Chapter 5 - The Grandmaster of Sarthas

Story by Ceberune on SoFurry

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#16 of The Grandmaster of Sarthas


After an hour of questions and answers by the ever-curious Usagi, Bianca was finally coming to the end of the list of curiosities about the young female Kitsune. Nadia however, was quickly filling with questions to fire back at the bunny and once Bianca signaled her completion she started with a question of her own. "Of all the training of protocol and diplomacy we received at the pleasure schools, Grand Master was not a title covered there. What does it represent?" She asked, curiosity glittering in here eyes as she painfully met the gaze of the Usagi princess as per her orders from her new master.

Bianca smiled brightly; glad to finally take over her much-favored role of teacher instead of recorder. "A very good question from one who thinks that she is below all others around her." She said, flipping through a few pages in her book. "The answer is neither simple, nor short. I'll need a moment to prepare it as such subjects are often prepared days before their presentation within the hallowed halls of teaching within the Usagi schools of knowledge." She said, flipping through a few more pages. After reading a couple of lines she smiled, turning the book in her hands and setting it before the fox whom looked at the page confused.

"But Bianca..." she said with some embarrassment. "I was not trained to read..." she did not get a chance to finish her sentence as the bunny touched the pages with a word of magic. The words themselves began to swirl and form images as the rabbit began a lecture on the subject at hand.

"To best answer the question posed, we must go back to our recorded arrival here on this world. Sarthas is the 5th planet from an M class star in the Tharsian planetary system. With three moons in orbit and having roughly 93 million miles between our star, and us this planet was capable, and did support simple forms of life. Our kind arrived on this world some ten thousand years ago, intent on making a self-sufficient colony on this world to separate us from a constantly warring empire. 500 years from our arrival we cut off contact with the empire, which we originated from and have lived on our own since. 500 years after our independence, we came under attack not from the empire we had just left, but from nature herself as we struggled to learn better ways to live on this world. I am sure they taught you of Necromancy back in your school, correct Nadia?" she asked.

The fox nodded seriously as her eyes remained glued to the images in the book. "Good, the power of Necromancy was discovered some nine thousand years ago, and quickly became one of the most potent sources of magic known. What we did not know at the time was the price of its usage. The power of Necromancy is the power over the fundaments of life and death. Decay, age, corruption, and everything outside of the basic foci of the elemental magics we were still learning to use at the time, became the focus of its practitioners. At the time elemental magics were very physically draining to learn and use. Necromancy was easy to learn, gave its practitioner a great deal of power to use, and did little to tire the typical user. The magic was only given cursory research before the Kokori Empire put it to practical use in an internal war. The first and only war that pitted dragon against dragon, The Culling, as it was known, became the single most destructive war as those who did not practice Necromancy began to learn the drawbacks of those who did use it. As armies of the living clashed on the battlefields and fell, necromancers would raise the dead to fight again, subverting the immortal soul and using the mortal shell as a weapon of war. Armies were winning the battles, and losing the wars as they shrank with each fight, and the armies of necromancy grew with each battlefield death. A leader emerged from the still pure elemental armies of Kokori by the name of Suzujomei Oyamishima. Given the title of Grand Dragon of the armies, he began to lead a war to aggressively push the necromantic armies off of the continent. His shrewd tactics are still studied today as he used a vastly smaller force to wedge and push numerically superior forces back. However, with losses mounting, he knew that even the best tactics he came up with would only last for so long. So he turned to the budding continent of Daquia for help in the war. Having watched the war in Kokori for over fifty years, Daquia was more than aware of the threat posed by the powers of Necromancy, and after a short war council of the four nations, sent a force to assist the Grand Dragon in his crusade. The force sent was vastly more than Suzujomei had even dreamed that Daquia was capable of sending. Led by a young Amarokine General, and matriarch of the Onyxclaw family, Suzujomei triumphed in a resounding series of battles, pushing the undead, and living armies of Necromancy into the seas of Kokori." She said. Taking a moment to flip the page in the book in front of the fox before continuing.

