Raven and Northern walked outside the castle as she began her explanation to him.
She skipped the basics since Northern was already equipped with that knowledge, even though he had learned it the hard way.
Some he had an idea of because of his mother, so he didn’t need a thorough expansion.
But others…
“Wait, so you’re saying it’s impossible to increase the class of talents?”
Raven glanced at him and nodded, then turned front as she continued walking.
“There’s a reason talents are ranked into classes.”
She nodded a greeting as a young woman in ragged clothes passed by.
Turning to Northern, she continued, “Talents, in their core, are a Class. They determine the route to power a drifter takes. These classes are grouped into three basics: warrior, mage, and engineer.”
She nodded another greeting.
“The warriors…”
“Swordsmen, knights, archers, hand-to-hand combatants,” Northern interrupted politely.
“Yes. And the mage class are drifters whose talents, without learning an art, give them abilities that can’t be used with weapons and somehow overcome the limitation of distance. Then we have engineers, whose talents are great for utilities.”
Northern nodded in understanding.
“Ranking talents would have been against their stagnant nature. And since drifters didn’t have a definitive classing system, talents were classed instead.”
“I think I understand… Your talent class means your route to power and how efficient it is, which is supposed to be the grading. Then that grading is constant and cannot be changed.”
Raven nodded.
“It’s nice to see you getting it. You’re a natural.”
“Thanks for the compliment… I guess?”
‘Crap, crap, what exactly does this make me?’
If talent classes couldn’t grow no matter how one tried, then didn’t that make him one to be honored, a gem in this universe?
‘I can evolve talent classes… make them better than they were…’
Of course, that was currently for himself alone… for now.
‘And I can have multiple talents. In the long run, have multiple talent abilities. In a way, it could be said that I have multiple classes and may choose to be whatever I want. I could even have a different persona for each talent. Or I can decide which kind of fighter I want to be… a warrior today, maybe a mage tomorrow. Hell, I could even be an engineer if I wanted.’
The limitations placed on the Copycat ability had made Northern not think too much about it.
But in the long run, he was bound to eventually become the strongest being in Tra-el… or so he felt.
‘I just need to be very delicate about the talents I copy…’
“Are you okay? Lael.”
Raven’s voice broke him out of his trailing thoughts.
Northern frowned a little at the pristine lady beside him.
“I warned you about that.”
“I’m sorry… North.”
His eyes stayed on her blankly for a couple of seconds.
‘I didn’t expect her to give in so easily…’
“Next, we’ll be talking about the state of things in this continent.”
Raven’s voice trailed, helping Northern back to the main point.
“You might not know this, but the Dark Continent is the smallest of the five continents. You can remove ten of it from the Central Plain, and the Central Plain still isn’t be the biggest.”
“Then why was it allowed to be a continent, even though it wasn’t big?” Northern inquired with an inquisitive frown.
“Because of Luinngard Empire… about fifty years ago, Luinngard submitted a petition to be recognized as their own continent. Before then, this used to be part of the Central Plain… although it’s an island quite far away.”
She paused and looked at Northern to ensure he was listening, then added after observing his focused expression, “It was situated at the northern edge of the Central Plains, to be exact.”
Northern looked at her for a couple of seconds, both their expressions gravely blank.
‘Is she trying to make a jest of me with that face?’
Raven looked like an unfeeling robot, one incapable of changing facial expressions.
She was flawlessly pretty, no doubt, but her face was stony, constant, and never-changing… there were moments of small smiles, but they usually didn’t last long and came once in a blue moon.
They stood at the edge of the outer settlement, marked by a bridge that arched over a dried-out drainage system—a gutter of some sort.
Raven leaned on the concrete frame and folded her arms as she resumed.
“Because of its power and influence, Luinngard was eventually granted permission by the Seven Kingdoms Council.”
‘Right, I know about that one. It’s the council of the seven kingdoms in the Central Plain that rose as a contingency measure to balance the growing of Reimgard Empire.’
And Reimgard Empire was the sole powerhouse of the Central Plain.
If the academy was one reason the Central Plains was adored and loved, Reimgard was the other reason why it was hated and feared.
Raven’s voice trailed back into Northern’s ears.
“After the permission was granted, two other vassal states emerged: this kingdom Lotheliwan and the Sand Nation of Sloria.”
Northern could roughly guess, ‘Sand nation, huh… they’re probably situated around the desert.’
“Now, we don’t know much, but we know that two nations were heavily affected by this disaster: Lotheliwan and Sloria. However, Sloria is doing quite well since they depend on Luinngard for everything—food, clothes, weapons, everything gets shipped to them.
“But it’s not as though they’re in a much better condition. Their kingdom was ravaged too, and all that exists there is a stronghold of drifters that holds things together. I do think they have more drifters there than non-drifters.”
“I see… Raven, I have a question.”
She loomed into Northern’s eyes coldly and answered, “Ask.”
“Why didn’t Sloria, or the people from Lotheliwan, just move to Luinngard? You said they were unaffected by the disaster. Wouldn’t it be much safer, with the power of the Empire? They’ll be able to fight the rifts and eventually win.”
Raven shook her head somberly, lingering before she responded, “Luinngard Empire has walls as high as the academy’s. Their gates are locked to outsiders… no one has even seen what it’s like on the inside. Everything is encased within a colossal wall.”
Northern nodded as her words sank in. ‘Now I understand why Ellis needed my influence, thinking I was a prince from Luinngard.’
Northern raised his gaze again, his eyes folded with determination.
“Raven, I have one more question.”
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[A/N]
I’m so sorry for all these info dumps, Northern finally gets all the information he’s been missing out on.