Chapter 2: Where The Path Leads

Glancing between the face of Mary Clair, the tavern owner that had lived next door to him and his grandfather as long as he could remember, and the tombstone marking the final resting place of said grandfather, Bell Cranel couldn't keep a look of absolute disbelief off his innocent face.

Three months! I've been in the Dungeon for three whole months!

"I-It feels like I only entered the Aberrant Dungeon yesterday." Looking at the face of disappointment on the woman that had practically raised him, Bell only just managed to stammer past the wave of guilt that flooded over him. "I know I fell asleep a few times while exploring, but I swear, to me it feels like it has only been two days since Grand-dad passed-"

Mary's face, weathered by age and marred by stress, looked like it was chiseled out of stone as she gazed down at the white-haired boy she had helped raise. A boy whom she had considered a son after her own son had died childless to a stray monster and her daughter died a penniless whore on the streets of Orario. When Bell had disappeared days after his grandfather's death, she had prayed that he had just left for the city housing the Great Dungeon without telling anyone, because the alternative would have been that she had lost yet another child to this cruel world. The old mother used to heartbreak looked deep into this child's wide and panicked eyes, and she let out a long sigh as her face softened considerably. Not completely, she had faced far too many hardships for her face to ever soften completely aver again but seeing her brave Bell alive and well did bring quite a lot of life back to her wrinkled face.

"I believe you, child." Mary nodded her head causing salt and pepper hair, cut short, to bob slightly. "With how little is known about the Stray Dungeons, I have no doubt that something as you are saying could happen. But please tell me Bell, why did you run off to do something so dangerous, especially right after we lost your grandfather?"

"Because Auntie Mary," A wide, teary smile formed on the white-haired teen's face. "What better way to honor Grandpa than to go on an Adventure and delve into the Dungeon in his name!? Not only that, but I even managed to conquer the whole thing and found tons of treasure at the same time!"

"Right…" By the curve of her frown, the owner of the sole tavern in her and Bell's nameless village was having a hard time believing the young man before her. "And this great treasure, it wouldn't happen to be invisible would it?"

"What? No." Cocking his head slightly and staring at the woman with red eyes full of curiosity, Mary Clair noted, not for the first time, how her pseudo-adopted child somehow managed to remind her of an albino rabbit. "It took a while, but I managed to haul all the treasure to that cave behind the waterfall that you showed me and said to keep secret. Remember the one?"

Oh, Mary remembered the place. When she was still a young single mother of two, she had shown her children the cave so they could have a nice play area away from the village and so they would have a safe place to run in case the village was ever overrun by monsters or bandits. After news of their deaths had reached Mary's ears, she had avoided the cave like the plague, too many memories, until the adorable grandson of her neighbor had managed to wriggle his way into her heart. After she had taken on the responsibility of being Bell's motherly role model, Mary had taken the boy to her family's once special cave whenever she could squirrel away some of his time from his grandfather and she could get away from the tavern. In the off chance that Bell came back from the Stray Dungeon with anything, then it was the perfect place to hide things. Other than her and Bell, everyone else who had ever known of the cave was long dead, making it a perfect hiding spot.

"Of course, I remember silly." Bell's Auntie Mary smirked as she lightly flicked the boy's forehead, her smirk growing when Bell's hand leaped to his forehead and he pouted at her. "I was the one that showed you that place, not the other way around… now give your Aunty a hug, will you?"

With a wide smile, Bell darted towards the woman who helped raise him, wrapped his arms around her lithe frame, and buried his head into her shoulder. Despite Bell's recent growth spurt, Mary still stood nearly a head taller than the boy, forcing her to bend slightly so she could wrap her arms around the child.

"Tell me Bell," Mary whispered as she nuzzled her adopted son's hair with her cheek, now wet with tears. "Do you plan on leaving now? For Orario? To become an Adventurer and a Hero?"

"Yes Aunty." Mary could practically feel the heat rising from Bell's cheeks, and while she couldn't see them, she was sure that they were red from her mentioning his childhood dream. "I'm going to travel to the Dungeon City, find a god or goddess that will accept me into their Familia, and become a Hero like the ones in Grand-dad's stories! Just you wait, once I'm a big-shot Adventurer I'll be sure to send you a picture of me battling evil monsters in my Hero Armor!"

