CHANGE OF PLANS

General Zard calmly started the meeting.

"I think you kids will have a hard time trying to keep up with us,"

The Beast king could unfortunately not join us this morning but, other than the eight of us here, Mrs Kelly was here.

We were all in the training grounds of the castle, sitting in the grass, everyone dressed in the appropriate tier as the situation suggested. Though saying dressed might be just a stretch of exaggeration.

The general was in running shorts with some type of sneakers made to handle the strength of a half-dragon, with a white army shirt to finish. Today, he looked just as calm as ever, or at least as calm as I have seen him since, like, ever.

His rock hard white face, with a tight lipped mouth and sharp nose almost made him look like from another race, were it not for the way his body was built. And whereas Mrs Kelly left her wings reign free at her back, Zard hid his with his magic, and would probably use them in case of an emergency. I would really like to see those wings of his though.

Kanon could be said to wear the same as the general, though he had no shirt on him, as usual. His brown abs glittered in the morning sun of Terill, one of the planets in the beast verse that the castle appeared to this week. I caught a certain monster staring at the dark elf and rolled my eyes at the irony.

Merlik was surprisingly dressed the same as the two men, but she had that black mask of hers on for some reason. Maybe it's just a habit of hers. Though beneath that mask, I could she had the beautiful face of Egyptians, and with her dark hair braided up into a ponytail for easier movement.

What's surprising is that she had game! Jeez, how did I not notice this from before?! She was definitely packing, and I didn't mean her muscles. Oh, look at that, Queen is glaring at me since she caught me staring. Like I care if she caught me or not.

Sally was in the same get up as all of them, nothing too surprising from her. The elves, I and Queen were dressed just how we normally dressed during this training, same to Mrs Kelly.

"Princess, I bet you trained them to the bone for what's to come?" General Zard continued.

"Of course I did. And don't call me princess, Zard. You know I don't like it," she answered with a frown. The general smirked before continuing. Those two definitely have something going on or had something going on, but I just can't pinpoint when or how.

"Well then. Kids and elves, I think I should explain to you why I think your still not ready to be on the same training as us. Though it's obvious, we four have both reached a point where such things like training are not as important to us as it is you. We all have more experience in this type of situations and also in terms of resilience, sure you kids are above average at your age, but us grown ups have build up a good resilience over the years,"

"Hence, I've deduced that the best option for the Elite is to spilt us up into an equal group of four, one with each leader in order to maximize the improvement. Princess, I think you have the right to choose that said leader since you've been with them the most,"

Mrs Kelly glared at the general, and I could almost feel a powerful fireball brewing from within her. She was really pissed at him. But she breathed in then turned back to all of us.

"OK, judging by how quick and fast they are all advancing, and how each have managed to build up a good endurance over the week, this will be a hard choice," she said, then placed her hand on her chin, looking thoughtful.

I wonder who she will pick. Definitely not me, cause sure I maybe the same age as Queen, but in terms of experience, she outweighs me by far. Let's not forget that both elves in our group are around eighteen, so it's most likely one of them, due to the age difference.

"Ah! This is a good chance to give you all my assessment of the kids over the time I've heard with them. Let's start with you, Earl. I've seen that you've gotten faster and much more stronger over the weeks we've been together, but you lack cooperation with anyone I'm assigning you to. For a leader, that is not one of the beast qualities,"

Earl nodded like he understood, which, quite honestly surprised me. He doesn't usually just hear these things normally, especially when one of them involves choosing the person to order him around. Maybe he gained some new found respect for Mrs Kelly.

"Alvin, you've been much better over the course of the week, even helping your teammate where needed. Buy I'm sad to say you are good at following orders, not giving them, as it has been very obvious,"

Alvin looked surprised, then somehow understood and realized that that was true.

"I'm sure you are all surprised that I've eliminated the most likely candidates for the position of leader, I'm I right, Zard? Call me princess one more time and there will be blood,"

"Don't worry, princ–I mean Kelly. We all trust your judgement in this, don't we guys?"

We all nodded in agreement. Mrs Kelly has never steered us wrong, so why start now?

But that just left me and Queen. Now I'm feeling really tensed about her next words.

"Coming up to the two youngest in the group, I'll start with Max. You've definitely improved much quicker than the rest of them, and you do have the quality to lead, and I would make you the leader, but Queen here seems to be more experienced in this type of situations, and has improved faster, the same as you,"

Huh, figures. I already knew that is what she was going to say. Congrats to...

"Be that as it may, I still can say with full certainty that Max is the most deserving to lead this group,"

"WHAT?!" I exclaimed in shock. Everyone else in the meeting seemed to agree with her, and we're clapping their hands.

"Wait, wait! I thought you said I didn't have the experience. So why pick me?" I asked Mrs Kelly.

