The knowledge of the Flaming Spear spellwork was sifting through the memory into Fen's head, making him slightly itchy. Thankfully, the feeling passed momentarily.
The memory of creating the spellwork stayed in his mind, and Fen focused on memorizing the formation of the spellwork and how to construct so that it wouldn't fade away.
Although the Lesser Dragon didn't use it's own magical energy for the Flaming Spear onslaught, it still had to put in effort to create them, even if the effort was majorly reduced because of it's nature as a Lesser Dragon with extreme levels of mental strength. This effort was recorded within the memory, presenting itself all wrapped up like a present within the memory Fen had managed to snatch from within the Dragon when he killed it.
Although Fen would have to learn how to manipulate his own magical energy, doing so would become much easier now that he had the experience of doing it inside the Lesser Dragon's body. Being a Vitul did have it's benefits...
Wait, were there even any downsides?
Anyways, the memory continued to play even after Fen completely memorized the Flaming Spear spellwork, but Fen couldn't figure out how to leave the memory until it ended, so he simply let himself be carried along by the Dragon's actions.
"Argh!"
At least, he tried to when he felt stabbing pain all along his backside, with the familiar sensation of being burned once again. Gritting his teeth, he refocused to find the cause only for his concentration to be broken by even more mind-numbing pain.
'Ah, this feels familiar. Isn't this- fuck! Isn't this the pain of the onslaug- Shit! Stop!' Fen screamed inside his mind as the pain from hundreds of Flaming Spears pierced through his head.
Fen really had to learn to keep his mouth shut, even while inside another being's memory. Merely mentioning the downsides of being a Vitul and suddenly, he was experiencing all the pain that the memory held.
Of course there would be a price for being able to learn a spellwork, and Fen should've known that. It just didn't click in his mind that being able to feel everything inside a memory also meant that he would feel, well, EVERYTHING, inside the memory. All the pain, not just the feeling of manipulating magical energy.
When Fen had to endure the original onslaught of Flaming Spears, he had the comfort of his nerves sometimes being severed from his brain allowing some momentary relief from the pain, but the Lesser Dragon had no such relief; it's body was too large and tough for the pain receptors to be completely cut off from the brain, so when Fen said every sensation, he meant every sensation.
Time felt much longer while Fen was inside the memory, stretching as if to accompany the massive amount of pain he was experiencing.
After what seemed like hours, the pain finally subsided to a dull ache, but an even worse feeling started to force it's way up his chest:
Despair. The loss of hope. During the onslaught, nearly all of his own will had been shaved away nearly making him forget that he was inside a memory. At this moment, he was the Lesser Dragon. He knew he was about to die.
He felt the Dragon's feelings start to fade away until despair was the only thing remaining. What it had believed to be a fun chase had led to it's own death, and there was nothing it could do about it. The feeling was soul crushing in of itself, but when Fen felt something touch him, his body shook at the realization of what was about to happen.
Fen had put his hand on the Dragon's maw to announce his presence, and now he was feeling the same sensation on his mouth and nose. What a fucking twist...
Seconds seemed to drawl to a crawl as Fen awaited his inevitable death, until he felt an explosion in his left eye, blinding him with the pain.
He was thrown out of the memory as soon as the Dragon died, but it wasn't fast enough. Fen felt the memory split off from the soul, but not before death. No, the memory split off after the Dragon had already died, sucked in by Fen's body when he drew his fist back to himself.
For a brief moment, Fen felt the sensation of death. It was terrifying; the feeling of nothing, the lack of sensation, the coldness that could be heat, the movement that could be stillness. Nothing felt like everything in that state. He had only touched the feeling, but even when the memory ended he couldn't shake his body free from the feeling.
It was oddly familiar with the Void in his dreams, except without Dey to protect him from the Void creatures. The full force of dying was projected into his mind, temporarily destroying his sanity.
Shivering despite the comfortable temperature, Fen stayed awake the entire night, only moving to his bed when his eyes lost their light and his hands stopped shaking.
****
Fen at least got some rest during the night; Dey didn't pull him out of his reality or anything like that, so his mind was allowed to rest.
It was a good thing to, after experiencing that memory, Fen needed a moment to clear his mind, at least for a moment. Even now, after he had woken up, his body still trembled at the slightest feeling of cold or warmth, and he was only comfortable in room temperature.
