9 Years Later Ch.10

-Novem POV-

I looked out at the training field; my training field! I don't understand how two mages could be so different! While Tribus stays cooped up in his lab, little Zero is constantly using the training field to test his spells.

I don't get it, he is definitely still a nerd like all mages. He turned his little building into a library after all. But still he trains constantly; and those spells… Tribus wasn't joking when he said Zero would be a genius. The boy pumps out custom spells like a factory. A lot of them are just slight alterations to preexisting spells but that's still impressive.

I tried to make a custom enhancement spell once and just the basic spell matrix nearly made my brain melt. Well I guess I should just be happy. I mean while I do have to limit myself greatly at least he's a willing sparring partner. I used to have to force Tribus to spar with me…

But still, in the 9 years I've known little Zero I can confidently say he is the definition of an eccentric genius. He could make any spell he wishes yet insists on large scale spells. Normally the power level of such a spell would decrease in reaction to the increasing range; at least that's what Tribus said. Anyway it would be our jobs to explain that to him and discourage such a focus, but he's too smart.

He figured that out the first spell he made and he developed a counter measure. Granted I doubt anyone else his level could use it… his mana reserves are large enough that he simply overcharges the spell with mana to negate the damage loss.

The academy would send home his reports and they would be filled with praise from the magic professors. He did somethings that even they never considered. He even created something that most of his professors and even some elders are considering a new branch of magic; he calls it physics magic. I don't understand how it works, but I do understand that creating a new branch at 7 is ridiculous.

Of course not everything is perfect, while his magic skills shot to the sky his melee skills remained slightly above average. Luckily his Glaive acts as a magical focus, otherwise it'd be a waste. That's another special thing about him… his weapon actually changes forms. He said it was a new one every 25 levels. It starts with just the Glaive and a staff but by the time he's my level he could have an entire arsenal of weapons.

Breaking out of my thoughts I quickly check the time. We need to get going. Today is his last day at the beginners academy. It's going to be a day of change that's for sure. After he didn't bring home a pet last semester I knew he was one of the rare few chosen for the elite test. When Grand Elder Umbras approached me about a long term assignment post graduation I was absolutely sure.

Great Mana Gods above he's even doing this two years early… normally graduation happens at twelve but he skipped two years due to his excellence. And while it was funny to see the other kids faces when the top of the year was two years younger at the minimum and four years younger for some of the repeating kids. I'm worried about him going through the graduation test..

Well being late will help no one… I guess I'll just have to believe in him.

-Mc POV-

Todays the day!

Wow I haven't thought that since I was born huh… finally graduation. And then on to the Shadow Tower Magic academy. I hope their library is nice, the beginner academy's library was very disappointing.

Nonetheless I've progressed a lot. A lack of books wasn't going to stop me ripping of every anime and novel I could for spell ideas. Ah spell creation… when I first realized it was math based I had a small panic attack, I was by no means a math guy in my past life. However it turned out I was underestimating the [Mages Mind] skill. The math came easily to me and after some levels in it it became even easier. By the time I was six I'd developed the skill [Calculation] and the title [Mathematician] making it even easier.

It was so easy that I ended up creating my own branch of magic, using my knowledge of science I ripped off Rimuru from tensura and created physics magic. Naturally the Megiddo was recreated. It's very difficult to cast requiring an entire though process from mages mind to take over the calculations while the main mind designates targets. When I finally got a third thought process up it became more reasonable with my main mind being able to focus on other things.

I was currently out on the training field testing out my newest creation. Well not really creation it's more of an upgrade to an already existing spell. The spell lightning blast, a single target spell that involves charging a beam of lightning in several spell circles before merging them into one powerful blast. I took the same idea of merging it into one powerful blast but made it so upon impact it will spread through all nearby mana sources absorbing a small amount and chaining to the next source.

That's right; standard rpg spell chain lightning acquired… sorta. The idea works, homing in on nearby mana sources and absorbing some to keep itself going. The limitation is that the further it spreads the weaker it gets which is fine. My issue is that it tends to home onto magic items and get stuck instead of homing onto people and spreading. To complete the spell I need access to the tier 3 attribute of life. Something only available in higher academies.

