Chapter 29: 'Real' Magic.
"Ha!" Syndra laughed.
Xerath turned around to Ahri, her entire face screaming 'good job, idiot'.
Yamoto was still clueless about what was going on.
So much for a grand introduction.
"You know what happened to my last mentor?" Syndra asked, pointing over to a large stonewall to her side.
"His entire body was smeared across there. You expect me to grant you the same fate?"
Her words were cold and harsh, but there was a hint of restraint in her voice. A tiny wavering note that skirted barely out of his notice.
I need to unlock that shard and bring it out into the light. That is the key to winning her over.
But how can I drag that out?
"I am not like your previous mentor. I have skill and knowledge into the arcane that none have even managed to comprehend."
"Then why do you wish to grant me knowledge of the arcane? You are nothing but a pawn of the Institute, sent to strip me of power and strength! I see through your lies! You will never gain my approval!"
"I have other reasons to be here. It was your cousin, Azulo Jun, who told me of your situation. I have known Azulo for many months now and know that she was right to introduce me into this issue. I know by raw and harsh experience what malpracticed magic can do, and I do not wish the same of a mage with such immense potential as you."
"Your words fall on deaf ears! My relatives are nothing but a nuisance to me! To me, your magic is little more than that of a parlor trickster! What 'great magic' can even bear to stand against I? Answer me that!"
"If I may, I must remove my cloak."
"Pfff… What will that do to your power?"
"My cloak is made of magical dampening material that is strong enough to reduce my large arcane signature. Without the cloak, I could be detectable by mages a hundred meters away."
Xerath started unbuttoning heavy cloak, each inch of space gained leaked forth an exponential amounts of arcane energies.
Syndra moved her head backwards in shock of this new change in power, but it could have also been due to the fact that Xerath was taking of his clothes.
In fact it was probably the latter from a slight red flush of blood to her cheeks in embarrassment.
Either way, she was still unphased by Xerath's power flux.
The cloak fell to the ground, revealing Xerath's true form.
Syndra backed away in her seat slightly, aghast at the crystalline entity before her. Nothing had prepared her for this, this being of true, refined magic.
"I-" The words were stuck in her throat.
"I still decline your offer." Syndra said, the strength of her previous tone gone.
Decline.
We are reaching her.
"But I will give you accommodation. You- You have peaked my interest, unlike the rest of your comrades. Speaking of which, who are they?"
Ahri stepped forward.
"I am Ahri, another champion of the League. I was acting as a guide for Xerath here."
"Oh…" Syndra started, her voice changing to like that of a preying vulture, "So a fox guides such a superior being to my realm? Your ways of persuasion are well known in Ionia. Did you do the same to this 'man' as you did to those others?"
Damn it! Xerath, I'm in a tight spot here. If I say anything, Syndra will use that to her advantage. Even if I say nothing, that is the exact same thing as saying yes! She planned this out and gave me not even a single moment to prepare for her. Damn her!
Xerath.
Come on.
Get the hint.
I need help.
Her fists tightening told both Xerath and Syndra their message.
"Oh? Are you afraid, fox? Afraid of what you were and always will be? HA! I have no such thoughts! My power and will is constant unlike your pathetic quiverings and fidgetings! Serves a wh*re like you right!"
"Syndra! I came here in good spirits. I expect the same from you." Xerath interrupted.
"So she did, did she? Well I was not talking to you, Xerath. This is between women now."
"Does it look like I care for such folly? Such trifles are beyond me! Your audience is with me!"
"My audience is with who I choose it to be! And now my audience is with Ahri!" Syndra snapped back to Ahri. "You really have persuaded this one as well? Had trouble sucking his soul out, did you?"
Those were mistakes! I could not control my power back then! I'm better now! I want to correct you!
But how do I correct you? How?
How!
HOW!
Ahri was physically trembling at the thoughts that spun through her mind, all the while Syndra's face bore a wicked smile at the destruction she had just wrought, allowing her composure to return from the reveal of Xerath's true form.
"M-M-My Q-Queen!" Yamoto started.
No.
No no no no no!
He's going to ruin this!
"P-Perhaps we are t-too hasty to make-make judgments. Per-Perhaps you-you could let us retire for the d-day? I-It has been a long journey for us, with no time spare to rest our heads for long. If w-we had some rest, then maybe we could converse on more peaceful terms?"
The fool!
Xerath readied his energies.
"BE SILENT! I SPOKE NOT TO YOU, WORM!" Syndra spat before unleashing a tendril of shadow that wrapped around Yamoto's body like an anaconda.
Yamoto struggled as he was lifted from the ground by the conjured force, the tendril digging into his clothes and skin.
