As she picked up the folded piece of paper, an small clear object fell out and made a clink sound upon hitting the boat.
Faine picked it up and studied its structure, it appeared to be made of ice but was as clear as glass as it refracted light from the sun and gave off twinkles of light.
It was shaped as a teardrop, it's transparency showed no flaws and looked as though made by a grand master craftsman.
She looked back to the folded piece of paper and unfolded it. Seeing her mother's writing made tears threaten to break out the corners of her eyes, they were already puffed up from earlier.
My dearest daughter Faine,
Your father and I are going to track down the people responsible for our misfortunes. Do not look for us, you are still not strong enough to face the enemies your father and I are bound to encounter on our journey.
Hide your traits, do not let anyone know where you are from, though I would have preferred it if you had taken after your father so that it would be hard for you to be found out of your origins, but alas, you took after me- hair, skin and all. My beloved Faine, train well and become strong.
Try to live a peaceful life, our grudges do not need to be passed unto you. In this satchel are I and your father's family techniques, it may be a daunting task to learn them but persistence will prevail.
The pendant with this letter is my family heirloom, passed only to those from the Palikova family, guard it well, it is what will help you to go back to your origins if need be.
Your father and I are going to track down the people responsible for our misfortunes. Do not look for us, you are still not strong enough to face the enemies your father and I are bound to encounter on our journey.
Hide your traits, do not let anyone know where you are from, though I would have preferred it if you had taken after your father so that it would be hard for you to be found out of your origins, but alas, you took after me- hair, skin and all. My beloved Faine, train well and become strong.
Try to live a peaceful life, our grudges do not need to be passed unto you. In this satchel are I and your father's family techniques, it may be a daunting task to learn them but persistence will prevail.
The pendant with this letter is my family heirloom, passed only to those from the Palikova family, guard it well, it is what will help you to go back to your origins if need be.
Take care my dearest
At the bottom of the letter were some inscriptions that she could not discern, it was most probably written in another language, after scrutinizing the inscriptions for a few minutes more, she gave up and kept it away in the satchel.
In the satchel were small finely polished jade stones with inscriptions on them, Faine was surprised to find them, because these were skill stones that had specific martial art techniques engraved in their core and could only be used once, making their value quite high, as most martial art techniques were written in scrolls, only those who had reached the enlightened realm of the second stage could ingrain their skills into these skill stones.
There were a total of thirty-three skill stones in the satchel, of which there were eighteen jade skill stones which shone faintly with blue light surrounding them when she injected a bit of her spiritual essence in them, this showed it contained techniques for the Earth realm stage, it could be useful for her for common attack and defense skills.
Following that were 6 yellow skill stones of the Physical realm stage, these were already rare to come by for normal practitioners but she had been given a whole six, she had yet to check what skills were in them but by merely seeing that they were in the Physical Realm stage, her martial arts was bound to improve a lot.
There were 5 orange ones of the Soul Realm stage, according to what she had learned from her parents and the books she had studied these ones were even rarer than the faintly glowing yellow and blue skill stones.
The stage of a practitioner depended on their ability to comprehend the elements and manipulate it to add to their own strength, the level of skill required to cast even the smallest spells needed at least some sort of understanding.
The remaining four skill stones were 2 red, 1 purple and 1 black skill stone. Faine held them in her hands as they slightly trembled. The purple and black skill stones were sure to contain secret techniques able to conquer to enemies with one move for those from the Mystic realm and above.
She stopped injecting her essence into the stones and the light surrounding them faded away, they all looked the same now, but she had already categorized them in her head.
Taking 10 of the green skill stones, she proceeded to absorb what was contained in them, the fighting styles contained in them were quite unique, she had never seen her father fight this way, and seeing as how it was her mother who prepared the satchel then it must have been what was practiced from the people of Xeraph.
The waters of the sea were calm so Faine decided to freeze the water surrounding her up to a 4 meter radius from the boat as a platform to train so she could familiarize her body with the techniques she had just absorbed from the skill stones.
She got off the boat and walked on the ice, the platform swayed slightly as she took three steps away from the boat and walked around a bit to see her work.
Her reflection on the ice showed a girl at 18 years of age, her crystal blue eyes were still puffed up from crying the previous day but her blue eyes still sparkled as the sun light refracted off them. The wind blew on her knee-length grey hair and caused it to splay across her smooth pale white face, she closed her eyes and took in a large gulp air.
"AHHH"
The quiet ambiance was broken by the high pitched scream of Faine, after emptying her lungs she weakly fell to the ice platform and knelt. After recovering her breath, her blue translucent eyes lost a bit of their luster, but determination was there.
