Calling Celesté without looking back, Magi began his lessons in Summoning.
“Summoning is an excruciatingly strenuous and exhausting task. It will drain energies from your body, mind, and most primarily, Mana. Knowing thy limitations is critical, and if thou or I falls the other must be able to Summon and Dismiss without the other. To start however, we must learn to be absolutely attuned to the other. Which means that we need not keep secrets and misconceptions between us; we must be able to think as, for, and with the other. Understood?”
“Yes Magi.” Celesté said, absorbing these strong words, but soon she thought in her mind though why she knew not, “No secrets?”
Magi explained the Governing Elements thusly, “These elements revolve around Mana and the binds Mana brings forth upon the world. Each element is represented by a general color or colors: reds for Fire, light and shear blues for Ice, deep blues for Water, purples and striking yellows for Lightning, weightless greens for Wind, deep greens and browns for Earth, blinding golds and whites for Light, and black for Darkness. In this World each element has an absolute opposite. These opposites are as follows: Fire to Ice, Water to Lightning, Wind to Earth, and Light to Darkness. These elements must occur in the World in equilibrium lest the World’s Balance be jeopardized, and with it the World itself. In this disarray plants would wither and die, the earth would lose its nutrients and ability to support life, seas and rivers would parch, the air would become thin and unsatisfying, the winds would fail to blow, light and darkness would know not where to fall--destroying themselves, and Mana would cease to exist.”
“I see Magi, and the cause of this imbalance is the Shadow Plague…” Celesté murmured.
“Well, not precisely it has not yet begun, but even in Its procession the effects of imbalance are apparent. We must be hasty to—“Magi cut himself short as he cocked his head, as if to hear a faint sound. “Celesté dost thou hearest that?”
Celesté strained her ears in the quickly receding twilight, “No Magi, I’m afraid not.”
With a second-nature, circular hand movement, rotating from the wrist and bringing his left hand to his right shoulder, he drew a small amount of Mana and held it to Celesté’s ear. In an instant Celesté could hear Magi’s heartbeat as loud as a battering ram, but more importantly Celesté could hear the cries of people, but she could not see their misery.
“Magi!” Celesté gasped with urgency.
“I know all too well, Celesté…” Magi whispered this to Celesté, “This is not a test, this is a bona fide problem, wilst thou assist me, Celesté?”
Celesté smiled and replied confidently, “You don’t have to ask.”
“I need’st thy help Celesté; moving bodies of substance to another place takes some Mana. Based on the number of bodies moved and the distance to the point desired, more or less Mana is required.”
“Alright, so how do I help?” Celesté questioned apprehensively.”
“I need thou to takest my hand.”
Celesté flushed and her cheeks burned red. Soon her hands were clammy with sweat as her heart pounded silently in her chest.
Magi shook her urgently, “This is not time for a fever, Celesté! Takest my hand!”
She did as told. When her grip was set, Magi did the same circular motion as earlier ere, and linked it with another movement. Striking the earth, like a hammer to a slab of heated steel, the Earth enveloped them in a sphere of stone. This sphere of stone burrowed with great speed through the earth. It was dark and dreadfully noisy in the sphere, and Celesté feebly clenched Magi’s arm for balance.
Soon, though, the sphere came to a sluggish stop and Celesté felt them move upward as the sphere melted away as sand, the particles hit the cobblestone with a flowing sound, similar to that of removing sheets quickly.
Their feet hit the ground just as a bolt of fire screamed by, barely missing Celesté. A muffled curse was heard curse was heard as another bolt was shot forth once more. Magi countered by forming a bowl with the cobblestones around him. The bowl ate the fire and as a plume of smoke blocked their view Magi placed the stones back. Though the counter was effective it had sent a shockwave of force throughout the courtyard. Plants had bent and been uprooted, and trees leaned to escape the epicenter of the power, which was scathed black.
A score of people filed out quickly, women held their children close to them, while men glanced back as they fled. Many armor clad guards were on the ground gasping for air; their armor holding a deal of burns, their arms clenching their burns.
“Quick, I must say.” A deep, gruff voice, replied.
Magi saw his face as the smoke cleared. The fleeting haze revealed a square face with rigid cheek to jaw lines. His eye sockets were concave, shading his eyes and giving him an eternally grave look. His black hair matched Magi’s, falling nearly past his eyes. These eyes were painted an empty white. His pupils were black dots amidst the gray-white pools where color should have been. With a quick turn of his head to move his hair out of his eyes, he unveiled for a moment a scar spanning from his right ear to his chin.
