Upon the stage, both Briar and her opponent Lyra Harple were standing still as statues with their eyes closed, several magical seals glowing around them like a prison.

“What’s this?” He asked, curiously.

“Dunno. They’ve been like that since the start of the match.” Hannah said. “It’s very dull watching.”

“It’s a spell construct: Mind Prison.” Rothema explained. “This spell locks you in place until you’ve solved all of the problems. No penalty on getting a wrong answer except for a loss of time.

Both Briar and Lyra agreed to the terms that whoever finished answering the questions first would be the winner of this duel. While duels aren’t usually done in this manner, for those close to the top, it would be a shame for them to be accidentally killed, so this is an alternative method that the magicians came up with to preserve their numbers.”

Kael nodded in acknowledgement. So that’s what it was. And, since it was a spell construct, it couldn’t be stopped or deactivated until the objective was achieved. So, even though the bell had been rung, this single match could not help but continue until it was finished.

“Well, I’m going to grab lunch. If Little Rose finishes before I get back, please let her know I’ll be back soon.” Kael had taken to calling Briar, ‘Little Rose’, since he was her older brother.

Indeed, as the ‘older brother’ what kind of brother would he be if he didn’t have a pet name for his younger sister? But, only he was allowed to call her that. If anyone else were to take such liberties, they would soon bear the brunt of an almost vicious lesson from Kael. Knowing Briar’s personality, should she come to hear of it, they would probably also bear the brunt of a second vicious lesson soon afterwards.

Behind him, Laura moaned. “Lunch? After eating that huge mountain of food already?” Laura shook her head. Kael is just as much of a monster as Briar is! She realized.

Kael just smiled lopsidedly. The food wasn’t for him, but for Briar. Moreover, he wasn’t going to be buying it from a stall. Instead, he was going to cook it himself. Glancing up at the sun’s position, he calculated that it wouldn’t be over for at least another half an hour.

“Here, lad. I’ll be going with you, as well. I could use some food myself.” Grandpa Thur said as he hauled himself up out of his very comfortable chair. Kael nodded.

“Me too! Me too!” Rien echoed raising her hand enthusiastically as she scurried over to Kael. She had learned early on that any food Briar made tasted unusually good.

“I’d like to come as well!” Karu leapt out of his seat and dashed over, also in it for the food.

Kael smiled wryly at the three who stood around him.

“Really, though. Don’t blame me if you get bored.” He said with a sigh.

““We Won’t!”” the two young children said with expectant gleams in their eyes.

-----------------

Briar stared at the space in front of her, a transparent wall filled with glowing blue glyphs, a look of utter astonishment on her face. This wasn’t a pocket dimension, but a specialized mental construct. Although they appeared as they looked usually, only the minds of the two magicians were present in this space.

Briar’s eyebrow twitched as she stared hard at the glyphs that filled the entire wall from top to bottom. For a test of knowledge, it sure appeared intimidating. And the challenger was the one who was allowed to chose the subject matter.

But, what surprised Briar the most, was that…out of all the subjects that could be picked, it had to be this specific one.

Her opponent, on the other side of the wall smiled in deep satisfaction upon seeing Briar’s dumbfounded look. It seemed that her gamble had worked out after all. Instead of magic combat, a duel of brains was more up her alley anyways, as Lyra aspired to become the greatest researcher magi of her time.

Briar glanced at Lyra, an odd expression on her face.

“You’re sure this is the subject matter that you wish to challenge me on?” Briar asked one more time, doubtfully.

“I am absolutely certain! There’s no way either of us can cheat our way through this!” Lyra nodded with certainty.

“It’s a race! Whoever can finish the test first wins! No take backs. No best two out of three.” She smirked. “So don’t even think about trying to scramfy[1] your way out of this one!”

Briar’s face seemed to have a convulsion as she finally managed to eke out a reply.

“It seems I have no choice but to agree.”

Then Briar lifted her hand, beginning to answer the questions one by one. Her opponent, not to be outdone, also lifted up her hands and began answering questions.

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After finding a relatively empty place, Kael washed his hands, and pulled out several things from his magic bag, including a table, cooking knives, several ingredients, and a griddle. This wasn’t an electric griddle, but a magic griddle which Briar and Madam Rothema had worked together on.

Able to be powered by martial spirit, it was a prototype model that had been completed a while ago. Since Briar had made a 2.0 version, she had passed this griddle to Kael for him to use instead. In fact, she had tweaked it to make sure that Kael could use his martial spirit, instead of the mana powered version that Briar kept.

Today, he had decided to make egg-topped hamburgers with stir-fried potato wedges. Mincing and mixing the meat and the fat with various spices, Kael started to form patties quickly. Rien and Karu watched with delight as Kael placed a wad of butter on the griddle, sizzling as it began to melt into a bubbly pool.

After adjusting the heat to a slightly lower temperature, Kael then quickly laid out the meat patties on the griddle, taking up half the space. On the other half of the space, Kael cracked eggs directly onto the griddle, letting them bubble a bit as he grabbed a knife in one hand, and a potato in the other.

Tossing up the potato, Kael’s knife blade swiftly blurred into a single shining arc, before it was returned to the table. The potato landed on the table, too, collapsing into ten segments ready for frying. Grabbing several perfectly-sized dinner rolls and bisecting them, he then turned to the griddle and grabbed a spatula.