One of the many reasons I'm excited to go onto higher learning; more knowledge! The attributes here work very strangely. The basic attributes merge to create tier two attributes, everyone can do it it's not hard. Tier three is far more complicated, requiring a mix of tier one and tier two attributes in certain ratios to create tier three. The problem is the near limitless number of tier two attributes.

For example, soul is the merge between light and dark. Water and earth merge to mud. And finally soul and mud merge to nature. Nature and soul merge to mind. It's an infinite cycle of creating tier two attributes. According to books I've read it took thousands of years to finally get the ratios right to create tier three attributes. Tier three attribute ratios are closely kept secrets of major forces and academies.

"Zero! It's time to go!" Novem shouted at me from inside the house.

"Coming Novem!" I shouted back while I started to jog towards the house. After nine years I truly consider Tribus and Novem as my older siblings. They took care of me, clothed me, taught me and all sorts of other things. I truly loved them as family, and they feel the same.

I still remember their reactions, from when I started walking and talking in basic sentences at two all the way to me starting to read around three and a half. Turns out I was right about the speech and reading markers being earlier then on earth m. Of course even then I was a bit too early but still, they were just happy their little brother was a genius.

"Do you have everything you need?" Novem asked as I entered the house.

"Yes. I have three days worth of supplies as well as camping and survival kits in my inventory." Sometimes I think Novem is a bit too much when it comes to preparation, but then I remember the type of world I'm in and that flies out the window.

I'd learned a lot about the world. For one I was somewhat wrong regarding the Shadow Tower. We are actually not an assassin organization but rather a type of elite special forces for the kingdom. Of course we still did some questionable things. We were like a mix between my past life's special forces and intelligence agencies. We did everything, wet work, sabotage, assassinations, raids, hostage rescues. We were a special military branch directly under the minister of defense.

And honestly I was ok with that, naturally I knew I'd likely kill some innocents who offended the wrong people. But my time in the void twisted me in ways I don't like to remember. For people I don't know I was extremely cold. It worries Novem to no end that I had no friends. But after a small attempt at caring I gave up. Except for my new family everyone else could burn for all I care. I still had some limits, I would likely never be able to directly kill a child. Yes, directly; for some reason the thought of blowing up cities didn't matter as much to me. I could never kill a kid in melee, but from a distance… probably.

This coldness is what had me unbothered about what was likely going to happen today. I'd noticed all but a few of my classmates get small pets at the start of the semester. Immediately I assumed it was a standard trope for assassin graduation tests. A first kill. I figured it was the standard cliche, raise the animal and kill it. The ones who didn't receive an animal such as myself would likely kill our first human today. I was fine with that, it was most likely going to be a criminal anyway so why should I care.

As we walked into town and headed towards the academy I was thinking about my future. The advanced academies require you to take missions. Pretty standard format for fantasy schools to be honest. I can't help but wonder what missions would be available. I was hoping they'd be simple, nothing long and drawn out keeping me from my books and experiments.

As we arrived at the academy Novem turned to look at me.

"Now Zero, today is very special. I want you to remember no matter what happens that me and Tribus will always love you okay?" Wow, if I wasn't already fairly certain on what was going to happen I'd be concerned. Well let's get it done with.

"Don't worry big sis. I know!" I truly did mean that. I highly doubted that I could do much that would cause them to hate me. There had been no brainwashing so far, so unless it happened in the advanced academies it's likely they would choose me over the organization if something went terribly wrong.

I left Novem and walked inside. I was a little sad to be leaving, after all four years of my life had been spent here. Learning things I could never have imagined. I arrived at my home room class, the teacher said hello before giving me a room number.

I walked down the worn old corridor that led to the lower parts of the school. As I walked I realized I was probably going to level up and finish my job off this kill. In this last year we'd had a few lessons where we killed magic beasts in class. Only now do I realize that this was likely planned. Appraisal would show our level so they could easily plan this out. Of course I require more XP to level up so it should have knocked it off course but between me hunting in the first forest and a few more kills than everyone else they'd balanced it out.

