The Starlight Ascendency - Chapter 6 His Desire Born

Two weeks has passed since Acerius first meet his teachers and today is the second weekend for him. Now he learn a great deal of things,both knowledge and ability. When. He was trying to access the STARLIGHT WORKSHOP last night, it seems like the day he can enter the workshop greatly shorten, the previous 18 months is now less than a year.And rapidly shortening every single day. It seems like the combination of morning workout,class and training is finally bear it fruits.

He also gained a couple of new way to use the Inventory. First it is possible to eject any item from the inventory in large amount and the item will emerge anywhere from two feets from his hand at cost that it will seriously tire him afterwards. By his calculation, he can only handle two simultaneous item ejection before collapse from extreme fatigue. The second way is something to do with his knowledge of microorganisms as living things. It is possible from him to create a perfectly clean and drinkable water because the inventory reject any sort of living organism as it act like a filter of sort.

And the knowledge he gained for two weeks are now are amazing. From basic common sense to politics, military tactics that so primitive in his opinion, engineering and constructing method that kind of perplexing him because of some unheard of manufacturing technique or tools. For example, the dwarfs has this technique of weld bricks together by slightly melting it using a rock of sorts instead of using concrete. He also learn the proper etiquette to engage with publics or nobles.

The also learn two brand new fighting technique, from hand to hand combat to sword fighting which respectively called Royal Hand Combat and Royal Sword Combat. In Acerius opinion the hand combat is much more practical than the sword fighting. It seems like the sword fighting is a series of slashing and thrusting while defending and parrying with shield.

Meanwhile the hand to hand combat skill which seems to be a combination of SPEAR System with jujitsu are much more practical in Acerius opinion.

The being said,he never actually spar with Chaud in hand to hand combat apart from teaching the technique and so far he only observe Chaud sparring any soldier that unfortunate enough to be dragged into to fighting him.

Acerius also learn something about the debut. It seems like a debut also act as an unofficial competition among all the Noble childrens and it last for three days. The first day consist of writing exam to which the topic can be anything and the second day are a battle of strength and wit for the boys and for the girls it will be a debate of sort.

“Well according to Bianca, the girl will engaged in mock situation where sometimes the adult will throw in real diplomatic situation and see how would they responded.”, muttered Acerius.

It seems like this world noble culture is nothing like what Acerius use to see in TV. It seems like Acerius might be the youngest in the kingdom history to debut. He was quite confident in his brain power but when it comes to strength, it might not be enough.

“Well maybe I should do some work that related to my previous occupation, if I’m not mistaken Chaud says that he usually visit the castle armory during his spare time. They should have the necessary tools to maintained the equipments.”

And thus Acerius goes his way to search the armory but then which direction should he goes, for five years he had life in the castle and apart from the main house , garden and training ground, he never went anywhere aside from the listed place. And thus he reach for his ever so helpful maid Vyonne.

“Vyonne, you there?”, hollered Acerius.

“Wait a minute young master!”, a voice from distance answering. If Acerius were to strained his hearing, he could hear a pitter-patter rapidly approaching him.

“Yes?.Young…Master.”, the flushes face Vyonne answering to her Young Master. Her haggard face and short breathness amused Acerius.

“Take your breath for a while Yvonne. There’s no need to rush.”, smiled Acerius assuringly.

In the past week, Acerius noticed that Yvonne no longer tense when working with him. When Yvonne first arrived here, she was so scared of doing anything. Afraid that maybe she will received some harsh punishments if she were ever commit any mistake. But now she look so innocent, a look befitting someone of her age. After a while, Acerius noticed that Yvonne no longer puffing and so he continued his conversation.

“Yvonne, I need you to bring me to the castle armory.”,ordered Acerius. Upon hearing what Acerius just requested, Yvonne lips twitch slightly.

“Why would young master wanted to go to such smelly place?”, mumbled Yvonne.

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“It has been almost a month since Yvonne working here.”, mumbled a young lady in the brown kirtles. Her job was simple, to simple attended for her young master Acerius. When she first start working in the castle, she had some ugly preconception about working for a noble child especially when most of her friends family used to work for nobles.

Among the story that she had listen was the noble children are always so fickle and dangerous that some even become subjected to their wrath. There are also some noble that will sexually abuse them or punished them whenever their child complained.

So when Yvonne first arrived meet her young master, she was really nervous and afraid.

A small boy with a really bright eyes scrutinise her before greeting himself, ” Hello my name is Acerius.”

“At first Yvonne was afraid of Young Master, because he talk like adult but he is so small. But he’s cute.” mumbled Yvonne again while making Acerius bed. ” The first time Yvonne makes mistake is when Yvonne fall and dropped a cup of honeyed water on Young Master feet. Yvonne was so scared that Yvonne stopped moving. Yvonne was sure that Yvonne will get punished.” reminisced Yvonne. ” But Young Master helped me up and ask me if Yvonne alright.”

