Unsealing Emptiness

Ozul again went into the tent, but this time he was practicing with his Ball of Purity. First, he created a small amount of it around the size of a fist.

Then he would just separate even smaller drops of it one at a time while also keeping his control over the previous ones. Unlike when he was attacking others, keeping them afloat and controlling each smaller drop at will was more challenging than expected.

This exercise was similar to the one that he was making Blaze practice. The only difference was that he did it in a more demanding way.

The drops that he would separate were around the size of the nail, and he would try to control each one independently from the others. For example, in a typical battle when he just turned the Ball of Purity into fine needles, Ozul only commanded them all to shoot towards one direction.

That level of control was already impressive, but Ozul wanted more. He wanted to have such precision that moving each needle in another direction at the same time wouldn’t be a problem to him.

However, that was easier said than done. Because even after trying for the whole day, the best he could achieve was being able to move three of the smaller balls in different directions.

.....

Adding the fourth one required him to slow down the speed and put more focus into it. Furthermore, the fifth ball would just mess up everything.

“Sigh. And I considered my control over it to be almost perfect.” Ozul muttered to himself in disappointment.

He could very well kill a rank-8 mage on a whim, but he can’t even move more than four such balls at the same time in different directions.

However, this was all reasonable. Ozul’s Ball of Purity is like an extension of himself-as a body part. And usually, a person wouldn’t be able to multitask and move each of his limbs in different directions to perform various tasks.

That was precisely why controlling every small drop of it was a challenge for him to move separately. Ozul was, fortunately, able to feel the improvement in his proficiency while he practiced. Only the rate at which he improved was negligible.

Despite the slow rate at which he improved, Ozul continued to practice until he concluded that it was enough and went back to sleep.

On the other hand, Raven checked up on the group to see if Clive was going to do the meeting again.

She came back to the tent when she noticed that everyone was busy with their own stuff. Clive was also in his own tent, which meant that there was no meeting for tonight as well.

Raven decided to meditate in hopes of a breakthrough to the next rank. Although she knew that it wouldn’t be so easy, she still had to keep trying.

The trio didn’t have to be on the guard duty since Clive never bothered to check on them. It gave them the time to train to their heart’s content.

Some of the people were really annoyed as the trio’s routine felt like they were only tagging along with the convoy and weren’t a part of the hired mercenaries. They could not complain to anyone, however, as they had noticed the behavior towards Ozul by Clive.

This had led to the mercenaries avoiding the trio even more. Nevertheless, the trio didn’t care about interacting with others anyway.

As Raven entered the tent to meditate, Blaze remained outside. After so much time in the jungle, he wasn’t as on edge as he was on the first day. It seemed that he was slowly adapting to his situation.

Blaze could still not focus on meditating, but his situation was improving. Since training the body as a Fighter did not require as much focus, he was able to practice in that.

While the trio were using this time of journey to train themselves, others were not as peaceful as them.

Clara sat on a chair in the wooden cabin with her hands crossed to her chest, looking sideways as she pouted.

Venessa stood in front of her with a troubled look on her face. It was just that Clara was throwing a tantrum that she wasn’t able to find an opportunity to meet with Ozul today either.

“It is your fault. I even saw him today, but you didn’t let me out of the carriage!” Clara took her anger out on Venessa.

“You don’t understand, Young miss. Sigh... Fine then. If Sir Hanry agrees, then you would be free to do whatever you want to.” Venessa gave up trying to persuade Clara when she noticed that the latter was not willing to listen.

Venessa had her orders, but she had also come to care about Clara genuinely, so she couldn’t force herself to deny her requests. Nevertheless, she was also sure that Hanry wouldn’t allow it either.

“Sir Hanry! Can you come in for a second?!” Without a care in the world, Clara hurriedly shouted right after Venessa had finished her words.

From outside, Hanry came in with his same old stoic face.

“You called, Young miss?” Hanry asked with a little bow.

“Yes, Venessa here said that if you agree, she will give me a bit of freedom. So...” Clara left her words unfinished as there was no need to before she looked expectantly at Hanry.

When Hanry heard her words, he looked at Venessa for confirmation to which the latter nodded her head with a sigh.

“I see. Then answer me this, Young miss. Is this about that black-haired young man?” Hanry asked with his face, not showing any emotions.

“Yes. I want to thank him properly for saving me.” Clara didn’t try to hide anything. She didn’t think there was anything wrong with thanking someone who saved your life.

“Then... unfortunately, I cannot agree with this,” Hanry said while shaking his head a little.

Venessa was relieved when Hanry did not agree with it. She was relieved because now it would be him that would have to take their young miss’s tantrum if she did not understand.

“But why?! It’s just meeting one person. What is the problem with that?!” Clara asked with frustration as she didn’t think that Hanry would so easily deny her request too.

Since she was a child, Hanry and Venessa had been with her. And there were only a few times when they would deny her requests, so she wanted to know what wrong was there in meeting her savior.

“Young miss, you don’t understand many things. That young man is not normal. He may very well be a dangerous person. Even now, we are not sure how strong he actually is.” Hanry calmly explained.

“But-” Clara wanted to rebuke, but Hanry didn’t let her and continued further;

“This man’s team was the only one to survive an attack from a monster which killed Duke Edwin and all the men under him. Now tell me, how is he normal? It was Emperor Luthien’s direct orders not to anger him since he could very well be also the person to kill Duke Edwin instead of the monster.”

When Clara heard that these were the direct orders from Emperor Luthien, she was stunned.

“But, how could Uncle- I mean his Majesty think about him like that? Didn’t he save me?” Clara questioned.

“Young miss, his intentions were not to save you. He just killed the assassin because he was implicated in that event. Moreover, don’t you remember how he did not even glance at you or how he was so nonchalant after killing someone in the Capital?” Hanry tried to make her understand some things.

*Sigh.*

“...I understand. However, if I get an opportunity, I will still meet him to give my gratitude. Even if he didn’t mean to, he was still the one who saved my life.” Clara, in the end, sighed and gave in after Hanry’s explanation.

Venessa smiled brightly as she thought, ‘Young miss has finally started to grow up.’ After that, she wiped an imaginary tear from her eyes.

Clara wasn’t so delusional to think that Ozul had protected her just for the sake of her despite when she didn’t want to believe it.

Moreover, these were the direct orders from his Majesty. So she couldn’t just go against them however she liked it.

‘But his orders are just not to get on his bad side. He never said that I could not meet him when I find an opportunity...’ Clara thought while smiling with a silly face.

Hanry and Venessa both shook their heads when they looked at Clara, dreaming with open eyes again.