"Well, you have something that she doesn't, and that's the need to act on instincts. She unfortunately is slow in that aspect, and in war, that could be a fatal mistake. Of course, the assistant leader would be her, you need all the help you can get,"

"I think I agree with that assessment, I can say the same about everybody else. Moving on, let's continue with the goal of the next months training. Teamwork with abilities. Of course, that's what my group has been doing for the past weeks we've been here, but I'm guessing that's not the case with your group Kelly,"

"Nope. During their endurance training, as I said, I've been grouping them with each other and forcing then in situations where they have too handle difficulties as a team. I think they have some idea of how to use their abilities to their advantage,"

The general nodded and continued, "Ah, I see. But I don't think we know of each others abilities, in this group. We may have some idea, but not the whole grasp of it. I think we should all take this time to know each other, since even though we'll be split into to, at times will still have to work together as all of us,"

Sally was the first to speak on the suggestion, "General, is that really a wise idea? Let's say one of us is captured by the enemy and they have someone who can read his or her memory, wouldn't it be a very bad out come for us if that were to happen?"

"What you say is true, Sally. But by revealing our abilities, I didn't mean we also reveal our tramp cards. Knowing about our different abilities and seeing how well we can use them is a different case. So take this to heart, kids. Don't go revealing more than you need to. Reveal just enough that requires you to work together with your teammates,"

"Since that's out of the way, I guess I should be first. So basically, I'm sure you all know by now I'm a half-dragon. And I bet you kids have seen Kelly in action a bit. So basically, I can do what a dragon can, but better than her,"

"What's that supposed to mean?" Mrs Kelly asked, standing up in anger.

"Nothing really. Just stating the obvious," the general answered with a calm look on his face.

"I'm going to act like I didn't hear that right now. But I hope you can back those words of yours once we're done here,"

"Is that a challenge?"

"Alright you two. Finish this discussion after we're through here," Sally interrupted the two heated demi-gons. "Anyways, my ability is speed, and I have a good grasp of my monster side,"

Mrs Kelly sat down, fuming, but nonetheless knew that this was neither the place nor the time. Kanon was next in line to tell us his ability, though we all knew it first hand since it was quite obvious.

"I can control one of the four guardians of the elements. That's all I got," he said.

"I'm more of a wind controller," Merlik said through her mask.

Alvin looked at all of us, doubtful at first that what they said was true, but he too joined the party.

"I'm more of a wind user myself," he stated.

Earl really didn't need to inform us of his power, those tentacles of his are hardly unforgettable, especially during training with him. But they too lost out to Mrs Kelly's flames, so I'm not exactly sure how powerful they really are.

"I'm an ice user. That much is obvious," Queen said as she flaunted her hair to the wind. She's awfully cocky today, like her ice ability is superior compared to all mentioned her. She wished, at least.

"And finally, you, Max," the general said was he nodded at me.

"Yeah, Max. What is your ability? At first, I thought it was a strengthening ability, but when your speed increases, that makes it all the more harder to pinpoint," Sally said.

"She's right, you know. I couldn't guess what it was during the demo-might and it was more harder to know it during your camp's competition," Merlik said.

"Wait, you watched my competition, Mrs Melik? I thought I wasn't that important for someone like you to even consider as an ally," I said, shocked that she would even consider knowing about the competitions.

The general was the one to answer for her, "Come now, kid. Did you really think an adamantium warrior would miss watching a fight that involved another of his or hers? The answer is no, the same way I watched Queen's match here,"

"Wait, I wasn't informed about this! Oh, gods. I'm sorry, Queen, that I couldn't watch your camp's competition," I apologized as I turned to her.

"Oh please. There's nothing to apologize for. I also didn't watch yours, or did you forget we were still in school? Now tell as what your ability is, cause if you can also use a water ability that easily, I'm also curious,"

The four older beings in our groups eyes widened in shock. Huh, guess they didn't have any idea about that.

***

[Yo, Bradley. What should I tell them? I'm not sure I can keep up with this rouse about having a speed ability and getting really lucky]

<Hmm... in such a case, I think it would be OK to tell them about your ability, the wizard one, of course. The healing one should still remain hidden, OK?>

[Got it]

***

"Yeah, so my ability is called Warlock. In short, I can basically cast any spell as long as my mana can handle it,"

"YOU'RE A WIZARD?!" every one exclaimed in shock.

"Huh, I guess you are all right. Yup, I'm a wizard,"

Not like I would correct them, or anything.

"Huh, that's...suprising. But anyways, let's continue with the agenda for the day. We've realized that time is not on our side, or at least, not enough to cover what we planned for training. So, the king agreed to combine the last two ideas for training," General Zard said.

"Since we were essentially supposed to train our compatibility with each others abilities then go up against beasts, we've decided to train our compatibility AND fight the beasts,"

No one reacted to what he said. Probably because that was to be expected, and quite frankly it would have been dumb to train us separately in those to aspects.

"I guess you all came to that decision too. Well then, go pack for your essentials, we're leaving in five minutes,"

"Wait, that quickly?!" Earl asked in surprise, then realized that he was the only one left since all of us had already gotten up and hurried back to the castle.

"OH YOU BACK STABBING MOTHER–"