"So you also know about the Ancient that's on its way here to destroy The Academy?" Lone asked a bit testingly.

Headmaster Erion smiled knowingly. "Oh, yes. I've been aware for quite some time about Gruluthu's plans. You needn't worry about her."

Lone frowned. "You can take on an Ancient, is that what you're saying?" Lone questioned sceptically.

The headmaster was a Divine, yes, but Lone wasn't confident if he himself could kill a Divine without giving it his all let alone a full-power Ancient, so seeing Erion being as calm as he was, seemed awfully... suspicious.

"Me? No. Gruluthu is ranked 5th amongst the Ancients. I have confidence that I could injure the 6th or 7th ranked Ancient, but kill one? No, never. Even if you, I, and all of the teachers here combined forces, we could probably injure Gruluthu at the cost of many, many lives, but even then, killing her is simply out of the question," Erion casually stated.

"Then why're you so confident?" Lone asked sharply.

"An old friend of mine promised that he would handle both Gruluthu and The Bone Palace. I have nothing but faith in him, so we have no reason to worry ourselves over such things," Erion claimed, confusing Lone.

"Wait, 'The Bone Palace'? What's that?" It would seem that Lone was full of questions today.

Headmaster Erion smiled kindly and said, "The Bone Palace is another Ancient. It has been trapped in the Great Barrier for the last million years, but the barrier is guaranteed to break in a little over 3-years from now, releasing it and its retinue of 12 Divines."

Lone's eyes shook. "And when will Gruluthu reach The Academy?"

"At the exact same time as the Great Barrier breaks, coincidentally. While she may be an aquatic monster, Gruluthu is still the slowest Ancient, giving my friend plenty of time to prepare," Erion answered happily.

"... So in 3-years, two Ancients and 12 Divines will be dealt with by this 'friend' of yours?" Lone questioned in disbelief. He really wished he was a White Dragonkin right about now. Being able to detect lies would be beyond useful in this conversation.

"That's correct." Erion simply maintained his friendly smile as he looked at the befuddled Lone.

"When compared to me, how strong is this friend of yours? Hell, who even is your friend? Another Ancient? Also, what rank is The Bone Palace in relation to the other Ancients?" Lone shot out several rapid-fire questions.

"Good questions, Lone, good questions indeed," Erion said with a short chuckle. "Let's see... I suspect my friend could run circles around you in a serious fight should he wish to. Who is he? Funnily enough, he's never actually told me his real name, but he's a foxkin like yourself and he called himself Neon if that helps, and no, he is not an Ancient, though I have known him for a little over a million years. As for your final question, last I recalled, The Bone Palace was ranked 4th amongst the Ancients, but it has been trapped for a million years, so perhaps it's stronger now?"

'Neon? Huh... Funny coincidence?' Lone really didn't know how to respond to such a... carefree and relaxed attitude beyond his sceptical thoughts, so he replied with a bit of ambiguity. "Okay... So, you're saying I shouldn't worry about it, more or less?"

Erion nodded. "Indeed, however, that doesn't mean that you and your friends can grow lazy. Remember, the details regarding the School Gathering Tourney shall be made public in 2-months, and as my personal disciple, I expect you to take at least one of the free participation slots for yourself and for your friends."

"You say I'm your personal disciple, but you haven't taught me any magic yet," Lone challenged.

The headmaster smiled. "You have yet to ask for any training."

"I'm here now, aren't I?" Lone wasn't one to turn his nose up at a free chance to learn magic, so if Erion truly was serious about him being his master in this regard, well, suffice to say that Lone stood to gain a lot from the man who naturally possessed eight affinities and was an octamage.

"Charm, enchantment, lightning, illusion, space, gravity, healing, or, lastly, time. Choose one. I'll teach you a single spell today and I want you to practice it regardless of if it has restrictions or not," Erion said very seriously as he maintained his smile.

