Chapter 125 - Back To Training

Chapter 125: 125 - Back To Training

Several days had passed since Adrien returned to Greymoor, and for once the mess the Bloodfang Wolves left behind was being cleaned up instead of breeding new problems.

The merchants attacked along Clairmont roads had already been contacted, stolen goods that could still be identified were returned, and food or cargo beyond recovery was paid back in Crowns out of Marcus’s hidden stash.

Word of it spread quickly through both the old Clairmont lands and the former Arquenay territory.

Merchants who had started avoiding the roads were using them again, since the attacks had stopped, the men responsible had been dealt with, and House Clairmont had answered in person.

Greymoor itself had begun changing with that new stability. Evelyne finally started delegating work that once ate nearly every hour of her day, hiring clerks and administrators to handle deliveries, inventories and the constant traffic of documents between towns.

Important reports still crossed her desk, though she no longer chased every minor detail herself.

Ariane had picked up some of that work from their mother as well, even if lately she spent far more time on magic, studying Frost and trying to add new spells to what she already knew.

The Bloodfang Wolves had changed just as much. They no longer operated as an independent company and had been folded into House Clairmont’s military forces, though Garrick took care not to wreck the structure that made them worth having.

They had spent years fighting beside one another, so rather than scattering them through existing units, Garrick rebuilt the former mercenaries into several squads around men who already knew how to work together.

Kael remained one of the most important figures among them, but every squad answered to Clairmont in the end.

For the first time in a long while, things moved in the right direction without something collapsing afterward.

House Clairmont was still nowhere near what it had been under Alaric, though Adrien did not need it to recover its old size overnight. What they had now was enough to live, rebuild and grow without wondering every morning whether it would all vanish by evening.

Adrien turned that over while sitting on a large stone at the edge of the training ground behind Greymoor. The place barely resembled the clearing he had used when he first started training there.

Workers had levelled several sections of ground, reinforced the outer area and installed proper training dummies at different distances. Wooden targets, stone blocks and reinforced posts stood among them so he could test spells without flattening half the surrounding forest.

He had asked for the changes after returning from the Bloodfang matter, since if he meant to spend hours out here almost every day, there was no reason to keep pretending an empty clearing was enough.

Adrien rested another minute before raising one hand. Mana gathered around him and the Nightveil Cloak manifested almost instantly, dark fabric falling over his shoulders and down his back.

[Item: Nightveil Cloak]

[Rank: B]

[1. Reduces the user’s presence in darkness and low light.]

[2. Slightly increases movement speed while active.]

He had read the effects several times already, though this was his first chance to test the second one. Adrien stood, pushed mana into the Item and felt the effect take hold.

His body did not turn weightless, nor did the cloak rebuild his movement entirely. Every push against the ground simply came out more efficient, letting him accelerate faster and hold speed with less effort.

Adrien crossed the training ground at a run, turned near one of the stone markers and came back. The difference was obvious enough that he needed no second attempt to confirm it.

Against his usual running speed, the cloak probably added close to another ten kilometres per hour while fed with mana. Not enough to make him a speed specialist, yet in a fight that margin could easily decide whether an attack landed or missed.

He slowed to a walk and pulled the cloak straight over one shoulder. ’So it’s designed to hide the wearer and help them escape once they’re discovered.’ The two effects supported each other almost perfectly, and the Item’s original purpose came clear the moment he lined them up.

There were other advantages too. The mana cost hardly mattered to him, since maintaining a B-rank Item barely registered against the reserves of Bottomless Core, and the manifestation speed was excellent.

Nightveil Cloak appeared in nearly the same time as Umbral Root, which meant Adrien could call it out whenever he needed it. Next to the ten seconds required to fully manifest the SSS-rank Lightning Manual, the gap was enormous.

Adrien dismissed the cloak and watched it break apart into mana. It would not reshape his fighting style on its own, though it was useful enough that he intended to keep it ready whenever he travelled or walked into dangerous ground.

His attention moved to the new training dummies, because there was another reason he had come out here today and it had nothing to do with the cloak.

Fireball and Flamethrower were still sitting at Novice 0%. He had learned both by watching Kael fight Marcus, and learning a spell through Absolute Comprehension was a long way from being proficient with it.

Adrien wanted to start fixing that. As he rose, another thought crossed him: Evelyne used Pyro magic herself, which meant his mother might know spells, training methods or small details about Flame he had never considered. ’I should ask her about it later. She’s been using this Affinity far longer than I have.’

Not today, though. Today he wanted to see what the two spells did in his own hands first and learn their limits before asking anyone else how they ought to be used.

Mana gathered around his palm and Umbral Root manifested into his grasp with the ease of something he had summoned hundreds of times.

Adrien barely thought about the process anymore, since the staff had grown so natural to hold that casting without it now felt stranger than casting with it.

He glanced down at the dark wood. ’I wonder what it’ll be like after Sylvamir.’ The Ancient Tree material was still waiting, and Vael had sounded confident that the right craftsman could push the staff to at least S rank.

Adrien wanted to see that result, though Sylvamir could wait. He turned toward the nearest training dummy, raised Umbral Root and began shaping Pyro mana for his first cast.