“So,” Elise began as she and Leon exited the arena, “do you have anything else on your schedule for the day?”
“Nothing much,” Leon replied.
Leon and Elise were leaving the arena from a private exit, avoiding the worst of the crowds, but there were still a few people around. Asiya and Valeria, however, had left a little ahead of them, with Asiya not failing to say that she wanted to ‘leave those lovebirds alone’.
Leon hadn’t responded, but he was grateful for the privacy, regardless.
Elise explained, “I was wondering if you had the time to head back to the Tower?”
Leon glanced up at the sky and guessed that he had at least an hour before he had to start heading back to the Knight Academy to not be late for trainees’ curfew. “I’ve got some time, I think that’ll be fine,” he said.
“Wonderful!” Elise exclaimed as she took his arm and began leading him back toward the Tower no too far away.
Upon arrival, the two wasted no time heading to one of the private rooms on the upper floors. As soon as they entered the room, Elise turned to Leon and said with a proud look, “Can you wait here for a moment? There’s something I want to show you, but it’s a surprise…”
Throughout the journey back to the Tower, Leon’s heart rate had steadily increased, anxiety about being alone with Elise making him incredibly self-conscious. However, he was still able to choke out a quick acceptance to her request.
“Then I’ll be right back, don’t go anywhere!” Elise said excitedly as she almost skipped out the door, leaving Leon alone with his thoughts. But even then, he was nervous enough that he wasn’t able to concentrate his thoughts on anything in particular.
About five minutes later, Elise returned to the room with a small, thin box. She grinned triumphantly when she slid back into the room, closing the door behind her almost as if she were smuggling in something of great value. She practically glided over to the table in the center of the meeting room and laid the box down upon it, facing Leon, and then watched him with great intensity.
“What… is this?” Leon asked, his face, stoic after having several minutes to get control over himself, showing little sign of his inner anxiety.
“It’s a dancing bear. Just open it!” Elise said with a laugh.
Leon undid the latch and opened the box. Whatever was within had been covered with a bolt of red satin, but Leon could sense an incredible amount of wind magic as soon as the lid was cracked.
“Is this…” Leon began, looking at Elise who was smiling and nodding furiously.
Leon pulled the satin out of the way, revealing a pure white feather.
[YEEEEESSSS! FINALLY!!!!] Xaphan roared.
Elise grinned proudly at Leon, and explained, “The final thing you wanted Heavens Eye to find was a feather from a fourth-tier bird who was strong in wind magic, no? Well, I managed to get my hands on the feather of a fourth-tier Eskellion Dove!” She paused a moment—Leon guessed she was waiting for him to say something—and when he didn’t’ immediately respond, she asked with some worry, “Is there something wrong?”
“No, it’s perfect,” Leon replied, a wide smile breaking out over his face. He’d needed a moment to recover from the sheer weight of the joy that had slammed into him through his contract with Xaphan. “How much is this?”
“… It’s a gift!” Elise said with some confusion, her proud smile slipping for only a moment.
“Are you sure? This couldn’t have been cheap…”
[JUST TAKE IT AND FINISH MY POTION DAMN YOU!] Xaphan impatiently bellowed.
“Please take it!” Elise said, with a steely firmness in her voice, a look of determination on her face.
“Thank you!” Leon replied with both excitement and great formality. Out of both the restlessness that had overcome him from Xaphan’s desire to finish the potion, and simply out of sheer happiness and gratitude at receiving a gift from Elise, he took a few steps forward and threw his arms around her, pulling her into a tight hug. “This was very important for me. I can’t overstate my gratitude for your help in this matter.”
“Don’t mention it,” Elise said, her face rapidly turning red. Leon’s quickly followed suit as soon as he realized what he was doing, and he just as quickly released her.
“I’m… really sorry,” Leon hurriedly said.
“It’s quite all right,” Elise responded, smiling at him and tucking a few strands of hair behind her ear. “I enjoyed being that close to you…”
Leon smiled back widely and completely unabashedly. With this feather, he’d finally be able to restore some of Xaphan’s power, and then the demon would be able to strengthen him, in turn. How he’d be able to Leon didn’t quite know, but he knew that the sooner he could get this potion finished, the sooner that he’d get a potentially huge boost in power.
“I hate to do this,” Leon nervously said, the uncertainty in how Elise might take his sudden departure dampening his joy, “but I should get this back to the Academy… Finish up what I need this feather for…”
“I understand,” Elise replied, looking a little disappointed, but her wide smile soon returned.