Pulling away slightly from the child, Mary chuckled weakly as she used her left hand to wipe her tears from her eyes while her right ruffled through her child's hair.

"I'll look forward to it, Sweetie Bell." Mary Clair laughed again at the look of mortification and embarrassment that overcame Bell's face at hearing her use her nickname for him. Then she smirked; "But what about the 'treasure you found in the Stray? Do you plan on just leaving it to rot in our cave?"

Despite Mary's obvious sarcasm, it flew right over the naïve boy's head, causing the woman to frown at the seriousness that Bell spoke with about the subject.

"No, I took what I think I'll need in the Dungeon City, I want you to use everything else, Aunty Mary. There is too much of it and a lot of the treasure is too heavy for me to carry to Orario, but I remember you telling me about how if you had some money you could improve the village. You could use the treasure to hire people to protect the village and build some walls around it and fix up all the houses that were damaged in the last storm."

Whatever Bell had found in the Dungeon, Mary decided, he must really think it is worth something, especially for him to think that it could be used for the betterment of their home. I wonder what exactly he found?

"Whatever you say, little man." Mary pushed the thoughts aside for the moment as she grabbed a large, tightly secured burlap sack and tossed it towards the young man who scrambled to catch the projectile. "Here, I had packed this for you after your grandfather passed, knowing you would want to head out on your journey. Inside there is enough food and water to get you to Orario safely, and a sleeping bag I made for you myself. Now get going my little Hero, your destiny awaits."

After securing the sack over his back, Bell gave his mother figure one more smiling but tearful hug, before dashing away from the village graveyard in the direction of one of the largest cities in the world, all while a trail of tears fell from his red eyes. The boy was beginning his journey towards the city of Orario, the home of the Great Dungeon, and the place where his fate called to him.

-Three Days Later-

The three days following Bell's departure from the village of his birth were extremely hectic for Mary Clair. The day after the boy left, the beginning of a rare but long stream of travelers passed through Mary's nameless little village, and as the only tavern/inn in the area, she had to deal with the bulk of the travelers.

Most of the outsiders were just regular merchants who had needed to change their trading routes due to a sudden bout of erratic movement on behalf of half a dozen Aberrant Dungeons, of note one of the traveling Dungeons had been reported to eat any human or demi-human who dared get within a hundred yards of the structure and not a soul had been reported to have escaped.

Yet still, a few of the visitors were abnormal. Of this type Mary counted no less than four god-graced Adventurers that had been in the area with the intention of delving into the Aberrant that her little Bell had said that he had completed, most of said Adventurers were rather depressed that their prey had up and vanished, and used their coin to drink away their sorrows. Also, amongst the abnormal visitors, Mary met two scholars actually from Scholoylon; the legendary school of higher learning created by a collaboration between all the various deus' of Knowledge, who were focusing their scholarly efforts on learning the secrets of the legendary Aberrant Dungeons. While they too were discouraged by the disappearance of the Dungeon that had appeared a few leagues away from the village, they were delighted to learn from the visiting merchants that a number of Traveling Dungeons had appeared in close proximity to the nearby major trade routes.

That was one of the things Mary enjoyed about her occupation, watching different people of different backgrounds and professions mingle, interact, and sometimes end up helping each other. Her smile grew even wider when the scholars offered to hire the Adventurers to protect them when they left to investigate these new Stray Dungeons, an offer that the three men and one woman cheerfully accepted.

However, just as there were visitors that brought smiles to Mary's weathered face, there were also visitors that filled her with unease, though Mary felt blessed that she only had to deal with two of these types. The first was just your run of the mill perpetual drunk who spat and cursed up a storm until one of the Adventurers did her the favor of throwing the man out of her bar onto his ass. The other one, however, he gave Mary the creeps.

Dressed in dark brown and white robes, wearing a black and yellow mask to hide the top of his face while a white cloth hid his mouth and a matching turban hide his hair, the man who introduced himself as Shezar made Mary's skin crawl. He asked a lot of questions about the Aberrant Dungeon that had been in the area, specifically questions about anyone who may have entered the structured and came back alive. Mary managed to feign ignorance and even convinced the rest of the village to not talk to the man about Bell, but by the time Shezar had left Mary had the dreaded feeling that he had gotten what he had come to here village to learn.

