Paragon of Destruction

"I don't get it."

Arran looked at the two memory amulets in his hands with frustrated eyes. One of them held a terse set of instructions on the Forms, while the other held a detailed set of notes to accompany the instructions.

And both, it seemed, were completely useless.

He'd studied the amulets' contents for nearly two weeks, using the student's notes to make sense of the instructions. As he'd soon discovered, the notes were a necessity, since the instructions had clearly been written to accompany personal instruction, rather than to replace it.

Combined, however, the two amulets were just enough for Arran to understand the instructions. And eager as he was to learn more about the Forms, he'd spent two weeks painstakingly studying everything contained within the amulets, making sure not to miss even a single word.

Yet the result was not at all what he had expected. In fact, it was the complete opposite.

The amulet that held the instructions had been divided into two portions, and the first of these covered all the Forms that Arran already knew. Except, the versions described in the amulet were worse in every way — slower, weaker, less efficient, and far harder to combine.

Still, Arran had diligently studied these inferior Forms for several days, hoping that they might somehow prove useful. Yet while learning them had been simple enough, he'd soon grown convinced that they were every bit as useless as they seemed.

But if the first portion of the instructions was disappointing, the second portion was downright infuriating.

The Forms Arran had learned from Anthea separated spells into individual components, making it possible to create new spells at a whim. At least, that was the theory. In practice, using the Forms was far too slow to be useful, and the resulting spells were laughably weak compared to real ones.

The second portion of the instructions, however, took this a step further. Instead of giving a way to combine the Forms, it took the Forms themselves and split them into thousands of even smaller techniques.

The results were every bit as disappointing as expected.

Combining these smaller Forms was every bit as slow and difficult as combining the larger ones had been. Even recreating Anthea's Forms from the fragments was nearly impossible, and there was no need to even think about using them for real spells.

Arran had hoped to find a way to combine the Forms more effectively. But instead, what he got was the opposite — a far larger set of techniques that were even less suitable for practical use.

Worst of all, neither of the amulets contained any information about how to actually combine the Forms.

A deep frown appeared on Arran's face as he pondered the matter. The glaring omission surprised him, and he soon realized that none of the possible explanations boded well for his chances.

Perhaps Elder Nikias had never bothered to write down the method to combine the Forms, instead explaining it to his students in person. If so, Arran would have to discover the method himself — a task that would take decades, if he could do it at all.

Worse, however, was the possibility that the Elder had intentionally omitted the method from his writings. That he had kept the most crucial part of the Forms concealed, to stop it from falling into the hands of others.

The thought was discouraging, but the more Arran thought it about it, the more it made sense.

The Forms he'd learned from Anthea were simple, and the ones he'd found in the student's void ring seemed even simpler. But perhaps the Forms weren't the true secret. Perhaps the true secret was how to use them.

If that was the case, then no amount of study would help him. Not unless he found the key to unlocking the Forms' true power. And if Elder Nikias had intentionally kept that a secret, Arran's search had reached a dead end.

With a sigh, he stored the two amulets in his void ring, then stood up and stretched his limbs.

He spent the next hour eating a large meal and taking a long walk through the dark forest that surrounded the glade. After being focused on the memory amulets' contents for two full weeks, what he needed more than anything was to clear his mind and find a new perspective.

He had barely walked three miles amid the trees when he stopped in his tracks. Suddenly, he realized what he had overlooked — the other memory amulets. In his focus on the Forms, he'd ignored the most obvious source of information.

He turned around at once, then hurried back to his small camp. And when he arrived, he sat down again, then retrieved the four amulets he'd only given a cursory inspection.

The first amulet he examined was the one filled with poetry. If the student had wanted to hide any secret information, endless lines of stilted poetry and awkward metaphors would certainly be a good place to do it.

For several hours, he struggled through the students' writings. Yet all he found were a thousand different ways to describe sunsets and flowers, none of which was the least bit useful in understanding the Forms.

Still, when he finished the amulet's contents, he found himself more relieved than disappointed. While he hadn't found anything useful, at least he wouldn't have to read the student's tortured verse ever again.

He ate another quick meal — his body was still recovering, after all — then moved on to the journal.

The journal proved much more tolerable than the poetry collection had been, and as he read it, Arran soon found himself engrossed in the students' story.

The student — the journal didn't mention his name — had started the journal when he was just a novice. And from what he wrote, Arran understood that the young man's talent had been middling at best.

He'd spent well over a decade as a novice, struggling as he tried to reach the skill to become an adept. While he had started as a member of the House of Flames, he had been removed when his progress stalled, after which he had joined one of the lesser Houses.

