Chapter 46: Departures and Bonds
Armored Dragon Calendar Year 417-418 – Rudeus, Age 11
[Rudeus POV]
The tornado spell nearly killed me.
I had constructed a practice arena using frozen water and earth magic. Created a contained space where I could test flight techniques without endangering the village.
"For human flight, this magnitude should suffice," I muttered, calculating the necessary velocity. "Approximately 100 meters per second."
I had been practicing for three weeks. Tried every combination of Earth Lance and Wind Arrow available. The tornado variation was theoretically the most efficient—a rotating air column providing sustained lift rather than a single burst. Theory and practice had, thus far, remained on poor speaking terms.
This attempt felt different. The mana flow aligned correctly for once.
I initiated the cast.
The spell worked perfectly. That was the problem.
It worked so perfectly that it generated three times the intended force, caught me flat-footed, and launched me from the practice arena like a crossbow bolt aimed at the sky.
The forest canopy blurred past. The clouds rushed toward me.
Then gravity remembered I existed.
Free fall. Wind screaming past my ears.
I had maybe three seconds before the ground. I used one of them to panic, one to calculate, and the last one to cast a deceleration spiral and conjure a water cushion in the direction I was falling.
It wasn't graceful. It was barely adequate. I hit hard enough to see white, then stars, then the distinct brown interior of something that was not the sky.
A nest. Rain Forest Lizard eggs the size of my torso surrounding me in a rough circle.
Three of them had cracks in them now. From the impact.
The mother was not pleased.
She was three meters of territorial fury with claws built to strip bark from hardwood. She was also, almost immediately, accompanied by whatever had hatched from the cracked eggs.
I had arrived as a threat. I was being treated as one.
For an hour I fought in the dark. Bleeding from multiple wounds, drawing more predators with every drop, mana reserves declining faster than I could compensate. I worked through it methodically: freeze the water around approaching creatures to limit their mobility, earth bullets for the ones that didn't stop, healing when a moment opened up. Nothing efficient. Nothing clean. Just surviving one attack at a time until I could create the space for something better.
Eventually I got the ice barrier up. Everything on the wrong side of it was frozen mid-charge.
I fired a light beacon into the sky with the last organized mana I had and sat down to wait.
Ruijerd found me shortly after.
"All the monsters are frozen solid," he observed, surveying the interior. A cave of ice with a dozen lizards preserved in various mid-attack postures. Like an exhibit of violence.
"An easy request to fulfill. Though next time, inform me beforehand."
"If you accompanied me, it wouldn't qualify as secret training."
He looked at me—at the blood drying on my face, the torn sleeve, the way I was carefully not putting weight on my left ankle.
"Training," he said.
"Training," I confirmed.
He laughed. Actually laughed.
I hadn't heard that sound from him before.
The days that followed were filled with practice.
Every morning I went to the cleared section of forest floor below the village platforms. Launch, ascent, deceleration, landing. Then again.
The launch got better. The deceleration got cleaner. The landing remained the weakest point—too much focus going to slowing down while not enough went to exactly where I was landing.
By the fifth day I had stopped landing in trees. By the tenth day I was landing within five meters of my target. By the fifteenth I was hitting my mark most of the time, and doing it quietly enough that Ruijerd stopped wincing every time I touched down.
My flight technique never achieved elegance. The best I could manage was using a blunt Earth Lance spell to launch myself skyward, then accelerating with wind magic and preparing water cushions for landing.
Crude, inelegant, and absolutely effective.
I was beginning to think that might be enough.
Claude watched one of my practice sessions with amusement.
"Your focus is wrong," he said.
"What do you mean..."
"Let's create an image of a bird. Can a hatchling fly..."
"They can't."
"When can they..."
"When their feathers develop."
"Right. But even a fully feathered bird needs proper nutrition."
"Physical development." He gestured at my body. "You're trying to manifest magic that requires physical capacity you don't have yet."
"So what do you suggest..."
In response, he rose into the air. Hovering with apparent effortlessness.
The technique I had tried three times. Failed three times.
He made it look like standing still, just elevated. No visible strain. No wasted motion.
"Though this spell is inefficient for me," he admitted. "My mana reserves are lower than yours. It's not sustainable long-term."
"Then why—"
"To show you it's possible." He descended smoothly and landed without a sound. "The technique is real. Your body will catch up to it. For now, work with what you have."
I stared at him.
Something stubborn lodged itself in my chest.
"I won't lose to you," I said.
He looked at me with an expression that was not quite a smile. "Good. Competition breeds improvement."
The Holy Beast arrived unexpectedly.
I woke one morning to find a creature curled at the foot of my bed. Fur the color of moonlight, eyes that gleamed with intelligence beyond any normal animal.
"Well, well." I couldn't help the crude joke.
"If it isn't the Lord Holy Beast. Did you have some business with this sex beast..."
"Wan."
It pressed closer. Resting its head on my lap with the casual trust of something that had never known fear.
