Aura seeped into the shallow iridescent scratches of Banda’s soul and lingered. It flowed slowly, like the surface of a lake, mending and soothing until finally his soul emanate a brief gleam of light and the last fracture was gone.
Banda picked up the Crystal he kept by his side and steadily replenished his aura. It had taken five whole days to fully heal his soul. Fortunately, the damage was not too great this time, but Banda was under no delusion that the harpy matriarch was the most dangerous threat to be found on this floor.
The damage could be far greater next time. Or worse, something could fracture his mind. And that, he did not know how to heal.
The Crystal dissipated in his hand as he plundered the last of its mana. Without pause, he focused the aura within him and began to cultivate.
He swelled the aura within the meridian on his right wrist and stirred it as fast as he could. At the height of its speed, he sunk into deeper concentration and pushed the surface of the ball of aura all at once to bump into the boundaries of the meridian.
Like a pulsing heartbeat, he pushed again and again, steadily and composed. With each knock, the meridian grew minutely larger. Too meager to tell between just a few times.
But the meridian did grow. Ever so slightly, the boundaries were pushed wider and wider until the walls trembled fiercely. Banda withdrew the aura remaining and spread it back throughout him.
The process of the second stage involved opening up all twelve Outer Meridians, though each meridian needed to be fully consolidated and expanded as soon as possible. Left too long and the meridians would settle at their current size permanently.
The firmer his foundations in this stage, the more aura he could draw out at once, and the faster he could do it. Strictly speaking, it was not required to consolidate the meridians to progress. But it was better if he did. Which to Banda, meant it was mandatory.
With his cultivation for the day completed, Banda turned his focus to the thing that had occupied most of his time these past days. He picked up the book he had taken and started to read again.
Runecarving was a human trick. One where markings were carved on weapons and tools and all other things to give them powers.
There were twelve runes in total, which all gave something different. The dead men wrote many confusing words to describe them, but Banda saw through it all to understand their true nature.
The Rune of Power made things stronger.
The Rune of Limitation made things weaker.
The Rune of Force created human tricks.
The Rune of Protection shielded against them.
The Rune of Truth saw through human lies.
The Rune of Mystery deceived.
The Rune of Change transformed.
The Rune of Endurance resisted.
The Rune of Travel moved.
The Rune of Hindrance prevented.
The Rune of Genesis healed.
The Rune of Oblivion destroyed.
Using the rune was simple, at least in theory. He needed only carve them onto something in the right way, and the runes themselves would know what they were meant for.
The Rune of Power on a club would intensify the impact. On a sword, it would cut sharper. Endurance on a shield would make it tougher. Genesis would allow it to slowly repair on its own.
Banda had no interest in weaponry, but his body was his sword and shield. If there was a way to make it stronger, he would learn it.
“I would have taught you how to read earlier if I knew you were this interested.” Eres commented as she practiced her Sense technique.
Banda briefly observed her with his own instincts. He hadn’t been able to spar with her lately due to prioritizing his recovery, which left her to practice on her own. In that time, she had extended her range to over three yards and gained even firmer control over it.
He didn’t like to admit it, but Eres was more skilled than him at aura manipulation. Even if he hadn’t lost these past five days, he would have fallen behind.
“You should have told me it was useful.” Banda muttered.
It had taken him a few days to become partially literate. He could remember words and their meanings after learning them only once, but there were many words. Far more than he thought possible.
‘The source of runic power stems from…’
“What is this word?” Banda held out the book to Eres.
“Quintessence.” She answered. “Mana given ego. It’s what all souls are made of.”
“It’s a soul?” Banda questioned. Souls were souls. He hadn’t ever thought them to be anything else.
“Not quite. It you tear a small piece off a soul, it wouldn’t be a second soul. Not really. But it is different from all other kinds of mana. The emanations of quintessence is the foundation of faith. You know it as divinity.”
‘The source of runic power stems from Quintessence.’
Power of the soul. Not two moons ago, Banda had thought little of souls. It was just a weakness to him. And in the case of others, food. But now he knew it to be the source runes and divinity. He wondered what other mysteries it held.
“Now that you’re all healed up…” Eres withdrew her Aura Sense. “We can spar again.”
“I want to carve runes.” Banda said bluntly.
“You are the obsessive sort, aren’t you…” Her enthusiasm fizzled out. “Well, I have enough junk for you to practice on.”
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“It says I need a tool.” Banda recalled the basic instructions in the guide.
“Don’t have one of those, I’m afraid.”
Banda thought of someone he hadn’t since their encounter. “I know who to ask.”
---
Cedal walked down one of the safer alleys to his house, dejected. He had just been kicked out of a hunting party again, this time after a single trip.
Fighting just wasn’t his strong suit, and he lacked the shards to afford supporting martial arts. Runecarving seemed to be his only hope, but that too had been taken from him.
He had managed to learn a few runes over the past few years, but a forger who broke most of the gear he acquired would never turn a profit. He hadn’t even the shards to afford another opportunity at this point.
A half-made Novice wasn’t worth much, even in a town like this. Things just hadn’t been going well for him lately. Or ever, for that matter. Cedal hoped his luck would turn around soon.
“Human.”
Cedal startled at the sudden voice, but his shock quickly turned to despair at the sight of its source. Before he could react, Banda put the runecarving guide in his hands.
“Show me how.”
Cedal found himself at a loss for words again, and another spoke up in the silence.
“I expect a bit more from the friends you make, you know.” Eres commented.
Cedal hadn’t even realized someone else was there, though his surprise only grew when he laid eyes on woman trailing behind Banda.
She was divinely beautiful. Silky black hair styled in a regal bob with a figure more seductive than any brothel harlot even within simple hunter’s clothing. Though what drew him most was her sharp, enchanting eyes. Eyes so deep he felt as though he could sink within them and drown.
