[Alea Triscan POV]

I was in the halls of one of the Xyrus Academy buildings, being a guard for the former king, Virion Eralith. We were in the kingdom of Sapin because of meetings with some noble houses, with the Glayder royal family as a way of intermediating these conversations.

I was still surprised how, in the first week of these scheduled meetings, the accident with Princess Tessia Eralith occurred, but I couldn't be present, as I was on a mission to find possible places where there are slave market posts. At that moment, who was here was my colleague, Aya Grephin. But now we've changed missions.

And why is that? Apparently the reason for the princess' accident involved a plant-affinity beast will, which she recently received...

"Elder Virion, I'm sorry for my words, but... Who was the idiot who delivered a beast will to Princess Tessia, without even warning her of the problems of assimilating something like this without preparation?" I asked, until now I didn't know who was the person who did that and I didn't even know what the mana beast was that owned that mana core.

"Kekeke! Relax, Alea. The person who gave her this beast will did it with good intentions... Problem is, my granddaughter got so excited she came up with this crazy idea. But if you're curious to know who delivered it, just wait until we get to the training room." he answered me, as we were approaching a blue colored door, it seemed to be affected by a spell.

Elder Virion placed his palm on the door, and slowly the blue color faded from it, revealing it to be a wooden door. With that done, he managed to open it, revealing a large field with trees, a water fountain in the center, a ceiling that simulated the sky.... I would never call it a "training room", but we were in Cynthia Goodsky's Academy, so I shouldn't be too surprised.

My sensory magic made me feel a great danger nearby and I looked scared to the surroundings, eventually noticing a red-haired girl running away from a large cluster of flowering vines that seemed to try to attack her. The girl was dodging and attacking those vines a few times to protect herself. I looked in the direction where that plant magic was being originated, and I ended up seeing that dark haired boy next to Princess Tessia, as they both used their magic together.

"Very well, Claire! Now try to destroy it!!" He yelled at the red-haired girl, who soon took a big leap.

"Ignition!" She raised her voice, releasing a spell that set her entire body on fire, along with a rapier she had in her hands. With the tip of that blade having extremely concentrated fire.

"Fire Torrent!" The tip of her blade became incredibly bright and started to release another spell, which was burning part of the magical vines. But even so, that plant magic extends further, trying to advance against the girl.

"Wind Flow!" She recited that next spell, her feet circling a layer of wind, as she ran over the vines, toward the spellcasters. She soon took a big leap as she got close enough and landed behind them, aiming the rapier in the direction of the two plant mages.

I could hear the boy clapping for her. "Good job you two. Tessia, I know you can speed up this attack more. And Claire, you may have done well, but that idea of yours was... Slightly stupid."

"I'm sorry, mentor Luz." the girl named Claire answered.

"Alright... You're right about that-" Tessia replied the boy, but looked in our direction. "Grandpa!!" she shouted happily and was running towards Elder Virion.

"Hoo! How are you doing, my dear granddaughter?" He said taking the princess on his lap, while the other two approached.

"It's been a while since we've seen each other, Aureate." Luz said with a smile on his face and scratching the back of his neck.

"Hey! Don't call me by my codename. That's weird, especially coming from you, Luley." I used the nickname Aya given him since we met him at the royal castle, which made him chuckle slightly.

"A-aureate? Does that mean you're one of the Lances?! W-woaaah!!" The red-haired girl said, her eyes shining because she was so excited.

"Claire, this is Alea, better known as Aureate. She was the one who taught me how to use my plant magic when I found out my Beast Will had access to this deviant form." Luley said, introducing me to that girl.

"And Alea, this is Claire Bladeheart. She's been the head of the disciplinary committee, which is a group at Xyrus Academy that I'm a part of, whose job is to use brute force against anyone who tries to destroy the peace on campus." He introduced her to me.

"It's a pleasure to meet someone so important!" Claire said still excited.

"I say the same... Being the leader of a group that has Luley must be quite difficult, right?" I said, making Virion laugh.

"I still can't believe he's not the leader of this committee. But I know him well enough to know that he's just not being leader because he wants to give others a chance, right, brat?" Elder Virion said looking at the boy, who just gave a big sigh, accepting that.

