Chapter 142: Too Weak To Dream
Niara felt Darian’s reaction, then confirmed what he’d guessed: "Yeah, the Children of the Academy, the ones I asked the Elders about before, are Mannaz created with the Academy’s help."
"If they helped the Dragon King, then his planet must be one of the four members of the inscription, right?" Darian asked calmly.
She nodded. "The ones with Dragon blood live in the north of the galaxy. In the south, there’s the King of the Bird Tribe; to the east, the felines; to the west, the canines." She took a deep breath and added, her voice pained:
"After I escaped and spent a few years hiding, I visited those places to understand everything. In some... I had to kill certain bastards. That’s why I became pretty well known among the Mannaz. In the end, I confirmed that on the four main Mannaz planets, the Academy helps the Kings create some anomalies..."
"In my case, while I was there, they focused completely on me. But in the other places..." She paused, her fists clenching tightly. "They kidnap everyone with mutations, use the Academy’s Stellar Ore to keep them alive, and run tons of experiments on them. Obviously, they all die in the end... so they figured out that if they created a couple and subtly altered them, then had them produce a child and altered it while it was being conceived... there was a slightly better chance the kid would survive."
"The ones born this way are the ’Children of the Academy.’ I’ve seen a few before... they’re miserable, with twisted minds and bodies. They usually die before reaching adulthood. And they still have to be lucky enough to be born with talent and become Summoners. But in rare cases, they succeed... some powerful Summoners and Spiritual Guardians came from this."
Darian listened, feeling deep pain as he pictured and understood what had really been done.
Because the Mannaz Bloodline had weakened, the Academy started testing all kinds of methods to create powerful Summoners. They had those Stellar Ores, which had affinity with life energies. If used roughly, they could try to keep someone alive even after terrible procedures.
The Dragons got lucky with Niara’s birth. But in the tribes... the obvious move was to try to reunite the Enfield Bloodline, which had been split into three branches.
"About your younger brother’s and sister’s Summoners... every Child of the Academy I met was like a puppet. To keep them stable, the Academy literally took over their minds and made them act according to orders," Niara added.
Darian snorted. "The Leader of the Academy is the one controlling those twisted puppets. He’s a traitor. Lucy and Lucius noticed something wrong and refused to complete the contract with the two. Those kids caused trouble on purpose to get arrested... so I would notice what was going on."