But there, too, his talent had proved insufficient.

After several years of training without any progress to show for it, the lesser House had removed him as well. And after that, he had spent the next two years living in a tiny room in one of the many inns within the Ninth Valley's capital, paying adepts for lessons whenever he had any coin to spare.

That Elder Nikias had taken him as an apprentice was a matter of luck more than anything else.

Eager to impress a serving girl at the inn, the student had boasted about his skill in magic, claiming that he was preparing himself to be tested by the Elder. The boast had won him the girl's attention — though not her affection — but afterward, he'd been forced to maintain the lie.

Several months later, however, it was announced that Elder Nikias was holding trials for new apprentices. And after months of lying, the student had no choice but to go even though he was certain he had no chance.

The journal made no mention of the trials, nor of the student's performance in them. Yet in the next entry, the student's complaints about Elder Nikias's arduous training made it clear that he had somehow succeeded.

After that, the entries in the journal grew sparser, with weeks or even months passing between each. And when the student did write, he wrote briefly, most often merely noting that his training was progressing at a steady pace.

The young man did not describe the training itself, but it was obvious that his progress was fast — barely a year after joining Elder Nikias, the journal noted that the student had finally become an adept.

The entry contained none of the jubilation Arran would have expected. Instead, the student merely mentioned it in passing, then continued to observe that his insights were still growing steadily.

The comment was made casually, but at once, Arran recognized its importance. And after rereading it several times to make sure he wasn't mistaken, his expression turned excited.

The student had not mentioned skill or spells, but insights. This was something the Ninth Valley's Matriarch had mentioned before — that the Forms relied heavily on insights.

Arran spent several minutes contemplating how the Forms related to insights, and as he thought it over, he began to suspect that the Matriarch had it wrong.

He'd studied the Forms carefully, both the versions Anthea had taught him and the versions described in the student's memory amulets. Between the two, Anthea's versions seemed more like real spells, while the ones detailed in the amulets more resembled training exercises.

And now, he thought that might be exactly what they were. Training exercises, but for insights rather than spells. The Forms didn't rely on insights, as the Matriarch had believed, but instead developed them.

Arran immediately set to work on testing the theory, quickly looking up the technique among the Forms that most closely resembled severing. With his true insight, it should be an easy matter to find out whether his suspicion was correct.

Finding the proper technique barely took any time at all, and he began to practice it at once. Except this time, he did not try to make the technique into a spell. Instead, as he executed it over and over, he carefully watched for similarities between the technique and his true insight.

The work took him several hours, but slowly, he began to understand how the technique was supposed to be performed. And as his understanding grew, he realized he'd been right — what the technique taught was a path toward insight into severing.

The path wasn't a perfect one, he saw. If someone other than him followed it, it would not lead them to a true insight. But what it would do was give them a foundation to build on — a way to build their insights.

A shiver ran down Arran's spine when he realized the implications.

Using the Forms, mages could gain insights into every single element of a spell. Every spell they cast would be near-perfect, terrifying in power even with limited Essence. And if a spell could be built from insights they already possessed, they would instantly surpass even people who had studied the same spell for centuries.

But that was just the start of it.

The further their insights grew, the stronger their magic would become. Lesser insights would already grant a staggering amount of strength, and greater ones would grant unrivaled power. And if a mage managed to turn his insights into true ones…

Suddenly, Arran's eyes widened in shock, as he realized what the Forms truly represented.

What they offered wasn't just a path toward becoming a powerful mage. It was a path toward becoming a Sage.

Long ago, Snowcloud's grandfather had explained to Arran that Sages' power came from their unparalleled insights into magic. And as Arran had later discovered, just a few insights were already enough to grant a stunning level of power.

Elder Nikias had somehow devised a path toward gaining thousands of insights. Which meant that he must have been on the verge of becoming a Sage when he died, if he wasn't one already.

And still, he'd been defeated.

Arran could not help but shudder at the thought. If the Hunters had defeated a mage that powerful, there would be truly monstrous warriors among their ranks. And Arran had not forgotten that his task was to infiltrate those ranks.

An uncomfortable frown crossed his face as he considered the danger. Yet he knew there was an opportunity as well. If the Hunters had techniques that allowed them to match even an Elder on the verge of becoming a Sage, learning those techniques would be invaluable.

Arran sat silently for some moments, then shook his head. There was no point in dwelling on whatever the future might hold.

He'd finally found the secret behind the Forms, and now, it was time to put his discovery to use.