Iron Hawk, Part 2

All seven guys then went straight to the plains on the south side of Geldern to bear witness to Gerald's magic.

Although they didn't usually use magic to fight, they still enjoyed a good magic demonstration. As such, they didn't want to miss a chance to see what the new guy could do.

As they all came to an appropriate distance from the city walls, the Iron Hawks stepped back to give Gerald some space to do his thing.

'Alright, I need to try my best this time. I can't embarrass myself before these guys or they might think that I'm weak,' Gerald thought to himself. He took a big breath to clear his mind and quickly gathered the necessary Mana for the spell.

"Watch this," he said. "Stone Bolt!"

With multiple cracking sounds, seven Stone Bolts flew out of the ground and hovered around Gerald like his guards. It took him almost no time at all to cast his spell. The onlookers were stunned, with their mouths agape.

"So fast!" It was one of the twins that said that.

The other one nodded and said, "Indeed, he is a really fast caster."

"Amazing! Seven different projectiles at once! But, can you control them separately?" asked Eneth, after he recovered from the shock.

Gerald thought he was testing him so he quickly answered, "Yes, of course, it's not a problem at all." He looked around to find the closest tree to use as a target. He then decided to make the spell look a bit more impressive and made the bolts fly in a formation while spinning in a circle.

As it approached the tree, the Bolts accelerated and they each moved in a different trajectory to hit the target from different angles.

Thak, thak, thak, thak, thak!

The first five Bolts hit the tree from the front and the sides. The last two flew past it in a big curve and it looked like they completely missed. But in fact, people quickly saw they were flying in a weird trajectory. The stone bolts made a turn and flew back to the tree.

Thak, thak!

The last two Stone Bolts hit the tree from the back. Now the tree had seven Bolts sticking out of it, all around and about equally spaced. Gerald wiped the sweat from his forehead. This maneuver was quite intense and it required a lot of his concentration, but he was really satisfied with the result.

He turned to the Iron Hawk gang to see what they thought about his magic. They were watching him with eyes wide open and their jaws almost on the floor.

First to react was the Spellcaster Eneth as he murmured, "It can't be… This has to be an advanced spell, right?" The other guys nodded in agreement and shock, in their eyes, this was not a simple spell at all.

Gerald frowned and said, "How can that be? According to the definition it's considered a Novice spell as it uses only 1 LIS of Mana."

The Spellcaster's eyes enlarged even more as he screamed, "What?! 1 LIS? And you can make seven separately moving Bolts?"

"Well, actually I just prefer to make seven. You could make more or less if you want. Of course, if you want to keep the Mana consumption the same, you will have to change the size of the Bolts. Like this…" said Gerald and summoned another batch of flying stones.

This time the Bolts were only the length of a finger, but there were twenty of them, hovering around Gerald.

Eneth just straight up lost the control of his legs and fell to his knees in shock. "T- Twenty of them...summoned in a second… 1 LIS…" He soon started spouting nonsense at the edge of insanity.

Suddenly, there was a gleam in his eyes and he ran to Gerald and grabbed him by the shirt while screaming, "Please, brother Gerald! Sell me this spell! I'll give you five, no, ten gold…no, twenty gold coins!"

Gerald frowned and the Stone Bolts aligned themselves towards Eneth. He was ready to turn this guy into a porcupine should the situation escalate.

Luckily, Armaz and Ermaz quickly reached out and pulled the crazy Eneth back, saying "Hey, buddy. Calm down. You don't even have two gold coins, not to mention twenty. Just take a big breath and calm down, alright?"

He did soon calm down in a sense. That's because he fainted from too much stress. The rest felt really awkward about his mental instability.

Kerius came to apologize for his teammate's reaction. He also complimented Gerald on his good spell control. In the end, he said, "I know it's not a polite thing to ask according to what just happened, but, would you be prepared to sell this Stone Bolt spell?" He has seen the power and potential of the seemingly simple spell.

If their mage could master this spell, just as Gerald did, it would be amazing. With his Earth Staff containing 100 LIS worth of Mana, Eneth could summon a swarm of Stone Bolts that would almost cover the sky. With the following barrage, they could make quicky work of any creature they wished.

It would be an insane boost to their income and fame.

Gerald, of course, knew what Kerius was thinking. He already considered all that himself. He wanted to decline at first, but then he remembered there might be another option.

"I'm sorry, but this spell was made by my family…" he said, which was technically not a lie. If he considered himself as the entire family, of course.

Kerius quickly understood what it meant so he nodded and said, "I understand. It's such a shame…"

"But, we might still be able to come to an agreement," Gerald cut him off.

"What do you mean?" Kerius asked curiously.

"We could make a trade. My Stone Bolt for your Unmoving Boulder. Since we are trading our family secrets it should be alright. I think that's a fair deal…" said Gerald and squinted his eyes. He knew that the temptation was great and he just might be able to get his hands on that defensive spell.

Kerius rubbed his chin and said, "I see…" He looked deep in thought as he continued, "I- I will speak to my family, but I make no promises on the outcome."

"No worries, I'm not going anywhere. Just take your time," said Gerald with a smile. The bait was set and fishes were interested. Now he just had to wait for them to bite.

He didn't feel it was too dangerous to give away his creation. From what he saw, Eneth was a slow caster and he probably couldn't bring out even half of the spell's power. That way he would get a nice defensive Combat Art for a simple self-made spell.

As he watched the Iron Hawk leave he rubbed his hands together and smiled, "And now… Time to visit Headmaster Orin for another talk…"