[Kai Crestless POV]
~~2 days ago ; First Saturday after the start of the school year.~~
It was late afternoon, I was walking through the halls of Xyrus Academy, very few students, most of them seemed to be there to ask the teachers for help with their studies. Nothing too unusual, this has happened several times as long as I can remember. But now I had something more important to do, something more important than this place.
I went towards the entrance of Xyrus Academy, and I could see a carriage waiting for me, I got in it, fixing my hair and looking to my side, where there was a man with a big hood and black cloak, his face was impossible to see, but I could see his red hair.
"So, Young Crestless, how's that first week's report going?" he said, as he picked up some kind of cigarette and smoked, I'm clearly not a smoker, but him having that particular brand of cigarette reminded me that he was an 'important' person to say the least.
"It's going well, I feel like no one suspects anything at the moment... And I've found two interesting mages." I said smiling as the carriage moves away from Xyrus Academy.
"Really? But... Interesting how?" he asked, blowing some smoke in front of him.
"One is a quadra-elemental mage, the first of all here from Dicathen, according to the records we have access to. The other is a duo-elemental mage, fire and wind. The second doesn't seem all that interesting, but in fact they both succeeded in having jobs to teach here at the academy. The first as a teacher of Practical Mana Manipulation, a basic subject, and the second one teaches about runes at a basic and an advanced levels." When I said that, the man turned to me, showing a smile and the red eyes he has.
"Hm... Very interesting... Two students... One is a Quadra-elemental and the other... Teaches about runes... Do you think we can get something out of them?" he asked me, still with that smile on his face.
"I still don't know, they both seem pretty close to elven and human royalty. And recently they were hospitalized after an accident where they had to save the elven princess... But I feel that maybe we can turn them to our side if we promise them power and protection. In the case of the duo-elemental, maybe we can even use our knowledge of runes as a factor in him wanting to join us." I said looking at the carriage window.
"I see. Very well... Have you ever tried to make a thing related to this?" his voice sounded pretty serious, as if he expected quick, direct results.
"I took a test and now I can be a student of that Duo-Elemental mage's advanced classes. We can try to start with him, as both mages are brothers... Let's make our negotiations become a familiar situation between the two of them." I looked back at him.
"Anything else I need to know?" He looked me deep into my eyes.
"I got five more of our group into this advanced class as well... Ironically, the six of us were the only ones who passed the permission test to be there. It seems our knowledge of runespells is helping more than we expected." I was proud of myself, after all those rune questions were super simple due to my previous schooling.
"That's great... A young teacher being slowly influenced by all his students to join our group... Splendid... But still, you and your other classmates should find more people who can come to our group. Don't forget... The dead-end of my plan is until next year, and so far we only have influence on thirty students and three professors, of those inside the academy." his looked very curious.
"Okay, I'll try to convert more people... The more people under our wing, the better the plan you are orchestrating." I scratched my chin.
"I agree. Since the accident that happened in some of our allies' camps in the dungeons, we have to be careful about the number of members in my plan. I still can't believe those idiots let mana beasts out of control to the point of destroying the camps... I hope the blood of this idiots will be completely destroyed... But anyway, thanks for the report, today I'll drop you off at some elixir shops, let's attract first-years with gifts." He smiled more, to the point that I thought his mouth was going to rip.
"But you said we shouldn't use that approach two years ago. Have you changed your mind because we have elves and dwarves now at the academy?" I asked and he answered me, nodding his head.
"Okay, I didn't mention some small details that I thought were insignificant, but you can read them here." I handed him a set of papers from my bag.
He didn't say anything, just handed me a small bag of golden coins so I could buy the elixirs. He didn't need to say it, just by the look in his eyes, I knew he was counting on me on this. Finally, this plan that had started 30 years ago would come to fruition. The carriage pulled up in front of the commercial part of the floating city and I took one last look at the leader of the operation I'd been put in.
"For Alacrya." I said saluting.
"For Vritra." he answered me, imitating the same movement I did. "Now take care, boy."
"Alright, master Draneeve." I said, finally getting out of the carriage, as I saw it moving away from me, with the leader of our group disappearing from my sight.
