Before the dim star even peeked over the horizon, Emory was already up and meditating. Though if she was honest, she couldn't go back to sleep after she woke up from what she could only assume was a vision. When dawn finally broke, she had been channeling her magik for nearly two hours. The light, however, was a trigger, causing Emory to go into a frenzy getting everything ready. As she finished, she donned a pair of glittering, scaled gauntlets and moved her fingers around to make sure they were comfortable. When she pulled them snugly over her hands and forearms, she felt a surge of power course through her body like a bolt of electricity that brought her to her knees. By her estimation, her mother's old gauntlets improved her effective sphere level by three or thirty percent in the case of the Arcane sphere. For the time being, she decided to take them off and put them in her bag. Emory quickly sent Tethys a message, letting the latter know she had left for training, and headed back to the stone tablet. There she trained for almost an hour before Athos appeared.
He commented, "Did you even sleep? You got here extra early this morning."
"We've run out of time," Emory replied slightly upset, "I had a dream last night that a platoon of Mantoan with an Uthid commander landed on my friend's planet. In the vision, it seemed like it was early afternoon of what could be today."
"Well, let's check then. Send a bolt my way," Athos ordered. The orb flew like lightning through the air, so fast Athos barely managed to catch it in time. Athos crushed it and shook his head, "Not yet, but just about. What about a blitz of attacks? That could push you over the edge."
Emory nodded as she closed her eyes and began creating multiple orbs in succession. After she created each one, it would leave her hand and float to an orbiting position around her. Each one she made, she made faster than the one before, and within a minute, ten glowing balls hovered around her. Fifteen more appeared in the next minute; by five minutes, one hundred orbs encircled her. Then she opened her eyes, which had changed completely gold, but the world had seemingly frozen in time. She called, "Athos! What's going on?"
"You're becoming an adult," a woman replied behind Emory. She spun around quickly, standing up and immediately establishing a fighting pose. The woman before her was incredibly stunning, a perfect figure with a teal braid of hair that reached her waist. Yet the woman appeared to be fairly young, not quite thirty, and shared the golden irises that Emory had.
"You're the woman who appeared while I was meditating!" Emory accused, "Who are you? What did you do to my friend?"
The woman laughed, "What did I do? Except for me talking to you, you did all this. I knew you would be a strong one, but I didn't expect all this."
"How did I do this? I don't have this kind of power," Emory glared, "I didn't even know magik could freeze time."
"Well, you didn't stop it entirely, just slowed the local time to one tenth percent time," the woman explained, "By the way, my name is Ninian. What's your name, fire child?"
"My name is Emory. I have many questions for you, but right now, only one is important: are you friend or foe?" Emory relaxed her stance slightly but was still ready for an attack.
Ninian smiled and bowed slightly, "It's nice to meet you, Emory. I am your friend and excited to meet the first new fire child that made it into adulthood in five hundred years. While I have time for all your questions, you unfortunately do not; you have time for two."
"Why do I only have time for two?" Emory questioned, "I thought time was slowed down."
"It is for the moment, your moment. But in a few moments, this will all return to normal, and the recoil will knock you out for awhile," Ninian grinned as she lowered one of the two fingers on her hand, causing Emory to slump her shoulders.
"You've called me a fire child twice now and said we were the same," Emory continued, "But no one I've talked to has heard of that term before. Is there another name that we've been called before?"
Ninian began fading into smoke as she answered, "We've been called a million different names, but my favorite is dragon." Emory felt herself grow faint and collapse on the ground.
When the orbs around her had multiplied, light began pulsing off rhythmically as the number increased. In a flash, the light exploded in a wave of magik that shook a ten-mile circle. Athos, being so close, covered himself in his shield and knelt on the ground to withstand the massive amount of magik being released. As the light dimmed, he lowered the shield and approached Emory. He smirked, "Just what sort of creature are you, child? With this power, we may be able to defeat her once and for all."
He checked her breathing and tried to wake her but had no luck in doing so. After five minutes, he heard motors in the distance quickly approaching him. For a brief moment, he weighed his options. On the one hand, he could escape now, leaving Emory there for her friends to take her back to their base. This was an appealing option because it would be the easiest. However, if he stayed, there would be questions, the kind he wasn't sure he could answer. Still, his magik had never failed him before, so he activated his second sphere and waited for the group to arrive. Ellen, Tethys, Wolt, and Zeiss drove up to the tablet on two motorcycles, stopping twenty feet away from Athos and Emory. Slowly, the four teens got off their bikes and stood beside them, ready for action.
"My name is Tethys Harding, and you're standing next to my seemingly unconscious friend," Tethys called as she slowly approached with a dagger in each hand, "I'm going to need you to take a step back."
Athos's nose flared, "Certainly not. I can see the swirling Void in your neck. This magik child would not be a friend of yours." His hands were instantly encased in a coat of prismatic aura. Suddenly, Emory sat straight up with glowing golden eyes and bulging veins surrounding them that pulsed underneath the skin.
"I don't have much time; I can feel myself fading in and out of consciousness as I go through this transformation," Emory explained, though her voice was deep and terrifying, "Athos, this is my friend. Tethys, this is my friend. Work together please." She blinked her eyes several times before falling back to the ground just as fast as she had risen. Athos took a deep breath and released the magik covering his hands while Tethys also put her blades away on her hips.
