8 SS+ Potential? (1/2)
Hellen was delighted after Erika told her that Riwall had a grade 5 bless. No mother would not be happy at something like this. She knew that her son would be able to work safely inside the court of some lord or maybe even in the royal court.
When she approached him about helping in forming his mana-core, she was initially surprised by his refusal, but after he told her about how he could already feel mana without further stimulus, she thought it was related to another of the blesses's effects.
He diligently worked on forming his mana-core following Friday's guidance to the letter, and on his fifth anniversary, he had a clean as marble mana-core inside his brain.
Friday opted to form the core in his brain for two significant reasons: security and responsiveness. No one was usually able to change its brain without serious repercussions, so to think someone's magic-core was inside the head was an absurd thought, if the core is somehow damaged, the magic casting can become erratic or completely cease to be possible, by having his mana-core in an unexpected place, the only way of stopping his magic was to kill him. And by having it so close to his brain, there was no communication delay, cutting the already fast casting time even more.
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Another three years went by, the carving of the mana pathways took longer than anticipated, mostly to accommodate a false core Riwall created in his belly, this way he could eventually fool someone into thinking they managed to disable his mana core. The upside of so much time spent on the pathways was the fact that he leveled his first skill, |Mediation| all the way to level 15.
Riwall was ecstatic after Friday announced the end of both the mana pathways and the training. By now, his status page looked as follows:
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------Panel------
-Name: Riwall Madec
-Age: 8
-Level: 01 (0%)
-Mana purity: 100% (Prismatic)
-----BLESSINGS-----
---Temelth`s Blessing---
-Languages - MASTERED
-Unknown (locked)
-Unknown (locked)
-Unknown (locked)
-Unknown (locked)
-----ATTRIBUTES-----
--- Mental Attributes---
-Intelligence:10
-Wits:10
-Resolve:10
--- Physical Attributes---
-Strength:10
-Dexterity:10
-Stamina:10
--- Social Attributes---
-Presence:10
-Manipulation:10
-Composure:10
-----SKILLS-----
--- Mental Skills---
-Meditation: 15
--- Physical Skills---
-None
--- Social Skills---
-None
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”Mom! I finally finished making my mana-core!”
Hellen was so used to Riwall making impressive things, that she did not even take notice of how weird it was for someone to finish his mana-core without constant guidance.
Nevertheless, she stopped washing the dishes and inspected his body for any abnormality. By now his body may resemble that of an eight-year-old on the outside, but internally he was a beast, packed with extremely flexible and strong muscles.
She circled her mana through his body and saw that he not only finished his mana-core but also made an extremely efficient path for mana to flow. As blesses were rare and had bizarre and undocumented effects, she did not think much of this achievement.
”Congratulations sweetheart! Now you should be safe from all mana related sickness. Although you certainly took your time, most of the kids begin forming their mana-cores when they are five or six years old, while you started at three.”
”No worries, I just wanted to make sure I did everything right, so, when am I going to leave our house?”
”I will make arrangements with Erika and have her cover for me tomorrow, and then we will spend the whole day outside.”
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”YES, FINALLY!”
Hellen laughed at her son's enthusiasm. She knew he was way more mature than other kids, which should have made staying inside the house for eight years an uncomfortable experience.
The real reason for his resilience was that Friday could make simulations about anything to entertain him, from mundane things like a summer festival to grandiose stuff like fighting alone against demons. If not for that, Riwall would have certainly escaped the house after four years locked up.
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The village was by no means big or crowded, but it was bursting with activity. The houses were close to each other, and most were made of stone, it certainly had the medieval vibe that Riwall expected and it reminded him of many of the animes he watched when he was younger.
Hellen looked over to her son and was happy to see his eyes shining while looking at the village of Marsastor. She hoped that Riwall would opt for working as a crafter, provided she could find someone willing to take him as an apprentice. This trip to the town was not only to have him knowing his surroundings, but to get the Adventurer's Guild to evaluate him, and then bring him to masters of different crafts to see if one of them would accept him.
{Look at that Friday! A lizardmen!} He was looking at a 2 meter tall hunched blue humanoid creature with very prominent lizard characteristics, its entire head was that of a lizard, while the body was of a human, except that it was covered by tough and thorny scales. He was wearing heavy armor with a heavy fur coat to protect him from the cold, a very plain tower shield strapped on his back and a big sword by his side. He was talking to a human woman and had a very bizarre accent because of the format of his mouth.
[I saw] Friday said unenthusiastically.
{Wow! Look at that! there are all kinds of beastmen too!} Now he was pointing to a group of 3 beastmen talking by the road.
One was a gigantic 2,5 meter tall polar bear-men, his face was that of a bear, lacking the traces commonly seen on humanoid races like dwarves, elves, and humans, his body was bulky and covered in white fur and his posture was slightly hunched forward. He was boasting a flashy heavy armor and a huge hammer on its back.
The other two seemed to be a male and a female of the same species, they were a mix of lizards and humans, but their human side was much more prevalent than the lizardmen he saw before, they had a light green color, a straight posture, and bodies covered by spiked scales. They did not have a nose, only two slits. Their faces had some kind of bone that resembled a mask and gave them a fearsome appearance. Somehow they seemed even more dangerous than the lizardmen he saw before.
[Yeah yeah, I see it too] Friday was making it clear that she was not impressed by what she saw. AIs like her were created and programmed to develop with their hosts, at the start they would be mechanical in their behavior and make decisions solely based on numbers, but as their bond with the hosts deepened, they would develop their own personality in a way that would counterbalance the host's shortcomings.
Obviously they would never go against the hosts, but they would most definitely not indulge them in their bursts of excitement. They were there to bring psychological stability and push their humans forward in all their skills, Riwall knew that he could count on Friday being the voice of reason when he was too emotional or provoking when he hesitates.
Riwall's attention, that was focused on the multitude of different humanoid species, got captured by an astounding building they saw when turning a corner. It was a stone building three-story high that occupied an entire block, on top of that there a huge banner that showed in glowing letters the name he heard from Erica's stories many times: ”Adventurer's Guild”.
They were an autonomous entity that operated differently at each nation they were based on. There was a council that made sure each branch stuck to the core tenets their founders drafted, but every other matter was to be solved locally. In Azure Kingdom, the Adventurer's Guild was partially independent, they were free to do as they pleased, but were obligated to answer to any Lord call to arms in matters regarding monsters and dungeons. Riwall did not know how the Guild operated in other kingdoms.