Chapter 78: The Unrefined

Chapter 78 -078: The Unrefined

It was well after dark when the city he had departed from came into view, and Mikael continued to will his failing body forward.

To get here, he had absorbed whatever energy Ragnarok had left, so the scythe no longer hummed and lost its signature dim glow, a sign of its weakened state. Now it simply supported its wielder like a staff, and Mikael leaned on it more than he would ever have admitted.

Getting closer to the main road, Mikael began to see silhouettes of people armed with bows and other weapons, leaving the city: adventurers. At the sight of them, his body nearly gave in, but the last thing the former Sovereign wished to do was fall before mortals again and be at their mercy. So he held what remained of himself upright, kept to the edge of the road, and let the black he was draped in do the rest.

The city gates were another minor landmark for him, one more small thing to reach and cross off. But when he entered, he was not surprised to find that his sense of direction was officially out of commission.

He just continued walking. Since the city wasn’t fully awake yet, there were few people on the streets, and it was quiet, a fact he greatly appreciated, as he was sure noise would go a long way towards scrambling whatever peace remained in his mind. Every footstep was a decision he had to make again, and again, and again.

He continued deeper into the city, making random turns and walking through alleys.

He needed to fall.

That was his body’s decision, and the moment it made it, he blacked out, nevertheless still walking. His legs had simply refused to stop without consulting him, much as they had once before. When he managed to force his eyes open once more, he was standing before a door, an unfamiliar one.

But he knocked, as heavily as his hands could manage at the time, though he wasn’t even sure the sound was audible to whoever was inside.

Still, he continued knocking, and moments later, there was a response as flickers of light moved through the windows of the house.

A man threw open the door, sword in hand.

“At ease… friend. I am but… a weary traveler.”

The man wore a frown that showed his skepticism, as anyone would. Most people didn’t come knocking with their weapons drawn and in plain sight whilst draped in complete black.

One thing did intrigue the man, even through the haze: the white hair of the stranger, whiter than any he had ever seen in his life.

“Dear, who is there?” a feminine voice asked from behind him.

“I shall pay you in gold,” Mikael offered, not wanting to strain himself further. While he was weakened, any threat to his mortal existence would most likely kick-start him into action, but he did not will for that to happen. There was every possibility he’d drop dead right after.

“If you’d just offer me a place to rest my head.”

The offer of gold was enticing, and Mikael’s appearance suggested that he would actually fulfil the promise. So the man put away his sword and came over to support him, then barked orders at the person behind him, something about preparing a room.

When he was brought to the room, Mikael drove Ragnarok deep enough into the ground to stand by itself, like a guard. The moment he fell onto the sitting bed, his will finally gave out, and he fell asleep instantly.

Ragnarok stood where he had left it, its dull blade catching what little light came through the window. The weapon had given everything it had to carry him here. Now it kept watch, silent, and Mikael, as he always had during their time back in the wilderness, did not have to.

—

The bell tolled at six in the morning, stirring Miriselle awake the instant it did. By a quarter to seven, she and Isabella had left for breakfast.

The first lecture of the day was Magic Theory I.

The two of them took their seats, and Isabella had barely opened her notes before the professor began.

“One of the differences between the Awakened, from the Novice ranks all the way up to the legendary Quasi-God rank, is the quality of mana your core can refine. As we ascend, so does our core’s refining capability.”

The professor paused, allowing her words to sink in and the students to take down whatever they could in their notes.

“We all absorb mana from our surroundings, as well as from other sources, to replenish our cores. But for this class, we shall be talking about the mana available in the environment: general mana. As you may know, there are mana veins running through the world, generating mana. That is why we have mana, and I don’t want to take questions on that yet, so Miss Limnor, put your hand down.”

The professor sighed. “You guys do know… I am not a big fan of teaching.”

“And somehow you’re a professor,” someone from the back chimed in.

The class chuckled, and the atmosphere lightened up a bit.

Miriselle smiled despite herself, and Isabella leaned in to whisper something she did not quite catch. At the front, the professor merely raised an eyebrow, waited for the room to settle, and went on.

“Mana is not power. You must have been told that repeatedly. I am aware that reaching Grandmaster rank at your age has given a certain number of you a sense of confidence in your ability as an Awakened. That confidence, I assure you, is not misplaced. You all did earn your place in these grounds.”

She moved to the board, where the ranks were listed from bottom to top: Novice, Adept, Master, Grandmaster, Sage, Archsage, Half Deity, Quasi-God.

“You are all here,” she said, tapping “Grandmaster.”

The room was quiet.

“By any conventional measure, you all should be at most here,” she continued, tapping “Master.” “The average brilliant Awakened, knight and pure mage alike, reaches Grandmaster rank in their late twenties or early thirties, if they reach it at all. You all reached it before most people your age had learned basic intermediate spells.”

She paused.

“Now, I say this because it creates a specific problem.”

She wrote a word on the board, then turned to face them.

Outpace.

“When you climb quickly, there is always a tendency to outpace your core’s refinement. Yes, a higher-rank core refines mana better than a lower-rank one. Faster and much more efficiently. That point is not in dispute.” She put her hands behind her back. “But refinement is not a passive activity, as I’m sure most of you believe. Your core has the capacity to refine purer mana than a Master’s can. Capacity, however, my dearest students, is not the same as output. The core refines what you give it to work with, yes, but that work is something you have to do deliberately and actively. Cultivation. It does not happen simply because you advanced.”

She let it land. Beside Miriselle, Isabella’s pen had stopped moving.

“The mana in most of your cores, without doubt, has the volume of a Grandmaster, but its purity was refined by, at most, an advanced Master-rank core. Think of it as having a large river. Your core is capable of cleansing it, but you haven’t done so yet. And no one has taught you how.”

A river that large, left unclean, would carry its impurities wherever it flowed.

The professor let the image sit for a moment, and several students glanced at one another, as though seeing their own cores for the first time.

The professor walked around the room, and when she was sure she had the whole class’s attention, she continued.

“Let’s circle back to our main objective: understanding how the mana in the environment interacts with our cores as we advance.”

—

The borders of Khyron needed no large walls, no gates, and no soldiers to watch them. Only the truly desperate entered: the likes of wanted criminals and exiles who tried to escape into it for a while, and most never made it out alive.

The environment made it very clear that it was not the least bit welcoming. The sky was thick with dense, dark red miasma, heavy with poisonous mana. The land, as far as the eye could see, was vast, silent, and empty. Overhead, massive beasts flew, although the two travelers did not seem to care about that.

The woman gazed down from the hill into the distance, her eyes unhurried and calm, very much unlike those of the people who entered Khyron with sane minds.

Beside her, the second traveler said nothing. The red miasma drifted across the land in slow, heavy folds, and somewhere above, the shadows of the great beasts passed over the ground and were gone.

“This is where it begins.”

And with that, she took the first step down.

See y’all tomorrow.