Chapter 2
Chris couldn’t stop smiling knowing that he now had four year of Tyler not picking on him. The four years of service was just an extra cherry on top. Chris turned to Tyler sleeping on a couch “Hey Tyler it's nine am. It's time for classes.” Chris said as he grabbed Tyler’s huge shoulder and shook him.
“Chris I know your my master for four years but please note I don’t go to school for the first three hours cause those classes are a waste of my sleep time.” Tyler then tried to fall back asleep but Chris wouldn’t let up.
After fifteen minutes Chris gave up then got ready for school. He looked around with a sad gaze seeing his grand manor empty. The dark wooden walls and family portraits along the walls with the armor that his family member died in lining the walls in this big open space. He then yelled to Tyler ``As your master I'm giving your first task. Either go to school or go make money. You have thirty minutes to do so!” With Chris’s voice leaving his body it bounced off of the walls echoing his voice making him even more sad that the only people here was him and Tyler. With that he left for classes.
Chris walked into his classroom and got a notification. He pulled up his personal screen and saw that Tyler was going to make money and a guild hall by taking missions. Chris smiled to himself knowing he didn’t need money. He wanted Tyler to train in some way and Tyler chose his path to training. Once Chris closed his screen he saw Pete walking up to him. “Chris are you ok? I beat the fuck out of Tyler and havent seen him since. I'm sorry that you must have lost stats again.” Pete rambled on.
“Pete buddy, I'm fine. I sort of now own Tyler for four years because his father felt bad and was pissed at Tyler. I didn’t even lose stats but gained some. I got a new quest too. Come close so no one else hears.” As Pete leaned in Chris told him about the quest. Pete stood back up and took a step backwards. He thought about it for a few minutes.
“Chris I think I can help with the alliance part but there will be a contract.” Pete went and sat down. He pulled out his phone and started typing something.
The teacher walked in. His name was Shawn Joanes his nickname was The negotiator. He would be called in for high profile deals and would even come out to help end wars with peace treaties at least once a year. “Ok class today we will be discussing how to forge alliances. Hey Pete put your damn phone away. Unless it can relate to this lesson I want in your pocket.”
Pete smirked “Well Mr Joanes it does happen to just about this exact subject. Chris, my family has some terms but they aren’t too bad. The three terms are you must we'll help each other out in a war. We share intel when needed unless it is highly important. The last term is we get first dibs on new products you develop or anything pertaining to your witchcraft creations. Do you agree?” With that Pete stood up and walked over to Chris and held out his hand. Chris stood up and shook his hand. A golden glow came off of Pete while a black miasma came from Chris. “I agree my friend.” Once they shook hands a burst of energy bursted out of their bodies and mixed with each other color. Chris had two faces created from the miasma while Pete’s energy had hundreds of faces. The energies then went back inside of their respective person.
“And that class is an alliance being forged right there. It’s a perfect example actually. Chris is a small family but is great friends with someone who in this case is Pete that has high authority in his family allowing for him to forge an alliance. Chris I must ask who was that second face?” Shawn asked.
“Well that would have to either be Tyler or Solomon. But then again Tyler isn't a permanent family member. Solomon is as permanent as I am since he is literally part of me.” Chris responded.
“Got it. It was the Solomon person then. Now please sit down and be prepared for the lesson. Chris you should now pay more attention in my class than ever before since you're now a Family head.” Shawn said. “Now with the rest of our lesson.” With Shawn saying that he turned back to his chalkboard.
Once class was finished Chris and Pete got some looks and were whispered about around the entire school. Chris went to his least favorite class. Combat training. This class was the bane of his existence because he never was able to do any of the training without getting injured due to his lack of stats. It was a big open gym with cages in the middle and a woman sitting on top of the cages. “Hey Chris are you gonna sit out again today?” the woman asked.
“No, I'm actually gonna try today to fight something today. I got a decent upgrade in terms of control.” Chris replied.
She nodded. She unzipped her tracksuit and pulled out a key then unlocked a cage with it. She grabbed a creature that looked like a large yellow dog. This beast was a Sparker. They were good for early adventurers to learn how to fight lightning based enemies without any real risk to their lives; they were also kept as pets. “Hey Chris if you can actually beat it i'll allow you to keep it as a pet.” the woman laughed.
“Guess he's coming home with me.” Chris smirked while getting into a staggered stance with his right foot taking a step back. He used his Mind Over Matter skill to perfectly propel himself towards the Sparker. Once he got within range he disabled all of his nerves so he couldn’t feel the pain from the shocks. His body still shook for a second but no pain came. Chris grabbed the back of the Sparker’s neck and pulled it into the air then slammed the Sparker against a wall thirty feet away. Making a small blood splatter on the wall showing that the Sparker is very injured. The woman blew on a whistle *Phwwwwwhht* “Get medical for the Sparker!” She leapt down from the pile of cages. “Chris what the fuck was that! You have never shown anything near that power level. Like dude are you using drugs for this class? I swear on my name Isabell Walsh I will expel you if you're using drugs.” She fired off. She raked her hands through her red hair. She always did that when she was stressed. Chris always found her red hair fairly attractive.
