by Aaron Oster
Her only response was to stick her arm up in the air, middle finger extending out in a very clear message of what she thought of his lesson.
“You really are a sick bastard, Gold,” Eric said, patting him lightly on the back before following them out.
∞
Morgan growled in annoyance as the mana slipped from his grasp and the blue light surrounding him went out.
“This is impossible!” he said, throwing his arms up in frustration.
He’d been trying to get his mage shield to stay up, but the mana kept slipping out of his control.
“It’s not impossible, just difficult to get the hang of,” Gold calmly replied. “Now, try again.”
Morgan took a deep breath to calm himself, then tried once more to form the shield.
He reached inside himself for the sphere of mana sitting in his chest. Grabbing hold of it with his mind, he began slowly siphoning off a stream of it, flattening it out and coating the inside of his body.
Sweat beaded his brow as a weak blue glow began to emanate from his skin. He willed more mana to flow out and the light around him grew brighter. He tried to feed a bit more into the shield and once again, his control slipped.
He couldn’t understand what he was doing wrong. He was following Gold’s instructions to the letter, but no matter how much he tried, it just wouldn’t stick! It was as though the mana was fighting him at every turn.
Gold sat in silence as Morgan fumed and tried to figure out what the problem might be.
He closed his eyes and began to run though the process.
First he would take his mana and stream it out, but it took forever that way. Sarah had her shield up in less than a second and she made it look easy.
An idea struck him then.
What if, instead of pulling it and shaping it, he tried to force his mana core to explode outward? It was worth at least a try.
Taking a deep breath, Morgan opened his eyes and tried to force the mana core to expand all at once. He felt a light tugging sensation, then a bright blue glow outlined his body. Morgan was so shocked, that he lost control and the shield disappeared.
He turned to Gold who had a pleased look on his face.
“I knew you could do it.”
“I was doing it wrong the whole time because of you,” Morgan exclaimed, having a hard time believing that a person could be so twisted.
“But you figured it out in the end didn’t you?” Gold said with a raised eyebrow.
“No thanks to you. Why am I even taking this crap from you anyway?! I don’t need you! I could have taught myself how to use a mage shield just by asking Sarah.”
Morgan’s fists were clenched and his heart was pounding by the time he was finished.
He didn’t normally lose his temper like this, but Gold had been torturing them for days without any apparent reason. Whenever they’d asked, they were forced to do even harder exercise. Sure, the Beast Zone was great, but it hardly made up for the abuse this man was putting them through.
“Tell me why I shouldn’t walk out of here right now and never look back?” he asked, muscles tense and ready to spring.
“How close are you to ranking up?”
Morgan was used to Gold’s seemingly ridiculous questions, so he just answered without asking why.
“I need a total of 423 to rank both up.”
“After we clear the Beast Zone today, you should have enough energy to make it to the next rank. If you are unhappy once you rank up, then you no longer have to learn from me. I will find you a new instructor and never speak to you again. Do we have a deal?”
Morgan thought about it for a moment, then reluctantly nodded.
“Good. Our lesson is over for today. I will see you at half past two.”
With that, he walked around his desk and left the room.
25
Morgan stared down at the Patriarch’s core.
All he had to do was assign the energy and he would rank up. Gold’s words kept coming back to him and he wondered what he could have meant by them.
Only one way to find out.
Taking a deep breath, Morgan assigned the energy. He felt the telltale tingling run through his body and shivered at the sensation.
He felt amazing. Much better than any previous rank ups.
Opening his status, Morgan was stunned.
There was no way!
Name: Morgan
Super: Rank - 5
Energy to next rank - 155/3,500
Mage: Rank - 5
Energy to next rank - 102/3,500
Super ability - Gravity
Mage ability - Air
CP - 210/210 (Regen - 2.2 per second)
MP - 210/210 (Regen - 2.2 per Second)
Strength - 21
Agility - 26
Constitution - 21
Intelligence - 21
Wisdom - 22
Super skills - Fly, Heavy handed
Mage skills - Wind blade, Tailwind
Every single one of his attributes had jumped by a massive amount!
Morgan closed his status and his mind began racing.
That crafty bastard! Gold knew this would happen, but didn’t tell either of them. The question was, why he didn’t. Well, he couldn’t ask him until tomorrow, but he could talk to Sarah about this. At least she should know why she was working so hard.
He slid out of his bed and left the room. Walking across to Sarah’s room, he knocked on the door.
“I’m sleeping. Go away!”
“Well, wake up then. I’ve got something important to tell you!”
He heard muffled cursing and the sound of stomping feet, then the door flew open to reveal Sarah, dressed in a nightgown and not looking very happy.
“What?” she asked, her voice laced with annoyance.
Morgan looked her over, noticing the deep V down the front of her gown, which revealed a generous amount of cleavage.
“That doesn’t look very warm,” Morgan said, pointing to her gown.
