Jack Riven—
"I know I skipped my daughter and all her kids to make you heir... but really? A three-year-old already classified at the Unbound rank?? Hell, kid, how'd you get so much insight from waddling about and shooting your friends in boredom—not just going from Dormant to Awoken, but from Awoken to Unbound?"
"I don't know. I just do what I feel," I said, staring at my dumbfounded grandfather.
The woman beside him, a young research assistant in the Riven clan named Sarah, was equally dumbfounded after reading my mana readings. Grandad had taught me that sorcerers like us weren't classified per se, but more so lumped together based on the concentration and purity of our mana outputs. We could get stronger through insight.
Each of us—from me to my parents to Mrs. Smith, who was an old lady living in our domain and gave me sweets when my mum wasn't looking—were born with a technique etched into our souls. It was influenced by several factors, such as lineage and the shape of the soul. A technique was the truest form of a person. Their technique was them, and them was their technique. However, this technique was rudimentary and primitive at first and would grow and evolve with the person as they experienced life.
My technique allowed me to feel all the space around me and manipulate it however I wanted. Initially, that was simply like making mini attraction and repulsion forces, but now I could harden my mana and shape it. I was able to progress not just the quality but also the range of my skill. My recent breakthrough allowed me to manipulate subatomic particles—or whatever Grandad called it—and ignite that matter or freeze it, essentially changing its state from liquid to gas to plasma. I was smarter than most thanks to my education, but I just nodded when Grandad told me these words, pretending to follow along. All I knew was that I could now make fire, ice, lightning out of thin air, control gravity as well as mini black holes that I thought resembled a hoover or the opposite, like an anti-hoover.
'Would the mundane think I'm a god?'
"Kid, what have I told you about just acting purely on instinct? At least try to understand how ridiculous the things you're doing are."
Suddenly, the shadows surrounding Grandad surged and moved toward his hand. They began taking the shape of a pure black spear of darkness.
"See. I wield darkness, but that's extended to shadows as I got older, so even in this daylight beaming down on us, I have more resources than I could ever need. Hell I can make it out of nothing, just pull it from then space around us."
He raised the spear and pointed it toward the ground, displaying the power and grace of the pinnacle of our people.
"This arena and this domain are mine. They will be yours one day. So work hard, but enjoy it too. I've seen far too many insidious, twisted techniques from people who suffer their way through life."
As he spoke, I glanced around at the familiar arena of our home—a gigantic flat plane of stone by the shore, with a big mountain to my right that looked like some deity had carved a perfect rectangle out of it from top to bottom—the Gate of Heaven—with steps leading up to the opening. The rest of the arena was open at the sides, opening out to the ocean. To my left was our castle, our stronghold, our ancestral home: Zymora.
Big towers made from stone reached up from the ground like a giant's hand reaching into the sky, interconnected with pathways. Some of the towers even floated. Mum said it was like a big city spiral staircase. All its rooms and halls were gigantic, with big intricate arches and huge windows. The castle was adorned with draconic imagery, space imagery, and an abundance of magical artifacts that did who knows what. Sometimes I'd try to shoot them with my mana when flying through the halls, but the retainers of our clan used to get really grumpy. At least my friends found it fun. When they were here, we'd spend our days training with Grandad and my parents or flying through the castle playing catch the fireball. The amount of fancy stone things I've destroyed can't be counted. It's fine though because the castle's interior is so massive I tend to only damage a small part at a time. Apart from that one time I made Grandad's throne implode, and all the windows in the throne room joined it in the implosion. They were ugly anyway.
As I finished glancing around, I looked Grandad in the eyes. There was a subtle hint of something—something I was sure I could see only because of my special eyes.
Sadness?
I ignored it for now, knowing he'd refuse to tell me even if I pressed him.
So I picked up my hands and began preparing for our final duel of the day. This time, I swear I'll land a hit on the old man, even if it means levelling a 1000-meter radius again.