Chapter 11) King Aaron, The First Hero

The guards on the outer perimeter of the castle vaguely started to see a large golden dome surrounding the building from all directions, expanding outwards until it had stopped just at the outer edges of the walls. Some of the rookie guards were partially frightened while some of the more grizzled veterans started smiling hysterically.

" Ah, His Majesty's mana is always a sight for sore eyes. It's subtle pressure, and overall appearance feels like a gentle but firm hug from your parents, raising the morale of us soldiers, while any enemy will feel like the executioner's axe is just about to take their heads."

Some onlookers heard the old guard state this with a gentle smile, clearly relishing in old memories. One rookie stepped forward with a nervous gait.

"Sir, is this really His Majesty's mana? How can it possibly encompass such a large area? I've never seen nor heard of such a profound level of control nor amount being possessed by only one person."

The old guard could only sigh. 'Of course you might have never heard of this before. The last time His Majesty released this much mana was years ago, before the first princess was even born. No one has been foolish enough to tempt him into using it since.'

"I'll have you know, that this isn't even a tenth of what His Majesty could do. Even 20 years ago, he had enough mana and control to spread his Domain for miles, encompassing armies with ease. This is merely a fraction of a fraction of his prowess. He can spread his domain to the outer reaches of the kingdom's borders now, if he so wished."

The rookie's eyes glowed in admiration towards his king. All the others nearby who had listened in could only stand there in shock of such a revelation. Most of them had only heard some bed time stories here or there about the King's magical prowess. This was the first time someone had relayed to them some bigger details of their chosen king's glory.

'They say his swordsmanship is on equal terms to his magic capacity, so how godlike would that be when in practice?' Some of the new guards all shared that question in their minds, as they continued to watch the shimmering dome above their heads.

In the meantime, the person in question was continuing his magic lesson with his daughter.

"Wait so this color isn't natural mana, but yours, Father?"

I could only barely comprehend how he could possibly have so much mana to be able to perform such an outburst. 'Then again, he is a hailed Hero for reason.' He gave out a small chuckle, while calmly continuing his lesson.

"Yes and no, this golden hue is my mana, but not all of the energy is strictly mine. With enough control, you can bend nature's will to form the actions you would like to perform, like I just demonstrated. The reason it is all perceived as my mana however, is because my mana is like a commander, giving nature's mana simple commands everywhere. I can just as easily use the world's energy as my own if I wished, but I wanted you to be able to see what I was doing so you would better understand what was going on."

I stood there silently, looking around at the faint sparkles in the air, taking in all he'd described.

"So what is it that mana perception realistically does? I mean common sense would dictate that you can see what isn't normally there, but is that it? Is there any special function I can't see going on?"

He himself looked around with an amused look on his face, his eyes still shimmering in a pure golden color.

"You are limiting yourself from understanding what it means to use mana perception. It isn't so much to see as to fully sense and feel where everything and everyone is within the range of your control. You are establishing a domain, where every heart that beats, every breath you take, and every action you make, you can feel in your mind's eye. For example, I know where our rats currently are, how nervous a few of them are based off of their fidgety movements and breaths, and I see that one in particular is trying to spread his own mana outside himself to resist my own."

This only gave rise to another question.

"What do you mean by resist your mana? Are you restricting them in some way?" My curiosity soaring with every word he said.

"With enough control, you can infuse emotions or will, directly into specified locations, effectively forming a sort of pressure someone will feel. For those rats, I reckon they feel as though a mountain had started to rest on all their shoulders, while Death seems to linger just behind them all, waiting for them to crumble. On the contrary, you should focus on the mana around you now, and try to experience what I'm deliberately pushing onto you."

With that I closed my eyes and began to spread my senses to my surroundings, trying to feel what he was talking about. After a few moments, I noticed a warmth and gentle pressure around me, filling me with a loving feeling. It almost felt as though father was giving me a strong embrace, right after I would be frightened of something back in my childhood. His presence always reassuring. I started to smile when I realized this, as I now knew he had been trying to calm my nerves all this while subtly.

