26 Golden Eyes (2)

"I don't trust him..." Those were Aria's final words as she ended her explanation. Seated on a hospital visitor's chair, the Archmagus scratched her chin and looked silently at the three figures staring right at her. A gorgeous blonde woman, with a bosom that could feed two infants at once, blinked twice and covered her mouth in thought. The same went for the handsome man lying against the windowpane. He was stroking his chin with furrowed brows and a confused expression. If he wanted to imitate the famous Thinker sculpture, the man had done so magnificently.

However, it was the third figure who was the first to break the silence. Donned in blue silk pyjamas, the muscular man sat comfortably on the patient's bed without any help from the nurses or his visitors. His pale complexion was gradually reverting back to its pink hue, and the frozen face of his could break out in all sorts of emotions.

Arms folded in akimbo, Finn replied: "Yeah, that guy sounds fishy. Learning all your memories with one touch and claiming he has amnesia? He's clearly lying."

"More importantly, are you certain that it's safe to walk around by yourself?" Yvette leaned into Aria's personal space and placed her left palm over the Archmagus' forehead. A golden light shone from the tips of Yvette's fingers and slowly entered the pores of the black-haired charmer. "You're still uncertain of the magic that ancient man used to absorb your memories. What if there's some sort of after-effect? For all we know, he may have altered your memories!"

"Yvette, relax… Do you think that I'm really that weak?" Aria puffed out her chest in retort. "I'm an Archmagus! There's no one more adept in magic than me. If there's something wrong with my memories, I'll be the first to realise. From the looks of it, that ancient man really just read my memories to learn our language and culture."

"Still… The magic and techniques that he uses are from a time long forgotten! You should be taking a check-up or something!" Luke, the trusted Elemental Archer, stared Aria right in the eyes. Aria had always been a little sister to Luke and Finn. The last thing they wanted was for their precious sibling to fall into despair due to the undoings of a mysterious power.

"Even if I did, it would yield no results," Aria shook her head before turning to the master elf healer who had been examining her for the past few minutes now. "Right, Yvette?"

"... She's right," the Healing Saint pursed her lips as she replied. "There's nothing wrong with Aria's body. I can't sense any issues with her magic core either. In fact, it must have been strengthened by the raised montgen levels. It's stronger than ever before."

Victorious, Aria shrugged her shoulders: "See? I told you."

"Fine..." Luke rolled his eyes and shifted his bum away from the window. Walking over, the suave archer ruffled Aria's hair, like how any elder brother would.

"Hey! What's that for?!" Obviously aggravated, Aria growled in protest.

"Yeap, that's the Aria I know!" Luke chuckled, showing his full set of pearly white teeth. "Fierce and quick to retaliate. Looks like the ancient man really didn't do anything to you after all!"

Aria's blue eyes that could hold the sky within it, quickly turned muddy as some dark thoughts came through. Bending her fingers into the shape of a claw, the female tiger roared. "I'm going to kill you!"

"Oops, perhaps he should have messed with your memories..." Cold sweat fell down Luke's forehead as he made a tactical retreat with his superior agility. The Archmagus was contemplating on giving chase and teaching the brat a lesson, but in the end, a short sigh escaped from her rosy lips: "Hah… That's enough about me. We're here to visit you, Finn! How are you faring?"

"Truthfully, I'm about seventy percent cured!" The bedridden man flexed his biceps to show the veiny muscles that were hidden within his pyjamas. "My strength and appetite have already come back, and I don't get any dizziness. If not for the chaos outside, I could have been discharged!"

"You sure?" Aria looked the muscular man from head-to-toe, seemingly trying to verify his tall claims. The High Paladin had been severely injured, after all. Even with Yvette's masterful healing capabilities, it shouldn't have taken this quickly to restore the man to the pink of health.

"Most definitely! Oddly enough, I feel that my physical state is slowly becoming stronger!" Among the trifecta of Aria, Luke and Finn, it was Finn that held the advantage when it came to senses. He had an intuition that would make countless assassins cry in envy, and his heightened senses enabled him to scan the battlefield without moving his line of sight. It came as no surprise that the High Paladin was able to monitor the inner workings of his physical state more than anyone of the S-Rankers present. "I think that after I'm fully recovered, I should be stronger than I was before. Though, I can't put my finger on why..."

Finn didn't mean it, but those words came as a thundershock to the young Archmagus. Memories rapidly arose from Aria's mind, and like a spider spinning a web, the young maiden quickly merged those memories into meaningful data.

'Magic concentration rising… Finn's increased healing methods… My magic core increasing in quality… They aren't all isolated incidents!' Aria quickly connected the dots and formed her own hypothesis.

"Status!" With a shout, the Archmagus called opened the thing that every mortal had. Two windows that were only visible to her eyes popped open and what Aria saw stunned her to her very core...

Name: Aria Saciustrum

Species: Human

Gender: Female

Job: Archmagus

Class: S

Age: 23 years

Blessings: ???

Strength: 19 > 33

Dexterity: 11 > 51

Intelligence: 390 > 476

Wisdom: 375 > 435

Constitution: 181 > 211

Willpower: 210 > 233

'Blessings?! What the hell is blessing?! And what's with this new feature?!' Aria mentally screamed.

