Ater Mountains(21.10.9978 AS)

“You are all so young!” Orianna said making and adorable pouting face. “When I was your age, I wasn’t even on this school yet!” The seventeen years old girl was talking to Tristan, Laura and Abigail. “You might have started late, but you are still in the top ten in our year!”  Tristan said trying to cheer her up. 

“And you still look like one of us!” Abigail added. “I- I… They’ll grow one day! You’ll see, one day they’ll be bigger than the ones the group leader has!” Orianna answered with tears on her eyes. Although she was already seventeen years old, her body hadn’t develop much. “I’ll only believe you, when I see it with my own eyes!” Abigail answered, sticking out her tongue, just to get smacked on the back of her head by Tristan.

“Is she always like this?” Caitlyn, who had been watching the scene asked, looking towards Abigail. “Unfortunately, yes.” Tristan answered her with a sad voice. Caitlyn’s didn’t say anything but put on a grimace saying. ‘I’m so sorry for you guys.’

“EVERYONE READY?” Sabrina shouted happily after they had finished their breakfast. “Pssss! We don’t know if the ‘clanless’ can hear us from far away, so don’t be so loud!” Caitlyn rebuked Sabrina’s carelessness. “Don’t worry, we are way too far away for the ‘clanless’ to notice us!” Sabrina waved with her hands trying to calm down her best friend.

“I don’t even know why I agreed to come to this trip with you again!” Caitlyn said. She wasn’t a bad student, but she wasn’t even close of being elected into the elite squad of her school year. So she was just coming to this patrol as a helper, because Sabrina had asked her to.  “Because I’m so cute?” Sabrina said, winking at the blushing Caitlyn. “Ehhh… N- No! Because you are hopeless without me!” She screamed.  “Pssss, We don’t know if the ‘clanless’ can hear us from far away, so don’t be so loud” Sabrina answered, showing Caitlyn her tongue.

“Fors, why did I come here for!” Caitlyn murmured as she started walking, taking the lead of the group.

***

In the past years Tristan had followed Bella’s advice of learning ‘telekinesis’ magic and ‘resonance’ magic. Not only that, but he had also trained himself in different types of martial arts. Now he could hold himself in fights using hand to hand combat or using weapons.

He knew how he telekinesis magic could synergize with his abilities. Not only could he use it to get his weapons easier out of his armory, but he could also use it as a support to his hand to hand fighting style.

But Tristan had no idea how he should use the resonance magic. He had the feeling it had something to do with the ‘resonance room’ he could open a gate to, but he didn’t know how to use this to his advantage.

Tristan had also used his time to develop many weapons and items together with Abigail. But all he could think about at the moment was the new weapon he was trying to create. It was a gauntlet that could increase the power of one’s punch. The only problem with it was: the gauntlet would not only destroy the target, but the user’s hand. Tristan just couldn’t come up with an answer for his problem.

“Yo! Trist!” Sabrina called out for Tristan, who was lost in thoughts as they were walking through the maze. “Now that I think about it, we have never a real conversation in all these years we know each other, right?” Tristan tilted his head. “You are right! We never had a long conversation.  Just always exchanging the formalities you like so much and some small talk we had with the girls present. But it can’t be helped since you don’t like boys, right?” Sabrina’s showed Tristan a grimace. “I do like boys! I just think girls are cuter! And I love cute things. So, wanna change the fact, we never really talked to each other?”

“I don’t mind.” Tristan answered. “So what do you want to talk about?” Sabrina shrugged. “Dunno, maybe about your abilities? I mean it sure is strange that someone with no passive and an active like ‘Rüsten’ keeps acing the test.”

“I don’t think so. What counts is the mind. You probably read about my passive. Thanks to it, I’m smarter than most of the people.” Sabrina smiled. “Yeah, I thought you would say so. But considering who your mother is, it’s obvious you would be acing the tests. Don’t you think?”

“What?” Tristan asked, baffled.”You heard me. Do you mind walking a little bit slower? So they don’t hear what we’re about to discuss.” Sabrina said while she continued smiling at Tristan’s lifeless face. “I… Erm… don’t… I” Tristan didn’t know what to say. ‘Why didn’t my passive warn me from this? Isn’t it supposed to be a foresight ability?!’

“You know I know her quite well.” Sabrina continued, slowing down here pace. ‘Wait, did Lamia tell her?’ Sabrina continued smiling. “She didn’t tell me a thing, I asked her after meeting you for the first time.”