She stood up and started practicing the stances. Ice sculptures were summoned by her on the platform to practice her newly gained fighting style. After spending the whole day trying to familiarize with the fighting styles gotten from the Earth realm stage skill stones, she proceeded to absorb the 6 yellow skill stones of the Physical realm stage.
Upon taking the first one of the skill stones and absorbing it, pressure came down on her body causing her to grit her teeth. Sweat formed on her face as she sat down on the ice in a lotus stance and closed her eyes to focus on absorbing the skill sealed within the Jade stone.
When she opened her eyes, she stared intently at the others in the bag with wider eyes, after she had managed to absorb one of the skill stones that faintly glowed yellow, she was surprised to not find any martial skills inside, but rather what was absorbed was a summoning technique to summon a low level plant spirit.
After she looked at the skill stone of the Earth realm that she had absorbed, she compared it to the Physical realm stage skill stone, they both looked the same, the only difference was the color that they faintly let out when spiritual essence from her was injected into them.
Excitement filled her heart when she realized that there might be more summoning techniques sealed within the other skill stones, but she could not absorb the ones of the soul realm and above yet.
Her level of development was only at the Physical realm at the third stage, she was currently only a bit away from breaking through to the Soul realm stage and had reached a bottleneck a few days ago. She had gone deep into the forest on the island to gather more spiritual essence in a secluded place and had planned to surprise her parents with the sudden breakthrough but fate had to play tricks on her and have her encounter that rouge magician.
Remembering the events that had happened, she quickly slapped her cheeks with both hands to clear her head and proceeded to take in the other five Physical realm stage skill stones.
She passed the next three days at sea practicing the new fighting style of her mother had left her, it would be highly advantageous to her because it involved a lot of flexibility and added essence to her strength, she spent her time to recuperate through meditating in a lotus position during the night time.
The sea was usually calm and seagulls sounded off from the distance, it was her fifth day at sea and her fourth attempt at summoning a fire spirit and the fourth time it had blown up in her face when she tried to give it a physical form.
Aggrieved, she assumed her weak point was fire because her strength was water and Ice, but that did not mean she would give up on trying. She had managed to form contracts with three spirits so far from the knowledge she had gotten from the skill stones, the fire spirit she was trying to summon to make a contract with however, seemed haughty in nature and did not seem to want to be called out. She slouched against the side of a small couch she had made out of ice on the platform.
After the first two days at sea, she had made a small training ground of ice and small furniture, it would look quite odd from a distance to see a large area of ice with sculptures and furniture also made of ice surrounding a small boat in the middle as its oasis.
Faine had nowhere in particular to go to, she just simply did not care where the boat would float off to, neither was she in a rush to leave the sea. She did not need to eat because she practiced to absorb essence from the environment to help in her development and nourish her body.
As she sat in a lotus position on the ice floor, a sudden release of her spiritual essence mixed with others from the surrounding spread out and caused the ice to crack a little on the surface, ripples set out from the ice platform and disappeared at it reached the waves from the ocean.
"...I-I did it!" Faine looked at her hands and clenched them, she had finally broken through the bottleneck to the Soul Realm stage, but she was currently at the first stage had not completely stabilized her body from the advancement yet.
She quickly got into a lotus position and called the essence of the elements around her and filtered them through her body to add to her own.
Night fell as she had just finished absorbing the 5 skill stones of the soul realm, she would have to wait until she had experience before she could enter the Enlightened realm stage and finally take in the skills held in the 2 red skill stones.
Just as she kept the emptied Jade stones back in her satchel and was preparing to spend the night in a lotus position to meditate, the surrounding waters stirred and the waves grew turbulent.
From the distance thunder claps were heard, the grey sky got darker as the stars were hidden behind heavily pregnant dark clouds. Faine quickly got on the boat just as the ice platform broke from the force of the currents, the boat was then released and began to sway heavily to the sides, threatening to capsize at any moment.
Faine created a wind barrier and stirred the water to a calm around her, but that was a fruitless effort as what came next was a large wave. The water swept down and smashed into her barrier, causing her to lose her footing and fall straight into the waters.
The water currents grew more violent as she tried to swim to the surface, she tried to cast a spell to direct some of the water current to propel her out the water so she could use wind magic to fly away from the storm but just as she was about to cast it, a black figure grabbed her right shoulder and smashed her against some floating debris.
Red seeped from her head and filled her vision as she stared blankly at a formless gigantic black creature in the water, one of its tendril-like limbs still held onto Faine as it drew her closer to itself. Faine grew panicked and quickly shot out ice blades at it, but the shards of ice were swallowed into its body and became ineffective, the creature gave off a murderous aura as its two red eyes stared intently at Faine.
