Chapter 6

The Essence Gauge is a must for any who dare to journey beyond themselves, to grow. Not only is it extremely useful in keeping one’s mana and Essence in order, but when one despairs in said journey, they can always consult the Gauge to remind themselves of exactly how far they’ve come. 

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Setting up camp, as it turns out, was the easiest thing Kai had done since quitting his previous job before working at 7-11.

That job—a burger flipper at a fast-food restaurant—had been too fast-paced. Too confusing. Often humiliating, especially dealing with entitled or rude customers. Things that should have been simple seemed complicated, whereas setting up a camp—which Kai had never done and thus seemed difficult—was surprisingly…not.

Well, then again, all Kai had to do was collect firewood while Jahanes and Lyra took the lead conjuring what they needed with their magic: two small tents and a few bedrolls, seemingly materializing out of thin air from their multitude of magic circles.

Kai blinked as he watched. So much was different from what he and Emily had come up with in the days when they first conceptualized the magic system for Astraven.

A thought occurred to Kai. What if this place really was Astraven, just…well, evolved?

“Yo!” Jahanes called Kai, waving him over. Kai obliged, dropping the wood he collected into a semi-neat pile and standing in front of Jahanes as he stood in the clearing. Lyra knelt nearby, neatly placing the wood and summoning a magic circle in her hand to light it with a mix of flame and light, though Kai could see her eyeing him through her peripherals.

“Ahem.” Kai turned back to Jahanes, who had his arms crossed and a suppressed grin on his face. “So, magic. Let's start by telling me what you do know.”

Kai gave himself a moment to think. It had been years since he had written or brainstormed anything even remotely related to Astraven. But after seeing that strange sconce and the magic that Giyre had used at Riversong, he remembered the basics. For instance, he recalled that mana typically manifested as the six primary elements: Fire, Water, Air, Earth, Light, and Dark, as well as Essence—the soul. Each one had both an opposing element and a complimentary one. The idea was that elements were naturally “mixed” and that it required purifying—either by a human or a machine of some kind—to make it an “absolute” element like fire or water.

Kai relayed that to Jahanes, who nodded. “Ah. So you’re not a complete newbie, it seems.” He touched his chin. “Can you summon the Diagram?”

Unlike the Essence Gauge, the Diagram was something he had come up with; a circle with the six primary elements and pure mana in the center. He had gotten the idea after that movie about the doctor who became a sorcerer.

Shouldn’t be too hard.

Kai stretched out his hand and imagined it forming. His hand began to tingle, and something flickered to life in front of his palm, but it didn’t resemble anything close to the Diagram, just some pathetic lines made of light.

“Hmmm.” Jahanes examined the lines as they began to fade. “You somehow cast an Essence Gauge but can’t summon a Diagram?”

Kai’s cheeks burned. Jahanes continued to study him.

“Have you ever summoned one before? Or tried to?”

“No,” Kai admitted. “But I’ve seen it.”

Jahanes nodded, then grabbed a stick from the wood pile, handing it to Kai. “Draw it for me.”

Kai nodded and drew the Diagram in the dirt below. Jahanes cocked his head. “Mostly correct, but you have fire and water in the wrong positions. Switch them, then try forming it again using the drawing as a template. Shouldn’t be too difficult.”

Kai’s cheeks burned even hotter as he did what Jahanes asked, redrawing the circle and holding his hand above it. The tingling sensation returned and Kai imagined the light flowing down the crevices he had drawn like hot molten metal filling in a cast at a forge.

Eventually, the lights connected to form the full Diagram. Kai smiled, and his Essence Gauge flashed:

<<Diagram summoned successfully. Spell added to personal Arcanum>>

“Excellent,” Jahanes said. “Now carefully lift it out. Will it to rise.”

Kai nodded and raised his arched hand, and the Diagram slowly rose from the dirt. Kai flipped his palm up and the Diagram stayed, though it flickered slightly.

“Again, excellent,” Jahanes said. “Now dismiss it and reform it without the aid.”

Kai reluctantly let the Diagram fade. He flexed his palm and pictured the light filling in the dirt like it had before. This time, it formed, though a little slower. Kai still grinned.

“Got it.”

Jahanes clapped as Kai let it collapse. He summoned it again, but this time he willed it to form faster. The Diagram flowed into existence, a little shaky yet solid. Next to Kai, Jahanes arched an eyebrow.

“Getting the hang of it, eh?”

“I think so.” Kai dismissed and re-summoned the Diagram one more time, before turning to Jahanes. “What’s next?”

