Chapter 23
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After that, they all left and went back to the main manor. After Alkali and Alkaline retrieved their weapons of choice: a spear and halberd, respectively. The trio went over to the sparring field just outside of the main town. They gave Rigel a long dagger since he didn't possess any weaponry.
"So, should Rigel and I spar first?" Alkaline asked with a bit more seriousness compared to how she was at the bathhouse.
Both Rigel and Alkali agreed without complaint. Rigel wasn't sure exactly what he was going to say in defense to his invulnerability, so he just hoped that he would lose without much of a fight. He wanted to trust the twins, he did, but his experiences prior to this era, the era of the 72 gods, led him to be quite distrusting. All of his insight into human nature screamed at him that these 2 were good people, but he couldn't easily let go of his trauma.
Rigel and Alkaline both stood at opposite ends of the 20 feet by 60 feet rectangular arena. Alkali said, "Start," and the 2 participants burst forth with their top speeds.
Alkali thrust her halberd at Rigel with explosive ferocity. He parried haphazardly with his dagger, but her momentum was far greater than his. His arm was blown back from the force and she brought the halberd around full circle in a slashing motion to bisect him laterally. Rigel timed it just right and dropped to the ground just before the blade hit him, not allocating her enough time to react to drop it in order to connect with him. Now on his back, Rigel shot forth a flamethrower at Alkali which was comparative to some of his best ones. She dodged to the side and pulled back a few meters away, charging a fireball in her hand.
Rigel would've done the same, but he never learned how to charge one. In a desperate attempt to interrupt her, he just shot a small fireball at her as fast as he could muster one to go. It flew rather fast, but nowhere near the speed of sound. It was still slower than even a baseball. However, Alkaline was just a few meters away from Rigel. In just a fourth of a second, the fireball reached her, forcing her to also drop to the ground and dispel the charging fireball.
Rigel, after shooting the fireball, immediately jumped up and rushed her. Right as he was about to reach, she suddenly unleashed a fireball of her own. Rigel fell to his right while spinning counterclockwise and barely avoided it, but he lost his balance and fell just next to Alkaline. She punched him in the face and tackled him. They got up and grappled for a bit until she finally swung him over her head and shoulders. He landed on his back and rolled away while retrieving his dropped dagger. She did the same and they continued fighting.
Rigel's lack of combat training became quickly apparent and Alkaline hastily disarmed him. He easily could have held onto the dagger, but he felt it was a good way to end the spar without any injury.
He sighed and pretended to fall over in exhaustion. Alkaline stayed on her feet, but was visibly trembling.
"Wow! That was incredibly exciting!" Alkali started shouting. "I never get to see many other high-level spars like Alkaline and I usually do, so that was a good experience."
The group agreed to rest for about half an hour and then Rigel would spar with Alkali. They did so, and then Rigel and Alkali took up their respective positions in the arena. This time, when Alkaline signaled for them to start, Alkali wasted no time and started to charge a fireball. Rigel cursed and decided to attempt earth magic.
He slowly started dragging a 3'x2' block out of the ground. The second Alkali unleashed his monstrous fireball, Rigel dove behind the block while using every ounce of his willpower to will the block to rise more. He landed just in time and the fireball smashed into the roof of the earthly block, exploding loudly from Rigel's point of view.
Rigel continued to will the block higher and higher into the sky while Alkali was busy charging up another fireball. By the time he let loose his fireball, Rigel had risen the block to 3 feet high. This time, however, Alkali shot the fireball in a slow arch in the sky. Rigel just barely noticed and dove out of the way. The fireball landed right where Rigel was just lying down with a thunderous boom.
Rigel shot another quick fireball at Alkali, who proceeded to dodge with relative ease while sending back one of his own. His, however, was much faster than Rigel's and arrived before him in a split second. Rigel panicked and barely managed to erect a wall of water out of nowhere before the fireball collided with it with another forceful boom. Steam bellowed into the heavens and the non-evaporated part of the water wall fell apart, following alongside the fireball into the afterlife.
Rigel was shocked by his sudden control over water but put it in the back of his mind while he switched to offense. He concentrated a vast amount of mana directly into the hand which held the dagger, his left, and unleashed it all forth at once whilst throwing the dagger towards Alkali. Albeit, the throw was more of a thrust due to Rigel's prone position, but an eruption echoed out and the dagger flew towards Alkali at a previously unfathomable speed. It arrived in front of him in just a fifth of a second, narrowly missing his face, and flew far, far off into the horizon.