Before, the first window only carried the name, species, gender, job, class and age. However located right at the very bottom, there was a totally new field, one that hadn't been seen in the long years of human history. The second window also contained a stunning surprise. Usually, when one increased their stats in any of the secondary fields, it wouldn't show how much they improve. Yet, there was a new feature that showed Aria's growth from the last time she opened her status window. But that wasn't the main issue...

'How the hell did my stats rise this quickly?!'

Aria was an Archmagus, a magician that devoted her entire life towards pursuing knowledge and casting spells from a distance. So… Why the hell did her Strength, Dexterity, Constitution and Willpower rise so much? Additionally, at her level, it would be difficult to spike her Intelligence and Wisdom fields in such a short time; but her Intelligence stat actually increased by sixty?! It was completely absurd!

"Guys, quickly open your status and tell me what you see!" Aria barked at her friends, her face completely flushed.

"Geez, what's the rush?" Luke scoffed at Aria's domineering tone, but still acquiesced to her request. Mentally opening up his status fields, the Elemental Archer's eyes ran up and down, only to firmly drop his jaw immediately. "W-What the hell is this?!"

Likewise, Yvette and Finn were slack-jawed, unwilling to believe their eyes. The ability to read one's status was innate, and for thousands of years, the fields had never been changed. With a Status Evaluation Plate, one could go even further to read about the Skills, Magic and Resistances a person might have. Yet, the very fundamentals of their existence were being questioned with this massive change.

"There are changes, right?!" Aria hollered out. "Quick, tell me what you see!"

"T-That… T-That..." Yvette, the trusty elf, was the first to break the silence.

Name: Yvette Galadhel

Species: Elf

Gender: Female

Job: Healing Saint

Class: S

Age: 24

Blessings: [Whispers of Myth]

Strength: 15 > 77

Dexterity: 12 > 53

Intelligence: 368 > 441

Wisdom: 399 > 467

Constitution: 157 > 198

Willpower: 233 > 257

Hearing the elf's status, Aria widened her eyes: "Wait, you have a blessing?"

"Y-yeah… What is this blessing anyway?! Whispers of Myth?!"

"I don't know! On my status, it's just a bunch of question marks!" Aria was far more shook that Yvette, who had obtained a peculiar blessing. "Hey, what about the two of you?!" The Archmagus turned her attention to the two who were still trying to fight the disbelief.

"M-my status… What the hell? How did the stats rise so quickly?" Finn hurriedly shared the details of his status with the young maiden.

Name: Finn Iustus

Species: Human

Gender: Male

Job: High Paladin

Class: S

Age: 26

Blessings: [Earth Warlord's Mandate]

Strength: 372 > 448

Dexterity: 140 > 166

Intelligence: 20 > 58

Wisdom: 11 > 46

Constitution: 371 > 423

Willpower: 400 > 456

"I've never seen such a rapid increase in my entire life! It takes weeks of training and hardcore exercise to just maintain my current strength stat… Yet, it just increased by this much even though I've been hospitalised?! I don't know how to feel about this..."

Finn was a bona fide musclehead and stood at the apex of all High Paladins. He knew how hard it was to raise stats, particularly the one for strength. Many S-Rankers would hit a wall, likely in the 400-500 range, before slowly falling back down again.

"Y-yeah… What's with this blessing and stat increase? How come we've never noticed this before?" Luke stuttered as he spoke out his own stats.

Name: Luke Indico

Species: Human

Gender: Male

Job: Elemental Archer

Class: S

Age: 27

Blessings: [Angel's Benediction]

Strength: 260 > 311

Dexterity: 399 > 437

Intelligence: 140 > 188

Wisdom: 149 > 178

Constitution: 112 > 156

Willpower: 256 > 306

"Like hell, I would know!" At this point, Aria was thoroughly agitated. "What the hell is [Angel's Benediction], [Earth Warlord's Mandate] and [Whispers of Myth]? And why is mine just a bunch of question marks?!" Aria thought out loud. Her blessing was the only one that was blurred out, which seemed odd, given that the rest of her friends all had defined blessings.

Ultimately, the change in status was a vastly new system that would stump researchers and politicians all over the world. As if the tragedies that plagued the world wasn't bad enough…

Aria wracked her brains, hoping to find some semblance of an answer from her vast database of knowledge. Unfortunately, no matter how hard she looked, the Archmagus mind drew black. That was until she remembered one particular scene...

"No, wait… There is one man that might have the answer!" Aria jumped right to her feet. Ignoring the stunned trio in the hospital ward, the Archmagus bolted out of the door at a speed that would make one question if she was an assassin.

"Hey, would you at least give us an-... and she's gone!" Yvette tried to dig up some answers before Aria disappeared, but it was far too late. Aria had vanished into the wind, and due to her intense focus, probably couldn't hear Yvette anyway.

"Hah… Aria really should fix that habit of hers… It's getting kind of annoying now." Finn shook his head helplessly.

"Yeah..." The blonde elf nodded. "Though, she's our only hope of finding out what went wrong..."