Chapter 12: A Planned Revenge

Two years have passed by, the children are stronger than ever. The tournament hype was soaring and most teams participating were having their try-outs.

As an official student of Clarus Academy, Dillon was obligated to join. It was more mandatory. However, he was still excited. He felt like he had a chance to make it, now that he’s been doing rigorous training for the past two years - his training was fruitful.

The try-outs for the team was located in the arena where they’ve been training in, those who did not take part of the training also joined the try-outs, although their chances of getting in were much lower.

Dillon nervously stood in line, his friends were waiting for him at the sidelines, them being present made him feel less nervous and more confident in himself. Yes, they’ve spent two years combatting three demons. There’s no way he could fail this!

“I can’t believe he came,” someone snickered behind him.

“Does he think he’ll actually pass?”

More laughter erupted throughout the line, some, although it didn’t seem like it, were trembling with laughter - holding it in. Their faces turned pink as they made fun of him.

Dillon clenched his fists. Stay cool, he told himself.

“He’s probably arrogant because he got to learn with that other group,” another person whispered, a partaker in the training.

“Really? I thought he did well,” a soothing voice said. Dillon felt grateful for this person - at least not everyone in the school was a jerk.

The person snorted back, “yeah, right. Don’t fool your eyes.”

“Hey,” a familiar voice growled. “Who do you think you are?” It was Orion.

Over the two years, Orion has grown in height, strength, and… looks. Not only that, but his element somehow gave him a permanent intimidating aura.

Orion, along with the rest of his friends, stood next to the person who was bad-mouthing him. Dillon felt his eyes prick with tears - hold it in, he thought to himself.

“Who do you think you are?” The person shot back, his face full of arrogance. Dillon recognized him - his rough, brown hair and sharp, pink eyes. This person was Michael, one of the more popular kids in his class, he was a year older than Dillon. He was also in the top 10 of the school, the number kid in his grade.

Due to his rank, he felt like he had a right to pick on Dillon, who was one of the youngest and weakest people in the entire school. Dillon never truly disliked Michael, but would prefer if he never existed in the first place. What can he say? He had a big heart.

“Cowards like you don’t deserve to know,” Orion said coldly, glaring at the person.

“What’d you call me?!” Michael yelled, reaching to grab Orion’s shirt, only to have his hand deflected.

Caelus snorted, his index finger pointing at Michael’s hand, “what are you trying to play at?”

Caelus, too, has changed. His medium-length hair was cut to a shorter length. Now, it was barely below his ears.

Michael turned red and glared at them. “You-!”

“Michael,” a soothing voice called out, it was the same voice who stuck up for him. “Enough.” It was Everett, Michael’s older brother of a year, and also the number 1 ranked person in his grade - two grade above Dillon’s and a grade above Michael’s.

Grades in magic schools didn’t follow the norm, instead, they’re placed based on how strong they are.

Dillon admired Everett - not only was he handsome, but he was nice and cool. He didn’t bully others, rather he stood up for the bullied. Everyone loves him. Everett shared a similar appearance to Michael, except his brown hair was longer and fell to his shoulders, it was braided on one side. His eyes were more gentle, rounder, and a brighter shade of pink.

Definitely more handsome than his bratty brother, Dillon thought to himself.

“I apologize for my brother,” Everett said, a troubling look on his face. He karate chopped Michael’s head while saying, “why are you like this? Huh?”

“O-ow! Brother, that hurts!”

“Good!”

Orion stared at the two siblings, a small trace of surprise on his face, before remaining neutral. “He needs to apologize to my friend, Dillon.”

“Huh? You’re friends with that lo-?” Another karate chop - two actually. Michael turned to Dillon, tears forming at the corner of his eyes. “S-sorry.”

“No worries,” Dillon waved it off.

So the peace resumed, yet some of the stares didn’t. He knew what they were thinking about, but he opted out on thinking about it. No matter where you go, someone will hate you. Unless you’re perfect, which, of course, he highly doubted anyone was.

Finally, Dillon made it to the front of the line - he was up next. His heart thumped nervously as he fidgeted in his spot. The wait was agonizing, it felt like hours, when, in reality, it’s been a few seconds.

Inhale, exhale, inhale, exhale- argh! That’s making me even more nervous! Dillon scratched his head in frustration.

“Dillon!” A voice called out.

“Y-yes!” he yelped, which caused some people to giggle.

Dillon walked up the stairs and onto a small platform. On the platform were two orbs - one to measure potential and check for your element, the other is, of course, the spirit orb. The most nervewracking experience about this was that your information would be public to others.

