Triple Casting?

Denis looked from Noll to Snow and back to Noll again, standing between the two.

"I shall start with the rules for this match, if you have anything I say then speak up."

The two nodded in response, Snow standing there lackadaisically with his left thumb in the pocket of his pants while his left arm hung down, his fingers moving in a rhythmical fashion, his right foot doing the same.

Noll, on the other hand, held a sword aloft with both of his hands, his knuckles turning white from the force as he glared at Snow with gritted teeth.

Ignoring that, Denis waved both of his hands one in the direction of each of them, sending a visible wave of magic power in their direction, something caused Noll to tense slightly until it wrapped around him creating two barriers, doing the same to Snow.

"The match will end when the first barrier around you is broken, it's strong enough to withstand a fully powered blow from a peak Novice Knight," Snow's rhythmic movements stopped for a moment before resuming, this time slightly slower.

"It'll lose power as you strike it so do your best. Everything else is fair game, go wild." Denis left the field with those words, glancing at Snow as he did so, which he ignored.

The field was left in silence for a while until Noll broke the silence.

"You're really just like I thought, not putting anyone in your eyes… You're too arrogant!"

Noll dashed at Snow as he finished saying that leaving Snow looking at him with a raised eyebrow before he shook his head, forcefully tapping his right foot on the ground, breaking his rhythm and sending a wave of magic power across the ground almost instantly.

A Magic Sensor would have noticed Snow's previous rhythmic movements trickling magic imperceptibly, sending it down to the floor in between him and Noll where Denis had been standing, slowly taking control of the ambient magic there and leaving a magic path behind.

Using that magic path, he could cast the spells he had been preparing almost instantly.

The ground in front of Noll froze before a flash of fire burned on top of it for a moment before disappearing.

Bill's eyes widened as his left foot landed on the ice and slipped due to the layer of water left by the ice melting from the earlier flash of fire, starting to fall back first to the ground.

At that moment Snow tapped his right foot on the ground again sending a bigger stream of magic that pooled at the spot below where Bill's head was falling to.

The pool turned into a visible green ball of wind magic that slammed into the back of Bill's head, breaking the barrier with the sound of shattering glass.

Once more silence reigned the field as everyone watching was left stunned by Snow's display of ability.

"Impossible!" Someone shouted in disbelief

"T-Triple casting…" Kelly whispered incredulously.

"No way…"

"How…"

All the while, Leon continued looking at Snow, a grim look on his face.

Triple Casting, the ability was simple on paper, allowing one to cast three spells at the same time, however, this required one to divide his attention in between three spells without allowing them to fail, something that could cause catastrophic consequences for the caster, especially in the middle of battle.

"Wrong."

However, this wasn't what Snow had done.

"What Snow used, was an application of Delayed Casting. A technique where you can cast each spell individually, before leaving it 'on hold', if you will, allowing the caster to dedicate only a small portion of his attention to maintaining the spell. This is very useful for laying down traps as you have seen, among many other applications."

Denis took advantage of the situation to teach his class, pointing out useful information for them.

Noll also slowly got up having recovered from his stunned state, looking at Snow with a conflicted gaze and a frown.

"This allows a 'pre-casted' spell to take effect immediately, not leaving the opponent any time to react, leaving Noll helpless to slip on Snow's ice." Denis let out a chuckle as he said those words, finding the wordplay amusing.

He looked around and grinned in satisfaction when he noticed he had captured his students' attention.

"As you can see, preparation is essential. As some say, preparation is half the battle. Snow's preparation in this fight allowed him to dispatch his opponent with minimal effort on his part, but this only worked because Noll wasn't expecting it, which you could say is due to carelessness. Remember to always be careful of traps, as they can easily turn a battle around."

Noll grimaced at his teacher's words, feeling like they were directed at him.

Snow approached the teacher and took advantage of the pause of Denis's words to address Noll, who was now beside him.

"I think that should have proved whether or not I'm deserving of listening to. Anything else you'd like to add?"

Noll opened and closed his mouth for a few seconds hesitating on what to say before finally shaking his head. "No…"

Snow nodded his head and kept silent, waiting for Denis to start speaking again, but before he could, Noll gave Snow a deep bow, to the surprise of those watching.

"I'm sorry for calling you arrogant. I thought you were not taking me seriously and became irritated at that. I apologize for my actions."

Snow looked at Noll with mild surprise in his eyes before he released a chuckle.

"Raise your head. While your actions weren't the most appropriate, your heart was in the right place, that's not something to ashamed of."

Noll raised his head and looked at Snow with visible surprise on his face for a moment, before he lowered his head once again, a small smile on his lips.

"Thank you, your highness."

Snow's face twitched slightly before releasing a small sigh as he looked at the top of Noll's bowed head.

"I told you to raise your head, I appreciate your respect but we are all classmates, no need to mind hierarchy unless the situation calls for it." Snow said, making his thoughts clear.

