Chapter-05

As such the following days went by more smoothly as we resumed our training along with classes at the academy, and if I was a little harsher with Yale in training over the next couple of days, it was only to motivate him more… That's right, motivation… ahem… it certainly wasn't me taking my frustrations out on him, no sir. The only new addition to my schedule was Grandpa Doehring's lessons in stone sculpting and that too only shifted from a more theoretical class to a more practical one.

For all these extracurricular lessons and private training, where I let lose my full strength, I made sure I was in a secluded area in the mountains behind the institute. Even then I had Grandpa Doehring act as my look out and even trained myself is sensory magics like windscout and an earth style variation of the same as well. The sensory techniques were the first thing I focused on as it wouldn't do for some random stranger to discover my full power.

No matter what else had happened and whatever fortuitous encounters I had, I did not let up on my training and thanks to that I officially set foot into the 5th rank as a magus after six months at the academy. With the Super Gravity field spell now in my arsenal I made use of it to train my physical body to great effect, those people in the Dragon Ball universe really had the right idea as before the end of the school year I managed to reach 4th rank as a warrior as well even though I did not train my body that much due to being busy with other things.

While I was training my arse off, I also made sure to take plenty of notes in a journal I kept on me. The idea was to make a record of the best and most time efficient way to train oneself, I planned to pass on a copy of all my studies to my little bro Wharton before he heads of to the warrior academy in the O'Brian Empire. In canon, father had decided to send him off to the O'Brian Empire to study there as Wharton had the innate required concentration of dragonblood to train in our clan's ways and become a Dragonblood Warrior.

Father's intentions and actions may have seemed the best at the time considering that the Empire founded by the Deity level expert O'Brian had the best warrior academy, but unfortunately my dear little brother's progress seemed lack lustre. Besides his innate potential as a Dragonblood Warrior and all the perks that came with it, his strength was… 'meh'. Well not this time, no little brother of mine will ever be just 'meh'. So, to achieve that my journal had listed within it all the yoga asanas that I knew, I also put down the instructions for the Blood Essence Refinement technique and I even included a few simpler explanations of the techniques listed in our clan's training manual.

Cause let's face it, after reading through the tome I figured that either my clan was sabotaged by external forces who managed to damage our legacy or the ancestor who penned the thing was high as a kite when wrote it. What the hell does wielding-something-heavy-as-though-it were-light mean, the whole thing was so abstract and don't even get me started on the records of the Impose level as I'm almost positive the author was touched in the head by the very essence of stupid at that point. I honestly had nothing against the techniques in my clan's secret manual but come on, they could have worded things better.

Take the wielding-something-heavy-as-though-it were-light stage, it was nothing more than gaining full mastery of a heavy weapon. There was of course what normal people knew as weapon mastery and then there was this stage which was some next level stuff. The mastery that common people spoke of was only about getting to a stage where the weapon would not interfere with one's movements and they could wield it accurately without losing one's balance or messing one's footwork. Then there was what was mentioned in our manual where it's like the weapon becomes one with the wielder's body and they can control it as easily as their do their limbs. At this level the movement of the weapon is more fluid and one has complete control of momentum meaning each strike is consistently fast and powerful. They can make changes and adjustments to their swings on the fly and even if physics says it is impossible, they can at least position themselves better to best respond to attacks on an almost instinctive level.

Naturally if I was putting all this down in a journal, I had to have mastered all this to some degree myself. The wielding-something-heavy-as-though-it were-light stage I got with several long months of hard effort; I took to swinging around a large club I roughly sculpted from solid rock as practice for this. Initially it was hard as I also had to be careful to not break or worse completely shatter my rough club, stone was quite brittle as well as heavy so mastering that was no walk in the park. Conversely after I got the hang of that I was able to do the reverse of wielding-something-light-as-though-it were-heavy much more easily, that helped boost my straight chisel style stone sculpting to the next level. I was able to pack unbelievable force behind my small and light straight chisel, the general speed and handling skill of the tool was also bumped up a level and the quality of my sculptures increased greatly.

My works were now way better than the horrible first attempts I made, honestly Grandpa Doehring nearly gave up on me as I was really that bad when I first started out- "What is this? I have been cursed by the heavens! I found such a talented genius in the ways of magic and combat but have to suffer due to his complete lack of talent in art." Were his exact words. Thankfully he did not give up on me and with a lot of hard work and repetition, the picky old man is no longer reduced to crying tears of woe from having to view my creations.

The next is the impose level, this was a lot harder for me as I had very little to go on both from my clan's manual and what I remembered from the Transmigrator's memories. So far, I had only a single instance where I felt that I touched upon this realm and the experience was fleeting and transient, I lost the feel for it as soon as I made even the smallest conscious effort to understand it more after the incident.

I experienced that state during one particular sculpting session; it was a long day and I was tired and frustrated due to spreading myself out too much and not seeing enough progress. I had cut down on the number of classes I was attending per week in order to focus on self-training and especially stone sculpting but progress was slow, I was almost of the mind to completely give up on sculpting and use cooking as an alternative to quickly increase my spiritual essence. Still my heart somehow wouldn't let me, not only did I not like the idea of giving up but this was also the legacy of Grandpa Doehring. It just didn't feel right to let it go like that, it almost felt like I was abandoning him or something so, there I was in my usual isolated practice area, straight chisel in hand.

