50 A New Beginning

Stanis jumped from rock to rock as he descended down the mountain, giving care to the wind as he jumped off ledges. It no longer hurt… This wasn't even due to his tenacity, it just wasn't painful in the first place.

He turned his eyes towards the sun and saw a ledge that led to a 25 metre drop: it was massive. He felt no fear whatsoever as he sprinted down the path, he had danced with Yils so many times that he found it hard to fear such little things like this. He jumped, his arms spread wide open as he embraced the morning sun.

For one second he was in a state of emptiness as the world seemed to flow through him, his whole body relaxed. The next second he was falling fast, teeth braced as he wracked his brain to produce icicle blocks to break the fall. Even he would be hurt if he tried to land this without assistance. He barely managed to create a block as his body crashed into it, a shattering sound followed by a loud thump.

He could feel wetness at his foot and so he lifted himself, only to see a splintered shard of ice through his ankle. Stanis had his teeth clenched but it was nothing worse than a sharp sting, after all he had been whipped into shape all these weeks. His pains quickly turned to joys as he began maniacally laughing; this was what true power felt like. He healed his foot and carried on, this time sticking to the paths and not the ledges as he descended.

In all truth, he wanted to run back to Zelgard and Yils. He didn't know it when it had happened but he now knew that he craved power, not the fickle type that could easily change hands through uprisings but rather the loyal, true power: the power of this new world. He also knew that Yils had that very power; she had been fighting him like an ant all this time, scared to accidently release her power and eradicate him from existence. She had been bluffing when she had said he had learnt all that he could from them, he now realised it as there were no tears clouding his vision or emotions directing his actions. But their will was his will, at least they had given him a target: the tier-three.

Tier-ones, in his opinion, were like teenagers; they were strong, sure, but not as strong as the adult grown Human.

As for tier-twos, they were like the talented Humans who had emerged after the apocalypse: not only were they incredibly strong but worse still, crafty.

As for tier-threes, well, he had no idea… However, he did have some hints: what he had learnt so far from Yils was that mana manipulation was the path that led forwards, which made him think that tier-threes had something to do with greater manipulation. It was fine anyway, he would crush through anyone or anything that now stood in his way…

This wasn't for Yils or anything, he loved her and Zelgard, sure, but that wasn't enough to drive him forwards. The only thing that could do that was his lust for power…

Hours passed and soon he could see a glimpse of Yona Village in the distance. The first thought to mind was that it was bigger; he didn't remember it being so large when he had left. His following thoughts were for the people he knew. Orena: he could now sympathise with her desire for power, although he still didn't share her sentiments of bloodlust. Kei and Callum: nice guys. Alyona: smart leader. He eventually sighed as he consciously stood up to the fact that he was actively ignoring a set of people.

Tanya, Jayesh, Scowly and whoever else who had there at the time. He understood their reasons, no one wanted to die there. But to leave him like that? It brought an extremely bitter taste to inside of his mouth. He secretly hoped that they had been hopping off single legs as they had made it out, bloodied and frenzied as they left him to the mercy of the merciless Zelts.

The speck-sized Village had grown to, well, a proper Village as he was now a few short minutes away from it. A very notable addition to the Village were plumes of smoke rising to the sky. At first, he had just thought they were burning something but his opinion changed as he had got closer. The smoke was coming from the Smithy.

He remembered how the System had always supplied them with equipment. Could it be that the supplies had stopped, or had they finally cracked the use of the redundant-seeming Smithy? A certain spring invaded his steps as he began to half-skip. His questions would soon be answered as he was now only steps away from the forge.

It was an open smithy, thus Stanis could very quickly see that there was only one person in there, although that single person was working very hard on their part. Stanis felt the spring in his steps die, before reviving as he shook his head and leapt over the obstacles, coming to a stop a single step behind the man.

"Stop distracting me, I won't hurry up no matter what you say!" said the man, the voice strangely high-pitched and feminine.

Stanis peered his head forwards and peeked a look, quickly realising that this man was actually a woman. She had shortly cropped, brown hair, although it looked sticky with grime right now. She was wearing heavy duty clothes as she worked, all of them just as dirty as she was. Her sizeable arms quivered as she hammered the sword in front of her, her expression cringing as she struggled at something.

She had noticed him peering over, but grew irritated as she realised Caleb was actually staring at her.