"We are so close.... I will pride the Crestless blood... I will pride my continent... I will be the beginning of the destruction of this stupid, unevolved place, called Dicathen..." Those were my thoughts , as I entered the elixir shop, already thinking about how to attract more students and professors to our plan.
----------------------------------------
~~Today ; Monday of the second week.~~
It was around 4 pm, I, along with my other five allies, were together outside Xyrus Academy, talking a little about our new plan that was going to start today. The plan is to try to convert one more Professor, and as a result, try to convert the only quadra-elemental in that place.
Counting me in, our group consisted of three Alacryans and three Dicathens, a dwarf and two humans. The dwarf had easily converted in the last year, before entering the academy. The humans had been with me for three years now, the boy was convinced when I showed him the potential of spellrunes, the girl was the hardest to convert, I had to deliver enough elixirs so that she was now on the Light Orange Stage, but it was worth it, as she is an Earth Conjurer with Gravity Deviant.
Relative to all the other members of my party, I had a spellrune that allowed me to control metal, not so diversely, but it was enough for me to use metal bars to trap someone or pierce an enemy. The other two Alacrians had two spellrunes each, one of them could create a fire shield and cast fireballs, while the other could create a layer on his feet that allowed him to walk on water, in addition to being able to cast Ice Spears.
The dwarf in our group was an Earth and Fire Augmenter, who even though he was on the Light Red Stage, was already showing powerful signs of Magma Deviant, we had given him a spellrune that allows him to temporarily quadruple his strength, at the expense of sanity. The human boy in our group, was a Water Augmenter, who, not being an Ice Deviant, asked to have two spellrunes, one that allows him to cast Ice Spikes and another that creates an ice armor for him. The human girl didn't seem to want to have spellrunes, she was smart enough to know the risk it would put her if she was discovered.
The parents of my Dicathen allies were aware of our plans, and would be rewarded with the assistance they were providing us.
"So Kai. Anything else we need to know about our new 'Professor'?" Said Alexyo, the alacryan girl.
"No big deal, he's a rune fanatic apparently, so trying to guide him to us using knowledge is the best option. But remember, we can't start by being aggressive." I told her, looking at my other allies who nodded in agreement.
"Yes, we have to get into his friendly camp first, so he lets his guard down." Burkit the dwarf complemented our line of reasoning.
We waited until 6 pm for us to go to the Advanced Rune Lessons classroom. It was a simple laboratory, but it seemed to really demonstrate the idea of being a place full of knowledge and learning, sitting on top of the table was my colleague from the disciplinary committee and now my Professor, Luz Leywin.
"Good evening, welcome to my Advanced Rune Lessons class, my dear students. How are you feeling?" He said as he sipped a mug of coffee and watched us walk in.
"We're fine, thank you very much." Letty, the human girl, answered him.
"Perfect! But I'd like to apologize to everyone for one thing... This is our classroom, but I actually got permission from Principal Cynthia Goodsky so that we could use a classroom that contains an arena, for practical classes. And this first class of ours will be practice. So... Could you follow me?" his voice was soft with us, something very different from what some students in his Basic class had reported.
Without question, we followed him through the hallways until we reached a classroom that contained a circular arena large enough to have a complex fight. But I noticed that on one of the walls of the arena there was a chalkboard, maybe Luz had prepared things before we found him in that lab.
"As I said before, we will have practical runes classes. Would you be able to tell me what that means?" He said after closing the door and walking to the chalkboard
"Are we using magic items that have runes? Something involving us identifying what the rune on the item does and then testing it?" Battione, the second human in our group, tried to answer doubtfully.
"Something like that... Anyway, I want to know something first, since you six were the only ones out of twenty students to pass my test." Luz said, smiling and excited. "Do you believe in the theory of using runes on a mage's body?"
Our eyes widened. "What do you mean by that?" I asked.
"It's just that for years, scholarly mages have tried to understand runes and how to use them. While most use them on magical artifacts and objects, there is a small group that believes runes can be placed on someone's body to give that person power." when he answered me, my eyes widened wider.
"Runes on people's bodies? I've never heard anyone talk about it." Denver, my other alacrian ally asked, I could tell he was in a cold sweat, even I was feeling that way too, since spellrunes are just what our professor was describing.
