By the time the sun began to dip below the horizon, the Great Kira Forest had already plunged into a deep, claustrophobic twilight.
The massive canopy overhead completely blocked out the fading light, leaving them to navigate by the encroaching shadows.
"Okay, let's camp here tonight," Lucas announced, his voice cutting through the eerie, rustling sounds that were beginning to echo through the deep woods.
Roya let out a massive sigh of relief, dropping her heavy bag near the roots of a giant, twisted oak tree. She collapsed onto the soft moss, massaging her aching shoulders while Lucas effortlessly gathered dry wood and sparked a small campfire.
The moon soon rose, casting thin, silver beams through the branches. The crackle of the fire was the only comfort against the bizarre clicks, howls, and shifting sounds of the nocturnal forest.
They sat opposite each other, eating their dinner in silence. Roya chewed on some tough dried fruit and stale bread, while Lucas polished off his own rations.
Once she had finished, Roya wiped her hands, took a deep breath, and shifted so she was sitting formally on her knees.
"Mr. Lucas," she called out, her voice steady. "I have something to ask of you."
Lucas looked up, his cheeks still stuffed with bread. He swallowed heavily, raising an eyebrow. "What?"
Roya bowed her head deeply, pressing her hands to her knees. "Please teach me how to fight. I want to become strong. Strong enough to protect myself, and the people I care about."
Lucas stared at her. His face remained completely blank, not a single trace of interest in his eyes.
"Forget it," he said blatantly, leaning back against a log. "No way."
Roya froze. She had expected him to reject her initial request, but the sheer, immediate bluntness of it still stung. She lifted her head. "Why?! I'll do whatever you want, just please teach me!" She bowed her head again, holding the position.
Time passed. Only the crackle of the fire filled the silence.
Eventually, Lucas casually brushed the crumbs off his lap, stretched his arms, and lay down on his side, turning his back to her.
"Keep watch," he muttered lazily. "I'll be taking a nap."
Roya stayed bowed for another solid minute. Then, she heard it.
Snore.
(He fell asleep! He seriously just went to sleep!)
Her hands squeezed into tight fists, trembling with a mix of anger and sheer embarrassment. She completely abandoned her formal posture, marching over to him and grabbing his shoulder, shaking him frantically.
"Hey! Wake up! At least tell me why you won't teach me! It's not like teaching me harms you in any way!"
Lucas, who wasn't actually asleep, swatted her hands away with an annoyed groan. "Hey, stop doing that."
Roya let go, huffing in frustration. She sat down just a few feet away, turning her back to him and crossing her arms. "Grumpy, stuck-up bast—" she whispered bitterly to herself.
"I can still hear you," Lucas cut her off smoothly.
He let out a long, heavy sigh and sat up, rubbing the back of his neck. "Listen. Aether is completely unique to every individual. You can't just copy someone else's style and hope to get better.
My Aether is suited for a blade. Yours is suited for whatever you do. I can't teach you my style." He paused, leaning his chin on his hand. "And I'm also way too lazy to teach someone."
(I knew it. That second reason is definitely the primary one,) Roya thought dryly.
But as she sat there, his first point echoed in her mind. Aether is unique to everyone.
Her shoulders slumped. (I guess he's right. He uses his Aether to empower his sword and move blindingly fast. I've only ever used mine to mend skin and heal people. Does this mean I can never become strong? Am I just stuck being a burden?)
A dark cloud of comical depression seemed to hang right over her head as she stared miserably into the dirt.
Lucas watched her sulk from the corner of his eye. He groaned, running a hand through his messy blue hair.
"Okay, okay," he grumbled, sounding incredibly put-upon. "I can teach you some of the absolute basics, I guess. The foundational control is pretty similar for everyone."
Roya's head snapped up. The dark cloud vanished instantly, replaced by a beaming smile. "Really?! I will be eternally grateful for your benevolence, O Mighty Azure Dragon!"
"Shut up or I won't teach you," Lucas threatened flatly.
"Okay!" Roya said cheerfully, maintaining her wide smile. She quickly crawled over to her bedroll near the tree, perfectly content to go to sleep.
Dawn broke over the Kira Forest.
