Aias: from a world of kaijus to a world of fantasy and magic

As Eric, Edwen, Isaac, Serell, and Aria look at Blake running off, with the key to his room in Aria's hand. One of them was looking longingly at him, and the other four had a mix of emotions.

Isaac and Serell's pride was hurt when they saw and realized that there was someone better than them—no, on a completely different level.

Isaac was easily outplayed, like he was a child, at the very thing people called him a genius at, his swordsmanship. Serrel was the same, but with magic, sensing Blake's absolute and overwhelming mastery of his magic, dwarfing his own.

As for Eric and Edwen, after calming down, Eric grew impatient with his inability to find his sister Rita because when he first saw Blake, he couldn't help but think he was his sister, save for the different color of his hair and eyes and, most importantly, the fact that he could wield magic.

As for Edwen, he wanted to find Rita, but not as much as Eric, because he was doing all this for Aria, who wanted to help Eric find his sister. Edwen thought it was best that she run away, but a small part of him wanted to know if his ex-fiancée, Rita, was okay. However, knowing her, he figured that she should be fine given how smart and resourceful she could be.

A silence fell on them till Isaac yelled out. "AHHHH!!! I can't stand him. I'm going off to train, Aria."

Walking off, Serell adjusted his glasses that were recently fixed and said, "Me too, excuse me," following Isaac.

"Wait, you two, where are you going?"

"Somewhere to train."

Smiling, motivated by their determination, she asked. "Then can I join you both?"

A bit taken aback, they did not expect Aria to say that, which made them blush.

Stuttering a little, both of them then said, "Su— Sure."

Then, turning back to Edwen and Eric, she asked if they were joining them. Eric said he would join but only watch, not telling her that he had a lot on his mind, while Edwen regretfully refused, saying he needed to take care of things, like taking some quests posted in the village hall to get some money, since they are broke right now and are waiting on their gear to be repaired.

"Oh, I see. See you later tonight. Good luck on your quests, and be careful."

"Yeah, you too."

Waving at each other goodbye, Aria, Isaac, Serall, and Eric made their way out of the village, which had a wide open meadow for them to train in.

There, Isaac took out his sword, one that was gifted to him by his father when he entered the royal academy, and he began swinging to warm up. Serell, on the other hand, made his hair glow blue, and he constructed swords made out of his mana infused with his nature.

Remembering their fight with Blake and how overwhelmed they were even when they were working together, Isaac imagined what he could have done differently to not be in that position, where he could only react to defend himself from the attack coming at him. He remembered how it felt as if he was being toyed with, how it felt to be completely helpless in a fight for the first time in his life.

He, a son of the captain knight commander, head of all knight orders in the kingdom, had expectations placed on him, which he gladly met and exceeded. At the age of 4, he began his training with a sword, and by the age of 7, when most children his age would start their swordsmanship training, he had the talent to beat most adults in sparring matches.

People called him a genius with a sword as he grew, and now, at just fourteen years of age, earlier this spring, they say he will be on track to become the youngest ever swordmaster, beating his own master, Thalric Veyl, a swordmaster who holds the current record at the age of twenty.

However, meeting Blake and fighting him, he found out somebody had already unofficially broken his master's record. Someone close to his age, who rivals his own master's skill, if not stands toe to toe with him. Isaac knew this with the bottom of his heart because during his sparring matches with his master and his fight with Blake, it felt like fighting Blake was like fighting his master if his master wasn't holding back.

He had never personally faced his master's full might, but on the few occasions he was allowed to witness him fight at his best, he felt that same overwhelming gap in ability just as clearly.

Seeing Isaac begin training, Serell was not one to slack off; he also remembered his fight with Blake and how his own talents compared to Blake's, surpassing his own, like his dedication to the mastery of his magic amounted to nothing in the end.

Like Isaac, people also called him a genius, being able to obtain his magic at an age similar to Isaac. Different from Isaac, he could see himself winning if it were in terms of a pure magic battle; however, he thought to himself, that is the problem. Magic is all about mana control. The more level-headed you are, the better you'll be in a real fight. If there is a fluctuation in your mana, then it could disrupt the spells you are controlling, and in Blake's case, Serel didn't sense any fluctuation from what he could tell.

It really bruised his ego because how could someone so utterly insane possess such flawless control? Yet that laughing lunatic appeared and shattered everything he thought was possible. That level of skill—it was like he had been born with innate talent for magic from the start—reminded Serell of the spirits he so deeply admired, beings naturally gifted with perfect control over mana. And the thought of them being similar really irked him even more; comparing majestic spirits to that lunatic was utterly ridiculous to him.

One day, he hoped to form a contract with them, though that was far in the future. It would be a long and difficult journey, since spirits form contracts under conditions no one fully understands. However, being more attuned to your magic significantly increases the chances of success.

