"Can I be a magical girl?"Kyle pinched the bridge of his nose when he heard this. He didn"t want to crush anyone"s dreams but he needed to let them down gently.
"Theo I wouldn"t want to say that you can"t do something but there are certain physical constraints to what you want to be. How about being a magical boy rather than a girl."
"Oh that"s a good idea so I"ll be a magical boy when I grow up!"
Kyle thought that there were many inconsistencies with this statement but as long as the kid was having fun he didn"t see any problem, everyone began chatting amongst themselves before another voice was heard.
"What about me Kyle can I be a magical girl?"
Susan was standing proudly while posing like a body builder. So here was Kyle looking at a woman at less than 5 feet tall posing like Mr Universe.
"No Susan you can"t, you"re too old, too unruly and to messed in the head but you can be Theo"s sidekick."
"Hey I"m meant to be the hero here you should bow down and wors.h.i.+p me."
"Oh you"re a hero awesome I"ve just come up with a hero name for you it"s Miss Wasting My Time. Okay everyone just ignore her and get back to studying I"ve got a meeting I need to get to."
"Okay thanks Kyle."
"Yes thanks Lord Kyle."
"Thank you."
After everyone had said their thanks and goodbyes Kyle left Susan on the floor throwing a tantrum and headed to his next arranged meeting. Before he got more than 3 meters away Susan caught up with him. You had to say she was resilient if nothing else.
"So where are we going next then boss?"
"Boss? Well I"ve got a meeting with the 3 guild heads, I want to discuss the upcoming separation of the lands and get them on board with us."
"Uh meetings but I"ll accompany you anyway; someone has to keep you out of trouble."
"Aren"t you the one who usually causes the trouble? I haven"t forgotten the drunken turkey incident from when you were last here. I still don"t know how or more importantly why you forced a turkey to drink an entire pint of whiskey."
"Well it seemed like a good idea at the time. Is anyone else going to come along for this meeting?"
"Yup I"ve got mother to talk with Draken of the array masters, Randall to deal with the blacksmiths and Alena to talk with the alchemists."
"Yeah that"s a good idea to bring someone from each of their respective professions, but are you okay with showing off Alena to the alchemists?"
"It"ll be fine we can defend ourselves from their small numbers if necessary and if my information is correct the local representative is unhappy with the current empire. Speaking of the empire don"t you have to return soon?"
"I haven"t told you yet have I? They found a successor who has similar future sight to me. She"s also from one of the great houses in the capital so they have placed her at a position of higher authority than me. After all I"m a country b.u.mpkin, but that means I"m free to do as I please and only have to return for certain events. By the time they realise I"m behind the schism they won"t be able to do anything about it."
"Oh joy, let"s get a move on I don"t want this meeting to finish too late."
"Right you need to get back to your harem right."
Kyle merely scoffed at this and rushed to the stables, with his new wealth Kyle had purchased a few steeds for himself and his people but he really wanted to fly his falcon but that would have to wait for now.
When he reached the stable everyone was already there and waiting so Kyle climbed into his saddle while Susan joined Maria on her steed before they quickly rode out. The meeting would take place in the array masters guild as Kyle had the most pull in this guild and had to play to his strengths.
As they were riding through the streets from one of the side streets a gang appeared also riding on Prism Runners.
They were closing in on Kyle"s group and were drawing their weapons ready to strike, Kyle felt this attack was poorly planned and executed even worse. Kyle looked back at his mother and nodded.
Currently Maria was the only known mage within his family so if she used her magic to blast away these idiot"s no one would question it. Maria was one of the few who had awakened more than one type of magical control as she could command both wind and lightning.
Since everyone already knew she could use lightning magic she decided to go with that and once they had a certain amount of clear s.p.a.ce she fired a sphere of compressed lightning towards their pursuers.
The output of this was far lower than what Susan had cast as Maria didn"t want to risk collateral damage so it only had around 10,000 volts which is much lower than a taser but it would be enough to disable their steeds.
Once the sphere was in range it exploded outwards, lightning was striking within the area of effect and was jumping around between the various riders due to the metal studs they had placed on their armour.
While this gave them a jolt they shook it of very quickly but the same couldn"t be said for their steeds that all began rearing up. Men were thrown from the saddle and crashed to the ground groaning and cursing.
