Mindonics Entrapment

Chapter 13

Chapter 13

This meant to be prepared for war at any time. I assume this was due to the shadow beast that we had met. Fortunately, not a thing has happened in the kingdom these last ten years. No attack from the shadow beast, no attack from the dark guild, not a thing.

Because of the amber alert, the students were to be guarded at all times. We were set a curfew and was not allowed to leave the town at all unless given special permission. I originally had wanted to go into the lands nearby and obtain some crystals but the plan was shut down pretty quickly.

I was given a personal tutor who also acted as my guard at all times, sleeping, eating, he was with me at all times except when going to the toilet. I thought all students at the school had the same thing but when speaking to Gary he confirmed that only a select few students had this.

It was bad enough that I was being criticized around the school for having red hair but even more so now that I was getting special treatment on top of it. In all these ten years the only person I was able to speak to was Gary who thankfully treated me the same.

It was not all bad though. I had learnt several things while attending school that have answered many of the questions I once had.

First, although most knights had no magical ability they were able to train something called Ki. The Ki would allow you to enhance your body, to control your senses to its utmost limit and perform feats that seemed impossible for a human to do.

In fact, some masters of Ki were even able to slow down the ageing process allowing the human race to live for hundreds of years. Although if a child body was to practise Ki it would end up damaging their internal organs. At the age of fifteen, our body would be able to handle the stress of Ki.

We had learnt the theory behind it for when we went to Avrion academy.

The most interesting thing I had learnt about while at the school were beast crystals. The human race knew about beast crystals unlike I first thought. It actually played an important role in human society.

Beast crystals would be used to forge armour and weapons for knights. While the mages would use them for enchantments, alchemy, and staffs. It also had many other uses in current technology.

The crystal themselves came from magical beast and would have to be manually extracted once a beast had been defeated. The crystal also had their own tier grading which matched the beasts grading system. The higher the tier of the beast, the higher tier crystal you would receive allowing you to make stronger and better weapons.

The last thing that I had learned but still have many questions about was my past. They did, in fact, teach about the Red Dragon Sen but only as a legend to link to their Divine being. It is said that I was defeated by this Divine being and in using all its power it had been forced to go to internal rest. Although the divine being no longer existed in human form it still gave commands to the whole land that everyone must follow.

It was as if the whole land was some sought of religious cult to this divine being. This was also why the Dark guild was created in the first place. One of the elders had refused an order from the divine being and was banished for breaking the rules. Ever since he has had a grudge and whished to destroy the kingdom.

If I wanted to find more about my past and what happened I would have to go meet this Divine being in person. The problem was only members of high ranking were able to speak to the divine being. I thought about sneaking into the place to get answers but I was met with problems straight away.

The Divine being was located in Roland academy which was far from where we were. That was if I was even able to get away from my guard in the first place. I had tried to lose him a few times but had no success.

I had learnt more at the school but these were the main points that I had decided to focus on. Now fifteen years old I was finally able to graduate and leave this hell.

The kingdom had issued that we were no longer on amber alert. I'm guessing they decided this after nothing had happened for the last ten years. This meant when I reach Avrion academy I would have a lot more freedom.

I packed my belongs from my dorm room at school, we were all the meet at the front of the school building today, where a few knights would pick us up and escort us to Avrion academy.

In front of the school building stood about fifty students. The number was a lot lower than when I originally first got here. When I arrived here there was around a hundred. A lot of people dropped out because it was too tough not being with there family.

I saw Gary and went up to meet with him. We waited together and chatted a bit about the upcoming trials at Avrion academy and what we were looking forward to most. As the two of us were talking we were interrupted by a familiar face.

"It's been a long time you two"

Wilfred said.

I had always liked Wilfred. He reminded me of my father a lot.

He also had this calmness about him that made you think, as long as you trusted him everything would work out. His appearance hadn't changed in these ten years either, I couldn't guess what his real age must be.

