Getting stronger


Sakura lay in bed thinking. She needed to get stronger before going to learn Metagaos's charms, if she wasn't strong enough he would simply eat her and that would be it. The issue was that most of her combat abilities were fairly weak.

She wasn't much stronger than a normal human and her spear-skills were on par with a beginner. She was decent with a bow but that alone wouldn't help her. Her charms were not particularly useful for combat either; from Kimbery she had gained a charm that allows her to better fight groups.

Neither her Endless desert charms or Ebon dragon charms have much use in combat. One Ebon dragon charm had brought her into sorcery (Without even a trial) but without any sorcery to work with it wouldn't be much use. "Protection from being consumed" Isn't really a thing sorcery does, it is more of a charm.

"Maybe you are thinking about it the wrong way?" Her Coadjutor suggested "Something like; Affirmation of self? the sort of charm used to resist the Wyld's corrupting effect."

Sakura nodded "Assuming he feeds by shaping away a victim's traits it would work... But do the green sun princess even have a charm like that?"

Her Coadjutor thought for a few minutes as Sakura looked through a scroll she had taken with her from the library, it was called "On the nature of the passive Yozi" It had been written by a demonic scholar from creation over a thousand years ago during the first age. Why Orabilis kept a copy in the library was a good question.

It was an analysis on the Yozi that didn't actively... Do anything? Metagaos was included so it was useful. The scholar had likely been an Exalted, probably a Solar or a Sidereal so it was an outsider's perspective. "To understand a Yozi you must understand that they are the ultimate spirit. Elementals, Gods and Demons are made almost entirely of essence and so are spiritual in nature. Yozi are actually closer related to Raksha rather than any other type of creation's spirits. They are living collections of charms, like the Raksha whereas most other spirits instead possess charms. This means that Yozi are shaping their bodies (and any other features they possess) using their charms almost all the time."

Sakura had seen what it was getting at; if they were basically living shaping effects then Metagaos was likely doing something similar to the Raksha when it ate. However when Raksha ate the soul and left a husk, Metagaos ate it all; he ate the essence patterns that allowed the target to exist as they are. It was like the Makiri magecraft, grafting from others onto oneself.

"Found it." Her Coadjutor reported in after a search through the lists prepared for them by the leaders of the Reclamation (Or more likely some of their souls). The lists contained most charms that a GSP would be able to learn from them. The lists were kept by the Coadjutors as the Yozi didn't want to give what amounted to a document that showed their true forms as masses of charms.

"Purity Of Madness Defense, requires By Pain Reforged. Basically it allows you to resist shaping at the cost of drawing your limit closer."

Sakura cursed at the cost "Why do they make a useful charm have that sort of cost?"

Her Coadjutor gave a mental shrug "No clue, either way this would get you a foot in the door with Malfean charms."

Sakura nodded "I will learn it however I need to be stronger in other ways too, I am too weak right now to fight with most demons. That needs to change."

"Honestly why not just ask your staff if any of them could teach you." Her Coadjutor made a point.


"Mistress?" The head maid was a little confused as the new mistress rarely talked to them.

"Who in my staff could help train me to become stronger?" The mistress asked. The head maids eyes twiched as the binding around her soul forced her complete answer.

"Including me, on your staff you have three Dragon-blood Akuma, I and one other were trained in terrestrial martial arts. If all you want is to become stronger in combat you would be best served by asking us to teach you."

Sakura nodded "When can we start?"

The Head Maid would have sighed if she had enough control of her soul for that, instead she answered truthfully "As long as it takes me and the other servants to prepare a Dojo."


Sakura knelt on the ground in seiza as the maid raised a finger. "If you wish to go through with this mistress allow me to inform you that while learning you must follow my direction. However I am bound to follow your orders, so to make this work you must release me from my obligation for as long as I am teaching you. This restriction must be set in such a way as to make me unable to betray you."

Sakura nodded "Okay, as long as you are teaching me martial arts you will be given enough freedom to teach me, however you may never intend to do permanent damage to me."

The head maid tilted her head as if feeling for something in her neck before nodding "Very well then. I understand your chosen weapon is a spear?"

Sakura nodded and called out her black spear from her shadow. The head maid nodded once "Very well, I shall then teach you Five-Dragon Style. A basic terrestrial martial arts. After that we will see."

The head maid took down a pair of wooden spears from hooks on the wall of the newly created dojo and threw one to Sakura before speaking "First I must know how strong you already are, we fight until one of us gives up."

The two squared off before the head maid spoke firmly "Begin."


End of chapter.

Sakura is practicing in general.

I resently checked my stat sheets for the three characters and realised that none of them really have combat charms, they just win because everyone else sucks (Or in Shirou's case UBW allowed him to balance the playing field)

Fun facts for those who don't know exalted; Five-Dragon style was created by the Immaculate order and yet here it is being taught by a fallen Dragon-blood to a princess of hell. They never designed any form of protection for it and it gets taught to quiet a few dragon-blood (A few never even became monks, they just learned from family).

OC Notes; As I basically create new exalted whenever the plot needs them and then never fill them out. So here is a quick description of Head Maid. She looks young but is actually really old, she was already over 100 when she sold her soul to the Ebon Dragon for eternal youth. She is now somewhere around 700-ish. In that time she has barely grown at all. She might have wished to live forever but with no growth she stagnated. She is a 1 dot mentor that Sakura just picked up, she can teach all of the Five-dragon style along with one or two other styles but never learned celestial martial arts. She is an earth dragon-blood but her blood runs fairly thin.

If you guys want me to write anything like this for any other OC that I pull out of my ass, feel free to ask.