The OP Lich is a Returnee, Chapter 44

Chapter 44 – The Martial Path

The fight was over quickly enough. After all, that was the gulf between us. If I did not limit my strength and speed, no amount of skill would have been enough to allow him to keep up with me. Even so, it was a decidedly one-sided match. Still, I did drag it out until Kinjo managed to catch up with us.

Once I scored the third of my three deadly hits on Miyasato, a quick slash that would have split him like a log under the woodsman’s axe if we had been fighting for real, I looked over to the priest, and said, “Well, now that our priest has arrived, I can begin your education. You are both students of old ways, traditional breathing techniques, no? The truth is that the martial path of gathering and using magic is not that different from the cultivation stories I teased you about earlier, at least at the base.”

As I had done with my other students, I kneeled in seiza, and waited until the two followed my example. “Magic is shaped by the mind, as you should know by now, if you’ve heard anything of me. The mind shapes and guides the magic, like the nozzle on a hose shapes and guides the water. However, a mind that does not believe, well and truly, in what they are trying to shape works against itself.”

Miyasato raised a hand, and I nodded, allowing him to speak. “So, it is like when you go into a match convinced you cannot win, and put victory out of your grasp? Or like when you stumble, and one mistake leads to ten more?”

“Excellent question,” I nodded. “And the answer is both. To pull off the greatest heights of magic, whether on the martial or magical path, one must have an unwavering belief that you can do what you set out to do. Your power may be insufficient to cause a reaction as dramatic as you may like, but that is the difference between a match’s flame and a bonfire’s blaze. The fire is the same, even if one is stronger than the other.”

I turned to look at Kinjo, and said, “As you have discovered, faith can be one guide to the belief you need. This is especially true in Eastern faiths and philosophies, primarily because of how different faiths view magic. You see, the idea of improving the body and soul, purifying and strengthening them through meditation and ritual is something you do not see in Western faiths. There, magic is the province of saints, or divine messengers, or demons, and it almost always takes the shape of a mage’s arts, rather than something you would see upon the martial path. Those faiths believe in miracles, like turning water into wine, instead of a body that resists aging and disease, capable of going to heights beyond mortal limits.”

Kinjo’s eyes widened slightly, but I could tell from the twitching of his mouth that he had already guessed some of this, and was just glad for the confirmation. Looking between the two students, I continued. “Ki is just another word for mana. There is no difference between the mage’s spells and a practitioner’s body strengthening or a priest’s purification ritual. It is all the same energy, just applied and channeled differently.

“The mage projects mana outward, to affect the world around them. The practitioner focuses mana inward, refining their body into something beyond mortal limits. The priest gathers mana through their faith, and the faith of those around them, using ritual to create effects that would not be possible, for either the mage or the practitioner on their own. Each of the three has strengths and weaknesses.”

Kinjo looked at me, questioningly, and I nodded to let him speak. “What are these strengths and weaknesses, exactly?”

“That is simple, really, at least for mages and practitioners. Mages are more versatile in how they can use their spells than the abilities that priests and practitioners might use, limited only by their own imagination and the depth of their mana pools, but they suffer from relatively weaker bodies, meaning they have few defenses once you pierce their magic. Practitioners, on the other hand, focus their magic through their bodies and their skills, so that they are physically stronger and tougher, rightly able to call themselves superhumans, but they do not have the mana pools for the kind of spells that you see the mages use.

“Priests, on the other hand, are a bit different. They are constrained by their faith, rather than their imagination or abilities. That faith guides how they can use their magic, and the purity of their faith determines how strong they are. So, a Christian priest might be more like a mage, since there hasn’t exactly been a martial tradition with the different churches in centuries, but those priests who were a little too fond of altar boys, or covered for their fellows who were, might find themselves all but powerless, because their faith is weak. On the other hand, a Buddhist priest who trained as a monk would be more like the practitioners, but with some healing and purification abilities on the side.

“The main strength of the priests, however, also lies in that faith. Mainly, how the faith is shared between people. In essence, the combined faith of the flock can infuse power into places and empower rituals to have a greater effect, because they believe in these communal rituals. This means that priests have a far easier time leading and joining ritual magics of their faith, and find it easier to include others who may have the faith, but no training in magic, into the ritual as well.

“Now, I know you may be thinking, ‘what use is adding people to a ritual if they cannot use magic’? And the answer is that they still have magic, even if they can’t access it, and their belief still helps refine and focus the ritual. Even if they are each weighted as one, compared to the priest’s ten, when you include ten or fifteen of those ‘ones’, then you are able to do things far outside the priest’s normal abilities. As a man once said, Quantity has a Quality all its own.”