Alkaline let out a quick yelp, Alkali collapsed on his knees helplessly, and Rigel started laughing chaotically, then quickly muffled it. Alkaline quickly rushed over to her brother and made sure he was okay. Rigel stayed laying down, pretending once more to be utterly wiped out.
"So, it truly wasn't Alkali who shot that speed of sound fireball. Then, who was it? Possibly his father?" Rigel mused to himself.
He then slowly got up and made his way over to Alkali, who was still bewildered by his near untimely demise.
Rigel and Alkaline both patiently waited for Alkali to recover, and he did after a couple of seconds.
"Are you okay?" Alkaline asked tenderly.
Alkali blinked a few times and shook his head before responding, "Yeah, yeah, I'm fine. Just a bit shocked." He then looked at Rigel with a combination of dread and admiration. "How did you do that? That sorta force would've blown my hand off if I tried it."
"Mine too, if I had to worry about anything other than comprehension," Rigel replied in is heart.
"Haha, I don't know, really. I just had a flash of realization and did it," he verbally replied.
"Oh. Well, you have to teach me sometime." Alkali said.
To that, Alkaline nodded in agreement. "For sure."
"If I even can," Rigel laughed. He actually had no clue if he could safely teach them, and decided to pretend it was a fluke and never perform explosion magic again.
They did various training exercises throughout the day until nightfall, then washed off and went back to the main manor. They ate dinner together and then went to bed.
Rigel never once saw the elusive master of the Jager house: the governor of Jagersbyt. At this point, he was almost positive that the one who fought against 4 direbison at once wasn't Alkali, but his father. That, or he was keeping himself to a lower level to compensate for Rigel.
Rigel then started to tear up a bit. What was he? He felt great to have talked to people normally for the first time in years, but he still despised the twins. He had fun today, but deep in his psyche, he didn't. He wasn't sure why this was, and even thought that they were good people. The contradictory nature he possessed, the loneliness and the arrogance, clashed and his mentality suffered as a result.
He clenched his jaw and hands and decided to ignore his weaker side- his loneliness.
"However, I can't get anywhere if I don't rely on anyone else…" he ruminated to himself.
He put those thoughts aside, and recalled the moment he summoned the defensive wall of water during the fight. He tried to remember the feeling, but throughout the entire night never once used water magic again.
That morning, Rigel decided to get up at sunrise once more, but this time wanted to take a stroll through town and view the different shops. In doing so, a common theme he noticed was that many of the shops; the butchers, herbs, blacksmithies, and produces, had 2 stories, one for living in and one for the actual store.
He wandered for a while, not seeing any open shops, regrettably. He furrowed his brows and kept weaving in and out of the open streets, until he saw a shop with a rough, wooden sign with the words "Open" inscribed into it placed on the door.
Satisfied, he entered the shop and saw an old woman at the back of the short room, behind a counter. The room itself was completely empty except for the one counter and door at the back. Puzzled, he walked up to the counter.
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After that, they all left and went back to the main manor. After Alkali and Alkaline retrieved their weapons of choice: a spear and halberd, respectively. The trio went over to the sparring field just outside of the main town. They gave Rigel a long dagger since he didn't possess any weaponry.
"So, should Rigel and I spar first?" Alkaline asked with a bit more seriousness compared to how she was at the bathhouse.
Both Rigel and Alkali agreed without complaint. Rigel wasn't sure exactly what he was going to say in defense to his invulnerability, so he just hoped that he would lose without much of a fight. He wanted to trust the twins, he did, but his experiences prior to this era, the era of the 72 gods, led him to be quite distrusting. All of his insight into human nature screamed at him that these 2 were good people, but he couldn't easily let go of his trauma.
Rigel and Alkaline both stood at opposite ends of the 20 feet by 60 feet rectangular arena. Alkali said, "Start," and the 2 participants burst forth with their top speeds.
Alkali thrust her halberd at Rigel with explosive ferocity. He parried haphazardly with his dagger, but her momentum was far greater than his. His arm was blown back from the force and she brought the halberd around full circle in a slashing motion to bisect him laterally. Rigel timed it just right and dropped to the ground just before the blade hit him, not allocating her enough time to react to drop it in order to connect with him. Now on his back, Rigel shot forth a flamethrower at Alkali which was comparative to some of his best ones. She dodged to the side and pulled back a few meters away, charging a fireball in her hand.