“We’ll be testing for your element, potential, and spirit. Afterwards, you’ll fight with one of our instructors to test your combat abilities and efficiency,” a lady said monotonously, she was like a robot. Her hair was gelled back and she wore a fashionable, business suit - very professional.

“We will be your judges,” she said once more, before gesturing to the three other people next to her. Eldrick was to the right, and on the left of her, was another man, although he seemed to be in his 20’s.

“Begin.”

Dillon went up to the potential orb first, he breathed in and then placed his hand on the orb. He knew his potential and element weren’t much, but he hoped they would overlook it once they tested his combat abilities.

“Element, earth,” the operator said, then frowned. “Potential 59 - medium.”

“Rejected,” the lady quickly said. “Next!”

“Eh?” Dillon looked shocked. “W-wait, what do you mean?”

The lady snorted, “listen, sweetie. We have no room or time for those with potential lower than 60 - now move so the next person can come up.”

“Wait a second, Mira,” Eldrick stopped her. “Couldn’t we at least have an e-”

“No,” Mira glared. “That would be unfair to the other participants we rejected with 59 potential. Next!”

Eldrick looked at the shocked Dillon with apologetic eyes. Eldrick knew how strong Dillon became, he could possibly be in the top 20 of the school.

“Sorry,” Eldrick muttered, Dillon just nodded, as he walked down the stairs, starstrucked. A person behind him laughed and whispered to his friend.

“I knew it,” he laughed.

Dillon clenched his fists and turned to glare at the person, “Yo-!” He stopped himself from yelling.

“What? What’re you going to do about it, huh?” The boy mocked, glaring back at him. He stared at Dillon as if he were a cockroach on the floor.

Dillon glared and kept his mouth shut, walking away from the line and to his friends, who looked furious. He would show them. He would show all of them.

“They’ll regret crossing me,” Dillon growled underneath his breath, fists clenched tightly.

“We’ll show them, Dillon,” Orion said, rubbing the young boy’s head, as tears continued to spill down in face.

“We’ll show them,” Orion repeated, guiding Dillon back to their side of the arena.

…

Over the course of one year, everyone improved tremendously. Ley, too, could now walk more stably. In fact, more stable than kids his age. They wondered whether or not the officials would allow a baby to participate.

Lilith improved her secondary familiar’s rank from a C rank to a B rank. She could now bind with Bell and lift heavy objects, as well as push them back or create a small invisible wall. This would combat her somewhat poor defense. Also, Bell could create platforms for Lilith to step on - this made it better for her to escape, besides switching spots with Rhett.

Rhett, on the other hand, is still an A rank. However, his strength has improved, too. He could jump farther distances and throw harder punches. Also, Lilith could now use some of his magic. Rhett 's ability was that of nature - plants, essentially. She utilized Rhett to bind opponents (or Brent, in this case) and attack him using small spells.

As for Eve, she could now stick barriers onto three people easily, four if it was an emergency. Her barrier also transformed - it could turn into a dome that completely surrounds a large area, though that took a lot of energy and time to form and it was weaker than her condensed shield. However, it was useful to block skills that were attacking all of them at the same time.

Kai could now pierce through harder materials, such as low quality metal. If he tried hard and used all of his mana, he could pierce through Eve’s shield. He could also manipulate the sound waves around him and create more sound bullets, as well as a small bomb that releases sound waves. This bomb could either mute the sound or create a loud sound, also, it was powerful enough to push away enemies.

Orion’s darkness improved to an impressive level, he could absorb the light surrounding him, albeit the distance is small. However, this small area of darkness gives him a bigger advantage by creating more shadows to hide in.

Caelus learned how to use a skill he called the ‘divine sense.’ If he spread his wind around, it gave him the general gist of the area and how many people were on it. Although he found it troubling to know the details, such as gender, ki or mana, height, and more.

Concerning their spirit essence, Kai and Caelus could now easily use a small amount of their mixed energy in their weapons. Also, they could use both element and mixed energy at the same time, for a small period of time, of course. Perhaps 10 minutes at most.

Ezra taught the others how to use their elements on their weapons, too. However, most of them already knew how to do this, such as Lilith, who used Bell, Kai, who shot out sonic waves and beams, and Ley, who still refuses to talk about his weapons.

Eve, on the other hand, could now apply her rebound to her weapon, propelling enemies even farther and faster than her regular swings.

Dillon improved the most out of all of them. Although his potential could be considered medium or a little above average, he could still hold his own against them. He went from fainting from a electrocution to being able to neutralize most of it using his own element. Also, started utilizing his earth armor more and even used the earth to cover some of his axe, therefore making it harder.

