Days passed, and soon the middle of the school year has already arrived. Since the event in the purple wilds, Ariel’s school life had barely changed. The only difference was that he spent some of time, cultivating his new, still nameless familiar.
His friends however had already named their own, but Ariel thought he would do it only after it had its first evolution. If you're interested about what the new familiars are called, Brendon gave his own, quite an unoriginal name, Snappy, while Erna and Sarah named theirs respectively Crystal and Drop. They might not be the most interesting names, but they suffice for what they are
Although Ariel said he would name his when it evolved, it was quite close to that already, since, in the time he spent growing it, the little spirit had jumped from the early stage Disciple, to the late stage. Only one more level was needed before it would take a new, more powerful form and be eligible to be named.
His friend’s familiars also improve a lot. Snappy and Crystal had reached the early Elite level not too long ago, while Sarah’s Drop also improve, from the unknown level its been at before, to at least mid Disciple rank. They have also found out what was unique about Drop, its water healing magic was beyond monstrous, a single spell could bring you back from near death which was complete life saver. That’s why they decided to use it only when they desperately needed it, and to also keep it as a secret, since if word got out it would bring countless troubles.
Of course the familiars weren’t the only ones to progress. Even though Ariel hadn’t gained another level, he has reached the peak of the Elite rank and was now stuck at a bottle neck, Erna in the meantime reached the middle Elite rank, showing how abnormal her talent was, worthy of being called a genius.
Sarah and Brendon also weren’t too far away, both having reached the early Elite rank’s peaks. However if you looked into which reached it first, you would find that the faster one was Sarah. Although it is unknown, if it is because of Brendon’s lack of talent, or just due to his lazy nature.
Off topic, the only other interesting thing that could be mentioned was when Ariel and his friends went to look for the teacher to complain why, was there a chimera at the purple wilds. Unfortunately the only answer they were given was that chimera’s are something out of their control since because of their unique circumstances they can be born between any animal’s, even if it is a very small chance.
The forest fangs are apparently also a problem they can’t deal with because it is just too difficult to kill every single of those small critters in the forest so they just repopulate. What they usually do is go trim the number of theirs every year, but it seems that this year it was done quite poorly.
Back to the topic, generally Ariel spent his time peacefully just like before, while training and gathering knowledge in his free time. Currently he was, like most of the time, reading some books at the library, just like he is used to.
His usual reading partner, Erna, has already gone back to her dorms early since she had promised to spend some time with Sarah today, so he was now reading alone at the far back corner of the building.
Suddenly however he heard footsteps coming from behind him. Turning his head he saw Brendon coming closer to him with a serious look on his face. Noticing that Ariel saw him, he let out a small smile, and spoke when he got into speaking range. “I knew I would find you here. Do you have a minute? I need to talk to you about something.”
Ariel put down the book he was reading and nodded in agreement while urging Brendon to sit down. His friend was not in any way polite about it and sat down while he spoke. “Thank you.” After he got a bit more comfortable, he continued speaking in a serious tone. “The reason I came looking for you today, was actually because I wanted to ask you for help.”
When Ariel heard what Brendon said, he suddenly became a bit more interested and continued to listen to Brendon. “My father has just given me an important task to handle, since he is busy with the usual monster floods that occur in this season.”
As Brendon spoke, Ariel managed to see that Brendon was a bit annoyed for having this mission pushed onto him, but decided to keep his mouth shut about it. “Anyways, the task I was given concerns slave dealers we have caught wind of in Lenara city. Even though this city of ours is a neutral place, since it is still in our Galath Kingdom, we are obliged to take care of such things ourselves.”
While listening to him, Ariel noted down a strange point and decided to verify it. “As far as I know, it is legal for slaver to sell slaves if they are debt or war slave. That means if these are in need to be caught or killed, then they should be catching civilians and selling them. However I still don’t see how this common crime is considered an important task.”
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Brendon nodded at his observations before responding and telling the important parts of this mission. “That’s right. If it were just normal slaver who overstepped their bounds, we could just give this task to some other person. But the thing is, the actions of these slavers are a bit abnormal.”
From Brendon’s words, Ariel’s curiosity got instantly peaked as he urged him to continue. “The usual slavers would be selling high quality slaves to the black market to try to earn enormous profits, but the ones we are after are selling the slaves to some specific source that we are unable to track down. This is beyond strange and my father is concerned about the people behind this since we have actually already caught such slavers several times, at different parts of the Kingdom. However, all of them killed themselves before we could get any information.”
After hearing everything out, Ariel nodded and spoke. “You are right, this is too strange. There should be some kind of organization behind these slavers. However it is unknown, what their goal for acquiring so many slaves is. It could be just to work at some places, or in the worst case it could be to prepare an army.”
A chill went down Brendon’s back when he heard Ariel’s last words. A rebellion is the last thing any Kingdom would want, but he soon got back his composure before asking. “So could you help me in this? I feel like I will need someone really powerful or it might end up as quite a mess, but it will definitely be dangerous.”
Taking several moments to think, Ariel nodded as he spoke. “I will help you. Having such dangerous people so close to our Academy is of course something I don’t want to see.”
Brendon was overjoyed with Ariel’s answer and spoke in a happy voice. “Great, let’s prepare a bit before we go out and I will also call the troops that were given to me to command. We can set our after two hours.”
Ariel nodded and after closing tightly the book on his table got up and started heading towards the dorm. Several hours quickly passed, in the meant time Ariel put on some comfortable clothes for fighting and also meditated to the most perfect shape he could be, before battle.
At the gate where he and Brendon were supposed to meet up, Ariel saw a large squad of about 30 knights standing there behind Brendon and another, seemingly higher rank, knight besides him. When he got closer, Brendon quickly jogged over with a smile and spoke. “You made it. Let me introduce you to the captain of the knight's squad that my father has entrusted to me.”
He spoke while pointing with his hand at the knight that stood besides, just a moment before. “His name is Henrik and although he is a commoner, he is quite skilled with the swords and also at a late stage Elite rank just like you.” The man called Henrik had quite a good build, with his manly and handsome face he looked like a perfect knight. What’s more, his hair and eyes that were the same brown colour also made him seem like laid back guy, anyone can befriend.
Henrik, seeing how Brendon welcomed Ariel, also made a polite salute before introducing himself. “Greetings, just like how the young master has already said, my name is Henrik and I am responsible for this knight unit so I hope we can work well at the task at hand. Young master has also already told me about yourself, so there is no need for you to do your introduction.”
Feeling satisfied at how Henrik carried himself, Ariel gave a nod of approval before turning back to Brendon to speak. “I just remembered something. You haven’t invited Sarah or Erna right?”
His friend quickly shook his head at Ariel’s question while responding. “Even if they both are stronger than me and can fight against monsters, I know that they still would hesitate against humans, since they have never killed before, like us.”
Ariel let out a breath of relief when he heard his words and continued speaking. “Then it is okay. Let’s get going before it gets dark. I would like to take care of this as fast as possible.
Brendon agreed with this and quickly commanded the troops. “We are heading out. This is a task given by his majesty so failure is unacceptable. Depart!” With Brendon’s shout, all the knights began moving in an orderly manner, and so another event started, which will make Ariel take his first step towards the most powerful enemy he will ever fight in his life.
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