“Let’s get together again soon,” Leon whispered, pulling Elise into a gentler, but more deliberate hug than the previous one. His mind was racing with thoughts of Xaphan’s potion, but within those were musings about what kind of gift he might get Elise, in return. As much as he appreciated this, he couldn’t just accept it without some reciprocation.
“Soon,” she agreed, returning his hug.
They stayed embraced like that for a few moments more before Xaphan’s impatience finally boiled over and Leon said his goodbyes.
---
When Leon made it back to the Snow Lions’ tower, he rushed up the stairs straight to his room. Waiting for him in the corner was the tall bowl covered in spell paper. He grabbed it and moved to a table in the center of the room.
[Now, what do we do?] Leon asked.
[First, remove the water-coals. They’re not needed and will only get in the way,] Xaphan immediately replied, though the demon kept his voice calm and measured so he could communicate the right information.
Leon removed the lid of the bowl and, using a pair of thin metal tongs, removed the water-coals and threw them into the sink in his bathroom. They almost immediately stopped burning without water around them, but they were still too hot even for a third-tier mage to handle with his bare hands.
[And then?] Leon continued.
Instantly, a flood of runes forming a complex enchantment entered his mind. [Take as much time as you need to inscribe this enchantment. It must be perfect,] Xaphan said.
Leon didn’t hesitate to get to work. As he wrote each rune, his hand was steady and his penmanship near perfect. His practice in the enchantment classes was truly paying off; although this was the most complex enchantment he had ever written, it only took as many tries as he needed when learning how to make a crude flare spell. He finished in only two hours.
[Hmmm,] Xaphan murmured as he inspected Leon’s work. Once he was satisfied that everything was in order, Leon peeled off the spell paper already on the bowl and replaced all of it with what he had just written.
[So what does that enchantment do?] Leon asked.
[What do you think it does?] Xaphan asked back. He wasn’t trying to be a sarcastic dick, he only wanted to fill some time and distract himself with speech while the enchantment went to work.
[The enchantment’s core was made of more than half a dozen separate runic circles, totaling three light runes, eight wind runes, and more than twenty fire runes. The modifiers had something to do with bodies, though I couldn’t quite parse what they did exactly. So I would have to guess that it fills your body with fire magic that was stoked with the wind magic, plus a little healing from light magic.]
[Not bad, though not very specific either and missing quite a few very big and important details. The enchantment is actually an amalgamation of two different enchantments. The first creates the potion itself, while the second dictates the potion’s effects.
[The salamander core is going to melt, releasing so much fire magic that it will saturate and feed the Kagu flower. Then, after the flower has had its fill, it will secrete a juice that will combine with the fire magic-rich water, which will form the potion. Lastly, you will need to eat the feather, then wash it down with the potion. And don’t eat the remains of the Kagu flower! You’ll probably be incinerated from the inside if you do…]
[But what will the potion and enchantments do exactly?] Leon asked.
[Once it settles in your stomach, all of its magical energy will be directed into your soul realm, thanks to the second enchantment. From there, the magic power will enter my body and stimulate my recovery. Essentially, the light runes will give the potion the healing properties it needs to enter your body without causing permanent damage, while the fire energy will invigorate my own atrophied demonic core—where my magic is produced, much like your magic comes from your bone marrow. The wind magic will help to feed those flames, prolonging their effect until the job is done.]
[Well, sounds easy enough,] Leon said. He figured that he had finished the hard part, a notion that Xaphan wasn’t in a hurry to dispel. It wouldn’t help anyone if Leon spent the next hour or so while the potion finished being made in a state of dread.
Leon spent his time quietly meditating, while Xaphan used his magic senses to monitor the bowl.
[It’s ready,] the demon finally growled.
Leon’s eyes opened and he opened the box he received from Elise and grabbed the feather. It was only as long as his index finger, making it easy enough to put in his mouth, even if it was less so to swallow. Complicating things was the strength of the wind magic the feather possessed; it vibrated and filled Leon’s mouth with air, making getting it down his throat a difficult task, especially as the air quickly turned sharp. Leon’s mouth was filled with shallow cuts and he spat out blood.
[Ugghh,] he moaned in pain.
[Swallow the potion! There’s not much time! It will hurt, but the injuries and the pain will only be temporary!] Xaphan shouted, spurring Leon onward.
With an awful look of pain on his face, Leon cracked open the bowl and started chugging without even looking at the thick red liquid in the bowl. The potion was scalding hot from the fire magic and it felt like his stomach had been set aflame, but Leon didn’t stop. The pain wasn’t nearly so intense as what he had felt when he had awakened the Thunderbird’s Bloodline.