“What are you…?” Sarah asked, before looking down.
Her face flushed a deep crimson, then she slammed the door in his face.
Morgan blinked, staring at the closed door in incomprehension.
Was it something he said?
He was raising his hand to knock again, when the door suddenly opened once more. Sarah stood there, her face still deep crimson in color. A blanket was draped over her shoulders, hiding the revealing nightgown.
He thought about asking what all that was about, but figured he’d just let it go. She’d been flushing and running away so many times now, that he just figured it was what she did.
“What did you want?” she asked.
“How close are you to rank 8?” Morgan asked.
“Pretty close.”
“How much energy do you need?”
Her eyes focused on the air in front of her for a second, before they turned back to him.
“I need 48 energy to reach rank 8.”
She smiled here and Morgan could understand why.
That meant that she’d be able to rank up tomorrow.
“Here,” Morgan said, fished around in his pockets and handed her three cores. “These are rank 3 cores and should have enough energy to get you to the next rank.”
She took them hesitantly and looked between him and the cores.
“Not that I don’t appreciate it, but why do you want me to rank up now?”
“Just do it, trust me.”
“You don’t have to tell me twice,” she said with a smile.
The next instant, all the cores in her hand crumbled and fell to the floor as they shattered. Sarah shivered as she moved up to the next rank and a pleased looking smile touched her lips.
He saw her eyes focus on her status and she froze; her eyes going wide with shock. He remained silent as she looked through her attributes several times to make sure she wasn’t dreaming. Finally, she closed her status and turned back to him.
“How di
d my attributes increase so much?”
“I think you already know,” he answered.
She opened her mouth to ask what he meant, then snapped it shut.
“Oh, that sneaky bastard! Of course he wouldn’t tell us this was going to happen!”
“Well, I’m going to sleep. I’ll leave you to clean up the mess,” Morgan said and headed back towards his room.
“Morgan, what the…!”
But he’d already closed his door.
∞
“Since you’re both still here, I will assume that you’ve already ranked up and see the benefits of my classes,” Gold said as they walked into their morning lesson.
Neither of them bothered rising to his bait, instead waiting for him to begin their daily torture.
“No questions? Demands that I explain myself?”
He faked a look of surprise.
“We’ve already figured it out,” Sarah said with a shrug. “No point in asking what we already know.”
A genuine smile spread across his face this time.
“Excellent, you’ve figured out that the physical training has raised your strength, agility and constitution, but have you figured out why your intelligence and wisdom have gone up as well?”
“For me, it was the additional classes you recommended I take,” Sarah answered for them. “And for Morgan, it was your misinformation about the correct way to use a mage shield.”
Gold nodded his head enthusiastically.
“Yes, you figured it out! Now I can tell you why I’m pushing you so hard. At the earlier ranks, increasing your attributes by four or five per rank is completely possible. However, once you break the first threshold, your ability to increase your attributes will slowly begin to decline.”
“What’s a threshold?” Morgan asked.
If Gold was in a talkative mood, it wouldn’t hurt to try and get some information out of him.
“A threshold is when someone moves into a new stage of power in their ability. For example; Sarah is now rank 8. When she moves up to the next rank, she will break through the threshold and thereby become more powerful.”
“How do you mean?” Sarah asked.
No one had explained any of this to her yet. She was sure her father had known all about this, but of course had never mentioned it.
“As you both know, all people that have an ability will begin at rank 0. Every tenth rank, the person will experience a significant increase in power.”
“How much of an increase are we talking about?” Morgan asked.
“Let’s just say that if you come across someone at rank 9, you’d better run the other way.”
“You don’t think I can win?” Morgan asked with a raised eyebrow. “I killed a rank 6 mage when I was still at rank 1.”
“While that is impressive, you still wouldn’t stand a chance. Take my word on that.”
Morgan nodded again.
Gold may be a twisted bastard, but he was a knowledgeable one. If he said that someone at rank 9 was too strong for him, then he would believe it.
“Now, as I was saying. Every time a threshold is broken, the person will feel a significant increase in power. However, their ability to increase their attributes will decrease with each breakthrough.
“While the maximum amount of attribute points you can get between 0 and 8 is five, the maximum amount you can get between 9 and 18 is four. Between 19 and 28 is three and once you hit rank 39, the maximum is two.
“So, you can understand why increasing your attributes is so important at lower ranks. Now, are there any further questions?” he asked, the familiar wicked grin now replacing the scholarly enthusiasm.
Neither of them bothered to answer.
This was another thing he did. He would ask if there were questions; then when one of them tried to ask, he would cut them off.
“You two are no fun,” he said, retrieving two chains from a pile against the wall.
Morgan was excited for this part.
His strength had gone up enough that the weight shouldn’t bother him too much. He couldn’t wait to see the look on Gold’s face when he sprinted easily around the room.
He should have known better.