I was so focused as I remembered all that the old man had taught me, from the first day that I met him to here and now, he patiently imparted to me all he had learnt in his life. His stern and wise teacher mode, his easy-going friendship and company, his rascal old man antics and most of all his caring and doting like he was my real Grandpa. Before I knew it, I was moving and the hand holding the straight chisel was chipping away at a boulder around three times my size. I was in a strange fantastical state where I felt as though I had complete control of my body and at the same time I had no control over it, I was somehow aware of all that was going on in my immediate surroundings and the boulder I was working on was in especially sharp focus for me. I was perfectly aware of its texture, its density and even the finest grain lines and fractures in its structure did not escape my attention. With each strike of my chisel, stone pieces were chipped away, each time only so much stone as I needed… no, as much as I wanted, was removed and the sculpture I wanted to carve out was taking shape as if directly willed out of the boulder. It did not take long as far as my usual sculpting sessions went and a little after 3 hours passed, I was standing in front of my completed work, it was the only piece of mine so far that Grandpa Doehring did not order me to destroy immediately. Maybe it was because it was a sculpture in his likeness but I must say that this work that I somehow made had an aura similar to the master pieces I had seen in the Proulx Gallery's master's hall.

Regardless I had no plans to sell this particular sculpture that I decided to name 'Beloved Grandfather', cheesy I know but that was how I felt. Grandpa Doehring seemed very pleased with it though… at least I think… it was hard to make sense of the old man's words in between his happy sobs and loud wails of joy.

Grandpa Doehring's reaction to that incident was odd to say the least, he seemed proud of how far I'd come and prouder still that he had inspired me to make him the subject of such a fine art piece. He also seemed a little jealous that I had experienced a moment of enlightenment so early in my life and progressed so quickly, it also gave him hope and confirmation that I was not completely hopeless as a sculptor. Upon later conversation with Grandpa Doehring on what and how that happened I started to draw parallels between the state of enlightenment while sculpting to the impose level of combat.

The enlightenment seemed to be a sustained application of the impose concept where one becomes hyper aware of their surroundings and also ironically solely focused on a single target or objective. The person becomes so focused on their target or objective that every action they take is to ensure they fulfil it, it's also not like they ignore their surroundings and become victims of tunnel vision either as they remain aware of their surroundings and actively use the environmental conditions to accomplish their task as well. End result, it would feel like the person has taken control of their immediate surroundings and both the person and their immediate area are acting to execute a single task.

In addition to all this I included in my journal a few simple and basic understandings I had of the various elemental laws and edicts that I thought would help Wharton out. Most of it was based on science form the Transmigrator's world that I had verified by observing and studying the natural essences during meditation. Last but certainly not least I included tips and tricks to quickly increase one's spiritual essence, spiritual strength was not given that much importance by warriors but it had its uses, especially in the later stages and I also made note of that so Wharton would not dismiss it.

I included the stone sculpting method that Grandpa Doehring taught me as well as things I'd discovered on my own like cooking, singing and/or playing musical instruments, calligraphy and painting. I had discovered that like stone sculpting helps one grow their spirit by connecting to rocks as they are sculpted, other tasks promoted similar results like connecting with fire while cooking, connecting with the wind when making music, connecting with the water in inks when doing calligraphy or painting or even connecting with light and its various colours when painting.

In short almost every piece of relevant knowledge I had and every insight I gained, I put down in my journal in the hopes that maybe, just maybe it would help my little brother when I couldn't be there beside him as a guide. Plus, all this could be considered as lesson plans and practice for when I finally decide to take the tutoring of my dorm bros and Delia to the next level. Further down the line it could even help my descendants, heck in my opinion at least, it would certainly serve as a better guide than our clan's current secret manual for things other than our Qi training method.

The end of the year was drawing closer and with it the end of the school year as well. Of course, the thing that had most of the students excited about it other than the month-long holiday after, was the annual school tournament. All students could participate and it was not mandatory, they would be divided based on their class grade so no high ranked mage more than just a single rank apart would steam roll a lower rank one. Matches would be conducted in an elimination format and the final winner of each grade would be awarded a special private villa within the institute for their use until the next tournament. The prize was not that attractive for me and I had even lesser desire to show-off like a circus monkey in front of a large audience so I was not participating, my dorm bros were also of a similar mindset. We were just going to spectate a few fights of our classmates and mostly just wanted to see the fights between higher grade mages to see what it would be like.

I walked in early to my last class for the year which was incidentally the class for wind magic and was greeted by the cute voice of Delia calling me over- "Linley, over here. I saved you a spot." I walked over to sit beside her with a smile and soon we started chatting away until class began. Over the year I've built up a good relationship with Delia, it most certainly helped that she had shown some interest towards even on the day of our first class together.

Recap-

I slowly worked my way up to the level of a good friend who helps out during class and after a couple months spent getting to know each other in class, she was comfortable with meeting up for study sessions at the library in our free time as well. In 5 months, we got to a point that we were close enough that others were cooking up rumours between us and her big brother Dixie invited himself over to one of our study sessions to make sure his baby sister wasn't being taken advantage of. You know, just the usual shake-downs/threats to his sister's possible suitor. I guess he was kind of used to this as he put up a very good show and conveyed clearly what he would do to me if I hurt Delia despite the girl in question trying to defend me.

I really admired Dixie as he really seemed to care for Delia and as a big bro myself, I knew the feeling so I just let him get it out of his system. I was quite open with him as well and I made it very clear with my actions that I wasn't out to use her or something. He probably had to deal with that a lot, what with both of them being from the famous Leon clan of nobles from the Yulan Empire. Plenty of people must have tried to curry favour with their clan by trying to take advantage of their young age or even just to get close to a genius like him and the fact that Delia was a very pretty girl must have attracted a lot of unwanted attention. So yeah, I understood where he was coming from and did not get offended by some of the things he said and instead actively tried to make friends with him too.

