No, only Kiara is there

As we enter the hallway that leads to the library’s main entrance, we see Gerald. He is further in the hall, past the library door, and he is walking away from us. It looks like he tried to meet Kathleen again. I hope she took my warning serious and wasn’t there.

Upon entering the library, I quickly head up to the reading rooms. The first one I check is empty, the other has Kiara in there. Thank the goddess, Kathleen wasn’t here.

“Hey there.” Kiara greets us. “Come to study more?”

“Oh, hey Kiara.” Shalia replies. “Yeah, I was hoping to learn nature magic today.”

“Have you already mastered water, earth and light?” Kiara replies.

“I already knew earth. Water is going well. Haven’t learned too much light magic yet.”

“You’re better off studying light magic first.” Kiara informs Shalia. “It’ll make studying nature magic easier.”

Kiara then hands a book to Shalia, saying one of her current trainees was studying light magic with her earlier today. She also points me at the seat where her rune master trainee was sitting. The book from last evening was there, as well as a pen and a bunch of sheets of paper with runes drawn on them.

That’s right. To be a good rune master, you would need to learn how to write them. I may as well start writing them myself.

I start by finding myself an interesting rune. Illuminate seems like a safe enough spell whose rune I can learn. If I activate it by accident, then the worst which will happen is this room getting illuminated. At first, I write the rune over and over again, so that I would write it correctly and not mess it up. Then I put my finger on it and try to funnel magic into it to charge the rune. No luck. I try the same with all the others I write, but that too doesn’t work.

“No luck?” Kiara asks when she sees me failing.

“Yeah.” I say as in pull out my adventurer card. No change.

“How did you feel when you got your previous skills?” Kiara suggests.

I think back to where I learned water magic. Back then it was frustration. Then in my duel against Leona … was I ****? No, frustration again.

“Looks like frustration is the unifying theme.” I inform her. “You’re suggesting I need to frustrate myself?

“I would much prefer you do it without frustration.” Kiara replies. “But if frustration is what does it for you …” Then she shrugs and returns to Shalia.

I go back to writing the Illumination rune over and over again. Then I once more try to charge it. After a whole hour of focusing on this one rune, but it still isn’t working. Come on. Clearly I am frustrated like the previous times. How come frustration worked back then and not now?

“I feel I know enough about light magic now.” Shalia announces.

She then turns to Ryul, who is resting his head on the table and is fast asleep.

“Ryul, will you help me?” Shalia asks, but Ryul doesn’t respond. She starts shaking him and again calls his name, “Ryuuul.”

Ryul finally wakes up and looks around all confused.

“I need to find a book on nature magic. Will you help me?” Shalia asks.

“Uh, sure. Yeah.” Ryul says, and they both leave the reading room.

After they have left, Kiara sits down on a chair next to me and asks, “Darx. I’ve been thinking. There’s more to your desire to learn rune mastery than just having a good skill, right? You said it was one of your father’s skills. Are you trying to become more like him?”

I was taken aback by Kiara’s blunt question. To ask me something like that so directly. But there is something to her question.

“My father died around the same time I was born.” I tell Kiara. “How can I try to be more like him when I don’t even know him?”

“Your mother could have told you about him.” Kiara replies.

“She didn’t.” I answer. “It was difficult for her to talk about him. Even now she still misses him. I had to meet Aelbrecht before I knew what kind of skills he had.”

“I see. So, it is more like trying to discover what kind of person he was?”

“And in the process, try to also discover more about myself.” I tell Kiara. “After all, half of me comes from my mother, the other half comes from my father.”

Kiara allows for a short but calming silence. Then she says, “Let’s see if I can help you become a rune master.”

Kiara takes a sheet of paper and writes a rune on it. Next to it, she writes the spell that the rune relates to. Underneath she does the same for a 2nd rune, then a 3rd all the way up until there are 10 runes on this one sheet. Then she hands me a 2nd sheet of paper and tells me to write the runes while at the same time speaking the corresponding spell name. I write them down from top to bottom and speak each of their spells. Then again, and again, until I’ve done it 6 times. By then I start to memorize to order in which the spells come. So, I grab a 2nd sheet of paper and starts writing them from bottom to top. Then I mix up the order in which I write them.

Once I feel I’ve memorized which spell belongs with which rune, Kiara hands me a blank sheet and takes from me the sheets I’ve written on. Then she tells me the name of a spell and I am supposed to write down the rune.

In an attempt to throw me off, the 5th spell she says is the same as the 2nd. But I was on to her and didn’t fall for it.

When Kiara is done testing me, she asks me to take a look at my adventurer card. To my joy, [Rune Master] has been added to it.

“Well? Try charging one of the runes.” Kiara suggests.

I place my finger on the rune for the illumination spell and send my magic into it. As I charge the rune, the ink starts to light up. After the rune has been charged, I place my finger on it again and choose to cast it this time. The glow from the rune transfers into my hand, then I direct it to the ceiling and cast the spell. When the spell activates, the room grows more illuminated. So much even that when I look back at Kiara her face is a bit less hidden in shadows. The shadows coming from her hood now hide only her eyes and the bridge of her nose. I finally see what the tip of Kiara’s nose looks like. She has a cute nose.

That is when Shalia and Ryul come back.

“Sorry, it took us quite a while to find the book. It was really well hidden.” Shalia says. “Oh, hey. It’s so bright in here.”

"I've got a new skill." I happily announce to my friends. "I've got [Rune Master] now."

Ryul and Shalia are quick to congratulate me. Kiara lets us enjoy the moment, then she asks me how I am going to use runes in combat. She makes a good point there. I can't exactly write them in the middle of combat. It'll take too long to charge and cast. I need to find a way to prepare them ahead of battle. Draw them on my body ahead of combat? No, the ink could come off and then they are useless. The best thing I can come up with is write them on a sheet of paper and then keep it on me as a scroll.

At any rate, now that I have the ability of using runes, I can start searching for ones that are useful in combat. I think I’ll focus on those runes that will help me defeat Dante.