Chronicle of the Eternal: Volume 1 (22 page)

The biggest bonuses to his
stats come from a combination of his high level crafting skills and the martial
and alchemy skills which recently broke into the third tier and unlocked
passive Tier 3 Divine Arts that raise his base stats. A few of his crafting
skills not only increase his health, but increase his endurance which also adds
small amounts of extra health to his total maximum.

***************************************************

A bit over a month passes
as Regal’s cooking skill grows beyond level 20. The dishes in the cookbook
continually get more and more difficult, and many use four or five different
herbs on top of seven or eight ingredients. He has doubts that this cookbook is
just basic recipes, but he doesn’t raise his concerns to the chef who has been
teaching him and giving him helpful advice.

Even though the recipes
become larger and more complicated, with Sampson’s advice and his own
ingenuity, his speed and quantity is constantly increasing. He manages to
finish all the recipes in the book, and his skill reaches level 82. The taste
of the food is incomparable to before as well, much to his squad members’
delight during their most recent trip into Theore Substructure.

Just as Regal finishes
making ten of every recipe, Sampson proudly states, “That recipe book is a
secret of mine, it contains every basic technique of cooking hidden within the
recipes. You have now mastered it, and will be able to even make most
intermediate and a few advanced recipes without having to learn any new
techniques. Go home early today; you have the inter academy tournament starting
tomorrow, don’t you? Next weekend, I will have you help our chefs, maybe learn
how to serve the customers too.”

Full of excitement, Regal
rushes home at dusk and goes straight to bed. Excitement has taken control of
his mind however, and he has trouble sleeping.

Regal arrives at Bluemist
Academy early the next morning, dark rings around his eyes showing he had next
to no sleep at all the night before. He isn’t the only student who is sleep
deprived, one in every five students have dark rings around their eyes just
like Regal.

Even without getting
enough sleep, they can drink an elixir to wash away any detrimental effects.
The tournament organizers will hand one out to every student participating to
ensure it is a fair duel where both students are at their peak.

“Is everyone here?” Mr.
Razor gruffly calls out while counting all the students. He only asks just in
case he counted incorrectly and missed someone. “Good, you’re all here, we will
be leaving now. Stay together and follow the teachers. The tournament is held
in the colosseum on the fifth floor.”

Regal finds Veronica,
Kilde, Astore and Piora just as the mass of students begins to leave the academy
and heads toward the nearest city exit where the city lifts are.

“Are you okay? You don’t
seem to have slept well,” Veronica asks Regal while examining his eyes.

Piora snorts before
saying, “That’s because the brat was too excited, isn’t it?”

“Who are you calling a
brat?” Regal frowns and asks her grumpily.

Rather than retorting,
Piora just giggles and looks away. At this moment, the teachers start to leave
the academy, and the crowd of students around Regal begins moving as well.
Being in the middle of the students, Regal is swept up by the unexpected
momentum and is separated from Veronica and his other friends.

He quickly reaches his
hand out, and seeing his intention, so does Veronica. Grabbing each other’s
hand, Veronica pulls him through a couple of disgruntled students and back with
them.

After receiving Veronica’s
help, Regal continues to hold her hand. He is incredibly happy to be holding
her hand, yet at the same time extremely nervous. His nervousness causes
Regal’s hand to become rigid, unable to open so he couldn’t let go even if he
had wanted to.

Regal secretly steals a
glance at Veronica, searching for any reaction to holding his hand. Her
expression is the same as always, nonchalantly looking forward, occasionally
looking at the sights around her, but not paying attention to their
hand-holding.

Seeing her indifference,
most of Regal’s nervousness fades, his hand becoming less rigid and able to
move again, but seeing no reaction also causes Regals happiness to diminish a
bit as well. He awkwardly releases her hand and tries to pull away, but
Veronica firmly grasps it. She notices him trying to remove his hand of course,
and looks at him in confusion.

“You need to hold my hand
so we don’t get separated.”

Regal looks over and
notices that the others from their group have already disappeared, but doesn’t
understand how.

“There isn’t that many
people here... I don’t think we would get separated.”

“Piora said that we need
to hold hands to not get separated. Is she wrong?”