My friendship with Dixie progressed much slower as he was a lot more guarded but with repeated interactions with him whenever he accompanied Delia, I slowly chipped away at his defences and got him to at least acknowledge me as an acquaintance or associate if not friend. It probably helped that I was not in any way scared or in awe of his genius talents, I was already way stronger than him but chose to hide my power so the fact that I was not subservient or toadying up to him was a plus in his books. It also did not hurt that I came across as a very intelligent and clever student who could keep up and possibly be even better than him in the theoretical aspects of magic. Eventually he stopped coming just to hover threateningly over his sister, daring me to do something stupid and actually joined us in on our studies and discussions.

I must say, the looks on the faces of my dorm bros when I had invited both Delia and Dixie for one of our joint study sessions on magical theory was priceless. Some of their reactions after the two had left had me in splits-

"How can this be? How can Third Bro who is 2 years younger than me get a girlfriend before me, The Great Boss Yale?" Yale was dejectedly muttering to himself.

"Third Bro, you are so amazing! Teach me your ways, at least give me some tips." Reynolds requested. I could only sigh at that, although George and I tried, it seems that our dear Fourth Bro has departed the path of the good innocent young boys.

For the most part I ignored the ramblings of our dorm's resident perverted idiots comedic duo and focused on what Second Bro had to say- "Good for you Linley! I don't know how you managed it but you've somehow managed to befriend both Dixie and Delia. Though I feel somewhat obligated to tell you that my Walsh clan and their Leon clan are somewhat allies of sorts and I hope you don't do anything that could be detrimental to them. I really don't want to be forced to pick a side between you and them." George tells me in a serious manner, even addressing me as Linley instead of Third Bro.

"Rest assured Second Bro; I don't have any ulterior motives towards them. I am honestly just looking to make friends." I reply to him, which was true. Even in the case of Delia, I just wanted her friendship for now since we were still very young and as for later… Honestly, I wouldn't force myself on any girl let alone her, just the thought of it makes my skin crawl in disgust, so if she wanted to pursue someone else and has no romantic interest in me, I would not force the matter, I would be heartbroken for sure but I would not force her. That said there was nothing wrong in building a more favourable impression and stacking the deck in my favour from early on.

"That's good to hear." George tells me with an honest smile before continuing- "So, you and Delia huh…" to which I splutter and blush.

"Not you too Second Bro, I told you it's not like that." I vehemently protest while still blushing. Somehow hearing things like that from his mouth instead of from the horny bros actually makes me embarrassed.

"Hehe, sure sure, whatever you say Third Bro. For what it's worth, I think you two would make a good couple, hehe." George continues to tease me for all he's worth and I can do nothing but grumble.

Present-

Delia and I chatted away about various topics until the instructor walked in and classes began. Class proceeded as per normal with nothing out of the ordinary until the instructor brought up the end of year tournament. He wanted to know who all from his class would be participating so he could register them. Since I had taken a lot of precautions to ensure no one spied on me while I was practicing in private, no one was aware of my actual strength so naturally none of my teachers put up more than a token effort to get me to participate in the competition.

In their eyes I was just another student in the sea of geniuses at Ernst and the only thing that stood out was my especially sharp mind and my grasp on magical theory. Those would not really translate well in a fight so they let me be for the most part. After classes ended and we were dismissed, I walked with Delia towards the library for some self-study, I wanted to brush up on my knowledge of rune formations and enchanting for my journal. I sort of wanted to put up some safety enchantments like those on magicrystal cards so only those people I allow, may read and learn from my work. I also wanted to put down schematics for a few simple things like privacy fields, stealth formations and a few simple defensive wards that anyone with the slightest knowledge may set up provided they had the materials on hand.

"You really aren't going to participate in the tournament Linley? I bet you or any of your dorm mates could get first place if you entered." Delia asks as we are walking. While she was not aware of my full capabilities, the little that I had displayed to her and my other friends let them know that I was stronger than I let on to the public.

"Sigh, no Delia. I just don't feel comfortable to be put on the spot like that and besides the prize for first place is… Reynolds actually wanted to participate until he found out about the lousy reward." I respond and she giggles at my opinion. My friends were no slouches either what with everyone following similar training routines, but my dorm mates and Delia also took to following my example in hiding their actual strength from outsiders.

"Hehe, yeah even I don't like the idea of being put on display like that and neither does brother so we will not be participating either. The instructors can be a bit pushy though, brother keeps complaining about how his grade's instructors keep egging him on to participate." She says with a huff towards the end. She actually had reservations at first, not knowing why it was we were down playing our talents but after seeing the plight of her dear brother and also speaking with him she understood the need for secrecy.

"Yeah, sometimes it is not good to stand out I guess. Still the instructors shouldn't force the students to compete, the tournament is not compulsory after all. Anyway, it's good to hear that Dixie won't be participating, he may be innately talented but his experience with actual fights is less than the older students. Best wait a little longer and train up before doing things like that." I readily agree with her and internally sympathise with Dixie's plight.

"You know, I've already spectated some unofficial fights between students whenever they get into a dispute and I couldn't help but notice that fights between magi are… somewhat bland. They only fight long range and a lot of them just focus on ending it quickly by throwing powerful spells from the get go." I start to tell Delia somehow hoping I can steer the conversation towards the benefits of warrior training and convince her to take it up as well.

"What do you mean? Magi are supposed to fight from long range after all and isn't it common sense to hit your opponent hard and fast before they hit you. It is more draining on our mageforce to cast multiple spells meant to wear them down rather than casting a single powerful one and defeat them. Why should we do it differently?" Delia questions with honest curiosity.

"True, that actually applies to low ranked mages like us especially but that might not be so for higher rank magi who have more mageforce and a wider arsenal of spells to use. Not to mention, that all depends on the fact that we need our opponents to stay still or at least get a lock on them if we want to hit them with our spell. I doubt that our enemies will stay still long enough for us to finish casting and that doesn't even take into account that the more powerful or wider the effect range, the longer the spell chant." I rationally reason out my view.

