Azyl Academy (Elemental Gatherers Book 1)

by Chris Vines

  Everyone took off running a 5k. The perimeter of the fields was about a kilometer. After slowly running through the first lap, I noticed the Mentor had disappeared. After two more laps, he was back, this time holding a bag. Finally finishing the run, I joined the rest of the group in gasping for air around him.

  “Good. We’ll be starting off with this just about every time, and it will grow longer soon. Physical fitness is important. Endurance is highly important, especially as fights take immense amounts of energy in a very short amount of time. This becomes important if there is a Beast Horde, where often the defenders are outnumbered dozens or hundreds to one. If you cannot last in those cases, you will die. Additionally, the stronger your body, the more often you can gather, as you will be physically able to handle the Aether’s pressure. Normally we would now do some bodyweight upper body exercises, but you are lopsided right now. Tomorrow we will do more once everyone has both upper body meridians open.

  “Now I have two things for everyone. First is a memory stone of some introductory forms for your weapons. Study these closely and practice as you can.” He pulled out memory stones from the bag, inspected them, and then handed one to each of us. “Once you have mastered that, you will present to me and Counselor Might. If you pass, you will be able to select a new technique or an advanced level technique of a previous one you have mastered. Secondly, I have a duel Inscription. You will place this on your weapons. This Inscription pairs with these necklaces, which you will wear AT ALL TIMES.” He strongly emphasized the last three words. “These necklaces will prevent lethal damage from the enchanted weapons in almost all cases. This will prevent accidental, and deliberate, attacks upon your fellow students. Additionally, the necklaces will send a signal when they prevent damage, and will need to recharge after a couple uses. This signaling is used in the tournaments held every month, to determine your individual combat ranking. Bring your weapons forward and I will place the enchantments.”

  Everyone got into a line and gave him our weapons when we reached the front. He pulled out a stack of papers from the bag. Each paper had a glyph on it. He took the top paper from the stack, pressed the glyph to the weapon, and infused Aether into it. As the Aether flowed, the paper glowed and seemed to melt. Afterward, the glyph had appeared on the blade of the weapon. “Do not lose the necklace. Counselor Pizar and Headmaster Glav have to work for several days to make each one and they get fairly mad when someone misplaces the necklace. You don’t want to make the Headmaster angry. Now spread out and examine your memory stones. I will assist as I am able and can call Counselor Might over if needed.”

  We responded “Yes sir” and moved apart. I walked about fifty feet from everyone else and sat down. I promptly stood back up and rearranged the trisula hanging on the belt because I’d just about stabbed my calf with one. That would have hurt. Need to get used to wearing these. This time I sat down while holding the handles tight to my side, keeping the blades away from my legs. Once I was seated properly arranged, I pulled the memory stone out of the bag on my hip and put it against my forehead.

  I was a young man, maybe a year or two my junior. I was standing in front of an older woman who was carrying Trisula and instructing the person whose memory I was watching. “Stand with your feet shoulder width apart. Bend your knees slightly, like that, well. Now, pull your weapons out of your belt and hold them with the point away from you. Long edge out, mirror me. This is called front grip” She stood as she described and moved her right hand to just above her head, holding the blade at a forty five degree angle or so to the left, as if covering from an overhead attack. Her left hand dropped down, holding the blade parallel to her left leg, as if defending it from a slash or kick. She quickly transitioned her hand so that the left was up and the right down. “Switch your hands one hundred times.” I watched and felt the muscle movements, trying to make sure I remembered everything I could as she corrected my motions.

  “Next, switch grips so that the short side is front. This is called reverse grip. The blade should be pointing away from your arm, with the prongs flat to it. Good, now switch back. Careful now, don’t cut you. Switch one hundred times.” Again I watched as she corrected his motions, making sure he was safe and correct. “Good, now go to reverse grip. First finger pressed into the edge of the tip; flex your third and fourth finger to provide pressure. Now punch forward. Again. One hundred times. Rotate your hands as you punch, right as your hand finishes extending.” After finishing watching this, I pulled out of the memories. Ok, let’s practice switching grips first. I stood up and drew my trisula in the front grip. I then switched grips, and promptly scraped my arms with the bladed side of the weapon. “Ow” I whispered. I discovered that, while my skin wasn’t pierced due to the enchantment, it still hurt. I adjusted my grip and tried again. This time I dropped the left one and only a quick jerk kept it from hitting my foot point down.

  Looking around, I saw that about half the students were having similar issues, while the nobles who had trained for years were moving smoothly through their weapon forms. I shrugged, picked up my weapon, and started again. Someone will always have an advantage. The only way to make up for it is to work harder. For the rest of the hour, I worked on switching grips, punching in reverse grip, and blocking in front grip. I kept at it until I was able to smoothly transition from an upper front grip block to a reverse grip that I then punched out with and back again. Hah, I know Kung Fu! The stones must do something to help me learn faster, because there is no way I’d learn that quickly without them. Memory enhancement helps too. I was about to look into the memory stone again for the next couple of moves when Counselor Might shouted out “Assemble around me.” We moved and lined up around him.