The village was in an uproar by midday. The Holy Beast had escaped its sanctuary.
Guards were searching frantically. The elder was composing apology letters to the ancient spirits.
"It came to me," I explained when questioned.
Nobody believed me. Why would the sacred creature seek out a human...
But the beast kept returning. Every day.
Sometimes for hours at a time. It followed me through the village. Sat beside me during training. Slept at my feet when I rested.
I tried to understand what it wanted specifically.
Was it the mana? My reserves were substantial, and magical creatures sometimes sought out strong concentrations. Was it the routine? After a week, the beast knew my schedule better than I did.
On the ninth day, I tried making something.
I had never been skilled at crafts unrelated to magic—but I had wood scraps and time and a specific image in mind. It took three evenings and came out lopsided. A small carved figure with a pointed head and a spear. I set it in front of the beast.
It regarded the figure. Sniffed it carefully.
Picked it up in its mouth and carried it to a corner, where it set the figure down and curled around it.
"I didn't know you knew him too," I said.
Ruijerd, when he saw the figure later, said nothing. He spent a long moment looking at it.
The beast returned every day after that.
Gustav eventually explained the lore.
"The Lord Holy Beast is born only once every several hundred years. Its appearance heralds an approaching world crisis."
The elder's voice was grave. "Once it reaches adulthood, it will embark on a journey with a hero to save the world."
"Adulthood..."
"Approximately another century."
A hundred years. A crisis that wouldn't manifest for a century.
And this creature had chosen to bond with me now.
"If the legends are true," Gustav continued, "great danger awaits the world a hundred years from now. Perhaps the Holy Beast senses something in you."
"That will matter when that time comes."
I looked at the creature. It looked back at me with eyes that seemed to hold secrets I couldn't comprehend.
"Or perhaps," I said, "it just likes being petted."
"Wan."
Three months passed.
The rain finally showed signs of stopping. The floods receded.
Paths that had been impassable opened again.
Eris fought Minitona three days before our departure.
The young beast-girl had been desperate to keep Eris from leaving. Had challenged her to combat, believing that victory would somehow change the inevitable.
The fight was serious by Minitona's standards.
She was fast—beastman speed, which could catch unprepared humans off guard. She struck low, targeting Eris's legs and balance. Her style was more wrestling than swordfighting, built for a body type that could use momentum differently.
Eris's first instinct was clearly to end it in one movement. I watched her stop herself. Make the adjustment. Lower her center of gravity and meet Minitona at her level instead of overwhelming from above.
They exchanged. Minitona got a grip on Eris's wrist and tried to use it for a throw. Eris read the motion, stepped into it to neutralize the leverage, and released before the technique could complete. Took a step back.
Reset.
Minitona pushed again. And again. Each time Eris redirected rather than crushed.
The final exchange was quick. Minitona committed to a tackle, Eris sidestepped with one hand on her shoulder—gentle enough to put her on the ground rather than through it.
End.
Eris won. Of course she won.
But she held back. Deliberately limited her strength to avoid serious injury.
The former Eris would have shown no restraint regardless of her opponent's age.
"She's my friend," Eris mumbled when I commented on her mercy.
They reconciled that night. I found them in Eris's room, talking through what language barrier remained, with the Holy Beast serving as translator through barks and gestures that somehow conveyed meaning.
Minitona was crying when she left. Good tears—a friendship that would survive distance.
Eris had grown, in ways beyond combat technique. We all had.
The night before departure was less peaceful than I expected.
I was returning from a final equipment check when I turned a corner and nearly walked into an assembly.
Eight beast-tribe apprentices—Claude's smithing students and a few of the younger warriors—had formed what could only be described as a delegation. Several were flanked by older women. One held a formal wooden carving.
Ruijerd stood slightly to the side with the expression of someone who had been called in to translate and was already regretting it.
The lead delegate, Tana's younger sister, spoke at length. Earnestly. Directly at Claude.
Ruijerd translated in a carefully neutral tone. The smithing apprentices had drawn lots. The winner's family was presenting a formal companionship proposal. There were secondary offers from two other families.
Claude had backed himself against a tree at some point during the speech. His hands were in a position that suggested he was strongly considering a barrier formation.
"Ruijerd," he said, very carefully. "I need you to express my profound respect for their offer and my sincere explanation that my work requires travel that makes this impossible at present."
"You want me to say no politely."
"I want you to say it in a way that preserves their family's honor."
"These things are complicated."
"I know."
"I will do my best."
What followed was a twenty-minute conversation. Claude's contributions consisted mostly of nodding and the specific expression of someone staying very still while planning an exit.
"How did it resolve..." I asked afterward.
Claude's hair was slightly disheveled. "I've been invited to return for a formal consideration when I'm of age. I agreed, in the spirit of maintaining good relations."
"That's a diplomatic way to say you're engaged."
"I'm not engaged."
"You sort of—"
"I am not engaged."
The Holy Beast walked past and licked his hand.
"That wasn't an endorsement," he said.
We left at dawn.
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