Ryckel watched how Hood moved shadows around, at times making them thick and tangible.
"My Greater Will," Hood said one evening, his voice oddly gentle as he practiced with his shadows against a tree. "Something that I worked long and hard diving inwards to find. Every Attuned has the opportunity to form their own unique greater will…Too bad you'll be a slave before you learn how to."
Ryckel thought back to how his Greater Will slot was empty.
Now that explains it…
"That sounds different from that...what was it again? Qistmu..." Vega slurred.
"Qistmutan." Hood corrected.
"Ah. Yes. That." Vega stretched his body.
"Please don't tell me that you've also..." The burly one, Brandy, nodded his head in disappointment.
"Hey. Don't blame me. I'm not an Attuned, so what good would it do from knowing all about their stuff?" Vega frowned.
"I'm also not Attuned, yet I know it. And for the use... I'll let you to figure that on your brain. Just pray you survive long enough till then." Brandy said.
Hood then sighed. "Vega..." Then paused. "It does sound different from Greater Will... Just think of them as the pillars of what the Attuned can do."
Wait... pillars?
"Pillars?" Vega looked confused, then widened his eyes. "Oh yeah. I remember now, Qist, Muter and Transor. Qistmutan."
Hood chuckled. "Yess. Qist is the flow and control of energy within an Attuned's body, allowing for making the body tougher and hit harder.
So what I was doing back then with Syrion... Must've been using Qist.
"Muter is making that same energy and putting it into objects... like a stone, which would allow it move faster and hit harder." Hood said.
Is that why the mud I threw at Syrion flew faster than it usually should have?
"And Transor is the changing the shape and very nature of an object. Like changing a piece of metal into a sword. As long as that metal is big enough for a sword." Hood continued.
Ah-hah! That was why the mud suddenly became hard!
Ryckel couldn't believe that even while still new to him being an Attuned, he had somehow used the core aspects of being one.
He now had new things to train in secret and focus on.
"Shadows… still don't believe that you aren't part of the Confessors. You're also from Nrigav to top it all off." Vega yawned.
Confessors? Never heard of them.
"Just because my Greater Will has to do with shadows doesn't mean that I'm with or was with them." Hood said.
"And every time it doesn't make sense. Aren't like people's lives different and special to that person…how can more than one person have similar Greater Wills? Keep up with your lies y'know." Vega countered.
"Oh look at you trying to be smart and all. Well said for someone coming from Carniem." One of the man, Brandy, chuckled.
Carniem… the greatest empire the continent had ever seen… Just for it to fall and for the Wistnan empire to take over…
Just like you guys will fall really soon…
Ryckel glared, trying his best not to make it obvious.
"Education is all a pile of dog water anyways… it was either that or survive on those Light Forsaken streets. Thanks to the Great Light, I even managed to escape that place…" Vega said with heavy eyes.
Shit for brains.
"Education is a pile of dog water?" Brandy chuckled. "And to think Carniem was once a great empire…"
"Oh shut up. So great and everything's shit." Vega frowned.
Most especially you.
"So is your brain." Brandy said with Vega scoffing. "Back to your so called 'argument.' Yeah, people's lives are unique and special…but no matter what, they're some people that their lives experiences can be similar to a point." Brandy said, looking high and mighty with himself.
Hmm… like two people being poor or both experiencing the death of someone…
"And I've been explaining that over and over now! It actually gives me a bad reputation. Makes people think that I'm with the Confessors, some…assassin."
Ahh… so they're a group of assassins I see. Makes sense why I haven't heard of them…
"Well it also doesn't help that you wear always wear a hood" Brandy tried to take a sip out of an already empty leather bag,
"Nothing wrong with taking in their practices if the Greater Wills are similar." Hood chuckled.
They later on resumed their travels. Checking maps with Brandy saying how the nearest town was somewhere called Lilliebore.
They hid in silver grass as they continued on, passing and then stealing a bit of produce from nearby dry fields. Seeing them reminded Ryckel of his mother, how she always busted her back tending to the dry fields.
I hope they're alive… they have to. What would I be without my family?
He looked at a lone tree off in the distance, it's trunk was like charcoal and the leaves like blood.
They were called the Savior trees. Ryckel had never seen one before in his life, only in books. Too bad this was the situation in which he's seeing them.
It would've been a bit better if Lyra was here. No. On second thought, he was glad she wasn't here.
This was his burden to carry alone.
The Stained Brothers saw other travelers, robbing them like the dry fields. They even weren't exactly travelers, more like nomads and it wasn't by choice, forced to be ones because of fear of the Culling.
All was fair game under the sun. Though they were some exceptions. If the Brothers ran into priests from the Church of the Great Light, Vega would disturb till they're left alone.
This annoyed Hood. It always did and probably always has.
The same could be said about Hood. They met a traveling caravan of performers and actors that were talking something about the Turhasi's Play.
Hood bowed to them, refusing to touch them.
Like wise, this annoyed Vega. It always did and probably always has.
"We're starving, Captain, and they've got food in those wagons!" The fat one grumbled.
"And so what? Humanity has already done enough to suffer Turhasi's wrath," Hood snapped. "We are Stained Brothers, not heretics. We fight the Amphictony, not the heavens."
Ryckel tucked that away.
Religious hypocrites. Hypocrites in general.
On the fourth day, they reached a jagged landscape of broken pillars and excavated pits.
This was a ruin site from a time long past that the Amphictony had partially cleared and broken down.
---The End of Chapter 8---