When I turned around, the first of Claire’s two familiars was just coming into the light, looking something like a 3D silhouette. Eyes and mouth of pure white, almost like what one would see on 2D drama masks, contrasted with her dark face and body as she looked to me with a simple, yet unreadable expression. She was about the same height as Sarise. Following beside her was an angelic familiar that was much smaller in height, smaller than Melody even, but still quite busty for her stature. Rather than normal angel wings, however, she had much smaller wings sprouting from either side of her ankles.

Once Claire’s familiars revealed themselves, I had all three of them sit on a bench I made out of Earth Magic. The familiars sat on either of Claire’s sides, while her Wind Fairy settled on one shoulder. They sat awkwardly in silence while I towered over them with arms crossed. I then had the familiars start off by introducing themselves.

Claire’s demonic Zaleckian familiar, Calipso, was a ‘Night Walker,’ just as the Observation Reports stated. Apparently, Night Walkers are among the top ten of most capable familiar races in Zalecks. They were known for their ability to move quickly between shadows, squeezing into tight spaces that would be impossible for others. They could also change their bodies as efficiently as a Succubus, including things like turning their fingers into razor-sharp blades. Really, if you require a familiar that is good with sneak attacks and stealth missions, then Night Walkers are your go-to demon.

Describing Calipso’s appearance was very difficult. She had a curvaceous frame, that was for sure, probably a balance between Sarise’s and Melody’s figures. That, and hair that seemed to be tied in a ponytail, was all that I could really make out. The Night Walker’s body and hair were the embodiment of darkness, looking a dark bluish-black under my Light Magic. Calipso appeared more like a three dimensional shadow than solid flesh. Thanks to her racial Shadow Aura, she didn’t reflect any light, which made making out any details nearly impossible.

Still, the sway of the Night Walker’s melons and the movement of shadows at her pelvis did suggest one thing. I couldn’t really ask with Claire being there, but I strongly suspected that Calipso was a total nudist, without a trace of clothing on her. Maybe that’s just how all Night Walkers look due to their Shadow Aura? I mused. On the other hand, she was a demon, if one couldn’t really make out the private bits, then of course she’d go full-body commando.

Across from Calipso, Claire’s angelic Zaleesian familiar, Piona, with her light mint-colored hair tied in pigtails which matched her white wings that turned dark green at the tips, was of the Hermes race. Their race’s name resembled the famous messenger in Greek Mythology, and it wouldn’t be an exaggeration to compare these beings with his image. Unlike regular angels, the wings on a Hermes’ ankles were there to stay, but what they lacked in strength, they made up for in speed and aerial maneuverability. Just like the god they were named after, Hermes angels mainly made a living in Zaleese through quick postage and delivery-based jobs.

Piona, despite being smaller and slimmer than Melody—about as tall as me, in fact—still sported an impressive figure under a tight white tribal clothing, consisting of a short-sleeve crop top, short shorts, and gladiator sandals. For being the first Angel I have seen, aside from Melody who can’t use Clothing Magic, I was surprised how revealing Piona’s attire was, considering how much of her very light pink skin with gold Familiar markings was out in the open. Her top stopped right over her peaks, their hard points tenting the hem line outward, leaving the lower half of her pale pink discs as well as the entirety of her underchest exposed. Similarly, her shorts were brazillian cut and so tight the zipper was incapable of fully closing. In front, a bit of her manicured light green lawn could just barely be seen, while the back only covered the center of her backseat, exposing the bottom and sides of both cheeks.

Maybe Hermes Angels have to wear minimal clothing as a necessity, both due to their small wings and to maximize their maneuverability in the air? I speculated. Even so, I couldn’t picture her moving quickly and gracefully, not with her large rack and trunk. Such would defy the laws of physics and common sense.

“All right, Claire, now that I know who your familiars are, start talking. What were you really trying to accomplish pulling me out here, having your familiars watch in from the sidelines on top of it?” I asked with arms crossed.

“I just, I just wanted to, I …” Claire trailed off while looking down.

“If I may speak under Mistress’ behalf?” Calipso asked with a hand up, “I’m afraid part of her emotional spiral is my fault.”

