"Father?"
"What happened father? You are acting weird."
"Ahh...your grip. It's too strong."
"Why are you forcing me?"
"What is that? Father...I am scared. You are not acting normal."
"Ahh...don'tβ¦.ahhhhhh"
Vision became blurry and Consciousness started leaving. Someone beside him mumbled to him.
"This will be your hope of survival andβ¦..our revenge." He continued "Remember one thing son, Never even trust someone, not even your shadowβ¦.."
He finally lost his consciousness, losing his ability to hear what that person was telling him.
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"Urghh. Not again that Nightmare." Early in the morning he woke facepalming his face, Sitting on the bed. The bed was big enough to fit 2 people easily. It was not luxurious, neither was it cheap. He left his bed to wash himself. His room was quite spacious and there were a lot of books filling 2 large and 1 small bookshelves creating an L shape in front of his bed. There was also a desk in front of the small shelf facing a window that was beside the 1st large shelf. There was an attached bathroom in his room and also a nightstand on the right side of the bed. After washing himself he opened both curtains of the window at the right side of his bed and the one beside the bookshelf in the left corner of the room. He sat on the desk before the small bookshelf where sunlight was coming directly from the front and he started reading some books.
After some time, He put on his clothes before leaving his room with 3 books. He wore a black robe with red lines on it. He thought to himself 'I have remembered everything in these books. Hope it works this time.'
While he was walking, people around him looked at him with disdain and hatred, whispering and mumbling with each other.
"Hey, isn't he the student Zarek Felkas, who's known for being useless not even being able to use his own aura."
"Even though he has high aura level, He is totally useless and can only be a punching bag"
"Not even able to learn a single technique, He is a disgrace to our regal artificer sect. But why does he get so much favor from the sect even living in one of the most luxurious quarters in the outer court?"
"Hell why is he even in the sect?"
"Don't know man but I heard he was recruited at a very young age because of his unique aura. But sometime later they came to realise that he can't learn a single technique because of some illness or something. And His body keeps weakening because of that and as you can see he is so fragile now. And they think his aura being so unstable is also because of that illness or curse. But there is no evidence behind this claim. Because most of the lecturers don't know anything about it. And only senior lecturers can prove this claim."
"Hmph still he is just a cripple garbage who is wasting sect resources. Why didn't the sect just kick him out of the sect."
Even with this much disdain there were some female students whispering with each other, "Even though his body became so fragile his face is still as handsome as ever with those short white hair perfectly contrasting with his sharp azure blue eyes."
"che." The male students there started showing their annoyance.
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After walking for a couple of minutes ignoring all those disdain, Zarek finally reached the library. It was a large 2 storied traditional wooden library. There was also a large cherry blossom tree beside the library, almost covering half of the library. It is an ancient tree which is said to have an effect of increasing people's focus around it. But no one knows if it is true. It does feel like your mind becomes somewhat calm when you enter the library but it isn't certain if it is the tree's effect. However it's certain that it is an ancient tree as it was there from the establishment of the sect.
"I am here to return these techniques." Zarek said after entering the library and coming up to a desk.
The librarian who was sitting behind the desk was an old man caressing his long beard. He said, "hmm. These are the weakest low rank techniques. Even if you didn't return it, it would have been fine as there are many copies of these weak low rank techniques." Generally borrowing or taking a technique outside the library wasn't allowed much less borrowing and not returning.
Zarek opened his mouth, "If someone borrows something he is obliged to return it. So here they are, I have returned what I borrowed, elder."
"hmph" the elder snorted before taking the techniques.
"You may leave."
"Thank you, elder." Zarek bowed before leaving.
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Sometime later, Zarek found a quiet place to see if he could use those techniques. It was a forest behind the treasury hall where very few people were around. There was a small statue of the sect's founder which he had never seen before. But he ignored it and started practicing before it.
He took a stance and punched in the air precisely as it was described in one of the techniques 'Air Splitting Punch'. This technique is a general punching technique which increases the force behind the punch. But alas his body can't keep up with it. Even though his mind can follow it precisely, his body can't as it was very fragile and slow. This technique doesn't require any aura but aura can amplify the attack. So he decided to use his unique white aura to amplify the attack and he punched in the tree.
