Chapter 5-How Duandra and The Multiverse Work. Part 1

“Learn to master your breathing. It is the key to how smooth and controlled your movements will be.”

Breathe in... Breathe out... breathe in...

I need to breathe properly and control my diaphragm. You're wondering what I am doing in this eastern-style dojo, sitting on the ground with Alex standing before me, holding a wooden sword, as I focus on my breathing. Actually, I'm practising sword techniques. When I decided to train with a sword, I thought I could do it alone, but...

*****

“Here is a standard iron sword; see if you can hold it.”

“Come on, Chelsea. I work out every day, lifting heavier stuff than this—therefore, it should... be easy.”

*****

It was easy, but I don’t know the first thing about using a sword. Turns out that seeing a sword in anime and movies is different from actually using one. I got some swings right, but they are not fluid at all, making a lot of openings. So, Alex offered to teach me his sword style, and here I am.

“What a pain, do you really plan on learning Alex’s sword technique?” queried a troubled Chelsea. Today, she was wearing what you could call gym clothes, a black tank top paired with grey joggers. It suited her while Alex and I were stuck in our usual keikogi and hakama worn in training.

“Why are you asking?” I inquired after exhaling.

“Nothing but with your current physical stats, I doubt you will be good enough. That is, unless you start by levelling up, maybe by killing slimes.”

“For how long? Three hundred years to max out or encounter a slime that is a demon lord, maybe slimes in this world are overpowered.” I said my with my right eye open.

“I don’t know what you mean by those…”

“Don’t worry, it's just elements from novels I’ve read. By the way, Alex, you mentioned that the hero you're descended from is European or something similar? So, why is this dojo modelled on Asian culture?”

“My direct ancestry is primarily European, to put it simply. However, Great Timelord Harald Band married a woman named Urana from his ten-member group, Turbulence,” he said as he moved to the Shomen. “She is descended from a hero from this Asian continent, as you noted. Additionally, she combined Master Harald's fencing style with an ancient technique from the Heian Era, or a similar period—only a few knew about it. This blend led to the creation of the sword style taught in our family dojo, called the Double Turbulence Sword Style.”

“So it's a mix of European and Asian sword styles, right?” I replied. “Well, for all I know, I might secretly end up learning the Hiten Mitsurugi or Sun Breathing.” I said quietly.

From a distance, we started hearing what I thought was Beethoven’s Fourth Symphony, and it was getting louder. It turned out to be the Sixth Symphony, but still, who was playing it? Just then, Nu slid open the doors.

“Great Shinta! This piece of metal has started making this sound on its own and is playing a kind of song," said a worried Nu, rushing in with my phone in her mouth.

“Oh my phone. MY PHONE!” Oh yeah, I picked it up last night before going to bed, when no one noticed.

“Huh?” asked the other three in unison.

“That is a phone?” asked Chelsea. “I thought they were smaller and had an even smaller screen with something like a keypad on it.”

“Well, it was like that around fifty years ago in the early 2000s, but it is 2059 now, and my world has already started shifting more towards digital. Even the manga store I work in is losing customers because people prefer reading online rather than in hard copies.”

I collected the phone and turned off the music, for some reason Nu said she was in my room and going through my stuff and saw my phone. She must have continued playing the song I was listening to last night.

*****

“Guuaah…”

Damn it. Why is she so strong? There she is, standing in front of me, her hand on the wooden sword, letting the tip touch the floor of the dojo. Well, that is to be expected; she has been training since she was six, and I have only just started.

“Get up. Defeating M.A.Y will still be a dream; we need to whip you into shape," Chelsea said in an intimidating voice, her violet eyes feeling like they shot death beams at me. Her threat is on a whole different level than what I expected from a noble’s daughter.

“By the way, what about your stats, Chelsea?”

“Just use your Scan Technique.”

“Okay…Hup.”

I just moved from lying on the ground to sitting down to check it. She was level 500, and her power level was 450,987, which is about 15,000 times higher than mine. That's why she kept defeating me in our mock battle. I was surprised, though, that I could check her level, but she said it has always been like that. The so-called goddess of Adventures, Aeloria, and the god of safety, Dureon, made it so people could gauge their enemies before battle.

“So that you know, you’ll never reach my level.”

“What?”

The maximum achievable level for the heroes is level 100, but afterwards, you receive a tenfold boost to everything except your level.

“You mean I cannot fight the demon lords until then?”

No, you can fight some to level up, though. I would suggest maybe the lower three of them, but bear in mind, rank seven in the M.A.Y is my enemy.

“That’s okay. By the way, what is the name of this world?”

“Duandra. That is the name given to it by the six heroes of ten thousand years ago. It was formerly known as Fellpath, the most diverse planet as stated by the gods, but the six heroes renamed it after a game or something of that sort they created for themselves as kids.”

I think I can imagine what it will be named, I thought to myself. But they could not have, I mean, that ten thousand years ago was long before the creation of great games.

So, um, why does M.A.Y keep appearing?

“Ask Elsa about that,” she said as she left the dojo. “She has the best knowledge of the history of this world and how it works.” And with that, she departed.

“Alex, Great Shinta, are you done training?” asked a confused Nu who had just woken up.

“Well, for now, it seems our rookie’s curiosity has been piqued,” he answered as he also left.

“Let’s go, Great Shinta.”

*****

Knock. Knock. Knock.

“Damn it,” whispered the blonde elf as she closed a red book and got up from her desk, placing the book on it. “Who is there?”

“Sister, it is Great Shinta and I; we came to ask you a question.”

“Can’t it wait until later? I am busy with something.”

