[3:42 PM]
A few minutes passed, and as soon as Caelus and Tellus had reached the capital, he looked around, noticing the shops with zithers, guitars, and even... Drums. Didn't feel like it fit here, but again, this was another world, so what could he say?
Looking around more while following Tellus, he saw another shop, fisticuffs, knuckledusters, gloves, and some potions from the looks of it. Alongside that, the other half of that shop was filled with new but normal swords, easy to use but not designed or anything, just mass-produced.
Though he could see that Tellus's sword was different. It was much thinner and leaner, though it also fit her build, since she had to rush in quickly; getting the first attack mattered.
"Is there any reason we're passing by the market?" He spoke, a little confused, though he noticed an entire store of ink brushes and paint bottles in the center, a man holding a larger one in his hand, with a long sheet of paper with a purple outline.
"Not really, though I do want to see what your path is," Tellus spoke, calmly examining the area, only to look back once and see that He was gone. Though not far, seeing that he only went to an older shop.
Caelus looked over, holding and touching a few of the staffs as the young shopkeeper let him, watching with a relaxed body, though... On the other hand, "Holy shit, this is a dragon, why is he at my shop, why is he looking here, oh, God, he's coming, act calm-" The shopkeeper stood still, trying to act as normal as possible.
"So-"
"What is it, sir-?"
"What do you think is the best staff? This one is really good, but... It doesn't fit my vibe." He spoke softly, but still audible.
Children hid behind their parents because their parents told them to, yet a few kids ran over, touched the tail, and He turned his eyes back, and a person dropped a crate. Caelus didn't mind, just kept his cool so his tail wouldn't hit one of the kids.
"Why is he so nice?" One of the parents whispered while looking around for the kids' parents. He just looked back at the shopkeeper, who was holding another staff, its frame made of a wooden structure, but not the usual type; instead, it felt dense.
Caelus, taking it, looked and examined it. Wanting to see what was so special about it, looked ahead. "So... What is special about this?"
"Well, it's a staff that repairs itself automatically; it can also adjust in size if you guide it using Mana, and its ability to channel Mana is excellent, almost one of the best. It's my best work, and costs about 3 gold, which... No one has been able to buy." The shopkeeper spoke still on edge, but with his soft-spoken voice, he felt a little bit more at ease.
"CAELUS!!, Don't just go around wandering like that. I don't need to be late!" Across the street, Tellus shouted, just seeing where he was.
Caelus reached into his clothing and found a pocket that conveniently led to the System's inventory, which held all his gold. He took out about 5 pieces, then dropped 3 on the
shopkeeper's hand. "Just so no one steals it, have this."
The wind blew slightly, Caelus, holding the other two coins, just flipped one of them. Landing on his head, he put the coins away and broke the edge of the staff.
"Sorry about that, Tellus, I was just bored with walking straight." The staff, which began regenerating slowly, began reforming into a whole staff.
"Cool, good job on making this." Caelus's voice was deadpan in nature, but a compliment from any dragon would be enough to cause people to faint... Literally.
He held the staff and slowly turned around, raising his tail so he wouldn't hit the kids. Looking to the side, he saw Tellus standing there, annoyed that he had walked off.
"Don't worry, I got what I needed. Let's get going." He spoke, looking at Tellus and walking past her.
"Also, apologies for wandering off, I was just interested in seeing what you people did, selling items you make is... Extremely inconvenient." He did want to play into the dragon's hoard part because it was funny enough as is, and it wouldn't do him any harm.
Finally, they went back to walking, and Tellus had to keep stopping him from getting distracted by things in the kingdom. Reaching the end of the street and the start of the entrance to the courtyard.
"This is where I usually train, but there's another location for mages, since it's a place usually reserved for them; they can be extremely destructive," Tellus spoke with ease, like an experienced warrior.
"I do need to continue training my blade. I have been getting a little rusty since I'm relying on Mana for barriers to not get hit."
Caelus listened, a little intently, but still he wanted to learn more, and he didn't think it would be weird for a world so ready for battle to train its weapons.
"Alright, I'll get going then," he said more casually, still the way he said it in his world, because it felt more comfortable. He could've started speaking Russian, but that would've been way too confusing for Tellus.
Turning away, he left, waving to her to make sure she knew he was going. Once he reached the doorway, he opened it and noticed 5 different people there, all wearing different clothing, one in inconspicuous clothing, the kind every person in the empire wore, except nobles or those of higher rank.
The others wore soft clothing that didn't protect them much, but with the use of Mana to enhance his own eyes, he could see tiny hexagon-shaped barriers around the clothing, meaning they still had magic to protect themselves, so their magical pool was much larger.
"Who might you be? You don't...-" His eyes widened, seeing the tail swing back and forth, brushing against the dirt of the floor.