With that driving force in his mind, he tempered his anger and cooled his head, using it as motivation to improve and not be made a fool of again. So, making swords out of his mana, infused with his mana nature, and recalling the precise control Blake wielded—especially as a close-range fighter. He aimed to set his sights on being at that level, if not surpassing it.

Watching both of them start training, Aria and Eric watch them in the shade of a tree. Eric leaned against the trunk, while Aria stretched, preparing herself for her own training.

He thought about the months he had been with Aria and the people he could actually call friends in their journey and how many tribulations and hardships they had faced.

After scouring all over the neighboring kingdom to do so, climbing mountains to isolated villages, fighting off monster hordes, searching through crime-infested towns, diving deep into dungeons chasing rumors of someone who might know his sister's whereabouts, and much more hardship, all to come to an end, near where they started, with nothing to show for it.

Granted, going through all that, it wasn't all bad, like the journey to visit an isolated village on top of a mountain having a wonderful hot spring, being hailed as heroes by small towns and villages after defending them from monster hordes or bandits, the joy of reuniting kidnapped children with their parents who were being sold into slavery, and much more.

However, as Eric previously thought, all of that came to nothing. He exhausted all his leads on his sister, and his last option was going back to Farsbarow to find any more leads he could have missed, but even that seemed likely to end in the same dead end for him.

Eric wonders what he would tell his father, what he would say, because he promised to bring back his sister, which he could not keep.

Those thoughts crowded his mind, but he pushed them aside, deeming them pointless for the moment. Instead, he turned his attention to Aria, curious about what she would be training, and asked her.

"Aria, what are you planning on doing?"

"Trying out this." Aria pulled out a pair of throwing knives, each engraved with intricate magical circles, and held them up proudly.

Eric looked at them closely and asked. "What's that? Where did you get them?"

"From the direwolves Blake had used them on."

Blinking, Eric said, "What?"

A silence fell between them for a second, and Eric then asked. "Wait, are they Blake's? Why didn't you give them back?"

Looking at Aria, baffled, she didn't look him in the eyes and twiddled her fingers, not expecting him to act that way, because she expected Eric to be impressed that she had a pair of special-looking throwing knives on her.

"Umm… Yeah, but he didn't bring it up, so I'm sure it's fine, right?"

"Huh…"

Eric looked at Aria holding those knives like they were something precious to her from that… that… bastard Blake, and a smile formed on his blank expression.

That smile was not a normal one, and Aria sensed it because it wasn't the first time she had seen that menacing smile.

"Aria… You know that doesn't belong to you. My, my… That piece of scrap looks like it's been well cared for. You really have been looking after it. I can't help but feel jealous of that forgetful fool—I mean, Blake. You've given them more attention than me; I can't help but wonder what happens when you meet with him again. I might just cry."

Scolding Aria, tears began forming on the edge of her eyes, and she looked utterly small, like the weight of each word Eric was saying was making her shrink. In a silent attempt to put an end to her well-deserved scolding, she looked up at Eric with the wide, pleading eyes of a small animal.

With that gaze looking back at him, Eric couldn't help but stop his scolding, and a second later, his face blushed, causing him to look away.

"Alright, alright, don't look at me like that."

Hearing that, Aria's face lit up with a bright smile after her scolding had finally stopped.

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When Eric finally looked back at Aria, after a minute to compose himself from that sight, he then said.

"I guess I can teach you how to throw a knife."

"Really?"

"Yeah, I'm quite good at it myself, and I can't have you hurting yourself doing it."

Saying that with a sense of pride like a kid showing off a new trick, Eric then led Aria a couple of paces away from the tree he was sitting by, using it as a target for Aria to throw at.

Now, behind her, he told her to use the proper stance for a beginner to throw things enthusiastically, followed by linking his hand with Aria's, showing her the proper throwing technique to do so.

However, unbeknownst to Eric, who seemingly wasn't noticing how close he was to Aria, Aria couldn't help but get dizzy and blush at how close they were together.

Eric's face is equally as handsome as Blake's, though they have many similarities and differences, with Eric's being more manly and Blake's being more androgynous. Aria couldn't help it, but blood started to run down her nose.

'He-heh… heh heh heh…'"

A strange, crooked smile spread across her face as she continued to look at Eric's face, and in a voice barely above a whisper that he didn't pick up since he was enthralled with teaching Aria, she muttered, "Pretty…"

However, eventually, once Eric was finally done talking, he finally noticed Aria was limp in her arms with blood running down her nose.

Panicked, he shook Aria by the shoulders, trying to wake her as she remained in a daze, muttering incoherent nonsense, until she finally snapped out of it a minute later.

"Huh… what happened?"