"I never thought of that." Delia is deep in thought pondering over what I said. She is now really glad her brother declined to enter the tournament as he too was of a similar mindset as her and if he were to face the more experienced older magi, it could spell his defeat in a most crushing manner.

"Those kinds things still don't consider fights with warriors at all and frankly I feel that the tournament lulls us into a false sense of superiority with regards to that and other real-world scenarios. I don't care what anyone says about how magi of the same rank are superior to warriors, I have seen some high rank warriors and they can be very fast, if you don't have a plan to delay the warrior with low class spells, they will get close to you and cut you down before you complete casting your powerful finishing spell." I warn her of the dangers of looking down on warriors too much.

"Gasp! … you're right." Delia exclaims after that revelation. Good to know that my points are sinking in, I can only wonder how many more magi students would survive the real-world assignments if only they had cottoned on to these truths earlier.

The Ernst Institute was quite thorough with its education, while it would shelter and train low-level magi- ranks 1 to 3- within the campus, mid-level magi -ranks 4 to 6- had to have experience of the outside world if they wanted to graduate. The institute had a mandatory requirement for mid-level magi to undertake at least 1 mission outside every 4 years of their stay, be it escort missions for merchant caravans, formal hires from influential sponsors of the school or just an exploration of the wilderness in the mountain range of magical beasts. Unfortunately, the casualty rates both fatal and non-fatal were considerable for students on these missions. Ernst still had fairly better rates compared to other schools of magic and that's what made graduates from here all the more respected but still, one could not guarantee their own lives when they stepped out in this world.

"Yeah, so it's best not to fall into that mindset of false security that all our troubles can be solved with one powerful spell. In fact, I've found out that a little warrior training would actually help us a lot even if we don't put all our focus on it. Just our regular meditation to absorb elemental essence to form mageforce indirectly helps strengthen our body and a little exercise every day will further strengthen us." I try to convince her on the importance of training one's body as well.

"Hmmm… I don't know." She sounds unsure. I don't know what but to me it's like while she is not particularly dismissive of the idea of warrior training, she also has some reservations. She must have some other reason as it does not feel like she is disgusted by the idea of a mage training as a warrior as well unlike some other stick-in-the-muds.

"If our bodies are strong, we will survive longer as not only will our ability to dodge spells by enemy magi be better but also thanks to our better stamina and strength, we will also be able evade high class warriors longer and finish them with one powerful well-placed spell. Training our bodies could in fact be the deciding factor between life and death in situations where we are ambushed, we would not have time to cast spells properly under those situations and I'd rather not rely on luck both to not encounter those situations or survive them." I extol the importance of training the body some more hopping to somehow convince her.

Her eyes widen as she truly understood the dangers and knew that they could very well happen to her. "You're right! I never even considered all this…but…" She is shivering a bit from the frightful revelation and I start to feel guilty after seeing her in this state.

"I'm sorry for scaring you like that but I really worry for you. We are training to be mages and sometimes things could get dangerous, I just can't stand the thought of you being hurt. I will do my best to protect you and I'm sure Dixie also feels the same but I would feel so much better if I knew for sure that you could take care of yourself or at least hold out long enough for help to arrive." I say comfortingly while pulling her into a one arm hug.

She takes a deep calming breath after a moment before responding- "Thank you for telling me this, honestly what you told me is very scary and I don't ever want to go through something like that but it's the truth. No matter how much I wish for the world to not be so I know that such things happen and they could happen to me or my friends and family, I guess I never considered much about all this before. Looks like my parents were right, I will learn and experience a lot more away from the comforts of our home." She said with a small smile and thanked me.

"About warrior training… if you or even Dixie are interested you can join me and my dorm mates. We practice in the mountains out back every morning and evening." I put out the training invite.

"Thanks, I really appreciate it but… I don't know how to say this but my family seems to be afflicted by a strange condition that prevents us from cultivating Qi techniques." She starts explaining and now I'm really curious though I already have some idea what it could be.

"What do you mean 'can't cultivate Qi'? Can you tell me some more details? I don't want to pry so I'll understand if you don't want to tell me." I prod for more info. I'm already pretty sure this problem is due to their Tigerstriped Warrior bloodline, as a member of a clan from the vaunted 4 supreme warriors, I knew that we could not train in any Qi techniques other than our clan specific ones and even then, there were other restrictions sometimes like my dragonblood concentration not being enough. I already started to formulate a plan to get around all this and help them based on the information she had given but more information would help.

"Well… it's not really a secret I guess but my mother somewhat wanted us to keep quiet about it. She said it would not be good if we let out that we had such issues in the family but since our clan focuses more on magic and we are training to be mages, I don't think it would matter if you knew." She voiced out loud as if to partially convince herself before continuing- "Anyway, I guess I can tell you. The thing is that my mother one day told us that her family was inflicted by some strange condition, none of them could train with Qi no matter what technique they used and the same would be true for us as her children. Dixie was devastated at that, he actually wanted to be a powerful warrior to bring honour to our family and protect us in case of danger… giggle" She broke into giggles at the end.

I couldn't stop myself from laughing a bit too at imagining the normally stern Dixie as a little brat going on about his dreams to be a knight in shining armour. It could be me stereo-typing but I thought that it was pretty normal for a young boy to have fantasies about wielding a big sword and becoming a powerful warrior. I was still going to tease him about it at the very first opportunity I got though.