[How are you doing?] Xaphan asked with a little worry as Leon finished, leaving nothing but a few drops of potion clinging to the side of the bowl and the shriveled Kagu flower at the bottom.
Leon barely managed to say [Alright,] through the burning pain. The potion had settled in the pit of his stomach, growing stronger as the feather kept vibrating.
‘At least the potion is suppressing those tiny wind blades…’ Leon thought, grateful for the small comfort.
Despite his brave face, Leon took a few staggering steps toward his bed before collapsing onto the floor, barely stopping himself from screaming in pain. He could feel the magic of the potion slowly moving through his body, scorching him from within. Eventually, the pain grew too great and he slipped into the comfortable oblivion of unconsciousness.
It took less than fifteen minutes for the potion to wear off. Every last speck of magic power had flowed into Leon’s soul realm, where it was drawn to the fire demon waiting for it. Where before Xaphan was like a bonfire, with the power of the Kagu flower and salamander core—plus the Eskellion Dove’s wind magic fueling his flames—he became like a tornado of fire.
Xaphan himself was in an inordinate amount of pain, but he didn’t have the luxury of passing out as Leon did. He channeled the fire magic into his demonic core and compressed it as far as he could. After five minutes, it felt like his core would explode; after ten, he felt so much pain that for a moment he was sure it had. The fire magic spread throughout his body, feeding his malnourished body but wreaking havoc at the same time. His bones cracked and his hard obsidian skin glowed red hot.
But after five more minutes, the pain faded. The fire tornado died down and the wind stopped blowing. Xaphan took a few minutes to catch his breath and collect himself, then cast his magic senses inward to inspect the state of his body.
Eighty-thousand years of immobility in a prison that sapped his magic power had left his core as dry as a desert. It had been so malnourished that he could barely generate any magic power at all. Leon had taken the demon into his soul realm and Xaphan had tried to use the young man’s own power to feed his core and recover, but Leon was just too weak. He didn’t possess enough magic for Xaphan’s core to heal in any reasonable amount of time. For all intents and purposes, the demon had been forced back to being a third-tier demon, even if the physical foundation he had laid during his rise to demonic Lordship was still there.
But the potion had been like a heavy downpour refilling a dry oasis. His powers hadn’t returned completely, but he could feel his core outputting roughly the same amount of power as he had when he was the equivalent of a fifth-tier mage.
[Good, I can work with this,] Xaphan muttered. He could’ve made due even if his core could only produce the same power as a fourth-tier mage, but he theoretically could’ve risen back to the sixth-tier from the potion so he couldn’t help but feel a modicum of disappointment. Still, with his core now given the kickstart it needed to recover, he was a happy demon.
Leon, on the other hand, wasn’t nearly so happy when he woke up. His entire body was sore and stiff, though the burns and cuts from the feather and potion had been healed.
[Did it work?] he asked, rolling over onto his back and not intending to bother getting off the floor.
[It did,] Xaphan said.
[Good,] Leon whispered before closing his eyes and taking a few deep breaths. [So, what now?]
[I’ll need a few days, maybe a week to take stock of my new situation.]
[More waiting, then.]
[These things take time, young mage. Just because the potion worked doesn’t mean everything’s immediately peachy. As I said, a week at most and we’ll know where we stand.]
Leon sighed and struggled to his feet. It was getting close to dinner time, so he made his way down to the first-tier common room. Upon reaching it, he saw the usual group chatting in the corner, so he walked over and joined them.
---
Before his eyes, Leon’s arm turned red from heat as it burned from the inside. Leon’s teeth clenched together so tightly from the pain that he couldn’t speak even if he wanted to. After a few more seconds, Xaphan managed to cut the flow of magic into Leon, but by then the skin on Leon’s arm had started to peel and bubble up; the burns Leon sustained all over and within his left arm were profound.
After a few more minutes of channeling his magic into his arm to dull the pain, which had been so severely burnt that he could barely move it, Leon staggered to his feet and made for the bathroom where his first-aid kit and the healing spells it contained were located.
Leon had ten healing spells in his first-aid kit, all of which he had to use to regain use of his left arm. Even then, his arm was still covered in light burns, but he could move it without pain if he was careful.
[Well, that was certainly enlightening,] Xaphan said flippantly in an attempt to lighten the mood.
[… That’s one word for it, I guess,] Leon muttered sarcastically.
[At the very least, we learned two things,] Xaphan continued, ignoring Leon’s comment. [The first is you need to focus on controlling the magic you borrow as well as only taking what power you need. The second is that the power I gave you was a little wild and outside of my own control. Fortunately, these are very fixable problems.]
