Chapter 97 - Truth
Chapter 97 – Truth
`Is that really Jason?` was the only thought in Serons mind, while he pulled himself further away from him.
Jason´s golden eyes were ice cold and it felt like they were penetrating every pore inside his body as Till snapped with his mana enveloped fingers to distract Jason and Seron.
“Jason calm down… It’s not like we are the perpetrator, right?”
This single sentence calmed him down but he wanted to protest about this statement, as he knew that Till could kill Guardian-ranked beasts when Till answered his unspoken question.
“What do you think happens, if I kill these Guardian-ranked beasts? I´m not suicidal, you know? Once I kill the protectors of the developing magical treasure, I´ll be hunted for good.
The Islands are somehow similar to the garden of some big families and they divided them amongst each other.
You said you want to clear a few islands… Which one do you want to clear and what about the magical treasures on the other islands? Who receives what? What about the newly developing lush islands? Do the big families have to divide their own island after some samaritan offered their island for humans to live on?
I can see that you hate the weak being used in order to strengthen the strong, but with your strength, you can’t do anything against it, even if you want.
Even I am too weak, to fight against these big families, which is the sad truth.
These families survived the mana outbreak and some of the ancestors are still alive.
I´m 56 years old and my mana refinement and absorbing talent can be considered pretty good, but these old gramps and hags lived for 300 years…
Even if their aptitude is worse than mine, don´t you think they have some tricks hidden in their sleeves?”
“To tell you the truth, I don’t really like how these big families treat people from the `lower` society, even if it is only a single noble rank.
They even divided Canir according to their strength and almost everything is distributed by them, which is kinda gross.
But don´t get me wrong… not every big family, clan, sect, and so on is bad.
You can tell from Astrix, that even if the hierarchy is horizontal and unfair, other Islands have it worse or even better.
Belgra for example is one of the bigger islands with 400 million citizens and they have divided their island into 5 parts.
While 2 parts are solely used for humans, it allows beasts below the unblemished rank to stay within their borders.
It is relatively peaceful as pacifistic humans begin conversing with more intelligent beasts.
Maybe they threatened them with their annihilation but it is nevertheless relatively peaceful in these 2 particular parts.
While the remaining sections are still infested from beasts, there is still a better environment for humans, because only hunters, military, and trainees enter these three sections.
One section has only beasts below the magical rank and the other two are infested by all kinds of beasts.
The previously named peaceful parts are used for humans that don´t like to fight and try to live in harmony with others.
They want to work hard to produce all kinds of devices, garments, equipment for hunters and so on rather than risking their lives to fight with beasts.”
Till looked extremely proud when he said all of that and a premonition emerged in Jason´s mind
“Belgra belongs to your family, right?” Jason questioned with slight hesitation.
Seron calmed down and looked at Jason fearfully, not knowing what to do, while Till´s proud expression vanished.
He cleared his throat slightly embarrassed as he said
“That’s partially true. The Greil and Gier family govern Belgra together and it was only because we are two large families with more peaceful thought than others, that we achieved peace within two parts on Belgra”
Jason found out many information at once and he finally understood why Seron was so different compared to all of his other classmates.
Furthermore, he figured out, why Till was so strong.
Looking at Seron, he asked, “You didn’t fight me with your full strength, right?”
Jason concluded this but there was still a ray of hope, that he was wrong.
Seron was still scared about Jason´s previous killing-intent outbreak but upon looking into Jason´s eyes, his fear vanished and he only nodded his head after a short moment.
“Damn” Jason cursed and Till roughly understood what youth in front of him meant.
“To be honest, your combat prowess is above average but only if you look at Astrix´s common average and your current mana core rank.
You´ve already noticed during today´s battle, that you were completely overwhelmed, and only thanks to your exceptional observance and your ability to copy the floating sky technique allowed you to surprise your opponent.
Considering your peers in Cyro city, your strength is barely average which includes only the students who go to high-school.
I excluded heirs with home tutoring and so on because you´re probably unable to even hit them once, as they reached the expert stage with the help of certain magical plants and reagents, while only being slightly older than you.”
When he heard Till lecturing him about the average strength of Astrix alone, Jason frowned.
He knew that his soulbonds were weak and his mana core rank was also below average in Cyro-city, but his combat prowess? He found himself pretty good considering the small number of techniques he had…
Suddenly a thought emerged from his mind!
“Mr. Greil! If I learn more martial art techniques similar to the floating sky movement technique, I can increase my combat prowess by a huge margin, right?”
“Well only increasing the variety of your martial art techniques won´t be enough because your innate strength is too weak with the peak of the Novice rank at the age of 14…
Considering, that I saw your aptitude for mana absorption multiple times, I can’t figure out why your mana core rank is still so low.”
Jason was a little bit dejected after finding out again that he was still weak, even if his strength increased by a lot when he was reminded that his teacher hadn´t told him the purpose of coming to the 6th affiliated Vanguard school on Astrix island.
“Mr.Greil you wanted to tell me, why you and Seron came here on Astrix or rather Cyro-city!”
Till had to think for a moment, what exactly to reply because he didn’t want to utter any secrets.
Looking at Seron, he received a look, saying something like `I don´t mind`, as he started.
“We have multiple reasons to come to Astrix and they have something to do with Cryo-city and Seron. I´m not sure how much I should tell you, but we will capture Seron´s second soulbond here, as soon as the time comes.
The beast we are searching for is rare and only gives birth to offspring every few years but it is important to get this beast due to certain circumstances.
Previously you said that the mana density should be much higher on Canir, but that’s only partially true.
It´s rare to find such a stainless mana vein somewhere and outside the dome, the mana density is still roughly the same as on Canir.
If you look at Seron, you might think it’s a lie, because of his low mana core rank, but he has his own reasons.
Furthermore, I also wanted to teach a class once in my life and experiment, how fast I can improve the combat prowess of the worst class in the worst affiliated school…I was just curious hehe”
Jason concluded that their main task was to wait for Seron´s second soulbond to be born as he nodded his head.
Once that was over they would leave.
Listening to the last part, Jason wondered if his teacher was really 56 years old or a child.
Till decided to become a teacher, just because he wanted to and additionally he gave out extremely rare techniques only because he was curious? Weird!!
Jason could roughly comprehend why Seron´s mana core was so weak compared to the average strength of Canir citizens…
After Jason looked at Seron´s mana core, he also had a good view on his constitution, which surprised him, as Seron´s mana channels seemed different than they should have.
The transmuted mana in Seron, was straightening and smoothing the twisted and crumbled mana channels.
As such, Jason thought that Seron formed a contract with a unique soulbond which were capable of healing damaged mana channels.
That also meant Seron was only able to use mana after he contracted his first soulbond.
Seron remained silent after Till said that he had his own reasons for his mana core rank but Jason could see the frustration in his eyes.
He understood this frustration as his family was probably not happy about Seron´s mana channels which seemed to be almost crippled.
He wasn’t sure if Seron had siblings, but even his peers were probably similar to bullies after noticing that they were stronger than him.
But how should Jason know something like that as he wasn´t sure how competitive big clans were amongst each other.
Seron hadn’t told him anything and Jason didn’t mind that either.
He was only an acquaintance or maybe even a sparring partner to Seron but not someone, he knew for years.
Trust had to be earned throughout a long friendship or important events, that showed one´s sincerety