“... You may speak,” I permitted.

“When Mistress noticed your disappearance last night, I was assigned to find you and observe your actions,” Calipso explained, “I can transition between shadows very quickly, especially at night, so it didn’t take long for me to find you here in the cave, but I was surprised you had come to Mistress’ private training grounds. Mistress and Piona felt the same when I reported your location. I started my observation of you after that, which was right before you began your chant to summon your Angel Familiar, Melody.”

So other than the restructuring of the cave, Calipso was watching me the whole time …

“From there, I just reported to Mistress and Piona all that I saw,” Calipso continued, “I honestly didn’t think much of what you were doing with Melody at the time, but what I told Mistress and Piona might have put both of them a bit on edge.”

If Calipso didn’t think it was wrong when I felt up Melody’s body, that might have been due to the latter’s Purity Aura acting in combination with Calipso’s Demonic Cultural perspective. If the Night Walker told Claire and Piona everything that she saw just as it was, though … considering the latter two aren’t demons and were not being exposed to Melody’s Purity Aura, of course they’d not just dismiss everything I did to my Angel.

“Did you tell them everything that was said between us too?” I asked.

Calipso shrugged, “I couldn’t hear everything, only the loud parts, like when you described Melody as beautiful and not ‘ugly’ as she was insinuating, and when she was crying with happiness after you touched her. It didn’t seem that bad to me at the time. It was no different from stuff I’d seen on Zalecks, and I guess I forgot I wasn’t still there, so I didn’t think about it and just told them what I saw and heard.”

Oh boy, and we said some preeeeetty suggestive stuff last night. Of course, Claire and Piona would panic, I thought, resisting the urge to facepalm after recalling how awkward that moment was for me.

“It seemed Mistress had to step outside some time after her bath to meet with Piona in private and console in her, so I regrouped with them after your business in the cave was finished,” Calipso continued, “I tried explaining to them how it wasn’t as bad as they were imagining, but Piona wouldn’t accept any of it and Mistress was also conflicted and in an emotional limbo. At some point, Mistress had us go back to her grandfather’s to rest for the night while she tried to think things over. We met up in private again early this morning to discuss how to deal with the information I found.

“Lord Soar, you may not have noticed, but for some time Mistress has really cared for you. She just wanted to make sure you weren’t straying onto a concerning path,” Calipso said while resting a hand to her bosom, “She only wanted to know the truth of how your summoning Melody really went, how you managed to learn Shimmerlin enough to summon her and your Devil familiar to begin with, and how you’ve been treating your familiars since their summoning.

“Since you’re the only friend she’s made, however, she didn’t know how to approach you without coming off as something of a threat to you. After talking things over, we compromised that she’d just wing it at the first opportunity to speak with you by herself while we stood by in case of emergency.”

“Is what Calipso explained true, Claire?” I asked her.

“... Yes, it’s true,” Claire answered while looking down.

I held a finger up, “Well, first of all, I’m pretty sure I explained it well enough for both Sarise’s and Melody’s summons. There was a summoning circle, I chanted the magic words in Shimmerlin, and poof, they appeared. The only difference between them was the time and place. I don’t think what happens after that is any of your business.”

Claire then looked up with a furrowed brown, “... Yes, that is true, and while you definitely left a lot of details out of your summons, there was still the matter of how you were able to speak Shimmerlin fluently enough to make a Devil and an Angel appear for you! We both know Ms. Renne couldn’t teach the language to us, as she not only doesn’t have a familiar, she’s never even seen the Shimmerlin language, and I checked with her! Aside from learning to be a bishop in a sanctorium, those copies of the ‘Book of Ancient Practices’ are the only other ways one can actually learn the Shimmerlin language. Unless you’ve been going to a sanctorium or seeing a bishop to have them teach you the language behind my back, there’s no way you could learn it so quickly right after I gifted you that book!”

“Uh huh, and you think having familiars like those two with you right now is any different?” I asked.

“It is so different! I spent years studying the Shimmerlin language under Grandpa’s tutelage before I was fluent enough to summon Calipso and Piona on the same day! I’ve even written the language since—”

“Since you were able to pick up a charcoal pencil. Yeah, I read that part,” I finished for her, recalling one of the lines in her reports.

