Pain

Ella clutched the area around her wound. She began to breathe rapidly as her index finger neared it. Touching it, she felt a stingy and painful sensation, which made her unconsciously pull out her index finger.

"How did you get injured?" A voice asked.

The girl turned her head to the origin and saw a robed man watching her. The stares of the man seemed to have pure blankness, like of a dead person's.

"I didn't notice somebody was here. You know, you shouldn't startle people." Ella said.

The robed man examined her. Based on her voice and height, she was just a teenager.

"I got hit by a carriage. I was only grazed, tho." She replied to the question.

"Do you want me to heal it?" The robed man asked.

"What do you want in return?" Ella was frank with her question. "Everything's not free. Especially for you, who just appeared out of nowhere."

"I want a few droplets of your blood in return for healing the wound." The man replied.

"Is that all?" Ella raised her eyebrows in suspicion. It was rather questionable for somebody to request such a trivial price.

"What's in my blood? Is it magical?" Ella further raised questions.

"Yes." The man replied.

"I want a higher price." The girl demanded.

"I will give you gold coins." Replied the robed man.

Ella was unfazed by the offer and suggested, "How about something not about money?"

The man: "Why don't you want it?"

"It's just a piece of metal." She said while standing up, supporting herself with the wall.

"But it's money." The man stated. He took out a pouch full of gold coins from under his robes.

"If you are in the middle of a barren desert, if you get two choices and they are a cart of food and water or a pile of gold, what do you choose?" Ella asked.

"The pile of gold." The man said.

"Ehh, are you serious?" A look of surprise appeared on the girl's face. "Why?"

"My body has more than enough strength to survive for over a few months without food and water."

"That kind of question isn't suited for somebody like you." Ella said and pondered. A thought flickered in her mind and she asked, "You are stuck between two choices, and one of them will surely be gone if you chose the other. Which one do you choose to save, a baby or a chest of coins?"

"It depends, what will I get from saving the little boy? What is his background? His status? His wealth?" The man asked.

"You..." Now, Ella was thoroughly startled. "You can't even value life!"

"What is there to value, if you are not being valued?" The man replied blandly, "Everything's not free, remember?"

"Maybe you just can't feel you are being valued." She riposted.

A long pause came afterwards. It was an utter silence between the two.

"What do you want in exchange for a few drops of your blood?" The man asked the earlier question.

"Food." Ella replied.

"How much of it?"

"A basketful will do it."

...

Later, the man came back with a basket full of fruits and bread and placed it beside Ella.

"Just as agreed." The man said, "Your name is Ella. Where did you learn that philosophical thinking?"

"How did you know my name?" Ella asked cautiously while examining the basket.

"I heard your friend calling you by that name." Allen said.

"Oh. What philosophy?" The girl questioned.

"The questions you asked." He replied.

"Those? I have a teacher." Ella said.

***

"W-w-what are we d-doing here? There are s-s-so many p-p-p-people!!! Who knows w-what t-they might b-b-be carrying!?" Heigens nervously stated, holding tightly onto Chelsea's arm.

In a street filled with people, William, Chelsea and Heigens were walking their way through them. They were wearing blue robes, slightly hiding their eyes and most part of their bodies. As they travelled through the street, they saw many others who were dressed as discreetly as they do, and act as stable as their postures, well, except for themselves.

"I want t-t-to go back to the c-c-carriage with Frederick!" Heigens removed his grasp from her arm. Chelsea acted immediately and latched back to his arm, preventing him from getting away.

"Haist." She let out an annoyed sigh.

"We are almost there." William said.

A few more turns and they finally reached the front gate of a small villa.

"This is where we stayed, I think a year or two ago." Chelsea said. Heigens tried to squirm out of her grip, but it was too firm for him to even make a slight budge.

"Calm down. You are going to get us into trouble. Is that what you want?" Chelsea whispered threateningly.

"N-no!" Heigens quietly squealed into submission.

"Somebody's entering the villa." William said.

The other two silenced themselves down; observing the villa, they saw a person wearing a cloak, muttering something, on his way inside the gates.

"I hope Allen's not back yet." The person murmured to himself.

Of course, the cloaked person was none other than Edwin!"

"Excuse me, mister." William called from behind.

Edwin paused on his steps and turned around. He spotted three people wearing robes. One of them was shivering as if it's the middle of winter; another one, seemed to have armor under its robe; while the one who called seemed younger than the two of them.

"What is it, mister?" Edwin asked.

'He's younger than I thought, he seems as old as I am?' William inwardly speculated.

"We are here to bring back a book from the library of the villa. I have forgotten it a year ago." William stated his purpose.

'A book? Should I let them enter? Allen might get angry if I did.' Edwin inwardly asked himself, and added. 'Maybe I should, he never really gets angry anyway.'