Chris took a step forward “Miss Walsh I haven’t used drugs. I just have gotten a large quest done but the thing is that I can’t share anything about the quest to anyone except my family but they're all dead so nobody gets to know about it unless I get more people into my family.” Chris said loud enough for everyone in the room to hear. Chris watched a team of medics rush into the room to heal the Sparker. It took about five minutes for the medics healing spells to make the Sparker good as new. Once that was done the Sparker walked over to Chris then lowered it's head to him. Isabell wore a shocked face “I didn’t even give it the order and it already finds you as it's master. Well Chris you now are his master in his eyes and the schools eyes. Just so you know he is young so there is still room to grow him. For now his stats are around Y or X maybe W but I can’t be certain. Did you gain some strength enhancing skill?”
”Miss Isabell I still cannot say.” Chris said with a little annoyance in his voice. He turned to his new companion. “So little guy, you're my companion. Let’s give you a name… how about Julius?” Chris asked. He got a shake of the head signalling a no. “Then how about Lumen.” Chris gave him this name because of the way his fur was marked. It was a large white spiral around his yellow body. Each Sparker has a white marking that tells someone how powerful their bloodline is. Lumen’s fairly strong for Sparkers but unless hris went out of his way to boost Lumen’s bloodline through feeding him better bloodlines or very strong creatures. The latter can cause mutations in Lumen that can almost completely change what type of beast he is. There was once someone who decided to feed their Sparker some Void Dragon meat and the Sparker became a new species called a Voiker. They can be bought but only the extremely powerful can get one from the original breeder. The Voiker can shoot out electricity that is as strong as a lightning bolt and wherever the bolts landed would be consumed by the void. The Voiker looked like a normal Sparker but was covered with black markings instead of white one and it's golden yellow hair was replaced with an electric blue. Chris was tempted to buy one but they were bought totally untamed and no magical contracts can be placed on one because of how strong they were so the owner would have to have the power to control and tame their newly bought Voiker.
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Chris pet Lumen and sat down for a few minutes with Lumen resting his head on Chris’s leg so he could be pet. After a few minutes passed Chris heard Isabell call out to him, “Chris come on over here! And leave you Sparker over there.”
Chris only nodded his head and told Lumen to stay where he was. Chris walked over and got in line standing shoulder to shoulder with his classmates. “Ok class I think that Chris will finally participate meaning we finally have an even number of students for this hour. Today we will be playing capture the flag while using only hand to hand combat. I will walk down the line assigning you to either red or blue.” Isabell walked down the line assigning each person either red or blue. Chris was assigned to the blue team. “Okay now that everyone has teams put on your personal armor or the school given armor. In this game I will not be judging on how many captures there are but I will judge teamwork and coordination. I recommend having a military tier system.” (I will be using the Marine rank system for this cause my uncle was a marine. The militaries in this world are more like special teams but the main military force is when the countries ask families to help them fight when the country military can’t fight on their own.)
There are one hundred students on each side. Some were from other classes and grades even. Gym in this school was weird. Combat training was the most important class in this school and because of that you can request to skip classes to participate in the gym whenever you want unless you have a test.
A senior named Mike Leonard spoke up to the blue team. “Okay everyone I assign myself as Gunnery Sergeant seeing as there are no other seniors on the blue team. Please get together by grade so I can assign roles better. Miss Walsh is giving us thirty minutes to assign roles, build strategies, and select a compound blueprint that we want to use.”
Nobody spoke up and quickly got into grade groupings. Well everyone except Chris. Chris strode up to Mike “Hey Mike i was wondering if I can have an officer position because I want to learn how to command so I can do so effectively once I gain family members.”
“Seeing as you're a freshman, the most I will give you is the rank of Sergeant. Sergeant Vo do you accept this rank?”
“I do.” Chris responded quickly.
“Good you'll command over six Privates, five Lance Corporals, and 4 Corporals. Now go pick out your soldiers and get ready. Once you have you people come back by me to discuss strategy and what blueprint we will use” Mike said with a smile
Chris nodded. He waited for ranks to be assigned. Once that was done he went around picking out people at random till he had his assigned amount of people. The others stood in front of him. “Okay guys. I have one question for you. Why do you think I choose all of you?”
Nobody responded. “It’s because we don’t get to choose who we work with or under and I applied that idea to my choosing process. Because of that I want you guys to socialize with those you may have not met before and try to figure out your weaknesses and strengths. I’ll be by Gunnery Sergeant Mike if anyone needs me.”
Chris walked on over to Mike and the other higher ups. Mike saw Chris out of the corner of his eye and waved “Hey Chirs get your ass over here we have a tie on the blueprint.”
Chris walked over to see the two blueprints. One was full defense and looked like a medieval castle while the other was an underground compound. “Wait why do we have a tie there are 9 of you?”