She struggled and took out a small dagger from its sheath on her thigh and lodged it at the tendril holding her, the air left in her lungs were expiring soon and she was close to passing out from the lack of air.
Another tendril quickly shot out and grabbed her left arm from attacking the tendril holding unto her right shoulder, the formless black creature held her hand as its eyes still gazed at her.
The next thing that registered in her head was an excruciating burning pain on her shoulder, the pain made her closer to losing consciousness but she willed herself to stay conscious, she would not have the monsters have its way.
Her body felt hot as the searing pain still rung in her right shoulder, the hotness of her body made her delirious, just as she was about to lose consciousness, her body let out a large-scaled electric current and shocked the creature through its tendrils and the water as a medium.
The creature made pained gurgled sounds and seemed surprised to be shocked by a human, Faine fainted and bubbles came out her mouth as her breath left her. The creature made some muffled sounds and the storm soon cleared, the sea was at peace again.
On a calm at sea, a girl covered in her blood from her head and arms laid unconscious on a small boat and a black monstrous creature no where to be seen.
In the satchel were small finely polished jade stones with inscriptions on them, Faine was surprised to find them, because these were skill stones that had specific martial art techniques engraved in their core and could only be used once, making their value quite high, as most martial art techniques were written in scrolls, only those who had reached the enlightened realm of the second stage could ingrain their skills into these skill stones.
There were a total of thirty-three skill stones in the satchel, of which there were eighteen jade skill stones which shone faintly with blue light surrounding them when she injected a bit of her spiritual essence in them, this showed it contained techniques for the Earth realm stage, it could be useful for her for common attack and defense skills.
Following that were 6 yellow skill stones of the Physical realm stage, these were already rare to come by for normal practitioners but she had been given a whole six, she had yet to check what skills were in them but by merely seeing that they were in the Physical Realm stage, her martial arts was bound to improve a lot.
There were 5 orange ones of the Soul Realm stage, according to what she had learned from her parents and the books she had studied these ones were even rarer than the faintly glowing yellow and blue skill stones.
The stage of a practitioner depended on their ability to comprehend the elements and manipulate it to add to their own strength, the level of skill required to cast even the smallest spells needed at least some sort of understanding.
The remaining four skill stones were 2 red, 1 purple and 1 black skill stone. Faine held them in her hands as they slightly trembled. The purple and black skill stones were sure to contain secret techniques able to conquer to enemies with one move for those from the Mystic realm and above.
She stopped injecting her essence into the stones and the light surrounding them faded away, they all looked the same now, but she had already categorized them in her head.
Taking 10 of the green skill stones, she proceeded to absorb what was contained in them, the fighting styles contained in them were quite unique, she had never seen her father fight this way, and seeing as how it was her mother who prepared the satchel then it must have been what was practiced from the people of Xeraph.
The waters of the sea were calm so Faine decided to freeze the water surrounding her up to a 4 meter radius from the boat as a platform to train so she could familiarize her body with the techniques she had just absorbed from the skill stones.
She got off the boat and walked on the ice, the platform swayed slightly as she took three steps away from the boat and walked around a bit to see her work.
Her reflection on the ice showed a girl at 18 years of age, her crystal blue eyes were still puffed up from crying the previous day but her blue eyes still sparkled as the sun light refracted off them. The wind blew on her knee-length grey hair and caused it to splay across her smooth pale white face, she closed her eyes and took in a large gulp air.
"AHHH"
The quiet ambiance was broken by the high pitched scream of Faine, after emptying her lungs she weakly fell to the ice platform and knelt. After recovering her breath, her blue translucent eyes lost a bit of their luster, but determination was there.
She stood up and started practicing the stances. Ice sculptures were summoned by her on the platform to practice her newly gained fighting style. After spending the whole day trying to familiarize with the fighting styles gotten from the Earth realm stage skill stones, she proceeded to absorb the 6 yellow skill stones of the Physical realm stage.
Upon taking the first one of the skill stones and absorbing it, pressure came down on her body causing her to grit her teeth. Sweat formed on her face as she sat down on the ice in a lotus stance and closed her eyes to focus on absorbing the skill sealed within the Jade stone.
When she opened her eyes, she stared intently at the others in the bag with wider eyes, after she had managed to absorb one of the skill stones that faintly glowed yellow, she was surprised to not find any martial skills inside, but rather what was absorbed was a summoning technique to summon a low level plant spirit.
After she looked at the skill stone of the Earth realm that she had absorbed, she compared it to the Physical realm stage skill stone, they both looked the same, the only difference was the color that they faintly let out when spiritual essence from her was injected into them.
Excitement filled her heart when she realized that there might be more summoning techniques sealed within the other skill stones, but she could not absorb the ones of the soul realm and above yet.
