Guardian

Pef flew into town on scaly wings and hot air. The town was very impressed.

People stared and bowed, like a minor divinity was crossing the sky.

Soon, he saw the stone quarters and loitered for a while, waiting for the air to cool.

As he descended, his Nascent soul marked the auras of note, another gold one, a dozen white.

At 40 meters altitude, the glove stored the airship, and Pef fell to a perfect landing.

A muscled man with a Spirit rank and a huge bone hammer looked down as Pef extracted his face from the ground.

"Are you a midget of sorts?" he asked in a booming voice.

"No sir. Pef Xi, age 13." Pef answered while spitting gravel and cursing the glove.

"New in town, are you?" the hammer guy asked rhetorically. A crowd was forming at some distance, hoping for a smackdown.

"Just landed. Got any advice what house can I buy? A stone one if possible..."

"Hmm. For now, you'll stay with me. There's a water mage with her core shattered, you can buy her house after she dies. That witch takes a long time to die" the man explained as he turned and walked away, his hammer folding to disappear into his palm.

'I think I'm under house arrest' Pef muttered with a sigh.

'Keeping you out of trouble, perhaps. Get him to hit you though'

'I don't think that's going to be a problem'

"Hurry up midget!" the man yelled while waving the crowd away.

Pef ran after his new guardian, observing him for clues. Brown hair, black eyes, looked about thirty, which meant some 300. Nascent rank breastplate, made of bone and leather. White aura, and a storage ring on his hand. Plus a Spirit rank himself.

Okay, guy was a powerhouse, for this continent. Likely the town sheriff too.

They walked for a few minutes until they reached a walled off garden, guarded by a dozen men with bows, and another man with a white aura, a Core rank and a bone spear.

'Hmm. This must be the deputy. And the flunkies'

"Hey Chief, is this the snake man?" the deputy asked with some confusion.

"Yeah, a Xi youngling. They always fly around, you know..." the man replied with a hand wave.

The flunkies bowed with awe. The deputy nodded a bit uncertain.

As they passed the gate, Pef noticed huge training grounds, where hundreds of men Practiced skills, from riding to archery and fighting.

t's a mini Legion!' the glove exclaimed with glee.

'No. It is the local chapter house for the Legion now. They just don't know yet' Pef mused, checking the auras for potential recruits. Only another white.

It seemed high-powered auras were still rare, even in this untapped world.

"These are the Lacrimosa Guardians. But you're too strong to train with them, Nascent rank I believe?" the Chief spoke softly, as Pef has stopped to stare.

"Yes sir. About half to Spirit rank" Pef admitted at once, turning towards his new boss.

"Think you can take a hit from me?" the man asked jokingly.

"From the hammer, sure. Maybe one soul strike as well..." the hero spoke unthinking.

He soon regretted it, as the hammer caught him in the chest, and blew him a hundred meters in a tangle of limbs. Pef picked himself up, coughing a bit, and dusted the new gravel from his hair.

"Good, good. You're durable, I like that. Now let's test the..." the Chief boomed from behind him.

Pef blacked out, again. Almost there, but not yet.

He woke up later, his Core leathers missing and instead dressed in a brown tunic of some vegetable matter. A woman with a kind face was gently wiping his face with a cold sponge.

"Ah, you've recovered already! It takes a week for the best Nascent guardians..."

"How long it took me?" Pef wondered with a blink.

"Maybe 6 hours? You're very strong, young man"

"Name's Pef, Pef Xi" he answered as he patted his chest. There was still a bruise there, but almost healed.

"Mia. And I think half the town knows by now who you are. You made quite an entrance. Face first, as they say" she joked with a wry smile.

"So, you're staying here too?" Pef inquired while checking his new room.

Kinda spartan, only bare stone walls, and a tiny wooden dresser in a corner. Plus the bed he already knew.

"Well... I'm Mia Quing" the woman explained a bit confused.

"Family?" Pef asked in a flash of inspiration, after noting the white aura.

"Smart too. Come, dad will want to check on you" the woman replied with a faint smile, and left the room on graceful steps.

A minute later, they reached a dinning hall, where the chief and deputy were wolfing down half a pig. The other half remained yet untouched, possibly for him.

"You two eat, then we talk" the boss ordered pointing at the roasted pig.

Amazingly, between the two of them, a hundred kilograms of delicious meat was barely enough.

How can I eat this much?' Pef wondered patting his stomach. There wasn't that much room

in there, as even a quarter of a pig massed as much as Pef at this age.

'Magic beast. Your Core absorbs most of it' the glove replied with an artificial shrug.

