That afternoon Derek trained his three students under the watchful eye of his own weapon master. They trained until sundown and the three of them took to this new weapon like fish to water. Afterwards they ate with his mother, grandmother, and Alicia. The addition of the three guests did not dampen the mood in the cottage at all. They were very courteous and Eona and Alicia appreciated these manners they hadn’t experienced since coming to this backwater place.

The next day Derek's schedule repeated itself and this time his students brought a few members of their retinue and some supplies with them when they came to train. These members happened to be maids and a chef who prepared a lavish dinner for them all after the training ended. The dinner was quite lively and Derek was pleased to see how happy his mother and grandmother were.

A few days repeated like this before the day of the third trial was at hand. Derek and Rebekah met up with Prince Kylin, Kenneth, and Duncan at their guest house before leading them over to the castle’s training grounds where the competition would take place. Derek took a position on a viewing platform that would be behind the crowds but could see the competition platform. There were two rings on that platform, intended for two fights to happen at the same time.

When Belany and Hector saw him they walked up and spoke with him for a moment. He took that chance to encourage them and remind them of some points in their strategy before they left to stand with their families below the competition stage. Elton and Feros came out and snickered at Derek before going below the stage as well. The Elders and the Patriarch all appeared on the opposite viewing platform and took their seats.

Prince Kylin looked at Derek, “Why aren’t you participating? You should be the strongest out of the five of you. It doesn’t make sense that you are not involved.”

Derek smiled at Prince Kylin, “I am not participating because I got disqualified in the preliminaries. It was a comparison of Holy magic skill level. At that time I hadn’t tiered up yet and while my attributes were just a little superior to Belany and Hector’s the four of them each acquired a bottle of Unicorn tears. While the five of us were all able to cast a level four smite, all four of them were able to cast a slightly stronger one than my own.

“I was defeated legitimately. Besides, I helped Belany and Hector prepare for this and am not interested in the kind of embarrassment Elton and Feros are going to go through today.”

Prince Kylin looked at the two knights. This kid had just dropped a bomb on them. “Wait, you were all tier zero and all five of you could cast at level four? What kind of madness is this?”

“Holy magic is our specialty, Prince Kylin. We fight demons. Our clan’s coming of age trials and ceremony are designed for us to make the step into tier one. This means that every clansman is tier one before age twenty, not just the geniuses as other clans allow. It has been over a century since a member of the clan has survived failing this requirement and they were banished from the clan and their name was stricken from the rolls.

“Similar to this requirement to reach tier one at an early age we also stress Holy magic training, with techniques and relics to enhance our affinity. Not one of us will receive a schema that doesn’t promote our order and light attributes. We practice casting the weakest of order and light spells from the moment we can talk. Our play as children includes competition in the casting of Holy spells. That being the case, it would be more surprising if one of us couldn’t cast above our tier.”

Derek thought a while before adding, “Though, really only three of us should have been able to cast at tier four. Elton and Feros aren’t really that talented. Elder Jacob acquiring those Unicorn tears was really a stroke of luck for them.”

Prince Kylin thought about that for a while, “Elder Jacob seems to live pretty well for how poor your clan is, he’s the Elder in charge of finances right? Those Unicorn tears should have also been outside of the reach of your clan’s finances. I wonder how he managed that.”

Derek didn’t think much about it, “He has gained a lot of fame in the last ten or so years for improving our clan’s revenue flow. He practically doubled it. That’s probably how he could afford it. Either way, that has nothing to do with me. When I go errant I will probably be able to solve my family’s money issues.”

The Prince gave him a long look then shared a glance with the two men behind him. Duncan’s face contained barely concealed fury, his scar had turned bright red. Kenneth just shook his head and looked to the competition stage, “Not now. Look, they are about to start.”

The Patriarch had stood up on the opposite viewing platform. He gestured to the crowd who were talking among themselves and they started to quiet down. He gazed at them all with a look of joy on his face, “Haha, we have all been waiting for this moment. Today we will get to see the youths compete to see who will take command of the party when they go into the mountains for their fourth trial. Each of these four candidates will have an opportunity to fight the other three. The candidate who performs the best will win and be the leader of the party!”

He looked at the four youths and smiled, “Fight well, today you will get to show the fruits of your training. The training armor won’t allow you to actually be hurt so give it your all! I hope to see some good fights. First up is Belany verses Hector and Elton verses Feros. Good luck to you all!”

Derek turned to the Prince. “There is nothing to see in the first ring. Hector will not fight his sister. The other should be a display of the two using the warsword against each other. The forms they will use are the orthodox forms of the clan, more useful against larger monsters than against men. You might be able to learn something of those forms while watching. Probably not though, neither is more than moderately skilled.”

The three guests nodded and turned their attention to the stage where two pairs had taken stances against each other. Sure enough, the moment the Patriarch announced the start of the fight Hector conceded to his sister but in the other field Elton and Feros were circling each other slowly while probing for weaknesses.

They continued in this state for a few moments before Feros charged in swinging. After that a frenzy of blades flashing appeared. They used a pretty weak order spell to attack and their Holy defensive spell. This meant that neither could really overpower the other. The force of the blades slamming into the magic shields did knock each of them back half a step each time, which gave them room to lunge forward with another vicious swing. It was absolutely brutal and they showed minimal skill as they hacked recklessly away at each other.

After a few minutes of this Feros’ shield finally collapsed causing Elton to score a hit and win the duel. If not for the training armor Feros would have been sheared right in half across the abdomen. Prince Kylin frowned down at the competition stand and said, “You’re right, there was absolutely nothing to gain from that exchange.”

