Battlefield

When Amelia and Mark's soul stopped teleporting, they found that they were at a battlefield. They studied the battlefield farther and noticed how strange it was. The sky appeared to be normal, a light blue in color with the sun brightly shining down. The ground, however, was not so normal.

Pillars of rock ranging from small to large dotted the battlefield. The smallest of such pillars were only a few centimeters in diameter and no taller than half a meter, while the biggest one in their site was several meters wide. Each one was unique, too. Some were different colors, others different shapes. Red, blue, green, and every color in between could be seen. Their shapes could be spiky, smooth, dented, or even strangely bent.

The biggest one in Mark and Amelia's site was the most peculiar. It's shape didn't remain constant. It was either shrinking, growing, or changing in some way, it never stopped. All of this was especially strange when they thought that all of these pillars were rocks.

Taking into account all of their strange properties, they began to doubt them being rock. After all, when was the last they had seen a rock spout lightning upon being hit? Taking hold on their observation of the strange pillars, the beings traveling around and in between them were familiar.

They had seen many of them before they had gone to Mark's dimension. The most abundant of which were of the four main races, humans, plants, gods, and demons.

'Why are they here?' Amelia thought. She said to Mark through their soul, 'Isn't this supposed to be Novus?'

'I don't know. We didn't learn anything about what Novus was like before we came here, so there's no way I would now whether we are there or not. However, there are definitely people from your dimension here,' he motioned towards the different races casting spells.

'Pass, do you know what's happening here,' Mark asked.

[This isn't your original dimension, and nor is it Amelia's. This seems to be something else, but I can't decide exactly what without more information] Answered Pass.

'So maybe our souls were taken to the battlefield of the Tournament of Races,' he suggested as he and Amelia started to walk towards the nearest protrusion coming out of the ground.

'That could be. The people from your dimension probably have their soul teleported here when they touch the strange stone, leading to them calling it Novus,' Amelia added on her own theory to Mark's suggestion.

They reached the closest protrusion, a pillar of brown rock, rather normal when compared to all of the other pillars surrounding them. No one had interrupted them thus far, clearly focused on fighting off the hoards of beasts that were coming from the direction opposite of where Amelia and Mark had went.

Amelia stretched out her hand, witch hadn't changed even though it was only her soul here, and touched the small pillar. Nothing happened. She tapped it, tried to pull it out of the ground, kick it, and push it over. Again, nothing happened. She wasn't angry over that, maybe slightly annoyed when she compared it to all the strange effects the other pillars were causing when the people fighting beast hit them, but not angry. At least, she told herself that, but Mark thought that she seemed to be rather pissed at the pillar.

She gathered Mana into her fist, noting that she could not only still do that with only a soul, but that it was also much easier than she could last remember, and she punched her flame clad fist into the pillar.

Instead of breaking like she had hoped it would, it did something unexpected. Rock, or whatever material the pillar was made out of, grew from where she had hit the small pillar. It looked like a mineral had spontaneously crystallized, forming a crystal bump on the pillar. She waited for something else to happen, but nothing. The crystal remained, but nothing else happened.

Mark calmed her down and moved her away from the pillar, bringing her to a different one.

"Calm down Amelia, it's just a pillar," he told her.

"I pillar that I want to smash to smithereens, but whatever. I think I know what these pillars do," she said back.

"Tell me then," Mark said.

"From what I can see, they should take in Mana and convert it into a certain property, and then release it. That pillar," she pointed at her new found nemesis, "turned the Mana I used on my fist into earth attributed Mana and released it, forming a crystal."

"That's interesting, but not what I'm most interested in. I want to know how we make our Soul Avatars stronger here. Do we just train like normal, which would be difficult since we're on a battlefield, or is there another way?" Said Mark.

"I don't know about that," spoke Amelia, "but I do know that we should join those people slaying the beast."

"Why?" Mark asked.

"Well, if we go back to my dimension, we will be placed based on points, which is determined by the number of beast we kill. They should have some good rewards for placing high, and we might find a way for our avatars to grow stronger while we fight," she suggested.

"You just want to release your anger from that pillar, but okay. Your logic makes sense. We should also try and learn about this place while we're at it. I think it's strange for the battleground for the Tournament of Races and Novus to be the same place," Mark said, adding on to their list of things to do.

"Okay, okay. Enough talking. I'm itching to fight after all of that training we went through," Amelia said in anticipation and eagerness. 'And I'll finally be able to fight with you and not against you,' she added in her mind, intentionally keeping it to herself so that Mark wouldn't hear.

Mark had similar thoughts as Amelia. Being around her made him act differently, one difference being him wanting to show off. He wanted to show the results of their training, and he wanted Amelia to think that he was cool while he did it. Only then would he feel like the training was worth, unlike before when he had the mindset to do something just for survival.

Amelia didn't wait for Mark and took off towards the monster-like beast, traveling faster than she ever had before as she weaved between the pillars. Mark followed behind her, applying Mana to his legs just as Amelia was, which they learned through practice that it greatly enhanced their speed.

Though, Amelia could naturally travel faster than Mark because that was what her fighting style demanded, but she made sure not to go outside of Mark's attack range so that he could guard her from afar.

Amelia went for a stray beasts first to test her power. Charging Mana into her fist with instinct level fluidity, fire burst from her fist and out towards the beast that was ten meters away from her. The burst of fire collided with the beast and exploded. The explosion caused the beast to separate into chunks of flesh, blood, and bones that landed on surrounding pillars. The pillars activated and each emitted their own aura of Mana that further destroyed the poor beast.

"Wow! That was easy. The beast looked like it should be at least a rank 2, so I put about fifty percent of my all into that attack, but to think that it would explode into pieces," Amelia said in wonder as she paused her sprint towards the other beast to wait for Mark.

"Judging by its aura, it should be a rank 2, but you're just too strong," teased Mark.

[Collecting remanent soul energy]

[Collected soul energy]

[Calculating energy in numerical value…]

[131 soul energy]