‘Can she read my mind? No don’t be ridiculous. She can’t. But isn’t she supposed to be a dunce? Wait if she was one she wouldn’t be by far the number one student in her year. Aahhhh! I don’t know what to do! Everything was going so smoothly and now… Calm down Tristan. As Abigail always says, YOU ARE THE CHOSEN ONE, SO ACT LIKE THE CHOSEN ONE!’ Tristan sighed.

‘This isn’t really working.’ Tristan sighed again. “W… We… do… don’t have to fall back. I know a spell to keep our conversation, just between the two of us.” Tristan said, while thinking ‘Why am I talking like Leo? I usually don’t stutter… Now I understand why Laura is always so weary of this woman! Not even Bella did throw me off track so hard as she did!’

“Great, you should teach that spell to me one day!” Sabrina clapped her hands full of joy. The gemstone on Tristan bracelet glowed green. “Now, no one should be able to listen to our conversation.”

“Good.” Sabrina smiled as bright as usual. “I know you have many questions, but we have time. So where should I starrrt?” Sabrina made a grimace before smiling once again and clapping her hands. “Oh, oh, oh, I know!”

She took a deep breath and finally started. “You probably know how the Schatten clan works, right?” Tristan shook his head. “Although, it might seem, like the clan is ruled only by the main family. There are actually three families that rule the clan. Ordered by importance those families are: Schatten, Kuro and Lum. Yeah, Cait is the second daughter of the Lum.” Sabrina said pointing at her friend.

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“Well, those three families rule over all the other families inside the clan. Of course, the Schatten have the final word in everything, but they can’t really oppose the opinions of the Kuro and Lum unless they have really stupid ideas.”

Tristan nodded. ‘Is this insider information, she is giving me willingly?’ Tristan was once again baffled by the way of how Sabrina handled things. ‘Is she gonna demand something of me? No. She isn’t that type of person. But what if she is? I mean she’s been playing the dunce for a long time. Dang it! She is worse than Bella!’

“Tristan, are you still there?” Sabrina asked him as they continued walking over the broad, dim lighted corridors of ‘the Maze’. “Yeah, I’m listening.” Tristan answered. “You see the Kuro and the Lum not only get to help the Schatten rule, but they can also work as a communication tool between the smaller families and the Schatten. Besides, they also play a big factor in the election of the new head of the Schatten clan. But most of the time they just select whoever the Schatten select as their new ruler.”

Sabrina stopped to see if Tristan was still listening to her. He nodded, so she decided to continue. “Well and I’m the heir of the Kuro family. This means one day I will have to carry the burden of helping your big brother rule the Schatten clan. You may ask yourself how I’m allowed to visit this school. I mean this isn’t a bad school, just not the type of school a future ruler should visit.”

Tristan nodded. Sabrina was right. Although the Guardian Academy was the best military school in the continent, its curriculum wouldn’t be useful for high society Demons. Demons in the high society were expected to be stronger than standard soldiers. Thus, most of the high society Demon’s visited schools that would teach them the proper etiquette. And get fighting lessons at home by their family’s own fighting experts.

“Well, I was also supposed to live an arranged live. I was supposed to play the prim and proper princess. But I didn’t want to. I refused to. My parents were at their wits end and almost decided to disinherit me and push the burden to my sis…” Sabrina looked sad. This was the first time Tristan saw her like that.

“But your mom came to the rescue.” She said with gleaming eyes. “She knew I’m not the person to play princess and she also knew I would feel guilty for the rest of my life if my adorable sister was forced to take the burden from me. Your mom and your dad somehow managed to convince my parents to send me to Gramps to school.”

“Gramps?” Tristan asked. “Wait you don’t know that? The principal is our great grandfather and he’s been taking care of us both for the past years. More of me since you don’t cause as much trouble as I do.” Sabrina showed a victory pose.

“Although, I still get home tortured by a martial arts expert… I mean tutored… I mean tutored, I will always be thank full to your mom. She saved me from a full on boring life. Therefore, I was heartbroken when I heard what happened to you. I was a really painful to see Lamia being so sad. Every time I visited her, I would try to cheer her up, but she wouldn’t cheer up.”

Tristan knew how sad Lamia was, when he first moved to Nocturnio. He knew how much pain he had caused his mother. So he could understand Sabrina’s feelings of wanting to cheer up Lamia.