"Well... Now you will hear. As I consider it the most powerful form of magic in existence." Luz's eyes began to glow yellow and I felt a powerful aura, an aura that seemed to make my body beg to kneel.
"And to show you that, today I would like to battle with you..." He said turning his back to us and writing something on the Chalkboard, I couldn't understand what it was, but that whole situation was making me stay really in doubt about what kind of class he would be giving us.
"Battle with us?" Alexyo asked, taking a good look at our Professor and possible future ally.
"Yeah... Is there any problem with the first practice class of Advanced Rune Lessons being a battle?... I mean, I'm actually going to pressure you guys to fight me, while you have to try to figure out what's written." Luz said as he started to take the vest off his DC Officer uniform.
"Written where?...." Battione asked, but our answer came silently.
After he took off his vest, he was left with a sort of training tank top, but he also took that off, and with his back to us, I saw something that made me extremely confused. On his back were several colored runes, there were several, I counted and apparently there were 14 spellrunes!?
Wait, is he from Alacrya too?!? But that makes no sense! There is no "Blood Leywin" in our records, and wait? Does that mean Arthur is also an Alacrian? They were already on our side and I wasn't even aware?!....
No... Wait... I had forgotten about that detail, Luz is adopted... But anyway, I never hear a report on him... Could it be that he's here for a mission more advanced than the operation I'm in?? What could be more advanced than an operation ordered by a Scyther?!
I looked at my allies, while the Dicathens were confused, my countrymen had a look of dread on their faces... But why? What was scary about that? We found out that a powerful mage was already from our home continent, what's so horrible about that?
"Ohoho! So you're already part of the group? I wasn't even aware of that. Wow, you scared me too much." Battione said more relaxed now.
"Group?....Which Group?" Those words came out of Luz's mouth, my face went extremely pale and I looked angrily at Batti, he had said too much without realizing or being aware that it was not good to say.
"What do you mean...? If you don't know about the group... This means..." Now it was Letty who started talking and the situation really hit everyone's minds.
"Either he is from Dicathen and received these runes from a traitor.... Or he is a traitor..." this thought kept bubbling through my mind as I saw Professor Luz's smile grow impossibly wider.
"Oh... I'd love to know about this 'group' you guys have... Could you talk a little more?" he started walking slowly towards us, our instincts were telling us that our plan with him was no longer possible, he would fight us to get all the information he wanted.
I was already starting to get ready to fight, but when I looked around, I saw that the Dicathens were moving away a little to have more space, while Alexyo was using one of her spellrunes to create a fire shield, Denver seemed to get legs trembling and ended up kneeling on the floor. Which made me strange, after all he was the most aggressive of our trio.
This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
"What are you doing?!? Summon your Ice Spears!" Alexyo ordered Denver, but he didn't do that, now he started to cry and seemed to ask for forgiveness.
"Well, well... Looks like he understood the situation... Great this will be quick then." Luz said that and I looked at him again.
I activated my spellrune, causing metal wires to come out of my backpack and towards him, as Alexyo started to focus a fireball, Letty started to cast her spell, Battione bubbled water through the moisture in the air and created water gauntlets to himself, and Burkit forced the earth beneath him to mold and obtained magma boots.
My metal wires easily seemed to wrap around Luz's body, trapping him and leaving both arms together to his torso, but he kept smiling and watching us, as he slowly seemed to.. START FLOATING?!?!
With him trapped in my metal wires, Alexyo launched a blue fireball 50 centimeters in diameter towards our target. But it seemed that spell broke before it was touched.
Letty saw this and used a distance gravity spell, aiming to make our enemy stop floating and fall completely against the ground, but what surprised us was that Luz kept floating as if nothing was affecting him.
"What the hell!!" Letty screamed in anger at the sight and seemed to force her spell harder, but her nose started to bleed from trying so hard and nothing actually happened.
Battione and Burkit were Augmenters, and due to the fact that Luz could withstand the gravity spells of the most powerful conjurer of our sextet, they were still far away, unable to use any spell to attack from a distance, the most they could do was reinforce their bodies by creating a full armor of their respective elements.