[How so?]
[All we need is time and practice. For now, I’ll focus on regaining the proper control of my power; it shouldn’t take more than, say, a week or so.] Xaphan decided to be cautious after Leon’s injury. He estimated that it would only take a day or two to shake off the rust and bring his flames under enough control so as to not burn Leon again, but he wanted the extra time to make sure he had gotten used to the sudden jump in power.
[I think I’ll take that time to make a few new healing spells,] Leon said, looking over at the pile of spells he had just used and then to his burned arm. It still hurt to move the arm quickly, but the spells had healed him enough that apart from a lot of peeling skin, there weren’t many obvious signs of injury, especially when he wore long-sleeved shirts. He was sure he could heal what the spells hadn’t in a week.
Despite that surety, Leon used the first few healing spells he made that night to clean himself up. His peeling skin had vanished during the night, so while his arm appeared to completely heal, holding a shield during training still caused some discomfort.
The week passed quickly with hardly a single word exchanged between Leon and Xaphan, but finally, it came time for Leon to have some real practice with Xaphan’s power. To make sure he wouldn’t be disturbed, Leon took the huge stack of healing spells he’d drawn up during the week and ventured out into the maze of gorges and cliffs in the north-western part of the Academy.
[So, has this been enough time for you to get a good handle on your power?] Leon asked, with only a tiny hint of sarcasm.
[It has,] Xaphan responded, ignoring Leon’s tone. [Are you ready to see what you can do with it?]
[Of course. Anything I need to know before we start, though?]
[Plenty. I guess the first thing I ought to mention is that part of the reason you were burned so badly last week was that you couldn’t stop the flow of magic out from your soul realm. I’d guess that problem was because you didn’t try until the flow had grown too large for you to properly handle, so keep it slow and ramp it up gradually.]
[Makes sense.]
[Another thing, demon fire is very potent. Just about anything can burn within it, so be careful about what you do with it. Don’t go starting any large fires, keep it in control. Again, go slow until you have a good idea of how much you can handle.]
[Got it.]
[Then let’s do this.]
Leon briefly smiled before his face turned deadly serious. He gently pulled on the connection between him and Xaphan and called forth the demon’s power. He kept it as minimal as he could, letting the heat from the connection trickle out slowly, before channeling it into his arm and out into his palm. There, a small red flame appeared in the center of his palm, no bigger than the flame of a small candle that leisurely roiled and flickered as if it were burning in slow motion.
The first time Leon used Xaphan’s power just after leaving the prison, this was all the power he had been able to call upon, so there was hardly a need for caution. This time, however, he had to hold back the demon’s power that tried to burst free from his soul realm. The longer he held the flame, the more intense the pressure became. He felt like a flimsy dam trying to hold back a raging waterfall after barely a minute, which caused him to extinguish the flame and immediately stop summoning Xaphan’s power.
Leon took a deep breath as the heat from the flame disappeared.
[You didn’t burn yourself this time. Progress,] Xaphan said mockingly.
[Screw you, demon! I may have gotten burned, but at least I’m always in control of my power!]
[If you’re so confident in your strength, how about you go about raising yourself from third-tier power to fifth-tier power in a matter of minutes and see how well you control yourself then!]
Leon grit his teeth in frustration. Xaphan did have a point; the demon had gotten used to his atrophied third-tier strength, so there would understandably be a short period of adaptation to the sudden spike to fifth-tier.
After a few minutes of rest, Leon began again. He kept the flame small, merely testing himself to see how long he could hold it. He made it about a minute and a half during his second test, about half again as long as the first try that morning.
[Hmmm. I’m going to try something,] Xaphan said as Leon extinguished the fire again.
[Like what?]
[I might be able to help you call upon only what you can bear. Might. I’ve never had to share my power before, so I’m learning as we go, too. Let’s try again.]
For a third time, Leon summoned the demon’s magic. This time, however, the pressure in his chest that came from his soul realm was greatly diminished.
[Whatever you’re doing… it’s working,] Leon mumbled, trying to concentrate on keeping the flame lit and under control. Xaphan was himself too busy concentrating to reply.
Leon managed to last five minutes that time thanks to Xaphan’s assistance.
[It seems like it will be a collaborative effort if you ever find yourself needing to call upon my power,] Xaphan said after Leon put out the flame in his hand.
[Fine by me,] Leon said. He was starting to get a good handle on calling upon Xaphan’s power and had already started thinking of how to maximize his time holding the fire. On his fourth try, he tried mixing Xaphan’s magic with his own, an idea that wasn’t theoretically terrible, but it left Leon feeling drained after only ten seconds. He guessed this was because he still lacked sufficient control over his own magic due to only being a third-tier mage that it felt so draining.
