Three months could be a short amount of time in the long run, however, for Greyson who was waiting to leave, they might as well been three years. Although he did want to match up against Leopold and Natalia now that he was stronger, his excitement to go out traveling was even more so. He felt prepared to fight them ages ago, so the extra waiting felt useless to him. Even his master did not have much for him to do or learn other than reading information about the empires he would travel through and the beast empire. Proper etiquette was always important just so he does not go somewhere and accidentally offend someone. For once, though, avoiding trouble was not his priority. Elder Sweetbow had even purposefully wanted him to travel with a merchant caravan in order to attract more trouble to himself. Bandits do feel wary when there are more numbers, but they also feel more greed towards large and wealthy merchant caravans than they would towards a lone, poor-looking traveler.Other than creating new works for his occupations, Greyson had no other way to spend his free time. Thankfully, Ronan was around to keep him from being too anxious or else he would not get any work finished. Building up points in the blacksmith a.s.sociation became his way of gaining materials for magic tools and his paintings were what brought in a good amount of money when he auctioned one every now and then. Musically, he had not been performing much other than for the animals around Elder Sweetbow"s manor and Ronan. However, he had learned a new spell after Siren"s Noise called, Sound Waves. Instead of targeting the mind, this spell actually made the sound waves from his flute into a physical attack. Playing the songs that go along with the spell would induce different patterns of attacks. The waves were very powerful as they attacked from all different directions, but, at Greyson"s current level, even playing halfway through one song almost emptied his mana stores. Since Sound Waves was such a comprehensive attack, he would save it for emergencies.
...
The morning of the tournament, Greyson eyes shot open with none of the normal unwillingness to wake up. Even Lucius was bright-eyed and bushy-tailed ready to leave once Greyson had woken up.
"Lu, I guess even you are excited for the trip aren"t you? Usually waking you up takes forever and even then you only get up to hop on my shoulder and nap on there." Greyson smiled over at Lucius, seeing how excited the other was. Most of the time the cat would act so mature, this was the first time Greyson had seen such childish enthusiasm.
"Hmph! What would you know? I"m originally a magic beast, I belong in the wild. You have had me cooped up with this borderline crazy elf for five years. How couldn"t I be excited? At least in the Dalia Academy you would often go hunting for magic beast cores so I could stretch my legs. But, you have mostly stayed within the Academy this entire time."
"Ah, well, sorry, I can see how this might have been unfair for you. But you still broke through didn"t you. You"re already a magister level stage one magic beast, so it"s not like you didn"t benefit."
"That"s only because the mana is pure in this area, plus, who do you think you are talking about? My bloodline is very high level so I will continually break through easily as long as I don"t die early." Lucius lifted his chin proudly as he bragged about his natural ability.
"Yes, yes, rub it in all you want. In the end, I"ll be much younger than you when I break through to the magister level."
"Pure jealousy, that"s all I hear. You obviously know that aging is different for magic beasts, I am no older than you in magic beast time. It"s okay, no need to feel inferior, your talent is quite high as well. Just not as high as mine." Lucius snickered.
Greyson just rolled his eyes in response no longer continuing the conversation. He instead starting getting dressed and making sure he had all his magic tools for the compet.i.tion. Once he had checked through everything, he threw on his boot and started out the door. Lucius had already hopped up onto his shoulder taking his usual position. Quickly making his way to the battle stadium again, Greyson was shocked by the immense amount of people as compared to the last time he had fought there. Now instead of just the new cla.s.s, it was all the students in the academy beneath the magister level. Most magicians in this area did not ever break through to the magister level and even the most talented ones break through at around 25 years of age or so. Ages ranged from around 8-10 years old to almost 30 years old. After one turns 30 years old, they stop being called students because at that point the chances of them breaking through to the magister level are very low.
Glancing around, Greyson looked for an open seat in the stands.
"Grey~ over here!" A familiar voice called out. Turning to look, Greyson already had a smile on his face as he could recognize the voice right away. Ronan"s happy grey eyes greeted him as Greyson waved back and made his way over. Surprisingly, Ronan had managed to grab some nice seats right near the battle stage.
"Did you come early or something?"
"Mm... I came early in the morning since I didn"t have any painting to do and I wanted to be front and center for your battles."
"Just my battles? Aren"t you going to join in?"
"No, of course not. I didn"t even sign up to battle. I"m not like you, this monster, already at the advanced level stage five. Who could compare themselves to you? I"m definitely two years older but I"m still two stages below you. Even the magister level is such a far away thing for me, yet your already at the border." Flipping his eyes in exasperation, Ronan just shook his head while looking at his friend. Comparisons are really odious.
