Preparing for the rise

Another 3 years have passed. I'm now 15. It's quite the significant age for mages.

At 15 every mage in the Corsair kingdom has a chance to enter a magic academy where they learn how to become a better mage, and I'm due to enter next month.

My sister is already in her fourth year and is soon to graduate. I heard she's getting into the royal mage corps as an inquisitor. It's quite the high paying job from what I've heard, and although it does have a lot of authority, the responsibility is even larger.

The inquisitors of the royal mage corps are a group of highly trained officials said to be directly under the king.

Sitting at my desk, I lean back on my chair and gaze at the ceiling, just when I was about to get lost in my thoughts, I hear the curtains ruffle.

"Zalfious."

A black shadow could be seen coming out from the curtains beside me.

"Yes, my lord."

Zalfious appears in front of me rising out of a shadow, he was covered in black robes and wore a mask. In the past 3 years he seems to have grown tremendously, I didn't even realize he had this much talent for demonic arts when I first took him in. The him right now could easily defeat the splint eater he had so much trouble with years ago.

"I take it that it's done?"

My tone deepens as I peer at Zalfious diligently bowing right in front of me. He takes off his mask and starts talking.

"Yes my lord. Lady Elaine told me to escort you."

"Then what are we waiting for?"

I stand up abruptly, pushing the chair back in the process. Today is the day I've been waiting for for a long time so I couldn't help but be excited.

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We are spending quite a bit of time getting to that place. They built it deeper within the Pelunia forest than I thought.

Oh right. You're probably wondering what I've been referring to all this time.

It's the demon realm.

If I think back to it, we didn't have a solid base for nearly 6 years since our inception. It's kind of sad really. But I guess it couldn't be helped, we spent all our manpower searching for the four pillars. And still even after 6 years we only found three.

Yes we found three. Elaine and her subordinates came across an extremely talented elf known as Shim Lanque. From Elaine's report, she said that she stumbled upon him while in the far West of the continent in some forest. She decided to recruit him but was met with a rejection. Afterwards she proceeded to beat the life out of him.

That's how he joined. It seems, that Shim would only join us if Elaine beat him in a match.

Well, I'm honestly quite happy with this result, the four pillars were a generational thing so the fact that I can even find three of them within the 6 years since the search is honestly quite surprising.

But even so, I just wish we could find the last pillar faster.

I sigh unconsciously and Zalfious worriedly speaks.

"My lord, is something the matter?"

This guy is extremely loyal. I look up and stare at the small dragon like creature right next to Zalfious. That small dragon is Zalfious' shadow pet.

Even though I could have taught everyone in the shadow academy how to create their own shadow pet, I've only done so to subordinates I find loyal enough. This created a sort of friendly competition where others would try their best to get stronger to get my attention, ultimately raising the entire power level of the academy.

"My lord we're here."

Me and Zalfious both stop in front of two huge trees. They look like they were a couple of hundred years old.

I took a deep breath and walked towards the gap between the two trees while Zalfious followed me. These two trees are the portal to the demon realm, or more specifically it is the entrance that allowed one to enter. The entirety of the realm had been built under an illusion array.

"She must have spent a lot on effort on this, but it's still quite bad. I should probably reinforce it later on."

I smirked as made my way through the portal. I know how hard Elaine has been working in order to try putting up a magnificent illusion array.

"How do I put it? It's kind of grander than expected?"

I stood atop a hill, below me was a huge crater and people doing construction could be seen. Behind was a huge building bigger than several schools. It was stretched around it's edge forming a large circle. It looks exactly like my first life. This place is called the demon realm, a place where the demons reside.

"Hey isn't it the boss?"

I could recognize this voice anywhere, I turn to face the source which was to my left.

"It's been a while Shim."

This young man is Shim. A tall elf with long luscious blonde hair tied into a ponytail and red eyes that could seemingly captivate anyone, he could only be described as beautiful.

"How are you on this fine day my lord?"