'Oh, that's why the manual says to eat everything I can'

The glove didn't answer. The Manual was sacred. Of course, it was right.

"So, young Pef. Where are your parents? Why are you here, instead of Blue Xi?" Boss Quing asked after a long silence.

"Mom's dead. Dad has left at least 12 years ago, I don't remember him. He only left me the glove" Pef explained while holding up his magic glove.

"Ah, the fabled orange Xi glove. The wearer grows a hundred times faster, then dies foolishly battling an Emperor or something" The man replied with a head shake.

"Yea, I killed an Earth ranked beast soon after I formed my Core" the boy explained with a shamed voice.

"Not with your strength you didn't" the deputy intervened and got smacked by his boss, getting knocked out.

Mia glanced at the fainted body with a pained look.

"A trap of some kind, eh?" the Chief mused thoughtful, as he examined Pef like merchandise.

"Exactly sir. A deadly trap. Muscles won't help against stronger foes"

"How long you plan to stay here, in Lacrimosa?" he asked Pef with a long stare.

"Till my Spirit rank, sir. About 2 years, I guess"

The woman beside him coughed in surprise, but the boss was not impressed.

"You have anything of value? And not the flying skin." the chief asked while looking over the young hero with discerning eyes. Like appraising a horse, or something.

"I have metal items, sir. Mirror, cup, dagger. And some smith skills" Pef answered, placing some copper artifacts on the table.

"Yes, I've heard of Lady Lin's new hobby. So this is the fabled metal..." the Chief said with a frown, while examining the dagger with his soul.

Mia had confiscated the mirror, and was busy grooming herself in delight.

"Anything else?" The man demanded after failing to cut himself with the feeble copper dagger.

"Yes, in fact. Copper can be used as currency. We just need to establish a bank, where people can exchange copper bars and plates with rice bags. The city will flourish as miners and farmers compete to produce more, then smiths can appear to smelt copper, and thus more artifacts like mirrors and cups and water pipes..."

"Ah, the normal people you mean. But traders will need armed escorts, to reach far cities.

I see. You want to enlarge the Guardians, to the whole continent?" the Chief wondered, tilting his head curious.

"If I can find some Nascent or Spirit snakes, I could build huge airships, able to cross the continent in a month. And carry people and goods. Storage rings would make trade easier..."Pef argued with a distant look.

He imagined the sky full of thousands of zeppelins, on a planet in the neolithic. Well, copper age now, if barely.

"Hmpf. Good luck with that. I have one ring, and Oracle Ching has the other. Unless you become a Sky smith, there won't be more on the continent" the man snorted, and tapped his ring proudly.

"If I may, sir? Perhaps it can be copied?" Pef asked in a flash.

"Why not? All smiths have tried..." Chief Quing said with an amused voice, flinging the ring at his chest.

Pef was thrown a few meters til he crashed into the wall behind him, the ring embedded in his skin.

'Glove? Any scans?'

'Opening pocket dimensions requires enough qi energy to bend gravity. Same as unaided flight. You would need a Sky rank, Aspirant'

Pef studied the ring for a minute before hanging his head.

"I need a Sky rank" he admitted in shame.

"At least you didn't burst a vein trying to force it. Oracle Ching told me that ring is heavier than a mountain. Just, not in this world" the Guardian's leader said with some wonder.

"Oracle Ching is correct. I should visit him" Pef said with a smile.

"She is waiting for you, next week. After you fight in the Clans Tournament and win"

the man said with a crocked smile.

"Under 15 of something?" Pef asked with a smile.

"Under 25. None of them have their Core anyway"

"Oh. Okay then. Beating people up is easy" Pef proclaimed heroically.

"I know" The Spirit ranked Chief agreed, as he extracted his hammer from the ring.

Pef gulped, as he prepared to get beaten.

Time flew by, as Pef slowly organized the bank, and got to meet the local clans. He won the tournament with ease, and gained some fame.

His soul grew even stronger, and soon he stopped fainting from one soul strike.

Oracle Ching was almost 600 years old, and her time was soon to end, despite her golden aura.

Then one day, as he was having tea with the old sage, she dropped her cup in shock.

"Firestorm and iceberg" she muttered while her hands flailed about. She fainted a few seconds later, under the strain of her vision.

'Our target has died. We need to extract the arrow' the glove demanded in a forceful tone.

'Oh. That's great!'

'Scanning for suitable targets in range. Sky ranked target located 1200 kilometers south-east, on top a floating ice island. Numerous Earth targets around as well'

Pef rushed out, guided by the glove, and sped towards his new house.

He had already bought the house with a precious copper cup, now he just needed to intercept the body before it was burned.

