grimoire

How are your guy's days? I hope it has been great. for me I decided to not force myself to write, I had noticed a recurring theme of me interested in a hobby and tried to pick it up always following the tip of forcing myself to do it to make it a habit only to be left burnt out be it singing, playing guitar, etc.

So now for my mental health, I will not force myself to write, I write this fanfic intending to get it as a hobby, not a job

~~

As I sheathed my katana, signaling the end of today's spar with Bell lying on the ground, exhausted and beaten, I turned my attention to the edge of the empty field where Liliruca sat, watching us spar. Her sharp eyes resembled those of a commander, assessing the strength of her troops, a talent buried without nurturing.

Approaching her, I noticed she was deep in thought, seemingly lost in her world. Sitting down beside her, I savored the cool morning breeze for a moment.

"What do you envision as strength?" I broke the silence.

"Huh?" Liliruca snapped out of her daze and turned her gaze toward me. It was clear that she had considered this question before and offered her perspective, "Strength, to me, means the ability to defeat anyone through pure combat prowess."

"You're not wrong, but strength comes in many forms. Consider a commander, for instance. What role does a commander play on the battlefield?" I prompted, introducing a different angle.

"A commander leads and directs those under their command to maintain order within the troops and secure victory," Liliruca explained.

"Then do you consider that a strength?"

Liliruca's eyes went wide in realization as she delved into deep thoughts. I smiled at her figure and left her alone with her thoughts, but her train of thought was interrupted by a scream as she looked at the source with displeasure.

"BEELLL!!!" a scream echoed from the broken church as a small figure rushed out of the door with a book. Hestia hurriedly approached the recovering Bell.

"Bell, where did you get this!" She shoved the book into his face, accidentally hitting him.

"Ow, Goddess Hestia, I borrowed that book from the Hostess of Fertility. A customer left it, and Syr let me borrow it," Bell replied with a hint of confusion.

Hestia sighed with a troubled face

"Bell, what you read was a grimoire," Hestia said

"HAH!" Liliruca screamed in surprise when she heard her words, and rushed towards them, much to my confusion.

Liliruca snatched the book out of Hestia's hand and flipped the pages to check her suspicion.

"Um? What's a grimoire?" Bell asked in confusion, and Liliruca chimed in to explain.

"Bell, a grimoire is a magical item that can grant you magic by simply reading the book, but only once as the characters disappear inside the book, leaving only empty pages behind. The cost of these books at the lowest is one million valis, as they are extremely sought after," Liliruca explained.

Bell's face drained of color in realization.

I looked at Bell in curiosity and finally chimed in on the conversation.

"You have magic now?" I asked, curious.

"Ah, Xian-san, yes, I have magic now," Bell admitted.

"Why did you not use it in our spar before?"

"Well, I didn't want to use my magic because I wanted to improve my knife proficiency, and it seemed a bit unfair to me as you only used swordsmanship in the spar," Bell explained

"Foolish, in real combat, you will need to use your full arsenal to your advantage. Without using your magic now, you will never know how to use it in combat," I lectured.

"Ah, don't worry about that, my magic is a supportive one rather than an offensive one, so I could cast it before battle."

"Supportive magic? How so?" both Liliruca and I looked in curiosity as Bell explained the nature of his magic.

-

"So a magic that can vary in strength depending on how many minds you condensed into it," I thought deeply about Bell's magic. I had encountered many magics on the battlefield, and many used a variety of spells, ranging from storms to controlling the ground they stood on, but most were limited by their inability to modify the power of their magic on the battlefield.

"Umm, are we forgetting something!?" Hestia's voice broke me out of my train of thought.

"Ah, right, the grimoire," Liliruca said, making the rest of us remember.

~~

this one is 120 words shorter than usual, but I do not want to leave you guys with nothing to read so here hope you enjoyed