I held on and tried to tighten the metal wires around his body, but nothing seemed to do any good, it was like he was too hard for me to tighten any more. So I tried to make the ends of the wires become sharp and go into his skin, but that's when I really freaked out.
The metal I controlled began to glow, as if it was being heated to an absurd degree, and soon the heat became so intense that it melted some of my strands. My eyes widened in response to that.
"Now, it's my turn?" He said smiling still and he soon shouted a spell.
"ICE KINGDOM!"
Around him, the entire room began to be covered in ice, with stalactites and stalagmites sprouting from the ice. I could see the frozen air of my breath, which is getting more agitated due to the panic I was feeling.
"Ice...? He's using ice!?! But he's categorized as a Wind-Fire Conjurer!!! Is that a spellrune?!? I've never seen a spellrune of this level before!" I tried to reason the current situation, when I noticed that my metal bars froze and were easily broken by the ice domain owner.
"Ice Spikes! Ice Armor!" Battione started running towards him while using the spellrunes he had. With his water armor transforming into ice armor and stomping hard on the ground, ice spikes began to appear towards our enemy. The thorns seemed to get smaller and thinner the closer they got to him, until that spellrune was completely nullified.
"Alexyo!" I screamed and she released another fireball, strangely, even though she hadn't concentrated so much, that projectile was over 60 centimeters in diameter, as if her fire had gotten stronger out of nowhere.
"I think not." Luz said while snapping her fingers and that fireball immediately seemed to return towards the alacrian girl, who used her fire shield to defend herself, but strangely the shield disappeared from her hand and she was hit by the attack, throwing her backwards.
"AAAAAAAHHH!!!" Burkit yelled, activating his spellrune as he ran towards the enemy, he had magma armor all over his body and carried with him a large hammer that was surrounded by magma as well.
"Water Blade!" Battione created blades of water in his arms, and because of Ice Armor's spellrune, the blades also turned into ice.
The human boy and the dwarf tried to attack Luz, using magma and ice, but I noticed something strange. The human's ice was starting to melt at an absurd rate, while the dwarf's magma was slowly hardening, returning to a stone state.
Luz ducked to dodge the big hammer, and then appeared to make a small punching motion towards the dwarf's stomach, which caused a pillar of ice to appear from the floor, which hit Burkit, launching him straight into the ceiling.
After that, the Professor used wind mana to trip Battione, knocking him to the ground, and then immediately stomp on his ice armor, creating a cocoon of ice around the human boy.
"Kai! Get down!" I didn't even look and ducked down quickly when I heard Letty's voice, she was now firing countless earth projectiles in a row.
I could see our enemy dodging some of the projectiles, while again using wind mana to redirect other earth shots to different directions, ending up with some hitting Burkit and Alexyo, who were already passed out and therefore taking that damage.
I tried to get up, but soon I felt someone holding my legs tight, I looked and saw Denver, he was still shaking and his eyes were full of tears.
"Kai... B-better run or give up... W-we can't handle him..." said my friend.
"Why do you say that?! You didn't even try to attack him! You instantly got down on your knees!" I yelled at him, while I still felt like I shouldn't get up because Letty was still trying to fire projectiles at the enemy.
"Kai... Are you blind?.. Look at the left side of his head...." I was confused and still annoyed by what Denver said, but he soon yelled "HE HAS HORNS!"
When he said that I immediately looked at our enemy, and I could see something that made me realize my colleague's real fear. Hidden beneath that dark hair were two onyx-black horns on the left side. One of them came from the side of the head, and was arched forward, the other was on the forehead and was arched upwards. My mind stopped working when I started to reason what that means.
"He... Isn't he just from Alacrya.... He... Is a Vritra...?" my eyes widened in fear, my body started to shake.
Was that why I felt awkward around him before? No, wait, I never felt weak around that boy, but why now? What made it different? How did I never notice that?!?
But my fear became extreme when I saw a black flame appear in his hand, aiming at us.. No, he wasn't aiming at me or Denver.. He's aiming at....
"LETTY! STOP ATTACKING AND KNEEL!!" I screamed at the top of my lungs, but she didn't seem to hear me and kept attacking him.