Roya woke up early, her body buzzing with anticipation. By the time Lucas slowly sat up and stretched, she had already set up a small cooking pot over the rekindled fire, boiling a fragrant, hot porridge using the dried herbs and grains from Bael.
"Food is ready," she announced brightly. "Freshen up and eat."
Lucas walked over to a nearby stream, pulling out a few of the Gin leaves Roya had brought from Oakhaven. He popped them in his mouth, chewing on the leaves to let the sharp, minty taste naturally clean his teeth. When he returned, she handed him a warm wooden bowl.
He took a bite. He paused, blinking in surprise.
(This is incredibly good,) Lucas thought, taking another, faster bite. (I didn't know she could actually cook like this. I could get used to this.)
He glanced up from his bowl. Roya was sitting just a few feet away, her chin resting in her hands, looking at him with a very sweet, expectant smile. "Hey, eat up so we can start!"
Lucas felt a sudden, unexpected warmth hit his chest. He immediately looked away, a faint, flustered pink dusting his ears, and focused entirely on aggressively eating his porridge.
Once the bowls were cleared, they stood in a small clearing near the camp.
"Alright," Lucas began, his professional demeanor returning. "Have you ever even tried to use your Aether as a weapon?"
"No," Roya admitted. "But I have used it directly inside of people through physical contact."
Lucas raised an eyebrow. "How?"
Roya tilted her head, tapping her chin as she slipped into her clinical mindset. "Well, usually I mold my Aether into tiny, microscopic threads.
I send them through the skin, navigating around the muscle fibers so I can stitch broken veins back together, or sometimes I use the threads to choke off blood flow to a specific artery so the patient doesn't bleed out during surgery."
Lucas stared at her. The mental image of invisible, microscopic magical threads crawling into his veins and choking his arteries made him highly uncomfortable.
"Okay, okay, I get the gist of it," he cut her off, clearing his throat. "Well... looks like I won't have to teach you basic Aether control.
If you can manipulate your energy that precisely inside a human body without accidentally exploding their arm, it means you have an unimaginably high level of control. Even I can't do something that delicate."
Roya blinked in surprise. "Is that true? But my dad always said doctors in the capital could perform such medical surgeries with ease. The way he wrote about it in his diary, it seemed pretty common."
Lucas slapped a hand to his forehead, letting out a heavy sigh. "Are you and your dad living in a dream world? Nothing about what you just described is common.
Healing a kid's broken leg in seconds without medicine? That type of miracle can only be done by the highest, most elite Aether users in the kingdom. There are only a handful of people in any nation who can do what you do. Keep that in mind."
Roya's eyes widened. She had always thought of herself as a simple village doctor.
"Now," Lucas continued, drawing his sword and flipping it to hold the blade. He offered her the jeweled hilt. "Let's start by having you pour your Aether into an object."
Roya grabbed the hilt. The sword immediately dragged her arms down; it was incredibly heavy. She squeezed her eyes shut, trying to coat the blade in her dark Aether. A faint, wobbly aura appeared around the steel, but it was jagged and weak.
"This won't work," Lucas observed, taking the heavy sword back. "You have no affinity for a blade. Use an object you are completely familiar with."
(An object I am familiar with?) Roya thought.
She reached into her pouch and pulled out one of her long, silver medical needles. She pinched it between her fingers and focused.
Instantly, a sharp, dense, dark layer of Aether wrapped perfectly around the tiny needle. It hummed with contained energy.
"Hmm. That works," Lucas noted, crossing his arms. "But how are you supposed to fight with that tiny thing? You'd have to get right up in a beast's face. Try scaling up. Move to a dagger, then a short sword. Eventually, you might be able to use a real weapon.
" He sighed, turning away. "I told you I wouldn't be a good teacher. Keep practicing. I'm going to go catch us some real food."
As Lucas disappeared into the brush, Roya stood alone, staring at the glowing needle in her hand.
She walked up to a tree and slashed at the bark. The Aether-coated needle carved into the wood easily, leaving deep gashes. But she frowned, lowering her arm.
(This would be amazing if I was an assassin creeping up on someone in their sleep,) she thought in frustration. (But I'm not. If a wild beast charges me, they will kill me long before I ever get close enough to stab them with this.)