Lone was surprised. "You don't have an affinity for any of the main five magic schools or any of their subschools?"

"Haha, no. I'm rather special, you see. Though I'm not unique. Your White Dragonkin friend - Gilbert, was it? He's similar to me, though on a lesser scale," Erion said.

Lone nodded. 'He's right. Gilbert knows nature and gravity magic, both sole elements. Still, being such a magical genius and not knowing at least one core element is a bit... odd.'

"Well, Lone? What element would you like to learn a skill from?" Erion asked again, moving away from the subject.

"Uh, time, obviously. That's the rarest one with the most potential, right?" Lone replied with a question.

Erion wore a happy expression. "I'm glad you think so. Some would argue that space is more powerful than time or that gravity, space, and time are all equals, but that simply isn't true. Time is, by far, the single most powerful magic type. Well, it pales a bit in comparison to the... uniqueness of Primal magic, but as you already know, most societies don't accept Primal magic as an official type due to its exclusivity."

"Right... So, is time magic, like, your main school of magic?" Lone inquired as he began getting a bit excited. 'Is he seriously going to teach me time magic? Like, for real? If I could get something like Swind's Sixth Sense or Soph's Minor Time Control, that'd be beyond amazing.'

Of course, Swind's racial skill, Sixth Sense, had nothing to do with the flow of time or with time magic, but an ability like that which could, for example, see into the future by even a few seconds could be instrumentally helpfully in many situations, from mundane things like avoiding messing up while forging to something serious like saving a life in a win-or-die fight.

The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

"I suppose so, yes. I wouldn't say I'm more proficient with time magic than the other schools at my command, but I would wager than I am the best time mage on all of Teresta, perhaps even Altros. I won't claim to be the best on the entire planet with absolute certainty until its all been explored," Erion said light-heartedly.

"Anyway, what I'm about to do to you will feel very... disorienting, so I apologise in advance," he added and he got up and prepared his wand - an object made entirely out of glass and which had a curved handle.

Lone nodded. "That's fine. I've been through a lot."

"I'm sure you have," Erion answered before he flicked his wrist, resulting in his transparent wand lighting up brightly with archaic runes. "Forget The Present."

----------------------------------------

"So you also know about the Ancient that's on its way here to destroy The Academy?" Lone asked a bit testingly.

The words left his lips as he had intended, but something felt... wrong. "That wand, wasn't it over there a second ago?"

Erion just remained silent as he waited expectantly. Not a beat later, three notifications filled Lone's vision.

The host has developed the active time magic skill: Forget The Present.

Congratulations! The host has developed an affinity for Time Magic.

The host has developed the passive skill: Time Magic Resistance.

"... What?" Lone was beyond confused. 'Why the hell am I learning time magic? Did Erion use a skill on me? But he never chanted anything... Wait, did he really not chant nothing?'

Soph's light breathing reverberating from his chest was the only sound Lone could hear in the room, but, oddly enough, it helped him focus.

The wand, Erion's proud expression, the system notifications, a small gap in his mind that felt... strange. It all added up to a single and somewhat obvious answer. "You erased my memory? No, wait, not erased... sent it back in time?"

Erion nodded with extreme pride. "As expected of my personal disciple. Every time I use that skill on Sarah, the fool, she doesn't even realise I've used it."

He looked a bit excited, in all honestly. More so than a million-year-old man should rightly be over something this trivial. "Go on, Lone. Look at the skill's information, would you? Ah, you likely gained the resistance too, knowing you. It's not dissimilar to any other resistances, though you likely already knew that."

Lone saw no reason to argue or do otherwise, so he pulled up the information of his two news skills. First, the resistance since it was likely to be the same as the numerous other ones he possessed.

Passive Skill: Time Magic Resistance

A skill that allows the host to resist all negative forms of Time Magic.

Negative forms of Time Magic used on the host will be weakened by 5%.

