"My grandfather...?" Quint trailed off. His eyes glazed for s moment before regaining its sharp focus in an instant. "What do you know about my grandfather?!"
"Ahaha!" Kasuyi laughed victoriously. He had succeeded in rousing Quint's inner desires to know more about his family. In fact, before coming to Fort Wildermont, he had already known that Quint would be stationed there, and had made plans to capitalize on this factor.
"I know a lot, young Quint. In fact, your grandfather and I were good friends, back then." Kasuyi rubbed his chin of smoothly shaved stubble that he let grow in a very elaborate manner. It gave him an older vibe, despite his younger body.
"that's impossible! He's been dead for almost a century! You can't be any older than seventy, even with the best age delaying spells." Quint pushed back, unable to believe that Kasuyi would know his grandfather, or anyone from his family for that matter.
Kasuyi's smile only gets wider, from something subtle, to a full on grin. "Of course, you may not know who I am, so you think that I am as young as you children." Kasuyi then smoothly tapped the butt of his staff on the rocky surface of the earth. Immediately, both Blitz and Quint felt a massive pressure weighing them down, forcing the both of them to the ground.
'Dammit! Has he finally gotten tired of me?! Is this how I'll die?' Quint could only think frantically, his thoughts flying all over the place, thinking of his possible death, and all his unanswered questions.
"Knell before my might, child. Knell before the Sorcerer Supreme, Lord Kasuyi!" An all powerful aura erupted from Kasuyi, engulfing the entire mountain range and scaring away all the surrounding wildlife for numerous kilometers in all directions.
'By the heavens... This aura... It's suffocating!' Quint felt choked as he was pressed into Blitz' back. The mount could barely let out sounds of protest as it was roughly shoved to the ground.
Yip!
It was then when Quint heard the sound of a puppy, that the invisible pressure, along with the oppressive aura that had wrapped around his throat disappeared. Although he was already on the ground, it was almost as though he collapsed, the energy in his body leaving him immediately as he tried to catch his breath.
"Ah, forgive me for that." Kasuyi wiped his robes, his voice devoid of any form of remorse, contrary to his words. "It has just been so long since I was able to release that urge to proclaim my name and announce my title, you see." He drawled, that relaxed smile ever present on his face.
As Kasuyi spoke, Quint was in a whole other world of his own, absorbed in his thoughts of fear when he was exposed to that pressure.
'That aura... Jus t how powerful is this man? What class is he? This... this isn't just King Class; I've been around King Class individuals before, but this...' His mind kept on revolving around those thoughts, over and over again.
When he managed to gather his thoughts and raise his head, he saw Kasuyi petting a small pup that was seated on his shoulder, which Quint had failed to notice earlier. The small pup had bony spikes that ran down its back, with obsidian black scales covering its body from top to bottom. It's brilliant violet eyes gazed down at him, a hint of intelligence gleaming within them. Quint quickly lowered his gaze when their gazes clashed.
'Scary...'
"Ahem, as I was saying, I am the Sorcerer Supreme, Lord Kasuyi. Perhaps someone of your generation might know me as the moniker of the Dark Lord, which the Imperial Army has decided to tag me with in their teachings of the masses." Kasuyi finally finished conversing through a mental link with Rajaa, the pup warning him not to overdo it and kill the Lord Class mage by accident.
"The Dark Lord?! Impossible, the Dark Lord is dead!" Quint sputtered, his eyes opened wide.
Kasuyi simply rolls his eyes at Quint's reaction. He was already expecting it.
"I was never dead, boy. Injured, yes, but not dead. A petty betrayal surely isn't enough to kill me. I have the 'Supreme' title attached to my name for a reason after all."
"..." Quint's lips bobbed, opening, and then closing shut for a few moments before Kasuyi spoke up again.
"Don't bother trying to comprehend how I am still alive. You would probably fry your brains and grow old by the time you have deciphered my secrets!" Kasuyi boasted, his shoulders raised high.
"As for your grandfather, I just wanted to let you know that if you wanted to know more about him and your family, it would be best if you came with me. After all, I was the one who raised him."
Quint listened in a stunned silence as he processed Kasuyi's words. Of course, someone so powerful, someone who possessed such a mighty aura, someone who seemed so unfathomable, was worth enough to bear the title of Sorcerer Supreme. Throughout his many years in the Imperial Army, although he had seem so much, things that normal people couldn't even hope to set their sights on, he had never quite seen a being as distant as the one before him.
"I..." He hesitated.
"Do not hesitate here, young one. This is the beginning of your awakening. The Imperial Army can never provide you the answers you desire." Kasuyi's words appealed to Quint's inner desires.
Although the mental fortitude of someone as powerful as Quint was quite considerable, his mental strength had already been weathered down by Kasuyi's earlier flexing of his power, and the constant shocks that he had been exposed to in such a short frame of time.
"I..." His heart wavered as he succumbed to his greater curiosity, "I want to know... Please, I want to know what happened to my family!" A flame of hope was lit up within his heart. All his life, he had wanted to know what had happened to his family, and why he was raised by the Army, but he was unable to get the answers he needed. Now, he finally had the chance, and he wouldn't miss it for anything. He knew that he was getting himself tangled in a mess, but as long as he found out what he needed to know, he didn't mind it.
"Very well then. Come with me." Kasuyi walked forward and extended his hand. "A journey awaits."