Noll raised his head and nodded, his small smile widening slightly, which got a helpless shake of Snow's head in response before he turned to look at the rest of his classmates.

"And that goes for everybody else. You should know that the Royal Family does not look kindly upon the abuse of power."

There were a few discreet gulps as everyone nodded, while some looked at Snow with appreciation in their eyes.

Two girls, in particular, looked at Snow with shining eyes, seemingly transfixed by his image.

It was common knowledge in the kingdom that the King did not approve of the abuse of power commonly seen in other kingdoms, where some Nobles liked to treat commoners as slaves and inferior beings.

That being said, while the Crown was powerful it wasn't all-seeing and some troublemakers slipped through the cracks. They were swiftly dealt with when found, however, a prompt public execution awaited them if their actions were deemed unacceptable.

Snow just kindly reminded them of that fact.

He glanced at three people in particular narrowing his eyes before looking away after a moment.

He'd sweep out the trash later.

The people he glanced at felt a chill pervade their bodies to their clueless confusion.

*CLAP*

Everyone turned to look at Denis as he clapped his hands to gather their attention.

"I suppose that's enough excitement for today, you're dismissed for the day, explore and make yourselves acquainted with the school, after all this could be considered your home for the few years to come."

A chorus of responses followed before Denis walked off.

Snow followed closely after, not wanting to deal with the aftermath of his actions, namely, being surrounded by people wanting to befriend him.

This left those people looking at his back with disappointment, wanting to go after him yet not wanting to offend him by doing so, allowing him to get away.

Snow proceeded to quickly walk through the halls of The Academy with a familiarity that only upperclassmen could match.

After a while, he arrived in front of a door and stopped allowing a man dressed in dark clothes to land beside him, kneeling with his head down.

"They left a few minutes ago."

One of Snow's eyebrows rose in surprise. "Where to?"

"The sparring hall, left side." The man answered curtly.

Snow was stunned momentarily before releasing a laugh.

"Was she involved?"

The man kneeling hesitated for a moment before answering. "It appeared so."

Snow smiled sharply, narrowing his eyes slightly. "Now this is interesting."

He glanced at the kneeling man and started walking once again, this time in the direction of the left hall's sparring rings.

Behind him the kneeling man disappeared from view as soon as Snow stopped looking at him, fading into the shadows once more.

When Snow reached the sparring rings, the first thing he heard was the distinct sound of clashing swords ringing out occasionally.

Speeding up his steps while wrapping a layer of magic that made him harder to notice and reducing his presence to the minimum he could, he walked through the entrance and looked down toward the ring where the sounds were coming from.

There, with her blue hair fluttering around from her quick movements, was Victoria.

Opposite to her dodging, counter-attacking, or parrying Victoria's attacks was a girl with red hair of similar length to Victoria's.

At first glance, both girls seemed evenly matched, but to the trained eye, the match had long been decided.

For every attack the red-head managed to launch, Victoria delivered two in return, leaving her scrambling to dodge or parry while Victoria dodged most attacks with barely any wasted movement, rarely needing to parry an attack.

The red-head quickly grew tired and showed an opening.

Quickly gathering her magic power onto her blade, Victoria thrust its tip into the opening she managed to create right at the neck of her adversary shattering the barrier similar to the one Denis had created.

The blow, along with the shattering of the barrier, sent the red-head stumbling back, struggling to regain her balance for a moment before she managed to stick her sword in the ground using it as support as she gasped and panted for air.

Victoria on the other side, stood graciously with her rapier-wand aloft, ready for another attack, lowering it down to its sheath after a moment.

Snow smirked as he watched her actions, feeling amused at how she was hiding her fatigue.

After all, despite how efficient and conservative Victoria was with her stamina, there was no way she wouldn't get tired, even if it was only mentally due to how closely she was dodging her opponent's strikes.

Nonetheless, Victoria hid it remarkably well, only the increased rise and fall of her chest showing how tired she truly was.

It spoke volumes of her discipline that she wouldn't allow herself to relax even now.

Snow looked fondly as he watched Victoria nod to her teacher, and saying a few words, before making her way out of the sparring hall, through the entrance Snow was standing at.

Snow walked beside her watching with curiosity as she allowed herself to relax slightly now that there wasn't anyone around, and decided to reveal himself, feeling like he had intruded on her privacy.

"Still as feisty as ever aren't you." He said as soon as he allowed his presence to return to normal and his spell faded away.

Victoria immediately tensed drawing her rapier and striking in his direction, only to have it be stopped by a blue hexagonal barrier, and quickly stepped back putting distance between her and the sudden ambusher.

When she focused her eyes she was surprised to see a familiar face right in front of her's followed immediately by a quick bite of pain in her forehead as he flicked it with his finger.

"See? Point proven." Snow smirked down at her as he took a step back letting her look at him as she rubbed her forehead.

Victoria kept looking at Snow's face trying to understand why she found him familiar until he tilted his head to the side making his white hair shift in front of his face, triggering memories she had almost forgotten.

"Snow?"