‘I know. I’ve attended an academy as well.’ Solus smiled at the memories that those words evoked.
Back then things were much simpler, but also more painful. Lith was still alone and no one but Protector knew the truth about him. Solus was without a body, trapped in the stone ring and reduced to a voice in Lith’s head.
Her smile disappeared as she remembered all the hardships they had endured. Yurial’s death hit her the hardest and the pain of his loss felt deeper now that Phloria was dead too.
‘Only three members of the old gang remain. I wonder if we’ll lose someone else before this mess with Jiera ends.’
‘What gang?’ Keila asked.
‘Nothing!’ Solus inwardly cursed her slip of the mind and quickly changed the topic. ‘What can you teach me about offensive telepathic abilities? I mean, in case another M’Rael gets my ring, how do I turn the table on him?’
‘There are countless ways to destroy someone’s mind, but if you are in a rush or if like in your case you can’t refuse your host, there are two things that you must prioritize learning.’ Dusk said.
Unlike the Horsemen who had been created by Baba Yaga to be independent, the tower wasn’t allowed to be picky with its host due to the damage in Solus’ life force and core.
Its first priority was to ensure Solus’ survival and to do that the tower needed external help. The host had to voluntarily imprint the tower to establish the bond whereas Solus had no say in the matter.
It was like Silverwing first and M’Rael later had tried to snatch Menadion’s opus from Lith’s hands, even though for entirely different reasons.
‘The first thing you have to master is the skill to hold onto your identity and remember that you are a part of the bond as much as the host. Your stone ring and my red crystal are no different, they are just mediums to our minds.
‘The artifact component tends to be compliant but you hold the same authority as your host over it. No matter what they order you to do, you can resist their will, but only as long as you remember that you are not a thing.’
‘If that’s true, then how could M’Rael stop me even from thinking?’ Solus shared the memories of her experience via the mind link, making both Dusk and Kelia shudder.
‘He managed to do it because your telepathic defenses are weak and because, from what I can see, you still consider your stone ring as your real body. The former allowed M’Rael to taint your willpower with his own while the latter made you submit simply because you believed you had to.’
‘What do you mean?’ Solus asked in confusion.
‘Our respective bodies are indeed an artifact but they are imprinted by two different people with two different minds. To put it simply, it’s like the artifact is a tier five spell that you are trying to Dominate.
‘It’s a tug of war of willpower. You lost against M’Rael because the Yggdrasill explained to him how to fight whereas you didn’t even know where to start. Also, you never fought the orders he gave to the tower because you thought you had no choice.
‘You only resisted his will and that was your biggest mistake.’
‘I see.’ Solus had already wrestled control of the simple features of the tower off Lith when they teased each other, but she had always assumed that he was just letting her.
‘That said, the most powerful offensive weapon people like us have is the mind fusion.’ Dusk’s words made her stop abruptly in the real world, grabbing Kelia to force her to look into Solus’ eyes.
‘I beg your pardon?’
‘You heard me.’ Dusk replied while Kelia’s voice apologized for a non-existent rude act in order to appease the curiosity of the train crew. ‘It’s the reason during our first meeting I shared with Kelia only my origins and my plans for our future.’
Back then, Kelia had been enraged at the idea of the Red Sun considering her a means to an end but now she couldn’t help but smile when he talked about ‘our future’.
‘I’m so glad we have bonded.’ She thought. ‘Back then, my only worry was to find enough food scraps to live and see another day. Now, instead, I can make plans for the years to come. Good or bad, I have a future!’
‘By my Mom, I’m so sorry you had to go through so much.’ Solus said.
‘Did… you hear that?’ Kelia stuttered even in her mind from embarrassment.
She was proud of her present but also so ashamed of her past that she had a crippling anxiety at the idea that someone might learn about it. That someone might learn that she was just a fraud.
A dirt-poor beggar that a kiss from a cursed object had turned into Mage Charming.
‘I saw that.’ Solus realized that Kelia had made her same mistake and tried to console her. ‘You have nothing to be ashamed of. You had it even worse than Lith. You should be proud of yourself.’
‘Oh, please! Magus Verhen is a self Awakened. In my shoes, instead of running away from the orphanage, he would have conquered it. If not for Dusk, I’d still be nothing. No, less than nothing!’ The shame turned into rage as Kelia hated Solus for forcing her to face what she considered an unforgivable sin.
Her own weakness.
Dusk was the reason she had escaped life on the streets. It was thanks to him that Kelia had experienced warm food and a clean bed after running away from the orphanage despite not having anything but her first name on her.
It was the Horseman who had Awakened her, given her the skill and knowledge necessary to enroll in one of the six academies. It was thanks to his guidance that her teachers first and the Empress later had noticed her.
‘No matter how much I hate how Dusk manipulated our first encounter or I despise his methods. Without him, I’m just an empty husk and now Solus knows it! Once she rats me out with Verhen, he’ll never respect me.
‘At most, he’s going to pity me.’ Kelia thought, making sure that the mind link was dead.
Feeling the connection lost and seeing the fury in the eyes of the young girl, Solus realized that her words had fallen on deaf ears. She tried to establish a new mind link to apologize but Kelia killed it off with her own mana.
‘So what?’ Dusk said in an attempt to calm her down. ‘Even if what you say were true, how are you any different from Verhen? Maybe he Awakened by himself or maybe Solus helped him.
‘Either way, they worked together to build the life he has. They attended the academy together, Solus helped him during every mission as a Ranger, and stood by his side during every battle.
‘I doubt he would have gone this far in life without her help. Solus is a powerful cursed object like me who possesses great knowledge and Verhen is a talented, hard-working individual who holds a powerful bloodline, just like you.’