"His continent safe for now, Suzujomei sent envoys to the other two continents to warn them of the danger of Necromancy. The warning was heeded, but reports soon came in from the Northern continent that the Dragon leader of the necromantic armies had survived the war and had created a new base of operations on the icy and deserted peaks of the far north of the inhabited continent. The still budding nations of our cold weather cousins solidified and pushed back all attacks on their cities with relative ease at first, but the armies were beginning to grow quickly and were becoming more and more tactically minded. Suzujomei brought a massive army with him north and faced down the necromantic leader on his own terms. The resulting battle and release of elemental and necromantic energies shattered the northern continent into thousands of icy shards of land. Because of the unpredictable maelstroms, and ever-present necromantic taint still present there, the ruins of the continent were named the Dead Lands. Though Suzujomei survived, he learned several lessons about the teaching styles of the dragons. Proclaiming Kokori an empire, and subsequently crowned as emperor by his peers and a majority vote of the remaining pheonix family clans, he set down the rules of dragons taking students to train. A dragon may only take a single student at a time to train. A student that has completed training is typically given the title of Master. Up until recently, only other dragons and their pheonix vassals were ever chosen to be trained. Now the wolf's title is singular in nature. A student trained by a Dragon is a Master, a student trained by Suzujomei himself, is a Grand Master. Because the Grand Dragon represents the pinnacle of dragon training, and his previous students were known the world over as some of the most dangerous combatants and advisors, they are often given a great deal of respect whenever their title is learned." She said, finishing the class with a smile to the fox.

Nadia shook her head from the trance the book had seemingly had her under and assimilated the information a moment before asking another question. "You mentioned that Ceberune was nearly mated when he was young...does that mean he has not been mated yet?" She asked, curious.

Bianca smirked before answering. "The wolf remains unmated, though well pleasured in school, his training requires him to remain celibate until it is time for his Awakening." She said, noting the glint of another question and smiled. "Let me guess, what the question is...What is an Awakening?" The bunny hazarded.

The fox nodded with embarrassment. The rabbit chuckled. "There is no need to be embarrassed Nadia. A hungry mind is a healthy mind. Between me, Ceberune, and those I am sure you will be meeting soon enough, you will have access to any kind of knowledge your young mind can ask for. As the wolf said, never hesitate to ask a question if there is something you want to learn or do not understand. One of us will explain it as soon as we can." She said with a smile. "And now to answer your question, I will again turn back to the past and a post Culling time period." She said, flipping another page or two in the book for the fox.

"An Awakening is a generic term to describe the full blossoming of a draconic student coming into their full powers. At the end of the Culling, Suzujomei placed more than just the single student prohibition on his fellow teachers. To prevent a young student from coming into their full power before they are ready for it, the master places a seal upon the abilities of the student. Though having access to a fraction of what they are capable, once they have matured in both personality and body, the seal wears away and breaks, requiring the student to quickly control a huge burst of magical power through them. The breaking of the seal killed many students in the early days, and techniques were developed to better cope with the sudden flood of power. Ranging from various forms of meditation, to self pain infliction, Dragons turned to their favorite past time as a way to better cope during the mind's attempt to deal with the burst of power. Being highly sexual creatures, dragons learned that mating during an awakening exponentially increased the chances of survival to its full control. However, this method only worked well in those very sensitive sexually, or those who have not experienced it. So one of the unspoken rules of being a draconic student was chastity." She stated.

Nadia again sat silently, absorbing the information. "So Ceberune will not be asking for my full services?" She asked in a somewhat shaky voice.

The bunny smiled disarmingly at her before answering. "Not immediately Nadia. Truthfully, he will not be asking for any of your services. As I said, the wolf is not aggressive sexually, though if he were, he could take any female he came across without complaint." She quipped. "That does not mean that your services will not be necessary. Let me explain some details about your master to help you understand him a bit better." She said.