Book 1, Chapter 16

Hierophant Arthur Hawking brought Immanuel Maier to another room for the duel. The room was the same size as The Hall of Answered Prayers, but was almost devoid of anything—the only things in this massive room were a weapons rack that was as long as the longer walls of the room, and a painting above it, which spanned the length of the entire wall and went high up the ceiling.

The painting had two parts. The first half depicted the unjust war of King Hendrik II against the ancient tribes that used to live where the present territories of Ashenfort, Ironthorne, and Greystone are located. The second half of the massive painting depicted King Hendrik II's execution by beheading, a massive crowd of Varelith people from ages past cheering on the executioner.

"A two-hundred-year-old Lawrence Herstadt," Hierophant Hawking said, referring to the painter by full name. His voice echoed through his helm, amplified by magic. The cleric wore a full set of shining silver armor that matched his helm. White cloth pieces with variations of his lily symbol embroidered on them served as his identification. He was equipped with a mace and a shield.

The cleric let go of his weapon, letting it hang by the wrist strap, and flashed five fingers Immanuel's way. "The number of sigils I bear is more than the number of fingers on this hand. But for this test, I will be using none of them."

"I only have one but, like you, I won't be using it." Immanuel drew his greatsword with one hand while the other held its scabbard. What he said elicited a chuckle from the high ranking cleric.

"You seem to be missing the point of this duel." Hierophant Hawking flicked his wrist upward and caught the grip of his mace. "The point is for you to demonstrate how you regard your sigil."

"Are all my military accomplishments not enough for you yet?" Immanuel finally asked out loud.

"They faked their report on your last mission. Who's to say that they have not faked anything else?"

Good point, no matter how much I speak about my feats.

With one hand, Immanuel swung his sword to one side. He dropped his scabbard with the other as he moved to get something else hidden under the cloak. He was warming up. "I will answer your implied question with old wisdom—like this sword, my sigil is just a tool."

Then he moved his other hand forward and showed four yellow-striped matchstick grenades to the Hierophant—each one pressed between two fingers and already hissing as they were already lit up.

"The real weapon is the thing between my ears!" Immanuel tossed the four smoke grenades forward.

The Hierophant just stood still. "Fool. Do you not see how armored I am?" The grenades bounced and landed in front of him.

Then they popped and began to emit thick gray smoke. "I see. So what's your plan?"

"Improvise!" Immanuel dashed and launched himself to the cleric, kick first. Out of instinct, Hierophant Hawking raised his shield to block it. But there was so much power behind the kick that it slammed the shield onto the wielder's chest and head. The force of the kick also pushed the Hierophant backwards.

Immanuel landed, and with the cleric's vision still blocked by the shield, the former moved to one side and struck the cleric's back with a spinning kick. The force pushed the cleric forward, but he resisted and spun, a massive force backing his mace.

The attack would have caved Immanuel's skull had he not flipped away in time.

The smoke was growing thicker around the cleric, but it was not enough to obscure his vision. He assumed a defensive stance. He could stay there until the smoke dissipates and he would have the upper hand the entire time.

To prove his point, Immanuel tossed a handful of throwing daggers at the Hierophant, who, rather than raise his shield, just let the knives bounce off his body.

"And what was that about?" Hierophant Hawking cocked his head to one side.

See?

Even while the high ranking cleric still had his head cocked to one side in reaction to Immanuel's pathetic attack, the latter tossed another handful of throwing daggers at the cleric. As with the previous batch, they bounced off his armor.

"Do you really think that would work against me?" But that was not what Immanuel tried to find out with his last attack.

A shadow moved with each throwing dagger. Now that's an idea to explore. He thought, remembering a few things—how he "sunk" to the ground the first time he used the sigil, how much his body changed each time he used the sigil, and a passage he read from the book On Sigils.

Sigil effects may be applied to objects at the cost of additional mana per heartbeat. It is up to the user how to make this happen.

The thick smoke spread further, almost obscuring the cleric's head. Patches of black moved with the gray smoke as it spread throughout the Hierophant's attack range.

And there's another idea to explore.

"My turn now." Hierophant Hawking raised his shield and mace. Then he dashed towards Immanuel, who responded by tossing another handful of smoke grenades and flipping away from the cleric's downward swing of his mace, causing the weapon to crash and crater the tiled floor.

Immanuel skidded to a distant stop. The smoke grenades popped and began to emit smoke. The cleric pulled his weapon from the spot where it crashed and readied himself for another attack.

Just as he was ready to rush to attack, Immanuel was no longer in front of him. From the cleric's peripheral vision, he saw Immanuel, launching himself at him again with a kick. But instead of just raising a shield, Hierophant Hawking also readied to counterattack with his mace.

The Hierophant blocked the kick with his shield, and he was pushed back by the impact. Immanuel was able to bounce off the shield just in time, dodging the swing of the cleric's mace.

