Chapter 20: The 12 Masters of the Forest
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When Luke started to read "Introduction to Magical Energies," he thought he at least knew the basics, but boy was he wrong. Once Luke dove into the first chapter called "Magical Energies: What are they?" It took Luke a full hour just to read the first page due to how complicated it was: "Magical energies are the very foundations of the universe; without them, everything wouldn't exist. There are many different forms of magical energies, all having different effects, with a few including, the most common, the five elements: fire, water, earth, metal, and wood, excelling at manipulating the five elements, and the more rare elements, darkness and light, being on the opposite side of the same coin, as one can't exist without the other. Depending on the magical language used, the effectiveness and effect of the magical energy might change, like light energy used to summon an undead. Some different planes of existence have higher concentrations of certain magical energies, while others don't have certain magical energies…"

All this information was new to Luke; he was finally starting to grow in much-needed knowledge. The joy Luke felt from learning about the very nature of magical energies couldn't be described in words, but along with the joy came headache after headache from overworking his brain. Luke knew that the overuse of his mind palace came with disadvantages due to his spiritual strength being too weak to fully use the abilities coming along with the core being fused to the mind palace and the core itself being almost destroyed. The strain on Luke's brain started to become painful, throb after throb, until it reached a point where Luke couldn't bear it anymore and had to leave the mind palace. Luke had only gotten through half the book before his head started to pound nonstop, but the knowledge he learned from just half was immense. Luke wanted to know just how much knowledge those higher-tier books must have; he couldn't wait to get his hands on them. Using his newfound knowledge of magical energies, Luke started to gather the small bits of life energy around him in the cell and absorb them into his physique to strengthen his body. This was an incredibly painful process, but Luke was used to pain at this point after his awakening. Opening his eyes, Luke saw one of those beings standing right in front of him with a curious look. "You never cease to amaze us; we had all thought you wouldn't bring any more surprises, but it looks like we were wrong." Luke heard the being say in a low and crazed tone, "All the more reason we should dissect and study you." Luke didn't know whether the being knew if he heard or not, or if it would even care with how powerless Luke was. The being then spoke in a harsh tone, "Now come along with me, everyone would like to meet you." Luke's stomach started to turn, and his surroundings changed, but Luke was too busy puking his guts out from the spatial shift. Once Luke emptied his guts, he noticed that the surroundings changed, and in front of him, there were 12 seats, each one holding their own unique aura.

Every seat was taken except the second seat, which belonged to the being who brought Luke along. The being in the first seat stood up and spoke, "Welcome to the abyssal forest, little one. May I ask what you are doing with her.. Wait a moment, pardon my manner, and let me introduce everyone to you. The being sitting in the 12th seat is Lizandra, a vampire who ranks last out of us all." Lizandra interrupted, almost jumping out of her seat. "How dare you say that! No one in here is stronger than me." The being whispered to Luke, "As you can see, they are very proud and will do anything for strength." The being in the first seat then apologized, "I'm sorry, little one, that was going too far." Everyone started to talk about themselves not caring about Luke anymore besides the 2nd seat until then being in the first seat spoke up, silencing everyone. "Silence, seeing as how no one is interested in this half-abyssal anymore, I'll take him." Almost instantly, you could see the being in the 2nd seat, bloodshot, ready to murder someone. It was giving off massive amounts of kill intent, but one look from the being in the 1st seat was all it took for the 2nd seat to retract their kill intent almost as fast as they let it out. After getting embarrassed by the first seat, the being in the second seat used his spatial shift to disappear from the meeting room. Slowly, every other Master of the Forest started to exit, with the first seat being the last to leave with Luke. The being in the first seat cast a spell,

 

" qv jkty wevztdfgw terejhfc, hsz zvhjvfgw msevhfc,

 

es v ivugjm mhtvj, tvh msemtejkw mramyvhfc.

 

qhesz ctz'w yvfg, tvh whsmjkvvhv ivjy,

 

mhti xhvdf cvuy, tvh temvcy jkvjfg."

 

Behind the being in the first seat appeared a glowing blue circle with intricate patterns in the middle, and Luke had no clue what they meant. Luke was starting to get sick of not understanding the spells and what they did. His curiosity was getting the better of him. Luke asked, against his better judgment, "What is that behind you? What are the patterns in the middle?" The being answered, "It is the magic spell Blind Gods Eyes used to block off all vision of the area. I wanted to make sure we could talk by ourselves. As for the patterns, it's too soon for you to be asking that." Luke was visibly upset at learning he couldn't ask about the patterns. The being smiled, letting out a chuckle, and spoke, "Before I tell you anything else, I'm going to tell you why I seem to care about you so much. I used to be a human just like you, and then I got involved in the magical world and transformed into this an unimaginable amount of years ago. Now I just go by The Master. I'm only telling you this because I'm going to be the only one on your side, as all the other beings want to use you for experiments even if they all left like they were disinterested." Luke didn't know how to react to the fact that he might be used for an experiment, and he didn't want to find out what that meant and that The Master had used to be a human. Luke had thought that no other humans knew about the magical world, but it looked like he was wrong.

Continuing where he left off The Master started to explain everything about the other Master of the Forest: "The 12th seat is held by Lizandra, who is a vampire who specializes in manipulating life energy, more specifically the blood aspect of it. She isn't strong by my standard, but if she can capture you, good luck getting out and not becoming a blood bank for her due to your rare blood." Luke interrupted and asked, "What do you mean rare blood?" The Master responded in reply, "Your half-abyssal blood is rare and used in a lot of rituals as an ingredient." Luke wasn't shocked at the grim reality of the magical world after experiencing what he had. The Master keeps explaining the different Master of the forest: "The 11th seat is held by a shadow slave of all things. This shadow slave isn't anything like a normal one due to it keeping its sentience after transforming. The shadow slave doesn't have a name and is referred to as the 11th. It specializes in using dark energy, more specifically the shadow aspect. It usually stays to itself and probably won't mess with you." Luke was amazed that a shadow slave was that strong and held a seat. Continuing his explanation, The Master skipped 10 through 4, which Luke thought was strange, so he asked, "Why aren't you saying anything about 4 to 10?" The Master then explained, "All of them aren't in the forest at this time; they were projections at the meeting. I'll explain about them when they come back." Luke found this even more odd, but he didn't say anything this time. The Master started to talk about the third seat. "The third seat is a little odd; she is a shadow dryad. She was born from the very tree surrounding us. She ranks just below me in strength, tied with the 2nd seat. She uses life and dark energy, more specifically the shadow aspect of darkness. She wants your very being to be used to nature her shadow plants, as your body is very nutrient-rich due to the purity of your energy because of your race." Now onto the one Luke had been waiting for. Once Luke had prepared enough to take this being out, he would, after how he treated him. The Master explained all he knew about the 2nd seat: "Not much is known about the 2nd seat, not even by me. What I do know is that he manipulates space with spatial energy, a rare energy that not many can use. This grants him almost invulnerability; if it wasn't for me being here, he would be 1st seat."

The Master was hesitating. After an intense internal debate, The Master decided to tell Luke one thing about himself: "Now the first seat being, me, is the strongest due to my ability to manipulate chaos and order energy after many years of study. That's all I will tell you about myself. Luke didn't understand at the time how impressive chaos and order energy were, with them ranking in the top levels of magical energies. The Master gave Luke an amulet and explained, "This will protect you from one attack." And then he left. Luke was grateful but suspected something was afoot. Not being able to do anything about it, Luke went to find somewhere to stay.

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