Thinking about my father I was deep in thought. I hadn't seen him for ten years I didn't know how he was doing.

As if Wilfred could read my mind he put his hand on my shoulder.

"Your fathers condition hasn't worsened. Your mother is looking after him well, I made sure to check with one of the knights before coming here."

I began to smile

"Thank you"

"How did you recognize us two, we've changed a lot over these ten years?" Gary asked.

"The blonde boy and red hair who fought the Drop bears, how could I forget something like that. I'm not that old yet."

"How old are you?" Gary started to look Wilfred up and down seeing that his appearance hadn't changed in ten years.

"Now that is a secret, my friend."

The three of us started to laugh out loud. Seeing this scene the other students around us started whispering to each other.

"Isn't that master Wilfred?"

"How are they on such good terms with him"

"They must be from a powerful family"

Wilfred hearing the students around us talk, decided to quickly say goodbye and leave us be.

Forward came a man who didn't look too much older than us, but had a big powerfull body and was bearing the Avrion Crest. He held a sheet of paper in his hand.

"To Future Avrion academy students, I am squire master Lancy. You must obey my commands at all times unless someone of higher rank intervenes. It is time for us to journey onwards towards Avrion Academy to journey will take about seven days."

Behind him, five carriages had appeared, each carriage could hold around ten students. The students had boarded the carriages while the knights travelled by horse. There were six knights in total including master Wilfred. The squire master was the second-highest-ranking official there, while the other knights were regular squires who were assigned to guard each carriage.

As soon as everyone was ready. The carriages and horses set off towards Avrion academy. I was excited to finally be leaving this place and was happy to hear the journey would take seven days. This meant I had the chance to gain a few more crystals.

I had already absorbed the crystal from the drop bear, and my current points were sitting at 42. I still remember the feeling of absorbing the crystal. It made my whole body tingle and instantly I felt stronger. It was an addictive feeling like a d**g.

We had been travelling for several hours the sun had fallen down. We decided to camp on the side of the path near a forest. We were pretty out in the open but the knights said not to worry too much as there weren't many high tier beast in the area and they would take turns keeping guard.

Each student was given a sleeping bag and shared a tent with a partner. I teamed up with Gary and shared a tent together.

In the middle of the night when everyone was asleep, it was time for me to go hunting. I activated my dragon eyes skill to make sure that the guard was patrolling a different area. With my dragon eyes, it made it easy to avoid being seen.

I entered the woods and started to look around to see if there were any Magical beast I could beat. With my Dragon eyes skill, I detected there was a few basic tier beast in the area.

"Lucky," I thought to myself.

This was a good chance to try nab myself some crystals. I went towards the first target that was closest to me and on its own. I didn't want to risk anything and wanted to see what type of magical beast it was.

Hiding behind a bush I got a closer look at the creature. It was a fanged boar. A powerful creature who could use it's two big front teeth to bite threw your bones. Although not as fast as the wolfs or agile as the drop bears.

I came out of the bush and made my self seen by the boar. The boar looked towards me. it started brushing its foot against the ground getting ready to charge.

As the boar started to charge towards me at the last moment before it could reach me I jumped into the air and landed on it's back. I quickly stabbed the boar behind its head making the beast fall to the floor.

I was unlucky as the notification didn't appear this time. I decided to use my blade to open the inside of the boar to see if I could still get the crystal that way.

To my surprise, the crystal was inside the boar. I held the crystal in my hand and tried to absorb it. A few moments later and nothing. The crystal still sat there in my hand. Perhaps I was only able to absorb crystals obtained by the system?

I continued to venture in the forest making sure not to stray too far away from camp. After defeating two more Fanged Boars a message appeared.

for now, I stored the crystal away to save it for later. I had a thought that I wanted to test out. I began to use my sword to skin open the boar in search of the crystal again. This time no crystal could be found.

It seemed as if the crystal that had been obtained from the system randomly could be absorbed. While if the system didn't obtain the crystal the crystal still remained inside of the magical beast.