Claire, her Familiars, and Wind Fairy widened their eyes in shock.

“... R-Read what part?” Claire asked, paling in complexion.

“Your ‘observation reports’ in the book you gave me, of course. The same reports where you described all your findings about me as your grandfather ordered you to, as part of your training to be a Galo Family Assassin, as well as your wish to be at my side as my ‘Shadow Guard’.”

“Y-You … You already knew I was … as well as my ...” Claire muttered, looking down and getting red in the face.

“I don’t know about you, but I don’t think a ‘guard’ would really pull me to the side for an interrogation like you just pulled,” I continued while shrugging my shoulders, “I was just thinking about whether to bring it up to you, but you basically forced my hand to do this. You obviously knew how powerful I really was before I even revealed it on my birthday, so if you really wanted to know the details of my summoning, you should have just been straight with me from the beginning instead of leading me on like this.

“I knew it! I just knew we should’ve done this the easy way!” Piona exclaimed.

“Oh, don’t you even suggest we should have just come out and asked him, that was my idea to begin with!” Calipso argued, “You knew as well as I do that that was the best idea, but noooo, you wanted to go all ‘good cop, bad cop’ on a scarily strong Magician who could take us out in a snap if we got on his bad side!”

“But you agreed with me that he might have something to do with those bandits! We had to question him on that!” Piona countered.

“Yeah, but in a mature, calm, non-accusatory manner. This was anything but any of that!” Calipso snapped.

“How do you expect me to stay calm after hearing what he did with that Angel?! Forget how … illicit, it sounded, it was highly irregular, especially for a human child! Just think what he might do to our Mistress!” Piona accused.

“Like I’d want-to/let-him do any of that to me/her!” Claire and I yelled in sync, surprising both us and everyone else in the cave.

“Okay, this might be weird of me to ask this, but why not?! Aren't I pretty enough?! Wait, now that I think about it, did you do anything to Fila last night?!” Claire asked while looking at me in horror.

“Hell, no!” I yelled, then calmed down when I realized how loud I was, “Let’s make something perfectly clear, what I do with my familiars is our own business between the three of us, and no one else has the right to interfere in it. Putting that aside, I do have some standards! Even if I did somehow get a girlfriend, I wouldn’t go that far with anyone under 18, especially Fila. And I won’t be going any further than touching, like what happened last night, with anyone, including my familiars, until I turn 21!”

“WHY?!” everyone, including my fairies, all asked while looking at me like I was the crazy one in this group.

“Because of a vow I made! Moving on!” I exclaimed, sweeping my hand across in an effort to shove the subject aside, “The original questions were what really happened between Melody and I after I summoned her, how I learned Shimmerlin so quickly to summon both of my Familiars, and how I’ve been treating them since their summoning, right? I already told you that what I do with my Familiars is no one’s business but the three of us, but I will tell you that I’ve been trying to treat them the best that I’m able to and not force them to do anything uncomfortable for them.

“As for learning Shimmerlin, I will admit that learning the language would have been impossible without that book, and as for how that was done so quickly … that’s due to a gift I have, and I will say no more on the matter.”

“… Does that gift also have something to do with your magical prowess?” Claire asked.

“… Maybe?”

Claire shifted her gaze side to side, as if she was skimming through answers in her mind, until her pupils shrunk in realization and looked back up to me, “Wait, no way, you don’t happen to have … the Wizard gift, do you?!”

I blinked in surprise, “… Yes?” I mean, she wasn’t wrong. I did have the Wizard gift, but that’s been upgraded twice already. I only answered as such because she’s the first to ever even mention the gift.

“The Wizard gift, of course! That explains so much now! … Wait, that does explain a lot, which means …” The more Claire thought about it, the more her face paled before she dropped to the cave floor and prostrated before me, “I am so sorry for everything I’ve done! Please, I beg you for your forgiveness!” she pleaded.

“FORGIVE US!” both of Claire’s familiars, who were at each other’s throats moments ago, screamed as they followed their mistress’ example. Even her Wind Fairy did the same thing.