"Caelus is the name." He spoke, not wanting to get into a fight, but staying focused and deliberate, though his voice was softer, no longer the completely emotionless voice as before. It was his actual voice.
"And you're... A Wyvern?" One of them asked, and they assumed it wasn't a dragon, considering they thought all of them died out.
"A Dragon." Caelus corrected, without hesitation.
"But they all died out, the Church-" One spoke again-
"I don't want to argue about this right now, so if you don't believe me, will you take one of my scales as proof instead?" He sighed.
"No. We'll fight. I cannot handle liars." They spoke, a grim expression on their face.
"And you're not gonna listen or see anything I have for proof that I'm not a liar?" Caelus spoke. Though seeing they summoned their staff, a decent quality, a little lower than the one he just got.
"No. Why would Dragons even tell the truth about themselves to humans?" They spoke with a fiery conviction.
"Because Dragons have no reason to lie other than to mess with humans. And I don't want to mess with you right now." He spoke to them, his tail slapping the ground in annoyance.
"Alright. A fight it is." Caelus continued. Holding out the staff, he didn't know what to do, but he knew it involved something like using Mana to form an attack, pointing it towards the other person. His expression defaulted to a neutral face. The System spoke.
One of the humans stepped forward, staff already forming as they pointed it towards Caelus with the same conviction as before.
[You can make your Attacks and Abilities anything; there is a route the Church gives, but that's very limited. Most mages don't listen anyway unless they were a part of it since birth.]
Caelus gave a soft smile, seeing them form a ball of Mana to send out as a blast, but still charging up. Caelus, on the other hand, formed Mana, assuming it worked like matter and rubber; he compressed it into a direct vector.
There wasn't flash or excess; the attack would redirect itself to discard any unnecessary paths and strike the other person's weakest point. Flying at insane speeds, it was almost invisible due to the compression.
Caelus quickly dashed to the side as the blast released, the other person wanting to dodge the slash. Yet since they took time, about four seconds to blast at Caelus, it landed a direct hit, a giant gash which also launched him back to the wall.
"I didn't even use that much Mana... This should be my basic technique. So just a Simple Cut." Caelusthought.
"What the hell is that!?" Another one of them shouted. Their voice shaking, then steady, they stood down. The person who got hit wasn't dead. Caelus wasn't the type to just do that. Especially in a place he was unfamiliar with. But it still hurt like hell.
Caelus turned to the side, noticing a dummy. Seeing as it wasn't being used, he ignored their question, having no reason to answer, and explaining his powers to someone else would be way too dumb.
As they spoke with each other, Caelus only continued to gain distance on them; the training ground of the Mage area was almost triple the size of the one Tellus was in.
Being in a rectangular shape. So at least the Church didn't try to ban obvious things like this. He almost believed they might've.
"I'll try and use this more... It was obvious that it was up to me to make something this powerful!" Caelus tried not to laugh at himself, thinking that he was remembering how he acted as a kid as soon as he discovered a show he loved from another country.
Caelus shook his head; he didn't really have anyone other than Tellus to talk to, and the System would barely count as a person, probably in an act. Compressing Mana once more, he tried to trim the amount he used. It wasn't perfect, obviously, but he handled it well.
Releasing it didn't create as much drag. Along with that, it took a little bit more time to cast, but it wasn't detrimental. But Caelus wanted to see how he could use it more quickly; it was only a normal attack, after all.
"Hmm… So if I..."
The sound of slashes increased; the more they happened, the more Caelus drained his Mana, optimizing each time he did it to solve the new problem that showed up, until there wasn't one except for its strength.
Caelus, after about two hours of testing, had begun sweating, even when he didn't do physical labor like swinging a blade or punching something; his body still reacted as if it were an extremely intensive task, albeit for his mind. Yet it seemed to carry over to his body as well.
Caelus took a breath, putting his staff away, and in a moment, swinging his hand to create a compressed Mana slash, thin in size, with extreme penetration.
It cost very little Mana and took barely a second to form. It flew out and hit the dummy, cutting it in half from the sheer force of its impact.
A gust of wind also formed from its impact. Caelus could use it 3 times per second now, which would be a lot more for a real fight. He assumed fights usually lasted from at least a few seconds to at most twenty minutes.
Caelus stopped, turned around, and noticed he was now surrounded by at least 10 royal guard trainees, with Tellus there looking at Caelus while sighing.
"You should've just told me that people were trying to bug you and fight you. They were already in trouble, and this time they just went to attack you, so they were removed from the position, but did you need to hit that hard?" Tellus rambled, clearly annoyed at Caelus defending himself.
"I only used a little bit of Mana for that." Caelus intercepted, to which Tellus began buffering from what Caelus had stated.