"Yes yes, Old Bat! You're right about that. But it's because she's also my disciple, if I'm going to test her intensely, I need to put her at the top of a group like ours." Luley replied.

"Anyway.. So you were the one who gave the princess a beast will? I thought you had a better sense than that." I commented.

"It wasn't me, it was my brother." When he said that, Tessia looked a little crestfallen, already standing on the floor, and Claire gave her a light pat on her back for comfort.

"Hold on..." I finally started to think...

"Plant Beast Will....Luz and Arthur...Diamond and...Note!?" I thought carefully and then panicked, grabbing Tessia's shoulders and rocking her frantically. "DID YOU JUST ASSIMILATE A ELDERWOOD GUARDIAN'S BEAST WILL?!?!"

"Aa-aa-aa-ah! Ye-ee-ee-es." The princess answered me with a shaky voice because I was rocking her, but I soon released her.

"T-this is insane!!" I spoke extremely in shock.

Elder Virion started to laugh. "That's why I called you here, I wanted you to take a look at Tessia as she tries to use her new beast will, to see how it's affecting her performance. I'm helping her with the basic assimilation part, while the brat is being a helper regarding the handling of the element itself." He said that and Luley saluted slightly comically.

"Hm... Okay. What are you going to do for now?... And where is Arthur?" I asked, looking at the boy now.

"Well, I think Claire is going to practice some attacking moves with my brother, in the meantime I'm going to test Tessia a little bit, so I want you and Virion very close to analyze the situation too and give your criticisms. And as for my brother, he was here just now, but said he was going to bring our colleague here, I think you know him from the Dire Tombs report of events, his name is Elijah Knight." Luz answered all my questions and I just showed that I understood everything.

The four of us walked to the center of that huge room, while the red-haired girl stood by the door, watching us and waiting for Arthur to arrive. Luz and Tessia positioned themselves 12 meters away from each other, while Elder Virion and I sat next to the water source that was there.

"Let's go..." the boy's hair was gaining three colors at the ends.

"Come on!" Tessia said excitedly, with vines emerging from the ground and going to her right hand, forming a kind of trident.

"What is happening?" I asked myself.

"Apparently, even though it doesn't fully assimilate, for some reason her beast will is letting it be used.. It's like a beast will that is letting it be completely dominated, even if the user isn't able to at the moment." Virion answered me.

"Are you saying that... A beast will... From a Class S mana beast... Is this 'tame'?" I asked in disbelief and the Elder just sighed and nodded.

I looked back at them, using my sensory magic to detect any changes in the surrounding mana. I could see an uncontrolled amount coming out of Tessia, but it was strange, the mana itself went out of control, but after leaving, it acted in a more organized way. Luz, on the other hand, seemed to have a small amount of mana around his body, which was kind of weird, after all, he was using plant mana now.

"Elderwood Domain!" From where Tessia stood, a multitude of vines emerged, surrounding her and forming thick plant walls around us. Her legs were also surrounded by vines and the princess's eyes were now glowing a moss green.

I was incredibly impressed by what level she was at the moment. Then something else struck me, but it was because of the audacity he had. "Heh.. Is that all?... I can override my power over this 'Elderwood Domain'...." Luz said this in the most mocking way I could imagine.

"What does he think he's talking about? I know he's on the Light Yellow Stage, but saying he can override a mana beast Class S domain is complex." I thought, as I watched, he was moving one hand towards the floor and the other up.

"Flower domain..." He said in a calm voice, slowly making a circular motion with his arms. And during that same movement, countless flowers appear around him that are gradually rising and joining the vines of the princess's Domain.

Even though I've never seen an enderwood guardian and the way they change terrain. That huge cluster of vines around us, along with the flowers, gave me a strange nostalgic feeling. It was as if I already had this before, even though I knew that such a situation never happened.

Through my sensory magic, I noticed that the mana around the Luz was spreading throughout the Elderwood Domain region, and not only that, it was as if each of the various flowers were a mana core that tried to contaminate the vines in order to become part of them. This was incredibly weird and absurd, but it was the only way to describe what I was feeling.

Their expressions were incredibly opposite. While Tessia was struggling to maintain that magic, Luz seemed calm and serene as if that was more common than breathing.