It was only after those three days of high volume business did Mary finally find some time to close her doors and hike through the nearby woods to the special place she had taken Bell whenever she could when he was a babe, and that she had shared with him after he had grown. Emerging from the dense underbrush, Mary beheld the waterfall that her mother had shown her as a child and the nearby path up said waterfall that her father had shown her after she grew old enough to be adventurous. Halfway up the trail that led to the fall's safe jumping spot, Mary abruptly turned off the trail and traveled on a much less tread footpath that lead her to a cave entrance behind the gallons of falling water, halfway between the pool below and the falls above. Inside she beheld a sight that stole her breath away.

Six huge burlap sacks, similar but much larger than the one the innkeeper had given to her pseudo-adopted son, stood resolute in the otherwise empty waterfall cave. Not even one of the sacks were fully closed because each one of them contained far too much of their precious cargo to be properly shut. As for the sack's contents, nearly spilling out of each bag were countless coins, tableware, and other objects all made out of or adorned with gold, silver, jewels, and other precious materials. By the gods, resting on top of one of the bags was a beautifully cut ruby the size of her head.

…

Oh Bell, you wonderful child. What have you gotten yourself involved in? Please, stay safe.

On the well-worn path to Orario, Bell Cranel carefully inspected his, once his grandfather's, sword, looking specifically at the encircled eight-pointed star that was now carved into the blade above the hilt.

"So, Mr. Baal said that his power could help me become a hero and then his mark appeared on my sword… I just wish I knew how to begin using his power!" Bell smacked his face with his left hand and slowly dragged it down while glaring daggers at the weapon in his hand. "Agggghhhhh!"

"No need to get aggravated, my new master." A deep, familiar voice startled Bell into almost dropping his blade. "Woe there, Young Master. Settle yourself."

"Mr. Baal!" Bell cried out as he stared hard at his sword. "Are you here somewhere? Are you in my sword!? Oh my gosh, is it even comfortable being stuck in a sword? Are you comfortable Mr. Baal? Are you alright!?"

"Eh, what a strange master I have found myself…" Baal mused in an absent tone. "Master, please calm yourself. I am fine and your Metal Vessel is more than sufficient. I am speaking to you so that I may tell you about the powers you have gained, and will gain, as my King Vessel."

Immediately Bell's concerned face morphed into one of excitement, like a child who just entered a candy store. With bright eyes, he beheld his sword in amazement.

"Mr. Baal, you'll teach me? Thank you!" Bell exclaimed before his face turned pensive. "For some reason, I thought I would have to figure it out on my own."

"That is because you have good instincts, Young Master." Baal's voice took a lecturing tone. "Normally us Djinn directly impart the knowledge on how to use our Metal Vessels directly to our King Vessel's mind over a period of time that is determined by how long their internal Rukh takes to adapt to our Rukh. However, it seems that something has happened to mankind in the absence of us Djinn because I cannot seem to directly impart knowledge to you directly. Whether it is because of the descent of the deus' to this world and something they did, or something about your family, or I could be mistaken, and it is something that is unique to you, Young Master. Either way, I will need to teach you to use my Metal Vessel myself through your mind."

"Oh…" Bell scratched the back of his head sheepishly. "I'm sorry Mr. Baal for being such a handful, but I am grateful for the instruction and the company."

"Indeed… what a strange master I now have." Baal mused out loud, prompting Bell to pout at his sword. "Oh well. The first thing you need to know, Young Master, is that you need not keep staring at your sword to speak to me. As long as you are touching your sword, we will be able to communicate."

"Oh, that's good. I was afraid that people would think I was weird for talking to my sword."

"Well, they will look at you strangely for talking to yourself, because none but you will be able to hear me. However, you can rectify that by just thinking what you wish to say to me. Try it, just focus your thought to communicate with me."

"Ah, ok…" Bell closed his eyes and furrowed his brow in concentration. Can you hear me, Mr. Baal?

"Yes, good work my young master." For the first time since the boy had encountered the Djinn, Bell could hear something other than seriousness in Baal's tone; a subtle warmth of pride. "Now on the subject of things you need to understand, Young Master, just like how to speak to me you must be touching your sword, to use any of my power you must be connected to your Metal Vessel. Other than that, let us start with the most basic ability I have granted you by accepting you as my master; calling lightning down from the heavens to strike your enemies."

