Life Giver

Eventually another full hour passed with little progress truly being made in the hearing. The councillors were truly skilled with their words, each and every time they spoke they managed to weasel in some subtle reason that they should receive some reparations because of the nights events. Whether it be due to their 'potential market loses', the 'assault to their prestige' or even just because who they represent are 'helpless civilians' of Ellaris in need of reparations.

Those that held no interest in such discussions had truly grown tired of hearing the other councillors whining's. So it was perhaps fortunate that at this time the heavy wooden doors to the council hall were suddenly opened with a loud, unruly bang.

Through the doors stepped a pristine looking young man with a pure white Elemental's Aura, a beautiful almost feminine face and a sword hanging at his waist.

Everyone quickly turned to look at this Elemental with annoyance and a hint of surprise in their eyes, they wondered who would be so rude as to interrupt the hearing in such a manner.

Yet as quickly as thoughts of condemnation formed in their minds, they quickly melted away when they recognised the young looking Elemental's identity.

"Speaker Blackfire, the situation has been contained. This is a full report." The young Elemental said calmly as he gently threw a colourful Qi chip towards the Speaker.

Speaker Blackfire calmly caught this Qi chip, nodding towards the young Elemental before focusing his attention on the Qi chip for a moment.

"Hmm.... Bring all of those safely restrained here, to testify and receive judgement." The Speaker responded casually.

The Youthful Elemental nodded back, taking this request as his sign to leave.

Many of the more experienced council members shook there heads with a mixture of disappointment and helplessness towards this young Elementals attitude, his clear disregard for them was obviously an insult to their pride. However itwas only Speaker Blackfire who was willing to speak a few words of gentle criticism towards him.

"Be careful with my doors next time Guardian Ellaris, I'll make you pay for them if they get damaged." The Speaker said calmly, a small smile in the corner of his lips.

In response, Guardian Ellaris simply waved his hand back at the Speaker without even turning back.

From the viewing room above, Casmir watched the Guardian's casual and almost thoughtless actions towards the council with a queer expression on his face. Although, when he had met the Guardian before, he seemed like a very calm and unrestrained individual, it wasn't to such a nearly reckless degree that he had just displayed.

But perhaps Casmir simply didn't know him well enough, to be able to make such remarks.

"Wasn't that a little too disrespectful..?" Casmir slowly said.

Bluefire however, who's eyes had been locked onto the Guardian the entire time he had been in the hall, quickly rebutted Casmir's comment in a defensive manner.

"Don't spout rubbish Casmir, Ellaris can do what he likes, he's earned this status through his own sweat and blood." She said firmly, a slightly soft and wishful tone to her voice as she spoke his name.

Casmir was surprised by her reaction, but when he looked at Bluefire he noticed an odd light in her eyes as she looked towards the Guardian. One which confused him for a moment until he recognised the look in her eyes, it was one he had seen many times in Rose and Elena's eyes.

Which such a surprising idea bouncing around his mind, Casmir quickly looked away from Bluefire, supressing any thoughts he had surrounding this matter.

Meanwhile in the council hall, a large precession of chained up cultivators walked into the hall wearing matching plain white robes. They were quickly lined up in a special boxed off area of the hall with a dozen armoured guards watching their every move.

Each prisoner had all of their limbs chained up, their mouths covered and for those who came from races with different body types. Any potentially dangerous appendages like horns or tails were covered by special types of restraints.

Yet even without these heavy restrictions on their bodies, none of the Truth Religion members would attempt to struggle or escape as they entered the hall. After the overwhelming strength displayed by Guardian Ellaris and his men, they knew that they had no chance of escape and that such attempts would only worsen their outcome.

Nearby, Official Kane waited until the prisoners had finished being organised and the Hall doors had been shut once more, before he looked towards Speaker Backfire, whom returned him a quick nod.

"Attention councillors, I will now be handing out some additional information, this information was gained either through contact with the Truth Religion or our own investigations into these individuals." He said as he organised his subordinates to had out some new Qi ch.i.p.s.