Cost: N/A Mastery: Beginner Level 1

'Ah, it's basically the exact same as Enchantment Magic Resistance, huh? Well, that's good to know. Who's to say if I'll ever be able to travel through time off of my own accord since Soph's Minor Time Control has nothing to do with me, but being resistant to my own time-travelling efforts would kinda suck ass,' Lone thought as he then moved on to look at his new active skill's information.

Active Time Magic Skill: Forget The Present

A skill created by the famous human and octamage, Erion of the Crest.

Due to how complex it is, the skill requires 10-minutes of pre-chanting before it shall successfully cast.

Allows the host to send a being's mind back 10-seconds in time. Can only be used once every 24-hours.

Cost: 500,000 MP Mastery: Beginner Level 1

"... What the fuck?" Lone was beyond shocked, quite evidently.

"Questions, I presume?" Erion asked.

Lone nodded slowly as he stared at the skill. "Yes, a handful. For a start, you made a skill? That's fuckin' cool, Man. I've created two myself - Lightning Wave and Kindling of Mana - but I'm hardly normal."

"I've made quite a lot of skills, Lone. Do remember that I'm a Divine and that I reached this state of power through my own efforts. I'm also over a million-years-old. I'd be a disgrace to all fossils like myself if I didn't have a plethora of self-created skills at my disposal, especially as one of the continental leaders of magical research - granted, I only focus my efforts on time magic and nothing else," Erion said in a bit of a lecturing tone.

Lone scratched his head bashfully. "Right. Look, I'm from a place where people live to about 130 tops, so whenever I hear things like 'unaging' or 'I'm 400-years-old' I kind let it go in one ear and out of the other. It hardly helps that you look about 20."

"All Divines are able to change their physical appearance to any state their body has once been in. Well, there are exceptions. If you had lost a body part, as an example, there is no way to get that back with Divine energy, or, if, let's say someone happened to have a handful of Primals living inside of them, well, any altercations of theirs wouldn't be reversible," Erion said until he recalled something. "Ah, also, pseudo-Divines like Samson, they aren't privy to this ability."

"Huh. Nice to know," Lone replied. "So Sarah, she's created skills as well?"

Erion calmly inclined his head. "A handful, yes. She's more traditional than me though and isn't much of an explorer despite the irony."

"Yeah, that's kinda hard to believe what with her being the owner and head of the continent's leading adventuring establishment," Lone joked.

"Indeed, anyway, have you more questions about Forget The Present?" Erion prompted.

"Erion of the Crest?" Lone immediately asked.

"Ah, I forgot about that. I'm from a place called Crest. Lovely little village before the massacre. It's a mass gravesite now," the headmaster merrily explained.

Lone smiled wryly. "Sorry. That must have been painful."

Erion inclined his head as if to say 'it's fine'. "It happened a very long time ago. Anything else?"

Lone rested his chin on the sleeping Soph's head in thought for a moment. "Hmm... Well, is that really the most powerful skill you have? It's cool and all, but surely a million years of research and experiments haven't led you to discovering nothing but how to essentially erase someone's memory for a ludicrously costly amount of MP, right?"

Erion chuckled. "Haha, well, Lone, it is, in fact, one of my strongest time magic skills."

"Really?" Lone doubted the man.

"Put it this way, Lone. Time magic is to us sentient beings what water is to fish or what the sky is to birds. We are aware of its ever-present existence, but we don't even come close to understanding it. Even the few among us who have insights into the subject have barely scratched the surface of the surface. Time is an uncaring mistress and she, unfortunately, stops for no one, making it a bit tricky to accurately study her," Erion said, trying his best to explain to his personal disciple.

Lone slowly nodded as he rubbed his light stubble into Soph's head of golden-blonde hair, resulting in a small moan of joy escaping her lips.

"Okay, I get it. By the way, can you fill me in on what happened before you pulled my mind back in time? I doubt you immediately used the skill on me, after all," Lone requested, to which, the headmaster happily agreed.