Regal is suddenly filled
with understanding, and silently thanks Piora. She most likely dragged Astore
and Kilde away too.

Slowly, Regal closes his
hand over Veronica’s and quietly says, “Umm, perhaps... it would be best then.”

The Bluemist Academy group
soon reaches one of the city gates, next to which the lifts are ascending and
descending to and from the upper floors. Regal’s academy is forced to wait
until the lift finally descends to the first floor. At the lift on the other
side of the city gate, another academy is also waiting for a lift to descend.

Regal wonders if the other
academy could be Aqua’s, as the uniform looks familiar, but can’t seem to spot
her no matter how hard he tries. Before he realizes it, the lift for his academy
has reached the ground and they start boarding it. Veronica pulls Regal’s hand
and drags him along so he doesn’t get left behind.

Dozens of hunters are
leaving the lift, prepared to leave the city and enter the wastelands, as Regal
steps onto it. He is curious when he sees them and their equipment. They wear
items such as leather or partial metal armor, to allow them to move around more
easily and avoid the attacks of mutant beasts. Not a single hunter is dressed
in full metal armor, but some mutant beast hides can be as strong as steel so
it is virtually the same.

They sling large rifles
over their shoulders, or holster revolvers and hand cannons while large combat
knives or full curved swords are prepared in case they run out of ammo, or
don’t have time to reload. Nearly all of them also have goggles equipped over
their headgear, propped up on their hats and ready to use to protect their eyes
from dust and the glaring sun, should it be behind the enemy.

Regal’s attention is torn
away from the hunters when the lift starts rising. Steam whistles from beneath
the platform as it shakily rises. Regal and Veronica are standing close to the
edge so they have a view of the city as their elevator rises.

The buildings that once
looked so tall are suddenly short. Regal gazes over the rooftops, picking up
the occasional pillar of smoke from a smithy. As the buildings get smaller, he
can eventually see all the way to the other side of the city, which almost
seems like the horizon of the outside world. The distance is so great that he
can barely make out any details.

He doesn’t get much of a
chance to stare at Grand City Theore’s first floor before the lift ascends into
the ceiling separating the first floor from the second. They emerge at the
second floor, which is very similar to the first. The only thing that differs
is the city layout.

The third and fourth
floors are much different from the first two. The buildings are much more
spaced out, and there are even vast plots of land. Off to two sides of the
floor, there are forests of trees that are grown only to be harvested for wood.

The fifth floor is a
little more industrial than the third and fourth, but it is still much more
spacious than the first and second. The smallest of houses are at least twice
the size as Regal’s with two or three floors, and they are all built on decent
plots of land too.

Regal follows amongst his the
Bluemist Academy students as they leave the shaft and enter the fifth floor. He
is breath-taken by the sights and constantly stares around with wide eyes. The
most impressive sight is their destination.

The fifth floor colosseum
is as tall as seven or eight houses stacked atop one another. Stone arches
adorn the upper edge of the structure while granite blocks and polished brass
accentuate the building with an awe-inspiring feeling of grandeur.

The teachers aren’t
surprised at the colosseum, as they have been here many times before. Every
weekend there are tournaments between hunters with various prizes for the
winning individuals. Nearly every hunter living in Grand Theore has paid the
entry fee to witness at least one tournament.

With the teachers leading
the way, Regal’s academy enters the tournament grounds along with several other
academies at the same time. The teachers group together and share a friendly
chat, but the students don’t talk to those of other academies.

Regal is looking around
lost when Miss Yatta silently appears behind him and with a, “Got you,” picks
him up and carries him off under her arm. She also mysteriously grabs Hazel from
nearby before leaving the group of students.

Regal gives Veronica a
helpless look as he is carried away, but she gives him a gentle smile and waves
goodbye. She understands that he has to go participate in the tournament, and
is confident that he will impress all the judges.

Veronica doesn’t fully
understand it, but when she’s seeing him off, she has a strange sense of
emptiness. She looks at herself curiously, trying to figure out what is wrong
with her body. She has never felt such a thing before, and doesn’t understand
it at all.

