"Freeze!"
Waving his staff, Raymond slammed it on the ground. Causing a ring of rime to form underneath his instructors feet.
His instructor easily however, side stepped out of the ring and dashed towards Raymond.
His zig zagging patterns might have caused ordinary mages to struggle but who was Raymond?
He was the Archmage!
He already knew the freeze spell wouldn't work. He just needed to force him to move. Waving his staff again. Several ice spikes formed in the air behind him and launched themselves towards his instructor in a perfect grid pattern.
"Ice Volley!"
"Fleet footed. "
Casting another spell to increase his movement speed. He quickly ran away from his instructor, leaving several mines in the ground as he ran.
"Not bad Raymond!"
Swinging his heavy two handed sword, his instructor casually blew an opening through his volley of ice spikes.
Turning around, he pointed the tip of his staff and shouted out as loud as he could. Flaring a white light from the gem.
"FREEZE RAY"
His instructor immediately moved his sword to block. But was met with nothing, rather his feet had been frozen solid to the ground from his earlier mines he set up while running.
'Chance!'
This time he actually drew upon his mana, slamming his staff into the ground, he yelled out again as loud as he could.
"GLACIER!"
This time a wall of ice rushed out of the ground, sending itself straight into his instructor who was still trying to free himself.
"Nice trick! But not enough kiddo. "
Even with his feet bound, his arms were still free to move. Gripping his two handed sword. He got into a stance and sliced the wall in half vertically leaving a gap in the middle for him.
Smiling, he stopped holding up his sword. Opening his mouth to complement Raymond, he was met with a second glacier spell.
"Well done kid! With skills like that you co-"
Unfortunately, his instructor was only an F rank. Definitely stronger then Raymond who was still a G+ rank but the gap wasn't large enough that he would go down so easily without a fight.
He didn't even notice the second glacier spell that Raymond had casted. All along, Raymond had conditioned him into thinking he could only cast spells verbally, unaware that he could also cast them without needing to chant.
Just that if he didn't chant, his spells would be slightly weaker and less efficient. Everyone knew that the louder you yelled, the stronger the attack.
With the wall of ice slamming into his instructor, cutting him off mid sentence. Raymond felt a strange sense of pride. Out of the several dozen instructors he had. Raymond had managed to defeat at least half of them in a fight. While it wasn't a true fight to the death. The fact that he could defeat them while being lower ranked then them fueled his ego.
Breathing heavily, he collapsed into the dusty arena. Closing his eyes to protect him from the intense lights.
Crash
His instructor evidently managed to free himself. Not that Raymond cared anymore. His mana reserves were nearly bottomed which meant he wouldn't need to fight any more.
Walking over to the collapsed Raymond, his instructor looking battered and dirty smoked and complimented him rather then scolding him.
"Kid, youve got some insane battle sense! You're a natural battle mage, it's almost like you've been fighting for several years already!"
How close he was to the truth. Not that Raymond would ever admit it.
"Thanks for the praise instructor, but ik just trying my best. "
"Your best? Kid if you keep going like this you might become the strongest mage to ever live! I hope you wont forget me when you reach that peak. "
"Haha, of course sir. "
This made him the dozenth instructor to say that. At this rate, Raymond would have to remember over a thousand people when he became an S ranker.
'I just want to return to Earth. It's so peaceful there, no mana, no monsters. Just human ingenuity. '
Raymond was seriously missing his apartment on Earth right now.
When the Grace family promised to give him the resources to become stronger. Raymond had assumed it would be stuff like natural treasures and elixirs. Why the hell was he being forced to fight so much!
And because of Raymond's incredible battle skills built from years of experience, the Grace family had to keep finding new stronger awakened for him to fight against!
Raymond once even tried to lose on purpose, only to be caught and scolded. Having to go nearly an entire month without ice cream was a torture equal to medieval torture devices.
... maybe not that far actually. But still, it was pain! Especially when they would go out to get ice cream and leave Raymond at home all by himself!
Ellen would even go out of her way to flaunt it in his face!
Back on Earth, he could go to any ice cream shop whenever he wanted. Now, he had to go ask for permission and they wouldn't even let him go more then 4 times a month!
Something he had taken for granted so easily back then.
'Ice cream... how I miss you so much...'
"... rned all that you can from me. Ill ask Rayez to find you a new instructor. When it comes to combat I think you've surpassed even me and I've got several years of dunge... "
'This guy talks too much man... '
Sensing a familiar mana signature outside. He opened his eyes and sat up straight. Ignoring the instructor and quickly makinf his way to the entrance door of the training grounds.