"Please focus your discussions on these details, in 15 minutes the Speaker and the senior councillors will leave to make their decisions in private. Anything that the councillors feel is needed to be said should be done so by then, thank you."

The councillors quickly received this new information and started quietly discussing it before they made their recommendations to the Speaker. Each of their recommendations included their opinions on the punishment for these 'heretics', the appropriate measures to be taken in response to this incident and a few other minor suggestions.

While the Council Hall was abuzz with new discussion, in the viewing room where Casmir and Master Bluefire watched the Hearings proceedings, they received a visitor.

After a round of knocks on the door, Bluefire opened it to find one of Official Kane's subordinates standing there. His subordinate simply handed Master Bluefire a Qi Chip respectfully and left.

Curious as to the contents of this Qi chip, Casmir questioned Master Bluefire however she didn't explain much to Casmir, she only mentioned a message that was also stored on the Qi chip.

"We've been invited to visit the Speaker in a short while, apparently you're being rewarded with a Merit Badge." She explained.

"Merit Badge?" Casmir replied in confusion.

Bluefire returned to her chair and sat down calmly before she explained Merit Badge's, a happy smile on her face.

"I hoped that you would be awarded one, but this was a.. unconventional situation, so I wasn't sure if they would award one or not."

"A Merit Badge is.. a badge of honour for citizens in the Heldan Republic, they represent an individuals value toward the country, they are a status symbol and they offer you direct benefits. They are typically only given to people who provide valuable services, are experts in certain fields or perform heroic feats." Bluefire said, a hint of pride in her voice as she looked at Casmir.

"In your case, I imagine they've received word of your 'heroic' actions and your talent. So they have decided to reward you... I'll be straight with you though Casmir, Merit Badges also act as a way of tying you down to the Republic and making you indebted to them."

Listening to Bluefire's explanation, Casmir grew increasingly curious and excited towards exactly what his Merit Badge would reward him with.

He curiously probed Bluefire for information, asking "What kind of reward do they give..? Are these badges hard to get? How do they tie me down to the Republ-"

"They typically give a small immediate reward of money or resource and a discount in certain government owned business." Bluefire said, interupting Casmir's line of questioning.

"There are different Branches and Grades of Merit Badges so some are rarer than others but they all represent a certain status amongst cultivators. That, and if you ever show too much favour towards another country by permanently moving there for example, their benefits can be stripped away from you." She explained quickly, stopping Casmir from asking anymore questions.

"But before you ask anything else, let me explain them further to you or you wont be able to see the whole picture, ok?" Bluefire said as she looked directly at Casmir, a slightly annoyed look on her face.

Casmir saw her expression and quickly realised his impatience was annoying her, so he leaned back in his chair and quietly waited for her to speak.

"Thank you." Bluefire said in a happy tone, as if Casmir's reaction was right and proper.

Bluefire then went on to explain the details of merit badges to Casmir as he quietly listened to her.

Generally, Merit Badges are split into three Branches by the cultivators cultivation at the time of their bestowment, Civilian for Qi Grades 1-3 , Guardian for Qi Grades 4-5 and Hero for Qi Grades 6 and above. Each Merit Badge is also given a separate Grade from 1-10 to signify the hardship faced by a cultivator and the value of their actions to the country.

For example a Civilian Grade 2 Badge might be given to a Qi Grade 3 cultivator for saving a small village from a dangerous Grade 3 ferocious beast, all alone. However a Civilian Grade 10 badge might be given to a weaker Qi Grade 1 cultivator for the same actions because of the exponentially higher difficulty such a weak cultivator would face to achieve the very same feat.

Along side these Grades, each Merit Badge comes with a Unique name based on the cultivators achievements. For example the Guardian Grade 5 Merit Badge, 'Eastern Ellaris Wolf Hunter', was granted to a cultivator of the Ellaris Guard for exterminating a pack of Dangerous wolf-like Ferocious beasts to the east of Ellaris.

However the most interesting part of Merit Badges was their use as a status symbol for cultivators, especially higher level Merit Badges which were much harder to come by. Such Merit Badge holders would receive large amounts of attention and often be bestowed a title along side their badge.