His tunic was short and common and allowed for quick and comfortable movements. They served little protections for a leather shoulder pad connected to his body by a belt. He had no sleeves revealing his trained muscles. Pants held by a belt along with a bag loosely slung around his waist were uncovered as the last of the smoke cleared. Leather boots were worn and past his ankles were folded outward to increase his agility.
Celesté watched as the two stare each other down, readying themselves for a duel perhaps, and wondered why no guards had come to reinforce their fallen comrades. Were they not on the ground of the Greinhough Castle?
Celesté began running as she yelled back, “I’m getting help, Magi! “
“Celesté, No!” Magi called back as the flare was summoned from their foe’s right hand. The man raised this bolt over his head then brought it down roughly it shot with an initially slow velocity-almost stopping- as it gained speed as it hurtled madly towards Celesté.
Celesté gracefully turned to meet this bolt of fire the size of her head. Before it hit her she adopted a spell-casting stance and used her own personal motion for gathering Mana. Her hand tapped her left shoulder, as it traced the horizon drawing a half moon in the air. This summoned a clear wall of water that met the flare, and as the flame dissipated, she sent the wall back at the foe.
Celesté panted heavily as Magi took over. While stating his praise and running to Celesté Magi sent forth a stream of water from a pool of unseen Mana he held in both hands. The two masses of water struck their foe with repeated loud blows, the first softer than the preceding. Celesté’s wall of water broke their assailant’s guard allowing Magi’s stream to strike with wholesome strength. Their enemy however used this to his advantage. Instead of slamming into the wall he had let his feet break his otherwise deadly confrontation with a wall. Wind encircled his feet and he pushed off as he held his sword with both hands. Flames danced around his sword as he threw it at the two. With the added momentum of his furtive rebound off the wall and his own arms, there was no room for countering. The sword struck the ground as it exploded with flames in a ten foot radius.
His face seemed, at the very least, shocked and disappointed when the flames were drawn to Magi’s and Celesté’s hands. Magi was astonished how quickly Celesté had synchronized with his actions, but left his praise for after the battle.
Magi warned his foe mockingly as he pulled the sword form the cobblestone it had split, “Thou should’est not thro thy weapon. Lest you leave thyself defenseless.”
The man answered back in a gruff, pestered voice. “We’ll see about that!”
Running at Magi the man revealed his motion for evoking Mana. His first two fingers of his left hand stretched out. He drew a straight line downward from his head; then, when reaching his waist he brought back his hand in a fist at his hip. Soon thereafter he pushed out his hand, now open, out and released numerous transparent binds of pure Mana. Magi paced forward hastily to draw the binds away from Celesté. As they weaved around him, they became more visible. Like translucent ribbon they held him fast, though his body had seen no same effect. His Inner Mana, however suffered greatly.
Aside from the Mana that occurs naturally in the world, there is Mana inside the body. It is this Mana that gives you life. This life supporting energy is in all things, whether animate or inanimate, alive or dead. More precious than blood, if Mana is removed from the body, your being reverts to the eight natural elements, and is dispersed into the world.
“Celesté,” Magi strained. Though it looked as if he stood fine, hisface grimaced in discontent.
“Magi, what is it?”
“My Inner Mana, Celesté, it’s being drained…. Thou havest to pacify him before…”
Celesté watched as Magi’s body fell limply on the cobblestone. Magi softened his curse as his assailant walked towards him.
“‘Defenseless,; huh?” The foe cackled back.
“not another step.” Celesté replied her face scowled acrimoniously in anger. Drawing her scepter she grasped it and drew Mana. Her prior movement was mimicked, scepter in hand, but as her finger drew the half-moon, it shot back sharply to above her head to the sky, then to her left side, followed by three more sharp lines to form a star. Though her moon and star appeared for merely a few moments before they silently dissolved, they were adroitly drawn. Her invocation brought forth a froth of bubbles. They appeared, as if from Mana iself, only a few at first, but as they multiplied, her foe’s face sneered indifferently in anguish. The now miniscule flare he held in his hand quivered, instantly dwarfed by the masses of water forming around him.
In second-nature, her foe switched elements, and formed a sphere of lightning. Black localized clouds appeared above him for an instant, sending a bolt of lightning through his hand towards Celesté’s frothing bubbles.
