Aether Beasts

Morning meditation followed by a pain bath was a terrible start to the day, though from the look Sandra had on her face when we met Zirani outside the treehouse, it had been worse for her. I finished off my breakfast of bread, cheese, and dry meat just as we stopped in front of Zirani who had a serious look on her face, the look she held when she was in teacher mode, determination in her calculating eyes as she looked over the three of us, stopping at Sandra to raise an eyebrow.

The dark-haired arcanist shot Zirani a slight glare. "Fuck those baths."

"There weren't that—"

I hushed Misty before she could finish her sentence and annoy Sandra ever further. I understood where she was coming from. The bath was unpleasant, far worse than even some of the worse pains I'd gotten during fights, which was saying something since I'd been electrocuted and beaten pretty badly. I just wasn't the type to complain that much, though Sandra was probably just venting out her frustration. I knew she continue to do the baths because she had just as much of a desire to make it across the great scar as I did.

"Ok, good to see you're all awake and ready," Zirani said. "I'm just going to do a quick recap of what we've gone over so far, and then we can move onto the actual training. We'll be using the elixirs and pills when needed."

Zirani quickly went over everything we'd learned in our previous lessons, and unsurprisingly I'd forgotten nothing. Back at the academy when I'd been a student, I'd always had a good memory, and usually, it only took one time for me to remember something, at least when it had to do with the arcane. Back then, and even now, I was obsessed with the arcane. It was always going to be a core part of my life. I just couldn't imagine myself not in a state of progression, and now it was even more prevalent. Before the goal had just been to get stronger and learn more of the arcane, but now? Now I wanted to cross the great scar, learn about my parents, master my affinity and the mutation and see what else the world of the arcane had to offer.

The first new thing Zirani went into was patterns, specifically origin patterns and how they were usually taught.

"Orirign patterns usually come in sets," Zirani explained. "Base sets, Advanced sets, Affinity sets. These are the three most common types, but there are also custom sets of course, and path sets, which are only used by those on a path, but that is for another time. We're going to start with the base sets which are exactly as they sound, there are the sets taught to arcanists before most even have their first core."

That would have shocked me before I'd met Zirani, but knowing the type of things that lay beyond the great scar, I wasn't surprised that arcanists on the other side learned so much so early. Their arcane arts were just greater than those in the plains. It was like we held a book with most of the pages ripped out, while those beyond the scar held a full copy, though at that thought I felt a reprimand from Ziranithrough our bond.

"If you think that everything about the arcane has been discovered," Zirani said with a slight glare. "Then you are dead wrong. Only those few who are at the top know the full truth or are closer to it. Most do not and will never know. The arcane is a wide and deep pit, or a mountain so tall you cannot see its peak. Many will take attempt the climb, but most will never even catch a glimpse at the peak, at the top, and even those who do will, from what I've heard, usually find themselves unable to reach it."

"Who are these people at the top you keep talking about?" Sandra asked. "I know you spoke about them before, but are they really that big of a deal."

Zirani look at Sandra and for a moment seemed to be deciding something. "Orion of the deep, king of the roaring sea. Meraxsis the damned, undead queen of the northern hive. Faradin of Altia, first blade of the tempest. These are just a few that lie at the top. The only reason I'm even risking uttering these names is because we're in a tower in the plains."

"And if we weren't?" Misty asked.

"Then no doubt we'd have trouble coming our way." Zirani shook her head. "Trust me. It's best if we don't talk about them. They are arcanists so powerful they might as well be gods from the old world myths, lets's just leave it at that."

I wanted to ask something, but the look in Zirnai eyes warned me not to. It was clear this topic had shaken her slightly and that she didn't really want to talk about it anymore. Those names, however, they'd carried a physical weight to them and I was sure the others had noticed. It had faint but the air had stilled along with the ambient colorless aether. I couldn't even begin to imagine how powerful you had to be that the mention of your name made the very air and aether come to a standstill, in fact, the world around us had also come to a standstill as if it had sensed something.

"Another time then," Sandra muttered as she glanced around nervously.

After that little tangent, we moved back to training, and the pattern sets. Zirani's plan was to teach us a few base sets first and have us get used to them over the course of a few days before we moved on to the advanced and affinity sets, which would lead into the advanced techniques she wanted to teach us. As she spoke it became clear that we were going to be staying here for longer than we had on the first floor, which was probably for training, but I also thought it was because of how comfortable Zirani felt here, not that I blamed her. This place was full of nature, no man-made structures apart from our treehouse, and even that was attached to a tree with nature aether.

I wondered how odd it was going to be when we got out of this place. How would the steel heart sect react to our jump from first core arcanists at the first elve to second core arcanists at the third level? We'd been only a level down from the elders themselves, and that would probably be a good thing, not that I thought they'd stop us when we left. I'd read the contract and the clause for leaving wasn't that bad. A bid of money and a good reason is all it would take. There was also the fact that with our knowledge, everything we were learning, the elixirs, and improved cores, we might very well leave the tower stronger than the elders, which was a shocking idea to think about. Not even twenty and soon to be stronger than elders who'd lived for years.

What a life.

The base sets weren't that complicated which made sense I guessed since they were taught to kids. The set was made up of origin patterns, and there was a ton of them, which were definitely used in most patterns. Some of the sets made it clear what it was leaning towards, technique-wise. One set was obviously for more solid and construct-type techniques, which meant things like armor and weapons forged from an element like Sandra's dark weapons and cloak or my bark armor. Zirani said she'd changed some of the sets because many held the same patterns, and some were just too low quality as she'd said, not the patterns since an origin pattern couldn't be low quality, just what patterns had been chosen for a set.

I would go through each set by forming the patterns of the set one after the others, some at the same time. I would do it over and over again, and at one point I asked why she just didn't teach us all the origin patterns we would need to know.

"Do you know how many origin patterns there are?"

I shook my head.

"Too many to count," Zirani said. "These sets are created for a reason. These origin patterns were grouped together for a reason and you're learning them together for a reason. If I tried to teach you all the patterns I think you ought to know, it would take a ridiculous amount of time not to mention the fact that you're still at the second level of infusion. Your mind could not handle that much information. When you learn a pattern it's stored in a special part of your mind, your psyche, similar to your memories but different. There is a reason arcanists at the lower levels aren't taught too many techniques or patterns and another reason as to why we have these sets."

"So if I tried to learn too many patterns my brain would what, die?"

"No," She said. "Your mind just wouldn't take it in the same way. You try to learn it but and maybe you could form it, but it won't be like normal. It won't slowly become instinct or feel as natural."

"That seems… stupid?" Sandra said. "I mean, I don't think memory works like that?"

"This is the arcane we're talking bout," Zirani said. "I'm not going to spend time explaining this right now, but do not think rules of the arcane are the same as the rules that govern the non-arcane aspects of reality. You have not yet climbed high enough to realize this, but you will in time. Now, back to training."

Those words weighed on my mind as I continued forming patterns from the sets. She was right I knew that I shouldn't think of the arcane as I did normal aspects of life. There was a reason it was called the arcane after all.. There was still so much to learn, and discover, and despite feeling small at times, I sought that knowledge, to climb higher and who knew maybe one day I'd see the peak of the mountain, or hell even reach it, as minuscule a chance as that happening was, but even so, there was nothing wrong with a fools hope.