He saw my smile and nodded approvingly. 'Her preliminary perception is remarkable, as some people have to have repeated exposure to depict acute emotions within the surrounding mana, meanwhile, she noticed within a few breaths.'

He refocused on the infiltrators and an almost sadistic smile graced his face.

'Now, for the fun.'

With this thought in mind, he grabbed hold of me, and stated:

"Hold on tight darling, as I am about to show you another use of mana."

Within a blink of an eye, they disappeared from the hallway. The only mark of their presence there being two subtle foot sized craters where the king had been standing.

They both reappeared in front of the rats, astonishing them all.

"And here I thought I would have to wait till I got to your little audience chamber to put you in your place old man!" The arrogant intruder stated with an overly pompous and snarky attitude.

"Eh, I got bored while walking with my daughter, and thought I might as well meet you here and now, considering I haven't had any good fun in quite a long time. If you think you have what it takes to kill me, come on then. I want to see if another human can outclass the ex-divine beast I've come to have already slain."

To that, the intruder started gnashing his teeth.

"Prepare yourself old man! I never once believed the stories! They are all embellished lies to promote another imbecile to the throne!"

He charged forward firing dozens of mana bolts, filling the hallway, and leaving no room for escape. 'You're dead now old man!'

The king let out a loud sigh, drawing everyone's attention.

"Here I thought I would finally have fun. (sigh). Seems I got my hopes up for nothing." He set me down and I watched as all the bolts drew closer to us. In the final moment before they made contact, King Aaron said just one word.

"Rend."

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It was like a dam had burst during a great storm. Everyone felt an incredible rush of energy, and watched as a golden tidal wave of father's mana ripped through the hallway, cracking all the walls and shattering any illusions of the infiltrators possible escape. The golden outburst was exceedingly destructive, shredding all of those people to dust, with a single person being left with nothing but a head and torso, as all his limbs were nowhere to be seen.

His body having been imbedded in the wall on the far end of the hall, the person in question already unconscious.

'How has no one told me father is so powerful?! With a single word he wiped all but one out, but the last man is nothing but a mass of flesh at this point. Is this really something possible because of just mana control? If so, then how powerful would that evil person father mentioned be, if he's not even confident in pushing it back, let alone killing it?'

My father, oblivious to my worries, turned around with a broad smile.

"(yawn). Well I guess that gave me a good stretch for half a second. Since we got to this point, I might as well be your teacher as I failed to find a good one all this time. The council is going to have a fit when they learn I'm going to make them do even more work so I can free up my schedule. Oh well. If they want to complain, they should be able to beat me in a fight!"

He laughed quite jovially for a while before sending for guards to escort the cult member to the cells for interrogation. As I walked beside him, I couldn't help but ask.

" Father, could you tell me more about your past? How you became a Hero? I'd also like to know how in the heaven's name you became so unbelievably powerful. As far as I am aware, you didn't perform a spell, as spells need at the very least a sentence worth of incantation."

Without saying anything, he set a course for his study. I wondered why he didn't just tell me, but I do admit he had me hooked now. When we finally arrived he guided me in before shutting the door behind himself. With a flourish, he had me cast my gaze to all the books lined across his shelves.

"Everything you see on these shelves are my life, quite literally. I'll have you know that no one can access this room without my personal consent, as I locked this room into it's own dimension. You are the only person besides your own mother, that I have ever brought in here, as some people would kill for the opportunity to learn of my past achievements and struggles, so that they may learn how I came to stand as who I am. While you are free to read all of this, you can just ask me any question you come up with."

"Then the first question I want the answer to is how you came to be the first Hero. Mother has told me some stories here and there, but never the full event."

I stared at my Father with overwhelming curiosity, completely enthralled by the thought of the coming story. With a heavy thud on his chair, he thought for a moment before finally figuring where he should begin.