  “Good work so far. Take your time to look through the memory stones. At the end of each sequence is a martial art form that uses every basic move introduced. Once you can perform those forms without error, we will unlock the next section in the stone and give you permission to pick an advanced technique. You are required to carry your weapons with you at all times from now on. You will get used to wearing it and grow stronger by having to carry around the weight of it. Now everyone, run five more laps, then you are dismissed for today.” We all took off with a groan, getting used to running with our weapons once more. I felt bad for Louis and Jon. Their weapons must have weighed significantly more than mine.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  After finishing the run, we hurried back to the dorms. I quickly grabbed a towel I had packed and headed to the washroom. Three people were already in the showers, unfortunately, so I stood waiting. Lo Xiao walked in behind me. I smiled and nodded at him in greeting, and he returned it in kind. Neither of us felt like talking, being tired and ready for a shower. One of the showers turned off, and Hunter Brett stepped out. I walked around him and took a quick shower since I knew others would be waiting. Heading out, I saw another member of my morning class who I hadn’t been introduced to yet but now wasn’t the time.

  I got dressed and headed out to dinner. I filled my plate to overflowing. I was starving. The food this time was a stir fry of vegetables and what looked like chicken meat. It was amazing, and that was not just the hunger talking. The Aether that I gained eating the Beast meat and Elemental plant vegetables seeped out of my stomach and into my center, slowly making the Aether there denser. Jon sat down as I was halfway through my plate. “Hey, those are interesting,” he said, pointing at my trisula.

  “Yeah, I wanted something I could defend and attack with, and a shield didn’t feel right. How’re you liking the shield?” I asked, gesturing to the shield that he set down, leaning against his leg.

  “So far so good, though I’ll have a bruise on my thigh later. Smacked myself pretty good. The edge is good for bashing, so I’ve got something that can defend and attack too.” He said the last part primly. “Though getting used to moving with it is going to take some time. At least yours are small. Not so much extra weight to run with.” After that, he dug into his food,
and we didn’t talk much more. Dinner was much more subdued than lunch since the majority of students had PT as the last event before dinner. After finishing eating, we cleaned up our place and brought our plates back to the counter.

  The server said “You know, you don’t have to bring them back up to us. Normally the nobles don’t even think of helping, while the others copy the nobles. We clean up the whole room once everyone is done.”

  “I know,” I responded to him, “but this is easier for you all, and I think it is better for me to help out than be lazy. You should put a bin for people to deposit their plates and utensils in, then more people would do this and you’d be able to finish faster!” I suggested. We stacked our plates and left, leaving the server with a thoughtful expression on his face.

  After leaving the dining hall, Jon and I headed into the Meditation Grotto and found a moderate sized pavilion. I sat down at the opposite side from Jon and focused inward. Ok, first I need to wipe both runes and then redraw the Lightning one. After that, look through the Fire memory stone to figure out the rune and draw it. Then Air. That’s all I can do today. Counselor Sila said to only have as many runes as you have open meridians. I braced myself for the pain of wiping the runes and then did it. Wiping two at once nearly made me cry out.

  I spent the next ten minutes slowly drawing the Lightning rune, making it as close to symmetric as I could. I had to wipe it twice to do so, but I got it in the end. Taking a deep breath and then focusing on my center, I gathered for a little while, taking a break from rune drawing to deal with the pain. Putting the level seven Lightning rune in the primary position increased my gathering speed by another factor of four. This is helpful. I’d noticed that opening two meridians had diluted my Aether down to the boundary between low and high Vapor. Gathering for thirty minutes got me a little farther up, but not that much. Hmm, I guess opening a bunch of meridians will make it harder to advance. It does make me stronger though. I’ll talk to Counselor Sila tomorrow about the balance between meridians and levels. Now, let’s see how another high level rune helps. I pulled out the red memory stone, ready to watch as another person made a rune.

  Seeing into the center of another person, I again watched them begin to draw a rune. This was a little different as the Aether in their center was noticeably red tinted. The rune started off with a single upward pointing chevron. This was then repeated three more times, rotating 45 degrees between them, to form a teepee like shape. After finishing that, they then connected the bottoms of the teepee, forming the ubiquitous eight pointed star. At this point they made a mistake and wiped the rune. Watching them get to this point again, the next step was to draw wavy, flame like shapes that connected each branch of the teepee. They’re drawing a campfire!

  I watched them repeat this several dozen times, trying to figure out the best shapes for the flames. It seemed that having the flames come to a point in the middle between the branches allowed for better gathering. That was the shape they completed the rune with. I pulled out of the memory. Time to draw a Fire rune! I thought as I settled my mind form the vision. I focused down into my center and began to draw. I decided to place the Fire rune about halfway out of my center in a straight line from the Lightning rune to my heart. Altogether it took me an hour and something like fifty tries to get the flames drawn right. Why was this harder than the Lightning one! Stupid curved shapes didn’t want to go in right. I grumbled to myself in annoyance.

