The next morning the City awoke to a surprise, the Lord had appointed the Mage who had appeared yesterday as the ‘Novatus Mage’ giving him an official title and status.
Although the news was somewhat surprising to the general populace, they didn’t place too much importance on it, they simply saw it as a fortunate thing that Novatus now had a Mage looking over it.
Who this news truly effected however, were the forces hiding in the darkness that were tasked with spying on Alexander for their masters, by the end of the day the news had spread to various factions all over the Kingdom alongside reports of the battle that had occurred in the night inside the mansion.
Caspian wasn’t too concerned about these forces in the dark, he could guess that they would place more emphasis on his appearance now and would try to investigate his origins but, what was there to investigate? What could they find out about a man that had never existed in the world before yesterday?
He chuckled at the thought of the informants struggling in vain to please their masters only to discover that their efforts were futile to begin with.
Alexander, although hungover from drinking during the night, was clear about his new role – he had turned into no more than a puppet for Caspian to use for his own gain.
From him Caspian was able to learn several things about the world around him, much more than he was able to gather from the books he had already read.
The people of this Kingdom called the world ‘Lilifeld’ after the Goddess of Creation, the main religion of their Kingdom, he discovered that the Kingdom he was residing in was called Syvfed and was established by William Syvfed over a thousand years prior with his lineage still being the ruling family to this day establishing a lasting dynasty.
The other two Kingdoms were called Oxtile and Westhorn respectively, Alexander knew too little about them to know how their cultures differed from his own but he did know that Oxtile was currently going through its own civil war as the people called for the disbandment of the ruling party in favour of a governing council.
It was rumoured that Westhorn and initiated this by establishing the rebellion themselves although in an official capacity they continued to deny it, Alexander suspected that this was just a rumour created by the Oxtile nobles to place the blame of a civil war on anyone but themselves as he’d personally witnessed how far they placed themselves above the commoners of their own country.
He also learned that there existed a free-land in the middle of the continent referred to as Imperium where the Mage Academies resided, this land was ruled by no country or king but all three Kingdoms kept a respectful distance away from it so that they didn’t anger the so-called ‘Beyond’ Realm Powerhouses.
From what little Alexander had heard from Dennison and what the System suggested it seemed that the ‘Beyond’ Realm was what they called people who had broken through the final limit of either the High Mage Realm or Knight Lord Realm and reached a higher-level of existence; but, because of how difficult it was to ascend to the realm there were only rumoured to be a handful in existence today.
The existence of a higher, albeit restricted, realm placed more placed more pressure on Caspian but he forced himself to remain calm; there were most likely less than a dozen people at that level in this world, the chances of him running into one this early were basically nigh-impossible.
“Do you know anything more about Imperium?” He asked while sitting at the table eating breakfast, Alexander was on the opposite side reservedly sipping from a cup of tea as he avoided eye-contact.
At his question his calm demeanour shook slightly as his hand trembled slightly, “Dennison knew far more but never told me for my own safety.” He mumbled; Caspian could see the pain in his eyes as he recalled that his trusted butler was no longer in this world.
Caspian pretended he had never asked as he continued to eat the porridge and fruit that had been provided for him. “Is there somewhere I can acquire a map of the continent?” He asked another question after a minute of awkward silence had passed.
Alexander thought for a moment before nodding, “Dennison should have had one, the Mages are the only group of people who have the ability to explore the world so freely.”
“Perfect, fetch it for me later.” Caspian said casually as he finished the last of the porridge and devoured the last grape. “One of my guards here,” He said motioning to a lanky figure covered in heavy black robes behind him, “Will be responsible for your safety, he will also kill you if you try to betray me. Do we have an understanding?”
The robed figure were obviously the Demons, he had acquired some robes to cover their bodies and faces so that he could move with them in public. Although their hulking figures might cause some alarm it wasn’t so outlandish for ‘men’ their size to exist, he wouldn’t risk frightening people.
