After one month of not talking with Kaelen or anyone at all, everyone knew they had a fight in the registration hall, and everyone has sided with Kaelen, Lucius is considered a villain within the school, others look at lucius the same way they look at Kaelen now.
'this is the same eye they used to look at me huh? so nothing changed at all'
The day of the test has finally come, every student of first year gather around at the main hall, when Lucius is waiting with Eira at a corner of a room to avoid everyone, hoping the test would start as soon as possible. Kaelen came pointing his sword towards Lucius and Eira with another mage.
'Fuck, what do he wants now, just let I have this test in peace please.'
"Don't think what I said is a bluff Lucius, I will hunt you two down. Eliminate you myself."
"This time I will beat you Kaelen, come at me with all you got." Lucius holding his sword handle, as another way to accepts Kaelen challenge.
As the Dean is announcing , and the grand hall starts to glowing blue, ready to teleport the student to the forest. Both Lucius and Kaelen stared at each other, but this time Lucius wasn't scared, he was serious.
"I will prove you wrong." Both said it at the same time when there body start to dissapear to the forest.
Lucius and Eira was teleported to the northen part of the forest, where Lucius considered to be the second best spot for the test, although there is no high rewards beast here, but it is the safest place to stay. Lucius has spent month studying and analyzing the forest, He had counted, all he needs to do is to defeat the Wyvern and survive for the rest of the test, he would have more than enough points to moved him up to class C, and he believes if he took out the necklace, he would be able to defeat it alone. Eira was wandering around Lucius when he was thinking of his stradegy, then he found Eira almost wandering away, Lucius ran to her and stop her imediately.
"Eira, let's find a spot to camp, then you can just lie there and not need to do anything okay? just don't be eliminated and I will do everything."
"..."
---------
Miles away, in the dense, humid thicket of the Southern Sector.
SLASH.
A Shadow Wolf, mid-leap, was bisected cleanly in two.
Kaelen Valiant didn't even slow down. He flicked the blood off his steel blade and vaulted over the carcass, landing on a thick branch and launching himself toward the next tree.
"Kaelen! Wait!"
Jace, the Wind Mage, was scrambling through the underbrush below, his robes snagged on thorns, Jace was a childhood friend of Kaelen, though Kaelen was trying to pair up with another mage, the only one who defeated him when he was young, the guy refuses and Kaelen decided to go with Jace.
"We have to stop! We've been moving for twenty minutes! My mana is draining just trying to keep up with your pace!"
Kaelen stopped. He landed on a high branch, looking down at his partner with barely concealed impatience.
"We aren't here to hike, Jace, we are hunting."
"Exactly! Hunting beasts!" Jace pointed to the dead wolf. "That was 10 points! We should harvest the core! We walked past three Iron-Tooth nests already! Why are we ignoring points?"
"Points don't matter, we could harvest them after I defeated him."
"You mean Fable?" Jace looked incredulous. "Kaelen, he's a Class D nobody! Why are you so obsessed with him? We can easily get top of the class if we focus on the exam!"
Kaelen grit his teeth. Jace didn't understand. Nobody understood.Kaelen had to stop them. He had to separate them. He had to save his friend, even if he had to break his bones to do it.
"I am going to find him, you can stay here and farm rats if you want."
"But the rules say we have to be a pair! If one of us got eliminated, we are eliminated out of the test"
"You think I will get eliminated? You are a S class mage, if you are incompetent enough to be eliminated out of the test, you don't have the luxury to cry about it."
He turned and jumped.
"Kaelen! Wait! You can't just leave me!"
Kaelen ignored the shouts. He moved like a golden blur through the canopy, leaving his partner far behind.
An hour later.
Kaelen was deep in the central zone of the forest. The trees here were twisted, the canopy so thick it blocked out the sun. It was a twilight world of shadows and silence.
He paused on a branch, he didn't know where Lucius is, but with this pace, he can searched up the entire forest in only 3 days, when Kaelen was about to continue.
Snap.
It wasn't a twig. It was the sound of a mana barrier being erected.
Kaelen reacted instantly. He backflipped off the branch just as the wood exploded into splinters.
A massive fireball, blue-hot and screaming, incinerated the spot where he had been standing a microsecond ago.
Kaelen landed in a crouch on the forest floor, sword drawn.
"Who's there?!"
"My, my," a voice purred from the shadows. "You really are fast. I thought I would crisp you."
Solara Ignis stepped out from behind a massive oak.