"What! Like magic! Like how god Zeus could throw lightning bolts before he descended to our world, like in Grandpa's stories!?" Bell exclaimed out loud before slapping his left hand over his mouth and glancing nervously, only to let out a sigh of relief when he realized that he was still traveling alone through the wilderness. Sorry, Mr. Baal. I'll try to be more careful in the future.

"You are doing fine Master." Baal's voice the epitome of patience. "And you are correct, this is a form of magic, but from what I know of god Zeus he had to throw his lightning bolts, whereas I grant you the power to call nature's lightning to strike at your target. No throwing involved, that was always more of Barbatos' thing. Now before we start your going to need to learn about how to focus on your magoi, so please follow my instructions."

Smiling down at his weapon, Bell took a few steps off the path to Orario and stopped under the shade of a large oak. Then, after spreading his legs into a basic combat stance, he sent Baal a quick thought to say he was ready.

"Ok, until you get used to using your own magoi, I want you to hold my Metal Vessel with both hands then raise it in front of your head so that one of your eyes is looking into the magic sigil while your other looks beyond." Baal began slowly and waited until Bell had settled into the new stance before continuing. "Now Master Bell, you need to focus inward. Try and feel your soul, the concept within you that makes you 'Bell Cranel'. For most people when you find it, it will feel like a fluttering sensation in your whole body, like a flock of beautiful birds that are flying through your body. Focus, focus my young master and find the sensation of a million flapping wings within you."

With his eyes closed, Bell did as his Djinn instructed. He started with his skin; imagining that he could feel each twitch, stretch, and itch that affected the surface of his body. Then he focused on his muscles; pretending that he could feel each of the skinny wires of sinew that hid beneath his skin. Then he pretend he could feel his blood, every drop of it, as it flowed through his veins in tone with his beating heart. Then the boy focused deeper and deeper, and he felt it. Deep, deep, in the pit of his stomach Bell felt what could only be described as a fluttering sensation. A hundred birds flapped their wings and flew through his gut… no not just a hundred. There was another two hundred flying around his heart chirping a joyous song.

Bell gasped and his eyes flew open when he made a startling realization. The birds weren't just in his heart and stomach, they were everywhere! In his arms, his legs, if he focused, Bell could even feel then in his Head! There were so many of them, and wherever they were they made him feel warm! It was so much! It was too much! It was so-!

"Bell! Bell, come back to me!" Baal's voice interrupted the shock Bell was feeling and in a start the boy fell to the ground, flat on his ass.

"Owe…" Bell groaned as he rubbed his posterior.

"I'm glad you have made it back, my strange little master." Baal's tone, while sounding calmer than before, still sounded rather concerned. "I never expected you to be one of the few who could be so easily captivated by your own soul."

"What happened Mr. Baal?" Bell eyed his arm wearily, still feeling a slight tingling in the appendage… and the rest of his body. "Did I do it wrong?"

"No, Young Master." Baal answered immediately. "After you discovered your Rukh, it automatically began to roil spontaneously. Now that I have been able to see it react, I have to say that your Rukh is… strange. It is different than any other person's I've ever encountered, though at this point I couldn't begin to speculate why, or how it will affect you."

"Does that mean that I won't be able to use your powers!" Bell immediately began to freak out. "I still don't really know what it means to be your Metal Vessel user or your King Vessel, but I don't want to be one that disappoints or reflects badly on you! Especially if we meet others like me or other Djinn!"

"Worry not, my naïve master. No matter how strange your Rukh is, I am sure you'll be able to use my Metal Vessel." Baal's word immediately calmed Bell and chased away his rapidly approaching depression. "We will just have to be more careful in your training. Now, I want you to focus on your Rukh again, however this time only on the Rukh in your arms. Feel how it affects your body. Feel as the flutter causes your arms to tingle and feel warm. Then focus that warmth into my Metal Vessel. Try it now, I will know when you have succeeded."

Closing his eyes again, Bell focused lightly on the strange fluttering in his arms and then noticed how the sensation made his arms feel like he had just been bathing them in sun, only from the inside out instead of outwards in, and in this state, his sword felt weightless in his hands. For a moment Bell just focused on moving that sensation around his body; focusing on the fluttering in his chest and the following tingling heat made his heart beat faster and stronger, then moving it to his legs made them feel both tense and twitchy as if ready to sprint. Moving the feeling back to his arms, Bell then focused the energy through his arms and into his sword, which promptly absorbed the energy like a sponge. Following the revelation, Bell was compelled to open his eyes as a bright yellow light shone through his eyelids.

