*Whew*

After being lectured to for an hour by Kira, Daelos finally managed to slip away while she was ranting. Since the second year tournament would begin in two days, he decided to pay a visit to a certain hot headed girl in the infirmary.

*Knock* *Knock*

Opening the door, he was greeted to the sight of two girls sitting at Rhina’s bedside. Looking towards the door, both Daisha and Ellora’s eyes met with Daelos’s.

“Yo.” Walking into the room, he lay down on the bed situated to the right of Rhina’s. “Long time no see Ellora.” Smiling at her, he bit into the apple he initially brought for Rhina.

Feeling the carefree aura surrounding his body, Ellora couldn’t help but feel slightly angry. “Why didn’t you come forward earlier.” Clenching her fists, she barley managed to contain the anger in her voice.

Ignoring her trembling body, he took another bite out of his apple before shifting his gaze towards her. “The girls were doing just fine without me, if it wasn’t for her losing the last match and forcing me to appear, I wouldn’t have come forward until the 2nd year matches.” Looking back at his half eaten apple he lost interest in the topic.

“HANDLING IT!? IF YOU HAD BEEN THERE AT THE START RHINA WOULDN’T HAVE PUSHED BEYOND HER LIMITS AND ENDED UP IN HOSPITAL!!”

“Heh” Turning his head to face her a grin was plastered across his face. “Even if I was there it wouldn’t have made a difference at all if she still got matched up against Maeve. Now tell me Ellora, do you honestly believe that she wouldn’t have gone all out against an opponent who can match her in strength? C’mon now, you’re her sister aren’t you, you’re supposed to know her better than anyone.”

“I-I” At a loss for words, she knew what he was saying was right. No matter what the scenario was, Rhina would never give up if her opponent was still standing. To her, pushing her body past its limits was something that she’d done many times before. Doing it one more time wouldn’t make a difference.

Seeing the tension between the two, Daisha stepped in and tried to change the topic of the conversation. “How’d you get back anyway?”

“Oh! Funny story really! You see while I was gone I met this party of female mercenaries - or were they adventurers? Anyway! One of their members used to be a student here and told me that it was practically impossible to get back here without an iron wing eagle!”

“Well yeah, but they’re only used during enrolment and when there’s an emergency.”

“Yeah, Amara told me the same thing. But then I got to thinking. If there was an emergency and one academy needed to contact another, how would they do it?”

“???”

Seeing the confusion on her face, he felt that a 200+ year old like her was lacking a bit in the common sense department.

“If there was an emergency then they’d need an aerial mount to get here.”

Waiting for a few seconds for both elf girls to digest what he had said, he played a game of catch with his now skinny apple.

1..2..3

“WAIT!! YOU STOLE A MOUNT FROM AN ACADEMY!!” Both girls shouted out in surprise as their eyes went wide.

“Yup! It was quite simple really. Because they’re so cocky they never would have thought that someone would dare to steal from them. I mean fuck, they didn’t even lock the place up! I practically strolled right in.”

Well my vibrational sensing technique helped me to not run into any patrolling guards.

“B – But how did you get the bird to stay quiet! NO! How the hell did no one see the bird take off!!”

Catching the apple, a warm smile formed on his face. “It wasn’t easy. First I had to tie up its beak while it was sleeping. Then I had to wake it up and threaten it.”

“Wait how did you threaten it?”

I used mental energy to force it to submit. I guess all those birdbrain jokes were pretty accurate.

“I killed its mate in front of it and then pretended I was going to do the same to it unless it took me to my destination.” Well I made it think its mate was dead. God I love mental energy!

“Okay, but how did you fly away without being seen?”

“I kidnapped the bird when it was dark so naturally no one would notice.”

“But what about the sound its wings make when it takes off?”

“I used the law of air to create an air bubble around it to muffle the sound.”

“B-But how did you make it to the island without causing a commotion?”

“That was the easiest part! When I got close enough, I killed the bird and used the law of air to help propel myself up to the island.”

“Oh…YOU KILLED IT!!”

“Well yeah. Can’t have it fly back and get used to trace it back to us. Think Daisha.”

“YOU! *Huff* Just to confirm. The bird you took was an iron winged eagle right?”

“No, when did I say that?”

“…” Breathe in…and out…in…and out. “You said that your mercenary friend told you that only iron winged eagles could get you here. Right?

“Yeah.”

“But you didn’t arrive here on an iron wing eagle?”

“No!? Haven’t you been listening! I said that the academies need a way to contact each other. So obviously they’d have their own specialised mounts for the job! No one said that only iron winged eagles could reach this altitude.”

“Isn’t that precisely what your mercenary friend said?”

“And I proved her wrong.”

*SIGH!*

Feeling like she was going around in a circle, Daisha decided to end this conversation with one last question. “So what kind of bird was it?”

“I don’t know.” Shrugging his shoulders, he showed that he didn’t really care what type it was as long as it could fly. “It was some brown bird with a weird greenish-blue pattern on its head and a turquoise coloured beak.”

“OH GOD!! You killed a blue beak weaver!”

“So?”

SO? BLUE BEAK WEAVER’S ARE LOVE BIRDS! IF ONE DIES THE OTHER DIES! YOU’RE A MONSTER! YOU KILLED ITS MATE IN FRONT OF IT THEN FORCED IT TO BE YOUR MOUNT ONLY TO KILL IT ONCE ITS PURPOSE WAS SERVERED!”

“Oh?” Sucks for the bird still alive in the Breamore academy.

