"So what do you say, do you want to 'not fall behind', …. Or do you want to thrive"
Thalien and his father stared into each other's eyes for a moment, before a system screen suddenly appeared.
[QUEST MENU]
[NEW QUEST]
QUEST DESCRIPTION: CAELAN OFFERED YOU A CHANCE TO START AHEAD OF YOUR PEERS ALLOWING YOU TO BETTER ADAPT TO THE ACADEMY'S HELLISH TRAINING.
QUEST OBJECTIVES: COMPLETE CAELAN'S AND SERAPHYNE'S DETERMINED GOALS BY THE END OF THE MONTH.
REWARDS FOR SUCCESS: 50%MASTERY OF VIRELION SWORD ARTS FIRST FORM THIRD MOVEMENT.
NATURAL SHAPESHIFTING MASTERY ADVANCEMENT TO (ADVANCED)
THERE'S NO PUNISHMENT FOR FAILURE.
Thalien looked at the screen, and then looked back at his father.
"Of course, I will go with the second option" thalien smiled
"Good choice, though you might regret it"
"Now, your mother and I have already developed a training plan for you"
"You and I will have a session every week, in which I will only use my right hand, and will not move from my place"
"Your goal is to force me to use my left hand, and or move at least one step, you will also need, to achieve complete mastery over the first form second movement"
"You will only be allowed to eat these special made energy bars, they have no taste, but have the necessary nutrients for your body development, one of those is enough to keep you going for a day, but you will eat three a day"
"You will get a 15-min bathroom break and four hours of sleep, other than that you will spend the rest of your day either training or getting healed by the healers"
"You will wake up every day at 3 in the morning for your session with sir Thomas or me"
"The session will continue until 8 am, after which you will train with your mother for another 5 hours, and then repeat the cycle until you go to sleep at 11 pm"
"Any objections"
"N-no"
Thalien was scared, he was genuinely scared.
'Can I even survive this'
"Good, now let's start"
"Attack me with all you got"
Suddenly thalien got tense, he gripped his sword, took a stance, and a deep breath
Then his blade glowed with blue aura.
Aura is essentially just mana used to empower your sword art, and give it unique properties.
When using magic, you normally push mana from your core to the outside world to manipulate it into the spell you want.
But in martial arts, instead of pushing mana outwards, you integrate it into your body and weapon to empower and give properties, depending on the affinity of mana you used, like fire, lightning, ice, etc., or you can just use raw mana like the virelion arts does.
That is called aura.
Thalien looked into his father's eyes for a moment before immediately jumping towards him with a vertical slash from his right. Once Caelan moved his sword to parry thalien immediately spun around switching the direction of the strike.
He was fast but Caelan was faster. And he parried the strike like it was nothing. Thalien didn't stop though, he followed with 7 fast strikes from every direction, which caelan parried with ease.
Thalien took a step back and immediately launched forward with a thrust to the head, caelan's sword moved to protect his head, thalien changed the direction of the thrust to his chest, but caelan reacted fast and stroke thalien's sword to the left, thalien lost balance only to find a sword launched into his rib, he could hear the bones shatter, he took a step back to retreat, but caelan followed fast with a thrust to his stomach, and then a horizontal slash to the shoulder, which made thalien kneel.
The training ground turned silent for a moment before caelan broke it,
"Stand up"
Thalien obeyed
"Why did you do that"
"Do what"
"Retreat"
"When I hit you. You immediately retreated, and virelion arts doesn't have good footwork or defense, it's made purely for offense, you overwhelm your opponent with fast powerfull strikes forcing them to a defensive stance, and finishing the fight fast, just like a lion, and lions Don't do defense, by retreating you gave the opponent the opportunity to turn the table, and force you into defense which is something you are not good at"
"When a virelion is hit they don't falter or break, they counter-attack with faster more powerful strikes to prevent the opponent from landing another hit"
"Now, attack again"
Thalien did, he jumped forward with a horizontal strike, which was parried, followed by a thrust to the head, and another horizontal, but nothing worked, thalien was fast, but his father was faster, it kept going until caelan hit thalien in his side, which made him hesitate for a moment before launching again, but it was too late, caelan followed by a thrust to the head and a strike to the knee, getting him to kneel again holding his head.
"One moment of hesitation, could end your life in battle"
"Get up"
They kept going that way until each bone in thaliens body was broken, at which point, a 6th grade healer arrived.
Healers are ranked by ten grades the higher the grade the better the healer.
It's said that 10th grade healers can revive the dead.
'By the way, I should find a good holy art for myself' Looking at the glowing hand of the healer, thalien though
Contrary to their name, holy arts have nothing to do with God, they are normal arts that use mana, and can be trained by anyone, people just call them holy arts because of the miracles they perform.
The session continued on and thalien kept getting beaten and healed, until it was time.
"Enough"
"You are showing progress, good job"
"Now, it's time for your mother's session, after that you will continue with sir Thomas"
"Yes sir"
Caelan nodded and said
"Wait for her at the forest west of the mansion"
With that he left.