Suddenly Tessia lifted that trident of vines and aimed it towards Luz, causing several of the vines that were on the ground and walls towards him. But Luz didn't seem to react that much and when the vines got almost close to him to the point of hurting him, they stopped.

"Tessia, I know you don't want to hurt him, but this one is serious training. Why did you stop?" Elder Virion asked.

"I-I'm not the one who stopped..." She replied, leaving me in complete shock.

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"Hehe. I'm sorry~" Luz said snapping his fingers as all the vines crumbled into moss green particles that now floated through the air until they disappeared.

"So.. What report can you give?" He asked looking at us, while our faces were in complete surprise, still thinking what happened.

"Well... From what I've seen... Your flowers, they work as if each one is a mana beast, and so they all at the same time try to impose dominance against the surrounding terrain. At the time of the attack, it wasn't Tessia controlling the vines... You were already in full control of them and just stopped the attack. You were acting." When I said that, Luz started clapping for me, as if I had said something very important.

"Oh! So Tessia's mistake was allowing you to complete your domain.. What an interesting situation." Elder Virion commented.

"W-wait! But how could I stop that?" Tessia exclaimed as she pouted and looked at her considerate brother.

"If the cause of the domain being overlapped was the flowers... Then you would have to be leaving the vines in constant motion so that those flowers couldn't stick to your domain." Virion raised that point and Luz sighed, looking defeated that someone had discovered the simplest way to stop his plant control.

"Yes, that's exactly how you could have stopped Elderwood Domain from being controlled by my Flower Domain." He said that and got a pinch on the cheek. "H-ouh!?!"

Tessia continued to pinch his cheek. "So I didn't have control of anything?!? Meanie!!"

Luz continued to moan in pain with the princess's "attack", it didn't seem like much, but my sensory magic made me see that she was focusing almost all of her mana to the hand that continued to squeeze the boy's cheek. I even feel sorry for him for having to suffer something like this, but a part of me thinks he completely deserves these things because he's totally abnormal.

After a few minutes, the training room door opened and I turned around to see the auburn hair boy, and he was with a boy with dark hair and slightly thick glasses. Both seemed to be talking, until he noticed my presence and waved, while the other froze at the sight of me.

"Alea! How are you? I didn't expect to see you here." Arthur said smiling.

"I'm great. And I'm here because of you! Are you crazy for giving the princess a beast will of that level?!" I exclaimed.

"Heh, relax, I've been punished enough. Luz threw me out of a window on the second floor of the academy and after that this Old Bat hit me in the back using a cactus." he replied putting his hand behind his back while Virion started to laugh.

"A-a-a-a-" The bespectacled boy stuttered as he looked at me, until Arthur slapped the back of his head, making him finally speak. "Aureate! It's an honor to be in your presence!"

"Fufufu. How cute... what he has?" I asked Luz.

"He only likes more mature women.. In the intellectual sense, of course.. It was lucky we found a girl our age who mentally is just the way he likes it." He said laughing and I ended up laughing along with him.

"H-hey! Don't try to screw up my reputation!" the boy was approaching us.

"Relax, Elijah. Anyway, now you and Claire are going to train with Arthur. I'm going to drop by quickly to see some things." He said walking towards the door, but Claire was holding on to his right arm.

"I think I want to go with you." Claire said excitedly.

"Um... Okay... Ahn... Elijah, you can survive there having my brother, two elf girls and an ancient king right?" He said turning his face to the one with the glasses.

"I'll hold him if anything goes wrong." Arthur said, deadpan, making their friend facepalm while Luz and Claire went out of the training room.

Tessia stayed with her grandfather, while I still stared at the middle of the practice room, which was now just Art and this boy named Elijah. My curiosity made me want to analyze their training.

"Piston Step!" Arthur was the first, he started by doing a spell that strengthened his legs and made him fly upwards. In the air, he made a motion of pointing a finger down and then pointing it at the boy, causing a crack to appear in the ground and go towards him.

"Earth Barrier!" Elijah made a movement with his hands, causing a wall to appear in front of him, the wall was in the path of the crack, which ended up not attacking him by the new obstacle ahead.