Anything more or less sent his senses into overdrive, and he would start sweating bullets. He could only hope the symptoms would pass with time, otherwise it would really suck if he had to deal with this forever.
Maybe Dey could help him? Too bad the useless God wasn't showing his face anywhere around him. He only seemed to appear at random now, popping in and out of reality to either mess with him or give him sage-worthy advice worthy of his title as a God.
At least Fen's body was more recovered, healing during the night. There were many less aches and bruises left internally, so he had his freedom of movement back, even if his mind felt like it was wrapped in thick cotton layers dipped in ink. But that wasn't accurate enough, add a few hammers slamming on this ink-covered cotton, and that was about what Fen was currently feeling.
It wasn't pleasant.
But, he had a plan for today, and the very act of having something to look forward to made enduring the pain much easier... moving around still felt painful, but thankfully, he didn't need his body today.
He just needed his mind! Shit. With this headache, he didn't know if he'd even be able to practice with magical energy. Then again, Fen had no idea how magic worked, or if he needed to strain his body to manipulate magical energy. All he had to use as reference were the Dragon's memories, but its body was so different that it was easier to find differences rather than similarities between the both of them. If anything, at least he would be able to manipulate magical energy easier once he figured out how to actually begin, with the experience he had ingrained within his memory.
So, Fen decided to head to the man who was most likely to have information about magical energy.
"Ah, I see you've come back alive from the Scenario. Congrats." Raisen turned back down to his gaming interface.
With his brow twitching from the lack of concern his instructor showed, Fen explained his need to learn how to manipulate magical energy to the old Knight, hoping that he knew some basic information on how to start learning, or at least how to sense the energy.
"What? You haven't even finished with my Lesson, and you already want to start learning magic? Kid, you've got my respect for working so hard, but don't push yourself," Raisen said, barely glancing up from his interface.
If Fen tilted his head a couple degrees, he could almost make out the game the old man was playing. Some sort of RPG...Nope. Just before Fen could start to grow interest in whatever Raisen did in his alone time he ruthlessly cut his attention off and refocused, a task which was significantly harder today than before thanks to the Dragon's memory.
Death's hands were trying their best to claw him down, and it was only Fen's will that allowed the candidate to carry forward.
"How many days are left in the month?"
"Around seven or so. Wait, why? You can't be worried about the Task, right?" Raisen met his eyes, his blue eyes narrowing.
"It won't hurt if I prepare as much as I can."
"But it will hurt if you injure yourself again. What happens when you get selected for the Task, but your body is recovering from whatever type magic?"
Fen smirked.
"You worried about me, old man?"
"Hmph. More like worried about covering my precious Vitul student; I wasn't worried about the Scenario, but you're more likely to kill yourself with magic then you are to die in a Scenario.
"Alright, listen, it's not like I don't understand where you're coming from, you have every right to be worried. I've seen Chosen operate, and if you get paired with one of those monsters, the odds of you dying are higher than you living, even with your... abilities."
A frown appeared on Fen's face.
"Are they really that strong?"
The old man guffawed, "Are they strong? Ha, some of them are even on the level of us instructors, you can't compare them to you Opfers." Raisen had a slightly bitter look on his face as he spoke. "Brats, is what they are. Lucky brats though. The Foundation never picked you because of the amount of talent you, or at least, that wasn't what influenced their decision the most. To be honest, they didn't give a shit how talented you are, how 'blessed by the Heavens' your skills are. They picked you," Raisen jabbed a finger into Fen's chest, still sitting down at his desk, "because they thought you would work hard. They don't even know about you being a Vitul, all they know about is your relation with your family."
'My family?' Fen's ears perked up when the conversation steered to his family. 'Does Raisen know about them? About who I was?'
"What do you mean?" He asked instead.
"Every single one of the Opfers has a reason for being taken. You have people you need to see again, right?" Raisen continued after Fen confirmed with a nod. "You'd do anything to see them again." Another nod. "Well, not everyone has family they want to get back to. Some of you want revenge, some power, some want knowledge, but all of you are fueled by your desires.
"The Chosen are the opposite of you.
"They've had access to all the power and knowledge they could have ever wanted since they were young, but they didn't have any drive. What more could they want? More power? More money? That became meaningless to them, and most of them stopped improving."
"If they stopped, then why should I be afraid of them?" Fen was confused. How powerful could a youth be if they only improved with the limits of a few years?