Her level of development was only at the Physical realm at the third stage, she was currently only a bit away from breaking through to the Soul realm stage and had reached a bottleneck a few days ago. She had gone deep into the forest on the island to gather more spiritual essence in a secluded place and had planned to surprise her parents with the sudden breakthrough but fate had to play tricks on her and have her encounter that rouge magician.
Remembering the events that had happened, she quickly slapped her cheeks with both hands to clear her head and proceeded to take in the other five Physical realm stage skill stones.
She passed the next three days at sea practicing the new fighting style of her mother had left her, it would be highly advantageous to her because it involved a lot of flexibility and added essence to her strength, she spent her time to recuperate through meditating in a lotus position during the night time.
The sea was usually calm and seagulls sounded off from the distance, it was her fifth day at sea and her fourth attempt at summoning a fire spirit and the fourth time it had blown up in her face when she tried to give it a physical form.
Aggrieved, she assumed her weak point was fire because her strength was water and Ice, but that did not mean she would give up on trying. She had managed to form contracts with three spirits so far from the knowledge she had gotten from the skill stones, the fire spirit she was trying to summon to make a contract with however, seemed haughty in nature and did not seem to want to be called out. She slouched against the side of a small couch she had made out of ice on the platform.
After the first two days at sea, she had made a small training ground of ice and small furniture, it would look quite odd from a distance to see a large area of ice with sculptures and furniture also made of ice surrounding a small boat in the middle as its oasis.
Faine had nowhere in particular to go to, she just simply did not care where the boat would float off to, neither was she in a rush to leave the sea. She did not need to eat because she practiced to absorb essence from the environment to help in her development and nourish her body.
As she sat in a lotus position on the ice floor, a sudden release of her spiritual essence mixed with others from the surrounding spread out and caused the ice to crack a little on the surface, ripples set out from the ice platform and disappeared at it reached the waves from the ocean.
"...I-I did it!" Faine looked at her hands and clenched them, she had finally broken through the bottleneck to the Soul Realm stage, but she was currently at the first stage had not completely stabilized her body from the advancement yet.
She quickly got into a lotus position and called the essence of the elements around her and filtered them through her body to add to her own.
Night fell as she had just finished absorbing the 5 skill stones of the soul realm, she would have to wait until she had experience before she could enter the Enlightened realm stage and finally take in the skills held in the 2 red skill stones.
Just as she kept the emptied Jade stones back in her satchel and was preparing to spend the night in a lotus position to meditate, the surrounding waters stirred and the waves grew turbulent.
From the distance thunder claps were heard, the grey sky got darker as the stars were hidden behind heavily pregnant dark clouds. Faine quickly got on the boat just as the ice platform broke from the force of the currents, the boat was then released and began to sway heavily to the sides, threatening to capsize at any moment.
Faine created a wind barrier and stirred the water to a calm around her, but that was a fruitless effort as what came next was a large wave. The water swept down and smashed into her barrier, causing her to lose her footing and fall straight into the waters.
The water currents grew more violent as she tried to swim to the surface, she tried to cast a spell to direct some of the water current to propel her out the water so she could use wind magic to fly away from the storm but just as she was about to cast it, a black figure grabbed her right shoulder and smashed her against some floating debris.
Red seeped from her head and filled her vision as she stared blankly at a formless gigantic black creature in the water, one of its tendril-like limbs still held onto Faine as it drew her closer to itself. Faine grew panicked and quickly shot out ice blades at it, but the shards of ice were swallowed into its body and became ineffective, the creature gave off a murderous aura as its two red eyes stared intently at Faine.
She struggled and took out a small dagger from its sheath on her thigh and lodged it at the tendril holding her, the air left in her lungs were expiring soon and she was close to passing out from the lack of air.
Another tendril quickly shot out and grabbed her left arm from attacking the tendril holding unto her right shoulder, the formless black creature held her hand as its eyes still gazed at her.
The next thing that registered in her head was an excruciating burning pain on her shoulder, the pain made her closer to losing consciousness but she willed herself to stay conscious, she would not have the monsters have its way.
Her body felt hot as the searing pain still rung in her right shoulder, the hotness of her body made her delirious, just as she was about to lose consciousness, her body let out a large-scaled electric current and shocked the creature through its tendrils and the water as a medium.
The creature made pained gurgled sounds and seemed surprised to be shocked by a human, Faine fainted and bubbles came out her mouth as her breath left her. The creature made some muffled sounds and the storm soon cleared, the sea was at peace again.
On a calm at sea, a girl covered in her blood from her head and arms laid unconscious on a small boat and a black monstrous creature no where to be seen.
Hi guys, please feel free to point out spelling errors, would be greatly appreciated :)
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