Chapter 040:

Rus Drake’s Point of View:

Rus wiped the sweat off his brow and raised his sword once more.

“You really are a tenacious one aren’t you?” The student facing him asked with a smile. He too looked tired and was marred with signs of having just been in a fight.

“Well, that’s to be expected, he is a knight after all,” Another student chipped in, standing beside the student facing Rus.

“Guys, the ring’s getting smaller, let’s end this quick,” The third and final student surrounding Rus suggested nervously.

“Don’t worry I was just having fun, let’s end this kid together,” After his words, the three then started approaching Rus together.

‘I have to use it now,’ Rus resolved himself with a hardened expression. He had wanted to save the skill for later, but it was clear that he had no choice now.

But just as he was about to activate {Berserker’s Rage}, he heard a voice interrupt him.

“Save it for later, Rusty,”

Swiveling his head toward the source of the sound, he found the familiar Timothy.

“W-what?” Rus couldn’t help but ask. ‘Does he know about my system?’ The thought made him raise his guard.

“Save your strength for later,” Timothy repeated, offering him a reassuring smile.

The young knight nodded subconsciously but thought to himself ‘Did I really misunderstand?’

In his heart, he understood that the likelihood of Timothy knowing he had a system, or even that he knew what a system was in the first place, was low. But still, the mysterious sparkle in Timothy’s eyes whispered the opposite.

‘He really is nothing like the stories Princess Eleanor tells me,’ The Timothy he had heard of was an average love-stricken boy with a bit of a pathetic streak that could be slightly forgiven by the fact that both his parents were dead.

But the Timothy of now, the same one who had the balls to punch Graveclaw’s Vice Captain Commander in the face, was a different beast entirely.

Belatedly realizing that he did not recognize the people around Timothy, he opened his mouth to speak, “Who are your friends?”

“Our friends,” Timothy said with a wink.

‘Our friends?’ Rus thought with a tilt of his head, he studied the group following Timothy. He noticed several things; for one, there was a healthy mix of students from both kingdoms. Another interesting thing was how they treated Timothy.

‘They are afraid?’ Rus thought in surprise after recognizing the emotion in their eyes.

“Alright boys,” Timothy announced with a laugh, speaking to the students who had tried to jump Rus. “We can do things the easy way, or the hard way,”

As if to punctuate the end of his sentence, three students who stood closest behind Timothy grunted and smiled menacingly.

At least they would have been menacing if not for the fact that they looked like they had taken a beating themselves.

“W-what do you want?” One of the students who had been fighting Rus asked.

“Simple, you either join our ranks or you can take a dive off the ledge,”

The three students shared glances before instantly coming to a decision.

“We’ll join!” The three said unanimously and simultaneously.

Rus nodded. ‘Makes sense, with Timothy’s numbers it would be a tall task to take them on,’ After the thought, he noticed something strange. The three students behind Timothy suddenly widened their smiles.

‘Their smiles are weird…it kind of looks like schadenfreude?’ He questioned himself. Unfortunately, he was about to learn the answer.

After hearing their response, Timothy sighed with a mixture of sadness and disappointment on his face.

This confused the students who had agreed to his offer.

“Tsk, tsk tsk. Young people these days. So impassioned, so idealistic. To think you would rather be beaten black and blue than surrender your pride and follow a leader you know nothing about,”

This further confused the three students who, at this point, grew wary.

“Well, no choice then,” Timothy said with a kind smile before quickly flicking his wrist and pointing toward the boys.

The effect was immediate as the several students standing behind Timothy charged all at once with the three who had stood closest at the lead.

It wasn’t much of a fight, within seconds the three students who dared to refuse Timothy’s offer were beaten to the ground.

“Make sure to hit them in places covered by clothes, we don’t want them looking too pitiful,” Timothy advised kindly.

After having their feathers plucked, the three students were then tied up tightly with torn pieces of robes. Rus wisely chose not to think about where those scraps of clothing had come from.

Stolen novel; please report.

Timothy clapped joyously after being presented with the three barely conscious sushi rolls.

“So, boys. Any regrets?” He asked, grabbing one of the hog-tied students and raising his head to establish eye contact.

The poor student opened his mouth to speak before closing it again in fright.

“Find anything good?” Timothy asked again, only this time, to the boys around him.

“Nah, their pockets were as empty as their heads,”

Alexander nodded with a regretful expression on his face. “Well, no choice then, toss ‘em,”

Rus watched with morbid curiosity as the group of ruffians callously tossed their fellow students off the ever-shrinking ledge.

“Right then, let’s go,” Timothy declared with a yawn.

Unsure of what to do, Rus decided to follow along, joining Timothy’s small group of fanatics.

‘What if they throw me off the ledge for saying no?’ Was the lingering thought that helped him come to a decision.

………………………………………………..

“This is a good chance to apologize for my previous actions, Your Highness,” Alec spoke calmly, even as he was forced to sidestep Clive’s attack.

“What for?” The prince asked back before vanishing from his spot beside Alec.

“I recognize the fact that student Moore is from your kingdom and thus under your jurisdiction. {Heat Conversion}” A magical circle materialized above Alec’s palm before turning red and rapidly expanding in size.

