“With these skills, I can see armor giving you a bit of trouble, but it still shouldn’t have been too hard,” the man said with a furrowed brow.
“I tried using Cone of Frost and Fire Ball, but neither of them showed much effect,” Ash said with a heavy sigh.
“I see,” the man replied looking back down at the sheet of paper. “First I should explain how the abilities work and why they didn’t work in that situation. Fire ball is a good skill to use to distract the enemy, but has little use besides that unless fighting undead. It isn’t very hot and it takes a lot of heat for armor to be effected. When you add in the padding, most warriors wouldn’t even notice. The same problem comes with frost attacks, but it can slow them down as the metal becomes weaker when it is cold. If you were to cast Cone of Frost and then hit it a strong attack with a spear, you could break through the metal. Given your current abilities, the best choices to use when faced off against a heavily armored knight would be Sticky Thread and Shock Strike. The armor is already heavy and restricts movements so Sticky Thread would make them an easy target. On the other hand, metal does bad with electrical attacks and the padding does little to stop its effects so Shock Strike works far better in close quarters.”
For the better part of two hours, Ash listened to the man tell him how to use his abilities more effectively. Some of the knowledge Ash would have guessed himself had he sat down and thought it out, but no matter what his life was like now, he was still slightly uncomfortable with fighting other humans. Once they were finished talking about his abilities, he started going over the different ways that they could be used together to make them even more effective. Ash tried to listen wholeheartedly, but he couldn’t stifle the yawn that forced its way out.
Hallera didn’t get mad as Ash yawned, instead he let out a light laugh. “We have been cooped up in this stuffy room for too long. Why don’t we call this to an end and tomorrow we can start the practical portion of why you are here,” Hallera said without a hint of dissatisfaction. “Celina, why don’t you show our guest around.”
“Yes honored uncle,” Celina said getting to her feet and holding her hand out to help Ash to his feet.
Celina didn’t lead Ash straight to his room as he expected, instead she led him outside to a large garden that lay in the center of the building. As they walked along a thin stone path that intertwined with a small flowing stream, Celina would often look at Ash though she never said a word. They stopped on top of a short wooden bridge painted the same colors as the flowers surrounding it. Looking out over the water as a few colorful fish swam by, Ash smiled. “Beautiful.”
“This is my favorite place,” Celina said happily. “When I was young I would often sneak here and lay on the bridge listening to the water as it passed underneath.”
“Sounds lonely,” Ash replied without thinking.
“It was,” Celina admitted. “Every generation the women are trained hard in case they become the next Maoh’s wife and guardian. When I was a child I thought it a great thing and worked hard. Then I started to resent it along with my other sisters in training.”
Listening to Celina, Ash could understand her feelings. It couldn’t have been easy to have be brought up just to be another’s shield. “What do you think about it now?” Ash asked, his eyes lingering on her round face as she looked down at the flowing water.
“I don’t know,” Celina said wistfully. “When I felt the calling, it scared me at first. It was as if my whole being was crying out. Then I learned the new Maoh had been found. You know we all felt it the second your blood touched the crown. It was as if something warm enveloped me, telling me everything would be ok.”
“But wasn’t that only because of the magic’s effects?” Ash asked, the disgust evident in the tone of his voice.
Celina gave a small laugh. “I asked my father the same question. He said that any freedom is an illusion. There is always someone at the top that wields the power to force others to do their bidding. Take the clan head. We are not forced to listen to his commands the same way we are to you, but we still must listen to them.”
“Don’t you hate it though?” Ash asked, forcing himself to look away from Celina’s smiling face. “Wouldn’t you prefer to marry someone you love instead of being forced to be with me?”
“That is the thing,” Celina replied awkwardly. “From the moment I saw you, I loved you. I know that the feelings are there only because of the magic, but they are still there.”
“I am already married,” Ash declared. “Even if you were beside me, I don’t think I could ever look at you with the same feelings of love that I have for Emelia.”