"Well, that is interesting, both your family's condition and young Dixie's childhood dream, chuckle…" I try to hold it in and get on with the topic but it was difficult. "Ahem, anyway, while that is interesting, I don't think you need Qi techniques especially since you are primarily a mage. People can still train their physical bodies up to the 6th rank without any Qi techniques with enough hard work. Plus, like I said earlier, we mages are able to strengthen our bodies while meditating to absorb mageforce so it could be a work around. What do you say, are you interested in joining me for some warrior training?" I ask again.

"Hmm… you know what? I think I will, I'll try to convince Dixie to join in as well. When do we start?" She responds and I am relieved to see that she is on board.

"We'll start next term, no need to rush especially now when the school year is almost over." I respond and we continue on our way and there is a notable spring in my step at having succeeded in convincing Delia to up her training.

We reach the library not long after and grab the books with on the topics we want to study before getting a table for ourselves. I find Reynolds, George and Dixie already sitting at a table so we join them with our own stack of books. From my dorm George and Reynolds also seem to be very interested in runes and formations so the three of us often discuss and bounce ideas off each other. Yale on the other hand really didn't want to put any more effort or train more than what he was forced to do along with us. He even went so far as to spend a small fortune to gift the three of us the basic tools required to pursue a career in rune craft and formation creation as well as a bunch of materials we could practice on. He as much as directly told us that he was hoping that we would spend more time on our side projects than on dragging him to train with us when we tried to turn down his very expensive gift. Really should not underestimate the lengths that Boss Yale will go to skive off on training.

Either way I wasn't going to look a gift horse in the mouth so I sincerely thanked him for the gift and made full use of it for my personal projects. All said and done, even though he liked to crib and complain often, Boss Yale determinedly stuck with the rest of us during training and had come a long way since we first met. He had just broken through to 1st rank warrior now and all the training equipment he had first brought with him were little more than novelty paper weights for his current body strength.

The three of us could see that while Boss Yale came from a very wealthy background and although he was raised with a golden spoon in his mouth, he was kind of lonely. He readily accepted us as his friends and just like he first said, he easily shared his wealth with us though we repeatedly declined, especially Reynolds and I who were given very little in the way of allowance from our family. Most of his life he had seen that anything could be bought or achieved if you threw enough money at it so his outlook on life was tinted by it a lot before he met us.

It must have been a very different perspective for him seeing the rest of us dorm bros working hard to achieve our goals by our own strength and efforts without relying on a rich family's fortune. He stepped forward and actually tried to keep up with us of his own accord after the first few times I forced him to train and despite all his grumbling he kept at it, I could kind of see it on his face when he thought no one was looking but I could tell he appreciated us including him in our friend circle.

Anyway, I made decent progress with my studies for my personal project, I had finalised on what enchantments I wanted to make and how to make them. Now I just needed to do it and with the months' time that I had before the yearly holiday I was confident that I would have everything ready before I visited home. I spent the remainder of our study session asking my friends if they needed help and answered any questions they had to the best of my abilities before we all returned to our dorms.

Soon the tournament started and after watching a couple of boring matches of my first-grade classmates I didn't bother spectating more, it was really boring and reminded me of those old Pokemon games from the Transmigrators memories. There was no dodging, tactics or excitement it was just two kids throwing rank 1 spells at each other while staying mostly in one place. Since the ranks of students was mostly the same, so were the power of their spells and the matches were mostly decided by who successfully fired their spell first. The matches of the seniors, especially those of the 5th and 6th graders was far more interesting and I got to see the battle styles and tactics of magi in action. It was still only long ranged battles only but the fighters moved around a lot more to get batter positioning and various tactics were employed so it was fairly exciting.

I spent most of my time on my enchanting project and watched only a couple fights or so a day at most, the vacations were coming up and I wanted to be done before then. The enchantment on my Journal was by far the most complex one and had demanded a lot of research on my part, I used a simplified version of the same rune formation used by magicrystal cards to verify authorised users and only give the correct people access. The complex part of my enchantment was the illusion diversion that would make random people who opened the book to only see a children's story on the pages, only the people I key in will be able to read the actual contents of my journal.

Since I also had plenty of reagents and materials for enchanting, curtesy Boss Yale, I also made 3 sets of the ward stone arrays that I had designed. It was a simple design for a very useful application, once activated the ward stone would generate a privacy field in a 5-metre radius where it will be difficult for anyone to spy on you. It wasn't fool proof and would certainly not deter Saints and would be less effective on powerful combatants above the 6th rank but I thought that there was little reason for them to seek us out like that for now. The wards also had additional abilities to generate a small stealth feature that would mask the presence of whatever is under them to make it difficult to detect them and an alarm feature that will warn those under the ward if anyone approaches within 10 metres of the ward stone. I planned to keep one set for myself and give one each to my brother and father respectively.

The tournament ended earlier than I finished my enchanting work but I was not too disappointed as I was confident to finish up in at most 2 days. With the school year officially over Boss Yale wanted to treat us, so he dragged us to all to the most luxurious restaurant on campus, the Huadeli Hotel, Delia and Dixie were invited to tag along as well since we had all gotten to know each other over the study sessions. We were all seated at a table on the first floor just talking about the past year and our experiences.

"You know, I really am glad you two convinced me not to take part in the tournament Second Bro, Third Bro. It was very boring and would have hardly been a challenge against the other 1st graders." Reynolds proclaims in a cocky manner. Well, I guess he does have some right to say things like that this time around as he has already reached 2nd rank both as a magus and warrior.

"Bah what do you know, Forth Bro? I'm still only at the peak of 1st rank mage and despite my strong body I have still only just reached 1st rank as a warrior. Tch, if only I had managed to break through, I would have participated and won, then there would be a long line of girls asking to be my girlfriend." Yale complains dejectedly.