I still remember when I first met him. He had requested a battle as soon as he saw me. I beat him up quite badly and ever since that day he has been subservient to me. He's quite the odd one, elves tend to stay in their own territory where they were born and never leave unless a disaster happens. But this guy actively travels the world in search of new experiences.

"How dare you talk to the lord as though he's your friend!"

Zalfious snapped at Shim reprimanding him for his actions. Shim raises both of his hands and gives a "okay okay" gesture.

These two have a sort of rivalry going on. Apart from their constant bickering on useless stuff they are also pretty similar in ranks so I guess it makes sense. Both of them are around first rate.

Well I don't really mind since I fully support anything that would make us stronger. It would be better to have some friendly competition between two of the pillars anyway.

"Ohhh! The clan leader is here!"

I could hear voices calling me from under. I stare down and was met with tens of people looking up at me, eyes filled with admiration and respect.

Disappearing into a cloud of black smoke, I appear in front of the people who were looking at me. Their eyes filled with even more admiration now. Zalfious and Shim soon make their way to join me and stood on my right and left.

Just then, I could see several figures dashing out of the huge building. They soon appeared in front of me. It was Elaine, Risa and Ries.

The three stands in front of me, and Elaine kneels and everyone follows suit. Not a single person in sight could be seen standing, even Zalfious and Shim that were beside me were on a knee. They all looked down and, in unison everyone raised their voice as they exclaimed.

"ALL HAIL THE CLAN LEADER!"

"ALL HAIL THE DEMON CLAN!"

"ALL HAIL THE ALMIGHTY LORD!"

Ah that's right, they call me the clan leader. I don't know when it started but because they did so, we soon became the demon clan, not academy. Well not that I mind, I always thought demon clan was better anyways.

"All may rise."

Everyone stood up in a hurry. It was like a highly coordinated army was in front of me. Elaine walked up to me and bowed.

"Master, I would like to show you around."

I nod in return and a grin could be seen from her face. Is she that happy about being able to show me around?

"Alright everyone! You may all return to your jobs." Is what she said before excitedly leading me around. The others had wanted to come along but apparently Elaine gave them a death stare and they all gave up. I'll just pretend I didn't see anything.

"This here is the outdoor training ground!"

"Outdoor? So there's an indoor training ground?"

"Yes!"

Ah by the way, I don't really know much about this because I wasn't one of those that were contributing to the construction of the realm, I did give them a few pointers here and there about how I wanted the demon realm to look like and taught them a bunch of new arts but that was about it. The others didn't want me to do it because they said the clan leader should sit back and relax. In the words of Elaine...

"Just take it as a surprise! Don't worry we won't let you down!"

I definitely am not. Just seeing this massive crater being worked on right now just put into perspective how much time and effort was spent on this. It's great to see them even using demonic arts in the constructing their doing, it does make for great practice.

"The outdoor training ground is different to the indoor training ground because it's separated into 2 parts. The actual training ground and the arena."

She spent the next few minutes talking about the specifics of the outdoor training ground, before we made our way inside the large building. She called it the main building. There were several hundred rooms just by observing the curved corridor.

"This place is the reception center!"

"This place is the library!"

"This place is the indoor training ground!"

"This place are for shops!"

"And this place is for..."

We took about 30 minutes just exploring the outer circle. Yes, there's an inner circle as well. Apparently this building has 2 parts, an outer circle where all commercial activity happens, and the inner circle, for bedrooms and anything related to lifestyle, like kitchens and showers.

Another few hours and we finally exit the building.

"Ah that's right, how is that thing going?"

I asked Elaine while staring at the people working on the crater. I couldn't see her, but I could feel her tensing up after my question.

"Everyone will return latest the day after tomorrow."

Elaine bows as she says that.

"Good. Alright I'll have to head back now."

I headed towards entrance on top of the hill and Elaine escorts me out. The others were too busy since they were rushing to complete the realm so I told them they need not see me out.

"Great job Elaine, tell that to everyone too."

"You guys really surpassed my expectation."

Elaine blushed and was taken aback by my comments before bowing.

"I'll see you in a few days then."

So I said, before launching myself in the direction I came when getting here.