Alexander nodded, he couldn’t help but shiver as he stared at the robed ‘man’ or if that thing was even a ‘man’ to begin with he didn’t know. He had seen the hideous deformed creature beneath them, and he was certain that if his death was left to such a creature it would be far more painful than anything he could imagine.
“What… what do you intend to do?” Alexander asked slowly, he knew absolutely nothing about the man before him. He was weak and yet far more dangerous than anyone he had ever met before, then there were the strange creatures that followed him like pets submitting to his every whim.
With just the few of them they could easily take over or destroy the city and yet he had no intention of doing so, he simply wanted status which Alexander had already given to him in ways of a title.
Caspian simply smiled as he got up from his chair, wiping his mouth with a cloth, “I don’t know yet.”
‘Whether you believe that or not…’ Caspian shook his head, internally he had already decided to head towards Imperium, but he didn’t have the strength or means for such a journey just yet.
“Oh right,” He suddenly remembered something as he looked at Alexander, “Do you have any Knight training methods?”
…
Caspian was sitting on a chair reading through the manual Alexander had provided for him, it was called the ‘Orville Knight Manual’, a very apt name considering it was used by members of the Orville family and given to guards who showed potential.
Alexander wasn’t very talented and was only barely at the peak of the Knight Apprentice Realm.
As to why Caspian had asked for it? That was fairly simple, he had questioned the system earlier and learnt that he could gain power through the standard methods as well as the Apocalypse Store, it was even to the extent that if he truly understood a skill without the use of the Apocalypse Store then he could combine his knowledge with the store to create new skills in the future.
Thus, he was notified of a new option becoming available in the Apocalypse Store, a so called ‘hidden function.’
[Skill Fusion]
It cost him nothing to use but it could only be used to combine skills recognised by the System as having learnt meaning he couldn’t simply understand the knowledge but also had to master it before he could combine it.
It took him an hour to finish going through the technique manual before he grasped the general concept, the training it describes was somewhat similar to the training he had seen Knights in his previous world go through however the manual described a meditation technique to circulate the innate mana a person was born with to strengthen the body.
Naturally, those who had more mana would progress faster. This would have made it a perfect technique for dual practice for a Mage however it was discovered that the Mana Circles that determine the tier and realm of a Mage would become unstable if they started to strengthen their body.
According to the System he wouldn’t experience a deviation like that because his ability to spell-cast was optimised by the system, if he was able to find a Mage Meditation Technique in the future the System guaranteed that there would be no conflict between the two.
Caspian ordered a servant to bring him a wooden sword to practice with, he held it firmly and began to go through the motions statically as he recalled them.
He would spend a few moments on every position to reinforce what it felt like in his mind before moving on to the next.
Half an hour passed before he finally finished his first cycle of the technique, the next step would be to increase the speed at which he performed the movements; he made several mistakes at first but after a few hours of practice he gradually grew comfortable to a speed where he only stayed in a single stance for a second before alternating to the next.
Although at first the movements felt useless and more cumbersome as he gripped the wooden sword after the first few rounds, he discovered that every inch of his body was being worked out simultaneously by following the technique.
Even his wrists that were holding the swords were beginning to grow numb because he’d held it for so long.
He didn’t feel fatigue but instead pain, as if his muscles were growing each time, slowly yet surely. ‘Can my muscles even grow?’ He questioned the system; he was only practicing the stances of the technique to familiarise himself with the sword because he hadn’t expected that he’d be able to perform a workout.
[Despite your preconceptions, your body is anatomically human. The Black-Marble can replicate any living substance that the Host desires because it itself is a living organism, as the System has stated before that you are simply no longer human in the traditional sense of the word but you possess a human body; in simple terms, your body is no different than any other humans other than that some physical limitations will not impact you]
Caspian didn’t question it or retort, he simply nodded and continued silently thinking that it was foolish of him to believe marble capable of turning into a living being was just rock to begin with. It was just another reminder that he was truly inexperienced about the rest of the Universe.
Thanks for the chapter
Rest well author san