As he opened his eyes, Bell's sight beheld the eight-pointed star on his sword was now glowing a bright yellow, while in his head Bell heard Baal speak again.

"Now repeat after me; Metal Vessel: Bararaq!"

"Metal Vessel: Bararaq!"

From the sky a flash occurred, followed by a bolt of lightning that turned a patch of the gravel path to Orario pitch black, a small trail of smoke rising from the patch. Then, immediately following the lighting, the drum of thunder echoed through the world.

"Wow…" Bell stared down at his sword, eyes wide in amazement. "I can call down lightning bolts… THAT. IS. SO. COOL! Metal Vessel: Bararaq!" Another lightning bolt charred a patch of ground black, and, impossibly, Bell's smile grew even bigger.

"Awesome… Thank you Mr. Baal!" Bell's smile became less excited and softer. "I don't know if I'm worthy of such power, but I'll try to make you proud."

"I am sure you will, my excitable little master." Baal's tone temporarily softened, before becoming stern again. "Now you need to understand what exactly you are doing. That fluttering you are feeling when you focus is your Rukh, your soul, while the warm tingling sensation is your magoi. Magoi is the energy that your Rukh produces within you, and it is not an unlimited resource. Using too much of your magoi can leave you feeling fatigued, weak, and sluggish and, in the absolute worst cases, it can kill you. Do you understand, Young Master?"

"Yes, Mr. Baal." Bell nodded seriously as he eyed the symbol on his sword, the one that gave him great power but could also snuff out his life. "When I'm inside the Great Dungeon I'll have to be very careful with my magoi reserves."

"That brings me to the second matter we need to discuss before you continue training." For the first time since Bell had met the Djinn, Baal sounded sheepish of all things. "I have yet to see the Great Dungeon in person, but from how you speak of it can I assume that it is inside a structure similar to mine?"

"I haven't seen it myself yet, but Grandpa told me a lot of stories about it!" At the opportunity to speak of the stories told to him as a child, Bell's tone became giddy. "He told me about the Adventurer Achilles and how he battled the corrupt Ares Familia on the 27th Floor, leading to the war god and his Familia being exiled from the Dungeon City. He told me about Hercules and the many-headed Hydra he killed on the 50th floor or how he and the legendary Argonauts slew the Leviathan when it escaped the Great Dungeon. Grandpa told me how Odysseus slew the siren coven on the 25th Floor, and how Perseus fought the Gorgon Medusa on the 66th Floor, and about Theseus who was the first Adventurer to slay a minotaur."

"So, it is a tower similar to mine?" Baal questioned. "A large tower that Adventurers continuously climb up?"

"No, we climb down." Sensing confusion emanating from the Djinn, Bell continued. "Yes the Great Dungeon is located underneath the Tower of Babel, but the Dungeon itself leads deep into the earth and no one knows exactly how far down it goes."

"That is worse than I was expecting." Baal's sudden groaning surprised Bell. "Master, as you just saw, at your level of skill you can only call lightning from the sky. Such power will be of little use to you underground."

With wide eyes Bell looked up at the sky and then down towards the ground before smacking his face with his free hand. However, before he could respond the Djinn continued to speak.

"So, to work around that problem you'll just have to start working on your next lesson in controlling the power I have granted you: Djinn Weapon Equip." Baal's tone turned severe. "Let me first begin by telling you what your end goal is in regard to the power I have bestowed on you: The Full Body Djinn Equip. When a Metal Vessel user Djinn Equips their body's Rukh completely but temporarily takes on all the characteristics of the Djinn whose Metal Vessel they are using. If you manage to achieve this, you will temporarily be able to use my full power. The Djinn Weapon Equip, on the other hand, will manifest just the weapon of the Djinn whose Metal Vessel you are using. In your case, it will allow you to use my sword. My extremely powerful lighting controlling and firing sword."

That sounds really cool, but also terrifying. Bell eyed his sword cautiously. I'll have to be very careful with such power, but I also should know how to use it, so I don't accidentally hurt someone. What do I do?

"First, act as if you were going to use Bararaq but don't invoke the technique." Baal paused to wait for Bell to do as instructed. "Now focus more magoi into your sword. Doing so should-"

"By the gods! My sword, there is lightning crawling up it!" The sudden appearance of the element nearly caused Bell to drop his sword in fright, but he eventually recovered.