Thalien waited infront of the forest for 5 minutes until his mom arrived, with her normal elegant demeanor and calm smile, she said
"Good morning, did you have good session with your dad"
Thalien nodded and said
"I'm learning alot"
"That's great"
"Now, I have a few questions, you just have to answer while walking"
"Questions?" said thalien tilting his head
"Nothing hard, just the basics of druidic arts"
"Now let's start, first question, what is natural energy"
"Natural energy is the energy that's continuously produced by The world, The fundamental life force and elemental essence that flows through all living things and natural elements. It sustains Life, elemental power and balance."
"And what is a druid's responsibility towards it"
"To intervene whenever it's disturbed, whether By demons, undead, or black magic"
"And why must we guard it?"
"Because when it's wounded, the balance breaks. Crops rot. Animals turn against their own. The land forgets its song."
"What's the pillar of druidic arts"
"Resonance"
"Good explain"
"Resonance is the alignment of self with the natural energy. We match our rhythm to the world's — to trees, rivers, stars. Without it, spells fail or backfire."
"And what aids resonance?"
"Meditation. Observing cycles — like moons, tides, migrations. Listening instead of commanding, and opening your mind to your surroundings"
"What's the biggest difference between mana and natural energy"
"While mana is meant to be commanded, natural energy does not respond well to commands, we do not force, we resonate with natural energy until our will become its will"
"What's the reason we can't store natural energy like mana"
"Because you need to keep in resonance with natural energy to control it, and to store natural energy you will need to keep in resonance at all times"
"Hmm, how about you use plant manipulation on that little flower"
Said seraphyne while pointing at a small red flower.
Thalien obeyed and put his hands on the flower, he took a deep breath and his hands started to glow green, the flower started growing.
"What affinity does this flower have?"
"Fire"
"Anything else"
"There is slight wind affinity, but fire is the main one"
"What's the structure of natural energy inside every living organism"
"Every living beings have all main elemental energies inside of them, some more prominent than others, and pure raw natural energy that acts as the balancing agent. While you can use some spells to manipulate affinity inside all living beings, sentient beings and animals are significantly harder to manipulate than plant, since they have less connection to nature, and have barely enough natural energy to balance the elements"
"But that doesn't mean that manipulating plants is easy, while they have more than enough natural energy for balance, you still need to be careful while manipulating the elements. A sudden spike in fire affinity can burn the flower, wind can cut it to shreds, etc., that's why plant manipulation is often used to practice natural energy control"
"Good answers, now I want you to increase the fire affinity of the flower, slowly Chip away from other elements and increase fire energy, until the fire energy is the sole dominant affinity"
"Y-yes"
It's harder to increase the main affinity than any other element, because maintaining balance becomes harder as the gap increases, but he did it, and smoother than he expected.
"Hmm smooth control, great resonance and balance, and you didn't try to force it at all, great job, you've come a long way"
"I think you're ready now"
"Ready for what ?" asked thalien
"Ready to choose what kind of druid you want to be"
"Come on let's keep going"
"Druidic arts are the most diverse, and balanced of all arts you can learn"
"druids can fight, heal, create artifacts, cast spells …"
That's when they reached their destination, and thalien almost let out an audible gasp, it was quite possibly the most beautiful scene thalien ever saw.
The impossibly large trees that are filled with natural energy. Hundreds of the most beautiful flowers he had ever seen, littered the floor, the vibrant colors as if he had just entered into an anime, the scent, the scenery, every thing was perfect.
"…. And tend to groves"
"Up until now I've only been teaching you the basics, even the spells you know were mostly to help you build a foundation, plant manipulation for control and affinity, natural sensory was to help you with resonance, natural shapeshifting was to build a connection to beasts and animals."
"But at some point every druid needs to find a path and stick with it, learning everything is not practical, and they cannot be good at everything"
"So what's your path"
'My path …'
"Swordsmanship is my main combat tool, what I expect from druid arts is to support that, in whatever way it can, healing, summoning, long rage spells, and anything else"
"So you want to be mainly combat/support oriented."
"Honestly, I hope I don't seem arrogant, …but … I think I can learn every thing in druidic arts and be good at it all"
'I have 10 talent points in druidic arts after all'
"Phht….hahaha"
Thalien's cheeks became red from embarrassment.
Seeing that seraphyne said
"I'm sorry I didn't mean to"
"I honestly think the same thing"
"There is just something about the way you hesitantly said it"
Thalien lowered his head in embarrassment, but then he felt her hand lifting his head, making him meet her eyes.
"You are the most talented druid I know, probably the most talented in the world, it's your right to be confident son, don't be embarrassed"
Thalien smiled, and nodded, all his embarrassment vanishing.
"Now, what do you want us to focus on in our training"
Thalien took a deep breath, and said
"I'm going to master everything druidic arts has to offer"
"But right now I need to focus on combat, and support"
Seraphyne smiled and said "I agree, now shall we start our training"