As he stormed in, a familiar scene was revealed. A group of locals were dragging the dead woman out, no doubt attempting a grave robbery.

"Drop the body now and leave my house!" he yelled with a qi infused voice.

"It's the Xi boy..." one of the men exclaimed and ran off.

"I'm not dying for some dead witch body!" another one cried and ran away.

However, the rest drew clubs and daggers, preparing to defend the precious loot.

'Incoming, wait for now, Aspirant' the glove whispered as Pef drew his elbow back.

A few seconds later, Chief Quing skidded to a stop next to Pef.

"Robbers? In my town?" the man boomed as his hammer spun out of the ring and into his hand.

The men dropped to their knees in defeat. They might have chanced something with a small boy, but the Guardian was known to have massacred thousands of bandits by himself.

"Mercy great sage!" a few of them cried, already trembling.

"Who paid you to steal the body?" Pef asked in a soft voice.

"Ah, some merchant, at the Agate Wine tavern..." a mousy fellow confessed as his urine dripped on the ground.

"Stay here boy. This is a death cult, not some regular thieves" the Chief demanded as he grabbed the traitor and sped away.

Pef looked after the afterimages left behind by the speeding Guardian.

A second later, a club hit the back of head with a bonky sound.

Pef turned around and smiled. "You will die last" he told the assailant who was staring at his broken club in amazement.

A minute later, the new sapphire was extracted, and Pef was piling up wood for a pyre, by emptying his glove compartment.

A dozen bodies were thrown on top, including the poor woman with a shattered core.

By the time the Chief returned, he could only wring the necks of his prisoners and throw them atop of the huge pyre.

"You move fast boy. I like that" The Guardian commented watching the flames.

"You're still much faster Chief. I have yet to reach you."

"And you still have a big mouth, Pef. Bah. I need to beat up someone!" Chief Quing exclaimed, with a certain target in mind.

"Not today Chief. I need to throw this far at sea, or the city will burn in a firestorm. That's what the old Oracle said" Pef exclaimed holding the bloody sapphire up to see.

"Gods. This death cult must have some... You go fly away then, my boy. Try not to die yet, my girl likes you." he muttered with a heavy sigh, then turned to leave.

Pef stared at his large back, carrying the city on his shoulders.

'A brave man, Guardian Quing. But only a leaf in the wind, against a god.' The glove mused with some wisdom.

'Let's go catch a fish, and then find our target, clock is ticking.' Pef answered, focused on his next rank.

'You haven't invented the clock yet, Aspirant.'

'We'll need zinc to make brass. Then I can build a clock' Pef said with a hand wave, while more Guardians arrived to watch the pyre.

"Make sure the fire doesn't spread." Pef asked the deputy.

"Yes sir. That's part of the job." the man replied with a bit more respect.

He got beat up a few times, but now the pecking order was clear.

Pef smiled sad and ran off, heading for the sea.

One fish later, and the airship rose in sky, braving the sea and all the monsters below.

Days flew by, and the weather got worse and colder.

The serpent ship creaked and groaned under the strong winds, while Pef had to stay awake and pilot manually, changing altitudes for favorable winds.

On the eighth day, a large ice shelf was visible on the horizon, and the temperature dropped below zero.

'Our target is that wounded Ice King Morse. Get ready to throw the fish bait!' the glove yelled in his mind.

'Okay, just say...'

'Now!'

Pef launched the big tuna like a dart, aiming for the enormous Morse below. Its tusks were 10 meters tall, and Pef wondered what had been brave enough to fight it in melee.

Then, he banked the airship, aiming for opposing winds a thousand meter higher.

'We have a problem...'

'What?'

'The Morse is too weak to eat the fish...'

'Oh, we can't escape the detonation radius now...' Pef realized with a start.

'Land and recover the fish. And the tusks.'

'But, the saphire nuke?' Pef asked.

'Just throw it in the ocean. There's a dozen Earth rank beasts, just under the ice'

And such, Pef got to kill his first Sky rank, in melee.

Wasn't much of a fight, as he simply dug himself through the eye of the immobile beast, and into the brain. It was a bit of hard work, since even the eye was very durable.

After that he stored the whole body too, as Sky ranked materials were unheard-of, on his continent.

Also, a hundred tons of ice, which was precious too, for different reasons.

The Legion method only pushed him into the Spirit rank, and half to Earth rank, as it wasn't much of a fight, simply ending a dying beast.

The next day, the iceberg blew up in a spectacular explosion, forming a pillar of water and ice kilometers high.

His rank grew again, almost to the peak of Spirit rank.

As the airship headed back to Lacrimosa, Pef realized he was probably the strongest man on the continent already, and he was only 14.