"Quite, as I was saying; it should generate electricity along the blade's edge via the sigil. Now keep forcing magoi into the sword until it feels like it cannot hold more." Baal gave Bell another moment to focus, during which beads of sweat began to trail down the white-haired boy's face. "Just a bit more… good, now you can stop giving your sword power. Instead, you need to focus on controlling the electricity the sword is producing; you need to force it to get denser instead of wilder, and then direct the dense electricity to condense around your sword and arms instead of allowing it to arc uncontrollably. Give it a try."

With a frown of concentration Bell focused on the lightning running up and down his sword and, after realizing that the sparks were still his magoi just… changed, tried to bring out more of the magical energy he had stored within the blade and add it to the electricity that was already visible. After a few minutes of fruitless struggling, the young man came to the realization that focusing the magoi in the sword into the eight-pointed star on the blade was the easiest and most efficient method of drawing out more arcs of electricity.

From his new home in the boy's soul, the Djinn Baal couldn't help but be slightly surprised by how easily his King Vessel managed to complete the first step in the training. The powerful spirit was not at all surprised however to see Bell having far more trouble in accomplishing the second step of the training.

Instead of controlling the countless arcs of electricity that now traveled up and down his sword, Bell was flinching whenever a wild bolt of electricity jumped from the Metal Vessel and scorched something around him black. Rocks, gravel, grass, and tree bark, nothing was safe from the wild lightning.

"That is enough my young master." Baal broke his silence when a stray bolt of electricity nearly burned off Bell's right shoe. "Get rid of the energy you have stored in the Metal Vessel by invoking the name of the technique I taught you please."

"Metal Vessel: Bararaq!"

As soon as the last syllable left Bell's lips a bolt of lightning at least five time the size of any he had called down previously heeded Bell's command and blasted a ten-foot hole into the path to Orario. However, right after the surge of excitement that accompanied calling down the wrath of nature faded, Bell nearly fell to his knees as a sudden wave of fatigue hit him.

"You did quite well for your first try, Master." Baal spoke again after Bell had begun to suck in air to catch his breath. "You have time, so I see no reason for you to force yourself to learn Djinn Weapon Equip right this moment. Instead, why don't you set up camp and prepare something to eat before the sun finishes falling behind the horizon. Later, if the weather changes as I anticipate, I'll teach you one more thing before you allow the world of dreams to take you for the night."

Looking up from his shaking legs, Bell's red eyes widened when he realized just how long he had been following his Djinn's instructions. When they had begun the sun had been beating upon his head from the center of the sky, almost exactly noon. Now, however, half the sun was hidden behind the distant horizon and the glow of its light was a darkening orange that already held shades of indigo-red. The sight made Bell's exhaustion feel even more pronounced, but despite it, he nodded his head to his Djinn's suggestion, sheathed his sword, and got to work preparing his tent, sleeping bag and something to eat.

It was nearly an hour later after the aspiring Adventurer had eaten some of the traveling rations that his mother figure had packed for him and rested whilst watching the fading sunset, Bell's slowly dipping head had shot to alert when a far off boom echoed through the wilderness. Then, from the heavens, the smallest sprinkle of rain began to fall, followed by a sudden deluge of rain that instantly snuffed the life from Bell's dying fire. Bell was only spared being soaked to the bone because of his hasty retreated to his tent.

"Perfect." Baal's voice distracted Bell from the storm outside his tent. "With weather conditions like this, it will be simple imparting this next bit of knowledge on you."

Um… Mr. Baal, are you talking about the storm? How does rain help me train?

"No, Young Master, not the rain." Baal corrected this King Vessel instantly. "What can help you is the storm's lightning."

Sensing Bell's bamboozled expression, Baal continued his explanation. "As a Djinn that specializes in lighting magic, I don't only grant you the power to harm others with the element, but by using my Metal Vessel you can absorb electricity from other sources and use the energy to refill your magoi supply. Also, as the strongest lightning aligned Djinn, all you have to do to absorb the lightning in a storm like this is to raise my Metal Vessel, your sword, into the air. I would, however, suggest you do so outside your tent, we wouldn't want you to destroy your shelter."

