Raiten: 8 Days Prior

  I place the last rock upon the small pile. The smooth, rounded river pebble balances awkwardly amongst the mossed over ruin stones—plucked straight from the crumbling walls. These are not the same ruins that Kiren and I fought the Lady in. But they are of a similar make—no doubt built by the same people. Two watchtowers stand sentinel over their crumbling grounds. Vines and greenery reconquer what was once theirs. Dirt clumps against the rocks, fusing with their parts, becoming hard and cracked.

  I step back from the little mound—stare at it for a few moments. A cold wind sings, whistling along my neck like the chimes of Takemeadow tinkling softly in the night.

  “I think,” I begin slowly, my own voice sounding odd to my ears. “I’m meant to say a few words. That’s what people do right? Normal people.” Adachi usually burned their dead. I would’ve done that if I could—but I saw a different funeral back in Takemeadow. Someone’s elderly father had passed. The family were all crying, yet exalting his wonderful life and impact on their small little community.

  “I’m not good with words. Never have been. And I know this isn’t ideal… I don’t have your body to bury.” I sigh. Scratch my head. A few bugs peak out from the darkness of the mound, running along the stones. “Knowing Masaru, that bastard will probably defile your body. Out of spite. He’ll put your head on a pike, or tie you to a pillar and let nature take its pick of you—” even the very image of that makes me livid. “They did that to my mother. The pike, not the pillar. Made me watch too—last memory I have of my home, before they turned me into…” I throw up my hands.

  A dark chuckle seeps out. “Sorry. I’m making this about me. That’s not right. My point—my point, is that I don’t want to remember you like that. I’ve had enough of that for a lifetime. I just… I want to remember you as my friend. As my broth—” I bite back a sick feeling in my chest. I can’t even say it.

  But it doesn’t need to be said. He’d understand.

  The stones stay still.

  I walk up to them and place a hand on the top one. “You… you were the only reason I made it through all of this. I would be dead without you. Or worse—I’d be lost.”

  I close my eyes and put my forehead to the cool stone. “I’m not a believer. Never had a reason to be. I don’t worship spirits nor a higher being. I don’t even think the ‘divinity’ of angels is meant to be bowed to. But, for you my friend, I can afford to believe. Because I want there to be some place after—you deserve that much.”

  I pull away and let my hand trail off the rock.

  “Rest well. Your war is over.”

  I turn away from the pile and wipe some tears threatening my eyes. But I won’t cry again. I’ve done enough of that. It's a waste of time.

  My enemies think I have lost. They probably think I will be grieving and broken in the woods.

  They made a mistake.

  They took too much. There’s nothing left for them to kill, besides me.

  But unfortunately for them…

  I already died yesterday.

  …

  “Raiten. It's good to see you,” a familiar voice calls.

  I open my eyes, not to find the expected glow of an orange campfire, but rather, the serene white of an endless void. Gradient bubbles of magicks pass over us, flashing with elemental glamour.

  “You drew me into this realm again?” I ask.

  Hypna shrugs, coming into my view. She wears blue robes and a witch’s hat—the conical top of which now limps off to her left side. Her black, white, and golden hair is spun into braids.

  “That’s a new look,” I mutter.

  “You did a good thing, just now. Burying your friend—”

  “I’d rather not talk about that.”

  “Right. Of course.”

  An awkward silence pervades between us, reminding me how little I know of this woman who occupies my mind.

  “I assume you brought me here for a reason?”

  “Yes. Well then,” she sits down, crossing her legs. The robes flow from her like water. The Witch of Dreams gestures for me to take a seat.

  I oblige, eyebrows arched.

  She’s about to speak, but she falters and her mouth quirks. It irritates me—this sensitivity. I’m not some fragile piece of glass.

  “Thank you, by the way.”

  “What for?” she asks. Then, her purple eyes widen in recognition. “Oh. It was no trouble, Raiten.”

  “Can I ask…what memory did I lose?”

  “If I could tell you that, I would.”

  “Right. Makes sense I guess. Well, as much sense as everything else does.” I chuckle ruefully at that. Despite all the information I have received about magicks, I still feel so woefully uneducated.

