Chapter Thirteen

The Masters Templar sat in the room observing what was happening in the room with the pedestal.

"These Acolytes are too soft. He wouldn't kill her until she had all but sacrificed her life to fill the circle. There's no way he makes it through, and if he does, it will just make the order weaker." said one Templar to the rest of the group. "The female didn't even fight back. She wanted revenge on her family and then essentially laid down and died. Pathetic."

The Templar that had taken Altair shook his head in disagreement.

"The Acolytes are brought here to prove their worth over others in order to get formal training." he replied. "How they do that does not matter as long as the end result is the same. That Acolyte got another to sacrifice their life for his through his vast superiority. All he did was make a promise to sow more chaos in the galaxy. Once he's done fulfilling his promise to this acolyte, we can install a puppet ruler on Summerhall and effectively take control of the planet. We all must remember that not everyone we bring here is a bloodthirsty killer. But by the time they leave, they will all kill without hesitation for the perceived "greater good". We will need to keep our eye on this one. He has me intrigued"

"Now that he had absorbed the book, we will see how long it takes him to unlock his latent abilities."

A couple of the Templar nodded their heads in agreement. The others were obviously disgruntled with the what they had seen. Mercy was not something taught here in the Academy and wasn't something they would be adding to the "curriculum" anytime soon.

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Altair rifled through the robes of the dead acolyte and took her translation notes she had from her time working with the two books. They were much more expansive and detailed than his own and he planned on putting them to good use. Pulling out the book and opening the page to the meditation technique, he put the new translation notes to use and continued to translate the technique so he could implement it as soon as he could.

He didn't have much time before the circle was filled and the pedestal began to pulse in a blood red. He stood up, putting the book and notes away and walked towards the pedestal. He continued to watch as the pillar absorbed the blood and pulsed faster and faster. There was a bright flash once the blood was gone and he cautiously reached forward and finally touched the book.

Upon touching the book, it glowed a deep red and looked like it was being absorbed by his hand. Just as quick as Altair had touched it, it had disappeared and been absorbed into his body? He had never seen anything like this. Nothing happened afterword, he didn't understand what was going on or what purpose this exercise had served except to get rid of one more acolyte.

Giving one more look at Alina, he turned around to walk out of the room when something caught his eye. It was two words. "Blood Sacrifice" mumbled Altair as he looked at the basalt frame of the doorway. "How did I miss that?" he thought to himself.

Looking around at the other inscriptions, he noticed he could read everything. The inscriptions in the room talked about the pedestal and what the requirements for lowering the force field were. Altair was shocked. "That book must have given me the ability to fluently interpret the language here."

Taking a last glance back, he exited the room into the dark corridor ahead. Walking back the way he came, he finally made it back to the door he entered and discovered it open. Reading the basalt door frame, it said "Halls of Enlightenment". "That makes sense considering what I just got" thought Altair, slowly making his way back to his room. He was caught up with all the inscriptions on the walls. It was a history of the Templar.

The Templar, according the inscriptions, were actually a race of humanoid beings that were masters of the mystic arts. They wielded powers that were since lost to the galaxy at large. The world Altair was on he learned was actually their home world. They lived here in peace for millennia until a space faring race discovered them. The humans were mystified by the powers these Templar cad control of and tried and failed many times to learn their ways. When they couldn't learn the techniques, they became increasingly hostile and wary of the power these humanoid beings held at their fingertips. A planet wide bombardment commenced that rendered the whole planet inhabitable.

Now a dying race, they inscribed their history, techniques and will into this structure. Afterwards they came together and cast a universal spell with the remnants of their people. It sent their power into the universe, giving a small chance that new beings born after the spell might inherit their power. The Templar passed on, using their life force to fuel the spell, and thus the race was no more. It was a spell of ultimate sacrifice. The Templar had hopes that whoever found this place would be guided by their burgeoning power and would use it to extract the Templar revenge on their persecutors.

If Altair had to guess, the rest of the halls would be telling various histories from different time periods after the fall and then rise of the Order of the Templar once it was founded on the original Templar home world.

Getting the gist of the end of the Templar race, he walked back to his room realizing that if he could read the walls, he would most likely be able to read the book that had been given to him.

He encountered no one as we walked back to his room in a hurry and once to his there, walked in and quietly shut the door. He pulled out his book that he had buried in his robes and opened the first page.

Sure enough, he could understand everything. Quickly flipping past the mantra, he opened up to the meditation technique he was ready to try.