Humiliation

Michael Keating

As a former dungeon clearer, I had seen my fair share of battle. Though it was mostly up against creatures, parties would get bored and have duels for fun. Some were pretty even, others not so much. However, none were as one-sided as this year's “Tournament of Future Champions" that I was watching.

My lovely daughter, the angel she is, is a kind-hearted sweet girl, and she was destroying every opponent she came up against. It was almost hard to watch. I had always known my daughter was a natural, she made it into the Academy at thirteen instead of fourteen. She is now fourteen years old, and competing in the tournament for fifteen-year-olds who are about to graduate and move on to become knights.

On the scale of knights, most of them are just under me at about the start of the third stage. Most are single magic users with refined magic, even some dual elemental mages like myself. However, my daughter was a little above that.

“Luna Keating will be going up against Isiah Trepin in this year's finals, BEGIN!” This was the fan favorite coming into this, and all I can think… this poor kid.

He cast a spell that is commonly known however extremely hard to pull off. HellFire Ring, this spell creates a circle in front of the user that slowly grows over time. However it isn’t like normal flames, it continuously burns even when touched by water. I am quite impressed he was able to pull off such a sophisticated move for his age.

“You did great the first few rounds girl, but your luck ends here.” He began a second incantation creating a vortex of air around him as well. “Now let's see what you got Lu…”

I had trained my daughter well however, there was something she learned on her own that shakes me to my core every time I see her. Never have I seen anything like the move she is capable of creating, I can’t even call it magic. In the blink of an eye, she pushed lightning through her feet and closed the gap between the two of them. He smirked, and I don’t blame him, with the two spells he was using it would be almost impossible to penetrate his defenses, almost.

With a single wave of her hand, his flames, and vortex of air were gone. The crowd let out gasps, awes, and even some cheers. But the look on the boy's face was priceless. Before he even had time to prepare for his next move a spiral of blue flames surrounded her arm.

She smirked, “Wish I could say it’s been fun.” With that, she hit him straight in the stomach scorching his outer layer of clothing and sending him flying through the air. He flew a solid fifty yards straight into the walls of the Colosseum. This silenced a few people, especially his family who happened to be two rows in front of me. However, the vast majority of the Colosseum roared with excitement.

“And we have our champion! Lune Keating!” My daughter glowed with excitement as he held her arm up declaring her champion. His family on the other hand were saying she cheated, used a magic item of sorts, and I really can’t blame them. How was it possible for her to wave away his magic and make it disappear?

Though none have been fully discovered some magical items are known to weaken some magic but not to outright dispel it. Somehow on her own, she became skilled enough at Aether manipulation to disperse the particles surrounding a certain area, thus cutting off the flow of magic. Though part of it made me excited, the thought of knowing someone could do that made me shake a little with fear. Everything runs on magic here, so knowing it can be taken away just like that is frightening.

After the event, she and I went to celebrate by going to her mother's bakery. “You did great today, I would say amazing however you did kind of stomp everyone,” This made her laugh.

“I was hoping I would have a little more competition, but it wasn’t too bad. I got to see some cool magic I plan on learning myself. Like that incantation from the last match, I think I can improve some of its downfalls.” This made me chuckle a bit. A spell used by high-level knights with little to no downside, and she can make it better?

“Well if you need help just let me know sweetie.” I put my hand on her head and messed with her hair. As we had almost made it to the bakery a voice came from behind us.

“Hello, you are Mr. Keating and Luna Keating correct? Winner of the tournament held by the academy?” We turned to a tall man at least six four, he had spiky red hair to match his ruby-colored eyes. He had golden armor and a massive scythe on his back. I knew immediately that this was the royal family's sentinel Noah Cook.

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

“We are and who are you hmm?” ERK!

“I apologize for my daughter sir, she is a little ill-mannered. All of her father's arrogance went straight to her instead of evenly splitting between the two kids you see.”

He laughed it off and shook my hand, a very firm shake. “It’s no big deal, I try to keep a low profile most of the time.” Low profile? He’s wearing bright gold armor and is as tall as an orc. “Anyways Luna, my name is Noah Cook, I am a knight for the king's family.”