"Fuuu, you should be afraid because of what they learned, not because they spent so much time learning. Think of the Chosen and the Opfer like this: Two people learning how to shoot a gun, training to kill each other. When you two face off you think it'll be a fair fight, but the Chosen have already learned how to fire nuclear missiles." Raisen used a rough analogy to get his point across, but Fen started to understand.
"So in terms of the Program, they already learned advanced magic strong enough to kill even me."
Raisen snapped his fingers. "Exactly."
"So what if I already learned a piece of advanced magic?" Fen's eyes lit up as he described what he had received from the Scenario. Raisen listened, only occasionally showing a reaction, especially when he described the Lesser Dragon he had killed.
The Knight whistled.
"A Lesser Dragon... It's impressive being able to do that, but you should already understand the reason why you won that fight." Fen nodded his head, a hint of frustration appearing in his eyes.
"I got lucky. I know that." Simply saying that brought an ache to his heart as Fen remembered all the instances where he had been anything but lucky.
"But that luck let me learn the Flaming Spear Spellwork."
"Ahh, so that's why you want to learn how to move magical energy... How much progress do you think you can make within only seven days?"
Fen could only shrug his shoulders.
"I can only try my best. If I cut down on my sleep again, who knows? As long as it'll help me get one step closer to the Chosen in strength, I'll do whatever it takes."
The pair stood in silence like that for a moment as Raisen took the rare action of focusing his mind to think.
'If he could learn magic, along with his Knight based skills, there would be very few among the Opfer who could threaten him. But, at the same time, there aren't many Opfer who could hold a candle to him in the first place, even without learning magic. And, if Fen does, hypothetically, learn magic, how much would that help him against a Chosen?' The existences of the Chosen weren't meant to be fought against in the early stages of the Program; they were meant to cleanse the unlucky few Opfer and would be their opponents after at least a month or two had passed inside the Void.
Raisen, being an instructor and a member of the Foundation was very aware of the difference in strength between the two groups. In contrast to his character, a seed of worry began to sprout inside his heart. The old Knight hadn't taken the time to think about it before, but if Fen really was paired with a Chosen he'd lose the kid.
'But he needs to be in his best shape regardless of leaning magic. What if trying to teach him only gets him killed?'
After a moment, the Knight gave his answer.
"I'm sorry Fen, but I won't. The risk's too high, even for me." Even as he spoke, a hint of doubt was on his face. But, he was confident that he made the right decision.
Before Fen could refute him a familiar voice appeared from behind him.
"Oh, Fen, good that you're here. I wanted to ask for a favor."
Erik happened to walk into the Training Hall at that moment, seeing the rare sight of Raisen not messing around with his interface and Fen standing right in front of him.
The teenager stopped right in front of Fen.
"Uh, what's with the energy around you, its tinted all black. Something happen?"
"Eh?"
Erik made a gesture of a wide circle around Fen. "You don't see it Raisen?" The youth had gotten rid of his fear towards the old Knight a few days ago, although he still flinched whenever he saw Raisen pull out his wooden weapon he used for training.
"What energy?" Both Raisen and Fen asked in unison, with very different thoughts in their heads.
Raisen was totally jealous, and a little angry. 'Damn geniuses, my talent isn't small at all, and yet whenever I'm next to these two, it's as if I'm the least talented in the whole universe!' He had every right to be angry, just maybe not at Erik and Fen. It wasn't their fault that their talent was on entirely different leagues.
In Fen's case, he was genuinely curious about what Erik was sensing, not at all jealous that the youth could sense something that he couldn't. If anything he was grateful that Erik was able to see it, rather than relying on just himself.
Seeing the anger flash in Raisen's eyes, Erik unconsciously took a step backwards, getting flashbacks to their physical 'training' with the wooden weapon. If he focused, he could still feel the sting of the blows on his skin.
The training did produce results however. Both Fen's and Erik's abilities to regenerate improved tremendously, although Erik's progress was still not as significant as Fen's. While Fen could heal from fatal wounds, like when he was able to heal back from almost being roasted alive into a skeleton, Erik could only heal from surface level wounds. The boy was getting closer to being able to heal entire limbs however, and was soon approaching regeneration.
"Usually his energy is golden and bright, but it's a lot duller today..."
Trembling, the youth was only barely able to speak, constantly glancing between Fen and Raisen, until his eyes finally rested on Raisen, his body ready to make an escape the instant he saw any hint of danger.