Essence Awakening

The Essence Awakening Ceremony is conducted once a child is admitted into Dawn Academy but the Ashthorne's would do it privately beforehand in order to prepare them earlier but also as a public demonstration for the up and coming Awakened talents of the new generation within the family.

All the elders slowly packed away into the sidelines of the courtyard, leaving only the dozen or so children in front of Duke Ashthorne that were waiting to conduct their Essence Awakening.

Even the Awakened elders were nervously waiting for the results of their children's Essence Awakening as it would directly affect their future within the Ashthorne family. All they wanted was to make sure they maintain their position within the family and further solidify their strength. The best way to do this was to have strong heirs.

The dozen 12 year old children were ranging between 3 and a half to 4 feet tall, looking like a pack of penguins. Even with their short stature, they all extruded an aura of dignity characteristic of an Ashthorne. They all had an air of maturity surrounding them, showing they had a vast wealth of life experience despite their young ages.

They all gazed intensely at Duke Ashthorne, but they could not hide their nervousness as today would be the most important day of their life. They all had grown up being the talented children within their peers, displaying feats uncommon for children their age, but today would determine whether they could continue to raise their head high and stand proudly as an Ashthorne or if they would be cast aside, rotting in endless shame and misfortune.

Duke Ashthorne nodded in approval of the children's determination.

He looked at the two boys, Elias and Maxwell at the front of the crowd adorned in simple black garments and faintly smiled. 

Elias was a 12 year old boy around 3 feet 9 inches tall, on the taller side within the batch of children. He had innocent brown eyes matched with dark black and short hair.

I reciprocated his gaze and thought, 'Father thinks highly of me and Maxwell. I can't let him down.'

This interaction caught the attention the children, they all looked towards the two boys and instantly recognized who they were. They were the children with the highest status amongst them, they were twins known as Elias and Maxwell, sons of Duke Ashthorne.

They now realised why Duke Ashthorne paid special attention to these two children out of all dozen or so 12 year olds. Their eyes intensified with a new burning desire, clenching their small fists.

'So they're the ones my parents kept talking about. I wish to beat them!'

Similar thoughts raced in their head of the children, a short discussion followed amongst them.

A young girl with large, round glasses and green hair whispered, "Do you think the Duke would also pay attention to us if we show great potential?"

"Of course, just because they're the sons of the Duke doesn't mean they're the best out of us. We're just as good." replied one of the children.

A short brown haired child proudly said, "I've been training my body since birth to increase the size of my essence core just for this day, there's no way I'll let those two outshine me." This child was exceptionally large, with a height of 4 foot 7 inches which left him towering above the other children. His skin was slightly tanned causing the muscles on his arms and his board shoulders to be exquisitely defined.

Elias, the boy causing the disturbance sighed and ignored the provoking comments of the other children.

'I just want to prove myself to father, everything else means nothing to me.'

Elias ignoring them further annoyed the kids.

The slightly tanned, 4 foot 7 inch child grit his teeth and continued, "You brat, soon I'll show you the difference between me and you."

Duke Ashthorne silenced their commotion before Elias could reply and continued,

"I'm sure your parents have told you what's expected of you today, but I will give a quick explanation nonetheless."

He gestured towards his right as if he was asking for something.

Out of nowhere, black ethereal darkness essence started to twist and coil from the earth as if they were snakes listening to someone's command, creating a small circular pool of inky blackness on the ground.

The sudden change caused the air to become unnaturally chilly, spooking the children.

A figure started to manifest out of the darkness, forming the silhouette of the personal butler of Duke Ashthorne. He was dressed in black in contrast with his pale skin. His eyes glinted with a cold, enigmatic intelligence. 

The darkness slowly disappeared as if it were absorbed back into the earth and the air returned to its natural beauty.

The ring of the unknown butler lit up causing a large stone to manifest from thin air, seemingly coming from the sub dimensional space within the ring.

The stone was shaped as a block with both 10 metres in length and 10 metres in height, much larger than the children. It was slightly worn down perhaps due to the passing of time. If one paid attention, they would notice 8 different colours interwoven together forming a muddy, yet mystical hue.

He nodded towards Duke Ashthorne and instantly darkness twisted and covered his entire frame once again, disappearing from where he stood.

"This stone is known as an essence stone. It will be used to first awaken your essence and second to test the grade of your essence core. Once you place your hand on the essence stone, it will inject the 8 essences into your essence core located in your abdomen."

There were many different methods to awaken a persons essence. A persons essence can even awaken naturally, but the standardized way in the continent of Lumeria was to use essence stones.

Essence stones were born from mother nature. They were once ordinary rocks but over the passage of time the 8 essences slowly seeped into them. If enough essence builds up within these stones they will transform into essence stones.

Normally essence stones were the size of a palm. However, the one being used for the Essence Awakening Ceremony was just particularly large. Its price could only be imagined.

Essence stones weren't particularly rare, they were in fact commonly found all over Lumeria. Essence stones had infinite uses such as being used as daily currency or as a catalyst for creating Essence Treasures.

"Inside the inner space of your essence core you will be able to see the wisps of floating essence injected from the essence stone.

The colour of the wisps depends on the type of essence you have."

On the continent of Lumeria there were 8 types of essences.

They were - Lightning, Earth, Wind, Fire, Ice, Water, Light and finally Darkness.

Every being in the continent of Lumeria unlocks their essence and becomes an Awakened.

An Awakened possesses an essence that falls into one of these eight types.

Usually the best time to awaken an essence would be around 12 years of age where the essence core in the body was just large enough to handle essence. Of course there were exceptions - where existences would be able to awaken earlier, either naturally or not. These were people who no doubt would become stronger their peers.

The size of the essence core within a recently Awakened is similar in size to that of a fingernail. 

"I will be able to determine the grade of your essence core once you touch the essence stone."

An essence core has both a size and a grade.

The size of an essence core increases as an Awakened grows stronger. However, the grade of an essence core is near impossible to change.

There are known methods to change the grade of a essence core through Essence Treasures but they always come with negative side effects such as Essence Blockage or in the worst case lose the ability to use your essence.

Within Lumeria, the grade of the essence core correlates to the potential that an Awakened has. It is categorized into 5 grades.

They were - Bronze, Silver, Gold, Dark Gold and Violet Gold.

A higher the grade correlated to a higher the potential of an Awakened.

Awakening with a gold grade essence core was quite rare, approximately 1 in 30 people awaken with such an essence core. They were bound to go far as an Awakened and would bring pride to their families wherever they went.

Dark gold grade is even rarer with approximately 1 in 2000 people awakening one. These Awakened usually go far enough to be able to rule over entire territories and lead armies numbering the tens of thousands.

Regarding violet gold, you may not see a single one appearing for a couple decades within Dawnflame Kingdom. These belonged to the top tier powerhouses who were seen as invincible in the eyes of mortals.

An Awakened with a silver essence core can achieve twice the results with half the effort compared to an Awakened with a common bronze essence core. This has a snowballing effect and becomes even more significant further along on the path of an Awakened.

An Awakened could be stuck in the same tier for their entire lifetime no matter how hard they try just because they were born with a low grade essence core.

There was the possibility that an Awakened doesn't have an essence, even rarer than possessing a violet gold grade.

Despite its rarity, they were bound to live unfortunate lives.

They could not gather any essences and therefore could never even step into Tier 1 within their lifetime.

They were basically powerless mortals in a world where strength and their ability to wield essences mattered.

No one born within the Ashthorne family since its founding had become an Awakened without an essence.