“A simple knight seems like an understatement don’t you think.” Me and him both let out a laugh.

“I suppose so, but remember low profile. I am in charge of a battalion and I was hoping post graduation you could come to serve as a captain under me.” I wasn’t sure if I had suddenly started hearing voices, or maybe I had just gone mad. But I swear he asked her to be a captain. My daughter seemed to not be as in shock as I am she seemed as if she knew something like this would happen.

“Don’t most graduates start as trainees and then become lieutenants after seeing combat for a period of time?”

“Yes in normal cases they do, however in the case of stage four, triple elemental with two refined magic capabilities, I can make an exception.”

“Two? You must be mistaken, my daughter only has one refined magic ability.”

“My father is right, as you saw in the Colosseum throughout the matches. I used all the magic I am capable of during them. Fire, Wind, and Water with my refined magic being lightning.” He gave a large grin to us.

“You may be able to hide it from everyone else, but you can’t hide it from me. Whether you are comfortable with saying it out loud or not is up to you, it doesn’t matter to me in the slightest. So what do you say?”

Though I had my own opinion on this as a father, I decided to keep my mouth shut. This was a choice for her future on what she wanted to do. Who was I to get in the way of that?

“I have one question about it.”

“And what’s that?”

She gave the largest smile I have ever seen come from her in my life. “Does it pay well?”

Apollo Keating

“So she’s going to be leaving us in a year?”

“That’s correct sweetie.” My mom poured me a cup of mint hot cocoa. I do have to say, the cocoa and food in this world were much better than the one I had come from. It probably has to do with the enhancement of magic. “So you know that means you need to spend as much time as possible with her before she's gone.”

“I know Mom.” I must have looked a little down because Ruby kicked me from under the table.

“You can take the time she's away to grow stronger, maybe you’ll even finally beat her in a match.”

“Like that could ever happen, you know her.” Though normally I’m modest and try to be. This time was just the truth, my sister was on a completely different level from anyone I knew. Up to this point, I was able to use fire and earth magic. My refined magic though it wasn’t perfect, was my favorite.

“Come on she can’t be that tough since the last time you faced off against her dimwit.” We all turned to see my childhood friend, the daughter of our sponsor come in, Mia Thorne. She was my age though a few months older, she had long jet-black hair with a crimson red running through the front bangs. I had seen this look a lot in my old world but she was the first with streaks like this here. Some people had different colored hair but never streaks. To this day I still can’t figure out if it is natural or if there is a secret underground female group selling hair dye.

“The last time we fought she canceled every spell I threw at her and proceeded to break one of my ribs.”

Mia sat down next to us stealing my cocoa. “Yea, but you were able to land a few hits on her. If you ask me, that's pretty impressive.”

“Then it's a good thing that you aren’t the one deciding fights huh.” I quickly snatched my cocoa back before she could finish the rest of it. I still haven’t been able to figure out what it is. Mia is the only person who knows every way to get under my skin. And the worst part is we lived in a house on their estate so I was easy access to her torments at all times.

“Did they invite you to the theater tonight? It’s supposed to be a giant event in honor of her making it into that regiment.”

“Yea, we're all going to it.” My mother responded for me and Ruby, neither of us seemed to like this very much.

“I’m not sure if I want to go, you know I’m not a fan of big crowds and whatnot.” Ruby yawned, leaning back in her chair. I seconded it by nodding. My mother on the other hand didn’t take this as well and smacked us both in the back of our heads.

“We will all be going. All three royal families will be there and are expecting us.”

“Huhhhhh” Ruby gave a stupid look. “Why are all three going to be there?”

“She’s the first of any race to make captain before the age of eighteen, it’s a very big deal. And you can wipe that stupid look away, you’re both going.

I exhaled, “Fine, but when this goes poorly it's your fault.” In my previous life when my gut said something wasn’t going to go well I called it my sixth sense. And my gut was yelling at me that this was stupid.