The Flame Princess looked less like a student and more like a queen inspecting her garden. Her crimson hair flowed as if caught in an updraft, and her hands were wreathed in balls of spinning fire.
Behind her stood a mountain of a man in heavy plate armor. Garrick. The Rank 4 Knight. He held a greatsword that looked like a slab of iron torn from a castle gate.
"Solara, I don't have time for this. Get out of my way."
As Kaelen was dashing towards Solara, Garrick block Kaelen way with a speed contradicting his size, slashing Kaelen straight to the chest, though Kaelen blocked it, he was pushed back by Garrick slash.
"Rude, Here I am, offering you a warm greeting, and you try to attack me?"
"I'm busy,"
"You wouldn't dare to leave a lady like me for some other matters?"
She gestured at Kaelen. Her voice starts to gets angry.
"I personally sent you an invitation to team up with me, only you, yet you straight up refuses me."
"I thought you would settle for the second best thing princess, is rank 4 the best you can do?"
"Where is your partner?" Garrick rumbled, his voice sounded mad.
"My my, you even left your mage alone in this scary forest, I'm so glad you refuses me, Garrick here beg me day and night to be my knight, how could a selfless princess like me refuses him, a trustworthy knight, unlike you, mr leave his mage alone."
"Well then, this should be easier than it should be now."
Solara first intention was to followed Kaelen until they rest, then she will ambush him. Because at the moment, Kaelen is the strogest person in the battlefield, she needed to defeat him in order to garuantee her perfect score. In the history of this academy, only one person had ever achieve the perfect score, the legendary knight Florian. Solara wanted to achieve the perfect score, so that her race in the heir competition could skyrocketed as right now her sister his getting more of the king and citizen favor.
"I can take you both on,"
"Oh, I hope so, Please be entertaining."
Garrick charged. For a man in full plate, he was terrifyingly fast. He used Earth Slide, the ground moving beneath his boots to propel him forward like a skater.
CLANG!
Garrick's greatsword met Kaelen's longsword.
The impact shook the trees. Kaelen's knees buckled. The sheer weight of Garrick's strike was immense.
He's strong, Kaelen realized, gritting his teeth. 'I can't block him. I have to deflect.'
Kaelen twisted his wrist, sliding his blade down the greatsword, sparks flying. He sidestepped, aiming a slash at Garrick's exposed armpit.
WOOSH.
A stream of fire cut off his attack. Solara was providing support fire from a distance, her aim precise and deadly.
Kaelen was forced to roll away, the fire singeing his cape.
"This will be quite entertaining for me."
"You really think you can win?" Solara laughed, launching a volley of Fire Arrows.
Kaelen moved. He entered the Zone.
He was a prodigy for a reason. He danced through the fire arrows, his movements fluid and precise. But then his ground suddenly shake, removing Kaelen balance, forcing him to deflect all fire arrows. Garrick appeared infront of Kaelen, his sword was busy blocking fire arrows from the sky.
Slash.
Kaelen's blade clashed with Garrick, allowing some fire arrows to injure him. Kaelen kicked Garrick knee, forcing him to kneel down, he used his sword handle to smash Garrick head and used that momentum to lunged past Garrick, closing the distance to Solara.
Solara's eyes widened. "Shield!"
A barrier of flame erupted. Kaelen cut through the fire with his Valiant swords style. His blade slashed Solara's arm.
"Ack!" Solara stumbled back, clutching her bleeding shoulder.
"I told you, I don't have time."
Kaelen was winning, against a 2 on 1, but Kaelen forgot one key aspect, Garrick was an spirit knight, having contracted with the spirit of Earth, Brokk.
"Garrick! Now!"
Garrick didn't attack Kaelen. He slammed his greatsword into the ground.
The forest floor shattered. The ground beneath Kaelen's feet opened up.
Kaelen lost his balance. He stumbled. But he still managed to lunged at Garrick, when the spirit appeared from the gound and shoot a massive rock to Kaelen, he managed to slice through, but behind the rock was garrick attacking Kaelen, although he manages to block it.
"Brokk!"
The below Kaelen shattered again, losing his balance, he manages to kick garrick away to saves himself from getting slashed. But he injured his leg in the process. It was all buying time for Solara to cast her spell.
"Inferno Cage!"
Four pillars of fire erupted around Kaelen, trapping him. The heat sucked the oxygen from the air.
Kaelen coughed, dropping to one knee.