Relief washes over Eric; hearing that, he quickly took out a handkerchief and wiped the blood coming out of her nose while asking her if she was okay.

With a wry smile and scratching the back of her head, she said. "Right, right, it happened again, sorry."

Apologizing for it, though it wasn't the first time it had happened, Aria felt really guilty for making Eric worry.

After Eric cleaned off the blood from her face, Aria asked to continue with his lesson, but this time she just watched instead of them being touchy-touchy with each other.

Observing closely Eric's stance and throwing technique, Aria copied what Eric was doing till Eric decided it was time for Aria to try it out for real.

"Okay, be careful now. They seem to be magical throwing knives; make sure you don't use any mana with them; we don't know what they do."

Nodding enthusiastically, she readied her stance, holding the knife between her thumb and forefinger, not too tightly and not too loosely.

Pulling her arm back, she threw it, and it spun a couple of times before hitting a tree. Seeing that she managed to hit the tree, Aria was about to jump in joy, with her whole face lighting up to let out a squeal of delight, until she and Eric heard crackles of electricity from the knife Ari had thrown.

Instinctively, Eric pulled Aria toward him, protecting her from whatever that was. When the noise died down, Eric let go, and Aria popped her head over his shoulder and looked at the tree where the noise had come from.

There, they saw that Blake's knife, stuck into the tree, was humming out tiny electrical sparks, which turned part of the tree around it black, into charcoal.

"Huh?" Turning to look exactly where Aria was looking, he then said. "Umm… Aria, did you accidentally use mana when you were throwing it?"

Shaking her head no, she then ran toward the tree, with Eric shouting out for her to wait, but she didn't listen.

Up to the tree, Aria examines it closely. She then grabs it but immediately pulls her hand back, feeling the burning hot metal directly on the palm of her hand.

Running up to Aria and seeing Aria pulling her hand back, he quickly asked if she was alright as Aria held her hand, grimacing in pain.

"I'm fine, Eric; I kind of burnt my hand a bit."

"What!!! Let me see."

Quickly looking at her hand, he worriedly said. "This is a really bad burn."

"Really? It doesn't seem that bad."

"Of course it is."

"Oh, I see. A simple heal should fix it."

Calmly, her hair began to glow a holy golden color, much like Sarah's magic, even as Eric looked on in panic. Golden light began radiating from her hands, and the red, burnt flesh on her palm began closing, and fresh new skin grew back, leaving it as good as new, like the burn on her hand was never there.

Sighing in relief, glad that Aria was fine, he then saw her approach the knife again, worried that she was going to touch it again, and he told her.

"At least let it cool down before you touch it."

Puffing her cheeks out like she wasn't going to do that, she said, "It's not like I was going to do that."

Seeing that, Eric couldn't help but blush a little, like watching a small animal pouting.

Taking a canteen from her side, Aria then poured water over the throwing knife, letting the water cool down the knife embedded in the tree.

Once it had cooled, she carefully checked it before pulling it out—only for her expression to completely change, with her eyes widening, and her mouth falling open in shock.

Stiffly turning her head toward Eric, like a child caught red-handed after breaking something she wasn't supposed to, she muttered in a small, guilty voice.

"Umm… Eric, I think I broke it?"

"What? Let me see."

Carefully handing it over, Eric saw that the magical circles on the throwing knife and the intricately small runes engraved on it were all melted away.

"Can it be fixed?"

Saying that guiltily, hoping it could be fixed, but Eric dashed that hope by saying it couldn't.

"I'm afraid not; we need to completely redo the engravings, but on the bright side, we have another of Blake's engraved knives; it shouldn't be a problem."

"Really?"

Relieved that it could be fixed, Eric continued.

"I think we should ask Serell because I don't really know much about runes."

"Right."

Calling out for Serell, who was far off in the distance, practicing his mana control, he stopped the sword that was made out of his mana mid-air and looked back. He was a bit ticked off that Eric was calling for him until Aria shouted and waved for him as well. Seeing her, his annoyance melted away, and he gladly let everything drop because Aria clearly needed him for something.

Walking up to them, with a smirk directed toward Eric, Aria handed Blake's throwing knives.

"I think I broke it. Can you fix it?"

Adjusting his glasses to get a better look, the moment he looked at the throwing knife, specifically at the one Aria hadn't thrown, to know what he was dealing with, his brow furrowed massively when he saw the intricately engraved runes on it.

"Umm… Aria… Where did you get these?"

Hearing Serell's question, Aria flinched and did not look him in the eye while twiddling her fingers.

"Aria… What did you do?"

Emphasizing her name to make him look at her, she had a really guilty look under Serell's gaze.

Explaining what happened, Serell took off his glasses and couldn't help but pinch the bridge of his nose.