Swinging the doors open, he found Ellen. Who was waiting outside.
"Whats up? I'm done with my training so you wanna go get ice cream?"
All that reminiscing about ice cream had given him an intense craving.
"Last week was your fourth time so you still have another twenty days before you're allowed to get ice cream. "
He tried his best to blink as innocently as possible.
"Ellen, pretty please? You know that mom and dad never say no to you!"
"First of all they're my mom and dad, you're technically just an employee under them. "
"I literally eat every meal with you guys, sleep in the room next to yours, go on outings with you all. Even if I'm not adopted, I'm basically their son now. You can ask them, they probably love me more then you!"
His instructor quietly opened the door and upon seeing the two of them, thankfully got the hint and decided to leave quietly.
"Thats absurd, they love me more!"
He already knew he wasn't getting any more ice cream, but sometimes making other people angry rewarded him with a feeling sweeter then ice cream.
"Nuh uh, I don't care anymore and I win this argument anyways why were you just waiting outside like a creep?"
"You... fine. My dad asked to call you. We're gonna be graduating from our middle school soon now that we're 14. With our high potential scores. Mom and dad plan to send us to the capital to study at The Academy of Heroes."
Ah yes. The academy. A staple of novels. Raymond himself had attended the academy in disguise a few times in order to get info about the protagonists while writing his novel.
Grinning, he patted Ellen on the shoulder.
"Oh man, reminds me of the past. Did I ever tell you about how I disguised myself as a student named Nutte Sachs? The fact that nobody even realised my name was literally just a play on the word nu-
" That was you!? The kid who would be absent from literally all of the semester and yet still maintain their top 100 place on the leaderboard!? No wonder..you only ever showed up during important events and to occasionally ask us questions."
She paused for a bit before continuing.
"And as a matter of fact! I DID notice how your name was a wordplay on uhm. That word. I just didn't bring it up because I felt bad for you! "
"Yeah yeah, believe whatever you want. Now lead the way, we don't want to keep dad waiting do we? "
She grumbled a bit before deciding that it wasn't worth it. Turning around, she started speed walking her way leaving Raymond forced to maintain the awkward speed just to keep up.
After a while of walking however, she stopped abruptly. Turning to Raymond with the biggest grin on her face.
"Hey Raymond, haven't you forgotten? According to that contract you have to call me a certain something don't you?"
Drat.
Raymond was hoping she might forget. But yes, according to the contract as Ellen's 'shadow' while he was essentially a glorified guard and servant to Ellen. But it also included a small section which she would use to constantly torment Raymond.
The small section wasn't that bad at first glance, it just stated that Raymond would be required to learn the proper etiquette in order to bit embarrass the Grace family.
Unluckily for Raymond, his etiquette teacher was Ellen. Who seemed to have very different ideas on what the meaning of etiquette was.
"... Ellen, lets not keep dad waiting shall we?"
"No no no, theres no rush Raymond. He won't mind. The bigger problem is you. Shouldnt you as my shadow be aware of the proper etiquette? What if you embarass me out in public? We can't have that can we?"
'Damn this woman!'
He gritted his teeth, closing his eyes. He took a deep breath,inhaling and exhaling. . Relaxing his body all over.
And sprinted as fast as he could.
"Fleet footed, Rabbit agility, Stronger muscles. "
Enough of his mana had regenerated to allow him to cast these spells, massively increasing his running speed.
Even without looking however, he could tell despite how fast he ran even though there was no sound at all.
She was right behind him.
"Enhanced constitution, bull charge"
He drew upon his low mana reserves, after these two spells he was practically a car running on fumes.
His speed increased even more but he knew. It wasn't enough, it was never enough.Although Raymond had recovered a small amount of his strength over the past 4 years it still wasn't enough. This damn regressor utilizing her past knowledge had become far stronger and faster then she was supposed to be at this age.
But it didn't matter, he could see it already. Rayez's office was right there! If he just lasted long enough!
Bang!
Slamming through the doors, he collapsed onto the ground in exhaustion. Yet when his eyes darted around he found nobody.
Wasn't the path they were on leading towards his office why wasn't he here?
This meant that. She had tricked him! Rayez wasn't in his office. She had been leading him on from the start like a dog!
Chills ran down his spine.
The doors which he had closed burst open once again. But this time it was the devil herself.
He desperately crawled away, but it was useless. He had no more mana left to cast anything.
She walked slowly, menacingly towards him. Before slowly leaning down towards his ear and whispered with a grin straight from hell.
"I command you to obey your contract"
...
...
...
"...yes... master."