Chapter 9- A dark past

"You're going to teach me magic?" Liara repeated with an intrigued expression.

"Yes, now tell me what you know about magic."

Lucious couldn't protect her forever and wanted her to get stronger in preparation for what's to come.

Liara was being oddly quiet and when he looked her way, he saw her looking away in embarrassment.

"I... um... I don't really know anything about magic..." she shyly confessed.

Even though she was the daughter of two powerful mages, she had no talent for magic.

Due to this, she was never taught about magic despite being a princess. Her only knowledge was what she saw Lucious do.

"Where does magic come from?" Her question was to be expected, though Lucious wasn't sure how much to tell her.

That's because much like Earth, this world, Venkhmar, didn't originally have mana.

"That depends on who you ask. But the truth is that it comes from the demons." He answered honestly.

"Demons?" She asked with a surprised expression.

Lucious then began to explain the history of magic. Ten thousand years ago, demons made their first appearance on Venkhmar.

After their arrival, they made a small empire to the north of their continent Zeshath, which was named the Zenak Empire.

The Zenak Empire quickly grew to power and the Emperor the Rennin Empire began to fear them.

His fear was that the demons would try to conquer his Empire and thus sent an assassin to capture the princess at that time.

When the elves and beastmen found out, they were appalled and enraged with their emperor. They viewed the demons no different to any other demi-human race.

To see the demons being treated so harshly for reason, caused tensions to rise. Many believed that the two races would start a civil war.

The demon emperor demanded they return his daughter within twenty-four hours, or they'd view this as a declaration of war.

Ironically, the human emperor had caused what he feared most and when the war started, both the elves and beastmen defected.

The demon princess was eventually saved, but the Rennin Empire had lost three quarters of its land to the demons, elves and beastmen which was divided equally.

To thank them for their kindness, the demon emperor bestowed both races with mana and aura along with spells and aura techniques to help them use it.

It wasn't until a thousand years later that the other races obtained these powers.

The only race to ally with the humans during and after the war were the dwarves.

While they suffered casualties, their lands remained mostly untouched. Their only penalty was to provide the demons, elves and beastmen precious metals each month for the next century.

Over the years, the truth of what happened has been twisted so much that each race has their own version.

The Rennin Empire claim it was a heaven-sent gift from the gods to defeat the evil demi-humans and demons.

While Nihlat the elven dynasty proclaimed it to be a gift from nature.

The Hozia Empire, belonging to the beastmen, believe its connected to their animalistic features which are linked to their ancestors and the other races have an inferior imitation.

By the time Lucious finished reciting the history of the world, Liara looked at him with a pensive expression.

He didn't know what the other races and other continents believed, but they most likely had their own versions and he told her as such.

"Now that you know where mana comes from, I'll teach you the first step towards learning magic."

He then told Liara to sit on the bed in the lotus position as he had done earlier.

"Like this?" she asked while looking at him with an innocent smile while combing a lock of hair behind her ear.

Lucious couldn't help but stare at her enchanting figure.

"Yeah... ahem... anyways. Take a deep breath and try to feel your mana." After giving her some guidance, he got off the bed.

He wanted to use this time to train his body a little as sensing your mana can take several hours even for the most talented.

After doing 100 sit-ups, 100 push-ups and 100 squats, he collapsed onto the floor as a heaping mess.

He abused his magic by summoning water with water shot before drinking it and splashing it over his face.

The water was surprisingly ice cold, which helped refresh him and before long, Liara finally opened her eyes.

"I think I did it, Lucious. There was this strange energy flowing all the way through my body." She happily proclaimed before noticing his current state.

"That's great. Now you need to practice moving your mana to a single point. You can do that in your room while I go clean myself up." With that, he shooed her out his room.

With her gone, Lucious quickly opened the only other door besides the entrance, which lead to a room with a bathtub.

"Thank God, this world has basic plumbing. I haven't had a proper bath in days." He quickly ran a cold bath to help his sore muscles and closed his eyes.

It occurred to him that he hadn't had a moments rest since he arrived, he had always busied himself with something.

It's been a while since I last checked my status.

[Host Stats] [Skills and abilities] [Quests]

[Name: Lucious Karvena Du Beaumont]

[Race: Kitsune]

[Level: 3]

[Exp: 215/700]

[HP: 100/100]

[MP: 135/135]

[Aura: 102/102]

[Energy: 65/65]

[Strength: 15]

[Agility: 13]

[Stamina: 13]

[Endurance: 10]

[Intelligence: 33]

[Perception: 10]

[Charm: N/A]

[Skill Points: 15]

[Stat Points:40]

Aside from aura they still seem pretty low. From what I can see, aura is the combined total of all my physical stats X2

Lucious put ten stat points in Strength and Agility each then finally got out the bath.

[Strength: 25]

[Agility: 23]

The night quickly came, and Lucious told Liara to be awake by sunrise before turning in for the night himself.