The guards arrived on the scene quickly and on seeing who was present approached Maria who quickly explained these men were trying to attack them so she used magic to disable them. The guards looked at Maria with respect before taking the attackers away.
In these outer lands mages were held in a certain awe by the common people, Kyle couldn"t help but smirk a little at the respect people were showering to his mother and thought "if they think she"s powerful now just you wait".
Continuing on after this little tangent they eventually arrived at the guild buildings, nothing much had changed except that at the imperial overseer"s office there were many more guards visible than at previous times.
It looked as though the overseer was calling in all of his available forces and reinforcing them with some of the mercs that had come over at the Miles family"s behest. Kyle didn"t think too much about it as he had already expected something like this with the overseer already being bought and paid for.
They trooped through the array masters guild and finally arrived at the meeting room they had been allocated for this meeting. Kyle led the way and saw that the guild masters were already present and was seated on the opposite side of the rectangular table in the middle of the room.
"Good afternoon gentlemen, sorry for being late but we had some issues to deal with."
"That"s okay Kyle we were just discussing some issues ourselves." Draken the master of the array guild responded first.
"G.o.d what a brat making me wait like this." This was Seamus the blacksmith"s guild leader, he wasn"t as large as Randall or other blacksmiths but he had a wiry strength to him along with having bright ginger hair.
"My time is a precious commodity so speak fast." This was Martin the leader of the alchemists and also a second stage mage. Kyle hadn"t been able to get any details about his element or accurate level as he hadn"t used his abilities since he had arrived in New Grange City.
"Very well I"m a.s.suming that everyone has seen the increase in forces present within the city?"
They all nodded to his question but it didn"t concern them as this was just the usual positioning of the n.o.ble families and as usual they would take no direct hand in it.
"Good well have you also noticed the movements of the imperial army to the south and the movements of the demon beasts in the same area."
When Kyle said this they drew a blank for a minute before Martin remembered a letter he had received from an acquaintance. It was a warning stating something was happening down south but didn"t elaborate on it further.
Kyle saw Martin"s expression which was also noticed by Seamus and Draken so they understood something was definitely going on.
"I heard from a friend that something strange is going on but not what exactly. What do you know?"
Martin asked this with an edge to his voice, he had been dispatched here by the guild after he had a falling out with one of the higher ups. Due to the large separation from the better resources Martin"s strength would stagnate but he was still a mage and expected to be treated as such.
"Hasn"t anyone ever told you to say please when asking for a favour?"
Kyle responded with a taunt to Martin who was thoroughly incensed by this and suddenly grabbed his staff and pointed it directly at Kyle. A spike of earth appeared at the end of his staff ready to be launched at Kyle at a moment"s notice.
Everyone else retreated from the table while Kyle just sat there with a smirk on his face. The staff that Martin was using to boost his magical output was actually something Kyle"s people had made using his blueprints.
This staff had small acc.u.mulation arrays engraved on the shaft which would condense a mages attack allowing for faster and more powerful attacks. Now why would Kyle give out something which may strengthen an enemy, the answer is he wouldn"t without some insurance so with a little surge of mana Kyle interfered with the functions of the staff and the magical attack collapsed.
This left Martin standing there with his staff pointed towards Kyle with nothing else happening. From behind everyone began hearing a whistling and crackling sound. Martin directed his attention to the source of this quickly and was shocked at what he saw.
Maria was standing there with a hand outstretched with a sphere of compressed air visible above her palm, the power of this swirling sphere was what was making the whistling noise and Kyle knew that if this was released this little man would become a little puddle of blood.
The crackling noise was coming from Susan who was standing next to Maria. She was going full Raiden at the moment with her eye"s glowing blue with lightning moving all over her body. Her palm was also outstretched but instead of a sphere there was a tiny dragon made of lightning swimming above her palm.
"Master you"ve improved your control again." Maria said when she noticed that everyone"s attention was directed towards Susan.
"Of course I"m a genius after all." She responded with her usual verve.
"Yeah a real genius, how long did I have to explain about lightning before you understood?" Kyle decided to slap her down, but she was in full flow now and wasn"t going to stop.
"Now do you feel lucky punk?"