She sighed, sitting down on a log. She twirled the needle between her fingers.
Then, something clicked in her mind.
(Wait. What if I throw it?)
She stood up, taking aim at a tree twenty feet away, and threw the needle like a dart. It bounced harmlessly off the bark and fell into the grass.
(No, just throwing it normally isn't enough. I need speed. I need to pour in as much Aether as I can, and instead of just throwing it with my arm... what if I launch it using an Aether burst?)
For the next few hours, Roya experimented. She managed to pour a massive amount of dense, violent Aether into a single needle, making it vibrate violently in her hand. But whenever she tried to throw it, the connection to her core snapped, and the Aether dissipated before it hit the target.
(I'm doing something wrong,) she thought, wiping sweat from her brow. (I'm trying to hold onto the Aether while I throw it. But it's a projectile. I need to detach the Aether from my body entirely and use it like an explosion to launch the metal.)
She picked up the needle, taking a deep breath. She closed her eyes.
She funneled a massive, dangerous amount of her dark energy straight into her right hand. The Aether condensed, becoming incredibly thick and heavy around the tiny silver point. She didn't hold onto the energy. Instead, she let it build to a critical mass at her fingertips.
She aimed at the thickest tree in the clearing.
(Burst!)
BOOM!
The sound was like a cannon firing. The recoil threw Roya onto her back, her hand stinging wildly.
Almost immediately, an immense, suffocating pressure slammed into her mind. Her head throbbed with a sharp, blinding ache. It wasn't that she had run out of Aether—she still had plenty—but the sheer, violent strain of forcing out so much dense energy in a single, explosive burst was too much for her body to casually handle.
A few hundred yards away, Lucas heard the massive explosion. His eyes widened, and he instantly dropped the rabbit he was carrying, sprinting back toward the camp at blinding speed.
When he broke through the brush, his hand was already on his sword. But he froze.
Roya was sitting in the dirt, clutching her throbbing head, wincing from the pain. Yet, she was staring straight ahead, looking completely stunned.
Lucas followed her gaze. Fifty feet away, a massive, ancient oak tree stood with a perfectly round, fist-sized hole blasted cleanly through its dead center. Thick white smoke was pouring out of the shattered wood.
Lucas slowly turned his head to look at her. "Did... did you do that?"
Roya looked up at him, rubbing her temples. A mix of absolute worry and massive excitement plastered her face. "I... I guess? Yes! Yes, I finally did it!"
Lucas leaned back against a nearby tree, letting out a long, exhausted breath. (Haa... this girl is going to be a problem.)
By evening, the fire was roaring again.
Lucas sat near the flames, carefully grilling the rabbit he had retrieved. Roya sat nearby, watching the meat sizzle while trying to ignore the lingering dull ache in her head.
"Mr. Lucas," she asked, tilting her head. "Rabbits are usually white or brown, right? Why is that one blue?"
Lucas didn't look up from turning the skewer. "Does this forest seem normal to you? Anyway, you had blue chickens back in your kingdom. Why do you care what color the rabbit is?"
Roya thought back to her life in Romero. "I guess so."
Lucas pulled the meat away from the fire, handing her a portion. "Take a rest after you eat. You did great today."
Roya's eyes instantly lit up. A smug, teasing grin spread across her face. "Oh my! Praise from the great Azure Dragon himself? How will I ever—"
"Shut up and go to sleep," Lucas interrupted, glaring at her. "Or I won't protect you from those legged snakes tonight."
Roya froze mid-bite. "What snakes?"
Lucas took a bite of his food. "Well, you were asleep, so you wouldn't know. But yesterday night, a massive twelve-legged snake crawled down from that exact tree you're sitting against. If I didn't deal with it, you would be dead right now."
Roya scrambled away from the tree trunk, looking wildly up into the dark branches. "First of all, why does a snake have legs?! Is that a wild beast too?! And why didn't you tell me this morning?!"
Lucas smirked faintly, leaning his head back against his log and closing his eyes to the warmth of the fire.
"Get some rest, Roya," he said quietly.
"Tomorrow, we will finally reach the Kingdom of Vael."