"I'm sorry; I came in a little hot," Tethys apologized, "There was a huge surge of magik that wiped out our communications array, and I feared the worst."
Athos slowly walked toward her, "No, the fault is mine. The fact that you have the Void sphere doesn't mean that you're the enemy. Though I had no idea humans could use it. How did you come to have this?"
"It was implanted in me by people I used to trust," Tethys frowned, "I had no idea it was magik. I bet they didn't either."
"The Void sphere has always been restricted to the Laxtros. I suppose we will need to see how it develops considering the different physiologies between Laxtros and humans. Nevertheless, my name is Athos, and I have been teaching Emory this week," Athos bowed slightly.
"Good to meet you. Can you tell me what happened to her?" Tethys asked.
Athos nodded, "Not entirely but I have a good idea. As you may have guessed, Emory is not your typical Hexblood but something much more. When we Elandrian reach third level in the Arcane sphere, we unlock the latent powers of our magik body. Normally, Hexbloods don't have a magik body, so this transformation doesn't occur with them. However, she does have one which means she's probably going through a change."
"How long will it take for her to finish this transformation?" Tethys pressed, "Not to rush, but an enemy is inbound to one of the other squads, and we really need our commander."
"That's hard to say. For some, the process takes only a few minutes; others take hours or even days, though that's very rare. Honestly, all I can say for sure is when she wakes up, we'll be able to get to your friends very quickly," Athos answered. He made a face as he put his hand out towards Emory.
"What are you thinking?" Tethys examined, catching the change in his disposition, "Maybe we speed this process up."
Athos mused, "Well, right now, she's drawing in magik but at a slower pace than she normally would. I imagine that's because she's also having to convert the magik into energy her body can use, breaking it down and rebuilding the body anew. In theory, if we could force more magik into her, it could speed up the process." His tone betrayed his confidence in the idea.
"Something tells me there's some risk involved with forcing more in," Tethys sighed as she rubbed her temples, "Why am I not going to like this?"
"For what it's worth, the risk is not for her; it's for us. Basically, we'll link ourselves to her, so she can draw from our bodies as well as her own. She could drain me or cause long-term damage to your vessels. In truth, I've never done this before if we do that," Athos explained methodically. Tethys frowned and turned back to the rest of the party. After explaining the situation to them, they still seemed unsure. The problem was all of them knew how big Emory's mana pool was, easily bigger than all of theirs combined; how much help could they really provide. But if the situation was reversed, they all knew she would do the same for them. They eventually agreed to help and started to walk back to Athos when the runes on the tablet began to light up like a little star. The light dimmed, revealing a woman with teal hair past her waist wearing an elegantly embroidered robe.
"An Elandrian and four humans? No wonder she had no idea about her heritage. Elandrian, are you strong?" the woman smirked as she called to Athos. He knelt there with his jaw open and his eyes as wide as they would go.
"You're one of the Ancients. This child is an Ancient!" Athos yelled as tears streamed down his face, "I believe I am strong, but compared to you, I am just a child."
Tethys pulled a blade back out and pointed it at the woman, "Who are you? Where did you come from?"
"Oh sweet child, I come in peace," the woman laughed as she raised a hand towards Tethys, "Take a nap; we'll fix your friend right up." Strange smiles appeared on Ellen, Tethys, Wolt, and Zeiss's face as their eyes fluttered, and droplets of blood oozed out of their noses. Then they collapsed and started snoring almost immediately while the woman approached Athos and Emory.
"I've never seen Charm that overwhelming," Athos marveled, "The guesses we made about your strength were greatly underestimated. What should I call you?"
The woman smiled, "You can call me Ninian. Were you instructing this child? Now that I'm close to her, I can tell she is a very special kind of fire child; one of her parents was a child of your kind, correct?"
"Yes, Ninian, that's correct," Athos bowed, "How can we help her through this transition?"
"She needs to reach half of her maximum mana before she'll wake up. Given how large hers is for a youngling, it would normally take several days. I'll transfer half of my magik to her, but she'll need more, which is where you come in. I also don't want to be here when she awakens. Once I hand over my magik, I'll leave her in your hands to finish the process. Can you handle that?" Ninian carefully detailed for Athos who just nodded in response. She readied a ball of pure magik in her hand no bigger than a baseball; however, he could feel more than three times as much as magik as he had in total in just this small orb. With her free hand, she popped open Emory's jaw and pushed the magik into her mouth.
Athos breathed, "You said this is half your mana pool, but from what I can sense, this is only a third of hers and dwindling. How can such a young person control so much magik?"
"It's due to her latent traits. The mixing of our three races gave her a very rare gift," Ninian heaved, feeling the strain from releasing so much of her magik, "She has a power called Limitless. That is why you must hurry and transfer magik to her if you want her to wake up sooner. Right now, she can't draw in as fast as she's growing; once she's awake, she'll make the necessary adjustments to keep herself stable."
"Limitless? How can such a being even exist? No matter, I will continue to revive her. Thank you for your help," Athos recognized Ninian's assistance as he set his hand on Emory's head.
"Her friends should wake up shortly," Ninian mentioned as she began to fade, "Tell her I'd like to talk to her once she's finished her business." Like a puff of smoke, Ninian disappeared with a whisper while Athos focused on channeling his magik into the red-haired girl. In truth, she was syphoning his strength faster than he could replenish it.