Rigel would've done the same, but he never learned how to charge one. In a desperate attempt to interrupt her, he just shot a small fireball at her as fast as he could muster one to go. It flew rather fast, but nowhere near the speed of sound. It was still slower than even a baseball. However, Alkaline was just a few meters away from Rigel. In just a fourth of a second, the fireball reached her, forcing her to also drop to the ground and dispel the charging fireball.
Rigel, after shooting the fireball, immediately jumped up and rushed her. Right as he was about to reach, she suddenly unleashed a fireball of her own. Rigel fell to his right while spinning counterclockwise and barely avoided it, but he lost his balance and fell just next to Alkaline. She punched him in the face and tackled him. They got up and grappled for a bit until she finally swung him over her head and shoulders. He landed on his back and rolled away while retrieving his dropped dagger. She did the same and they continued fighting.
Rigel's lack of combat training became quickly apparent and Alkaline hastily disarmed him. He easily could have held onto the dagger, but he felt it was a good way to end the spar without any injury.
He sighed and pretended to fall over in exhaustion. Alkaline stayed on her feet, but was visibly trembling.
"Wow! That was incredibly exciting!" Alkali started shouting. "I never get to see many other high-level spars like Alkaline and I usually do, so that was a good experience."
The group agreed to rest for about half an hour and then Rigel would spar with Alkali. They did so, and then Rigel and Alkali took up their respective positions in the arena. This time, when Alkaline signaled for them to start, Alkali wasted no time and started to charge a fireball. Rigel cursed and decided to attempt earth magic.
He slowly started dragging a 3'x2' block out of the ground. The second Alkali unleashed his monstrous fireball, Rigel dove behind the block while using every ounce of his willpower to will the block to rise more. He landed just in time and the fireball smashed into the roof of the earthly block, exploding loudly from Rigel's point of view.
Rigel continued to will the block higher and higher into the sky while Alkali was busy charging up another fireball. By the time he let loose his fireball, Rigel had risen the block to 3 feet high. This time, however, Alkali shot the fireball in a slow arch in the sky. Rigel just barely noticed and dove out of the way. The fireball landed right where Rigel was just lying down with a thunderous boom.
Rigel shot another quick fireball at Alkali, who proceeded to dodge with relative ease while sending back one of his own. His, however, was much faster than Rigel's and arrived before him in a split second. Rigel panicked and barely managed to erect a wall of water out of nowhere before the fireball collided with it with another forceful boom. Steam bellowed into the heavens and the non-evaporated part of the water wall fell apart, following alongside the fireball into the afterlife.
Rigel was shocked by his sudden control over water but put it in the back of his mind while he switched to offense. He concentrated a vast amount of mana directly into the hand which held the dagger, his left, and unleashed it all forth at once whilst throwing the dagger towards Alkali. Albeit, the throw was more of a thrust due to Rigel's prone position, but an eruption echoed out and the dagger flew towards Alkali at a previously unfathomable speed. It arrived in front of him in just a fifth of a second, narrowly missing his face, and flew far, far off into the horizon.
Alkaline let out a quick yelp, Alkali collapsed on his knees helplessly, and Rigel started laughing chaotically, then quickly muffled it. Alkaline quickly rushed over to her brother and made sure he was okay. Rigel stayed laying down, pretending once more to be utterly wiped out.
"So, it truly wasn't Alkali who shot that speed of sound fireball. Then, who was it? Possibly his father?" Rigel mused to himself.
He then slowly got up and made his way over to Alkali, who was still bewildered by his near untimely demise.
Rigel and Alkaline both patiently waited for Alkali to recover, and he did after a couple of seconds.
"Are you okay?" Alkaline asked tenderly.
Alkali blinked a few times and shook his head before responding, "Yeah, yeah, I'm fine. Just a bit shocked." He then looked at Rigel with a combination of dread and admiration. "How did you do that? That sorta force would've blown my hand off if I tried it."
"Mine too, if I had to worry about anything other than comprehension," Rigel replied in is heart.
"Haha, I don't know, really. I just had a flash of realization and did it," he verbally replied.
"Oh. Well, you have to teach me sometime." Alkali said.
To that, Alkaline nodded in agreement. "For sure."
"If I even can," Rigel laughed. He actually had no clue if he could safely teach them, and decided to pretend it was a fluke and never perform explosion magic again.
They did various training exercises throughout the day until nightfall, then washed off and went back to the main manor. They ate dinner together and then went to bed.
