“Oh, that?” Derek laughed again. “It’s real, but it’s useless, as far as I can tell. I’ve been there. It looks like a Soaring Spire — maybe even bigger, actually. It’s cylindrical, and it’s the only one that’s perfectly smooth. There’s only one set of gates, and it’s locked tight. Couldn’t put a scratch on them.”
“…You tried to blast your way into a spire?”
Derek shrugged. “I was bored, alone, and hundreds of miles from home. I didn’t want to waste the whole trip out there. So, yeah. I tried to break into the tower…a lot. I tried climbing it, too. Summoned my pact-bound friends. Nothing we tried worked.”
Huh. “Okay. Well, it’s probably not related to this.”
He raised a hand to his chin. “Unless you can get in there through the other towers. If there’s a way to teleport from another tower, it’d be a perfect safe hiding place for the people who captured Tenjin… Presuming the place is set up like the other spires, of course, and that there are safe spots. Which there might not be.”
“I’ll try to do some research on that, too, if I can find the time.”
“Don’t worry about that spire. You were right — it’s probably not related. If you really want to be involved with this, I definitely think talking to your mother should be the priority. Aside from that, let’s get you and your friends strong enough that I’ll be comfortable taking you with me to the tower if I need to.”
I nodded. “Sounds like a good plan. Does that mean you’re going to offer us some kind of special training? Teach us the secrets of how you reached Emerald at such a young age, maybe?”
“Goddess, no. I don’t have time for that.” Derek grinned. “But you know? Keras might.”
I thought back to Derek’s Emerald-level summoned monster panicking at the idea of even sparring with Keras.
This was a terrible idea.
Marissa and I stood up at the same time, then glanced meaningfully at each other.
Well, at least I’m not the only crazy one.
Chapter II – Special Training
We found Keras back on the roof. I don’t know when or how he slipped past us to get back up there, but it didn’t really matter.
He was sitting with his legs folded in front of him in an unusual style, his sword laid across his lap. His eyes were closed.
On a hunch, I flicked my attunement on.
The aura around the unsheathed blade of his sword was a silvery hue under my attuned vision, thicker than the flickers of argent I’d seen in his personal shroud during moments of intensity.
No question that it was the same color, though.
I still didn’t have the faintest idea what that meant. There was no level of attunement that corresponded to a silver glow. Even if I extrapolated through the colors of the rainbow beyond green and imagined hypothetical ranks above Emerald or Sapphire, silver wasn’t one of those colors. And this definitely wasn’t just a strange shade of blue; it looked like a haze of metal, complete with a lustrous reflection.
Do foreigners have different aura colors because their magic works differently? Maybe a copper-silver-gold scale or something?
…If that follows and he’s only silver, I’d hate to see how powerful gold would be.
While I was distracted with the epiphany that “Tyrant in Gold” could refer to an aura color, Marissa stepped forward.
“M’lord Keras, forgive me for botherin’ ya while yer meditating. Can ye spare a moment?”
Keras opened a single eye. “Well, if you’re being that polite, how can I refuse?” He closed his eyes again, cracked his neck, and then his sword was sheathed at his side.
With my attunement still active, I could see that a silvery aura lingered in the air where his blade had been, but just for a moment. The weapon itself was no longer emitting an aura now that it was sheathed; instead, I could see a faint blue aura around the scabbard.
Now that’s interesting.
Blue meant Sapphire. That was absurdly potent — we’d been told in class that Sapphire Mages were purely hypothetical — but at least it was something our system could properly identify.
And that was just the scabbard. Why did it need an aura like that? What did it do?
Keras reopened his eyes and stood, glancing to Marissa, to me, and back to Marissa. “What can I help you with?”
Marissa bowed deeply. “Please teach me how you fight.”
I raised a hand to rub behind my head. “Uh, me too, I guess?”
Keras folded his arms. “Why would you want me to teach you?”
That can’t be a serious question.
I frowned. “I can’t speak for Mara, but I’m going to go with ‘because you survived fighting a visage and an Emerald-level elemental is terrified of you.’”
He turned his head away from me, his jaw tightening.
That…wasn’t a good response.
Was he angry?
Maybe? But, if I was reading his eyes right, it looked more like shame.
Fortunately, Marissa jumped in before Keras had a chance to flatten me for my insolence or anything.
“Uh, m’lord, I was mostly thinking that you had a unique fightin’ style, with shaping your shroud into blades and such, ‘specially when you hit everything around you at once.”
He turned his head to her immediately. “What do you mean by that last part?”
“When ye were stuck in the stone, sir. I couldn’t see it, but I could feel when your shroud shifted. And it didn’t feel like burning — it felt like cutting, the same as when you cut through m’lord Hartigan’s shroud. Never seen anyone do something like that with their shroud before, m’lord. Not even our teachers can change their shroud into blades.”
Keras’ eyes narrowed. “No. I doubt anyone else could.” He sighed, looking away. “If that’s what you want to learn, I can’t teach you. You wouldn’t have the right type of…mana, for lack of a better way of putting it.”
“Beggin’ your pardon, m’lord. Maybe I couldn’t do precisely what you do, but…” She pressed her hands together in front of her, closing her eyes for a heartbeat, and then brought them back apart.
Her crimson shroud stretched out four inches in front of her hands, in blade-like points. “It isn’t much, m’lord, but…”
Keras closed the distance between them in a moment, striding forward with fervor. Marissa didn’t retreat.
If I’d been faster, I probably would have stepped between them in alarm, but Keras moved too quickly.
He reached upward — and brushed his hand against the blade-like shroud.
I saw silvery sparks when his fingers made contact.
“Remarkable. You managed this after only seeing me once?”
Marissa nodded. “It isn’t anything like your technique, sir. I know that. It’s just a standard shroud, shaped like—”
Keras tilted his head to the side, examining the shroud. “You’re not the first person I’ve seen who can produce a similar blade, but at Carnelian level? Having just seen something like it for the first time?” He paused for a moment, taking a step back and looking straight into her eyes. “It’s beautiful.”
Marissa blushed almost as bright red as her aura.
Keras was turning away a moment later, raising a hand to his lip in thought. He looked totally oblivious to the reaction he’d just triggered. “Yes, I believe I can teach you a bit. I will make no promises of anything specific. I am not much of a teacher.”