"Well, to start, it began with the rise of the Beast God. To be exact, the fifth in all of history. They are not so much as real deities, as they are just the supreme beast of that era. It takes a few centuries at a time for them to be established as the beast hierarchy is quite strict in the rule of might means right. None of the Beast Emperors wish to be under anyone, so they try to kill off anyone rising in power too quickly. Needless to say, they are unfathomably powerful to have all the other Emperors submit to it. Anyway, the Fifth Beast God ended up being a World Serpent, a colossal creature that spans whole mountain ranges and devours anything and everything in it's path. Truth be told, all of the humans at the time genuinely thought the world would end, as this Beast God had a limitless hunger as it grew larger. With the Beast God devouring everything, all hope had been lost, until 2 years after its appearance, I decided my personal training was done.

I had finished my magic knight training at 18, just before the Beast God's rampage. As my mentors told me I wasn't ready to challenge it yet, I decided I'd venture deep into the wilds to hone my skills and instincts for what I thought to be my greatest challenge yet. For two years I had to forgo fighting the Beast, and for two years I struggled with my inner demons, over how many lives were being lost all for the sake of my training to complete. At last, once I had counted my 20th birthday, I sought out the Beast God. I followed the path of carnage for a whole month before finally seeing the tail of it. The Beast God had nurtured itself perfectly, for I could not reach its head for hours, from dawn when I had first found its tail, it took me until dusk to meet its face. When there, I released my frustrations in full force as I yelled 'Face me Beast God, and meet your Maker, for I shall be the last thing you lay eyes on before your inevitable death. For this, I swear on the names of all the people that have been slaughtered by your incessant gluttony!'

The Beast God looked down upon the seemingly insignificant human spewing nonsense at it.

'So another person has come to die. I might as well give you the courtesy of knowing my name. I am Joru the Infinite! You would have lived if you simply worshipped my supreme being, but now you must die, due to your own stupidity!'

With all words out of the way, I soared high into the sky with an explosive leap to reach Joru's face, and from then on, the battle didn't end for one whole week. We had been unleashing magic the world was only just then learning about, and neither of us backed down for even a single moment. I had found it difficult at first to get used to the thickness of the scales, but after repeatedly dishing out slashes and stabs, I finally found the perfect amount of force I would need to slaughter him. However in order to do so, I would need to create a whole new spell of my own, and that was what had taken me the whole week. Upon the seventh day of battle, I finally had a breakthrough in my magic. With the new found spell I instantly knew the battle was about to come to an end, and Joru seemed to think so as well.

'It seems this battle shall come to an end, human! Allow me of knowing your name before I end you!'

With a now calm look on my face, I replied. 'My name is Aaron. Aaron Lucian Saphire. It has been a thrilling battle, Beast God Joru, but I must end it here.'

Both of us locked eyes, before we both prepared our final attacks. Joru opened his mouth wide, where a small sphere of black energy was quickly growing in both density and size. The air around it vibrated and hissed with the pressure it exuded and the heat it gave off. I started the incantation in my head as I slowly rose higher and higher into the sky, and my eyes shined gold while the earth trembled and clumps of dirt rose into the air. Moments that felt like centuries rolled by as we prepared this final exchange. Joru finished just before I did, sending out a screeching beam of intense black energies. 'Collapsing Star,' he screamed as it rushed towards me. I spoke the final word of my incantation before releasing the name of this spell I had created.

'Cataclysmic Void'

With the words spoken, the world shook. With my sword in hand, a horrific, dark miasma covered the whole blade, and while I had it raised above my head, I brought down my sword in a ferocious chop. The black miasma fused with my sword's aura, cleaving the beam in two, and continued expanding and pushing forward almost effortlessly. The world in front of Joru went dark as the slice split his head in two, continuing all the way down his body's massive length. The slice cleaved the ground apart, leaving an enormous chasm, but not finishing quite yet. After the slash made it past Joru's tail, an enormous wall of black flames rose from the chasm, consuming Joru's very existence.