He really had worked hard over the year and wanted to participate in the tournament to show off badly, unfortunately for him, George and I intercepted him before he signed up. We weren't too harsh with him though and gave him a way out if he still really wanted to participate; we simply told him that we would not stop him as long as he reached the 2nd rank as a magus or at least entered the mid-level as a 1st rank warrior as well. He whined a bit telling us it was too difficult but after giving him another option where we would let him be if he managed to beat one of us in combat, he piped up and put more effort in training in order to meet our first condition. Sadly, he did not break through in time for the tournament but he was close now and would break through any day now.

"Girlfriend this, girlfriend that… is that all you think about Yale? Well as a girl myself let me just say that we aren't really attracted by things like winners at such tournaments. Even if there are girls who seek to get to know you after you win, they are not really sincere and are mostly just chasing after fame." Delia savagely shoots him down.

"Haha, well said Delia. Listen to her Boss Yale, don't go chasing girls like that and be careful of girls who only approach you to take advantage of you." I softly tell him.

"Humph, I don't want to hear that you Third Bro when you are happily sitting next to your girlfriend, already so henpecked too. Sniff, who knew that the quiet, serious and studious Third Bro would be the first of us to get a girlfriend. Where is the fairness and justice in that?" Yale bemoans his lot in life and Delia who was sitting beside me blushes cutely at being called my girlfriend.

"Delia is just a good friend Boss Yale." I tell him clearly. If I had turned to look at Delia at that point, I would have seen a very dejected and hurt expression on her face that was in contrast to her earlier blush. She was understandably upset for being turned down by someone she is starting to like after all.

Ignorant of the emotions playing out on her face, I continue- "Besides, I've already told you this plenty of times before Boss Yale, we are both still too young. If we both still feel the same after a few more years then I will definitely pursue her honestly." I declare my true feelings and by the time I turn to look towards her and her hurt expression is long gone with a surprised look taking its place.

She takes a moment more to digest exactly what I had said before quickly asking me- "Wait what do you mean by 'both feel the same way' and 'pursue me honestly later'?" her blush has returned and she is visibly more flustered.

"I mean exactly what I said Delia." I say with a gentle smile and clasp her hand with mine on the table. "You are a very smart, intelligent and beautiful girl. Even that doesn't do you justice I feel but I just don't have the words to describe what an amazing person you are and I very much enjoy your friendship and company. I just don't want to do something reckless that would wreck what we have or worse, hurt you in any way. I want to take this slowly to make sure that we are both ok with this and we both want to push further."

"Buwaa…you….huuu…LINLEY!" She rather loudly calls my name towards the end which has the other diners look over towards our table because of the commotion. Delia quickly pulls her hand out of my grasp and turns her head away from me in an epic pout. Her face is completely red like a tomato at this point… a very cute tomato might I add.

Yale is gritting his teeth in frustration at this point. Reynolds has pulled out a notebook from somewhere at some point and is feverishly scribbling away with a weird expression on his face. George only raises an eyebrow at this and looks curiously at Dixie whose only reaction was to let out a sigh.

"Are you alright with this?" George asks Dixie as he wants to know his opinion on this matter. Honestly, he thought Delia and I made a good pair and he was even rooting for me but as good friends of Dixie and Delia as well, he needed to make sure they were also fine with this.

"Sigh, while I can't honestly say that I'm alright with this, I need to somewhat accept that my baby sister is growing up." He lets out another sigh and begrudgingly acknowledges what has happened. It seemed to cause him physical pain to admit to as much but after looking around the table once more he continues- "It's her own decision in the end and I don't want to jinx it but she could do a whole lot worse." He admits with a shudder.

George looks over at where Dixie was looking at just now and after spotting angry teeth gnashing Yale and creepy smile notes scribbler Reynolds he also concedes- "Yeah, I guess there is that."

"Snicker." I just laugh a little seeing all the lively chatter around the table and just bask in the moment of good times with amazing people. With that thought I pull myself together and raise my juice glass to make a toast- "Enough of that now. Regardless of all this drama let's just focus on the now and enjoy our time together, let me propose a toast- to good times with amazing people!" I call out with my raised glass.

Everyone else around the table freezes for a moment after my declaration but eventually they all move to raise their own glasses with a smile and toast with me- "Hear hear, to good times with amazing people!" But before we can celebrate some more on our high spirits, we are rudely interrupted…

"Would you look at what we have here? If it isn't little Reynolds and his gang." We turn to see four youths were making their way down from the second floor. Their leader, a golden-haired youth, stared at our group coldly, his gaze was especially directed towards Reynolds and me. He was also shooting glances towards Delia with a covetous gaze which really pissed me off.

"Tch, what do you want Rand? Just leave us be if you don't have anything to say, we are celebrating here." Yale fires back. Rand is a classmate of Reynolds and I in the fire style classes for 1st grade and to say we did not get along was putting it mildly, over the past year we had a few confrontations and our respective dorm mates were also pulled in. None of the confrontations till date had resulted in fights so far but rand and his cronies seemed to take our mercy as a sign of weakness.

"Hmph." Rand glanced at our table where Dixie and Delia were also sitting. "Juice? You guys are still drinking juice? Oh, Yale, I really feel embarrassed for you. The four bros of my dorm are all drinking victory wine. You guys are drinking juice? Senior Dixie, Sister Delia, why are you sitting with these nobodies who aren't even confident to participate in the school tournament? Why if you did not associate with this bunch, you would have no doubt also participated and won the competition for your grade. This bunch are destined to be subpar magi and it would not do for prestigious personages such as yourselves to associate with them."

"Tch, see this is why I wanted to at least participate in the tournament. If we don't show our strength then any random fool will come pick a fight with us." Yale mutters and we all kind of have to agree that he has a point.

"What?! How dare you…" Rand and his gang are ruffled but before they can properly voice their rage, they are cut off.