Mike pointed at a short girl who had blue hair and wore tight leather armor. “Well it’s because Sarah over there has a different idea that provides no real defense and is super dependent on the soldier’s stamina making it so the other team can keep pushing us till we run out of energy.”
Chris looked at the blueprint and saw that it was a simple looking office building that was fifty feet high with some reinforced windows.
“Yeah but Mike here’s the thing. She might have the better idea here. Castle’s can be taken from any side and the underground compound limits large movements that some people’s fighting styles may depend on. The office building allows any fighting styles and we have the flag on the top which means we only have to watch one area and not have to care about anywhere else. That will allow us to also be able to make an easy retake of the building or it could be easy to trap the flag holder inside if they capture the flag. It’s risky but also not risky at the same time for those reasons. So my vote goes to Sarah’s idea”
“I see your point but then again can’t we do that with the compound?” Nate, another Sergeant, asked.
“Yes but the compound limits our fighting and defense styles.” Chris responded.
Mike laughed “Fine I vote we go for the office.” Once Mike voted for the office four other voted for the office. The office blueprint was selected. Mike walked to Isabell and gave her the blueprint. She placed the paper into a portal after she dipped the blueprint into some magic powders. “Okay blue team walk through the portal one by one and prepare to capture the flag. Red team is waiting.”
One by one Blue team went into the portal after a check over of their armor. Chris arrived on the other side to see a rack of siege equipment. There were grappling hooks, rams, catapults, ladders, etc. there was anytime of entry device there too. Chris grabbed a grappling hook and some plastic explosives and a detonator. He stored away his chosen equipment. After twenty minutes everyone heard Isabell voice “Okay students please remember no spells, weapons, or releases that are used to harm others. Each of you only have one life then you will be booted out of the virtual world. There is a kill feed in the corner of your vision. The fights will be to the death. Have fun and work together!”
With that Chris watched as Mike wore a face of defeat. “Fuck fuck fuck fuck! We were never told that we get siege equipment. We are fucked!” With those words the higher ups all felt terrible and became unorganized. Well everyone except Sarah and Chirs
Chris yelled out to everyone in the army “Those who now any type of formation magic or any type of protection magic will bolster the building. Besides those people we will have twenty guards watching the building and protecting against any attacks. I want the rest to move to the red base and capture that fucking flag! Sarah, you go and watch over the attacking part of the army. I will stay back here to watch over the defense.” Chris barked out orders.
The higher ups nodded except Mike. “Who put you in charge Chris. You're just a lowly freshman. You have no experience leading an army. I have taken multiple leader classes for leading dungeons raids and family wars. I doubt you have taken any of those.” Mark yelled angrily.
“You may be more qualified to lead a virtual army but we are in a much more real war than your simulators they use in those classes. I don’t have much experince but I have something you don’t it's called being able to stay the fuck calm. Now please get out of my face while I figure out how to set up defenses and Sarah figures out an attacking strategy.” Chris turned to his defense people. “Okay everyone I will need the top room blocked off. No one may enter until I say so.” With that Chris walked to the final floor and summoned Solomon. “Master Chris I am here. What do you require of me?” Solomon asked
Chris laid his head onto a desk while facing Solomon “Well Solomon I need to figure out how to defend this place using only me and thirty seven others from about one hundred attackers and we have only fifteen minutes.” Chris chuckled. After a few minutes of explaining everything Chris knew Solomon sighed and began to speak “You should be attacking Sir. Your release spells allow you to compete with mike and still not even break a sweat. You should engage the enemy with a small special operations team to infiltrate the enemy in secret. Only pick the strongest but make sure they are quiet. I suggest you move quickly so the Red army won’t catch you trying to invade them.”
Chris nodded and dismissed Solomon back to his realm. Chris explained his plan to Sarah. She nodded and pointed out the people who were right for the job. She pointed a finger at Chris and never stopped pointing. “Chris this should be a solo mission. This plan sounds like a suicide mission and wont help the army. If you want to put are army a man down do it but only if it’s you. I will lead a real attack.” Sarah turned away but Chris had to make a bet.
“Okay Sarah but If I win I get to have a date with you and I get a meeting with your family head. If I lose I’ll give you an item from my family vault with the only restriction that it isn’t an artifact rank or above.” Chris fired out with a smirk.
Sarah texted someone and got a notification and smiled, “Fine Chris my Grandfather says that’s okay but only if you also give up one ritual of my grandfather’s choosing.”
Chris stayed calm on the outside but on the inside he was shocked to his core. His rituals were the entire point of his family and if he lost it to another family it would boost Sarah’s family by a large amount of power but on the other hand Chris could get a date with Sarah and also try to forge another alliance. “Well Sarah I agree to those terms. Let me tell you something though I am very capable of stealing some dumbass flag before you can.” With that Chris began sprinting to the red base after activating his body with adrenaline and deactivating the feeling of exhaustion.