But, he had made Xaphan’s power a little easier to control, even if it didn’t last nearly so long as the previous attempts.
The two practiced for the remainder of the day. Leon’s final practice run before he returned to the Snow Lions’ tower lasted for almost fifteen minutes.
The next day, the pair changed their focus. Instead of trying to maintain a tiny flame for a long time, Leon tried to conjure a larger, more useful flame. He didn’t try to summon a flame roughly the size of a torch or magic lantern as he had the week previously, but instead only increased the size of the candle-sized flame by about half. He quickly found that such use of Xaphan’s fire was quite inefficient, as such a small increase more than halved the time he could keep the flame lit.
Despite this inefficiency, Leon continued down that road of training. Keeping a fire the size of a candle lit was hardly practical for battle, so he needed to learn to handle greater amounts of Xaphan’s power.
All throughout the next week, Leon would venture off into the western mountains whenever he got the chance. From a certain perspective, this kind of training wasn’t productive for him, as he was merely learning to use borrowed power. His time in the long-run would be better spent working on ascending to the fourth-tier. However, when Xaphan brought this up, Leon responded that there would be hardly any point to making the contract between them if he never learned to use Xaphan’s power. Besides, what Leon wanted was strength, and Xaphan’s demonic fire would certainly give him that, even if it that strength was only temporary. Plus, it wasn’t as if Leon completely neglected his own training; it was a tough decision for him to make, but Leon cut into his sleep time to make some extra room in his schedule for meditation and working to increase his own power.
Fortunately for him, he only had to keep this schedule up for another week. With Xaphan’s help, Leon was able to conjure a small explosion of demonic fire out of his hand that had a range of about three feet, and he had enough control to do so two or three times before the burns accumulated enough to disable his arm. During this time, Xaphan also had to teach Leon how to douse the flames so as to not kill anyone he didn’t mean to or set everything around him on fire.
---
Leon sighed in pain as he slid to the ground with his back against a large boulder. The ground all around the secluded crevice he had been practicing in was scorched and blackened, with the rocky walls not looking much better. It had been hard practice, and the skin on his left arm that was cracked and bleeding from the heat was proof of the intensity with which Leon had taken to his training. In fact, he had gone through more than three-quarters of the healing spells he had written, a total of more than one hundred and fifty that all went to treat his burns.
He had grown so used to the sensation of pain that Leon could barely even feel the fire that ravaged his arm during practice, but he had to force himself to take a break whenever he felt his arm started to grow heavy and lethargic, as he knew that the damage was severe. It got so bad that Xaphan had to intervene.
[You’ve already gotten enough of a handle on my power to fight with, there’s no need to keep pushing yourself. Slow down!]
[I suppose,] Leon muttered, as he pressed more healing spells onto his burned arm. [I just want to learn enough control so that I don’t have to worry about burning myself if I ever need to use your power.]
[No amount of control will lessen that risk right now. What you need to focus on is your own power. If you ascend to the fourth-tier, you’ll probably be able to call upon much more of my power before your arm is burned to the point of disability. Ascension to the fifth-tier, I’d guess, would allow you to use this level of power with relative impunity. You don’t specifically need control, you need to get stronger.]
Leon couldn’t argue with Xaphan when his entire left arm had been covered in healing spells. The demon’s fire was truly potent, but Leon felt that the pain had been worth it to have such a power that no one would ever suspect in his wheelhouse.
[You’re right, I should double down on my own training,] Leon said quietly. [Though I am looking forward to when I can use elemental magic for real, rather than relying on you for it. Throwing even this small amount of fire is rather… intoxicating…]
[I don’t like that tone…] Xaphan replied with a worried tone.
[Relax, I’m not talking about getting reliant on your power. If using only your magic were this fun, though, I can’t wait to see how it feels to use lightning,] Leon said, every word dripping with anticipation.
As soon as his arm was healed, Leon drew his sword and began practicing. He flooded his body with magic, but the thought of learning how to use his own elemental power had made him too restless to meditate.
He’d rarely trained so intently with his father’s sword before. Usually, if he were to practice his sword techniques then that was what he wanted to concentrate on, saving the flooding of his body with magic power for when he would meditate.
But now, he was doing both at the same time, even if the sword movements were only meant to keep him moving. And as he moved, a comforting warmth spread out from the handle of the sword and throughout his entire body, though Leon was so into his training that he didn’t even notice.
---
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