Miss Yatta quickly moves
toward a different location in the colosseum while carrying Regal and Hazel.
She arrives where Mr. Razor is waiting with the third participating student from
his class – Lawe.

The room is an armory,
containing weapons and armors of all kinds. It isn’t just the three
participants from Regal’s academy that are there either. Fifty or more students
are there with their teachers, choosing weapons and armor for the tournament.

“You’re here, that’s good
at least. Sorry for bothering you Miss Yatta, I don’t know where Mr. River
disappeared to.”

“Oh, I will find him after
this.” Miss Yatta gives the other teacher a devilish smile that causes a cold
shiver to run up Regal’s back.

“Well, we don’t have a
great deal of time, so I will leave that to you.” Mr. Razor lets out a helpless
sigh before turning to Regal and Hazel. “I have already explained this to Lawe,
but to give everyone a fair chance and prevent some students having the
advantage of better equipment, you are allowed to select three pieces of
equipment to borrow from here.”

“As a teacher of your Bluemist
Academy, my recommendation is to choose one weapon and two pieces of armor.
Make sure you select armor that doesn’t hinder or slow your movement too much.
There is nothing easier to hit than a slow moving target.”

All three students nod
their heads in understanding.

“There is another thing
you need to understand. There will be quite a few people who will approach you
after your introductions to invite you to their settlements or guilds. We won’t
tell you whether you should accept an offer or not, but you still have three
more years of studying and training. The most important figures won’t attend
until the graduation tournament in three years when you are at your peak.”

“Mr. Razor, I know about
guilds, but what do you mean by settlements?” Regal asks, confused at the term.

“A settlement is a town or
city in the wilderness outside the grand cities. Many people leave to live in
those places because taxes are lower, often even free. To live in Grand Theore,
you need to pay a gold coin a year just for the simplest houses, living here on
the fifth floor could be anywhere between ten and twenty gold a year. A lot of
people can’t afford it and move to an outer settlement.”

“There’s just one thing I
don’t understand. What happens if they die? Do they have Temples of Life in the
settlements, or does everyone have to travel back from their nearest grand
city?”

“Unless it is a new
settlement, they will have a rebirth ponds. There are two types of settlements.
The first is created when enough people live in an area and build it to a
certain point, where the world will give birth to a new Rebirth Pond and Pond
of Rest. The second are the locations and structures in the world which have
these already there. There is much more about this, but you will learn in class.
For now, go and choose equipment.”

Regal quickly leaves after
receiving the teacher’s guidance. Mr. Razor looks at Regal hurrying off and
silently thinks to himself,
‘There is much you don’t know just yet. Like how
desperate some lords of a settlement can be to get more people to live there.
The battles over territory and Rebirth Ponds. Even worse, the wars over those
castles, underground labyrinths, steel fortresses, and other locations where
the Rebirth Ponds already exist. They won’t pay a bronze coin toward activating
the inactive ponds, but they will coat their nails with poison as soon as
someone else does.’

Completely unaware of the
teacher’s thoughts, Regal first heads toward where the weapons are. There are
guns and close combat weapons of all kinds, but the majority have requirements
that are far too high for the students to be able to use, especially those with
alchemy engravings. Engraving a weapon inevitably raises the required level to
equip it, so Regal is forced to look at the lowest tier of weapons available.

At the end of one rack,
various small guns are haphazardly placed. A few dozen students from other academies
are also crowded around them, so Regal has to squeeze through them to reach
them.

He looks at a few
revolvers, but none of them are more than mediocre at best. He holds one for a
particularly longer time than the rest, and the students behind complain that
if he has found a weapon to move out of the way so they can keep looking.
Ignoring their words, Regal ends up placing the revolver back where he picked
it up from and continues searching.

Out of the corner of his
eye, Regal spots a gun slightly larger than a revolver behind another gun. It
is positioned in a spot that is easy to miss when looking past it. Intrigued,
Regal picks up and inspects the weapon.

Regal’s eyes widen in
surprise. The weapon isn’t just good, it’s beyond that. It is also of the rare
quality, two tiers above ordinary. The only downside to the weapon is that it
can only hold three bullets at a time.