"Valiant swords style, Death spin." Kaelen decides to use the swords style that his family forbids him to use on human again, Kaelen can't lose now, he have to find Lucius to save him.
With just one spin, the fire cage dissapear imediately. He dashes towards Solara and aim for her chest, but Garrick came in time and took the slash for her, injuring him badly.
"How?" Solara shaking, watching Garrick unable to stand up, lying infront of her.
"I said it before, 2 is not enough for me." Kaelen panting while standing above Garrick and Solara, he was also injured but not as bad as Garrick and Solara. As he raised his sword to eliminate them, he was teleported back to the grand hall, he watched Jace being carried away by doctors as he is trying to understand what just happen. He loss, just like that, Kaelen loss the most undeserving way.
"You loss huh?" A voice who just teleported back mock him.
"What? why are you here? who did you loss to?"
"I just gave up"
"what? why? I was looking forward for our rematch there"
"Yet both of us is here, I wanted to see the underdogs to place first in the test anyway, so its a lucky that you also loss."
The voice came from a mage, the only person his age that Kaelen ever loss to, the only reason Solara place first in the mage department was because this boy doesn't even care, he is no doubt the strongest person in the academy.
---------
After 3 days, Lucius has finished set up a camp with 2 tents in a place that is crowded with trees, hoping no one would find them,especially Kaelen, Lucius want to end this in peace, all he needs to do is to defeated the wyvern, and survive. He had made a plans to defeat the wyvern, and he all he needs to do is to wait for the right moment to do it, the wyvern is a strong beast, so even if he believes he can defeat it without the necklace, he wanted to wait until other student had come to try to defeat it, in the 6th days, the wyvern should be fairly injured, and he just need to swoop in to gather the points and hide until the end of the test hoping no one is strong enough to defeat it.
"Eira, come out, eat some rabbit stew." Lucius has also been taking care of Eira the last few days, she had does what she said, she didn't do anything at all, but Lucius doesn't care about it, he had a plan that works, and that is all he need.
"Hey, it's not a rumor you know."
"what?"
"I killed him, with my own hands, in front of his citizen."
"...."
"I'm dead serious you know!"
Lucius looked at Eira eyes, her eyes did not look like they were joking, she was being real about it. All this time, Lucius believes it was all a rumor, he forces himself to believe it was all a rumor, no normal human being would kill their own parents. But after hearing that, all of Lucius trust in Eira crumbled in an instant. He still wants to believe it was only a joke, but her eyes, her voice, she was speaking the absolute truth.
"And I can kill you as well,"
As Eira raise her hand did Lucius hands rest on the sword handle. Lucius eyes were terrified of her, the same eyes people used to look at her, he hurriedly got himself to a fighting stance.
"you act like you know me, but you know nothing, when you truly know me, you'll understand why others act like that."
"..."
"I know about you're argueing with Kaelen for me, drop the act, you say you know me? you're just desprate, you need a mage that accepts you. Even if she's a devil or not."
"I do trust you Eira..."
"Then throw your sword to me." Eira said it as she raise her other hand, as if ready to catch the sword.
"Eira, you know I can't do it." Lucius eyes is full of wary, he doesn't fully trust Eira after what he just heard, holding tight to his sword handle.
"Eira I understand how you feel, I truly do, trust me, but I can't throw my weapon to you like that." This time Lucius is sincere, he understand how Eira felt, people had looked at him that way before, he knows how it feels like, but his aunt, even if she trust him, she was always defensive around him, worried he might lose himseld, and he understand perfectly well about that as well.
"Trust me Eira, you aren't alone"
"You say you understand me? Stop the act! They look at me with disgust, with fear, like I'm some kind of alien, how could you ever understand how that feels? How could anyone understand how that feels? Even my mother, hated me, she vomitted when she looked at me, even my teacher, the person I respected, the person I trust the most, look at me with despise, and yet you talk like you know that feelings?." Eira shouted, her tent starts to freeze up.
"..."
"And you know what, they are not wrong either, I killed my own father, I deserve a fate worse than death, there is no excuse you could make for anyone hurting their own family. Why do you keep acting like it's not wrong, like it's perfectly normal to kill your own father, the person you love the most, even I disgust myself for it, who ask you to trust me?"
"..."
"Forget it, you are just like them, no, even worse, you act like a hypocrite for your own benefits."
Eira closed her tent as Lucius is sitting there with his burnt rabbit stew.
"I have to make another dinner now."