Derek smiled at him then turned to see the Patriarch looking down at the competition stage. He smiled and said, “That’s one win for Belany and Elton and one loss for Hector and Feros. We will have Belany fight Elton and Feros fight Hector next. Give it a few minutes for everyone's mana to recover then we will start the fight. Remember to give it your all.”

That last bit was aimed at Hector who had surrendered without a fight last time. The next two fights were to be between a mage and a magic warrior in each case. The crowd had a good idea how this was going to go but were hoping to be surprised.

Derek smiled as he saw the four down below prepare for the fight. Elton and Feros switched to glaives and rested for a moment to recover their mana. As they moved into the ready position Derek turned to his guests and said, “Heh, watch this.”

The three guests smiled and looked to the rings. Just a moment after the Patriarch shouted, “Fight!” a strong wind shot out from Belany and Hector and caught both Elton and Feros off guard. When that wind hit them they were both catapulted into the air and deposited several yards out of the rings.

The audience gawked. This was not the result they had expected. Both of the brothers had been defeated in one blow by some sort of wind spell. Derek and his guests couldn’t help but laugh at the two piles of armor that had just been a pair of arrogant warriors. On the other observation stand Richard and the Patriarch both looked quite pleased but Elder Jacob was in a fury. “What is this? They broke the rules! You can’t use wind magic in this competition! I demand they be disqualified now!”

When they heard this many in the training yard frowned at the Elder. The Patriarch stood and said, “The rule is that you can only use Thorne clan spells and those that you crafted yourself. The prohibition is specifically against spells learned from sources outside the clan. I ask the mages here. Was this spell learned from a spellbook?”

Rebekah started to answer but Derek lightly grabbed her arm and shook his head. She understood his meaning so she stayed quiet. A few minutes later another elder stood up and said to Belany, “Child, show me the structure of that spell and tell me how you and your brother came to learn it.”

This ancient fellow was Elder Matthew. He was known for his understanding of magic and his impartiality. Belany quickly complied, presenting the structure of the spell as clearly as she could for the Elder then explained, “My brother and I came up with this spell when we were training with clansman Derek these last few weeks. We would come up with a concept and test it on our clansman until it worked. This design took several hundred tries.”

Derek paled as he thought of all the times he had been roughly tossed by the twins as they attempted to create new magic to fight Elton and Feros. Every time he got up and dusted himself off he told himself that it was all for his vengeance against the two bullies and thus he was able to persevere.

Duncan turned to Derek and laughed, “Several hundred times, huh? That must have been a hell of a thing to watch.”

Rebekah chortled from the side, “Oh it was. I recorded it with air magic if you would like to see it later.”

Derek looked at his grandmother as if she had grown horns while she and Duncan laughed and promised to watch the recordings later. He couldn’t help but say, “My own grandmother…”

Elder Matthew had finished reviewing the structure of the spell quickly and determined that this so called Windbuffet was indeed a personal creation of theirs. Afterwards he had Belany show the structures of the other two spells as well so that this so called cheating issue would not be raised again. He determined that all three spells were all unique to the pair and even complimented the pair on them and told them that after the competition he would be willing to help them improve the spells still further.

Belany and Hector quickly agreed and Elder Jacob could only bite his tongue as he knew that his outburst had only brought the scorn of the others on him. By this point Elton and Feros had recovered themselves and Belany and Hector had recovered their mana. Jacob went over and quickly coached his sons before the Patriarch announced the results after the second round of the competition. Belany had the lead with two wins and no losses. Elton and Hector were tied for second place with one win and one loss each. Feros was doing the worst with two losses.

The Patriarch looked at them all and smiled, “I am glad that you youngsters have made this interesting. The next round will be Belany verses Feros and Elton verses Hector. Good luck to you all. Take your places!”

This time everyone was excited to see how the fights would turn out. That Windbuffet had surprised most of the people there. When the Patriarch shouted “Fight!” the two warriors were ready. Feros leaned forward but was caught by an updraft and thrown backwards. He was able to force himself to stop just inside the ring but when he was struck by another Windbuffet he was forced out of bounds again.

Elton leaned forward and tried to use his own weak strength in air magic to support himself. This allowed him to land a few yards from the edge of the ring. He used his glaive to protect against a second Windbuffet but he was hit with the Earthtrap spell instead. He panicked when his feet sank into the dirt as this was his first time encountering this spell.

Hector showed no mercy. The moment Elton’s feet were bound he began to bombard him with the Wrathfire spell. Elton’s fear was clearly visible as he tried to protect himself from the repeated blasts. Within moments Elton’s mana gave way before the wrathfire and the training armor’s aegis flashed to life. The training yard was so quiet that Derek could hear Elton’s panicked breathing. Beside him Duncan muttered, “Too brutal.”

The silence lasted only a short while before Elder Matthew began to clap. This spread throughout the training yard. Only Elder Jacob, who was red with rage, failed to join in. His two sons were lying on the ground in a stupor while Belany and Hector beamed with pride. The Patriarch smiled down, “Well done, well done. It has been ages since a mage won this competition. You two have done great! Those spells were ingenious indeed. You should be proud of yourselves. You have definitely overcome a trial today.”

The Patriarch waited for Elton and Feros to collect themselves before scanning the crowd and announcing, “All four of you did very well today. You did your best and demonstrated your skills. The rankings are as follows: with first rank and three victories and zero losses, Belany has won the right to lead the team in the fourth trial. In second place, with two wins and one loss, we have Hector. In third place, with one win and two losses, we have Elton. And in fourth place, with zero wins and three losses, we have Feros.

“In two weeks, on the next full moon, these four will be joined by Derek and they will go into the mountains for their fourth trial, the true core of the coming of age trials, the Demon Hunt!”