Both the eggs and the patties were flipped over to cook on the other side before Kael tossed up a block of cheese, his knife a singular blur. The block fell to the counter, and thin slices peeled away from the block. Karu placed a slice of cheese on each burger patty to slowly melt.

Rien and Karu clapped at the demonstration, clearly impressed. But, Kael was not quite finished yet. Watching the burgers carefully, he then swiftly tossed them into the air with a flip of the spatula, followed by eggs. And, without even looking at them, the burgers and eggs fell each onto its already plated hamburger bun substitute.

Grandpa Thur also clapped along this time with Rien and Karu. It was an impressive display of swiftness, accuracy, balance, and control of the items in the surrounding space. The old man understood from this display that Kael’s close combat abilities were probably 10x more dangerous when a sharp pointy object was added into the mix.

Kael presented the children and the old man with some of the burgers he had made. The old man got one large hamburger, while the two kids got two small hamburgers each.

“Hey, how come they get two” the old man grumbled.

“Both of theirs combined is less than even 2/3rds of yours, so stop complaining, old man.” Kael scolded with a ‘no nonsense’ expression.

“I’m also expecting Teacher and Master Thales will want some-Helen, Briar, Me, Princess Claire, also Me…” Kael ticked off the people he was expecting to pester him for one.

“Hey, you were in there twice!” The old man objected.

“Personal food tax for having to cook all of yours. The worker is worth his wages, after all. Not to mention the fact that you’re eating my food for free, so stop complaining.” Kael scoffed.

“Hmmph! I suppose I shall allow it then. But, why Princess Claire?” The old man asked.

“Do you honestly think that she won’t come see Little Rose after her match? After they had just become friends yesterday?” Kael raised an eyebrow and shook his head.

“How can I expect for Little Rose to bear having her friend do nothing but watch her eat her food? While we are nobles, we certainly aren’t ranked so high that we can slight royalty in front of their faces.” Then Kael eyed the old man critically.

“As someone who was once a king, you sure are someone who doesn’t care about etiquette very much.” At those words, Grandpa Thur could only sputter and mutter into his beard about ambitious and overbearing youngsters.

At that point, a cheer rose up from the magician’s arena.

“Oh!? That should mean they’ve about wrapped it up by now.” Kael noted as he quickly wrapped the burgers and placed them, and the cooking instruments away in his bag. Because he had wrapped the instruments in martial spirit, they hadn’t got a spot of dirt or food on them, even after all that mincing. Therefore, it was fine to just put them into the bag, as is.

As he set off towards Rothema’s room, he wondered who had finished first.

----------------------------

Briar stood before Lyra, who had an odd expression on her face.

“How!?” She finally asked. “How were you able to finish answering everything so quickly!? Even answering the dozen bonus questions at the end!? Just how competent in the ancient languages are you!? Is your father a researcher!?”

Briar didn’t answer her question, instead asking “Do you know how old I was when I was accepted by Madam Rothema as her apprentice?”

Lyra shook her head. “I don’t know. How old?”

“Seven years old.” Briar replied. At her answer there was a general intake of breath.

Usually, a Magi only took on a student once their mana capacity, talent, and character were determined to be exceptional. For there were many with large capacities who became lazy in their pursuit of knowledge. Even more became complacent after reaching a certain comfortable goal. For Briar to be accepted at the age of seven, either her talent, or her mana capacity had to be exceptionally large.

Of course, since Briar was disguised as a 15 years-old, they assumed that Briar had studied under Madam Rothema for 8 years, instead of just 5 years. Additionally, no one related Briar to the rumored ‘genius of geniuses’ in Grayelle kingdom, due to her external age difference of three years.

Moreover, with such a teacher as Madam Rothema, it was perfectly reasonable for Briar to learn a language within eight years. Even other Magi had to ask to borrow her books after the fire burned down the Grand Library of Aldengur. Thus, Rothema was placed among the highest of the more knowledgeable Magi.

What they didn’t know was that Briar wasn’t fifteen. Moreover…

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“Whoah! Teacher, you taught Briar how to read the ancient language, too?” Helen asked, her admiration for Rothema at an all-time high.

Rothema made a somewhat troubled face. “Actually, in this case, I haven’t even breached the subject to her. It looks like she somehow managed to study it on her own free time outside of my lessons.” But, where on earth did she get her hands on that much ancient writing? Could she have discovered an ancient’s diary? Rothema thought to herself. Whatever else she thought about it was not shown on her face at all as she watched the exchange.

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On the stage, Briar shrugged.

“I did ask you whether you didn’t want to try a more challenging subject, but you insisted upon choosing the easiest test on the list. You really shouldn’t have given up academics in favor of cheap benefits like boosting your speed with easy subjects.”

At that, Lyra almost vomited a mouthful of blood. What easy subject!? It is the universal agreement of magicians that the ancient language is one of the most difficult subjects of study in out of all the subjects a magician can pursue! Your grasp of the language is almost godly compared to mine! It’s almost as if you studied under an ancient being, yourself!

[1] Scramfy: a weasel-like animal that is known for its speed.