Chapter 8: Oaths
Mikhail stood in the castle central grounds with the man–who was named Burnip–in front of him.
The area had been cleared for their fight with all of them waiting at the edge, full of suspense.
Normally, fights were common whether just spars or actual fights.
Nobody really cared, all of them were barbarians.
But this time was different. Because it was Mikhail.
Mikhail who had accepted a fight willingly into Avalon’s trap.
Everyone knew how much Avalon hated Mikhail, it was knowledge as common as knowing he was Vlahovic’s favorite boy.
But not in their wildest thoughts had they predicted this future.
Even his own squadron were staring at him with surprise, trying to figure the reason behind his decision.
They wouldn’t though.
Mikhail started at Burnip and the ordinary longsword on his hand.
For fairness, he himself had been handed two ordinary handguns.
He wouldn’t be needing them though.
He had enough of using his weapon these days. Now it was time to test up his magic.
As he was thinking though, suddenly a holographic screen opened in front of him.
—————〔Essentia〕—————
• [Otharis]
﹂ ꝏ
• [Aqualis]
﹂ Herald
• [Cindralis]
﹂ Monarch
• [Norvalis]
﹂ Monarch
——————————————
’Oh nice.’
The screen was nice but the information inside wasn’t anything new to him.
In this world, selective people were blessed with magic as well, their name being Maguses.
Or Magus for a singular user.
Magical energy, or mana for easy term usage, was present all around them, even in the body of maguses.
But this mana when broken down had natural elements to it, resulting in six partitions.
The 6 elements. Cindralis (Fire), Aqualis (Water), Borealis (Air), Gaialis (Earth), Norvalis (Darkness), Divalis (Light).
The more elements you were blessed with at your birth, the more talented you were.
The rarest possibility was having 3 elements and yet Mikhail was one of those people.
As for why he wasn’t a talent in the Empire, he didn’t know and he didn’t care.
For the names written below the elements, they were his [Limiters].
A Magus had 5 ranks they could try to reach in their life, with each rank getting progressively harder.
Magus, Warden, Herald, Monarch and Archon.
Your [Limiter] for an element was basically the level at which you could use spells for your element.
A Cindralis-Magus with a Herald Limiter could never use a Monarch Cindralis spell without serious consequences.
It was hard for them to even rank themselves past their element’s limiter anyway.
It was a complicated case if you were a multi-essentia magus though.
Unfortunately, Mikhail had no time to get into the complexities right now.
Focusing in front of him, he prepared himself for the fight.
Reaching out in his pocket, he took out 2 bullets, loading each in his guns.
Burnip’s expression turned visibly frustrated, thinking he was not taking him seriously.
But Mikhail was quick to clarify.
"I’m just saving my bullets, they are harder to get here on the hold."
It was true.
It was also why Mikhail planned to finish this guy off with just 2 of his spells.
Getting to their positions, Mikhail saw the battle begin.
An announcer wasn’t needed on the battles here.
Shouts went off from behind Burnip, cheering him on.
"Attack this pussy!"
"He ain’t even a slash’s work!"
It only seemed to work in Mikhail’s favor though.
He saw the man’s confidence increase as they circled each other, prompting him to dive in for a slash.
Mikhail, however, knew it was faint to force him to attack.
Even that blockhead was smart enough to know he had no chance with Mikhail in close range.
Those guns would blow a hole in his arms or legs.
Which was why...
SLASH!
A clean whip cut through the air as Burnip’s sword slashed.
It was all too simple for Mikhail as he stepped outside to dodge it.
But he knew it wasn’t over yet.
"Borealis Ballium," Burnip pushed his palm from underneath, straight at Mikhail.
The latter remained calm, his eyes tracing all of Burnip’s movements.
In a moment, Mikhail’s arms were crossed, defending himself from the sharp push of wind in the next second.
It tore into his arm sleeves a little but again, he was harmless.
Instead, Mikhail saw Burnip take more advantage of the push by putting more distance between them.
The latter was trying to force Mikhail into using his only two bullets in a moment of hurry.
With his element of wind though, the pipsqueak would be able to dodge them quickly enough.
Once missed, Mikhail had no weapon to defend himself with.
Unfortunately for Burnip, the blue-eyed boy had already tested what he wanted to see.
’I overestimated. This guy is weak.’
If all of them in the camp were like him, then it was no wonder a lot of them died back then.
In a sense, he didn’t even blame the deaths. These slackheads needed a lesson of where they were.
But for now, he needed to give a lesson to one in front of him first.
For the first time since the battle started, Mikhail’s hand went to his guns
In this world, there were 6 elements.
But there was a 7th element too.
Click. Click.
Mikhail loaded both his guns, his eyes locked on Burnip.
The latter was now standing at the edge of the area, waiting for his chance to dodge and hide among people.
He knew now not to make any moves.
It was all for when Mikhail would shoot. And in his mind, miss from such a distance.
And that 7th element was...
The element of Oaths, Otharis.
However, there was another special quality about this element.
Mikhail raised his guns, taking aim at Burnip.
It was that this element was only exclusive to Mikhail in this world.
Only him and no one else.
"In the name of God of Oaths, I will hereby not move from my position throughout the whole battle," He whispered.
Mikhail felt it, the same feeling from his past life in his chest. The feeling of similarity. The feeling of chains binding him inside.
"As a compensation for the said condition, the shooting range for my guns in both magical and non-magical spells will be doubled."
He felt it. The chains binding closer and closer. Only one step was left now.
Looking at Burnip’s expression, Mikhail was once again reminded of something from his past life.
A thing that people often failed to realize while facing him.
And it was that out of all the elements he possessed...
"This oath has been signed under the name of God of Oaths and I, the Oathkeeper, shall abide by it," he whispered.
His element of Oaths was the strongest one.
Boom! Boom!