“Human.” Banda said again, a little more annoyed than before at the lack of haste to his order.
“Oh. Ah, yes… But, I only know half of the runes. And I can only carve them half of the time.” Cedal blurted out without thinking.
“Show me.” Banda said for the second time.
“The things is… I need-” Cedal caught a shortsword softly thrown by Eres and glanced around in place until he realized they mean for him to carve the rune right in the street.
Cedal sat on the ground and placed the sword in front of him, as he pulled a thick needle with a bulbous wooden handle from the leather pouch at the back of his belt.
He carefully held the awl as he channeled glowing white aura through it, and started to carve a connected symbol in the base of the sword’s blade. But the soft light shattered and blade broke it two, barely a few moments after he began.
“I…”
Eres tossed him a small shield before he could make his excuses, not showing the slightest concern for the broken weapon.
Cedal suspected by their attitudes and the strength he had seen of the savage man that they were wealthy enough to consider mundane items made of low grade metals to be worthless scraps, but he was unwilling to test the boundaries of that.
He focused himself and began anew. The point of the awl scraped effortlessly into the shield in a different symbol this time. This time he kept at it for much longer, but at the last stretch the prospect of relief shuddered his concentration. The light shattered again and violent cracks spread throughout the shield.
Eres tossed a second shield, a larger one this time, with the same indifference as before.
Cedal felt the pressure on him grow. But alongside that, his face flushed with embarrassment at displaying his incompetence.
Cedal held himself together. He took a deep breath to calm his nerves and steeled his focus. He carved the same rune as he did on the first shield, and this time he succeeded.
The glow of the awl faded, and the runic symbol on the shield flashed in its place. A glow covered the shield before it too settled, the metal seemingly holding greater mana than before.
Banda had not slackened his focus on any of it, not for a moment. He had honed both his senses and his aura on the rune as intensely as he would a hunt. The aura used in the carving was obvious, but there was something more.
He struck it suddenly, with a fraction of his full power but enough that would crater in a shield of this quality. But the only damage was a slight dent.
“It feels different.” Banda said as he focused on the rune. “Is that the soul?”
“Yes…” Cedal answered with some surprise. “Are you… reading the book already?”
No sooner did the words leave his mouth, that Cedal considered the insulting implications. And once again on reflex, his mouth ran on its out out of panic.
“All runes draw upon the power of the soul. The Words of Creation. The language of the primordials. They used their souls to speak, and those words became the laws that govern the world.”
“Only Anshar spoke the true Words of the World. The other primordials just mimicked the sounds to lesser effect.” Eres corrected.
“Is that so… I didn’t know that.” Cedal wasn’t sure whether that was true or not, but he had no desire to argue.
“No stories now.” Banda put a stop to the direction the conversation was going, before it grew longer, and held out his hand to Cedal.
“Huh?” The action took Cedal by surprise. A handshake at this point was not high on his expectations. He tentatively reached out his own.
“Awl.” Banda specified.
“Ah, right. Of course.” Cedal quickly pulled his hand away and dropped the awl in Banda’s, not catching Eres’ amused smile as she handed Banda an axe.
Banda started his attempt right away. He had memorized the shape of all the runes, and now he had seen how to wield his aura and the power of his soul.
He carved the shape of rune with ease unwarranted of someone who had never written until less than a week ago. Copying the markings was easy. Controlling the flow of the white aura was not.
The light shattered barely a quarter of the way through and the axe splintered. Eres was ready with another item and Banda attempted again without hesitation. He sharpened and firmed his focus further but that only got him half way before he failed again.
Banda’s expression lowered in a frown as he glanced at the awl. The book told him that he needed this human tool to channel it properly, but he found it only made things murky.
“This is good for your first day.” Cedal offered encouragement seeing Banda place the awl down. “It takes most people half a year just to draw their first rune.”
Banda sunk in deep focus, paying no attention to his words. He held out a finger and and soft white light glowed from his nail. Mimicking the effect of the awl, Banda carved out a rune of power on the gauntlet placed before him, and succeeded.
“Oh?” Eres showed an expression of being genuinely impressed. But Cedal was speechless.
To succeed on merely the third attempt, and without even a tool. Such a feat seemed like a fantasy. Cedal couldn’t help the disheartened feeling on envy creep up within him, but upon noticing Banda’s stare he quickly buried it down and played it off with an awkward laugh.
“Show me other runes.” Banda said.
“Hm?” Cedal was surprised. “...with talent like yours, you should be able to learn them entirely on you own.”
“I need to see them.” Banda didn’t elaborate further, and again, Cedal did not argue.
The novice runecarver carved the runes he knew one by one as Banda asked, and Banda replicated them all in a single attempt. However, on the fourth success, Banda felt a weakness take him, as though struck with many sleepless nights all at once.
“Ah, your soul is drained.” Cedal commented at the sight, knowing the feeling well. “It doesn’t damage it, but runecarving does fatigue the soul. It’ll be refreshed by tomorrow with some rest.”
“Then I come back tomorrow. You show me the other runes.” Banda handed the runecarving book back to Cedal, to the young man’s surprise.
Banda didn’t need it anymore. He had memorized the patterns and knew how to carve them now. Though, as he started to leave something else crossed his mind.
“Tell me if there is a threat to you. I will kill them.” He offered calmly and bluntly, as if it were of no consequence at all.
Cedal was speechless once again, but it was not fear or envy that held his tongue this time. It was the faint and unfamiliar feeling that for once he might have actually gained something.
“...no one is bothering me now.” He answered, though his thoughts seemed a bit deeper than that.
“Tell me when.” Banda said as he turned to leave. He needed this human to stay alive, at least for now. He can’t have him die before he masters this craft of runes.