“You will have numerous wives,” Celina said, the smile never fading from her face. “I am not foolish enough to think that I will become a favorite or even one that is well liked. I am stubborn and hardheaded, but I still wish to be by your side. I don’t want to have that feeling of loss ever again,” Celina added her face going slightly pale. “When the Maoh died, it was as if my heart was ripped from my chest. Everything just seemed so bleak and hopeless.”
For another hour, the two stood on the bridge without another word said. When the silence seemed to press down too hard, Celina waved her hand and Ash followed. He was taken to a large room with a window that overlooked the gardens. Celina gave a short bow and turned to leave. “See you tomorrow my Lord.”
Celina didn’t give Ash a chance to respond and quickly disappeared down the hall. As he watched the young woman leave, Ash once again thought about Emelia and the child she carried. He knew that it hadn’t been that long since he had seen her, but to him it felt like an eternity.
While he was thinking, Ash heard a soft giggle from his closet. Unlike the doors made of hardwood and metal he was used to, the doors in the demon world were made of a thin light wood and what Ash thought to be a type of paper. Looking over at the closet, Ash noticed that a few dark shadows swayed on the other side. Pulling his sword from his inventory, Ash approached the closet as quietly as possible.
When Ash slid open the door what he found were six small eyes staring up at him. Ash put away the sword and bent down and tried his best to smile at the faces of the now scared children. “What is going on in here?” Ash asked trying to make his voice as joyful as possible.
After a few moments one of the children, a young girl with her hair tied behind her stood up and took a few steps toward him. “I am Deedra,” the child declared, her voice only shaking slightly.
“Hello Deedra, I am Ash,” Ash said as he took the child’s hand and gave the back of it a light kiss like he would do when greeting a noble back home.
The tense atmosphere from before was gone and the three children bombarded him with questions. Laughing, Ash tried to answer them as quickly as possible but before he could get an answer out three more questions were asked. Ash soon found himself drug about the palace to get in all sorts of mischief.
He was first taken to the kitchen where the giggling children stole a number of small pies. Then they went to the back of the large garden to eat. Once they were done, the children started picking up small handfuls of snow and dumping them on Ash. Laughing, Ash picked up a handful of snow and made a small ball and threw it at one of the kids.
Once the sun started to fall, two of the children disappeared leaving Ash alone with the young girl called Deedra who was currently curled on the ground sleeping soundly. Ash lifted her up gently, thinking it would be bad to leave her to sleep in such a place. After wandering the halls of the manor, Ash found one of the maids. She gave him a small smile when she saw Deedra in his arms and took Ash to another door and knocked lightly on it before disappearing and leaving Ash standing alone.
When the door opened, Celina, standing in a snow white gown, appeared in front of him. Her face blushed a pale pink as she quickly hid behind the door. “I was hoping you might know what to do with this little rugrat?” Ash asked before Celina had a chance to talk.
Celina looked down at Deedra who
layed limply in Ash’s arms. Her eyes quickly softened as she pulled the child From Ash’s arm. “Thank you,” Celina said before she quickly closed the door leaving Ash standing alone and more than a little surprised at the whole encounter. With a short laugh, Ash turned and headed back to find his own quarters.
9-3
The next day Ash, Celina, and four other demons headed for the labyrinth. The other four warriors were each over level eighty and one of them had a level of a hundred and eight. Ash had always silently wondered what the highest level one could become was. He had read a number of stories while in Emelia’s study about great heroes that were above the level of two hundred, but to him they were just stories. Now though, he had witnessed someone over level one hundred himself.
Today they would be fighting on the nineteenth and sixty-second floor of the labyrinth. The goal was to gain three abilities. Two were passive and one was active. He wasn’t told much other than they would gain the abilities in one day and spend the rest of the week training them so that he had a better understanding of how they were to be used. Normally this would take a year, but Ash was on a short schedule so he was only getting a small dose of the true training and hoped to pick up the rest when things had settled down.