"You can come in." Edwin opened the gate.

"Thank you." William expressed his thanks.

Then the group of three followed Edwin's lead. At some point, William asked with a very quiet voice, "Chelsea, how powerful is that person?"

"About as powerful as I am." Chelsea replied.

"As powerful as an adept? Can you sense how potent his mana is?" William asked.

Chelsea: "Not really sir, I can sense that his body is controlling both internal energy and mana at the same time."

A look of astonishment could be seen over William, "He can control both mana and internal energy? He's lucky that he didn't die."

Based on his research and knowledge, it was extremely dangerous for somebody to want to both utilize mana and internal energy. One's body could explode into gore if there was a slight miscalculation or move!

The benefits of becoming a controller of internal energy and mana was astronomical, however, becoming one also has an astronomical risk! It has a few to absolutely no chances of living at all!

In fact, it was akin to a suicide to the point that the government illegalized such practices.

"Should we report this to the government?" Chelsea whispered.

William went into deep thought and he replied, "No, whoever is this person's mentor should be powerful enough not to be easily meddled with."

"But sir, even wizards aren't able to guarantee their students' life during and after such transformation." Chelsea replied, "And he can become a valuable asset for the government too. Those other factions will surely want somebody like him."

"Let's be reserved about this first." William ended the conversation at once.

Moments later, placing his hands behind him, William gazed up the dimming sky. Stars showed themselves up as if plastered onto the heavens' nostalgic colors. The sight reminded him of the day when he last saw his older brother.

"Are you thinking of your brother again?" Chelsea broke his sea of thoughts.

"Yes." William muttered.

"You hate him, but at some point you miss him. What feeling is stronger, sir?" Chelsea asked, showing a caring smile. Serving as William's guard for years, she at most already knew a lot of his habits and common thoughts.

A feeling of emptiness welled up from his body, as if he had no body in the first place. "I wonder." He said, "How do we feel these kinds of feelings? These emotions? Its origin, how do we even have it?"

"My mentor told me it's because of very little living beings inside us. We are also made up of them too." Chelsea said.

"What your mentor taught you is far from what we scholars have observed." William stated. "The senior scholars hypothesized it is because of the energies around us. It is a type of energy that differs from mana and internal energy. They said that that energy compliments both mana and internal energy."

The both of them stared at each other's eyes for a while in silence, until they both laughed out loud, losing their solemnity.

"Ehem, let's be serious." William reorganized himself and his clothes and resumed walking with his hands behind him.

"Sir, speaking of practitioners that can control mana and internal energy at the same time, how are those people called?" Chelsea returned to the original topic.

""Gathian" for singular, "gāthian" for plural, but it is also acceptable nowadays "gathians" in plural form, Gonthian for objects that both have mana and internal energy. Complex and useless vocabularies coming from the very old times. Also, there's the...", William replied without leaving any information behind.

"Lastly, it's named after the first recorded person who can control mana and internal energy, Thian." The young Morgan finished his remarks.

'So I'm called a gathian?' Edwin overheard William's and Chelsea's conversation. Additionally, from his senses, he could determine the strength of the three visitors.

Other than the nobly and the nervous persons, the woman in the middle was the most dangerous. She was at least as powerful as he was!

But he wasn't afraid if this group of people would have hidden motives. The city had a powerful guard force and the first round of the contest should be done by now.

That monster would soon arrive.

They walked straight to the library. Wasting no time, William started to look for the book as soon as they arrived. Chelsea and Heigens also joined in the search, with the latter getting coerced by the former.

Edwin stood by the door and watched the three search for the book.

With the library's small size, the search ended without taking too much time.

"S-sir W-W-William, what is that b-b-book again?" Heigens asked and he looked on the lectern. He blew away the dust on it, most of which landed on his face.

"A-a-achoo!" Heigens stumbled back to a bookshelf and the dust coming from it fell down to him. "Ahhh! H-h-hazard!!! D-d-deadly hazard!!!" He panicked and ran out of the room, passing by Edwin.

"King Daniel II's Laws of Trigurniburg Kingdom!" William shouted.

"I d-d-didn't find that kind of b-b-book!" Heigens shouted from outside the room.

"I saw no trace of it too, sir." Chelsea added. "???", She grabbed out an amulet from inside her robes.

"Have you taken a book from here?" William asked Edwin.

"No." Edwin shook his head. Then he suddenly recalled that Allen read a book.

He was about to open his mouth when Chelsea said while keeping the amulet, "We should leave sir, Frederick's already contacting me through the communication amulet."

"Alright." William nodded and sighed, showing regret and disappointment on his face, "Looks like somebody else took it."

The bookshelves on the villa were already missing quite a couple of books. They looked like, as if, they were broken sets of teeth.