Swallowing the lump that had formed in his throat at the thought of calling the wrath of the sky down at himself, Bell stepped out of his shelter and put a few feet between himself and it before raising his unsheathe sword into the air. With another sudden, but much louder 'BOOM!' a giant streak of lightning fell from the sky, racing straight at the white-haired boy. Despite the terror Bell felt at the moment the thunder sounded he refused to close his eyes in fear, the shame he felt for his fearful actions during his Djinn Weapon Equip training feeding a flame of angry courage in his gut, and because he kept his eye open he was able to witness the lightning impacting, and disappearing into, the eight-pointed star on his sword.

In that instant after absorbing the lightning, the rain temporarily stopped falling onto and around Bell, all the wetness that had soaked the bot instantly dried up, and Bell Cranel felt more powerful than ever. The fluttering of his soul, that had been sluggish from exhaustion, was now so energetic that Bell felt as if the flapping of the countless birds was making him weightless, while the tingling of his magoi actually felt painful as it raced through his body.

"Now Master, use the power you just absorbed as fuel. You already know how."

"Metal Vessel: BARARAQ!"

The fatigue that stuck Bell after launching his spell far surpassed what he had been feeling earlier, but, in Bell's opinion, the price was undoubtedly worth the spectacle he had invoked. A shockwave producing strike of lightning that dwarfed anything the boy had ever seen. It shot from the sky, hit a tree ten time's Bell's size, and instead of setting it on fire, the surge of lightning turned the tree into dust and ash.

Despite the fact Bell had to force his body to keep standing, all the boy could focus on was the pile of dust and ashes with wide eyes, even as the rain that had been displaced by Bell absorbing the storm's lightning resumed falling onto the white-haired boy. It was only with Baal's prompting was Bell able to claw his attention away from the destruction he had caused.

"That is enough for today, Young Master. You should get some rest, after all, we still have quite some distance to travel to reach Orario and there will be plenty of time during the trip for you to practice with your new abilities."

Nodding his head tiredly in acceptance, Bell stumbled back to his tent and absently dried himself off with a small rag before falling onto his sleeping bag. The young man's head had barely even hit his pillow when unconsciousness began clawing at his sight. Just before sleep claimed him, he managed to force out a few words.

"Mr. Baal, thank you for the training. With your help, I'll get in a Familia for sure."

"You are welcome, my young master. I am sure you will find the Familia you are meant to be with if you just follow the Rukh. It will never lead you astray."

For the rest of Bell's time following the path to Orario, he trained with his new powers in addition to putting league after league behind him. He would walk throughout the day, taking short breaks periodically to practice calling on the wrath of the sky before continuing his trek, until sunset would cast vast shadows over the gravel path. Then, after setting up camp, Bell would practice the steps to Djinn Weapon Equip, though each time the end result was the same as the first time he had tried, or he would continue practicing with Bararaq, or he would follow some of Baal's other training methods until he felt like passing out. For nearly a month Bell's life was just a pattern of traveling and training, until, finally, the great walls of one of the largest cities in the world appeared on the horizon.

The walls of Orario, over thirty feet of some of the sturdiest stone Bell had ever seen, cast a vast shadow over the white-haired aspiring Adventurer as he approached the Dungeon City. The North Gate of the city, one of the four that allowed entrance to the four cardinal directions, was already open as Bell advanced and as he passed through, he also noticed how the gate was also protected by a series of portcullis'.

Within the city walls the sight of one long paved street, lined with countless brick shops and houses, leading to the looming Tower of Babel, and by extension, the Great Dungeon stole Bell's breath away. The largest center of civilization was unlike anything the country-raised boy had ever experienced, and as he walked down Orario's streets Bell also marveled at just how many people he passed on the streets and how different they all were.

People with cat ears and people with dog ears chatted with man and women with sharp claws and wolf-like eyes, while men Bell's height but possessing full beards and fully-grown physique growled as they pushed past those taller than them. Then on his second examination of the crowd, Bell even noticed that some of the people he had originally thought to be human actually had pointed ears!

Wow! Grandpa told me that different races lived in Orario but I had no idea that there were so many of them!

"Um, Master?" Bell, who was unknowingly grasping the hilt of his sword with his off hand, widened his eyes when Baal interrupted his thoughts. "Don't you have something more important to start doing, instead of gawking?"

"Your right Mr. Baal!" Bell smacked his cheeks lightly to refocus himself. "It's time to go impress a super cool deus with how awesome I am to get entrance into their Familia!"