Chapter 91

Cara came back down the same dangerous path, she made sure to not look down on the way back. She reached the hall and entered.

"Did you find it?" Elder Shadow asked.

"Yes, Elder, the blade was halfway in," she said bowing.

"Hmm, that's good, not much time left then," muttered the elder. 

"Good work, Cara, let's see about your question then, well the answer is the path that you follow, no matter how much good it is, it eventually becomes too small, and it isn't a big secret you will figure it out eventually yourself, once you progress from silver to gold," he said.

"But then that means we'll need to learn other paths, but that's forbidden," she said.

"Learning a new path isn't always the answer, you will just be repeating the story from another point of view, what you need to do is expand your vision and perspective, it requires you to take drastic steps in your life, if your parents were serious about becoming high Jades, they wouldn't have had kids, which Elder do you know of who has a family, and if some have they have abandoned them in the search of more power, but do not take me wrong, this is not their strength, but their weakness that they can't set themselves free if they have someone to look after, it is just more difficult that way, what you need to do, is start making your own path from that point on," said Elder Shadow quickly in one sentence.

Cara heard everything and she understood the words, but she wasn't sure she understood the deeper meaning behind them yet. 

"Go away now child, If I have to attend tomorrow's festival, I need to finish my meditation," said Elder Shadow. Cara bowed and left the hall. She locked the doors and hurried back down with empty buckets in hand. 

"You took your time, you must have been slow, well it isn't easy to climb so many stairs with that much weight," said Rit. 

Cara nodded and rushed off back down to her home, she was hungry and tired, she needed to eat something and then get a good night's sleep for tomorrow. Now the fight itself seemed like a small part of a much bigger day. She reached her house and grabbed something from the kitchen and ran to her room. 

She ate quickly and changed into loose clothes and picked a scroll from her bag. They had all been given one from the school when they had turned eighteen. It had some of the basic forms for fighting and their first step towards conditioning their minds and body to advance to the next level. She hadn't practiced them with her hammer yet. She was sure Roisin and the others had done it plenty of times. She let the last of her energy drain into training the forms so that when she finally hit the sack she didn't have any left to worry about tomorrow. 

Ash's recovery had been going well for the last two days, the training with Lufina was similar to Sasha's only she was a bit more physical with him when he got the forms wrong, he wasn't training with his sword anymore but a much heavier wooden training sword which was a little too big for him. His arms got tired way too quickly just holding the sword. After the morning training, he would have lunch in the rider's mess. There Ciara or Brea would be there to keep him company. 

"Listen some of my friends have been forcing me to introduce them to you, I promise they will be absolutely civil," said Ciara the first afternoon. Ash was too busy trying to eat his food with the big spoons without dropping it especially with his sore arms to disagree. Ciara waved a hand and suddenly three women were at their table, one right beside him and two across. 

"This is Ronda and Nora," Ciara introduced the ones sitting across from him. They were both big like Ciara and had a wild look to them, which he had started associating with the riders. 

"And this is Amelia," Ash turned to the amazon who had sat beside him, Amelia had her hair tied in a long braid, and she had a band over her forehead which had some writing on it. She had similar bands on her forearms too. Amelia did stand out a little from the others with the way she was dressed, her physique was also a little different, her legs were very long and muscular. 

"Amelia is an archer," said Ciara.

"It is not easy to shoot an arrow from atop a griffin and hit your mark, she is also very adept in a spear," said Ciara. 

"I have a friend who is also an archer," Ash said remembering Ron, Amelia's one leg probably weighed equal to Ron. The griffins truly were powerful creatures to fly so fast with the amazons on them. 

"Nice to meet you, Ash Blake," said Amelia turning towards him and giving a slow bow. He could tell that she was a shy type, he hadn't met one Amazon like that, Rebecca wasn't shy she just was pissed all the time, which had been getting better lately as she got used to having him around. 

"Praise about our abilities too Ciara," Ronda said from across.

"Ronda has the biggest mouth in all the raiders, Nora has the record in getting punished by Captain the most, and they are both decent with the Gada," said Ciara.

"What's Gada?" Ash asked.

"It's a weapon," said Ciara.

"Oh, that big round hammer kind of thing I saw some of you carrying around?" asked Ash.

"yes, if you are curious, I can show you it some time, you swing it like a hammer and thrust it like a spear or can even throw it," said Nora.

"yeah, and then you can show us your Gada," said Ronda and everyone around the table laughed except Amelia and Ciara who was shaking her head. 

Ash was again reminded of a group of human men in a bar hitting on a waitress. After lunch, it was time for his afternoon session which was more fun because it was about magical training. The Amazon usually had affinities like earth, forests, water, wind, and fire. Earth and Forests which were much rarer but found sometimes in elves, even rarer in humans were the most common ones in Amazons and they trained their afinites like their bodies, until the breaking point. Ash had to abandon his sword again and try to start using his body to hold electricity, his first task was blasting away rocks thrown at him with bolts of lightning thrown from his hands. It was really difficult he had to build up mana fast, then hold it in his hand while it was in electric form, and then aim it at the rocks, this whole process took him minutes to complete, and the rocks were coming at him within seconds. 

Every bolt he produced felt like he had just run a mile. After the sun finally set he went to the scared waters, the favorite part of his day, he had now found out, that not everyone was allowed to take a dip in them and not every day. 

"It will soften your body too much, you shouldn't rely on help all the time, be ready for everything, and it is a gift by our goddess we mustn't misuse it," Lufina had said. 

Only the amazons who had done intense training and were allowed by a healer like Lira could take a dip, or a high ranking official or some other special reason. Ash obviously liked it, surrounded by naked amazons while all the tiredness from his body was washed away. It was even more exciting watching amazons who he now knew by their names naked. Lufina was there with him and so was Brea who had apparently asked special permission from Lufina. Then he would go back to the house he was staying in. Staying with Celia and Rebecca was a double-edged sword. He was going crazy watching Celia prancing around in enticing clothes with her big tits and ass. Rebecca had started getting better around him but he was sure she wouldn't like it if she found him doing anything with Celia. 

"Welcome back, Ash," Celia greeted him, as he entered the living room. Ash nodded and went back to his room to change and rest and do some reading. Celia came into his room after some time while he was lying on the bed. She was wearing a very thin dress with a lot of straps, her large boobs were pushing to burst out.

"I thought I would take your dirty clothes," she said. Ash pointed at his clothes from today which had indeed gotten very dirty in the training. Celia sat down on the bed beside him.

"What are you reading?" she asked.

"It's a book, my mentor gave me," he said not looking at her.

"What's it about?" she asked.

"It's about all the other kingdoms, how they work and how they fight and everything else," he said. 

Celia didn't say anything, Ash looked over the book and saw that she was again intently staring at his crotch.

"Do you need something?" he asked. 

She hadn't realized he was now looking at her so she kept staring at his dick and said no. Ash now aware of her stare and looking at her long cleavage couldn't help but get hard, a bulge started forming in his pajamas which kept getting higher. Celia was taken aback, she was blushing slightly as she looked up and saw him watching her.