Chapter 17: Combat Orbment

S1189. Osborne Villa.

Two years passed by in a blink of an eye in a certain home located in-between Heimdallr and Trista.

A violet haired golden eyed kid could currently be seen running through the hills and trees in the back of the villa, that stretched on for miles and miles. He was currently panting heavily, sweat dripping onto the grass as it passed by him.

"Hah...stupid father...", The young kid said, panting as he swiftly ran, crisscrossing through the trees.

'I just had to utter the word "Train"...father really is relentless sometimes...', The young violet haired retorted to himself, suddenly coming to a halt by one of the nearby trees. Placing his hand on it, he sucked in a deep breath of fresh air. As he did, he heard a notification sound off in his mind.

[!Ding! Player Naoto has run 10/10km. Daily Quest complete. Please select your reward from the Daily Quest].

Yet I couldn't even continue the prompt in my mind before an aged voice reached out to me nearby.

"That's not backtalking I hear, is it now?", A firm voice spoke out to me, not far away. "Today's session is far from over, my son.", The firm voice continued to say. "Soldiers who talk back to their superior officers get severely reprimanded in the army."

"...", Trying to form words, but after hearing that, I stayed silent. Hearing me not talk back to the figure not far away as I continued to let out pants, a smile appeared on their face.

"Good. Now let us begin our next ten kilometer stretch. If you can complete this second lap, I might show you an Arts or two before we continue your rapier training later in the day.", The firm man said to me. This man was of course my father, Giliath Osborne, and as for the violet haired kid, that was me.

"Really!?", I responded excitedly, feeling more vigor return to my body. Two years had passed, but I was able start training with father. Unfortunately, the moment I uttered the word "Train", to Giliath, he relentlessly started a training regime for me. As a result of that, one of the Gamer's more popular functions triggered, the Quest system. Except for now, It only issued me Daily Quests to suit my training and exercise.

"A fearsome man I may have been as General Osborne, but a liar I am not. Come, let me know you my combat orbment.", Giliath said, responding back to me as he approached me at the tree.

Hearing this, anticipation appeared in my eyes as Giliath reached into one of his pockets. After a moment, he brought out a mechanical device of sorts. Very similar to a fancy pocket watch locket. Except it was a few times larger. Bringing this out, father spoke out to me once more, showing it off to me for the first time.

"This device is known as a Combat Orbment. These devices casts what we call Arts. Arts provide many boons in a variety of ways, as well as being capable of causing massive destruction. Despite the waning use of mana since the Middle Ages, thanks to the Orbment Revolution, us normal humans can cast Magic like it is nothing."

"Combat Orbments bring their power forth from very special minerals found deep within mining veins found around Zemuria, Septium Veins. Through these special veins and thanks to the Epstein Foundation over three centuries ago, we can refine these Septium minerals into Quartz, placing them into these special devices.", Giliath explained, telling me what Combat Orbments were.

Hearing that, anticipation appeared in my eyes again. Septium and Quartz were two key elements of the Trailsverse. This is where one major aspect of science comes in, separating Trails from your typical magical fantasy. Sure the elements are strong in Zemuria, but every normal human can tap into them thanks to the discovery by the Epstein Foundation, which ushered mankind into a different path from the Middle Ages, aka the Orbal Revolution. Father had shown me more information regarding this topic over the last two years, but now, it was my first time getting to witness Arts, should I finish this training session.

Still, I saw the Combat Orbment in father's hand. His Combat Orbment was modeled after the Orbments seen earlier in the sky saga, which made sense. The Enigma, Arcus, and those Calvardian models from what I could see currently don't exist at the moment. As for the sky saga models, they didn't really have an official name for them. They were just called Combat Orbments.

Most people are probably used to the Arcus models though. It was thanks to Class VII that they successfully went through real testing since that was the model they used in the cold steel saga.

Still, I was amazed seeing a combat orbment for the first time. Father never brought his out until now. Moreover, his color scheme dyed it a fiery red, likely mirroring the place he serves with Heimdallr at its center. It also had Erebonia's insignia on it, which made sense.

"So this is a combat orbment...", I uttered, still trying to catch my breath.

"Indeed. My model is a rather specialized one. Come have a look.", Giliath said, urging me to come closer.

"Okay!", I said happily. I then saw Giliath press something on it, and we heard a clicking sound as if the locket opened. It did, and within it was the full structure of the combat orbment.

If I remembered correctly, in the sky saga closer to the beginning, these combat orbment have six slots to slot in a Quartz. They can have up to four branching lines, allowing one to combo Quartz as they please. We simply call these lines. And sometimes, a slot on any given Line can have an elemental lock meaning only one type of element could be slotted into it.

Yet for the one in front of me, I did not see the standard six slots in this combat orbment. No I currently saw nine, with just the minimum of two Lines...

Seeing this my eyes turned wide a bit.

"Why does this combat orbment have nine Quartz in it?" I decided to ask father.

"One of the perks for serving His Majesty. Like I said, mine is rather customized, not following the normal standards. I also opted to have no elemental locks, allowing me to choose what I want to do accomplish by my own choice.", Giliath started to explain how his combat orbment worked.

"Will having this much let you cast more than the usual ones too?", I asked.

"Of course. The more Quartz a combat orbment has, the more Arts you'll be able to use. But for now, that is it for the explanation. We will do a practical test on it shortly, that is, if you can complete our next lap.", Giliath responded back to me with a grin.

Even though I was still only three years old, I knew father was pushing me to strive harder. Somehow he could tell I was growing a lot faster than normal humans, as Rean was still behaving like a typical two year old child now. He never asked why, but it was still my fault that I wanted to start training this early, and here I am now.

On the bright side though, training as a young child does prove the best yield as that is when we can develop to the potential we can reach to. A classic among martial artists. As to whether I would learn martial arts here besides father's famed military training, that remains to be seen.

And besides...

I wasn't the only one who was doing this training either. Father was actually accompanying me, doing it as well. He ran ten kilometers along with me like it was nothing and he didn't even break a sweat.

"Okay!", I responded again, concluding my thoughts.

After receiving a short course on what father's Combat Orbment was, we continued to do our running. As I did, I paid attention to the Daily Quest notification from earlier. Before long a blue panel appeared inside my mind, giving me the details of the reward I had earned from today's Daily Quest.

Meanwhile...

Somewhere located in midwest Zemuria, an event started to take place as I continued to train...

Two girls could be seen, happily chatting away with each other. As for one of the two girls, they seemed a few years older than the other one. The older one also had a very familiar look to her...

*

Who likes green onions?

Hint: next chapter is our first side story.

Keep up those power stones and collections!