"Rand, enough, there is no need to use such words. We weren't bothering you and you are clearly celebrating your win at the tournament. We will forgive you and forget about this, so let's just go our separate ways." George, who was the most level headed and diplomatic one among us tried to diffuse the tension despite feeling insulted by Rand's earlier remarks.

"Shut your mouth, George. This is none of your business. I'm talking with senior brother Dixie." Rand yelled before staring at Yale. "Yale, last time I saw you at the Fragrant Elm bar, your arrogant manner pissed me off. And now, this time, you dare to be so arrogant in front of me. If you have the ability, come and fight me. Why, don't you have the balls to fight?"

"You really need to mind your manners Rand, just because you won the tournament for 1st graders doesn't you are all that powerful. There are quite a few people that are strong but chose not to even participate in such competitions, so they can't be used to accurately a person's strength. It certainly would be very unfortunate if you only judge people based on things like this and run afoul of some expert who will deal with you violently." I warn the idiot. I know that something similar happened in canon and I won a small fortune from the brat but we were not even bad mouthing him to have him come pick a fight with us this time. Whatever, I'll be happy to take the load off his coin bag and teach him a valuable life lesson at the same time.

"Oh, is that so. Are you going to do something about it, Linley? You are only good at magic theory, can you even put up a fight. Come Senior Dixie, Sister Delia, let us be away from riff-raff such as these, who knows, their weakness might be contagious." The toady can't seem take a hint even with Dixie and Delia staring disdainfully at him and is still trying to curry favour with them.

At that point my patience was completely gone, not only was this idiot continuously insulting me and my dorm bros but he was also irritating Dixie and brazenly hitting on Delia. "That's it, you need to get out." I said as I stood up and before he could mouth off some more, I picked him up by the neck in a strangle hold. With my strength it was just too easy and with the fool dangling in the air from my grip I proceeded to haul his arse out of the restaurant.

"Wha.. you…ugh…" He couldn't speak properly due to me squeezing his neck. I causally tossed him out the door and was heading back despite the crowd that had gathered to watch the show.

"Wow, that felt so good Third Bro. Maybe now he will learn something and not let his mouth run off like that." Reynolds spoke up beside me.

"That kid is pretty small, but he is so strong… he picked up the champion of the 1st graders and threw him out like he was rubbish." The other diners at the restaurant started gossiping. Previously they seemed to have a high opinion of Rand and the mood of the crowd seemed to be in his favour but after I had so easily dealt with him, they turned their back on him.

Rand's face went red, as his heart was filled with fury and shame. He came back and shouted fiercely, "You, are you a magus? If you have the skills, compete with me using magic. What sort of behaviour was that? A noble magus actually used the lowly skills of a warrior." Rand was filled with anger and humiliation. He had just won the yearly tournament for the first graders, but just now, when Linley seized him by the throat and hoisted him up, he had been filled with the terrifying sense that his life was in the hands of another.

"Right, if you have the skills, compete using magic! Are you even a student of the Ernst Institute?" Rand's nearby friends immediately called out in support.

"Magic? Snort, really Rand just because you won the competition doesn't mean you are the best among us first graders or even the best in our age group. Dixie is the strongest one of our age and our Third Bro here is the next strongest." Reynolds proudly declares.

"Of course, Senior Dixie is the best, we never questioned it but this kid Linley… no way he is stronger than Rand." One of Rand's lackeys' retorts.

"Third bro, show them a bit of your power, maybe then they will finally shut up." Yale urged unable to bare these hooligans jumping around and bothering us.

George had just been yelled at by Rand, so right now, he was in no mood to give Rand any face either. "Rand, let me tell you something. Know your own limits. Many of the experts in our school simply don't deign to participate in the yearly tournament. Don't really believe that you are something special."

Some of the seniors who had been a part of the audience egged us on- "You'll only know the truth upon duelling. Rand, compete with them." Those fifth and sixth graders especially called out laughingly. They viewed the struggles of the first graders as nothing more than an amusing diversion.

"In that case, I challenge you to a magic duel right now Linley. Do you dare to accept… and if I win, I want you to apologise to me and I also want you to stay away from Senior Dixie and Sister Delia." Rand proclaimed.

This twat, no way I was backing down from this so I accepted- "Since you want to be beaten so badly, I will accept. When I beat you to the ground later, I want you to get down on your knees and apologise to my friends. In the future I want you to take the long way around when you see any of us, I don't want you anywhere near my friends."

Needless to say, the verbal pissing contest continued all the way to the arena where the competition was held, which also doubled as a place where students could settle disputes with force. By the time we reached the location a monetary bet was also placed thanks to Yale waving his wallet around and I now stood to win 10,000 gold coins when I win this little fight… if it can be called a fight. Rand and I stepped forward to the overseeing elder's desk who was in charge of managing these disputes before heading to the assigned battle ring once we agreed to all the conditions of the fight.

The school obviously made sure any fights would not get out of hand and no permanent harm occurred, violators of this rule were severely punished, besides signing an agreement to that affect the school allowed students to put down some conditions of their own as long as they were within reason. This was done to maintain fairness and ensure the loser did not go back on their words.

The crowd from the restaurant had followed us here and it had only grown larger as word spread on the way to the arena. I saw money changing hands as the students started making bets between themselves, of course those things happen in these places. Betting on matches was somewhat encouraged at the institute and there was an entire committee of 6th graders and a few teachers who jointly managed it. The management thought that it would teach the students the value of money as well as help students be observant and make smart decisions. Just then I got an idea to once again increase my funds so I pulled aside Yale and George who were the money bags and socialite of our group.