Currently, the children were in their usual world-domination period spot. However, they weren’t planning their world takeover plans, they were discussing something much more important to them…

“We should just have Dillon one-handedly take them on,” Kai nodded, satisfied with his answer. Kai, too, cut his hair. His once girly appearance was replaced with a more boyish look - he liked it this way.

“No way, I want to fight, too!” Eve complained, her long hair now in low twintails - she said it was a part of the plan to deceive enemies.

“I don’t think I can take them all at once,” Dillon admitted.

“No worries, as long as we get rid of them,” Caelus smiled evilly.

“Obliterate,” Orion corrected, his arms folded. “Also, I hate that Mira lady.”

“Same,” they all agreed. She was too uptight, strict, and narrow-minded. The worst combinations. Well, at least she was decisive.

Eve looked at Dillon darkly before saying, “let’s get rid of her, to-”

“Rejected,” Lilith said, slapping Eve’s shoulder.

“In books, the main character, despite being treated horribly, would defeat them all with flying colors, causing a change on how people look at him,” Ley recited, as if he’s read something similar before. “It’s in Brent’s How To book.”

“Ah, the answer is simple, isn’t it?” Lilith smiled, “you just have to get stronger. We have a year left, after all.”

“Correct,” a charming voice said. Alarmed the children looked around, only to see Ezra appear before them. “I just registered our team for the 15 and below tournament. We have a year until the competition…” Ezra trailed off, his face getting darker every second, “get ready for more training.”

As he said this, the children trembled in fear.

…

Like this 11 months have passed by, with even more rigorous training - believe it or not. At first, they, too, didn’t believe such a thing was possible.. until they experienced it themselves.

The children were forced to wear gravity bracelets the entire day on high, medium after practice. Even during breakfast, lunch, and dinner. They were allowed to set the bracelet on low when they sleep.

Running increased to 10 miles a day, then 10 miles with the bracelets, after that it became 10 miles a day with the bracelets within 65 minutes.

Their new training regime included exhausting themselves of their energy and then using mana potions. They did this for 2 hours straight everyday. This method helped increase their core limit - allowing them to take in more mana and ki.

As usual, they would spar. However, this time they were to spar against Brent who would increase his power to 50%. They were told it was to stimulate their senses and get used to fast-paced battles, as well as opponents who were clearly stronger than themselves.

This time, however, Atira sparred with them, too. She explained to them that it wouldn’t help them if they were always fighting the same opponents.

She’s an absolute demon on the battlefield. Everyday, she would switch her weapons and style, so they wouldn’t get used to her. This allowed them to learn how to adapt quickly.

Ah, Ley joined in on the fights, too. Although he stays with Lilith, they cover each other's backs.

Concerning their spars, towards the end of their 11 month training, Brent and Atira would spar against them together (holding back, of course).

Eve sighed, “it’s been awhile since we got a break.” She was now eight years old, her brother, too, was eight.

Orion and Lilith were 10, Caelus was 9, Dillon was still 8, Eve and Kai were 8, and Ley was 3. Ley could sprint around, although slowly.

“The tournament is next month, right?” asked Dillon, trembling with excitement. He couldn’t wait to show the world how strong he’s gotten. Also, his family would be coming - he told them it’d be a surprise.

Dillon shifted nervously in his spot, then, with determined eyes, said, “I want you guys to meet my family.” He had a hard time coming out with this, seeing as he knew they were all without parents.

“Oh? When?” Orion asked casually.

“Eh?” Dillon looked at them with surprise. “Well, they’ll be at the tournament, so…” Dillon trailed off.

“I guess we’ll see them there, then,” Kai grinned.

“When we’re there…” Caelus trailed off.

“Urgh, stop it! You’re making me feel nervous!” Kai shouted, slapping his cheeks, to which Caelus grinned at.

“Wuss,” he said.

“Am not!”

“Immature,” Eve commented, to which the boys glared at her for.

“Ooh, I can’t wait now!” Kai shouted, using his element to create an even louder sound. Everyone covered their ears and glared at him. “Just wait, we’ll win this small tournament!”

Dillon grinned, and shouted, “yeah!”

___________

Stellar's Box (?)

Thanks for reading, remember to comment/give feedback!

The long-awaited tournament arc?

Yep, sorry for the delay - I had a little writer's block when writing this. Anyway, I needed a reason for Dillon to, well... y'know.

Artwork for this arc:

Spoiler :

Not everyone, sadly. I feel bad, Dillon kind of resembles Eve - BUT OH WELL.

Anyywaaaay, look forward to the next few chapters. c; Time for their years of training to finally profit.