“Ergh” The sound of groaning caught everyone’s attention as they saw the unconscious Rhina slowly open her eyes. “What’s all the shouting about?” With a voice that clearly lacked energy, the elven fire starter looked around the room and saw the concerned faces of her sister, best friend and Daelos…”DAELOS!!!”

“YO!” laying on his side he sent her a friendly wave before chucking his apple into a nearby bin.

(AU: Flick of the wrist)

Surprise covered her face as she never imagined that she would be seeing him again. Well not in the infirmary anyway.

“Cool fight, blue hair suits you.”

It took a few moments for her to register what was going on, before a slight blush appeared on her face. “Did we lose?”

“N-

“NOPE!!” Before Ellora had a chance to explain what happened, Daelos cut her off.

“I heard your prayer from afar and through rain and fire! I crawled my way up from the depths of hell to bring upon you this victory!!” Bowing slightly, a huge grin covered his face, while Rhina’s blushed deepened.

Noticing the red shade on her sister’s face, Ellora wasn’t happy. It would be fine if this was a year ago, but for some reason, the boy behind her seemed to have changed in some way. Although it wasn’t obvious, this new aura that surrounded him made her feel uncomfortable.

“Anyway, what was that form you used? Did your elf king bloodline evolve or something?”

Seeing Daelos stare at her, Rhina felt like his face had matured a bit.

“I wouldn’t say evolved – more like I switched to a related element and applied it to my elf king form.”

“I see, so you essentially fused the power of lighting into your elf king form?”

“That’s a simple way of putting it but yes.”

“But since that form requires fire to use, what happened to it? It couldn’t have just disappeared right?”

Thinking about it scientifically, energy could not be created nor destroyed. And from what he understood about laws, the same rule applied. He theorised that the base forms of laws were actually elemental particles in the air that could be stored in the body and released in their elemental state. If he was right then it would explain how he could easily disrupt the molecules holding the laws together.

Take fire for instance. It could be describe as a hot gas gone nuclear, but the molecules within fire vibrate and move at high speeds. By using his own vibrational energy to interact with these molecules, he can easily force them apart and dissipate the flame.

So, similar to when mages and mage knights convert the particles in laws, he converts the laws back into the particle states. Therefore he does not destroy attacks, but instead dissipates them.

Rhina’s lightning form on the other hand confused him. Since waking up in this universe, besides his ignorance to laws, he never thought that there would be anything that he wouldn’t be able to explain through scientific means. Even her initial elf king form could be explained by her absorbing more fire particles into her body and releasing them at a faster rate.

But this new form didn’t make sense at all. He thought that she had got rid of the fire particles and used lighting as a substitute. But if that was the case why did she need to go into a form that boosts her fire particle absorption?

Seeing him look so lost in thought, Rhina felt that it was good to have him back.

“During the match I temporarily exited my elf king form so that I could tap into the power of lightning. Once that was done I switched back into my elf king form and activate the power of lightning in the exact moment my transformation beings. By doing so I trick my body into thinking that the lightning is fire and the result is that new form.”

That’s genius!! Like seriously amazing! To switch between her normal form and elf king form in less than a second while activating the lightning, means that her timing and precision is monstrous! To activate both simultaneously within such a tight timeframe is outrageous! Just the calculations alone would make it neigh impossible for the mind of a normal person to carry out!

Admiration, that’s what he was feeling right now. Pure, unadulterated admiration. Besides Kira, he’d never felt admiration towards anyone else since coming here. Not even the knights at Berilia could instil this feeling in him.

Without showing it on his face, he nodded to every word Rhina said trying to look unimpressed.

“And that’s how the form works.”

“Say, Rhina?” Looking at her best friend who recently woke up.

“Yeah?”

“Why didn’t you tell me about that form before the tournament!”

Seeing the anger in Daisha’s eyes she tried to play it off as if she was suffering from repercussions of her battle. But seeing Daisha’s cold eyes staring at her, she knew it was a bust. *Sigh* “It was supposed to be a surprise for the 4th years.”

“That doesn’t excu-

“What’s it called?”

“Huh?”

Butting into their conversation, Daelos decided that he didn’t want his teammates to fight two days before the next tournament.

“Your new form, what’s it called? Elf king level 2?, lightning elf form? Zappedy zapp zap?”

“God your terrible at naming things!” Hearing those names, Daisha couldn’t help but cringe.

“Then you give it a go Oh Queen of naming things.”

“Hmph…” Closing her eyes and tapping her foot, it took a solid minute of silence until she came up with a name. “SPARKY!”

“…”

“…”

“…”

“What? Its cute!” Seeing their disgusted expressions, Daisha couldn’t help but defend her idea.

Maybe if she was a dog.

*Sigh* “Sis you’ve been awfully quiet. Why don’t you try throwing your hat into the pile?”

Sitting silently watching the banter between the three of them, she felt like she was out of place. One was the only elf in the academy capable of using the law of light, the other was a mysterious human who managed to fight her sister to a draw, and the last one was her little sister who managed to become the first person in elven history to achieve a new elf king form.

And what was she? Just an outsider who can do nothing but cheer for the success of others? An older sister who can only look up to her little sister? A broken woman who was tricked into giving up something she can never get back?

“SIS!”

“HUH” Snapping out of her self-pity, she realised that everyone’s eyes were on her. “What?”

“Idea? Remember?”

A name for Rhina’s new form?

“What about…Thunder King.”

“Thunder King – I like it”

“It’s got a nice ring to it.”

“No complaints here.”