Afraid that another
student will notice the gun and try to snatch it, Regal quickly tucks it into
his belt and leaves the area.

The second location he
goes to is where leather armor is stored. Leather is lighter and more flexible
than metal, allowing more mobility, so it is the best choice for Regal.

Regal eventually locates
two pieces of armor just as Mr. Razor recommended. The first is a deep-red
leather vest, while the other is a set of armguards that protect the backs of
his forearms, and can even be used similarly to how one would use a shield.

Regal returns to where the
teachers are waiting and finds Hazel and Lawe already there. He happens to
overhear Lawe speaking to Hazel as he gets closer.

“Why don’t we practice our
alchemy skills together sometime? Training together will be of a benefit to us
both.”

Hazel indifferently
ignores him and doesn’t respond, the same way she ignored Regal. The only
difference this time is that Lawe is more persistent, speaking in a prideful
way as though he is speaking to someone weaker than him.

“Hazel, your skills are
unmatched, but why don’t you let me help you get stronger? I’m sure you will
get to know me much better as well.”

Hazel apparently has
enough at this moment, glancing at him and coldly saying, “Go practice with
someone else. I have no interest in boys.”

She puts a strong emphasis
on the word “boys”, causing Lawe’s brows to twitch in irritation. Regal can
tell that he isn’t pleased, but Lawe only says, “So be it.”

Lawe is the type of
student who usually gives off a friendly demeanor, which coupled with his
charming looks, makes lots of students flock to him. He is one of the most
popular people in Bluemist Academy, and his strength is undeniably at or near
the top.

Hazel’s words are
surprising to Regal. It is true that he had only seen her actually associating
with the girls of the academy, but he didn’t know she had a dislike for boys.
He suddenly has a better idea as to why she ignored him previously.

Miss Yatta, who is
patiently waiting, excitedly appraises the gear that the students chose before
nodding her head in approval.

“You all managed to find
some good equipment. I’m sure you will make us all proud.”

Mr. Razor and Miss Yatta
lead Regal, Hazel and Lawe out of the armory and toward the tournament ground.
Regal stares at every little feature of the colosseum in fascination as he
passes it, from the wall candelabras to the innumerable banners of various
designs hanging from the tall ceiling.

Regal loses track of time,
and only comes back to his senses when he steps out into the arena of the
colosseum. The sudden change in the light level dazzles his eyes momentarily
before everything comes into focus.

The arena is an enormous
oval, covered in sand and dirt, with a few small craters still present from
past battles. Within the oval, four square stages have been prepared, each a
hundred feet wide and long. Each stage also has a set of tall seats for the
judges to sit upon to preside over the match. There are a hundred tables around
the outskirts of the arena, most already occupied by students of the various academies.

A wall to protect the
spectators from the combatants surrounds the arena, and beyond that are the
seats for the spectators. There are nearly eleven thousand people in the stands
from all the academies, and another ten thousand spectators here to have a look
at the latest generation of students. Despite this, the seats are only thirty
percent full.

“Fellow Immortalis!” A
female announcer stands on one of the stages and shouts out. “Welcome to the
first tournament for the 53rd generation of Immortalis. We have twelve guest
judges to cover all four of the stages, please give them a warm welcome.”

The announcer introduces
the twelve judges, all experienced hunters, who walk up to stand beside her and
bow in different directions toward the stands. The announcer then explains the
rules of the tournament, even though everyone is already aware of them, before
continuing on to start the competition.

“All the participants,
please come up to the stage and take a tournament number. This is the number
that will be used to decide when and what stage you will appear on.”

In an orderly fashion that
seems to have been prepared long before the tournament, the participants leave
their table and ascend the stage to where the announcer stands next to a newly
emerged ballot box.

Regal is mixed in the
middle of the group, along with Hazel and Lawe. His turn arrives within a few
minutes, upon which he reaches his hand blindly into the box and pulls out a
small golden plate. Engraved on that plate is the number ‘125’ – his
participant number.

Soon everyone has chosen their
plate, and the ballot box vanishes back into the announcer’s inventory. The
judges then also leave the stage to claim their seats, comfortably settling in
and preparing for the matches. It is clear that the tournament will begin
immediately.