Marked Ones: Advent of the Demon Prince

Natali let out a long exhale. Her breath was visible in the chill morning air. It was early enough that the sun had yet to rise, so the air still felt slightly frigid. With her was her best and only friend, Lyrah who had chosen to join her on this excursion to the training area.

Since they were granted the approval to attend the Royal Academy in a few years, they were also gifted a small location to practice their skills from the prying eyes of the public and foreign dignitaries. Lyrah had no Compatibilities to speak of, but that did not stop her from practicing a few simple things that would keep her safe from a mugger or at least buy a little time from an attacker.

Most of Lyrah's training was spent on developing her noble manners. Since this was the first time the Oracle was being allowed to make a public appearance, they wanted to set the example that all who reside in the king's palace were held to the highest of standards.

It also looked good upon the royal family for appearing as though they had such 'kindness in their hearts' to provide education and resources to a pitiful Marked One, even though the mark that they carried had saved the kingdom from many hardships.

Natali on the other hand had Compatibility with Dagger Arts and Ice Magic, which suited her overall appearance very well. She also had the Mark of Recall which would allow her to bind one object to each of her hands, then at will recall that object from any location to instantly appear in her hands. When used in concert with her Dagger Arts, it was a potentially deadly weapon.

It was for this special reason that Natali was also granted permission to train with Lyrah as well as attend the academy by her side. Natali was essentially a built in body guard for the Oracle and so very little expense was spared for her training.

At first, her father secretly trained her in the barracks, but one day the training sessions were discovered by someone who reported it to the Elders in charge of the Oracle. Instead of anyone getting in trouble, they saw this as a golden opportunity to train a body guard that doubled as a personal maid to the Oracle.

That maid was also marked, so they would not have to struggle finding a normal person willing to care for a Marked one.

"Nataliiiii…" Lyrah whined. "Are you almost done? My arms are tired…"

The white-haired girl looked at her friend and gave her an exasperated sigh.

"[Glacies: Icicle Lance]"

A massive lance shaped of ice pierced the target on the other end of the modified archery range they had. The target was wearing beat up and worn out plate armor, and even though it was damaged, the armor was still solid and strong in many places. Yet despite it being thick plate, the lance pierced it as though it were paper.

"Woooowww!" Lyrah cooed. "That's awesome! What rank are you again, Natali?"

"Intermediate." She whispered.

"Oh that's so cool! I will never be ranked since I don't have any Compatibilities, but it's soooo cool that you got so strong."

Lyrah's compliments made her blush a little. This was pretty normal behavior for the excitable Oracle in training, but it was still pretty embarrassing to receive such legitimate praise.

"Shall we return to your training? You were supposed to be meditating and trying to call forth a vision if I am correct."

"Oh, come on, not you too? I just want to take a little break…"

"Lyrah if you don't get back to it, I will inform your mother." She threatened. "Besides, you've been taking a break by watching me for the last hour, I think that is plenty of break enough."

Natali was in charge of babysitting Lyrah when she got like this. No matter what Lady Adellia tried, Lyrah would just get frustrated and stop listening while trying to train her. Natali's own mother could not train her because she had responsibilities as Adellia's caretaker, so Adellia gathered up a bunch of materials to try and have Natali teach Lyrah on her behalf.

In truth, activating the Mark of Prophecy was not too different from other marks. The general…feel that it had was very similar. They had made great progress, but there was one major issue. It was the fact that Lyrah could not tell her mother the visions she had.

They had been lying to Adellia about not being able to successfully induce a vision as Lyrah has been able to do so with regular success for a few months. The reason they had to hide it was because of a promise that they both made to Natali's mother, Mylene, years ago. They swore to never tell Adellia about any visions regarding the strange boy with the multicolored eyes.

While Lyrah was able to successfully induce her visions, every single one was about this boy. They were able to determine that he was currently about their age thanks to the variations in age from their dreams.

The Oracle could not see into the past, they could only see the present and possible futures, so when Lyrah had seen him fighting as a child when they were both around eight and nine years old, that meant he had to be near their age.

"You still have not seen another vision aside from him?"

"No! And the ones I do have, don't make sense! I need help on how to make sure the events I see happen out of order…but its all jumbled. Like someone took a picture book and bound the pages in a random order. But I cannot tell my mom about these visions because of our promise to Auntie Mylene…" Lyrah whined. Tears had started to form on her face, likely from frustration.

"Can you tell anything at least from those? At all, even if it is just a feeling, an inkling. Just go with your gut." She advised the young Oracle.

"Hrm…" Lyrah hummed with one tongue sticking out of the corner of her mouth. "Something big is coming for him. I don't know what. I don't know when. But if he might not survive it."

Natali's face grimaced. She really hoped he would. She had been hearing about this mysterious boy her entire life. The only people she knew were Lady Adelia, Lyrah, her own mother, and her own father. Aside from them, she also knew a lot about this nameless person so she was rather invested in meeting him one day.

However, whatever was happening was something he needed to deal with on his own. And even if he needed help, there was nothing that she could do. After all, she was stuck in this castle for a while yet.

"I hope everything works out…" Lyrah mumbled. Natali knew that her friend felt much the same about this person as she did, but there always seemed to be something that Lyrah held back. Natali felt that there was still something that her friend was holding back. Though it did not really matter in the end since they may not ever meet him in the future.

"I do too. Hey want to get some tea? We can call it a day." She said to her friend while activating her Recall. Two bright yellow flashes glowed in her hands and materialized into a pair of daggers. She stowed them behind her back where there was a set of sheathes to hold them.

Lyrah happily agreed and trotted along behind her, thankful for practice for the day to be over. Natali could not help but pat her adorable friend on the head. Technically, the black-haired girl was older by almost a full year, but you would not be able to tell from the way they interacted. It was almost like Natali was the big sister who spoiled and doted on the younger one.

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