"CALEB, I TOLD YOU I----", her ferocious roar was cut half-way through as she realised the slim man in front of her was a world apart from the bear-built, tattoo-covered Caleb.

"Who are you?", her anger had simmered down but her voice was still rough from irritation.

Stanis hadn't expected such a hello and thus had been taken back, although he quickly recovered as he examined the girl in front of him with greater detail. She had quite a stubby face and just as stubby body, although he was now embarrassed how he could have previously thought her as a man considering her obvious figure.

Her eyes were as brown as her hair should have been was it not for the grime, and her whole surface skin was dyed black from smoke. What he didn't notice with his focused eyes was her simmering fury, a tinge of red starting to show from underneath the dirt.

"WHAT. THE. FUCK. ARE. YOU. LOOKING. AT?!" she whispered, the sounds barely escaping the gaps between her teeth but still retaining their dangerous venom nevertheless.

"Oh," Stanis came back to reality as he realised he had been staring at her body over for quite a while now, "I was just here to learn what you were doing? I thought forging was pointless?"

Despite the honesty behind his question, he had forgotten what he currently looked like. He was a man wearing dulled and now torn, simple clothing. His healthy yellow-tinted skin was now a sickly-white, all due to his repeated drinking of the mana water without the required capability.

The chub that had once acted as his final defence against the world was now all but gone, his body slim but also ripped at the same time. But none of this gave him such a bad image as his hair did: dirty, frizzled and outgrown. His hair, alongside his facial hair, made him look like he had been living away from society for weeks, an image his questions only furthered.

She gave him a contemptuous look before turning back to her work, hammering the sword with a previously lacking fervour as she worked with greater intensity. He was just about to call her out when she did it first, all the while focusing on her sword. "You can improve equipment with mana. Now shut up and go back to brood in your forgotten corner of this world or whatever."

She had been pestered for the past few days by Caleb to finish his sword and now she had to deal with this hermit. Chances were that he would die in a day if he didn't even know this simple data by now. Stanis didn't particularly take offense from this as he had learnt how to deal with cold shoulders from Yils, and so he instead turned around to look through the pile of metal equipment she had piled up. She ignored the racket as she focused her energy onto the sword; she was this close to working out how the mana worked.

Stanis eventually picked a straight dagger and moved to another corner of the smithy. There was only a single furnace and the girl was currently using it, so he instead settled for cold metalworking, grabbing a decent hammer before tightening his grip on the dagger. He swung the hammer, all his strength behind this blow…

*CLLLARRRRGGHH*

A horrible sound was emitted as the knife broke, almost as if the blade was crying at this show of injustice. He had hit it so hard that blade had bent to the point of breaking, even the metal surface below it compressing under the pressure. Stanis looked at it half-dazed before shaking his head and replacing the dagger with a longer sword. At least now he knew to start from the bottom to the top, not vice versa.

*CLING*

*CLUNG*

*CLIING*

It took him about ten minutes to work out the perfect strength. The blade now sung with joy as he struck, no longer striking plain but rather striking while circulating the mana techniques he had learnt from Yils. It was similar to how he had strengthened his icicles to the point of compressing them into crystals, he had simply worked the mana in a precise circuit out of his body. This was, without a doubt, difficult for him but it was also good practise and so he regularly took breaks, before eagerly getting back to work.

The girl he worked with had also gotten back into her pace and worked with a similar intensity to him, although to far less success than him. She, however, didn't cry or beg as she persisted, pushing herself to break her limits.

The hours passed and Stanis finally increased his proficiency, his skill at blacksmithing rapidly growing as he began working out its secrets. Behind him lay several shortswords: some were bent to the point of being unrecognisable, whereas the newer ones lay shining, a certain power clear in them. The girl had stopped working almost an hour earlier and now watched Stanis with the same intensity she put into her work, her shock not little as she saw how he was affecting the metal.

He finished the blade he had been working on a few minutes later, finally opening his eyes as he stopped imagining the repetitive circulations. It shone with a bright metallic gleam within his hands, its jaws clearly hungry for blood as he inspected it closer. He took the final step and stabbed it into his open palm, the blade struggling but eventually slipping through. A good blade!

He was about to turn around and fetch another sword to train with when he was poked at. He peered towards the poke and found the girl from earlier looking at him.

"Hi, sorry if we got to the wrong start. I'm Rikkey" said she, smiling a toothy grin as she looked at him. His only weakness…