Mid-flip, Immanuel tossed a handful of throwing daggers at the cleric. Then, with the same hand he used to toss the daggers, he felt his chest, intending to activate the sigil. The daggers bounced off against the cleric's shield and chest. Immanuel had already assumed the form of a shadow when he rushed towards the shadow of a throwing dagger, intending to become one with it.

Immanuel felt like he was putting on new gauntlets with the maneuver. The dagger's shadow stretched.

The Hierophant slammed his mace down the shadow form of Immanuel, but all the attack did was crater the floor again.

A tendril extended and gripped the dagger whose shadow he melded with. Then Immanuel extended more tendrils towards the thick of the smoke and the other daggers he had thrown, fashioning himself in no time into a black tree whose fruits are daggers and darkness.

Making my shadow form smaller and melding with a naturally occurring shadow strains my mana resource, owing to shadows being considered objects, perhaps. But in exchange, I get to reshape my shadow form in many different ways.

Hierophant Hawking struck a tendril with his mace, causing it to lose its grip on the dagger it held, thus dropping it.

I see. Attacks hit any extensions of my shadow form.

In retaliation, Immanuel melded part of his shadow form with the Hierophant's shadow. More tendrils shot out, and they crawled along the cleric's body, enveloping it from the ground up like they were vines rising up a wall. An additional number of tendrils also shot out from the smoke and wrapped different parts of Hierophant Hawking's body, restraining him completely soon enough.

And now to complete my art piece.

Immanuel tossed a throwing dagger to another tendril, one behind the Hierophant. Then Immanuel had the tendril reach around and stab into an eye slit, the dagger just thrust deep enough that it was a credible threat to the cleric’s eye.

"Yield?" Immanuel asked, his voice sounding otherworldly in his present form. “I could do more with this form, I tell you.”

The Hierophant chuckled. "I'm impressed."

"I ask again, do you yi—"

The tendrils were pulled towards the direction of the Hierophant's head at sharp speeds. The resulting dark mass then shaped itself into Immanuel. His legs were on the cleric's shoulders, and the dagger that he snuck into one of the Hierophant’s eye slits was on a raised hand. The weapon seemed ready to be thrust down the Hierophant. As for Immanuel’s greatsword, it clanged somewhere nearby as it was cast aside.

In a high-stakes situation, the dagger would have found itself into gaps between armor pieces and exposed flesh, and then would have drawn buckets of blood in no time. In a real fight with Immanuel, anyone foolish enough not to use spells, magic items, and sigils would have fallen down hard without a struggle—Immanuel would have likely killed them standing.

But with this situation being a mere test of skill, Immanuel being perched on the cleric's shoulder caused the latter to struggle with balance, and in no time, both men crashed to the floor.

There was no hint that the impact hurt the cleric in any way at all.

"Maier?" the cleric asked, his voice calm.

"Yes, Your Beatitude?" groaned Immanuel, his back arched in pain.

"Stay here a while. I shall teach you the fastest way to boost your mana capacity."

Immanuel grinned through back pain.

—

The following day, after spending the remaining time of the previous day resting, Immanuel had recovered from body pain, and his mana–his second soul–had reawakened.

From the unused bedroom that the Hierophant decided would be Immanuel’s room while he stayed at the Cathedral, he proceeded to the Hierophant’s circular chamber by way of The Hall of Answered Prayers.

The cleric was seated at the table, going through the sigil scrolls that Immanuel had chosen. At this point, they no longer had a tendency to roll—they had straightened, which made it easier for the cleric to study them.

“Ahh, here you are. Come, follow me.” Hierophant Hawking rose, leaving the scrolls on the table. In no time, a cleric phased into the chamber and removed the sigil scrolls from the table.

The Hierophant pulled the book that opened the door to the secret room. Both men entered into the empty space, and their conversation began.

“Before anything else,” the Hierophant began, his body leaning forward. “Promise me this secret stays between us.”

“I’m sorry?” Immanuel’s eyes widened.

“This lightning fast method of raising one’s mana capacity was something I discovered myself soon after the ceremony that elevated me to Hierophant.”

“I’m listening.” Immanuel leaned forward.

“Just a disclaimer, however, that I have yet to see this method work on someone else. But I discovered that this works on me, all by sheer accident.” Hierophant Hawking rose up from the floor.

Then, once he was at a wide enough space, he raised and stretched his arms up.

And bent down to the floor.

This was followed by a handstand. Alright…

After a short while, he lifted his left hand off the ground, balancing only with his right hand.

Then he pushed down and bounced off the floor. And when he came back down the floor, he landed on his little finger—it carried the weight of his entire body.

“No… fucking… way…” Immanuel could not help but hiss.

And then the cleric’s little finger emitted a golden glow.