I was actually scared when I learned that appraisal gave level information. After all I had been a level three baby. Luckily it seems that babies could be born from lvl 1 to lvl 5 depending on their parents. Me being a mana blessed child making it all the more believable. Appraisal was an amazing skill applicable to anything touched by your mana and easily learned. It was so easy I actually fused it and then relearned it.

By the time I finished reminiscing I'd reached the room. Knocking on the door and walking in I saw something that I completely expected. A woman handcuffed to a chair with a sack over her head. I have to say between the intentionally dimmed lighting and the rather scary looking overseer most kids would freak out. Luckily I'm not most kids. I simply bowed slightly to the man before waiting for further instructions.

"Hmm, they weren't joking about you were they boy?" After exactly two minutes he finally spoke up in a rather amused tone.

"They said you were cold and one of your professors even laughed when I mentioned you getting scared" Ah I see so he thought the rumors were exaggerated.

"Would that have been professor Fields sir?" Professor fields was my torture teacher; an elective class involving the resistance and usage of torture. If anyone would laugh at me getting scared it would be him, [Gamers Mind] making it so that emotion and reactions were a choice made his class easy.

"Yes actually it was, he said you had the strongest will he'd ever seen. Well moving past that here's her file. Judging by your grades and reaction I'm guessing you know why your here so read it and make your move kid." At that he tossed me a small folder and stepped off to the side.

I opened the folder and—-

"Miranda Dawn; wanted for leaking state secrets overheard while sleeping with the mayors son."

'Hahaha….it's her! It's actually her! Finally my revenge… nobody tries to kill me and gets away with it!'

Without reading anything extra from the file I summoned my Glaive. A beautiful weapon, obsidian black with a purple sheen on the blades. I stalked over to her and opened a psychic link, a creation of mine one step above that of telepathy. Perfectly invisible to anyone who can't directly see mana.

'Hello mother!' Wow the amount of hate in that word would make a certain sith emperor happy.

'W-what? Who are you! What's happening to me!' Ah fear, she doesn't even know why she's here.

'Your being executed for leaking state secrets; at least that's the official reason.'

'I didn't do it! I'm innocent! Please spare me, I'll do anything…' Was that a seduction attempt?

'Oh even if you were innocent it wouldn't help you in the slightest. I called you mother and you didn't even respond to it..?' I could virtually here the gears in her head start turning.

'Wait! The kid John took? S-son?! That's you! Oh my god I missed you! That man took you from me! There was nothing I could do!' Wow, if I wasn't aware of the truth I may have almost believed that little outburst, unfortunately for her I knew what happened that day.

'Hahaha funny! You think I'd believe that?! Even if I couldn't sense you lying I still wouldn't believe it! You see I remember everything, from you trying to abort me to virtually selling me to him!' It feels nice to get this off my chest to be honest, maybe I should vent more often…

'W-wait we can talk about this! I always regretted it you know! I really didn't—-'

'Shut up! I just wanted you to know who's hands your dying by and why! That's all!'

And with my talk done I beheaded her in one stroke.

I felt… relief. None of the emotions I thought I'd feel at killing a person swelled up inside me. I originally thought I'd have to suppress them with [Gamers Mind] but there was nothing to suppress. All I felt was relief and joy that the bitch was dead…

And as I stood there the notifications flooded in…

{Killed [Miranda Dawn] lvl. 24 +4800 XP}

{Title [Sapient Killer] gained}

{Title [Psychopath] gained}

{Title [Parricide] gained}

{level up}

{+10 WIL +5 NRG +5 WIS +5 Free SP}

{Class complete}

{Previous Classes page added}

{Current Class page added}

{Class completion reward [Soul Cleanse] received}

{Beginning soul cleanse}

{Fracture detected…. Purging….. Purged}

{Repairing….. Repaired….}

{Title [High-Functioning Madman] removed}

{Title [Healed Soul] gained}

{Resuming soul cleanse… no danger to host detected…. Host is being put to sleep.}