At this point in her explanation, Bluefire suddenly asked Casmir a question.

"Casmir, haven't you ever wondered why people call me Master Bluefire?"

Casmir was surprised by her sudden question but from the context he quickly pieced together her meaning.

"Well I assumed it was because of your Qi refining skills.. have you received a merit badge before then?"

Bluefire nodded, explaining "Yes, after my work on the Dragonfly Shuttle many people were impressed by the weapons systems I designed. The noted my focus on adapting personnel requirements to minimise the amount of Qi energy impurities cultivators received, while simultaneously keeping the weapons systems at full combat capacity."

"Thanks to my efforts I was Granted a Hero Grade 2 badge, Master Qi Refiner. Ever since then people have called me Master Bluefire out of respect for that Merit Badge."

With a twist of her hand, a small bronze metal badge appeared in Bluefire's palm, a rainbow coloured crystal at its centre.

"It's not the only Merit Badge I have received, when I was younger I was awarded with a few low grade Civilian and Guardian Merit Badges but they were not valuable enough to be given a title alongside them." Bluefire explained casually.

Casmir was intrigued by the Merit Badge when he saw it, he noted that the crystal at its core gave off a very unique Qi energy signature. Casmir speculated it might be a form of identification for the badge but he didn't worry about that for the moment, he was more interested in how the Merit Badge had suddenly appeared in her hand like that.

"Master, how did you do that with the Merit badge? It just appeared out of thin air?" He asked.

A look of surprise appeared on Bluefire's face as she looked at her own hand with a slightly bemused expression.

"Haha.. oops." She said softly with a smile, realising that she truly was treated Casmir too casually for her own good.

"I'm not supposed to show that to outsiders really.. but I suppose it doesn't matter for my disciple. You'll probably use them in the future anyway." Bluefire said as she gently placed her hand on her own c.h.e.s.t.

Suddenly as Master Bluefire's feminine hand rose away from her c.h.e.s.t, a pitch Black Crystal rose out of her body with an ethereal quality to it. Almost as if the crystal wasn't real, but a projection made from a high Grade Qi Chip.

She held the black crystal in her palm as her Merit Badge suddenly vanished with a slight flash from the Black crystal. "This is a very rare and special form of Qi technology called a Void Crystal, it uses a special resource and a variety of complex and secret arrays to create an independent space in which you can store objects."

"It's truly a marvel, but like I explained earlier its a new form of Qi technology that is a secret to the public, generally only Qi Grade 6 cultivators use them because of their value and the fact that they require Soul Energy to be used properly."

Casmir looked at the pitch black crystal with a brilliant look in his eyes, wondering how such a technology could even function. The crystal itself was such a deep dark black colour that it felt as if it was absorbing the light around it, it gave it a very mysterious vibe that intrigued Casmir.

"However," Bluefire said, interrupting Casmir's thoughts "for now you shouldn't speak a word of Void Crystals to anyone. Do you understand Casmir? Even your girlfriends!" She said seriously, with a slightly depreciative look as she mentioned Casmir's girlfriends.

Bluefire then placed the Void Crystal on her c.h.e.s.t once more, allowing it to slowly sink into her body and disappear once again.

Casmir nodded in response to her question, not caring about her derision towards his current lifestyle. His attention was focused on watching as the crystal sank into the skin just above Bluefire's b.r.e.a.s.ts, not realising his eyes were intruding upon Bluefire's privacy.

Unfortunately for Casmir Bluefire did notice his gaze and quickly stood up wanting to scold Casmir, but after seeing no l.u.s.t or heat in his eyes, she simply harrumphed towards him and turned around.

"Alright! It's time to go Casmir, come on!" Bluefire said in a loud voice, tainted by the lingering frustration she felt from his gaze upon her body.

Little did she know that Casmir was completely oblivious to her feeble anger, his mind didn't contain the slightest of l.u.s.tful feelings towards his Master, if anything he saw her as a guardian-like figure.

During the entire time he stared at Bluefire's body, he was simply daydreaming about the possible uses of Void Crystals and how such a technology worked.