As I was distracted thinking about this thought. I heard an incredibly loud snort come from behind me. I turned around to see a fang bore the size of a horse.

It was an intermediate tier fanged Boar.

If there were basic tier beast in the area, there was always a good chance of an intermediate beast too. This was due to how the evolution worked between Magical Beasts. Magical Beasts would hunt another beast, once defeated they would eat the magical crystal inside the beast. Once the beast had eaten enough crystals it would then evolve into up to the next tier.

When hunting the group of fanged boars I should have known they would be a chance that a higher tier beast would be around.

I stood as still as humanly possible not moving a hair on my body, waiting for the boar to move. When the boar charged at me I managed to sidestep at the last second with the boar missing me only by an inch.

I was too slow like this. If I tried doing the same thing again I could be seriously hurt. I changed into my beast form putting the sword in my mouth and crouching down on all fours like a tiger. When the beast charged at me again, this time I did the same back heading towards it. The beast used its fangs to try to bite down on me, I jumped to a nearby tree and clung on to it so hard that my fingers where an inch deep into the tree.

My strength had greatly improved after absorbing the crystals. I was not the same person as I was ten years ago.

The boar looked up at me, seeing I was hovering above in the tree. The bore couldn't climb or fly so it did the only thing it could do. It used its full weight and strength to start slamming into the trees.

The boar's strength was impressive as it would tear down the trees one by one. As the trees were falling down, I would quickly move to the other one nearby. Jumping from tree to tree.

I was beginning to get tired of the chase and knew I needed to do something sooner or later otherwise I would run out of stamina and not have the strength to attack.

As the boar continued to chase me through the forest I came across a tree that was twice the size of the others. I jumped to the tree with the boar following behind me. This time the boar's strength wasn't enough to take down the tree in one hit. It's head banged into the tree causing the tree to slightly slant but not fall over.

The boar was slightly dazed from the impact. I knew that this was my chance. I ran down the tree as fast as I could. I needed to strike before the boar came to. Using the momentum from running down the tree I jumped in the air. with the blade gripped tightly in my mouth managed to reach the tip of the boars head. The momentum continued moving me forward until it had sliced through from the head to the end of its tail in one smooth motion. Blood started to shoot out of the big cut on its body, moments later collapsing onto the floor.

I took a few moments to catch my breath. It was a lot tougher then I thought it would be. I made it harder on my self because whatever happened I needed to not get injured. If I were to be injured while hunting and returned to camp it would be hard to explain the cause of my injuries.

I was pretty confident in defeating an intermediate tier beast since I did so when I was a child. This time I was a lot stronger than back then, but what made it more difficult was trying to not get hit.

I took the blade out of my mouth and started thinking. The beast form was great for attacking, it allowed me to move faster, and made me more agile. Although it helped me gain speed the strength behind the strike was weeker then using my hands. Making me rely on momentum for power.

The form also sacrificed defence. If fighting a human I would need to use the sword to block attacks rather then dodge. In the case of a large beast such as this one, there was no point blocking as I would have just been hit back by the brute force. Against a fast creature or human, I would need to learn how to block and counter.

If there was some way I could combine the two techniques it would help me greatly in the future.

I was a bit upset that the system didn't appear with a message, which meant that I hadn't obtained the crystal. So I decided to walk over to the beast and retrieve the crystal. I put the crystal in a pouch around my waist. Even if I couldn't absorb the crystal I would still be able to use it to create armour or a weapon. Worst case I could sell it to make some money.

With that, I decided that it was enough excitement for one day and headed back towards camp. I used my dragon eyes skill to pick the right moment when the guard wasn't on patrol and snuck back into my tent.

Gary was still sleeping snoring away. luckily even if the tent was on fire I don't think it would wake him up.

I struggled to go to sleep as I started thinking about the points gained from the crystals. What would happen when I reached a hundred points?