The labyrinth didn’t have a metal plate, but a stone sculpture of a large flaming dog in front of it that the head guard placed his hand on. The six people were instantly transported to the nineteenth floor.
Ash was excited to once again be fighting in a labyrinth, but that was short lived. The monster were earth spirits and before Ash had a chance to kill a single one, the four large guards threw up their hands and bombarded the spirts with their magic. Watching, Ash had to admit that they were indeed skilled at the use of magic attacks, but it left him feeling more than a little useless as he moved from one corpse to the next only absorbing them.
Seeing his face, Celina who had stuck close by Ash patted him on the shoulder as he stood from absorbing one of the spirits. “You will get all the fighting that you want tomorrow. I promise,” Celina said with a teasing voice.
Ash smiled back and prayed that she was right as he continued to absorb the dead monsters one after another. Ash had quickly lost track of the number as he went from one to the next so when he heard the welcome “Tring,” Sound in his ears he let out a cry of happiness.
[You have reached the absorption rate for lesser Earth Spirit. Abilities available: Earth Shield (active), and Heart of Stone (passive).]
“Tring.”
[You have been randomly awarded the ability Heart of Stone.]
[Heart of Stone: slowly absorbs the essence of the earth into your blood strengthening the body over time. Level max.]
Ash read the description of the skill a number of times, but was still unsure of how it worked. He wanted to ask either the clan head or the sage, but since neither were present all he could do was wait.
Once again Ash followed behind the four guards while they easily cut through the weak earth spirits so that he could absorb them. Time passed by slowly for Ash and he walked from one body to the next until he heard the welcomed sound once again.
“Tring.”
[You have reached the absorption rate for lesser Earth Spirit. Abilities available: Earth shield (active).]
“Tring.”
[You have been randomly awarded the ability Earth Shield.]
[Earth Shield: Cost 40MP- create a stone shield made of condensed earth. Level 1-0%.]
Seeing the ability Ash knew that he could do the same thing without the ability but it would take him longer and most likely use up a bit more MP as he would have to use two abilities at once to do the same thing. At first Ash thought that his luck made him prefect to be a gambler and in some ways that was true. Without his Gambler’s Boost, Ash wouldn’t be nearly as strong as he was but at the same time it limited him. If he had chosen to be a mage or wizard Ash could make any number of spells using his different abilities. If he had chosen a swordsman he could do the same thing. As a gambler it limited him since very few abilities used luck as their main source.
Ash was lost in thought as they continued to the labyrinth door and flashed to the sixty second floor. As soon as his vision cleared, Ash could feel the deadly aura of the place. Unlike the floors he had been to before, Ash could almost taste the danger that hung in the air. Looking around, it was almost as if they were in some sort of jewel cave as the ground and roof both were made of clear diamonds.
“My Lord, stay close,” one of the guards said as he looked around. Unlike before when the guards quickly moved out, killing everything in their path with but a few blows, this time they stuck close to Ash, never moving more than a few feet from his side. It didn’t take long for Ash to get his first glimpse of the new enemy. It was a slender creature made of pure diamond. As soon as it appeared, the guards started to use their magic to bring it down. The diamond monster gave out a piercing scream and charged as three diamond spears flew from its hands.
The guards each threw up their hands and three stone walls jutted from the ground. The diamond spears flew through the first wall as if passing through paper, and then the second. At the third wall, Ash could see cracks starting to appear, but the spears were stopped. Before Ash could say anything, the guards were already at work and loud bangs made Ash’s ears ring and strikes of lighting bombarded the diamond being.
Seeing that the spears didn’t work, the diamond creature continued to approach the six people. Three of the guards focused on attack while one of the guards started using his magic to try and slow down the diamond monster.
At the beginning of the battle, Ash was more than a little startled and when the diamond spears were shot toward him, more than a little afraid. Now he was still slightly amazed, not with the monster, but how the guards fought seamlessly as if they were a single entity. Looking to his side, he noticed that Celina was watching the fight as if it were a show made just for her amusement. Shaking his head, Ash suppressed a laugh and turned back to watch the battle.