Art descended towards the earth wall, taking a leap when he reached the top of it and thus landing behind the boy with the glasses, who quickly made an arc motion with his hand. This caused half of that Earth Barrier to separate from the grounded half and head towards the auburn hair boy.

"Earth Gauntlet!" To defend himself, Art punched that piece of wall coming towards him. I could see part of the earth mana particles that were in that big projectile, go to his right hand, initially creating a gauntlet a few centimeters before impact. That punch resulted in the large projectile returning towards the conjurer, while the earth gauntlet in Art's hand seemed to readjust and become more detailed.

The conjurer left his arms in front of his body to defend himself, and that projectile seemed to deform in midair, turning into a sphere, which when touching him, ended up molding itself even more, and instead of receiving great damage, the boy was pushed back and now had gauntlets in both hands. But those weren't earth like Art's, they were metal...?!?

"Metal?! Where did that come from?! Don't tell me this conjurer turned earth into metal! And in a fast motion!?!" I thought, curious about it all.

"Metal Spikes!" The conjurer spoke his next spell, causing a cluster of metal spikes to appear on the ground and advance towards Arthur. This was amazing, I never imagined seeing something like this, it was like metal was being created... Wait... That's exactly what's happening! Metal was being created instead of molded!!!

"I think Mica would love to meet someone like him." I thought of one of the Dwarf Lances, Mica Earthborn, better known by the codename Ohmwrecker. She is always excited to see interesting things on this level, and I can already feel what that hyperactive energy of hers would be like when she kept asking the conjurer nonstop.

"Earth Pillar!" Arthur said, creating a pillar under him and now going up so he wouldn't be affected by his friend's attack. With a smug smile, he spoke. "Time to see how you're doing with that spell!"

"Great! Go with all power!" Elijah yelled anxiously.

Soon the conjurer was positioning his hands on the floor, while the augmenter was taking a deep breath and took a false step, falling off the pillar. But it was during that fall that it happened.

"Earth Body Extension!" The two shouted their spell. Arthur was touching his leg to the pillar and made an aerial kicking motion as he fell, the pillar seemed to thicken and move fluidly, following his movement, without disconnecting from his foot. Elijah, on the other hand, made a punching motion towards his friend, creating a pillar that came out of the ground fluidly following what he did.

I was literally seeing the same spell being used by a conjurer and an augmenter. One of them didn't need to be touching the ground, the other used the previous pillar to be able to be in contact with the ground, even if it was high up.

Elijah's "punch" and Arthur's "drop kick" collided with force, causing both attacks to destroy each other. Or I would say so, if the "punch" hadn't turned to metal halfway through its path, hitting Art squarely, who was hurled against one of the walls of the training room.

"WOHOOOO!! I finally got you!" Elijah said cheering as Art climbed out of that hole that was created by the impact.

"Argh.. I must admit, your speed in using metal to power up attacks.. is improving a lot.. Great job." the auburn hair boy commented as he walked back to where he was before.

"I must say that this training of yours is interesting... I've never seen anyone conjure metal. Usually you shape existing metal." I commented looking at them.

"Hm... Well, I'm a quad-elemental, Luz is a human with plant magic, and Elijah creates metal. We're the Freak-Trio!" Arthur said that as if... It was something to be proud of.

"Hey! Don't put me in this environment!... Although really, we are extremely abnormal." Elijah said, making them both laugh.

"And really, your speed in controlling earth mana is slightly scary. I mean, I got to know what you were doing a little before Arthur, but that's only because I'm a white core mage specializing in sensory magic." I applauded the glasses boy, who was all embarrassed by it.

I heard a loud whistle, and looked in the direction the sound was coming from, eventually seeing Elder Virion. "Alea, Tessia left some equipment in her room. Could you go get them?" He said as he threw a key towards me, I took it without much difficulty.

"What kind of equipment?" I asked.

"It's a white staff with a blue gem and a glove containing a light green gem. I think they're either in my closet or on the bench next to my bed!" Princess Tessia spoke.

"Oh. Okay, where is your room?" I asked again.

"It's in the same building where Goodsky's directory is. In Tessia's case it's on the first floor, use the key to identify yourself and be able to enter there." This time Art who answered me.