“Well now that I see where you’re at, I’m going to have you try a little casting. You already know mana is in a naturally mixed state, but will be purer depending on what area you’re in.” Jahanes knelt and scooped some dirt and grass into his palm, holding it out toward Kai. “What do you see?”

“Dirt and grass”

“More broad. Think of the base elements.”

“Earth,” Kai said.

“Good.” Jahanes stood and brushed the dirt and grass from his hands, looking skyward to the moon. “What else is here?”

“Light.” Kai’s eyes narrowed. “I can make a mixture of both here, can’t I? Because we're in a forest?”

Jahanes grinned. “Now you’re getting it. What we’re going to do next is called a Focusing Rune. Like the Diagram, it's a visual aid, meant to help you narrow down the mixture percentage to get something you want. This is usually meant for elemental spells, and yet it can get infinitely more complex from there.”

Jahanes held his palm out and summoned the Diagram. Immediately after, a second magic circle materialized in front of the first, before shrinking and repositioning itself between the earth and light symbols. Twisting, glowing branches erupted from the Diagram and lashed out, before swishing back inside and disappearing. Jahanes turned to Kai and grinned.

“Vinelight,” Jahanes said. “Approximately thirty percent light mixed with seventy percent earth.” He extinguished the vines and faced Kai. “Now your turn. Doesn’t have to be exact, just try to get some kind of mixture going.”

Kai nodded and summoned his Diagram. Brows furrowing, Kai pictured a second circle forming between the two elements, and he felt a tingle in his palms as it solidified. Then, unsure really how to pull the elements forward, he closed his eyes and tried to imagine the Vinelight like Jahanes had done.

Something pulled both within Kai, and outside him. He felt energy—nature itself, he somehow knew—flow into him and out through his palm, toward the Diagram. He mentally ordered the focusing rune to move between Light and Earth like it had for Jahanes, then pictured it jetting out from the magic circles as Vinelight.

An entire set of glowing leaves erupted from Kai’s Diagram, before losing their light and settling on the forest floor. His Essence Gauge flashed:

<<Spell Cast: Leaflight. Added to personal Arcanum>>

Jahanes nodded, rubbing his chin. “Not bad. How are you feeling?”

Kai knelt to catch his breath. His chest felt sore, his stomach twisted a little but not really in a bad way, more like when you tried a new exercise for the first time. He could easily get used to it, given the time and practice.

“I’m alright,” Kai said, standing. He looked at his hand and summoned his Diagram again, inspecting it. He paused as a thought came to him. “Back in the village, I saw this blue light form around my blade.” Kai glanced at Jahanes. “How did I do that?”

“Instinct, I’d say.” Jahanes said. “Most magic users will often manifest mana in stressful situations like yours. Although…” he trailed off.

“Although…what?”

“...if I hadn’t seen you unlock your subclass, I could have been fooled into thinking you were a practiced Spellblade,” Jahanes continued. “You may be an amateur, but you sure didn’t look like one. When you fought that Vielfiend, it almost looked scared, if such a thing was possible for a Shadow.”

It was scared? Kai pondered that idea for a moment. “Well, that makes two of us.”

“No doubt,” Jahanes said, clasping his hands together. “So! Any questions? Anything in particular you’d like to learn?”

“Earlier,” Kai began. “You seemed surprised that I had the HUD—” he shook his head, correcting himself “—sorry, Essence Gauge without a Diagram.”

“To be frank…well, yes. I am.” Jahanes arched an eyebrow, then crossed his arms. “It’s not exactly the hardest spell in the world to cast, but it's usually done either with the spell codex or the aid of someone who already has it. There are very precise mana mixtures that have to be obtained to add in the sub-spells: the inventory tracker, the medical diagnostic, and more along those lines.” He paused thoughtfully. “Assuming you’re not lying, then you’d be the first person I’ve ever met or heard of that has actually created one with raw spellcasting.”

“Like I did during the fight with Lamentis?” Kai asked.

“Exactly,” Jahanes said. “Though I’d be wary of it in the future. While sometimes powerful, raw spellcasting can also be quite dangerous. That's how the mages of old did it, but they had a nasty habit of blowing themselves up by not realizing exactly what element mixtures they were pulling.” He beamed. “Better to learn the Diagram, then, eh?”

Kai nodded as an idea came to him. “You said you couldn’t read my Essence Gauge earlier, right?”

“Right.” Jahanes nodded.

Kai summoned and mentally ordered his Essence Gauge—or “EG” as he decided to call it—to go back to Jahanes like it had done earlier. When it appeared, Kai whispered, “translate.”

