15 Chapter 15

All three people looked at her with surprise.

"Wait a minute-" Warren jumped in, "If you agreed with me, why'd you give me such a hard time?" Asking the exact same thing the two others were thinking.

"I said you had to be nice and polite, not to approve everything." She answered. "If you did that you wouldn't be the head of the administrations would you?"

"Oh, why didn't you just say so?" He said, turning to them and giving them a warm smile the liked which they'd never seen even on the kindest of people. "I apologize for this, but the academy cannot accept your child at the moment, we request your understanding in this matter."

This time It was Valerie's turn to join the other two in their stupor.

They were shocked.

And for Curtis and Valerie who worked with him, scared.

Did the sun rise in the West today?

"That was so much more simple than the roundabout conversation we just had," He complained, "you could've just told me from the get go and we wouldn't have had to waste our breaths talking."

"Ok... sure.." Valerie unconsciously shifted away from him and looked uncomfortably towards Curtis and Akagi.

"Curtis, you've been in this school for a long time," she started, "You know as well as I do that we are very strict about who we accept."

Even if Curtis wanted her way, it was hard to refute her.

After all, she advocated for the strict screening, and even conducted another one of her own for those who were assigned to her class.

"He's got no background, no official education before this and as far as talent goes, reaching Acolyte at the of 12 is just average." Being average was fine and all in the world, but this was an academy which even rejected the application of the 'talented' more than half the time.

"Trust me, he's..." She stopped herself just short of blurting out his secret. "...he's very talented, it's just that he hasn't had anyone to guide him so far, but I'm sure he'll catch up quickly."

"What about background? Our students come from pretty big places," She argued, "Do you think they'd accept a no back ground kid 4 years younger than them and far weaker sitting in the same class as them?"

Was she going to fight them for him?

Valerie held that part of her sentence back, seeing that the rest of her point had already reached Curtis.

Going too far with it would just antagonize her.

"Not to mention.." Just because Valerie was holding back didn't mean Warren would.

Valerie glared at him to stop, but in his usual fashion he continued on.

"Where's he going to get his resources from?" Luckily he wasn't pushing the same point as her.

Gryphon Academy made it a point that their students needed to come up with their own resources.

Talented meant that they had a good chance of being powerful one day. But it also meant that they weren't cheap.

If Gryphon academy had to supply each student with not only good resources but also ones that suited their constitution, then every teacher would have to work voluntarily.

"You're not in a position to spare some for him either," Valerie pointed out to Curtis, "and even if we let him enter, we'd quickly have to kick him out if his position lags too far behind the rest, which is pretty much where he'll be starting."

Her brows crinkled together as she thought about her options at this point.

...

Back in the apartment, Tasha sat in his room with his legs crossed.

Concentrating as much as he could, he was able to visual his body in his mind.

Starting from his normal physical constitution, he went deeper, into the muscle sinews and fat layers underneath.

Going even further, he could see all his veins and organs almost as if it had been stripped away from him and put back together outside.

If anyone from this side of this novel saw it, they might not necessarily be able to identify all these different parts.

But they'd probably notice that there was a new organ next to the heart which shouldn't be there.

It beat just a step after the heart and shone with luminescent light.

This was what they dubbed a Mana Core.

About the size of a child's fist but was responsible for any great thing a magus had ever done.

Inside Tasha's, a little ball of light was floating at its center, looking almost harmless.

Once he was sure everything was fine, Tasha's breath changed.

It was deeper, more powerful. With every exhale one could almost swear they heard a howl in the distance.

'Breath of the claws' mother dubbed it when she taught him, it was something all the other kids were able to do within weeks of being born.

His Core fluctuated a little as his breathing became more steady, but suddenly the ball of light inside him shifted violently, rampaging within the walls of his mana core.

That plain little ball's form shifted, its sides bubbling while a slit formed in its center getting jagged with each passing second.

And then, nothing..

A sweat drenched Tasha stopped himself before things could go any further.

'Mother told me that I'd be able to get stronger if I went out in the world...'

He looked back, through the time he had ever since he'd left, his core hadn't changed much in all this time.

If anything, it

That either meant Mother was wrong, or he hadn't found what she hoped he'd find.

Since attempting to try it again was pointless, he decided to actually explore the apartment for the first time.

Exiting his room, he spotted the dining table he hadn't noticed was there before.

Mostly because it was buried under the pile of garbage Curtis and him had partially cleaned this morning.

On top of it was something he'd never thought he'd see in this setting.

...

"You shouldn't have told us this." Valerie's political expression has devolved into a frown.

After some time she could only sigh in reluctance, "What's the point of discussing anything with us if you were gonna strong arm us anyway?"

Curtis held back her elation and gave her the best apologetic smile she could muster.

"It's not really a discussion considering we'd never considered the alternative." Before she could say what she wanted to say, Warren had interrupted with this.

"I must say however, that I am pleasantly surprised by an outcome I did not expect." He looked up for the second time today and quite literally displayed his amusement with a "Ha Ha."

Akagi pursed her lips and checked the other two to see if awkward silence was the correct response to his words, seeing the other two's expression, it seemed that 'bewilderment' was more suitable.

To the point that Valerie looked around to figure out if he world was falling apart.

When she saw that it wasn't she attempted to bring the group out of this silence. "Uhh... thank you for that Warren... I guess.. but that doesn't change anything I discussed earlier." She turned back to the two.

"A lot of issues will remain if he enters your advanced class which means we can't put him there.." she continued, "If anything, he's aadded a security risk we can't afford to allow anywhere near the advanced class."

"But you just said..." a wide eyed Curtis tried to interject.

"I wasn't finished." Valerie commanded, "we could still consider putting him in the common classes when the next school year starts in 3 months, he won't be under you, but I trust you don't have anything against the other teacher's teaching methods right?"

At this moment an announcement echoed through-out the whole academy.

[Dear students, due to the effects of the human aging process, I will no longer be able to make the usual daily announcements you all so eagerly dreaded, in my place are Bert and Joe whose voices you will also come to dread by the time you leave here.]

[Bert here, due to the effects of the human aging process, I have been forced to take on this task so that I can list this as a part of my extracurricular activities when I apply for a job further down the human aging process, thank you for having me..]

[...Joe will not be joining us as he is currently affected by the 'milk in fridge' aging process.]

Once it was finished, the PA system gave off with a shrill squeak before shutting down.

"Aw man, Wiz is gone?" Curtis groaned.

"Yes, it is very unfortunate, I always appreciated his dull voice as he made the announcements." Warren added, "Now there's some new kids who will taint the announcements with their 'whimsy' and 'energy'."

"Yeah... sure, 'that's' why I was sad about it." She replied sarcastically.

"Would you look at that.. turns out between your brutish and savage disposition and my scholarly attributes, we do have some things in common." He stated.

"Gee thanks..." Curtis glumly answered.

"Hmm... then again, being similar to you in some way... that doesn't feel right.. You know what? good riddance, why do we need a daily announcer anyway, seems like a waste of budget." Warren recanted almost immediately.

"Ok back to the topic at hand, Curtis how do you feel?" Valerie asked before the conversation deviated even further.

"A little hurt honestly..." Curtis frowned.

"Not reall... I was talking more about this... Tasha.." she checked her files, honestly worried despite the conditions she put forward.

On his medical records, his lack of an appendage had caught her eye.

It was hard enough living through everyday life without drawing the wrong kind of attention.

But put him in the center of haughty kids who probably have powerful backings, talent and an unhealthy dose of unearned God complex and things could get ugly really quickly.

As a principal of this place, she couldn't help but wonder if it was worth the trouble.

"Who's the teacher?"