The young magician then thrust his hand upward, conveniently blocking the sword that aimed for his head from above.

Fire exploded outward as the spell seemingly dissipated the young prince’s blow.

“An interesting spell,” The young prince complimented with a calm smile. “A spell that converts physical force into pure heat, truly innovative. One problem though,”

“Oh?” Alec asked with a smile, looking upward. The majestic prince was stuck midair, looking like a coiled snake that had just struck and missed. ‘His posture is broken, he used all he had to leap above me and strike. If I hit him with a fire bomb now, he won’t be able to dodge mid-air,’ He had just begun to cast another spell when a glimmer of light caused him to squint.

Focusing his gaze, he finally caught sight of what had reflected the sunlight into his eyes. ‘A sheathe?’ He thought, puzzled.

In the prince’s other hand was the sheathe to his sword.

“It has a limit to how much force it can convert at once,” The prince ended his explanation by reeling the sheathe back and swinging with all he had.

The sheathe slammed into his sword which was still grinding against the spell.

The wave of heat given off by the spell was even greater than the last time and Alec began growing worried; he was right to do so as shortly after, the spell shattered with the sound of breaking glass.

‘I can still do damage!’ Alec thought with teeth grit. “{Fire Bomb}!”

He completed his spell and blasted away at the air above him, where he thought the prince had been.

“You underestimate my speed, Alec,” A voice behind him caught him off guard. Moroe immediately rolled forward, narrowly dodging Clive’s wide swing.

Unwilling to give up on his advantage, Clive continuously struck, raining down attacks.

To his credit, Alec proved himself a competent close-quarter combatant as he weaved in between attacks, barely keeping up with Clive’s speed.

Keen observers would notice, however, the calm expression on Clive’s face, as opposed to Alec who had been biting his lower lip throughout the onslaught.

‘He’s playing with me!’ Alec thought angrily, deciding to stop holding back.

“{Reflect}” Alec whispered as he smashed his hand into Clive’s sword.

Instead of happiness, Clive felt surprised as he sensed his sword abruptly stop before shooting back.

“Tsk. You talented bastard,” The young prince complimented while leaping back and away from Alec, who had just completed his second spell.

“{Stream Fire}” Alec chanted while pointing his five fingers toward Alec.

From the small magical circle hovering in front of the fingers, five concentrated beams of pure heat shot toward Clive.

“Damnit!” the young prince cursed, using everything he had to dodge the first beam. Unfortunately, that attack was closely followed by the second.

Feeling the heat encroach, Clive decided to throw caution to the wind and slammed against the spell with his sword, wanting to slice it apart.

His hopes were instantly shattered as his sword and arm were blown back so rapidly, that his posture fully broke.

The third beam came to him then, barreling toward his chest.

Out of pure instinct, the young prince stopped fighting against his sword and allowed himself to be blown back by its momentum. Mid-air, he twisted his body further along with the sword, allowing the third beam just enough clearance so as to whoosh pass him. He grimaced in pain as the spell passed him, leaving a searing mark across his chest.

Distracted by the pain, he tripped and fell, skidding across the arena’s floor.

The fourth beam did not give him any time to stand but Clive did not care as he already had a plan for it. Recalling that he had a sheathe, the young prince tossed it toward the beam. The two met mid-air and an explosion instantly followed.

‘Fuck!’ Clive cursed, closing his eyes as debris from the explosion pelted him.

The fifth beam, he could do nothing about.

“Aghhhh!” He screamed as searing pain overtook his senses. The fifth beam of fire struck his shoulder and pierced his flesh.

Enraged by the smell of his own burning flesh, the young prince forcefully opened his bloodshot eyes.

‘Now!’ He thought desperately, making it back onto his feet. He had sacrificed his non-sword-bearing arm for the upcoming attack. He was going to make damn sure it was worth it.

“{Fuego}!” Alec’s voice loomed loudly.

Instead of worrying about the plume of fire making its way toward him, Clive focused on his breathing.

His mind was filled with images of Timothy from some time ago when the mad young man punched Vice Captain Commander Gunther in the face.

Though he hated to admit it, Timothy was, for some reason, much better at controlling his Wisker than he was.

More specifically, he spent many nights contemplating over how Timothy managed to compress his Wisker, focusing it all into one body part, his fist.

Back then, Timothy had done so with such ease, to him it was like breathing.

“Talented bastard,” Clive cursed again as he desperately funneled his Wisker into his sword, coating it in an emerald hue.

Then came the hard part. His recent awakening made controlling his Wisker easier but even then he could barely copy what Timothy had done with ease.

With most of his Wisker funneled into his sword, Clive began using all of his concentration to compress it further. The emerald hue of his sword grew more compact and shone more brightly with each passing second. Soon enough only half the sword was illuminated with a dazzling deep green light.

‘Further,’ The young prince thought obsessively even as he felt the heat of {Fuego} upon him.

At some point, the green light coating the sword was replaced with a white cap that shone only on the sword’s tip.

“Now!” The young prince roared, hurling his body straight into the plume of roaring fire.