In the end, the battle took less than ten minutes though when it was happening it felt like hours to Ash. Once the diamond monster died, Ash quickly absorbed it while the others guarded him.
After watching the battle, Ash was glad that he had so many high level guards around him. He was a lot of things, but Ash was not an utter fool. He knew that if he was forced to fight the monster alone, there would only be one outcome and that would be his death.
The guards continued to fight while guarding Ash until once again he heard the welcomed sound in his ears.
“Tring.”
[You have reached the absorption rate for greater Earth Spirit. Abilities available: Diamond Soul (passive).]
“Tring.”
[You have randomly been awarded the ability Diamond Soul.]
“Tring.”
[The new stat Soul MP has been created.]
[Diamond Soul: Ability to convert MP into Soul MP. Ratio 100/1. Level 1-0%]
“That is all of them,” Ash said as he read through the description of Diamond Soul again.”
“Then we should retire for the day my Lord,” the lead guard said as he began to lead Ash back toward the labyrinth exit.
Once they left the labyrinth, they were met by the clan head along with the sage and a number of other people Ash had seen the day before. “I see that everything has went well,” the clan head said happily. “Let us head back to my manor so that I can explain why these three abilities are important and why we are the clan in charge of their training.”
Ash was once again taken to the room with the long table and forced to sit on the ground. After a whole day of nothing but following behind others as they fought, Ash was already feeling restless. Being forced it sit on the ground while calmly drinking tea just made him want to scream in anguish.
“First let me explain a bit about my clan and our blood ability and normal abilities. Just like the Maoh, each clan head has a blood ability. Though unlike the Maoh, it is po
ssible to pass it along to more than one person in each generation, though less than one person out of five will receive the blood ability. Our blood ability is ‘Affinity of Heaven.’ It makes it possible for us to use all four major elements with a reduced cost. The other ability that our clan often has is Diamond Soul. Which is the same one that you gained today. I know from the description it sounds like a useless skill, but it is honestly better than our blood ability. However, it isn’t unique since many of the other clans have it as well. The reason it is so useful is you can condense your normal MP into Soul MP. Now Soul MP has the same use as normal MP, the only difference is that there isn’t a limit to how much soul MP that you can gather and save. It allows our best warriors to have an almost limitless amount of MP to use for emergencies. My advice is that each night before sleeping, you condense all the MP you have left from the day.”
“I see,” Ash said nodding his head. It was true that at first he didn’t see much use in the ability, but now that he had head the head’s explanation it made sense. The main problem back at the fort was his lack of MP. If he had spent months or even better years condensing MP, he could have used his strongest magic over and over, devastating the enemy’s forces.
“The other abilities are slightly different than Diamond Soul. Heart of Stone is useful, but it will take years for it to truly show its potential. It creates a small Earth Stone in your heart and circulates earth essence through your veins slowly strengthening your bones and muscles. Earth Shield is easily enough to understand though it is much harder to know when to use it and how to use it flawlessly than you might think. That is what we will be doing over the next few days. First, what do you know about earth’s strength and weaknesses.”
“Earth is the strongest of the four elements in defense. Other than that I am not really sure,” Ash admitted.
“You are right, in physical defense Earth is the strongest. It has its weaknesses though. When faced against fire and wind, earth has the advantage but a skilled mage can find ways around earth since it is inflexible. Against water, earth is still strong but water can cut through earth better than the other elements, but it is still much easier for a mage to go around your defense then go through it. This is the reason that earth shield is one of the first abilities that a Maoh obtains. Unlike Earth Wall, Earth Shield can be formed in the air and can be called and recalled at will as long as you have enough MP. Over the next few days, you will learn how to do this, or at least that is mine and the sages hope.”
Reborn: Demon's Legacy Page 2