Supreme Magus

Chapter 3786: Crooked Towers (Part 1)

"Careful. Just because you are strong now, it doesn’t mean you are also sturdy." Vastor said. "Remember that your body is still that of a normal human."

"Then what point does it have being strong?" Zinya pouted.

"I was about to say that you have to activate the earth element for that."

"Oh!" She nodded and called upon the orange feather, feeling as if sand trickled along her skin.

Zinya punched the mannequin, and its head cracked on the point of impact, where a real human would have had a jaw. Despite its weight and solid base, the mannequin fell to the ground, cracking also on the arm on which he landed.

"Is this a joke, or am I this strong?" Zinya asked. "Can I turn the potion’s effects off to try this again with my normal strength?"

"No. Potions are not fusion magic." Vastor shook his head. "Once activated, the effects of a potion last until its power is consumed. In your case, about two minutes."

"Two minutes?" Raaz echoed. "Isn’t that too short?"

"It’s too long, if you ask me." Vastor replied. "No fight lasts that long, and if after two minutes you’ve not managed to escape, you are either captured or dead."

"Zogar is right, Dad." Lith chimed in. "Unless there’s a chase involved, none of my fights lasted more than a couple of minutes. And that’s because Awakened heal mid-fight. Against regular humans, it’s rare for a fight to last more than ten seconds."

Elina swallowed hard at those words. She had never fought for her life, and knowing that she had so little time to win or escape frightened her.

"Elina, do you mind giving it a try?" Vastor put the cracked mannequin back on its feet and in front of her. "Your strength shouldn’t be much different from Zin’s. Push it, slap it, do whatever you want."

She tried to push it down, but she failed. Then Elina slapped it with all her strength. No new cracks appeared, but she swore out loud while holding her throbbing hand.

"I told you. It’s as heavy and dense as a fully equipped human." Vastor said. "Picture the mannequin wearing armor, a helm, and everything else. Raaz?"

"Sure." Raaz went for a tackle and topped the mannequin, but the fall was much less violent than the one caused by Zinya’s fist and the dummy suffered no damage.

Once Vastor lifted it again, Raaz went for a quick jab and then to clutch his injured hand just as quickly.

"It’s you Zin." He said while suppressing a streak of swear words. "You are that strong."

Lith was about to heal Raaz and Elina, but Vastor stopped.

"Don’t. This is the perfect chance for you to learn how to apply the tattoo and for them to activate the healing potion. It’s no different from what I already explained to Zinya."

Lith chose for Raaz the feather pattern, and a circle comprised of six Dragon heads for Elina. The light potion spread a warm feeling, like a hot bath or a tender embrace.

As soon as Raaz and Elina activated the tattoo, the pain and swelling subsided.

"It’s amazing!" Raaz said. "What if I want to be faster?"

"Air potion and earth potion, or you’ll tear up your muscles and break your bones."

"Is there something we can do without the earth potion?" Elina asked.

"You just did." Vastor replied. "Light, darkness, and water potions don’t need the protection of earth."

Raaz tried the air potion, becoming faster than he had ever been. He broke several human records on Mogar, but it was something human Awakened and Emperor Beasts did every day of the week.

Rena used the fire and earth potion too, shattering a dummy into pieces with a quick combination of punches and kicks that Lith had taught her for self-defense. Elina tried the water potion, becoming as limber as a dishrag and as lithe as a cat.

’Damn, two minutes is too short.’ Raaz thought while staring at his wife. ’The tattoo has five charges, but Lith isn’t stupid. He’ll understand why we are "training" so much.’

While Raaz and the others experimented with the various potions stored in their tattoos, Lith informed Vastor of Quylla’s research on the fallen life forces of the people of Zelex.

"Thanks, my boy, but I already knew about that." The Professor patted Lith’s arm. "I mentored Quylla when she worked at the White Griffon as Assistant Professor, and I’m the leading expert in Body Sculpting, remember?

"I would have been surprised and offended had she not consulted me every time her research hit a snag."

"And?" Lith asked.

"And what?" Vastor shrugged. "I help her the best I can, and that’s it. I want to see her succeed. The Kingdom can use another Magus from the Light department."

"Sure, but that’s not what I meant." Lith replied. "I know that your ’assistants’ suffer from a similar problem. I was politely asking you if you intend to get her cooperation or try to poach her research on the Harmonizers."𝚏𝗿𝗲𝐞𝐰𝚎𝕓𝐧𝚘𝘃𝗲𝐥.𝐜𝚘𝕞

"What if I decided to play dirty?" The Master looked coldly at Lith.

"Then we’d have a problem." Lith returned the stare in kind.

"Relax, my boy. I was joking." Vastor broke into a laugh. "I have no interest in Quylla’s research except that as her professor. She has nothing to fear from me, and neither do you."

"May I ask you why?" Lith furrowed his brows in confusion.

"Of course you can." Vastor puffed his chest with pride. "You are my student. You are supposed to ask questions. Quylla has nothing to fear from me because her research is useless to me.

"Our projects both start from monsters, but that’s where the similarities end. Quylla is working on restoring a twisted life force into a stable one. To reverse the fall." Vastor stared Lith in the eyes to make sure he understood, and Lith nodded for him to continue.

"I’m working on fusing that twisted life force with another twisted life force and turning them into something completely different and stable. Nothing of what she’s going to learn applies to my... assistants."

"I see." Lith pondered. "If you reverted the fall, the other half would devour the healthy life force, and hybrids like Zoreth would either die or revert to their previous state."

"Correct." The Master nodded. "Their life forces are like crooked towers that stand by leaning onto each other. If one turns suddenly upright, the other crumbles."

Lith didn’t like Vastor using the same simile he used to define himself and Solus one bit. The Professor noticed and ignored his displeasure.

"My goal is to use the materials of the two crooked towers to build a new and upright one. A tower that achieves the best of both worlds and surpasses both crooked towers, even if they were to right themselves."

"An ambitious project." Lith noted.

"Yeah, right. Because your research is all about ice cream and anti-aging creams." Vastor scoffed. "Every mage worthy of his name follows an ambitious project. The rest are just in for the money."

After a while, everyone had tried everything but darkness fusion.

"What does the darkness element do?" Zinya asked.

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