“Bang! Bang! Bang!” “Your highness, an urgent report!”

“Good grief,” The muffled sound came through the heavy oak door, adorned with gold, “Can’t I even eat in peace!”

“Your highness, it is a matter of utmost importance!” a royal official called out from in front of the door. “Fine, bring it in”

A young man opened the door and swiftly walked in, seeing the emperor at a large table, eating an elaborate meal set in front of him. Quickly arriving at the table, the young man bowed and passed a scroll to the emperor. The emperor opened the scroll presented to him and read through the contents. His eyes grew large, and he nearly spit out the food in his mouth.

“What?! Tell me young man! Is this a joke?”

“No your highness, it is not.”

The emperor, His Majesty Sir Orvan Fostel Vilnor could not believe his eyes, as rage grew in his heart.

“Tell me! Just how did someone manage to infiltrate the imperial archives? The mages I hired were SSS-Class! Do you know what that even means?”

“Sir, from our investigations at this point, it appears to be the work of a grand auramancer.”

Orvan leaned back in his chair a bit. “A grand auramancer, you say,” he mumbled out. “Are there any files missing?”

“We do not know yet, but the files are being verified as we speak. I will let you know as soon as we find out.”

“Very well, you may return,” Orvan said with a wave of his hand. Seeing the messenger had left, he let out a breath. “A grand auramancer, huh? Those guys are a pain.”

*** *** ***

Meanwhile at Votran, the tournament was finally underway. Although Reylor’s “making people surprised” skills were SSS-Class, the skill of his opponent was still insufficient to justify giving Reylor a Class-S rank. Nevertheless, he was elevated to A+, thus enabling him to select additional squad members. Additionally, he was excused from the tournament so he could observe the contestants.

This tournament would rank the contestants, but this was merely a means to an end. The ranking was especially for the sake of showing the observing squad leaders to pick out capable members to join their groups. As such, it was customary for many support mages to forfeit their place in the tournament, since it would not give an accurate representation of their abilities. As such, Elany and Aileen both opted to withdraw. Aileen technically was a combat mage, but at this point, she could only command a couple of offensive spells, which would be unlikely to be able to cause damage to any but the weakest of opponent mages.

So naturally, their attention was turned to the companions who had traveled with them on the road to Votran. Flira’s spell casting had improved quite a bit. She could now cast much stronger spells and with greater speed. She prioritized water spells, but augmented them with fire spells.

Gelt’s primary affinity turned out to be wind magic. Presumably because of this, he had switched from using a great sword to a longsword. Though the physical power behind his attacks were about the same as before, they were now augmented with magic and relied far more on accuracy.

Flint, on the other hand, was completely different. He had foregone his plate-mail entirely, along with his sword and shield. His body armor was replaced with magically reinforced cloth, and he wore leather bracers. He had little fear of bodily harm nonetheless, because he had focused on earth magic, and while he could use it proficiently both at range and by augmenting his body.

All three did quite well, not losing to anyone in their respective classes. They each finally met their matches against some of the students who were here since they did not make it into any of the squads the previous year.

There was one other match that caught Reylor’s attention. A caster was facing off against a close-combat augmenter mage. The caster moved skillfully, also using dark illusionary magics to stay out of reach, while occasionally counter-attacking. His combat prowess was formidable, but this was not the main thing that caught Reylor’s attention.

“Where the heck is that guy’s karma aura?”

He could not understand it. Here was a guy, who certainly seemed human enough, but Reylor could not read his karma no matter how hard he tried. This was a very perplexing matter. He decided to approach this man at the conclusion of the tournament.

“What are you looking at, Reylor?” A pair of amethyst eyes looked questioningly at him. They were Aileen’s.

“That dark mage over in that arena. There is something different about him.” Reylor pointed to one of the four arenas currently in use.

“Oh, that’s Khes. He is a bit strange. He has a hobby of playing by himself with puppets, but it’s kinda creepy. They look like real things, but move differently. That’s about all I know, though. He tends to be a loner.”

“Hmm, puppets. Where have I seen puppets?” Reylor thought to himself, running memories through his mind.

He suddenly stopped to take another look at the man, but peered a bit more deeply. A look of surprise flitted across his face.

“What even?! No wonder I can’t read him. He doesn’t have a human soul! And that hobby of his… It could be… Whatever, I’ll just have to ask after the tournaments.”

He leaned back and relaxed, awaiting the end of the tournament.

When all the matches had ended, the real event began—the squad selection process. The squad-less students were arranged in different areas, one for each ranking bracket, one for rankles combat support mages, and one for non combat specialists—such as alchemists and enchanters—who were willing to work primarily for a single squad.

Reylor walked over to the group of people in one of the middle brackets, much to the wonderment of many onlookers. Usually the captains would go straight for the people in the top bracket, so as not to lose out on the top contestants, or they’d go for the group of active support mages to se if they could snag a healer. It was almost unheard of for a person to go straight for someone in the middle brackets, yet this is just what Reylor was doing.