“Whoa, whoa, hang on! What is going on here?! How is the Wizard gift this big of a deal?!” I exclaimed.

“Right, being out here in a small city at the edge of the country, of course, you wouldn’t know. Soar, before I explain, does anybody else know about you possessing this gift? Have you shown anyone your status card at all?” Claire asked while sitting back up.

“No, I’ve kept my status card close and haven't shown it to anyone at all. Not even my parents or Ms. Renne know I have this gift,” I answered.

“Okay, good, keep it that way. Now, since I’m sure the others are waiting for us for lunch, I’ll try to keep this brief,” Claire said before giving me the low down.

While there are many gifts, it is possible for at least two people in the same place to possess the same one. It’s also possible for one person to be born with more than one gift, but not multiples of the same kind. There are common gifts like one that boosts physical strength passively without using Strength-Enhancement Magic, or boosting aptitude in a specific Elemental Magic. Some even grant you talent in specific weapon arts, martial arts, or job fields like cooking or teaching. These common gifts, no matter what they may be, are usually found in anywhere from 1:30 to 1:100 people in the world. Then there are the rare gifts you won’t be as lucky to find, as their effects are more unique, have additional effects and benefits, and may even be a combination of two or more more common gifts. The odds of finding someone with a rare gift is greater than 1:1000.

The Wizard gift’s power and rarity, as Claire explained to me, was more startling than I gave it credit for. While there are records of other Magicians that had the Wizard gift in the past, the odds of finding someone that possesses it are one in three hundred million. You’d have better odds winning the jackpot than getting this gift. I was a bit anxious to ask Mona if she knew how many people are currently living on Manara knowing those odds, but I doubt it’s as big as Earth’s population of seven billion—not including fairies, of course. Magicians could absorb, understand, and retain knowledge better thanks to the Wizard gift. Because of this, Wizards of the past have contributed to world-changing developments. They’ve even helped save the planet when it was in dire crisis. They’ve made themselves into legends that last for thousands of years, claiming titles like ‘hero’ for themselves.

What’s more, for the Wizard gift’s upgraded version, the Sage gift, the number of people in history who have achieved it can be counted on one hand.

“You may find these gifts mentioned in fairy tales and fiction that the commoners pass off as myths,” Claire continued, “Only a handful of the kingdom’s nobility, including the royal family, are aware of the legitimacy of these gifts’ existences. Soar, when did you discover you had the Wizard gift?”

I looked up and scratched my head in thought, “Uh … as soon as I made contracts with my first Fairies and I acquired my status card, I guess.”

Claire held my hands in hers with excitement, stars glimmering in her eyes, “Amazing! The Wizard gift is so rare that it’s almost impossible to get it if you're not born with it! It’s virtually unheard of as a dungeon clear reward, and if there’s some specific requirement that you can fulfill to have a chance at getting it, no one knows what that is. You must have had the luck of the gods to be able to get it! If you had it by the time you were five, then you’ll definitely get the Sage gift sooner or later! I can feel in my gut that it’s a real possibility, and as an assassin, I have spent years training my instincts!”

How do I tell her that I had already acquired the Sage gift by then, and that upgraded again into the Great Sage gift just recently? I thought while laughing nervously.

“Soar, if you don’t want your life getting derailed any further than it already has, then you must keep this secret to yourself at all costs,” Claire continued, “I swear to you that I will take this secret with me to my grave, to the very last day I serve you.”

“Whoa, whoa, wait, what?” I asked with widened eyes.

“You already know my background, right? I come from a line of assassins that secretly served the royal family. Apparently, a previous king was best friends with his prime minister, who was also a Wizard at the time. That king assigned an assassin to him as a bodyguard from the shadows, and that assassin’s descendants became retainers to the prime minister’s family down the line. Thanks to that, to honor good relations between royal descendants and the Wizards discovered in their time, assassins from covert ops would be sent to serve those Wizards as added protection for the rest of their days. This case with us isn’t much different from that, as we just happened to meet under special circumstances. Wow, I never thought I’d be so grateful to be born in this family!” she finished excitedly.

“But, Claire, I don’t need you to protect me. I’m more than capable of looking after myself, with or without my familiars,” I argued.