The letters on Jahanes’s end flickered into a language Kai didn’t recognize. Jahanes studied them, swiping through the pages.

“Hmmm…you’re a level 9?”

Kai winced. “Is that bad?”

“Not in the slightest. It’s certainly good enough to go on our little adventure.” Jahanes continued swiping through. “Though I find it fascinating that you were as strong as you were before you’d even unlocked your subclass.”

Kai looked down at his hand and curled it into a fist. “It just feels like a bunch of meaningless numbers to me.”

“Just…numbers?” Jahanes looked up from the EG and gave him a bewildered stare.

“Yeah,” Kai replied. “I—”

Kai’s EG flashed, and he stopped mid sentence.

<<+10 xp.>>

Kai blinked, feeling even more confused. Jahanes, who could apparently still see his EG, inhaled sharply. “I bet you're wondering why your Gauge shows you gained Experience.”

“I don’t know,” Kai admitted. “Probably broken or something.”

“Broken?” Jahanes snorted. “Kai, do you even know what the EG is for?”

Kai raised an eyebrow. “To…track my stats?”

Jahanes blinked. Then he shook his head. “The Essence Gauge isn’t some random computation. It looks into your soul, your Essence, and measures you as a person and does its best to translate that into a form you can understand. They’re numbers, yes. But numbers are reflections of something, of you. And someone who’d defend others that he barely even knew against a Veilfiend is a strong person in my book.”

Kai thought back to the fight. The Minatour’s imposing form, the people cowering behind him. The feeling that he was almost certainly about to get wrecked into oblivion and lose any chance of finding answers.

But then there was that moment. The way the light danced around him, and the word “Spellblade” carved itself into the air.

That begged one, very important question.

“What exactly is a Spellblade?” Kai asked.

By the camp, Kai heard something shift, turned to face it, and saw Lyra staring at him in disbelief. Jahanes gave Kai a similar look. “You mean…you don’t know?”

“No.” Kai shook his head. “It’s just…well, there's a lot about Astraven that’s new to me. Being an outsider and all.”

Jahanes just studied him, rubbing his chin, eyes narrowing. He gestured to the campfire. Kai obliged and sat on the bedroll, crossing his legs as Jahanes sat, next to Lyra but keeping a respectable distance.

“So…a Spellblade,” Jahanes began, “is a type of magic user—usually a Paladin or Fighter class—who seamlessly blends spellcasting with combat, specifically with a blade. Like your sword, for instance. Any old fool can use magic and a weapon, but only Spellblades can intertwine them. Like Wizards use their wands or staffs to cast their magic, Spellblades use their blade as a conduit.”

Kai’s hand found the pommel of the sword Brannick had lent him. He’d make sure to return it, once he saved him.

“So why am I a Spellblade?” Kai asked. “Doesn’t that mean anybody who is good enough at magic and swordplay could become one?”

Lyra scoffed, as if insulted by the notion. Jahanes shrugged. “Not quite. In addition to being a subclass, Spellblades were once a proud order that served the god Kaius. They were noble warriors who were pure of heart, even faced with the toughest challenges and moral conundrums.”

Kaius. The name of one of the two “gods” of Astraven, in addition to Emilia. Creators of Astraven, the source from which all mana originated—at least, that's how he and Emily had written it.

Assuming that I’m “Kaius,” I don’t remember making Spellblades. Kai arched an eyebrow. “Where are the other Spellblades at? Is there some that can train me?”

Lyra’s semi-scowl morphed into a frown. She inhaled sharply as she spoke for the first time since they had gotten to camp, “No. Spellblades were always few in number.”

Were? “What happened to them?” Kai asked.

“The Spellblades were first to battle against the Shadows. One day, they gathered what few of them remained on an expedition to the North Cascade. They were overwhelmed and presumed lost,” Lyra said. “Even Kaius’s champion. Kaelthor.”

Kai’s eyes widened. So that's what happened to him. He frowned. “Does that mean I’m the last?”

“Honestly, Kai, I wish I knew,” Jahanes said. “Their monastery still stands in Aldrathen, and there are mages and priests who still know the arts of the Spellblade. Assuming we manage to kill Lamentis, then perhaps we can get you there for some more formal training. For now, get some rest. You’ll need your strength for traveling in the morning.”

Kai nodded, suddenly feeling fatigue catch up with him. Not just from the battle, but from all of it. Knowing he disgusted Emily yet again. Waking up in a new world that apparently was the one he had created in his childhood.

As the others disappeared into their tents, Kai laid on his back, feeling a bit of that darkness from Earth creep back into his thoughts as he closed his eyes and fell into a nightmare.