on Vonreid's eyes. "What do you see?" "Nothing."
Raghav then removed his hand from his eyes and placed them back on the shoulder over the hands of King Belreid and General Temis. "What your father told you about enhancing the mind is an incredible technique, but it is only useful if you wish to stay slower. How will it help if you want to go faster than light itself? It won't; your eyes will not be able to absorb the light, of course, you would still need to keep your brain processing faster to think and act at those speeds, but you will be blind."
Vonreid's jaw was wide open, even Belreid and Temis were looking at Raghav with slightly wider eyes. "Can you move faster than light?" Raghav shook his head. "Not yet…but soon I will. I currently face the problem of negating friction, run faster than sound, and you get a sonic boom. Run even half the speed of light, and we are looking at a nuclear explosion due to the supercharged atoms."
He then closed Vonreid's mouth. "That is half the problem, the other half is how do I see my surroundings? And to that, my answer is, Mental Image, I spread my energy around, seeping it into everything that exists around me, whether it be physical or temporal. Then an Image formed in my mind like how I showed you the images I clicked in my phone. I form countless of these images and move them in my mind, creating a moving film. Just like how a camera records videos."
Vonreid nodded, looking down slightly. "Do you have another question for me?" Raghav leaned forward, trying to look at Vonreid's face. King Belreid and General Temis's faces hardened for a moment as Vonreid turned to look at Raghav. "How can I be like you?"
Raghav gently smiled. "Don't!" He then stood straight as Vonreid looked up at him. "What? Why?"
Raghav looked up at the pillars, his face returning to his serious self. "Be yourself. You wish to be like me because you see in me strength, gentleness, and righteousness. You want to be Raghav." He then looked down at him. "But you are not Raghav, you are Vonreid. Be Vonreid, you don't have to be Raghav to inherit these values, as General Temis said, we are all made different with different paths in life, but we are all made by The One. It is our actions that take us down different paths. You wish to be me, I wish for you to be better, be yourself, follow the path of honesty, righteousness, protect those who can't protect themselves, stand up to those who push others down above all else, remember, justice achieved by sacrificing the innocent is no justice. The only soul you have a right to sacrifice is yours, and only to protect others, not to quit."
General Temis, Raghav and King Belreid squeezed Vonreid's shoulder. "You are the future, outshine us." They then removed their hands from his shoulder as the boy gave a nod full of determination to Raghav before looking forward, finding his elder sister crouching in front of him.
She held his hands and looked at him, tilting her head. "My younger brother is growing so fast."
Vonreid smiled, hugging his sister, who hugged him back. 'I forget that even though his body is that of a twelve-year-old, he had been asleep since he was seven.'
King Belreid looked at his daughter before patting Vonreid's back. "That was a lesson worth learning, was it not, Vonreid?"
Vonreid broke the hug and stood by his Father's left side holding his hand. "It was Father." "Then do you not think you should thank Raghav and General Temis for this?" He quickly turned towards Raghav.
Raghav raised his hand, stopping him. "No need to thank me, where I come from, we have a saying. 'Knowledge grows the more you share it.' Besides, I did nothing. The One shared his wisdom with you, with me being a mere conduit for his message."
Vonreid was about to speak, but stopped himself, giving Raghav a nod before turning towards General Temis, who was watching this unfold with his hands crossed and a smirk on his face. He moved a hand between himself and Vonreid before gesturing towards Raghav with his head. "What he said."
This caused everyone present to chuckle, save for Raghav, who only maintained a small smile.
King Belreid then sighed. "We should depart, take care, General and may The One be with you on your journey. Will you be joining us, Raghav?"
Raghav shook his head. "I plan to head to the Adventure's guild to get my license and spread the word that I am looking for a party."
The King nodded. "We shall see you at dinner then." Raghav nodded as King Belreid walked past him with Vonreid. As Aurelia walked past him, she smiled at him and waved.
Soon, only Raghav and General Temis were left in the field. Raghav looked at the destroyed field. "What to do with this?" General Temis stretched his left hand, and a green glow spread throughout the destroyed field as it repaired itself. "There."
He then looked at the pillars. "I believe we should leave them to inspire the newcomers. Good luck on your adventure, I wish to join you, but life hardly ever goes as you wish."
Raghav nodded, stretching his hand out for Temis. "Take care, General, let us have our spar once you return from war in the east."
Temis shook Raghav's hand. "Oh, now I cannot wait to delay my return. Till we meet again."
Raghav then walked away towards the academy building, leaving Temis to bask in the sunlight in the open field.