“Woah, why’s someone coming over here first?” “I don’t know, but whoever it is he’s coming for sure must be pretty lucky. Mid tiers usually go last, since there is less room for change, but we aren’t the most powerful.” “I don’t know, but guy was the one who got a squad residence on the first day. I wonder if he knows what he’s even doing.”

All mages under S-Class had been evacuated during Reylor’s duel, so it was only natural that none of the contestants were unaware of his powers. Still, Reylor kept walking onward until he found his target.

“Khes!” Reylor waved at him.

“Hmm?” Khes was at a bit of a loss. Why was a captain already looking at the mid-bracketers, and furthermore, why was this person looking for him? “Hello?” He said. He was truly a loss for what to say. This was too strange—he hadn’t even met Reylor!

“Hello Khes. My name is Reylor I was talking with Aileen, and she told me you had a unique ability, so I wanted to see if you would be willing to show me?

Khes felt a bit uncomfortable. Those eyes. Those eyes! Why were they so overbearing! They made him feel like he was missing something. Well-truth be told, he was missing something, but he never felt it so much as he did right now! Unfortunately, many had seen his “puppets,” so it’d look strange if he withheld now.

With a look of skepticism, he pulled out one of his puppets-a look-alike armadillo. He made it walk around in a couple of circles and change directions a couple of times. Its movements were slightly hurried, and sometimes a slight bit spastic, but there was another interesting aspect to this puppet.

Reylor’s eyes narrowed slightly, for he could see what few others could. What he saw confirmed he suspicions. The creature was not a look-alike at all. It was real—very real. Reylor could see the cells at work as each of its tiny muscles contracted. When it was moving, its biology would behave in such a way that Reylor knew it possessed a sliver of soul. When it stopped and Khes moved to put the creature away, the sliver of soul dispersed.

“Khes, if you had really bit puppet, could you control it?” Khes nodded. “Could you control lots of puppets?” Khes nodded again, though a bit more slowly this time. What did this guy want with him?

“Good,” Reylor said with a smile. “Join our squad?”

“Huh?” Khes was somewhat stupefied. “You want a mid-ranker in your squad?”

“Yes. I like your puppets, and think they could actually be quite useful in combat if used appropriately.”

”Well, ok. It’s really just a party trick, but whatever.”

“Awesome. Elany and Aileen are over there—feel free to join them,” Reylor said. Khes’s eyes opened a bit wider, along with a few others. He had just been admitted to the same squad Aileen was in, along with Elany too! Luck was on his side today!

A few other people around his chuckled and scoffed. “Yeah he got into Aileen’s squad, but so what? He has a captain without much of a brain. They’re not going to really graduate for a few years at least. Hehe.”

Reylor, of course, heard the banter, but he let it go. After all, he was going to have the last laugh. All the signs told him he had not simply chosen a dark mage, but also a lich necromancer!

*** *** ***

A lady clad in red stood atop the ruins of a stone castle, peering past the overgrown courtyard to a small, run-down village beyond, many thoughts running through her mind. It was bitter-sweet. Lucille was back at the place of her birth. She had been here before, but only briefly, as she spent most of her time looking for anyone who might have survived from the royal household, and then bringing retribution to the ones who had treated her so vilely. This was the first time she had obtained the luxury of being able to just pause, be still, and contemplate.

She felt happy, in a way. Being able to return to her rightful home was nice, despite the current state of things; and she once again had an attendant, so that made her feel like royalty again. His loyalty also warmed her heart. At the same time, she felt like she was missing something.

She started thinking of the events that had led her here. Her imprisonment, her days of slavery, and then her rescue. Her rescue… She also thought of when she had parted from them, and returned, then left to carry out vengeance against her former masters, with the help of her guard. What was she missing, though? But deep inside, she knew.

She missed them. She missed the people who had come for her when no one else would. The people who would always meet her with smiles, and took care of her as of a friend. These were the people who had shown her love, when there was nothing guaranteed for them.

And then she had left them—cast them off like common rabble. If only she could go back…

She steeled herself. There was a lot of work to do. It was up to her to rebuild, and rebuild she would. While she was unable to find any of the royal household, there were still many villages close by that had been neglected after the annexation. Shade beasts frequented the area, and there were not many able-bodied men. As such, they had all been forced to focus solely on survival, and the cities had fallen into disrepair. The first piece of work would be to ensure the cities’ walls were in good repair. Then it would be best to begin training a new generation of warriors to protect and possibly reclaim their homeland.

She was a Shildwell, wielding techniques secret to only those of Shildwell blood. But this was a new age. She was probably the only Shildwell left, and her people needed her. They were her new extended family, and she would pass on her knowledge to the martially incompetent who so desperately needed it. By doing this, she also hoped to right some of the wrongs of her ancestors, who had ruled with such a heavy hand.