“I’m not doing this purely out of necessity, I want to do this! Wizard or not, my feelings …” she trailed off before turning red, realizing the gravity of the situation, “M-My feelings for you … s-still hold true, as you read in my reports. I want to be by your side, Soar, whether you reciprocate them or not.

“I know I may have creeped you out with my … stalker habits over the years, and you may not think much about me now after knowing that I’ve killed people. I apologize for all that, but I still want to stay by your side, now more than ever, so please …” Claire got down to the ground once more and prostrated again, “Please, Soar, let me have at least this much …” she pleaded, her voice cracking in the end as if she was going to break down crying.

I squatted down and patted her back hesitantly and awkwardly. I didn’t think I’d ever get approached by a girl like this. Sure, her behavior up to now was concerning, but despite her family background, she wanted to try to stay true to herself and not let those relations control her life. That just made me worry in the back of my mind, however, that friendship with me would push her deeper down a path she didn’t want to tread. Judging by those observation reports, though, there seemed to be no way out of it. Her life as an assassin was set in stone when she made her first kills, and I have no place to judge her after I just did the same so recently.

Grabbing Claire by the shoulders, I pulled her up.

“May I ask you something, Claire?”

She nodded her head erratically, “Anything at all!”

“Those people you killed, the first ones your grandpa wanted you to deal with, they were just bandits, right?”

Claire nodded.

“Have you killed anyone else after that?”

“No. Other than monsters and animals, I haven’t killed anybody after those bandits. I was planning to take out those former soldiers I mentioned in the end there, but—”

“Yeah, about that, I was the one who killed them,” I interrupted her.

Claire paled as she looked at me with widened eyes, shocked by my casual admission. I then quickly explained the circumstances and how all that led to me making friends with Fila and Onelri.

“No wonder they couldn’t keep their eyes off you. I recognized some of those bandits’ profiles when I saw those wanted posters at Brightlas’ Hunter’s guild. I had an inkling, but I was told some info about their deaths that really contradicted with what I thought happened,” Claire said.

“That was because Fila’s and Onelri’s families covered for me so no one would know who really took the bandits out,” I explained, “We figured no one else knew about the bandits or their cave, so it’d be fine to make something up. Aside from them, no one else knows about what really happened … though Zalena called me out on it recently because she had some suspicions, and I’m planning on telling her the truth soon too. My familiars aren’t aware of this fact, either, but the same plan applies to them. So, what do you think of me now, knowing this truth?”

“… When I talked to Fila and Onelri about it, the time and place were the only things that bugged me, everything else sounded like the truth. They were especially grateful to their hero too.” Claire closed her eyes and smiled, as if recalling those moments, “To be honest, it may have been my instincts as an assassin speaking, but the part I was worried about the most was what might happen if you abused your powers. Now that I know the hero they mentioned was you, not only can I put these doubts to rest, I’ve learned something new about you too.”

She then stood back up with a smile, “If you can be okay with me and my kills, there’s no way I can’t do the same. You’re still the same Soar Osmis I’ve watched all these years, and I’d be more than happy to serve someone of your caliber. Ask me anything, and I’ll answer in a heartbeat.”

“I’d rather we’d start out as friends, I could use a really capable one I could count on,” I said while extending my hand.

“Of course!” Claire answered as she took my hand and we shook on it.

I then heard sniffling from behind her. “I’m so happy things worked out between them!” Calipso cried while she dabbed her eyes with a handkerchief.

“I still have some concerns … but if Mistress is happy, then that’s all it matters,” Piona added while nodding to herself.

I’m glad I got this worked out, too, but there’s still something that concerns me … her grandfather, I thought. Going by how recent her last report was, Claire was still on bad terms with her grandfather, yet they continued to live together. Though it has been going on for a long time, I can’t help but feel that their situation is a ticking time bomb ready to blow up at any moment. Sure, parental figures have to discipline their kids, but living with a guy like that couldn’t be healthy. Plus, up to now, Claire has had to make enough money to provide for herself, her familiars, and her Fairy Companion.

I want to help her, but what’s the best way to go about this …