Rigel never once saw the elusive master of the Jager house: the governor of Jagersbyt. At this point, he was almost positive that the one who fought against 4 direbison at once wasn't Alkali, but his father. That, or he was keeping himself to a lower level to compensate for Rigel.
Rigel then started to tear up a bit. What was he? He felt great to have talked to people normally for the first time in years, but he still despised the twins. He had fun today, but deep in his psyche, he didn't. He wasn't sure why this was, and even thought that they were good people. The contradictory nature he possessed, the loneliness and the arrogance, clashed and his mentality suffered as a result.
He clenched his jaw and hands and decided to ignore his weaker side- his loneliness.
"However, I can't get anywhere if I don't rely on anyone else…" he ruminated to himself.
He put those thoughts aside, and recalled the moment he summoned the defensive wall of water during the fight. He tried to remember the feeling, but throughout the entire night never once used water magic again.
That morning, Rigel decided to get up at sunrise once more, but this time wanted to take a stroll through town and view the different shops. In doing so, a common theme he noticed was that many of the shops; the butchers, herbs, blacksmithies, and produces, had 2 stories, one for living in and one for the actual store.
He wandered for a while, not seeing any open shops, regrettably. He furrowed his brows and kept weaving in and out of the open streets, until he saw a shop with a rough, wooden sign with the words "Open" inscribed into it placed on the door.
Satisfied, he entered the shop and saw an old woman at the back of the short room, behind a counter. The room itself was completely empty except for the one counter and door at the back. Puzzled, he walked up to the counter.
After that, they all left and went back to the main manor. After Alkali and Alkaline retrieved their weapons of choice: a spear and halberd, respectively. The trio went over to the sparring field just outside of the main town. They gave Rigel a long dagger since he didn't possess any weaponry."So, should Rigel and I spar first?" Alkaline asked with a bit more seriousness compared to how she was at the bathhouse.Both Rigel and Alkali agreed without complaint. Rigel wasn't sure exactly what he was going to say in defense to his invulnerability, so he just hoped that he would lose without much of a fight. He wanted to trust the twins, he did, but his experiences prior to this era, the era of the 72 gods, led him to be quite distrusting. All of his insight into human nature screamed at him that these 2 were good people, but he couldn't easily let go of his trauma.Rigel and Alkaline both stood at opposite ends of the 20 feet by 60 feet rectangular arena. Alkali said, "Start," and the 2 participants burst forth with their top speeds.Alkali thrust her halberd at Rigel with explosive ferocity. He parried haphazardly with his dagger, but her momentum was far greater than his. His arm was blown back from the force and she brought the halberd around full circle in a slashing motion to bisect him laterally. Rigel timed it just right and dropped to the ground just before the blade hit him, not allocating her enough time to react to drop it in order to connect with him. Now on his back, Rigel shot forth a flamethrower at Alkali which was comparative to some of his best ones. She dodged to the side and pulled back a few meters away, charging a fireball in her hand.Rigel would've done the same, but he never learned how to charge one. In a desperate attempt to interrupt her, he just shot a small fireball at her as fast as he could muster one to go. It flew rather fast, but nowhere near the speed of sound. It was still slower than even a baseball. However, Alkaline was just a few meters away from Rigel. In just a fourth of a second, the fireball reached her, forcing her to also drop to the ground and dispel the charging fireball.Rigel, after shooting the fireball, immediately jumped up and rushed her. Right as he was about to reach, she suddenly unleashed a fireball of her own. Rigel fell to his right while spinning counterclockwise and barely avoided it, but he lost his balance and fell just next to Alkaline. She punched him in the face and tackled him. They got up and grappled for a bit until she finally swung him over her head and shoulders. He landed on his back and rolled away while retrieving his dropped dagger. She did the same and they continued fighting.Rigel's lack of combat training became quickly apparent and Alkaline hastily disarmed him. He easily could have held onto the dagger, but he felt it was a good way to end the spar without any injury.He sighed and pretended to fall over in exhaustion. Alkaline stayed on her feet, but was visibly trembling."Wow! That was incredibly exciting!" Alkali started shouting. "I never get to see many other high-level spars like Alkaline and I usually do, so that was a good experience."The group agreed to rest for about half an hour and then Rigel would spar with Alkali. They did so, and then Rigel and Alkali took up their respective positions in the arena. This time, when Alkaline signaled for them to start, Alkali wasted no time and