Sighing, "Do you know how much they cost?"

Tilting her head, she said. "Umm… no, how much?"

"At least several large platinum coins."

Saying that after handing it back over, Aria was blinking a bit from that revelation, unable to comprehend, till she let out a big "What!!!," nearly dropping both of Blake's throwing knives to the ground.

"How can they be so expensive?!"

Answering her question, Eric said. "Part of it is due to mythril metal being mixed into the knives, and the other, the main reason it costs that much, is because of the runes engraved into it. Is that right, Serell?"

Calmly stating this, he drew on the full extent of his magical knowledge and his limited understanding of runecraft, then turned to Serell for confirmation.

"Yes, that is correct. With how small the runes are and how intricately the magical circles are engraved on it, it would take someone extremely skilled to make them, especially so because I don't recognize some of the runes in here."

A pause lulled between them till Aria, shudderingly, asked. "Umm… how—how much would it take to fix it?"

Coming from a baron's family—the lowest rank of nobility—the cost of making a single knife was practically an arm and a leg.

Noticing that, Eric and Serell calmly said, like that amount of money was nothing, at the same time. "I'll cover it for you."

'Hey Serell, you don't need to; I know some people who are skilled enough to fix it, so there is no need for you to budge in."

"Oh, really, Eric? I also have some people who can fix it as well; they would surely be much faster and better than the people you are suggesting."

"Says who?"

Bickering between themselves on who will cover the cost and take responsibility for fixing it for a good while, with snide remarks and insults being thrown at each other, Aria was the one who stopped them and said.

"Alright!! Enough, you two! We'll decide who will fix it after we find Eric's sister, Rita."

Stopping their arguing, Serell went back to training, while Aria and Eric decided to head back to town and do some quests to earn some money.

For the next week or so, Isaac and Serel were off training, while Aria, Eric, and Edwen went off to complete quests to make some money.

They finally got their equipment repaired and had enough money to set off to Farsbarow the next day, early in the morning.

Taking a brisk stroll, they walked on the side of the road till Isaac stopped.

Noticing that Isaac had suddenly stopped, Aria asked what was wrong.

"Everyone… Do you feel like someone's watching us?"

Whispering that quietly, Edwen responded. "Yeah." Then, looking at Serell, "Could you find them?" followed by telling Eric, "Get ready when he finds them."

Silently nodding, they already know the routine. Serell's hair glowed blue, and he immediately cast a wind search spell, spreading out his mana in a wide area in a pulse, roughly a 300-meter radius.

There, Serell detected a presence hiding in the bushes, quietly observing them. Instantly, he pointed his finger at the person watching them, followed by telling Eric where that person was hiding. At the same moment, Eric's hair glowed white and pointed in the same direction—but for a completely different reason.

Lightning sparks around his arm and focuses on a single point between his fingers. A ball of electricity forms in less than a second, which he then shoots.

The small ball of electricity hissed through the air with a sharp crackle, moving faster than the eye could follow. When it struck the bushes where the person watching them was hiding, a jolt of electricity arced into the tree, followed by a scream of pain.

Rushing up to the figure who had been spying on them, they saw a man wreathed in smoke, groaning in pain, and already unconscious after being hit with a massive surge of electricity.

The first to speak was Edwen, commenting. "Huh… he doesn't look like your typical assassin."

"Yeah, he looks like a hunter, I think," responded Eric.

"Then why was he spying on us?" asked Serell.

"Who knows?" Isaac said with a shrug, as everyone stared at the guy, until Eric said.

"Alright, let's go. We should pick up our pace so we don't run into any more of them. Aria, could you cast your support spell?"

"Okay, give me a second after I heal him first."

"Fine, but please be quick about it."

After healing him, Aria then casts support spells on everyone, specifically ones that increase their speed and endurance, allowing them to run as fast as a horse but much longer.

By the time they reached Farsbarow, it was a bit late in the afternoon. They approached the city gate and presented their adventurer guild cards to the guards without much difficulty. However, the guards peppered them with far more questions than usual, almost as if they were deliberately stalling for time.

Now officially in Farsbarow, they decided to look for lodging before going to the adventurer guild.

However, as they were walking through the bustling streets, Eric, Edwen, and Serall had a frown.

Curious, Aria asked what was wrong, but all of them unanimously said it was nothing. However, with not that much pressing from her, they finally caved in and admitted that they sensed Blake's mana.

"What? He's here? Where?"

Begrudgingly, Eric pointed to where they sensed his mana, not wanting to be the one to spoil her excitement.

With that, they walked eventually to a high-end inn, in which Aria managed to sense Blake's mana since he was the only one using his magic. Like fate had once more interwoven the two, they met each other's gaze as Blake stared out the window at her.