Also, who knows how many people rented this before the current ones did? There was a high chance that the preceding renters of the villa had taken the book.

Those were the thoughts inside William's head before saying to Edwin, "Thank you for letting us in, we will see ourselves out." They didn't stay for long and grabbed Heigens along the way in the corridor and left the villa.

By the villa's door, Edwin watched the three as their backs get smaller, "They are sure in a hurry."

"Who's in a hurry?"

The boy jumped backwards in fright and landed precisely on his back. If he was still a normal human, that landing would have been painful.

He looked by the side and spotted Allen also standing by the door, looking at him with his dead eyes.

"Oh, you're back!" Edwin stood up and greeted him as if the jump didn't happen.

"What are you doing?" Allen asked.

"I'm just... you know practicing a... a... an emergency dodge, yes! An emergency dodge! In case a horse tries to kick me." Edwin easily made up an excuse.

"Okay." Allen nodded and asked, "Where did those people come from?"

"You mean that group of robed people? I don't know, they asked me to take them to the villa's library to get something they forgot. I am sure they meant no harm at all." Edwin explained in full detail while looking towards the left.

"Who were they?" Allen questioned.

"I don't know, I didn't get to ask them." Edwin shrugged.

Allen didn't delve into the situation any longer. As long as the visitors didn't do anything major, he won't care even if they jumped out the window from the second floor.

"The sun is about to set. Go to the backyard and prepare for training." Allen said. Prior to the first round of the contest, Allen had also been training and helping Edwin become stronger not only in physical but also in mental and emotional aspects.

"I will!" With obvious excitement, Edwin ran to the backyard garden.

His body slanted a little on the way but he managed to grab hold onto a piece of furniture.

"Did you limp just now?" Allen asked.

"Yes. I got an injury from fighting. The opponent's style is so mesmerizing like real stars. It was so beautiful." Edwin recalled in his mind those attacks that he encountered.

Every time the opponent sent out an attack, it would always have a connection with the celestial bodies. It was a showy yet at the same time a deadly combo.

He was caught off guard many times even though he and the enemy had the same level of strength.

"I lost the fight. I would have won if I utilized my mana." Edwin gritted his teeth in anger as he remembered the ridiculing smirk of his opponent.

"Attacks relating to stars? Did you fight a woman?" Allen asked.

"Yes." Edwin became curious, "How did you know?"

"She must be from the Aeoshun Observatory." Allen said. "You go on to the backyard. I will have to do something first.

"Alright." Edwin went to the back of the villa.

When he exited the building, Allen turned his eyes to the gate of the villa.

Earlier, he teleported to the second floor of the villa after he left Ella. As soon as he arrived, he felt something prickly tearing his insides like the shears used to cut his skin open and remove his ribs.

It has been a long time since he felt that sensation. A sting long gone. Came with it were the many memories, he had long wanted to forget and have forgotten.

Along with it was a spark of emotion. It was only temporary, but was refreshing. The emotion was unlike what a Soul Shard could give; also temporary, yet limited. The latter was only a candle, in contrast, the former was a sun.

"It had something to do with those people."

***

Meanwhile, as William, Heigens and Chelsea returned to the carriage, they rode off at once.

On the coach's seat, Chelsea heaved a sigh of relief. The reason why she rushed William to leave was not just because of Frederick contacting them, but was because she had sensed a powerful fluctuation on the second floor.

She and Edwin were of the same level of strength, but her senses were greater than the boy's because he had only recently become this powerful and hasn't consolidated his power yet.

Suddenly, her hairs stood on their ends as a chill travelled all over her body. Like invisible eyes scanning her all over.

"Hiyah! Go faster!" She whipped the magical steed. The magical stallion responded accordingly and sped up.

The sun was nearly about to set. The lantern hung on the streets lit up. It was a very special occasion for Ryon City and lanterns were almost everywhere.

"No good!" Chelsea made inward curses. With these lighting up the road, she knew that they wouldn't be able to escape whoever was spying on them!

"This adept has good senses." Allen jumped up the rooftops without making any noise, gradually closing in onto the carriage.

"Hm? I can't sense anything inside it. The carriage must be built with special materials." Allen said with a different set of tone this time.

Getting closer to the carriage, a frenzied feeling washed over him. His eyes turned bloodshot, while his breathing intensified.

'I need to get whatever is in that carriage!' Allen decided.

He knew whatever inside that carriage was very important, either to a powerful private organization or the government because they were the only ones possible to get a hold of such materials to block his scanning. If he barged in without permission, he knew he would be hunted down like a criminal and could even implicate Edwin.

But in his mind, there was only one thing resonating with the desire that has once again risen after a long time.

Get whatever was in that carriage.

Even if it will cost the lives of the people around!

He took out his curved sword from the satchel and injected it with internal energy to the brim.