The shadow was dispelled by Xerath's cerulean burst, the snake evaporating into tufts of shadow smoke.
"B-But how!"
"Magical tendrils, a channeling of magic through a vector in such a way to repulse matter. And not even counter-proofed? I used those back in my academy days to do menial tasks and even then I knew that I could mess around with idiots who only counter-proofed it once. You have a long way to go before you can ever face off against a real mage."
Syndra's rage boiled in her face at the thought that this entity could waft away her magic on a mere whim and laughed at it.
She was the best mage on Runeterra, but he was laughing at her?
"THEN TAKE THIS!" She cried, summoning eight magical spheres of immense density to her side.
Well then.
I can guess what is going to happen next, Xerath thought.
I can't dodge all of them.
But I can do something else that will probably just piss her off more, which will save myself from the damage.
I can also let the spell go through, but that would only let her ego burn even hotter.
I need to put her in her place.
How about this then?
As Xerath predicted, Syndra launched the balls directly at him.
They came in fast, making a blink seem as long as the swing of a great sword in comparison.
Xerath emitted a blazing corona of cerulean light.
The balls greedily feasted on this new energy like rabid dogs, the corona fragmenting as the cerulean corona faded from sight, only a small pinprick of darkening blue remained on the surface of the spheres.
In a sudden flash of energy, each sphere was repulsed back with immense force.
Syndra felt one of the balls whistle by her head as it cracked against the stone wall behind her, her eyes wide in astonishment.
But how was that possible?
Each of these balls weighed as much as four-dozen full plate armors, and their shells could withstand impacts of titans!
Not even the greatest mage could so quickly generate enough energy to halt even one, let alone eight!
However, Xerath did more than just emit a corona of light.
His corona was actually a buffer of dense magic, enough to cushion a small portion of the momentum of the spheres. This tiny brief moment of compaction allowed Xerath to gather the location of all of the spheres as they impacted across the magical shell.
In this moment, Xerath concentrated the coronal magic into super dense shards of arcane energy at tangents to the impact zones. As the shards compacted from the immense forces of the magical spheres, Xerath set up a magical force behind the shards, effectively preventing the shards from drawing any closer to himself.
In a final motion, Xerath dispersed the tips of the shards, unleashing the raw pressure held up inside them. The shards broke apart, their momentum transferred to the spheres as the magic burst out from their containers. The resultant forces were enough to repel the spheres with such force that they became embedded in the stone walls of the room.
This was magic.
Not simply confined to summoning elements to do one's bidding, but using a combination of simple laws to produce a truly outstanding display of otherwise unexplainable phenomena.
Xerath was beyond Syndra in much more than simple conjuring technique, but also on the very knowledge of the fundamental laws of magic.
But Syndra did not know this.
She saw the motion of the balls being repulsed, but the beauty of Xerath's method was beyond her.
She knew that Xerath had used comparatively little arcane energy to ward off her assault, but how could he have used this sort of simple burst to ward off such a powerful attack was simply inconceivable to her.
Holy f**k, mouthed Syndra.
Every single strand that could have been identified as confidence and composure had been completely removed by Xerath's incredible feat. Her face was completely blank and pale as all the blood had rushed out of her, her mind racing to try to comprehend how this could have happened.
But there was nothing she knew that could have explained this spell Xerath had just manifested.
"Become my student, and I shall teach you how to do that."
"I-" Syndra was struggling for words, her very body trembling.
"I… w-will consider your offer." She said, her voice void of all emotion, only the stammer of a clueless soul.
"I am sorry for having to do so much, I will talk with you tomorrow on the matter. I have not had much time to sit down and relax since I set off from the Institute. I will say this however." Xerath cleared himself before continuing.
"You have an undeniable amount of power locked inside you. That much is obvious. But your previous mentor failed to teach you what I consider to be the very core aspects of magic. You have every right to despise him. I know that the Ionian magical community is unorthodox to the other nations, Shurima included, in how so much is focused around set rules of feelings and control over them. Only those that can get their principles can achieve the right to be a mage, which are a scant few who have often than not chosen to enter into the Kinkou or enter a monkhood. Another important aspect about you in particular is about your disciplines, a concept not taught in Ionian culture. Most people, including me, have a single discipline that can spread out loosely into other disciplines. You, from what I have deciphered, appear to have a massive six at your disposal. There is no single master that can teach you to control your power, and the lack of core knowledge is causing you to drag behind other mages of a similar caliber. I have extensive knowledge into the arcane and the very fundamentals of Physical Induction, as well as significant experience into the Magical and Physical mediums. There is much for you to learn, but I will help you along your own path."
Xerath relaxed himself, another one of his 'grand speeches' done.