Aura color is related to emotions and personality of a person when he manifests his aura. Every person has a different aura color based on their environment when they manifested, the emotion that led it to or the personality of the person. Different aura has different traits. Some of the common aura colors are orange being more destructive than defensive, blue being more defensive than destructive and green being more supportive than defensive or destructive and similar colors. If a person is ill-tempered or was angry or in rage when he manifested his aura color would be around orange color. On the other hand, green manifests if the person is open-minded, kind, cheerful and blue manifests based on how happy or sad the person was. But unique auras are different because very few have a completely different color other than orange, blue or green. And it's because the above said emotions generally take over other emotions and personality easily.
"Ouch, ouch, ouch."
Just as white aura touched the tree it immediately dissipated because of being too unstable and his bare hand punched the tree. As a result his hand is now numb.
'Even the weakest technique doesn't work' Zarek sighed.
Still Zarek didn't give up and kept practicing the 3 techniques. While practicing he suddenly tripped over and fell really bad on the statue.
"It's not broken." Zarek sighed in relief. But the statue was quite off place. So he has to position it before anyone sees him.
Just as Zarek would stand up, a small cave suddenly appeared before him from the ground.
Seeing the secret passage his interest was piqued. He peeked and searched the cave before going inside to have a look. Just as he stepped inside the cave closed itself.
'What the hell?' Even though the cave suddenly closed itself there was no fear, much less any emotion on his face. He closely inspected the cave while carefully walking inside as there was no going back. The cave was really dark and dry with many spider webs as though even light didn't enter this cave for many years.
After walking for a while he came across several paths. He checked every path to see if there is any difference in airflow, light or sound. But it was all the same for every path. So he wasn't sure if he could get out of it if he went in any path. Not getting any answer even after searching for a while he leaned on the cave wall to think. Just as he leaned on the wall the wall flipped and Zarek fell inside another secret tunnel rolling for quite some time. After sometime he stumbled on a wall before standing up and cleaning off the dirt from his clothes.
After standing up he looked around himself. He was in a small dark room which seemed to be a place of collection or something because there were a lot of weapons and expensive looking stuff arranged and it looked like they were here for centuries as dirt was covering them entirely. He looked around for some time before seeing a doll more than twice the size of his palm, close to half a meter, placed on a pedestal in the middle of the room which piqued his interest. He walked forward and picked up the doll before blowing the air with his mouth, sweeping away the dust on the doll.
"Cough cough. What a unique doll it has almost every joint a human generally has. It feels like it was made imitating a human body." The doll seemed like a wooden doll. It didn't have any hair, eyes, nose or mouth but it's body was made exactly as a human body.
'It must have taken a lot of work to make this.' Zarek thought to himself before putting away the doll. He started walking to see the other thing.
Creakβ¦
Suddenly a sound came behind him. Zarek looked behind and saw the doll looking at him. He freaked out a little bit but still kept his cool. He started walking and then he heard another sound in his mind.
'Mind linked.'
'Voice registered.'
'Genesis Codex Puppet artifact activated.'
This time Zarek really freaked out. He stumbled on the wall behind him and again the wall flipped and he was in another room. Treasures were also there. But the room wasn't dark and gloomy. It was bright with lights and it was a large hall with treasure organized in shelfs. It was none other than their treasury hall and he was inside their treasury hall which was off limited for students.
"Who's there?" A middle aged man shouted.
"Greetings, Elder Dray." Even though he was in the treasury hall, He still bowed respectfully.
'He isβ¦.' Elder Dray thought and said "How did you get here?"
Seeing the elder not knowing about the secret room and the passage, He remained silent.
"Are you here to steal?" The elder asked.
"Noβ¦" Zarek replied.
"Then why are you here?"
Zarek remained silent again.
The elder frowned and checked if he had any treasures with him. After checking, He said "Get lost. If I see you here again you won't be spared like this time."
"It will never happen, elder." Zarek bowed and left.
"If it wasn't for that person protecting himβ¦.." The elder sighed.
Author's Note: Hello readers. This is my first novel so there might be many mistakes. Therefore do point out my mistakes. I will fix it immediately. Even though this novel is kinda like cultivation novels, I am not from china. I don't know their culture so there might be many flaws. But bear with me. And also the names are all randomly picked from name generator. I am not good at names. >_<