For a moment the bubbles allowed this visitor to bounce from one to another, though with a forward, thrusting movement of Celesté’s the bubbles conglomerated, becoming as one. The bolt became trapped in the sphere, now the size of Celesté, and aplyed insanely within it. Each time it hit the walls of its watery prison, a loud sizzling noise resonated, and a part of the bubble evaporated instantaneously. These holes were likewise filled with the rest of the water, but slowly the sphere was dissipating.
Now this was kept up for a few seconds, but here concentration began to falter. Her foe, on the contrary seemed to be mocking her, though he could no longer control his bolt of lightning. The prior stalemate now seemed to be tipping into her foes favor, and it was painfully obvious to Celesté’s being. But with what mortality she had left she released a furious:
“No!” Celesté wailed in desperation bringing her scepter to her left shoulder again. Hold it there the bubble reduced in size at an alarming rate.
“Perfect?” Her foe sighed ambiguously.
“Spirit’s guide me,” Celesté realized in mid-thought, “The outcome will be one of two: my bubble will negate the bolt or the lightning will pierce through and…”
Just as the bubble reached the size of her head, Celesté’s concentration failed her. Her bubble vanished and her vision blurred. A slight migraine snared her mind and she fell to her knees her hands consoling her temples. The threads Celesté would always see in her eyelids had left, and she heard a gruff curse in the distance.
“Magi, did you just curse?” Celesté strained her field of sight returning.
Before Celesté could gain recognition of the situation Magi retorted a stern, “Both of thy Mana’s are sealed.”
Though he stated this firmly Magi had difficulty becoming upright, and managed only a genuflection of sorts.
His hand seared and steamed with Mana, and the dreadful binds that coiled around him had been ripped and splayed like child’s play upon the stones. They too ceased from the world.
“Thou think’st thou can conquer me with such a weak Bind? ‘Tis mere folly that thou would
st deign to assure yourself as much.”
“Quit your cocky tone.” Their foe released.
After a long pause with Magi’s eyes closed in deep thought, Magi answered, “No.”
He raised his hand and slammed it into the Earth. A fissure carved its way toward their foe. Just as it had reached him it stopped; glaives of earth escaped the fissure, entrapping him.
“Celesté, stand down.”
“Right, Magi.” Droned Celesté weakly.
“Now then, who doth we hath here?”
“Hold thy tongue!” His foe mocked Magi’s speak.
“Thou dost know that I am not crushing thou with the pressure of the stones, correct?”
“Tch,” his foe spat, “I suppose I am beaten.”
“Heh, I believe thou art a formidable foe,” Magi consoled suppressing his heated rage.
After a silence their foe hung his head blandly and stated, “Will you not administer the finishing blow?”
“I said nothing of that matter, milord. There is no need to kill those that need not death.”
“Surely you do not mean you will let me go on my way?” their foe plead.
Magi did not heave a second thought over his head before he willed the earth to relinquish its glaives,. His foe stood, blindly aghast, that Magi had freed him. In fact, Magi stared back at his foe as if the battle hadn’t even taken place, though Celesté clung tightly as if she were a monkey to Magi’s arm.
His heart beat brusquely in the cage of his chest, “I will give you my name, Zenn.”
“A name that signifies thy strength,” Magi judged placidly, “Thou mayest call me Magi, if thou wish’st.”
Celesté continued as if cued. “And I am his Apprentice, Celesté.”
Zenn’s eyes stirred intrepidly, melancholy filling the white iris. And as his hands failed to withhold his despondency that flowed as tears from his eyes, Magi and Celesté bore themselves witness to his anguish. When the spell of heavy shudders as if he were suffering from ague, had ended, Magi elegantly ambled towards Zenn. After abruptly staying Celesté with his left hand, Magi whispered calmly, attempting to inhibit Zenn’s sorrow, “Please, if thou wilst. Tell me what is amiss. I mean thou not a touch of harm.”
He turned with an insidious smile, baring his white teeth. With a silent thrust of his hand, Magi grimaced painfully, his pensive actions ere were of little service now. Celesté hastened her pace to the two, but sadly her foe held her with an oath.
“If you so as take a single step more, your Master shall perish.”
Magi fell limp as his freshly Mana renewed nerves didn’t respond to the orders his mind were sending. But before Celesté could take another action, Zenn adopted his spell casting stance and summoned a plume of blinding, suffocating haze that seared Celesté’s throat and eyes. Stunned, Celesté too fell into shock as her body failed to respond to her movements, and her mind fluttered precariously away. Zenn hefted Magi’s light frame and left the scene.
“Soon, my sweet, we shall have our justice, soon.” Zenn murmured forlornly.
Sorry, the forum said the whole thing was to big. ^_^
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