Morgan’s eyes went wide as the chain wrapped around his shoulders. His legs already beginning to tremble under the weight as he stared at Gold in incomprehension.
“Did you really think I wouldn’t use a heavier chain?” Gold asked in mock surprise. “I thought you knew me better than that.”
He saw Sarah’s legs buckle next as a new chain was tied to her and resigned himself to a miserable two hours.
26
“I’ve noticed that the two of you have yet to fight in any ranked matches,” Gold said, as they exited the portal.
Morgan and Sarah both turned to glare at him as he tucked the key into his pocket. They were both exhausted and splattered from head to toe in mud and gore.
This run had been especially difficult. The ram had charged Sarah instead of Morgan this time and had managed to shatter her mage shield with its glowing horns.
They had both gotten pretty banged up in the process of killing it, as they had been forced to fight more recklessly than they usually did. Gold had, of course, done nothing to aid them; instead standing on the sidelines and egging on the ram to attack them harder. For some reason, the ram had seemed to take his advice and did his best to kill them both.
“Oh, don’t give me those looks,” he said dismissively. “If you don’t fight and win, at least one ranked match a week, your class rankings will begin to fall. Do I need to remind you what will happen if you fall below 50th?”
“No,” Morgan sighed.
While Sarah didn’t technically need the scholarship, he definitely did. Which meant that after supper, he would have to visit the arena.
∞
“Will you be coming with me?” Morgan asked, as they exited the dining room.
“Why not,” Sarah answered resignedly. “May as well meet some of the people in our year; see who we’re up against.”
Morgan wholeheartedly agreed with her, so they stopped back at the house to get ready. While Sarah changed into a set of combat clothes, Morgan laced on his shin guards and tied his fingerless gloves to his waist. He then took the map out to find the arena’s location. About ten minutes later, Sarah was ready and the two of them headed out.
It was about a ten minute walk from their block, which Morgan was quite grateful for.
He hadn’t been looking forward to an hour long walk to the other side of the academy.
It didn’t take long for the arena to come into view, a tall oval-shaped building that took up the space of several blocks.
When they approached, they could see a bunch of other students waiting near one of the entrances and headed over to wait along with them.
“What do you think it looks like on the inside?” Morgan asked, as the line moved forward quickly.
“I’ve never been in an arena before, so my guess is as good as yours,” she answered.
It took another ten minutes to get to the entrance, where a woman sat behind a desk with a large stack of papers before her.
“Names and classes?” she asked as the two of them stepped up for their turn in line.
“Morgan, super class.”
“Sarah, mage class.”
The woman began rifling through her stack of papers, growing more and more aggravated as she couldn’t seem to find them. Finally she looked up, a suspicious expression on her face.
“I don’t see your names anywhere on the list. What are your class ranks?”
“I’m ranked 9th in mine and she’s ranked 1st in hers,” Morgan answered, becoming worried that they would be turned away.
The woman’s expression changed in an instant. She went from open mistrust to all smiles.
“Why didn’t you just say so?” she asked, rising from her seat and waving someone else to take over for her.
“Follow me,” she said, wal
king through the small entrance and into the arena.
He and Sarah exchanged a confused look, but she just shrugged and followed the woman, Morgan trailing a few steps behind.
He openly gaped as they entered the massive structure, his head swiveling from side to side as he tried to take it all in. There was no ceiling overhead, leaving the arena open to the darkening sky. It was brightly lit despite the gloom and he didn’t have a problem seeing anything.
Rows upon rows of seats sloped upward surrounding a large open area in the center. The area was huge and currently taken up by twenty or so fighting stages where people were battling for a higher ranking.
“We don’t usually have students in the top fifty come in through the main entrance.”
Morgan’s attention snapped back to the woman as she began talking again.
“Where would we come in, then?” Sarah asked.
“Right over there,” she said, stopping and pointing to a fenced off area.
While the rest of the arena was quite crowded, this area was practically free of people, with only one or two standing inside.
“Go speak to the person sitting behind that desk and they will tell you all you need to know.”
“Thanks for your help,” Sarah said, and the two of them headed to the gated area.
They walked in and saw a small group of people loitering around the entrance and Morgan thought that they looked quite unpleasant. From what he could hear, one of them was bragging about fighting prowess and how no one could even hope to match him.
As they approached the woman sitting behind the desk, the group containing the braggart moved in front them, spreading out in a semi-circle to block their path.
“Can I help you?” Morgan asked, not at all interested in dealing with these people.
“Yeah, there’s something you can help me with,” the boy in the front said, folding his arms and sneering down at him.
“You can buzz off. This area is for people ranked fifty or above in the class and since you’re clearly a weakling, you don’t belong here.”
Morgan took a moment to size the boy up.
He was a few inches taller than him, maybe five foot eight; with short cropped brown hair, brown eyes and a slightly flabby face. He was clearly a weakling and felt the need to make himself appear stronger by belittling those around him. He knew how to handle these types.