A NOT SO TYPICAL MORNING

Kalen's pov

It was a typical morning for me in Trident city, I had just entered the public guild hall and was immediately besseched by several mercenaries who wanted to hire me as an extra for their various activities, usually it was unheard of for high ranking mercenaries to work with lower ranks unless substancial incentives were introduced but i had known most of the people here since i was a porter, hell i'd even worked for the older ones at one point and saw them all as family as such i never held myself in such a high regard that i couldn't help them out if they felt a job would be too challenging.

Although my somewhat dull expression didn't show it i was extremely grateful to everone here the pure warriors who taught me body strenghting and how to manifest blade aura and the mages who taught me spell casting and nurtured me from tier to tier never once showing jealosy when i surpassed what they were capable of at that age, in any decent guild the mercenaries their had to at least be proficient in one of two arts pure combat or spell casting, pure combat wasn't simply swinging a sword around those who could call themselves warriors had to be able to manifest aura, and energy source created by fusing ones will or intent with their mana creating an entirely new energy capable of interacting with the physical world, warriors use aura to augment their bodies which would have already been trained to their physical limits for an extra burst in strength and defense and some were even capable of of shrouding their weapons in it, of mastered to the appropriate level humans could overpower ten's of giants and tank attacks from dragons and after years of training they would finally reach the mastery level "synchronisation" the state where one's intent and mana fuse so perfectly it create's 'ki' the purest form of blade enhancement capable of cleaving mountain's with casual swings and

splitting the earth just as easily where one's will to attack and his energy are so at harmony that the destruction they perform from the simplest attacks are devestating, while for spell casters they move up the ranks in a more elderly fashion, there are several theirs in magic a tier being which level a caster or spell is at lowest being 1st tier and highest logical tier being 9th, i say logical because after 9th tier casters experience something they've termed as "GRAND COSMIC AWAKENING" (pretentious i know) where their the confounding 10th tier the problem with this tier is that casters gain access to two classes of spells which ever one agrees with (including me)should be in two separate tiers as the power difference and nature of these spells are just simply put a tier apart but still casters that have reached said level can cast both almost effortlessly, they were called super tier spells and god tier spells, anyway casters are people who use the mana in their bodies to overide that in the atmosphere and and effectively take command of the forces of the universe via very specific commands called spells, even if you are at the tier and posses the mana if you don't know the spell you can't do anything at least at the lower levels, as you advance as a caster your personal mana and the universal mana become more and more intertwined allowing you probe it and gain certain information about the nature of what you're probing and use your own mana to influence it twisting its form in simple ways without the use of spells, like for example if you wanted to lift all the water in a lake rather than trying to maintain the float spell on what is actually billions of targets you can infuse your mana into the water, probe it for its properties and with ample understanding move it like it is in fact your own mana, hell this is how new spells are formed, in order to register as mercenary you have to be at least 5th tier, the reason i was being nearly mauled was because i could do both, i was a magis-sword an S-class one at that, in order to become S-class a warrior would need to achieve synchronisation and a caster grand cosmic awakening magis-swords are people who have walked the path of both and an S- class magis- sword had gone through the advancement in both areas manifesting ki as well as gaining access to the two new tier's of magic and that was what i had done, but it wasn't over yet, some people say it was a reward from the universal way for steadfastly walking on both paths which could be extremely difficult at times others say it's as a result of a person being extremely compatible with an aspect of nature but the truth is no one knows for sure but when one walks the path of a magis-sword mastering ki and spells they get a third awakening called and Arcanum.

They've been called many things a gods blessing, a will of the world, even the mark of godhood, not much is known about it but you can always count on two things you have to be a magis-sword to get it and it always fits the user, an Arcanum can be defined as an authority over a certain aspect of the universe it can be anything from elements like fire and water to concepts like time and binding, some are combative and some are not but one things for sure, if you have one you are eligible to hold the most important position in the world, the position of a Don, a Don is someone who rules somewhere in between a king and a god weilding more authority than the former and slightly less than the latter, Don can only be suppressed by another Don specifically the one whose number is less than his, there are 13 cities in the Dalharmac continent Trident being one of them and each city has 5 Don's and they all rank by strength the weakest being number 5 and the strongest being number 1 and in order to move up you have to defeat the one in front of you, if a battle between warriors can split mountains and magic casters can turn day to night and command the world to do their bidding how would a battle between being who can command forces of nature to the extent that they are mistaken as gods be like.

Anyway today i had a prior arrangement so i quickly extracted myself from the crowd before me and made my way to the counter where she was waiting, my childhood friend who worked the counter at the guild hall, i was 6 when i met her a lonely survivor but due to my upbringing knew how to handle myself in a fight so out of desperation i arrived here this very same guild hall looking for work where i met her, her parents ran the place being retired A-rank mercenaries before deciding to put down their weapons in order to raise their only daughter but unlike her parents who were quite skilled Lorain was only slightly more harmful than a mouse as she had no training in the arts, you see when here mother was younger she got involved in an accident where her womb was damaged in truth she was never suplosed to have children but Lorain was born nothenless just weaker than most and couldn't regulate mana flr any purposes as even magic casters had to have a certain physical level in case of backlash from a spell going wrong but her parents wouldn't let her take that risk.

When i first arrived in the guild hall everyone thought i there to beg for scraps but instead i walked straight up to the counter and asked how to made a mercenary, Lorain's mother was stunned to say the least but regained her composure instead replying by asking where my parents were i replied that they were dead and i had no time for patronising she thought to give me entrance exam and send me out after i failed telling me to come back when i was older but instead i passed with grades equal to a C-rank when i should have started off at E before she could refuse what she said i grabbed my card out of her hand and immediately marched up to the notice board looking for a quest that would pay enough to put food in my stomach and new clothes on my back but before i reached there someone pulled at the hem of my clothes, i intended to flip said person over my shoulder but before i could do so she spoke

"please don't go"

i turned around to see the most innocent blue eyes from a girl no older than me, i had met a lot of people some even younger than me but never once had i seen someone who didn't have at least one negative feeling show up in their eyes, even children would look at the world negatively depending on what was in their view, many had seen my as nothing more than an opportunity some with disgust at my appearance but only her had nothing but concern in her eyes as she said the words

"even some of the older uncles come back injured when they go, i know you're strong but please don't"

with tears threatening to break out of her eyes she said those words to me.

That day i went, not on a solo quest but as a porter to a responsible veteran who Lorain's parents introduced me to and when i came back deep into yhr night she was there wide awake and waiting for me, even though she had no reason to she had decided to worry about me a boy she know nothing about, a boy who had lost everything and didn't even get to see it happen, an odd friendship was born between the most cheerful girl in the world and the boy who only seemed to find true happiness when he was with her and that friendship carried on till this day as i said tje words

"good morning Lorain"

with an actual smile in my face and as she replied her voice was drowned out by the opening of the guild doors as wide as possible by one man as we and the rest of the people here saw him their smiles died.