"No, it can’t; it involves the future of this world. You don’t want to lose this world, ri-”

The door opens before Nu can finish her sentence, and Elsa has a depressing and furious expression on her face. The therianthrope cat-girl and the boy with crimson hair just froze, petrified by the murderous glare from the elf’s radiant blue eyes.

“Let us go to the library, shall we?” said the elf, forcing a smile onto her face before the three of them headed to the library.

*****

As the wooden door creaks open, the once-dark room begins to light up as the magic-powered lamp inside the library springs to life, and the three of us step in. Elsa moves away from Nu and me to one of the shelves. The library appears new, with a stunning marble and tile floor decorated with flora and celestial designs throughout. The ceiling's design resembles the frescoes found in those cathedrals from the Baroque and Renaissance periods, and the mahogany shelves are arranged in neat, beautiful rows and columns.

“What did you want to ask?” asked Elsa, bringing out a book titled *History of Duandra - Continent of Valhalla Edition*.

“Well, I want to understand why M.A.Y never fades away. Is there a third party involved, or do the gods arrange it?”

“Well, the answer to that is... There is no certified answer.”

“Huh?”

“Huah? Sister, you are useless.”

“Humanity’s intelle-, no, not even the fairies' advanced magic system can detect the force behind M.A.Y.” she said, letting a sigh escape from her lips. “There are many theories and hypotheses. The most proficient and potent theory is that there is a being behind it all, mainly proposed by monks and priests; it suggests that this being may be more powerful than Guerre, the god of war, and Paix, the god of peace. Both of whom are said to be among the most powerful gods and goddesses of the multiverse.”

“A third party, or any other theory?”

The fact that one demon lord remains and is working to gather new ones, but that idea was dismissed after Galim’s defeat.

“Oh, my triple-great-grandfather said that scholars researching this topic dismissed it as a theory the moment Demon Lord Galim’s defeat was announced across the five continents," said Nu.

“This Galim guy-”

“Girl, she is a female.” Nu hurriedly interjected, smiling and feeling proud of herself for some reason.

“Sorry, I just thought of something else from a game, but either way, this Galim — is she that important to history?”

“You see, M.A.Y at that point had twenty demon lords, but Galim announced to the world she defeated them all and that they served under her.” Then Elsa’s expression grew darker, and she trembled in place before showing Nu and I a page from the book she was reading. “This page shows that Galim was the only demon to ever conquer three continents, excluding this one, because of the heroes. She even captured Valhalla, the strongest continent."

“Oh, so she was the overlord of it all.”

“Yes, Little Shinta, and she is also recorded as the most powerful demon lord to have ever existed.”

“Huh, that powerful?”

“Yes, from what the heroes said, they had to fight her in a different dimension so as not to destroy the planet, and at that, the various dimensions they fought were crumbling due to the shockwave of the battle.” Finished Elsa as she dropped the book back on the shelf.

“I have other questions too. If I want to save this world, I need to know how it works.”

“Well then ask, I’m sure I can help you, Great Shinta.”

“Stop calling me that.”

“Little Shinta, what is the question? I need to get back to reading.”

“Elsa, will it kill you not to call me that?”

“You said we should treat you how we treat ourselves, excluding Alex. I call every other person little.” Elsa said smiling.

“Fine then,” I said, letting out a sigh. “What are affinities, and how many of them are there?”

“Well, according to history,” she began, gesturing with her hand for us to follow, and we proceeded deeper into the library. “There are two hundred and ten affinities; they are split into seven categories.”

We then arrived at another shelf. Elsa brought out a book with a black cover, and it was large; it also had gold designs at each corner of the cover. She then continues to open the book and flip the pages.

“The gods decided to select two hundred and ten of them to control the magic system. After selecting the perfect few, they brought the list to the Great HJ, the one who has absolute authority over our multiverse.”

“This HJ, is he that powerful the fact you can state his name, because I thought you weren’t allowed to say the name of such celestial beings.”

“Great HJ is the most lenient of all the gods; he even acts and looks like he is a human from what people who have supposedly met with him say.” Interjected Nu.

“Oh, I guess I would like to meet him.”

“Many priests, monks and even the heroes have wanted to meet him. Back to the subject of magic, each affinity has a thousand magic spells. Each has ten levels from one to ten, and each level has ten ranks, Z to SS, and each rank has ten spells. This makes it so that Level 1, Rank Z, Spell 1 is the lowest spell, which is spell 1, while Level 10, Rank SS, Spell 10 is the highest, which is spell 1000.”

“Making the number of usable spells, two hundred and ten thousand, am I right?”

“Yes, but the general maximum amount of affinities for a person is five, so having ten or fifteen makes you a natural talent.”

Is that why Chelsea is a big shot among adventurers? I thought to myself, as Elsa continued explaining.

“The magic system can reach the destruction of 100,000 universes on all hundred million dimensions.”

“Hundred million?”

“Yes, each universe has a hundred million dimensions, but forgetting that, let me tell you one thing, your Teleportation affinity of its kind that uses god level techniques. But know one thing, even with that, it consumes from your MP.”

“I guess that would happen. Now, about classes, can you tell me about them?”

“There are 250 classes, each is split into six categories. Zero, Low, Mid, High, Advanced and Kami Tier.” She said, closing the book she was holding, “Zero Tier has forty classes, Low and Mid-Tier has fifty, High and Advanced has forty and Kami Tier has thirty classes.”

“So what is your class?”

“I started as a Mage Apprentice, a Low class, but now I am an Archmage, a High Tier class.”

“I started as a Mercenary, a Zero Tier class, and now I am a Phantom Assassin and an Arch Priest, which is also a High Tier Class.” Nu

“I guess this party is actually powerful.” My memory just shifted into a blank state as I wondered whether I would have a powerful class or a minor-level class.