  “About that. Let’s talk business.”

  “The business of what? Potions?” I tack that last bit in sardonically, for all I remember Hypna selling is cures for… menial sorts of issues. Bladder problems, for instance.

  She doesn’t share my amusement though. “What else?”

  Hypna snaps her fingers and this realm of magicks fades. I feel us transport back into the broken conflux that is my mind. There’s a sense of control now—even I could make some manipulations here and there.

  However, I allow her to take the reins. She’s the expert.

  Hypna closes her eyes and waves a hand out. A cycle of memories flashes all around us—a panorama of despair.

  Then, she stops her hand and closes it into a fist. The scene freezes, showing giant blades that pierce the earth—a monster that hounds after me, soulfire raging from its antlers. A twisted metal entity of vengeance, flashing towards me. The boy shogun, running, shooting small bolts of lightning.

  We’re back in the Battle of the Glades.

  A twisting sensation pinches up my stomach, and my gut seems to boil up with acid.

  Hypna opens her eyes.

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  “Let me teach you the business of war. Specifically, the transactions you’ll need to make in order to kill every last one of your enemies.”

  I stare at the image of Souta, ignoring Hypna’s dramatic proclamation.

  “Thraevirula visited me yesterday,” the witch begins, drawing my attention back immediately. “She gave us a time limit till she hunts us. Ten days.”

  I frown. “Why in the hells would she—”

  “It doesn’t matter. It's an advantage—use it.”

  “You say that… yet you didn’t tell me this yesterday.”

  “I—” she sighs. “I didn’t even want to broach this today. You need time, Raiten. Time to recover and… process things. Even if you don’t understand that now.”

  “You should’ve told me immediately. You don’t keep that stuff from me Hypna—no matter what. This is still my mind. My body. Do you understand?”

  “I was doing it for you—”

  “Do. You. Understand?”

  She sighs, like a mother dealing with an impetuous child. “Yes. I understand. Now, do you want my help or not?”

  I narrow my eyes at her, but nod.

  “Good. Then we’ll start simple: what do you think you know about magicks?”

  “That’s a… tough question.” I stare at the ground, avoiding the piercing gaze of the battle around me. It hurts to look at it. “Where do you want me to start?”

  I glance up. Hypna frowns at my avoidance of the scene, but she nods to herself and thankfully, snaps her fingers. The memory is replaced by a neutral ground—not necessarily the in-between realm that we occupied earlier, for this still lies in the confines of my mind. But rather, we are on the edges. Conceptual thoughts take shape here. Fragments of ideas.

  The things that can’t necessarily be put into words.

  Abstraction.

  I can barely look at it—for my mind does not comprehend what it sees.

  “This is your conception of magicks. It is… unfinished. Vague.” She snaps her fingers again. The whiplash is getting to me—too many scenery changes. Thankfully, this next one is just a void of black.

  I only have to focus on her now. Her purple eyes gleam in the darkness like violet jewels.

  She raises a finger. From it, blue Aether spins forth into the air, making a spiral above us.

  “Let’s start here. What do you remember of this theory?”

  I stare at the never-ending construct—it whirls like a dust storm. “The Fundamental Theory of Magicks. Sorina told me it was a series of concentric circles. You told me it was spirals.”

  “Is, not was.”

  “Right. Cause it's neverending. New magicks branch off from the basic ones. Newer magicks from the branches. And so on. New circles.”

  “Give me an example.”

  “Is this a test? Am I a student now?”

  She stares at me, unblinking.

  “Fine. I know that wind is in the first circle. Sound is a branch: second circle.”

  “Good. But it's not called wind, it's called air.”

  My eyebrow twitches. “Does that distinction even matter?”

  “Yes. Names are very important when it comes to magicks. Careful diction is the entire basis of Incanta.”

  “Then maybe I’ll just learn Servanta,” I mutter.

  “What’s 38 times 57?”

  “Point taken. Incanta it is.”

  Hypna smiles slightly. It's a beautiful expression on her. “Luckily you probably won’t need to know the runic languages. At least, not to learn what I’m going to teach you.”

  “And that is?” Though I’m pretty sure I can already guess.