"I'm already getting annoyed with so many pebbles hitting me, you know?" Luz said, his yellow eyes glowing with intensity.
"SoulFire" The Vritra said throwing that Fireball made with decay mana art towards Letty, she tried to defend herself by shooting stones in that fireball and creating a wall in front of her. But that was easily consumed by the attack, breaking through all her defenses and hitting her.
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHH!!" a terrifying high-pitched scream erupted from her mouth as she was being surrounded by Soulfire. Her body fell to the ground, having several spasms as she didn't stop screaming.
"Tsk..." Luz walked slowly towards her, seeming to ignore me and Denver. When he got close to her, he snapped his fingers and I could see her passing out and stopping on fire.
With that done, he now started walking towards us, looking straight into our eyes. His gaze seemed more insane than Draneeve's, while the smile he wore seemed to tear his own cheeks a little, making blood flow. He was above us as we knelt, terrified of everything.
"Looks like you're the only one who has an ounce of survival..." He said looking at my colleague and then back at me. "Kai... Kai Crestless... What a suspicious surname, isn't it?... Was it the knowledge of fate to have a blood named that way? Hehehe... Well... Don't worry.... I'll keep you all alive and let you out of this room... If you do a quick and simple little task... And no, it doesn't involve killing each other... I have more pity than my other self."
"'Other self'? what does that mean?" I thought confused, but nodded in agreement.
He soon coughed hard on the floor beside us, drawing blood. "Drink of my blood... And you'll be free~" Denver immediately did as requested, but I looked uncomfortably at the blood and then at the Vritra in front of me. He gave a little laugh.
"Relax, you saw me using SoulFire.. By that logic, it's impossible for me to have access to Acid or Poison... Isn't that right?" he said something that made sense, by common knowledge in Alacrya, people who awakened Vritra blood, if they could use Soulfire, they wouldn't be able to use Acid and Poison, as one was from the fire element of decay mana art, and the other was from the water element.
I was going to start drinking from that blood on the floor, but I saw Denver starting to scream in pain and writhe after he drank from it, which made me more afraid to do that action. Seeing this, Luz held tight to my neck and spewed blood directly into my face, thus forcing me to swallow a little.
My face was dirty with that blood that was darker than usual, I felt immense dizziness and strong pains in my head, the pains were spreading to the rest of the body, which was now writhing without my having any control. My vision slowly darkened, with the last thing I saw being that Vritra's glowing yellow eyes.
----------------------------------------
I don't know how much time passed, but when I finally managed to open my eyes, I found myself in a completely dark place, it looked like a pure Void. My head felt a little dizzy and like it was 'full'... But why?
That's when I realized, even though I was in a Void, a place devoid of perspective, I could feel that I was actually upside down, tied up by something that, no matter how much I looked at my body, I couldn't see, it was as if there was nothing holding me back, even though I felt there was.
I soon heard the sound of a door opening and then closing, slowly the Vritra boy appeared in front of me, he didn't have his horns as if he had ripped them off, and those bright yellow eyes were completely dark with red pupils.
"Hello Kai... How are you? Comfortable?" He still had that broken smile and I tried to move, but nothing was working.
"W-what are you going to do to me?!" I screamed, feeling tears coming out of my eyes without me wanting to cry, it was like my body was acting different than I wanted to.
"I already did... That blood you drank.. It was infected just like the mana your allies use to create corrupted mana beasts~" He chuckled and continued to stare at me.
If my skin was already pale, now it has become the purest white in existence. Does he know how to corrupt a mana beast? He did the same to me using his blood?!?!
"W-what do you mean—" Before I could finish my sentence, he moved his own right arm, and my right arm moved in response. My eyes widened, was that why I couldn't move properly while hanging?
"Do you understand?... You and your friends will now be my 'assistants'. But there's still one thing missing... Your mind is still sane... I'll need to break you a little." He chuckled.
"Break me?..." I asked, startled by him getting closer to me.
----------------------------------------
[3rd Person POV]
Cynthia was entering the Academy's detention room and soon saw Professor Luz's six students. They were all tied up in different ways, and seemed to be talking to themselves, delirious, their eyes completely white.
