48 Chapter 13 (1/2)
Sinking into the soft cushions of the couch back in the privacy of our apartment, I let out a tired sigh. It had been a long day, what with the resource distribution followed immediately by the award ceremony. Especially the conversation with the Duchess.
I looked back over my shoulder to where the girls were talking about something at the entrance. Trying to think up a way to bring up the topic in an appropriate manner was giving me a headache.
Deimos kicked off her shoes and ran to the washroom ignoring Phobos' indignant cries. Phobos huffed irately, adjusting both her and Deimos' shoes neatly before coming up to the couch and settling down beside me.
Placing her satchel beside her, she leaned against me. Urged by a sudden impulse, I wrapped my arm around her waist and dragged her into my lap.
After a surprised squeal, she gave me a smile, resting her ear against my chest while clutching my collar with a hand as she sat across my lap.
Hooking one of her slender legs through the handle of her satchel, she brought it within her reach and brought it into her lap. Opening it, she took out our rewards for our positions in the Tournament.
The first ten had been given medals carved out of crystals corresponding to their own elements. Deimos had obtained an Aeolian crystal while Phobos had been awarded an Umbral crystal. It was an extremely practical gift as even though the crystals couldn't become a direct boost to their powers due to Vita's divine power running through their veins, they could be exchanged for a substantial amount of resources suited to them with the clan.
The crystals could be used to seed two new mines of wind and shadow stones. The crystals just had to be placed in some area that was rich in the corresponding strain of mana and they would cause the mana flow in that area to centralize on them, further enriching the density of that particular elemental mana, causing ordinary stones to evolve into elemental stones by absorbing the mana.
I planned to obtain the materials required for Deimos' Specialization in exchange for the two crystals.
When a mage advanced to Tier 2, they had the option to Specialize. There were two directions they could choose to go: power or control. As the terms suggested, a Wind mage Specialized in power would be able to create much stronger gusts for the same amount of mana expended while one that Specialized in control, would be able to thread a needle with their masterfully manipulated streams of wind.
Of course, there were Generalists that kept their abilities balanced which allowed for more versatility, letting them skip the prohibitively priced procedure required for Specialization. But, you would never see them become anything more than mediocre within their peers.
Actually, the choice to Specialize or not was heavily determined by the element one possessed. For example, in the case of shadow mages, Specialization in control meant that one could Shadow Walk extremely accurately, within millimetres of their desired goal, yet, the improved accuracy came at the cost of the distance they could travel for a given amount of mana.
If, on the other hand, a Shadow mage Specialized in power, they would be pass in and out of shadows much further from them, but, their movement would become erratic. As, both were really bad handicaps to have for assassins, most shadow mages were Generalists.
Fire mages on the other hand felt ashamed to call themselves true moving artilleries unless they had Specialized in power.
Deimos, obviously was going to Specialize in control to emphasize her speed even further. Like me, she too practised the Thunderclap Samsara Palms, but, her version was more focused on agility and hit-and-run tactics to harass the enemy into making a mistake so a finisher could be delivered.
I felt bad for Phobos for having to give up her reward, though she herself probably didn't care. I looked down and saw that she had unwrapped my reward, a trophy made out of Mithril.
As the best mana conductor known to man and possessing extreme toughness, they were the first choice for spiritual weapons. The trophy had enough material for a pair of daggers, or to create the edge of a long-sword.
I set firm resolve to look up the best blacksmith in the capital and have him or her re-forge her fans with the metal before we returned to the Felidae Estates. Since she had already formed her contract, I could lock the weapon to her mana frequency with my contract magic, making it useless to anyone who stole it unless they forged it again.
This was another way in which Tamers could earn their living, 'marrying' weapons to their owners.
My thoughts drifted to the rest of the rewards handed out. The ones ranked between ten and twenty had been given a Mithril trophy similar to mine. Those ranked between twenty and thirty had obtained a trophy made of Orichalcum.
Opposite in properties to Mithril, Orichalcum was the best mana insulator known to man and combined with its extreme toughness, it made for the best defensive equipment. Although, the lack of mana permeability meant that it couldn't be locked to the owner.
Ranks thirty to forty had been awarded Adamantium trophies. The material possessing the same toughness of Mithril or Orichalcum without the mana-based properties of the two.
Forty to fifty had Sky Iron trophies. Contrary to its name, the metal was anything but light, in fact, Bruno's hammer-head had a Sky Iron core. The jet-black material which was obtained from meteorites was extremely dense and even a tiny piece could weigh kilograms.
Beyond the top fifty finalists, the top five-hundred had also received trophies made of platinum, gold, silver, copper and quartz based on their ranks.
Deimos walked into the living room from the washroom, wrapped in a towel while she dried her hair with another one. Despite the washroom being large enough to fit all three of us, we generally bathed separately, she was probably arguing with Phobos on who got to have the first turn.
She flopped down onto the settee opposite to us, which in her current state of undress ended up revealing large swathes of 'scenery'. From her mischievous grin, that might have been entirely intentional.
When Phobos made to get off my lap, I sighed and pulled her back by my arm around her waist. I had been trying to procrastinate by letting my mind wander off on tangents but the time set by the Duchess neared and I couldn't delay the conversation anymore.