Resolve X Rock & Stone

Still slouched over in his tent, Kelle continued to try and process the massive amount of information that was just given to him.

He could understand quite clearly what a strength trait might do for him, and he was also quite happy seeing that polearms was a 'Specialty', which apparently meant that he would receive abilities and boosts when it came to using them.

From what the notebook had said, it also looks like he has an atypical soldier Regalia. That thin little notebook that nearly turned him into a vegetable had even mentioned one of the most important things that made his different.

It mentioned that when a Regalia is cursed, it often brings a demerit or a type of consequence when it comes to even just owning it. Curses are said to come in any kind of form and sometimes might not even be that bad. But, some of the curse descriptions even mentioned that there could be severe side effects like losing a limb.

The upside was that the wielder's ability was given a proportional boost. Many of the properties and functions of Regalia were apparently in line with something called the law of equivalent exchange.

The information had mentioned just one way to be able to tell how severe the side effect of using his Regalia would be, and that would be the depth of the blood colored red shown on the Regalia itself.

Kelle slowly stood up, still rubbing the back of his head, where a welt sprung up when he rammed his head onto the wooden pole.

He ran his hands over the mark one more time as he peered down at it, trying to find out what some of the patterns on it meant, 'Judging from the color, the depth of red is so deep that it become a dark, bloody crimson.' 

Kelle felt like he'd just been dumped into a bath of ice, realizing his new path to power might have ended before it already began, 'W-why…? It can't be that if I try to test and find out my abilities, I could end up dying as the side effect!' he thought while feeling his palms starting to sweat.

As Kelle felt himself plunging into despair at the thought of his last chance running away from him, he quickly steeled his nerves and smacked both of his palms to his face to focus himself.

'Even if there might be some kind of block in the road of my path now, It'll only make the journey longer. No matter what, I will become the strongest General anyone has ever seen.' with that thought, he could feel his Regalia Shiver and intertwine with itself as if it were a beast looking at the most appetizing prey.

Kelle hadn't seen any information that Regalia could change how people think, and it hadn't said anything about even altering their thinking. But, Kelle could tell something had clicked into place within him, while raising his Regalia up to his eyes he said aloud, "One thing is for sure, and it's that we both hunger for the war to come."

The change in Kelle's demeanor slowly became more and more pronounced as he seemed to straighten his back and walk outside of the tent towards the training grounds Captain Orin had mentioned to him.

'It's time to find out what you can really do.' Kelle thought as he rushed past some of the other soldiers running around.

Some of them gave him looks, but as they saw the mark on his arm, they started to avert their eyes, and Kelle took notice of this. 'I wonder why none of the people I've encountered so far has always had that look. Is it not common knowledge that this crimson glow is a curse?'

Perhaps it was something he could ask about later, but for now, Kelle reached the grounds and looked around.

Sprawled out before him was an extremely grandiose site, for him at least. An expansive cobbled field that formed a perfect square and it was filled with all manners of objects and structures he hadn't seen before.

Just a few meters away from him, he could see the two shorties he had briefly encountered earlier brawling with each other in a depressed pit of sand.

"Nyeha! You're going to need more grit than that if you want to take a captain's head once we reach the battlefield, Rock!" Bellowed one of the identical-looking fellows.

'Quite a strange name, but these two are pretty interesting. For their pretty small frames, I wonder how they fit that much power in there… and why are they fighting on something like sand?' Thought Kelle as he stared at their brawl.

"Hah- Stone, our battles are always pretty much equal. But with how much of a numb skull you are, I'll be the one to grab a captain's head and take all of the glory for myself first!!" Shouted one of them.

'Rock and Stone… I guess they might be twins? I have heard about them, but I haven't seen-' Just as Kelle was going to start pondering over the strangeness of the situation, he saw a flash of amber-colored light.

"Stone!! You said you wouldn't use that damned thing, that's just cheating!!" Screamed one of them unwillingly as he stared at his twin.

Rock only snorted as the amber light grew larger exceptionally quickly, and something Kelle would never have dreamed of seeing happened just as he squinted to see through the light.

'This is… Humans can accomplish things like this?' Kelle's mouth hung open in disbelief as he stared forward.

Just as Stone had pushed Rock back far enough with his shield, he had dropped it and held up his maul with two hands. There was a yellow-earthen Regalia on the back of the man's palm, and Kelle could clearly see the same interlacing lattice-like Regalia move up his fingers and onto the head of the maul in mere moments.

It quickly became covered in some kind of marbled stone, and the man's face scrunched up for a second as if trying to handle a change in weight from the weapon.

It all happened in less than a second, as the man slammed the maul down towards his twin with his maul leaving a distinct and captivating amber glow.

BANG-!

The sound of splintering wood and creaking metal erupted under as Rock's shield was utterly destroyed, and luckily enough for Rock, it looked like his twin had controlled the maul just enough as it slammed into the cobble of the grounds below and left a deeply etched mark on it. Just missing Rock's boots by a small margin. The splintered wood and bits of banded metal littered the sand pit as the both of them looked towards each other.

"Nyeha! I'll take the win this time. I won't use it again; I just wanted to try this out in real combat before the war." Stone said while looking quite amused at his brother's picturesque, stunned face.

"Captain Orin won't use his against me for some reason, I still don't know what that guy's Regalia does. I've asked him to spar so many times but he always finds some excuse to go back to his tent." He said regretfully.

'These two are actually in my team…?' Thought Kelle while looking at these two twins.