Strongest Hammer God novel Chapter 26

Chapter 26: Chapter 26 – The Four Aspects of Power

Samson and Kyle returned home. _{fɾēewebnσveℓ.com}

Kyle learned more about Sandspeak, the language of this area, and went to bed.

The next day, he was sent to accompany Tarren, the older hunter.

Tarren had been working for Samson for over ten years, and he was the longest-standing employee at the company.

"Samson actually also recruited me from the prison," Tarren explained as he went through a bush.

"You were... in prison?" Kyle asked, trying to get the grammar right.

"Yep," Tarren answered. "Banditry. In case you don't know the word, I essentially stole from merchants on the road. I even had a group under me."

"Sadly, or luckily, we ran into a guard squad, which quickly suppressed us."

"I spent a couple of weeks in prison. At that time, Samson was searching for new hunters for his business. He had been working alone until then, and well, I joined. I've been working for him ever since," Tarren explained.

Kyle got most of what Tarren said.

"Back then, I was just an Early Squire. Well, technically, I can't count as a Squire since I didn't have the luxury to undertake the ritual."

'There's that weird word again. Early Squire. Still don't know what the fuck that's supposed to mean,' Kyle thought.

"What's a Early Squire?"

"An Early Squire," Tarren corrected before turning to Kyle. "Wait, you don't know what a Squire is? How can you not know that?"

Kyle shrugged. "Never heard."

Tarren frowned. He wanted to know how it was possible that someone didn't know what a Squire was, but trying to get something out of Kyle was too frustrating due to the language barrier.

"It's how we determine someone's power," Tarren explained. "There are different Realms. You could call them levels of strength."

"Every Realm has five levels, and reaching a new one increases your power substantially."

"In the beginning, you are a normal human and are not part of the First Realm yet."

"If you train hard enough and get your hands on a bit of Ether, you can become an Initial Squire. You will be quite a bit more powerful than a normal human, and you essentially took your first step towards the path of power."

"Did you get all that?" Tarren asked.

"Eh, normal person trains. Normal person needs Ether. If true, then more power, right?" Kyle asked.

"More or less," Tarren said with a nod as he jumped onto a branch to look at the surroundings.

"The stronger you get, the more Ether you need to become even stronger. You can partially generate your own Ether by training, but it's much faster and easier to just buy it," Tarren explained.

"Question: Where Ether come from?" Kyle asked.

"Everywhere," Tarren answered, gesturing to the air around him. "It's in the air, in the earth, in stone, in water, in the trees, in animals, and so on. It's everywhere. The difficult part is getting it into your body."

"How to get into body?" Kyle asked.

"There are multiple ways," Tarren said as he landed in front of a tree with unripe fruit.

He took out one of his satchels and emptied the contents onto the tree's roots.

"Some Ether is toxic to humans. Some Ether is beneficial to humans. Some Ether is just useless to humans."

"A good example of toxic Ether is the Ether inside beasts. Beasts don't want to be eaten, which is why they evolved a trait that makes their Ether toxic to humans. Other beasts don't have that issue since they evolved traits that deal with that toxicity but humans... well..."