  Yet, instead of simply saying Aether, Hypna outstretches her other fingers. From each, new lines form and puncture into the different levels of the spiral. Then, those lines stretch out horizontally, till they rise up once more, cutting blue against the darkness of the void. They create forks. Bidents, tridents. Tetradents? All the way up to seven.

  “What are you trying to—”

  “Tell me, Raiten, what do you know about Stages?”

  “I don’t know what that means. ”

  She nods. Then, she nudges her head to the ends of each line. At those ends, different elements take shape. To varying degrees.

  Too many to count.

  Water comes in seven forms, light in four, darkness in five, Aether in three, fire in seven—its nightmarishly hard to track.

  I focus on one branch to ground myself. Fire.

  At the end of each line, there is flame in various states: a spark at the left-most side. And a raging, hellish flame that bursts forth into the sky on the rightmost side.

  Between those two ends is a sliding scale. The fire grows in strength with each line-end.

  “Stages are the best way to gauge someone’s strength in an element,” Hypna begins, speaking a little too fast now. Or maybe I’m just thinking too slow. “Most first circle elements come in seven stages of mastery. Fire, for example, comes in the following stages:

  1st Stage: Spark.

  2nd Stage: Kindling.

  3rd Stage: Forge.

  4th Stage: Inferno.

  5th Stage: Pyre.

  6th Stage: Cinderlord.

  7th Stage: Phoenix.”

  I stare dumbly at those flames. “And this is something that each element has?”

  She nods. “Not all of them are seven. Aether, as you can see, is three. And beyond that, in the other circles, the stages are even fewer—mostly due to lack of discovery rather than complexity.”

  “And… Why did no one ever tell me this?” My voice lilts with barely suppressed rage.

  Hypna tilts her head. “I’m not showing you all of this to overwhelm you, Raiten. Rather, I want you to understand that this world you’ve entered—this game you’ve begun: it is ten times the size that you might think. Your enemies, even your allies, have seldom reason to show you such things. This level of knowledge is very secret.”

  “Thank you. That’s very comforting.”

  She ignores my bleeding sarcasm. “Think about it like this. One in a hundred people are born with innate magicks—they have an affinity to an element. Out of that 1%, even less have the resources or teachers to learn past the 1st Stage of mastery. And jumping Stages is no easy feat: even with all the resources in the world, it would be extremely hard for any man to reach the 3rd Stage of an element.

  “But lucky for you, I’m no mere teacher. And you’re a quick study. You already have the 1st Stage of Aether: Frame. Now, I can take you all the way to the 3rd Stage.” The Witch of Dreams stands now and approaches me. The branching lines of Aether and all their elemental ends disappear in a mere flash. She places a hand on my shoulder. Squeezes it.

  “I will tell you everything I know. Every piece of knowledge that was hidden from you, I will grant it. So trust me when I tell you that I’m on your side.”

  I gently pry her hand off and stand as well. “You know, the last two people who said that were Saegor and Thraevirula.”

  She frowns.

  I shake my head. “I’m not trying to give you a hard time. You’re right. This is just… another adjustment I have to make.”

  After a moment’s hesitation, the witch nods.

  “For my reference, what stage was Saegor on the fire element?”

  “4th. Inferno.”

  “Huh. That’s…”

  “Lower than you thought he would be?” she chuckles. “Raiten you have yet to see the truly terrifying forces that bend this world. But, to be fair to Saegor, he’s higher up in stages regarding Eldritch magicks.”

  “Who would be considered a 7th Stage fire user?”

  “The Dragon King, Zod.”

  A shiver runs down my spine. Figures. I can’t believe Hui was fighting that monster. Before Basilbane killed it, that is.

  I close my eyes in contemplation for a moment. Then, I sigh. “This would’ve been very helpful to know earlier.” Maybe I could’ve gauged Baroth’s powers, or Souta—actually, would it even work with lightning? It's not an element.

  Too many questions.

  But for once, I can get my answers.

  So, like a good student, I take my seat, cross my legs, and stare up at the Witch of Dreams.

  “I’ll play the hand I’m dealt with.”

  “I’m glad to hear that.”

  “So, where do we begin then, master?”