” Yvonne was afraid for few days but everything is okay because Yvonne now knew that Young Master is good person and will never hurt other people like the other Noble children. Because CUTE is justice.”,reaffirm Yvonne.

“Yvonne,you there?”, a childlike voice calling for her. Her kind young master need her.

“Wait A Minute Young Master!”,replied Yvonne.

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The armory of the castle is located behind the castle granary. Around this time of day, only the workshop worker mainly the territory-employed blacksmiths and quartermaster are left as most either went for holiday or doing other stuff. Even then the rhythmic sound of hammers silently break the quiet atmosphere .

The first thing Acerius noticed was the Quartermaster.

The quartermaster is a stout and short man in his 50’s with shiny beards. Even though Acerius never meet a person like this before, he seems to remember someone who met this description based on what he had studies the past two weeks.

“A Dwarf?”,mumbled Acerius.

“Yer got some good eyes kid!”, replied the Quartermaster. ” Who’s lad is this Yvonne?”, ask the Quartermaster.

“I’m sorry to bother you Mr.Elric. This kid here is Lord Arthur son, Young Master Acerius.,”answered Yvonne. ” Young Master, this man here is the Quartermaster, Elric.”, She continued.

“So what do yer want lad?”,sneered Elric.

“Please refrain from talking like that, Mr.Elric.”,reprimanded Yvonne.

“It’s alright Yvonne. Mr. Elric, my name is Acerius Connelius. I’m here just to observed. Yvonne you can continued your other work.”

“But Young Master?”

“It’s alright.”,smiled Acerius assuringly

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“So what do yer want kid? Workshop is dangerous for a child especially for someone of yer status, even a dwarf will receive the repercussion if something were to happen to you.”

“Because I’m Interested in your work.”

“I see, yer want so see the workshop?”

“Yes Please.”

The Armory as Acerius suspected also has it own workshop. When Acerius first step into the workshop, he feels the breeze of nostalgia. The soft hammering of hammer and the heat from the furnace greeted him. Currently there are six worker working in the workshop. Four of them are human and two dwarfs. The dwarfs are evidently younger than Elric because their beard are shorter. The dwarfs has a cultures of keeping their beard till their deathbed, so the longer the beard the older and knowledgeable they are.

“The two dwarfs is my apprentices, Mika and Endura. The others are just helper that periodically sent here by each knight leader.”

Knight Leader is the leader is the Knight Division. Each Division usually consist of 250 full time soldier. According to Bianca, the Connelius has the second largest army in the kingdom totalling 1600 soldiers. With four Knight Leader handling the total of 1000, the rest was under Arthur Connelius.

“I don’t see any coal here,how to you feed the burner?”

“Hmm, good question lad, we dwarf don’t use obsolete technology like coal anymore. To power the burner, we use fire magic stone to the circuit.”, Elric then proceeded to show Acerius the circuit. Behind a metre diameter of the burner, lies a series of symbols foreign to Acerius in a metal panel and in the middle of the series of symbol lies a fist size red crystal. When Acerius hovered his hand above the crystal, he can feel pulsing and scalding heat emitting.

“This burner is really expensive as it is only manufactured by the Dwarf Kingdom. The secret lies in the circuit, even a slightest mistake in engraving the symbol will cause an unintended effect. Well usually it just malfunction. And the metal you see here is only available in the Dwarf Kingdom and even I don’t know the recipe.”

“What do you do here Elric?”,ask Acerius.

“Well, usually we just maintain the weapon. Half of the weapon in the Armory is obsolete because rusting or broken during battle. Hey lad, tell your father to buy new weapons.”

“Why don’t just make one?”

“Well it because the iron quality in the territory is great,really low impurities but your father focus on exporting it rather than using it in his own territory and import cheap ingot full of impurities. And no way will I use such low quality metal. The sword will be so brittled.”

“Why don’t use it to make other weapon such as crossbow or ballista?”

“What is crossbow or ballista?”

Wait those weapons didn’t exist?, ponder Acerius. Instead of explaining with words,Acerius draw it on a piece of paper.

“By Minerva! This is great! How did you know about any of these? Let me do this. Come back here next week. Genius. Now get out from MY workshop! That mean everyone except for my apprentices.” ,exclaimed Elric

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After the conversation Acerius then return to his room and meditating. During the workshop visit , he invoked the on the circuit. The circuit was make from an unknown alloy that maybe native to this world while the series of symbols means < AMPLIFY, CIRCULATE, CONVERGE >. He suspected that the circuit exist only to amplified the stone but still he could not figure out how does it powered .Based on the new found information about how some material exist only in this world and how some weapon never exist in this world piqued his interest greatly. It is possible that because of magic and magic stone, the improvisation of long range weapons greatly stall.

Now Acerius was thinking if he can help his father territory even just by a little maybe he could improve his standing during the debut and make his family proud,or maybe he can become the new king candidate and making this world his heaven. And thus his desire for the kingship budding.

Thus the wheel of fate are moving.