"If you will excuse us then, your accommodation is welcomed."
As Syndra was showing them their rooms, Xerath heard the sounds of people 'relaxing' all around him.
Other people in the castle?
For there to be this much noise, there must at least be a few dozen people staying here.
"Those people are those who have sought me out for protection." Syndra said, her head not turning to meet his face.
"So you are offering asylum? Why do such a thing?"
"Because I originally thought that the needy should be compensated, and if they need me, why should I not answer them?"
You are a thorn in Ionia's side. If you are doing this, then you are only digging deeper into them. You could even be p*ssing off other countries and organizations.
Night was fast approaching, leaving Xerath with a grand eight hours of doing nothing except thinking, staring up at the ceiling from his bed.
It was nice to think sometimes, especially after all that has happened within the past few days.
I protected Ahri three times so far, the time at the tavern, the time against that drake and now Syndra's sharp jabs of words.
Wait wait wait.
Why am I thinking about Ahri like that?
She's strong, incredibly strong on the Rift and in the League in general.
She should not need this much attention.
But there is just something about her that makes people drawn to her, me included.
That beaming honest smile.
It has to be that.
There are only a few times when people can pull that sort of smile off and she has done that to me several times like back when we first met. Or at least insinuated it.
That smile is enough to break down the defenses of any man.
She is a seductress after all, so I wouldn't be surprised if she knows these tricks to work through a man and strike directly at him!
But she wouldn't do that now.
Not once has she shown such intent in that sort of act.
She can't, can she?
I know about her past, but I do not know the exact details of it.
Perhaps she is hiding something?
Or does she dislike her past so much that she is willing to completely abandon it in exchange for all of this new sense of meaning she has been granted from the League?
"Hey Xerath?"
And of course she calls me just when I'm thinking of this.
Great.
"What is it Ahri?"
"You mind if I come in for a bit?"
"Come in then." Xerath said, trying not to sound hostile.
Ahri slid open the door, revealing herself in a night robe.
The two stared at each other for a moment.
"You want it to be like that?"
"Like what."
"You really are dense."
"What of it?"
Ahri laughed for a moment.
"I wouldn't worry about it. I think that Syndra does know that there is something going on between us, but I don't care really."
"Definitely not lovers, that's for sure."
"At least down to the usual love."
"You would usually go with intimacy?"
"Usually, I just haven't been feeling in the mood to do that sort of thing recently."
"Explain."
"My… experiences… just keep coming back whenever I do that sort of thing. It can be kind of scary sometimes, so I usually try to keep away from those kinds of deeds now."
Ahri closed the door behind her, inching her way closer towards Xerath.
"But there are some who help. People who go beyond the usual bounds of relationships through their own experiences and actions. They help put my mind at ease when they ask for aid since they usually mean it in such a manner. When I ask for aid, they come to my side instinctively without a need for words. The very thought of them helping me is enough to bring a brief moment of solace to my mind, and when they ask for help, the thought that I know that I am being useful to someone I know so well makes me incredibly happy."
Ahri was now sat at his bed.
"A tiny drop of solace to retain the sanctity of one's sanity? The idea is far from alien in my mind."
"Yeah, I guess you could put it like that. Sometimes, I just need a little bit of solace when my mind goes into overtime."
Ahri lay down beside him, gazing into those sapphire pits of his eyes.
"Mind… just staying like this for a little bit? I… have quite a bit on my mind."
Xerath laughed.
"Pray tell. Your thoughts have been at least… entertaining… to listen to."
Ahri stumbled for words for a moment before her lips tightened and began to speak once more.
"Those insults… hurt. It doesn't matter how simple and archaic they are, they still hurt when every single person out there is thinking about my being. Being called a 'b*tch' or 'wh*re' still hurts me despite how many times it is repeated. It drags on in my mind and reminds me of my past self and how pathetic I was."
Ahri's fingers curled as she remembered those times of simple and brutish lust. Xerath could more than see the hatred she had for her past self.
It was written clearly across her entire face, the feelings of weakness and anger whirling their way inside her mind.
Xerath cautiously moved his hand toward her, trying not to creep her out.
Slowly, he rolled her towards him, letting Ahri wrap her own arms around his chest like a child vying for its mother.
Entire minutes passed as the two stayed silent and motionless, all that could be said being lost in the moment or the silence saying what was needed.
Twenty-two hundred hours.
Suspect remains in that palace.
Population is unwary.
At Oh-three hundred hours, we begin our move to seek and secure suspect.
This Sovereign will pose a threat, but we have ways to deal with mages with our equipment.
First mission will be successful, no doubt.
The Boss should be proud of us when we get back.