"Huh? How do you know that? Don't tell me you've been going to her room~" I smirked.

"N-no! The disciplinary committee and the student council are in the same building, the structure is similar. The difference is that one is on the first floor and the other is on the second." Arthur's cheeks were slightly red.

"Okay, so I'm going." I got up and walked out of the training room.

I started walking around the campus. Flying would be the fastest way, but I didn't want to distract unsuspecting students. I appreciated the beautiful calm and slightly icy weather we were in, some trees having orange leaves, while the sky was still clear, with very few clouds. Such a good weather made me forget that it was still 9 am.

Arriving at the building, I walked a little through the corridors of the first floor until I found the entrance to the student council sector. I knocked lightly on the door, and a brown-haired girl opened it, looking at me.

"Hello, how can I help you?" She said smiling.

"I came to get some things Princess Tessia left in her room." I showed her the key to the princess's room.

"Oh! Okay, come on." the girl opened the door fully for me and let me in.

The student council's main room was well-appointed, with a large table in the center with several chairs for meetings, as well as doors with identification numbers. Sitting in one of the chairs was an orange-haired boy, who seemed so focused on the papers he had in his hands, he didn't even notice my existence.

I went to the door with number 1 and used the key to enter. The princess's room was large, with a huge white bed and several gold and emerald green decorations. It was as if the elven castle room had been transported here and still had small details of human architecture.

First I went to the bench next to the bed, on top of it there were several picture frames with photos of the Eralith family, in addition to two photos of her with Arthur and Luz at the time they were living in the elven kingdom. I also saw a glove up there, it was gray with a green gem in the middle. I took that and went now looking for the staff.

I opened her closet, revealing several dresses worthy of royalty right away, along with at least 5 copies of her school uniform, but I couldn't find the staff. I used my sensory magic to facilitate and soon I felt a water element stone under the bed.

"Oh, apparently the princess gets in the way sometimes." I bent down to pick it up, but it was a little far away and the space there didn't allow me to get under it.

I took a rope of vine inside my dimensional ring and put it on the floor, using my plant magic, I made the vine move under the bed and bring the staff to me. Then I put it back in my dimensional ring and left the room, closing the door.

The boy who was there was still super focused, and the girl waved at me as I walked out of the student council sector. Before I left the hallway, I heard a noise, as if something had fallen upstairs.

"Hmm..." I was curious, so I went up the stairs closest there.

Arriving on the second floor, I saw the entrance door to the disciplinary committee sector and the hallway seemed to be completely empty, but soon I activated my sensory magic and noticed a lot of wind mana around a specific area.

"Um... Hello? Did something happen?" I asked and soon I could hear a voice.

"Oh! Sorry, I just tripped over something." It was Luley's voice, but it was coming from within that invisible mana sphere.

"Uh... Why are you using an illusion spell?" I asked but got no answer.

"Okay... I'll... Go back to the princess training room.. Want to come with me?" I raised an eyebrow.

"No, thanks. I decided to get some rest, that domain spell I did used up my mana core a lot." He replied still unseen and soon I saw the disciplinary committee door open and close.

"Uh... Okay..." That was really confusing, and I walked to the training room.

"Oooh! I hope it wasn't a problem to find?" Tessia said, walking over to me and picking up the glove and staff, I soon noticed that Cynthia Goodsky was there at the moment.

"Hello Miss Lance, I hope my beautiful academy campus looks amazing for you." she said smiling upon noticing my presence.

"Oh. I love the place, the outside areas are very relaxing. Anyway, what are you doing here?" I put a hand on my waist.

"Just guiding my disciple, no big deal." Cynthia patted Tessia's head.

"Um.. Alea, have you seen my brother? He had told me yesterday that we were going to train for real, but he hasn't come back since he left with Claire." Arthur was doing some physical exercises nearby.

"Well, I did find him, but he said he was super tired at the moment... For some reason he was under an illusion spell and kept falling to the ground from the noise." I commented

"Hm.... Alright." He sighed and looked at Virion, stopping what he was doing. "Hey Old Bat! How about a little spar like old times?"

Virion smirked. "I thought I'd never ask for this."