I left the big tree where Cheif Mirodar's office was as I gathered and organised my thoughts.

The thing I was going to start with was probably the easiest one to explain and understand, the demons, their different abilities and their bloodlines. As I had already seen first-hand, the demons as a whole race weren't the same. The demons were more like one race that had many subspecies under it, and every one of those subspecies had its special abilities. Just like how the Fiyavtics had strong bodies and astonishing regenerative powers, the kallas their ability to connect with each other, and the royal family, Rioal, their fire manipulating powers. That was easy to understand, so I moved to the next point as I made my way toward one of the bridges connecting the big trees.

The other thing that the demons had for themselves was bloodlines, some of the demons had special bloodlines that set them aside even among members of their own subspecies. For demons, bloodlines were a matter of utmost importance, a bloodline meant the difference between a commoner and a noble in their caste. 

A bloodline was a mutation that occurred in an individual, and either due to natural means or careful breeding, it became a permanent feature of said individual's offsprings. For example, my personal bodyguard, Deraan was a bloodline holder. He was part of the Bjorn noble family, their bloodline made them even stronger than the usual fiyavtic in all aspects, and even though most commoners thought that that was it, that wasn't all it did, the bloodline even gave them the ability to enter a certain berserk state where they would get even stronger still.

Some even said that the royal family's fire manipulation ability was a bloodline of some kind, that the Rioal made sure to kill the main bloodline when they became strong enough, and that that was why the Rioal were as rare as they were.

The demons were quite simple in terms of how they got their abilities and it was quite easy to explain and go through, unlike the elves and the humans and their powers. I stopped my wandering thoughts as I studied the bridge under my feet, it seemed to be made of intertwined branches, ones that were still alive, with flowers blooming here and there and fruits popping up from time to time, I took in the beautiful sight as my mind started working again.

The humans, of course, had their Inheritances. Inheritances were tools that manifest when a human interacts with an Ancestral Ore, those tools can be anything, they can be a sword, a bow, a needle, a ball, a pen and even a bed, if you can think of it, there's a chance that it's out there. Each of those tools and equipment would have one or more special abilities to them, and on more occasions than not, they would also enhance their users in certain aspects. Each person can only have one Inheritance at a time, there were no stories about anyone having more than one at all.

I didn't know what affected what type of inheritance one would get because Dorian hadn't gone through the ceremony of getting one yet, but I heard that it didn't really have anything to do with what your deepest desires are, instead, it was linked to what is most suited for you, sometimes someone would want a sword but they would get a hoe, instances like that were more common than not. Interacting with an Ancestral Ore wasn't the only way to get an Inheritance though, that was because they could be, well, inherited. And that could be done in more ways than one.

One of the most common ways an Inheritance could be passed on to another person was, through selection, not by the user, but by the Inheritance. Usually, when the user dies the Inheritance would be ownerless and people could aim to connect with it. That didn't mean that the first person to try would get it though, Inheritances were the ones with the final say in the matter, and they were known for being picky, especially strong ones, some strong Inheritances had been ownerless for hundreds of years, collecting dust in some noble's vault.

Another way someone would get an Inheritance was by getting it from the original owner, and actually, that was the reason they were called Inheritances in the first place. This method was more demanding than the earlier one and it took much longer to work safely. For this method to work, the user should be 100% willing, there shouldn't be any doubt in their heart or something bad would happen as the Inheritance could react badly to the receiver.

The first step in this method was for the user to get a baby or a child no older than 5 years old and will them to be their inheritor, doing that, the inheritor would receive what could be seen as a seed, a seed that would bloom fully when the original user dies, giving the new inheritor full control of the Inheritance. Before that though, the inheritor would only be able to use a fraction of the Inheritance's power.

This might seem too much work, why not just wait for the original user to die before getting it normally, but it had some great advantages, the first and most minor of which was having two people use the same Inheritance, no matter how weak the second user's control over it is. The second reason was how you didn't need to wait for the Inheritance to choose a user, it would be usable by the inheritor as soon as the original user dies, this would make sure that some important and strong Inheritances are never not active. Finally, the third reason, and the reason most people went with this method, was how if done at a young enough age and for a long enough time, the Inheritance would affect the Inheritor and their body, making them much more suitable to wield it when the time comes for them to inherit it. In this case, the inheritor is always stronger than the original user, with greater control over the Inheritance and stronger compatibility with it.

I remember that I had heard from somewhere that if this method is used, the inheritor would have a personality that matches their Inheritance, I wasn't sure how that was, and what it meant, but I could guess.

That was mostly what Dorian knew about Inheritances, I was probably forgetting some things, and there most likely were some other points that were kept from the commoners that Dorian didn't know at all, but that was for later, I was almost sure that in the next few days, I would get my chance to choose an Inheritance, with the war coming and what not, the town would need all fighters it could, and I was old enough to get an Inheritance.

Even though I said that was all I knew about Inheritances, that was for them as tools. Inheritances in the humans' society had an important position, just like how bloodlines were for the demons. Like I said before, once someone gets a strong enough Inheritance, usually a martial one but not always, they would get sent to the noble governing their city to get a family name before getting sent to spend time in the army, if they then did well in the army the family name they got would be recognized by the kingdom and they would become true nobles, usually just a Knight, but that title can grow. There are a lot of noble houses that are built on a single strong Inheritance.

Speaking of that, nobles can choose to either use the same family name they had when they were young, continuing under the family's banner and holding its name even without being the Inheritance's holders, or get a new family name for themselves when they get a strong enough Inheritance. That second one would mean that they are cutting ties with their old family and that they are leaving the family to try and grow on their own, few nobles ever try that as it was quite a gamble, but some who didn't have good standings in their houses or had no hope of being chosen for any important positions in the family would take this step.

I guess that that might have been the reason Bruce decided to work with the demons, Sir William Longspear had already chosen his eldest son as the inheritor, and Bruce's own Inheritance wasn't that strong, giving him no hope of making a name for himself on his own. I still couldn't accept what he had done though, he sold his whole town for selfish reasons, such a person didn't deserve any pity. I threw that out of my mind, Bruce was done for and I didn't need to worry about what would happen to him next, it was out of my hands.

I took a deep breath as I turned my eyes mentally to the meditating Zagmuz's side when I started thinking about the elves and their Elemental Magic.