Lightbringer System: Orphan to Paragon

It all leads up to this. I have to get a good result or this will all be for nothing. Kain died because of his fear of truly becoming trash after today, and I want him to see the heights we will achieve together from the afterlife! 

The trainee knights started performing the Awakening one by one, which consisted of placing their hand on the large crystal orb that would stimulate the inner potential of the user. This shows two things, whether one has the potential to become a Soul Cultivator, and the element that they are most suited for if so. 

As each of the trainee knights went up to orb, few will leave in a good mood. Out of the 50 trainee knights in the ceremony this year, not including myself, only 4 are expected to have the potential to awaken and can learn to cultivate their Soul Core, and work towards potentially becoming a powerhouse in this world. The orb will not react if the person does not have appropriate potential.

Looking up at the sky, I saw that dark clouds were now forming, as if to swallow the light itself. How ominous for our fates today.

After 13 failures, the Awakening orb finally reacted to one of them, a young female trainee knight around my age. I believe her name was Leliana? The orb glowed with a bright earthy brown, and the number 4 was visible in it. That means she is a Rank 4 Soul Initiate with an Earth affinity. You can not ask for a better affinity when it comes to being a knight of the Duskbane family. 

Not all of Kain's memories have integrated yet, so some stuff is still hazy in my head, but I believe Soul Cultivators starting with Soul Initiate who can awaken with a starting point of Soul Rank of 1-9. Only they are taught the information about the higher ranks, but I do know of Father's rank.

Father is a Rank 96 Demigod, with a Dark affinity. You normally only see affinities for Fire, Water, Wind, and Earth, with extremely few exceptions being Light and Dark. If the chance is 4 out of 50 for a talented person to awaken and get one of the main four elements, then you would be a 1 in a 100 to get a light or dark element. 

Leliana left the stage and went to sit in a designated area for successful awakeners near my family, being applauded by the attendees of the ceremony. 

After around an hour of the ceremony, my time has finally come. In order to not be killed by the System, I needed to successfully awaken. A person can awaken anywhere from Rank 1-9, and usually indicates the potential of said person. 

Feeling the weight of the attendee's eyes upon me, especially the ones from my family, I wore my best confident facade and approached the orb. 

Anxiously placing my hand on the orb, I prayed, Please just give me a Soul Rank of 1 if nothing else! You probably hear this often, but it is quite literally life or death for me!

I felt a strong and warm energy flow through my body through the orb. At first there was no reaction from the orb, and my heart dropped. There's no way, right? The Duskbane bloodline had to at least awaken with a Soul Rank of 1! 

The dark clouds above me had to be connected to my emotional state, because they were growing darker as we speak, ready to wash away this stain on the Duskbane name.

Orin loudly said so everyone present would hear, "Looks like even the world doesn't think you should be here, trash! Where is your useless bravado now about earning the right to be here?!"

The audience to his show of getting rid of me started to join in, and insulting me by calling me the "Trash of the Duskbane family", how my existence was an insult to my Father, and various others. 

"I will remember these kind words of all of you. You will come to painfully regret them one day, every single one of you" I said, finally letting loose the anger and frustration over everything towards everyone present. 

I fought fucking tooth and nail to survive on those damned streets as an orphan, nobody would offer me help and only beat me for even thinking to ask. 

I learned though! The right words to say to each group, to be able to incite gang wars between bandits when one of them would threaten my life, and even conversing with nobles out of my league! A few nice words to them would earn me a few copper coins, enough to buy a loaf of bread I could make last a week if I was careful about the mold!

I will not accept this result, Kain killed himself because of this fucking ceremony, and I will not let both of our deaths be in vain!

I reached back and slammed my hand on the orb with as much force as I could, not giving it a choice to reconsider testing me again, and the stimulating energy flowed through my body again. Humans were not made to handle this energy twice at the mortal level, and forcibly doing so resulted in me coughing blood onto the orb. 

I WILL AWAKEN!

The orb reacted by losing its clarity and filling with a deep black that almost seemed to have an infinite depth. The audience went silent as they witnessed the black clouds in the sky grow darker and move to envelop the stage I was on. 

A Natural Reaction! 

This was a rare reaction where the user's affinity with an element starts at Rank 9! No number was displayed, because it did not have to be. The environment reacting to the orb's reaction was proof of a prodigy being born! I awakened the fucking Dark element at Rank 9?! 

As the black clouds kept moving towards me, the System's voice appeared in my head. 

[A Hero is one who rises when the world is against them. When Fate acts against them, they shatter it!]

[Task: A Hero is Never Late - Complete!]

> Objective: Get to the Awakening Ceremony on time, and successfully Awaken - Complete!

> Reward: A second Soul Core

What do you mean, a second Soul Core?! How is that possible, System? 

[The previous host's soul agreed to leave you his Soul Core if you were able to successfully Awaken in front of everyone.]

But what does that mean for Kain? What happens if he does not have his Soul Core anymore?

[This was a reward that Kain wanted to offer towards the man who had the potential to become the Lightbringer. A pure soul who never wished harm upon any of his abusers, nor destruction upon the world, and last words were to wish his family a happy life. A soul that would have also made a potential Lightbringer if he was eligible for the Lightbringer System.]

His last words were to wish his family a happy life? How is it possible for someone to suffer like we have, and still remain a ray of sunshine?

Wait… A ray of sunshine? A second Soul Core means a second element affinity can possibly awaken… There's no way.

Within the endless darkness in the orb, a shining golden light began to form and rapidly grow until it filled the entire orb and covered the darkness inside of it. The golden light inside the orb grew so powerful, that a beam of light shot out the top of it and wiped out the dark clouds coming towards me and into the sky. When the light reached the clouds in the sky, it dispelled the dark clouds there as well, leaving only a bright and sunny day in its wake.

I have both the Light and Dark elements… 

A golden number formed from the orb, in large visible numbers to the entire audience. Staring at the golden number before me, I wanted to fall to the ground from the shock. 

Rank 10.