"Hey Boss Yale, Second Bro. Could you help me place a bet in the student pool, please put me down for 1000 coins saying that I will. I'll pay you back the initial amount from my winnings." I whisper to them while I see some of the older and richer students set up the betting pool.

They both raise their eyebrows at that before also looking to where a lot of students were already gathering to place their own bets. They both had a somewhat sinister smirk before Yale responded- "Consider it done, and don't even bother paying me back for something this small Third Bro. Hehe, I might even place a small bet of my own though, so you better beat that punk up really good."

"Right, I'll also place a bet on you Third Bro, so you better win or else…" George nods along before they both head over. Reynolds, Dixie and Delia were close by so they heard everything and they also rushed to place some bets.

I headed up towards the waiting area beside the stage so the student betting pool could finalise, these student betting pools were a little different from what the students fighting to settle a dispute set as conditions. The conditions that the fighters could set for themselves could be a lot more severe for starters, the student betting pool had strict limits put by the managing committee like minimum and maximum bets of 100 gold to 1000 gold. This was done to ensure no one threw in chump change for fun and also prevented the rich money bags from drowning others in gold. Betting pools were also set to remain open for at least 3 hours and closed just before the match in question was to start, this was done to ensure that all those interested could participate and the pay-off rates could be set without anyone changing stuff up once the match had begun.

This could only work for magi I thought as normally warriors could not bear to sit still for so long couped up in one place. From what I knew, though betting was common even among warrior circles but their matches gave their participants at least a day's notice so they were properly prepared. Magi on the other hand could just spend a few hours in solitary meditation without wasting their training time, so that was what I did in the interim. Time passed quickly and soon it was time for Rand and I to settle our dispute on the fight ring.

Once I got on the stage, I noticed that the spectating crowd had increased, good that meant more gamblers would have placed a bet. Looks like Rand's little bit of fame as the 1st grade's tournament champion title was good for something after all, hehe suckers, I bet the odds would be more in his favour as well which was great as that meant more money for me when I won.

The elder in charge of managing the fights also stepped forward to officiate the match and once he determined we were in position 20 meters apart, he started counting down- "Ready, you may begin in 3…2…1… fight!"

Rand started chanting the words for the most powerful spell he knew, which seemed to be the rank 2 fire style spell 'Fire Ball Burst-shot' that launches up to a dozen basketball sized fireballs at the opponent. I let him continue a bit more, so that he may at least have some showing in this fight. When he was a little more than half-way through, I started casting my own spell which was my modified but still simple rank 1 spell 'Earth Spike' that would also make the ground under my opponent shake quite a bit.

I released my spell just right and timed it to strike just as Rand finished shooting his last fireball. The cocky prick was so confident when he noticed I hadn't started casting the same time as him, he thought he would win with his one spell for sure and let his guard down. My 'Earth Spike' shot up just a couple of centimetres in front of Rand's nose and rose to over his head obstructing his view a bit as well as scaring the crap out of him, the added shaking of the ground below him ensured he smacked his face on the newly risen stone pillar as well. I easily evaded the 7 fireballs he had managed to fire my way; the number, speed and power of the fireballs was sub-par which showed he had still not mastered the spell.

I decided to finish this with one more spell, no need to let this drag on, I continued to use my warrior strength to easily flank Rand's side after dodging his fireballs. I was already chanting the spell for the 2nd rank water spell 'Water Torrent' and before Rand recovered, I launched my attack, which took on the form of a pressurised vortex of water that was maybe 10-12 times wider than a modern fireman's pressurized hose spray and correspondingly more powerful. Rand was just regaining his wits when he was bodily hurled off the arena stage by my latest attack and smacked the wall below the spectator stands with a fleshy thud.

I winced a little wondering if I went too far but just remembering the prick's attitude from before and his almost blatant attempts at flirting with Delia popped in my head again, the dude was lucky to get off that easily I reasoned in the end. He just slid down to the floor outside the arena now that the pressure of my 'Water Torrent' was no longer pinning him to the wall, he will definitely have a big bruise from that. No internal damage or broken bones at least as I had held back, yeah, no need to feel too guilty for that I thought to myself.

The audience was quite for a while still processing my swift and efficient takedown of the supposed genius winner of the 1st graders Tournament but soon everyone was clapping in applause at the fight. Rand though seemed to still be in denial as he got to his feet dripping wet and was voicing out loudly that I only managed to get a cheap shot on him and that the fight was far from over until the referee for our match promptly declared my win.

"What?! That was nothing, I can still fight." Rand was going on.

"Stop it Rand. I was still going easy on you in that last fight." I say to him before firing off 3 spells towards him in rapid fire. Before the wet and dishevelled boy could react or protest any further, a large jagged rock the size of his head struck the wall to his right and cracked it, a fireball similarly struck the wall to his left and finally a sharp wind blade cut a considerable gouge above his head. "Or would you have preferred I use one of those spells to finish the fight? I could have just properly aimed with my first Earth Spike you know." I calmly added on.

"Gulp… well I…" He finally seems to realise he got off easy. Sure, the institute was strict with enforcing non-lethal fights but accidents happened a lot of times and injuries at least were common place, he was very lucky indeed. Just the thought of what could have happened to him if I nailed him with the 'Earth Spike' made his butt clench. "…I… Thank you for going easy on me Linley. I will work hard and there will come a day where I defeat you." He declares solemnly in the end and finishing with a polite bow.

I return the polite gesture to show that our conflict has been resolved and proceed to get off the stage and claim my prize. In total that whole fiasco netted me 15,900 gold coins, the 10,000 from my wager with Rand and the 5,900 was the profit on my initial 1000 gold bet in the student betting system, it was a good haul. After the other conditions of my wager with Rand were met; he got on his knees and kowtowed to my friends as an apology for his past actions, we all left.