Seeing that the two understood where I was coming from, I said, “In that case, we will start with your training. Breathe in through the nose, and, as you do so, picture the energy flowing into you. Let it move through you, and infuse you. Let it touch every fiber of your being. And then let it go, so you can take the next breath.

“With each breath taken, you add a grain of sand to the measure of your mana, your ki. ‘Just a grain of sand!’ you might say. How can such a little amount make a difference? But if each breath is a grain of sand, what will it be after a thousand breaths? Then think that a person takes over twenty thousand breaths a day. Eight and a half million breaths in a year. A grain of sand weighs only thirteen milligrams, but eight and a half million grains of sand? That is enough to bury a tank with twice its own weight in sand.

“This is the essence of magic. Once you have refined your breathing so that it happens naturally, without thinking, your body will begin to feel the effects as each grain of sand improves you. When you begin to naturally accumulate mana, you can then begin to store a portion of that mana within you, creating a pool that you can use to fuel skills and abilities.”

“Sensei,” Miyasato asked, “what kinds of skills and abilities are you talking about?”

“The martial paths, as you know, tend to focus on the body, first and foremost. Beyond the passive body strengthening that will move your baseline beyond mortal limits, you have two types of uses for mana. We call them skills and abilities. They are both active uses of mana, but the difference is in how they are used.

“Abilities are effects that, while not passive, are designed to be held active over time. Active body strengthening is a good example of this. Another would be surrounding yourself in an aura of elemental energy, or enhancing your weapons and armor with the same. Effects that you can sustain throughout a fight.

“Skills, on the other hand, are singular attacks, defenses, or techniques, designed to be used in an instant. A slash that sends a wind blade scything across the room would be a skill, as would a defensive skill that blocks incoming damage, or allows you to parry incoming spells. I’m sure you can imagine many other skills that would be useful to a warrior on the battlefield.”

I took a breath, and said, “As with mages, every practitioner has one or more elements that they are attuned to from birth. And, same as with the mages, this attunement tells you which techniques will come easiest to you, and which ones you will struggle with more. A Flame Swordsman will always have the best effect with fire skills, but that does not mean he could not learn to use some water skills. He simply won’t be as good at them, or be able to use them as efficiently.

“Once you’ve learned how to touch your mana, and reliably circulate it through your bodies, I will teach you how to find your elements. Actually, my other students will be going through the process as well, so it will do them good to see martial students progressing the same as they are. If you two are as talented as you appear, then I expect you will be ready about the same time as they are.”

“Akagawa-san?” Kinjo asked. “Out of curiosity, what are the different types of practitioners called? Is there an ‘archswordsman’?”

“Hah! No, the martial orders were organized far differently from those of mages. They were separated by rank, like any military would, more than anything. If you saw a ‘flame swordsman’, or an ‘earth monk’, or a ‘gale bowman’, then they were likely in the militia, or adventurers, or something similar, because they had no other organization around them, and they were likely limited in the scope of their abilities and skills, unless they were particularly gifted.

“Which is not to say that there weren’t terms to describe different practitioners that crossed the martial orders. In general, they were called things like Firesoul or similar, and would get sorted into units of the same element, or at least compatible elements, if possible. Having opposing elements in a formation could weaken any defensive abilities or skills used by the group, which was a disaster waiting to happen, obviously.

“Less importance was placed on the individual, and more on the unit. In that way, I guess you could say that the mages would compare to special forces for an army, while the rank and file would be the martial orders. Sure, there were exceptions, but for the most part this is how the other world used magic-users in war. Mages were the hammer, and the warriors were the anvil.”

I took another breath. “In many ways, the warriors had it easier than the mages did. They were able to shrug off attacks that would cripple or kill mages, and their skills could be devastating on a battlefield. But those skills were also simpler, far simpler, than a mage’s spells, requiring less calculations on the fly as the mage tried to bend the world to their will. A warrior would often be praised based on the number of skills they had, and few would have more than eight or ten that they could use reliably. Meanwhile, mages had to memorize dozens of spells, just in a single element, to ensure that the magic they wielded did not end up blowing up friends and family, instead of the enemy.”

I sighed, and shook away memories of the past. “But you should focus on your training. When it is time, you will have dinner with my other students and myself. Tomorrow, you will begin training in earnest, until you unlock your elements, and then until you can draw on them, even in combat.”