The best guess that I could make was when reaching a hundred points with the basic tier crystals I would then be able to start absorbing the intermediate tier crystals but there was no way to test my theory.

Or was there?

When thinking about again I remembered there was something else that I had that also absorbed crystals. The black wolf Cub I gained a while back. In all this time I had almost forgotten about it.

I closed my mind and an image of the wolf cub started to appear. In the ten years, it hadn't seemed to grow in size at all. Perhaps it would grow again once I started to feed it more crystals?

I started to smile thinking how much of a genius I was. This was great, I would carry on hunting in the forest in the next few days. Whatever crystals I obtained form now on I would feed to the wolf. Once it reached a hundred points I would be able to conclude my experiment.

Since ill be using the Wolf cub more perhaps I should give it a name.

As usual, as soon as I started to think about it the system responded with a message.

The black fur of the wolf reminded me of a dragon I use to be good friends with. He also had black scales as well. I think he would be happy with this name.

As soon as the sun began to rise, the Squier master Lancy would wake up by banging two pots together. The ringing in my ears was dreadful. Gary, on the other hand, would still sleep like a baby. I kicked him in the stomach so he would finally wake up and stop snoring.

The students were required to put everything away, the fire pit, the tents and the provisions for our journey, back into the carriages. Thirty minutes later and we were on our way again.

A couple of students in the carriage were complaining about the whole situation.

"Does Avrion academy not have a teleporter? I see no need to travel there via carriage."

"Yeah Roland academy has one, and apparently Avrion is meant to be on par with Roland, yet they can't afford a teleporter?"

A girl sitting at the back of the carriage mouth started to twitch. As she was getting annoyed at what the two students were saying.

Until finally she couldn't stand it anymore and stood up.

"Didn't you two learn anything? Avrion academy is stationed at the front lines of the battlefield with the shadow plague. What were to happen if war were to break out and we lost Avrion?"

The two students looked at her with a blank look on their faces failing to see what point she was trying to make.

"It would mean our enemy would have access to the teleporters themselves. Allowing them to move anywhere in the kingdom."

She sat down in her seat and started to mumble to herself.

I recognised the girl well, her name was Slyvia Heart. She had long silver hair that would reach her waist. With a symmetrical face and a body to be proud of. By humans standards, I guess she would be considered a beauty.

That wasn't the reason why I had recognized her though. At Renny academy every term they would post the results for our knowledge test. Every single time without fail, her name would be at the top of that list. I don't think there a single student that couldn't recognize her.

A few hours later and the carriage came to a stop again. Signalling the spot where we would set up camp for tonight. This time thankfully we had stopped at an abandoned castle to use as a base.

We went to the dining hall of the castle and decided to sleep here for the night. Each carriage of people formed their own sperate group, who had a knight as there leader.

As we entered the dining hall the students looked curiously inside. The castle was in ruins with pieces of stone broken everywhere and gaps in various different places.

"What happened here?" Gary said out loud.

The knight who was with us started to explain.

"This is the outcome of one of our wars with the Gala Kingdom, we would still be at war today if it wasn't for the shadow plague."

"What does that mean?"

Gary asked.

Slyvia couldn't help herself and had to explain.

"The surrounding kingdoms had signed a truce, once we found out the nature of the shadow plague. All though tempory, we have agreed to team up against our common foe."

The students were tired and happy for once they weren't camping outside so talk among us fell silent quickly and proceeded to get some rest for the night.

This time the guard duty was put on the top of one of the castle towers, This allowed the guard to have a bigger field of view. Warning us of any incoming enemies.

There was no need to use dragon eyes tonight. I made use of a nearby gap in the wall and proceeded to exit through it. Once out I would go to a nearby forest to hunt Beasts. Just as I was stepping outside of one of the gaps I felt someone tugging on my sleeve.

"Where are you going at this time of night?"

Slyvia was holding on to the sleeve of my arm.