  I decided I didn’t want to deal with the pain of badly drawing another rune tonight, and instead focused on the meridian that Counselor Sila had partially blocked off. Looking inward, I saw that he had essentially created a funnel like wall that reduced the size of the opening by ninety percent or so. Hmm, I’d rather have control of this myself. Can I make the same structure and have it hold together? I’ll try making it after his first. I pulled Aether together that made it past the funnel, and tried to get it to stick together. However, as soon as I relaxed my control, the structure fell apart. I tried over and over again, pushing the Aether together harder, trying to tie it together with additional strands, and anchoring it to the wall. Finally, I figured out how to make them stay, by building a double sided funnel such that each piece was pushing on another that forced it to stay in the shape. As soon as I finished that, I noticed my hearing ability decrease to what it was before my meridian opened. Hmm, I just blocked off even more Aether from the meridian, so the benefits decreased. I focused on the structure put in place by Counselor Sila, and forced Aether to impact the sides. As soon as I put intent into the impacts, his structure dispersed, and my hearing and sense of smell doubled.

  I sat with my eyes closed, slowly breathing in and out, savoring the smells of flowers and trees that I didn’t notice before. I heard insects, birds, and animals walking around, and a very low hum of conversation from other students in the Grotto. I reached into the Aether structure, and removed the innermost layer blocking off the meridian. I slowly increased the Aether allowed through this way, trying to get used to the enhanced senses. It seemed to be going well until “Hey Aiden, are you okay?” thundered in my ears. With a soft cry, I fell over. I put my finger to my lips and whispered “shush” to him while I rebuilt the blockage to the starting level.

  “What happened?” Jon asked after I stood up and took my finger off my lips.

  “I unblocked the senses meridian that I accidentally opened this morning and was trying to get used to the extra noise and smells. I was already starting to get a headache when you asked how I was doing, and that was way too loud for me, at this stage. I’ve got it blocked off again now, so I’m fine.” I answered back.

  “It is just about sunset, want to head back?” He asked.

  “Not right now, I’m going to stay out here another hour or so. You can go on in if you want to.” I replied.

  “Okay, I’m not surprised you are going to continue. Don’t stay out too late. I’ll see you in the morning.” He said as he got up, stretched, and walked away towards the dormitories.

  I focused down to my center and began gathering again, with a plan of doing so for an hour and then working on my first weapon techniques again. Pulling in Aether even faster with both runes available left me feeling full and unable to continue after only half an hour. “Whew, if I can keep up this rate, I’ll be able to open all the meridians that are easily openable and still make low Mist in like a month!” I exclaimed to myself, and then thought, at Mist you are supposed to be able to sense other people’s auras. I wonder what that is like. I stood up and looked outside. I stopped what I was doing, gaping at the wondrous beauty of the Mediation Grotto at night.

  Bugs like large fireflies glowed softly, only in eight different colors, the main colors of the elements. They left streaks through the sky as they flew around. Glowing lights hovered over the pathways, illuminating them to help people move around. Flowers I hadn’t noticed gleamed in the provided light and the fireflies alighted on them, moving almost like bees. A bright red bird started to fly by, before bursting into flames, though without burning. “A phoenix!” I cried in wonder, awed at the world around me. I sat down with my back to the pavilion and just watched the animals and the forest light the night, feeling the stress that had built up over the day start to fade away. The phoenix I saw came back after a couple of minutes, and landed on the roof of the pagoda, looking down at me. It seemed to look through me, then jumped up and flew off. I watched in wonder. I can do this, I thought to myself, ready once again to build on my new life.

  Watching nature took away from my weapon time, but that was okay. I needed the destressing more than I needed to practice. I headed back to the dorms after an hour of relaxing, ready to sleep after a busy day. I went up to my dorm, waving at Brett and Ming in the lounge as I passed them, and changed into sleep clothes. After looking out at the Grotto one last time, I lay down and went to sleep.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  The next morning I got up, got dressed, and checked my schedule. Today is Wood day, so
we have Beasts, which should be fun. I then headed to breakfast after making sure my trisula were secured in their belt. It was a good thing that I did since Counselor Might was chewing out a couple of people for not having their weapons off to the side of the dining hall. I saw them take off back to the dorms to get them, apprehension written on their faces. Shaking my head, I walked into the meal hall thinking Just like the Academy, the day after you are told something will be mandatory, they will check it. Gotta learn sometime. The meal today was fried meat that reminded me of bacon, from a Jungle Boar, and scrambled eggs of some kind. I sat down with Brett and Lucas from my Gathering class.

  “I see you remembered your weapons today” Lucas commented as I sat down.

  “How’d you know?” I asked.

  “You didn’t come in sweaty; Counselor Might is making people run a lap around the training fields if they forget them, after running back to their rooms to rectify their mistake, of course. I doubt many of them will forget again.” He responded with a laugh.