started to charge a fireball. Rigel cursed and decided to attempt earth magic.He slowly started dragging a 3'x2' block out of the ground. The second Alkali unleashed his monstrous fireball, Rigel dove behind the block while using every ounce of his willpower to will the block to rise more. He landed just in time and the fireball smashed into the roof of the earthly block, exploding loudly from Rigel's point of view.Rigel continued to will the block higher and higher into the sky while Alkali was busy charging up another fireball. By the time he let loose his fireball, Rigel had risen the block to 3 feet high. This time, however, Alkali shot the fireball in a slow arch in the sky. Rigel just barely noticed and dove out of the way. The fireball landed right where Rigel was just lying down with a thunderous boom.Rigel shot another quick fireball at Alkali, who proceeded to dodge with relative ease while sending back one of his own. His, however, was much faster than Rigel's and arrived before him in a split second. Rigel panicked and barely managed to erect a wall of water out of nowhere before the fireball collided with it with another forceful boom. Steam bellowed into the heavens and the non-evaporated part of the water wall fell apart, following alongside the fireball into the afterlife.Rigel was shocked by his sudden control over water but put it in the back of his mind while he switched to offense. He concentrated a vast amount of mana directly into the hand which held the dagger, his left, and unleashed it all forth at once whilst throwing the dagger towards Alkali. Albeit, the throw was more of a thrust due to Rigel's prone position, but an eruption echoed out and the dagger flew towards Alkali at a previously unfathomable speed. It arrived in front of him in just a fifth of a second, narrowly missing his face, and flew far, far off into the horizon.Alkaline let out a quick yelp, Alkali collapsed on his knees helplessly, and Rigel started laughing chaotically, then quickly muffled it. Alkaline quickly rushed over to her brother and made sure he was okay. Rigel stayed laying down, pretending once more to be utterly wiped out."So, it truly wasn't Alkali who shot that speed of sound fireball. Then, who was it? Possibly his father?" Rigel mused to himself.He then slowly got up and made his way over to Alkali, who was still bewildered by his near untimely demise.Rigel and Alkaline both patiently waited for Alkali to recover, and he did after a couple of seconds."Are you okay?" Alkaline asked tenderly.Alkali blinked a few times and shook his head before responding, "Yeah, yeah, I'm fine. Just a bit shocked." He then looked at Rigel with a combination of dread and admiration. "How did you do that? That sorta force would've blown my hand off if I tried it.""Mine too, if I had to worry about anything other than comprehension," Rigel replied in is heart."Haha, I don't know, really. I just had a flash of realization and did it," he verbally replied."Oh. Well, you have to teach me sometime." Alkali said.To that, Alkaline nodded in agreement. "For sure.""If I even can," Rigel laughed. He actually had no clue if he could safely teach them, and decided to pretend it was a fluke and never perform explosion magic again.They did various training exercises throughout the day until nightfall, then washed off and went back to the main manor. They ate dinner together and then went to bed.Rigel never once saw the elusive master of the Jager house: the governor of Jagersbyt. At this point, he was almost positive that the one who fought against 4 direbison at once wasn't Alkali, but his father. That, or he was keeping himself to a lower level to compensate for Rigel.Rigel then started to tear up a bit. What was he? He felt great to have talked to people normally for the first time in years, but he still despised the twins. He had fun today, but deep in his psyche, he didn't. He wasn't sure why this was, and even thought that they were good people. The contradictory nature he possessed, the loneliness and the arrogance, clashed and his mentality suffered as a result.He clenched his jaw and hands and decided to ignore his weaker side- his loneliness."However, I can't get anywhere if I don't rely on anyone else" he ruminated to himself.He put those thoughts aside, and recalled the moment he summoned the defensive wall of water during the fight. He tried to remember the feeling, but throughout the entire night never once used water magic again.That morning, Rigel decided to get up at sunrise once more, but this time wanted to take a stroll through town and view the different shops. In doing so, a common theme he noticed was that many of the shops; the butchers, herbs, blacksmithies, and produces, had 2 stories, one for living in and one for the actual store.He wandered for a while, not seeing any open shops, regrettably. He furrowed his brows and kept weaving in and out of the open streets, until he saw a shop with a rough, wooden sign with the words "Open" inscribed into it placed on the door.Satisfied, he entered the shop and saw an old woman at the back of the short room, behind a counter. The room itself was completely empty except for the one counter and door at the back. Puzzled, he walked up to the counter.