“I also thought you were killed by the will of Fors. I thought, I wouldn’t see her smile ever again. But then I met you five years ago. The very moment I met you, I knew. I knew you were her child.” Tristan looked puzzled towards Sabrina. “How did you know?”

“Come on. For me your mom is like a goddess.  Of course I would recognize her child. Besides those greenish-grey eyes you got. No one else besides her has such special eyes.” Tristan had never thought about it. But it was true. Most of the Demons had black or dark brown eyes.

“So, I went straight to see her after returning from my first patrol. First she denied it. But after I kept insisting she told me about you. And why you aren’t allowed to live as a Schatten.”

“Wait, she told you about that? Not even I know why! All I know is: It’s because of ‘them’, whoever ‘they’ are supposed to be.” Tristan answered. “So do you know who ‘they’ are?’ he continued.

“Duh, of course I know who ‘they’ are. I’ll be the next head of the Kuro after all.” Sabrina said with a superior tone just to break out in laughter. “Sorry, sorry, but it just feels great being seen as the smartest person in the conversation. You know, most of the people think I’m stupid or something.”

A few moments passed before Sabrina could calm down enough to continue her explanation. “’They’ are ‘his’ will.” –“Wait, what? Now I’m more confused than I was before.”  Tristan answered.  “You heard me. ‘They’ are ‘his’ will, and with ‘his’ I mean Fors.”

‘I’m doomed. Fors doesn’t want me to be alive? Why? Wait, it’s because of Bella! Yeah of course, it’s because of that woman! I hate her. How could she do this to me? No! No! No! Even if my passive tells me that I will have to fight him. I don’t wanna.  I just don’t want to!’ Tristan thought.

“So I’m cursed by this world’s god?”  Tristan asked her.  “I don’t know. I just know who they are and how to become one.” –“You know how to become one of them?”  Sabrina smiled. “Of course I do. After all, someday I will have to choose, if I want to be one of them or not.

You know it is a big fat lie, that mortal’s can’t reach an MR higher than Saint. And it is also a lie, that Lamia is the strongest mortal in this world. Right now there are at least thousand Saints walking through this world, training to one day reach immortality. To one day become Reiter in Fors’ army.”

Sabrina took a deep breath. “This topic is so boring, isn’t it? Well, it can’t be helped. Just so you still follow me. ‘They’ are those Saints wandering around in our world. ‘They’ don’t report directly to Fors, but they do work under his Reiter.”

“So ‘they’ are still mortals hoping to one day become immortal?”  Tristan asked.

Sabrina nodded and patted his head. “So why am I telling you all of this? Well your mom asked me to look after you. This is my way of telling you not to do something incredibly stupid, like trying to fight ‘them’.”  Tristan looked awkward towards Sabrina who was laughing.  He knew someday he would have to fight them.

“Anyways under all circumstances you aren’t allowed to even think of fighting them. ‘They’ all are convinced you died five years ago by the hands of your grandmother. Yes, Lamia’s mom, is one of ‘them’. But she couldn’t kill you, for the sake of Lamia.  So your parents, gramps and your grandma planned a way to save your life.  And it would be pretty bad if you were to throw their efforts away, for your personal revenge, right?”

Tristan nodded. “Very well then.” Sabrina clapped her hands. “The reason I’m telling you about this right now, is because this mission is actually in ‘their’ name. Since you’re Lamia’s son, you probably have heard the fairy tail about Fors starting the ‘Great War’, right? “ Tristan nodded. Lamia had told him this fairy tale way too often.

“Well, you see, the contents of said fairy tail isn’t something the broad masses should know. Imagine if it came out, that Fors was the one starting the ‘Great War’. This world would go out of control, right? Anyways, there is a group of people called the ‘bards’. They try to spread it around, with other information putting Fors in a bad light. Therefore, they want to eliminate them.  And that’s the true goal of this mission.  To kill a bunch of ‘bards’, pretending them to be ‘clanless’.”

“What?! How could this even pass, as introductory mission?” Tristan asked shocked.

“Well, we are just here to catch the ones that escape. The Zerstörung clan, already sent their assassins to take care of this business. As I said, we’re just here to catch, those who managed to escape them. I don’t see a problem with that.” Sabrina looked at her map.

“Looks like were arriving soon. Please pretend I didn’t say anything about this to you, but keep in mind, to never even think of challenging ‘them’. Unless you want to waste all our efforts to keep you a life.” Sabrina waved at Tristan, leaving him behind, running towards Caitlyn.