Greyson just shrugged while smiling shyly, "I"m not that amazing, there are probably a good amount of people who are just as talented. Plus, I haven"t even broken through yet, it could be a long while before I do. Just because I"m at stage five doesn"t mean I am already there. Some of the students here reach stage five at fifteen but they still don"t break through to the magister level until they turn 23-25 years old. Acc.u.mulation and comprehension is part of it."
"Yeah, yeah, yeah. We"ve had this conversation thousands of times already. I don"t believe that for a second. My estimate is that you will break through before you turn 16 and you"ll break the record."
"Speaking of the record, do you know who was the one who set it?"
"Of course! How could you not know? Our Snow Country"s greatest genius, Jayson Glacier. He named himself since he was found floating in a glacier. He was adopted by commoner parents who ran a tavern, however, he had enormous magical talent. It was said, though, that he was not multi-element magician, but he could only control the ice element. Anytime he tried to use the water element, he could only summon ice. Even his body was perpetually cold while his hair turned snow white. Snow Country was obviously a place where this genius could flourish. The Moon Empire had offered him a n.o.ble t.i.tle, however, he rejected it saying that he only pursued magic and was not interested in position or political power. It"s been many years now since he disappeared after breaking through to the Magister level. If he were still alive, he would be about 200 years old."
"That long? And there still hasn"t been anyone who has beaten his record?" Greyson felt a little shock. Just thinking of the sheer number of children born these past almost two centuries, the thought that no one had beaten him was pretty unbelievable.
"Well, there will be one who will break it soon."
"Hm?"
"I"m looking right at the person who will break his record." Ronan said looking intently at Greyson. Scratching his nose, Greyson could only smile accepting the compliment. He really did have confidence to break the record, but that doesn"t mean he will go projecting this everywhere.
"But my master did tell me that 18 years old was only the record in the Snow Country. The other human countries and different race empires actually have broken this record. Apparently the youngest in the Elf Empire was 15 years old. It was the younger sister of the current Queen, apparently she was a rare talent."
"Those other races are rather quite talented, that"s true. Yes, sadly Snow Country is the weakest and the furthest out with a bunch of low mana level desolate areas. But, even if people beat our record it was not by that much. I think the youngest in the other human countries was a little under 17, they were apparently turning 17 in a month. I guess it barely counts as them being 16 when they broke through." Sadly sighing, Ronan felt a little unwilling to admit the weakness of his country and empire. Greyson opened his mouth to ask more, however, he was interrupted by someone walking up onto the middle stage. The man had a stately presence but was dressed casually in a silk loose s.h.i.+rt and pants that lead into leather boots. He was handsome in a rugged, tough sort of way and did not fit in with the more scholarly atmosphere of the Academy. Close-cropped blonde hair and sky blue eyes with a small scar on his left eyebrow that only added to a heroic charm.
"Who-?" Greyson began.
"h.e.l.lo, students, for those who are new, I am the Princ.i.p.al of the Academy, Pearson Grimlow. I am very excited to check out our school"s talent at this year"s tournament. For those too weak to partic.i.p.ate, I hope you will continue to strive until you are also able to prove yourself on the battle stages. I am just here to give a couple opening words, Vice Princ.i.p.al Morninghand will take over now to announce the first round of battles."
Leaving those words, Princ.i.p.al Grimlow flashed up to the high seating where all the other higher-ups watching sat together. Greyson eyed the princ.i.p.al curiously with a little humor as he remembered something funny. After pestering his master, he had finally found out why an elf like Elder Sweetbow stayed here in the Idris Kingdom to be an Elder at an Academy. Apparently this serious looking princ.i.p.al was actually a conniving fox underneath and had tricked Sweetbow into a bet. Elves were very serious about promises they make and they will rarely even break them, so Sweetbow had no choice but to follow Princ.i.p.al Grimlow back and serve at the Academy. While he was still chuckling to him reminiscing about his master"s expression back then, Morninghand had already come up to the stage to announce the matches.
"The way the tournament works is that there are ten stages in all. Anyone can come onto the stage and they become the stagemaster until someone comes around and beats them. This compet.i.tion will continue until there are ten stagemasters remaining."
Greyson"s ear perked up hearing the set up. Interesting. This should be fun.
"Does this mean I should wait so that the strength of the challenger keeps growing? That would keep the tournament interesting." Thinking to himself, Greyson glanced around to find some familiar faces. The first one that came into view was Natalia with her flaming red hair that was noticeable even from a distance. As his eyes. .h.i.t her, he could have swore he saw her wink back at him, but he couldn"t be sure. Shaking his head, he continued looking around. Looking around, he spotted the black wild hair of Leopold. His whole body was radiating his usual confidence and vigor. Pa.s.sing through the audience, Greyson continued looking around to see if he could spot any other strong opponents. Soon, he gave up, though, as he had not been around outside much so he was not really sure as to what people looked like. Maybe he had heard of their reputation, but he would not be able to match the names to the faces.