"..*Sigh*... Who are you at the moment?" the Director said looking at the boy who was sitting in front of the six students.
"Zalgnity." The boy turned to look at Goodsky, he had blood red horns, made completely of mana, his voice was thick and quadrupled, his eyes were complete black, with the iris being blood red.
"Oh, so you're the 'devil'... I see..." Cynthia said, watching those students.
Kai and their group were in a complete delusional delusion made by Zalgnity, not even the demon himself knew what they were seeing, but he knew that when the delusion was over, that group would become obedient and faithful to him.
The demon laughed. "Impressive how you're not scared by this, Miss Goodsky." He said with a curious look at her.
"I've seen much worse things... That and Sirius explained to me how the two of you work... But it still surprises me that information about Luz. How does he still stay sane?" She asked.
"That's the thing... He doesn't have any sanity, he just focuses on one objective and is guided by several other objectives that arise... In this case, his main objective... Is to keep the Leywins safe, for have welcomed him."
"... So it's luck that he'll at least want to defend Dicathen?" she asked, Zalgnity didn't even bother to answer, just gave a heavy sigh.
Slowly, Kai's group of rebels becomes quieter, as if the psychological torture is over. Zalgnity stood up clapping and approached the human girl.
"What's your name? Where were you born?" he asked her.
"Letty Wunter... I was born in Sapin, Dicathen." She said in a soft voice, but there was no feeling at all.
"And you?" The demon said now turning to the alacrian boy who was beside Kai.
"My name is Denver of Blood Linkre... I was born in Vechor, Alacrya." He responded in the same way as the girl.
"Great great...." The demon walks away from them and speaks aloud. "Who represented power to you?"
"Agrona Vritra..." They said in unison
"And who represents power to you now?" Zalg smirked.
"You, my god, god of corruption..." they continued talking at the same time.
Cynthia was approaching them and then looked at the demon. "What do we do with them now? The three of you didn't explain this part of the plan to me after we found out about possible spies for Alacrya as students at my academy."
"According to what Sirius told me... Agrona is the type that absolutely hates to see small problems in this plans... He is quite a perfectionist for this... We will release these children and I will tell them to continue to act normally... We won't interfere with whatever they're planning. At the most, we'll lessen all consequences..." Zalgnity said, taking a species of plant he had caught inside the school's botanical area, wrapped it in a paper and used fire affinity to light the paper, starting to smoke.
"So... Is that it? We'll pretend we don't know anything, but will we prepare ourselves?... Honestly, seeing the way Agrona is, unfortunately I must accept this idea of yours..." Cynthia sighed and looked at Kai. "I don't believe... I put... an Alacrya spy within the disciplinary committee... I'm really getting really old..."
Zalg gave Cynthia a light tap on the shoulder. "Relax, we can all end up being tricked at some point. From what you said earlier with Sirius, you thought it would take another decade for the first possible attack. So of course you wouldn't imagine they would be infiltrated here.. Anyway, there's an advantage to that... Kai can meet with Luz or Sirius so we can catch up on what they're planning."
"It's true... It has this slight advantage... But tell me something... they were only in this state of control when..." Cynthia tried to understand the situation better.
"Yes, when I'm controlling this body. That's when I'll be able to give orders to these six students. In the same way that this body only has access to decay mana when Sirius is in control. But he and I always need to rest and recharge our energies after gaining that. So don't wait for our help all the time. Remember... Luz is in absolute control of this body, and he is a duo-elemental with a beast will. Don't wait for this type of mind control magic and these other things." He laughed as he answered that.
"When you 'see me' without the blood horns... You'll go back to complete normal, but you'll think you just had a regular class, thus forgetting about the fight and the revelations that happened.. Understand?" He asked the students, who simply nodded in agreement.
"Fine... Cynthia, better get out of 'my' classroom. We'll talk later." He said now looking at the Director, who understood and left.
But meanwhile, something more dangerous was happening, on the other side of Xyrus Academy, that danger would affect Luz's life forever, or at least for a week.
A pouting Claire was waiting for Luz, because she wanted to help him to make the cupcakes he promised before. Kathyln was also there, just waiting for her senpai....
{A/N: And in this moment, y'all know... Luz will be fucked up...}