10 November Year 2367

"And I'm here."

Telfer stopped in front of dormitory 324. How do I get in? Right, I can use the student handbook.

"Let's see...insert your student handbook into the door and press your right thumb on the thumbprint lock. Here goes nothing."

Telfer stared at the wooden door impatiently. Just then, an electronic voice said,

"Confirming identity of new student, Kevin Firman. All clear, welcome Kevin Firman."

The door swung open and Telfer was greeted by a large muscular youth with a bright smile on his face. His dark brown wavy hair bounced up and down as he held Telfer up while spluttering loudly,

"Azuma get over here! Our new roommate is here!"

"Oh, give me a second."

Another voice came over, albeit a little annoyed.

Telfer looked over the youth's shoulder. A small living area complete with a table, several chairs and what looked like a television. Past the living area were several doors, each of which presumably led to a bedroom. Just then, a black haired youth stepped out of one of the doors and started walking over. Telfer inspected him closely. Black haired with brown eyes that seemed to stare piercingly at him. He looks... Asian? However, he immediately brightened up and said,

"Nice to meet you, I am Azuma Kazuhiro from Class 1B. I use emblem magic. Introduce yourself you idiot."

"Sorry about that, my name is Vincent Richmond from Class 1C. I use Earth magic. What about you?"

The large youth grinned cheekily while placing Telfer back down.

"Hi, I'm Kevin Firman from Class 1D. I use poison magic. I will be your roommate from now on."

Telfer nodded at Azuma and Vincent.

"Your room will be the one furthest to the left. Where's your luggage? Aren't you a transfer student?"

Vincent asked Telfer in confusion.

"Oh, I uh... didn't pack anything. I'm actually planning to buy stuff now that I'm here."

Telfer quickly came up with a lie. He wanted to quickly move on and take a break but then Azuma said,

"Oh, we can accompany you then. We will lend you some money as well. Since we are at it anyway, why don't we just explore the campus first? You're a transfer student after all. After that, we will bring you around Vestak and treat you to dinner."

Noooo! My well-deserved break...

Just like that, Telfer was dragged around by his new roommates. However, the introduction of the school campus was a much-needed one. The Vestak Magic School campus boasted a size of 15000 acres. Situated in the middle of Vestak city, the campus had a number of different facilities. Aside from the usual facilities such as dormitories, classrooms and mess halls, there were also the other magic focused facilities. These included the Beast Keeping area for those who specialized in taming and summoning, the Magic Practical Training area, where mages could test out new spells and cultivation rooms which mages could use for faster absorption of mana. Among all these facilities, the 2 most heavily utilised facilities were the mission hall and Arena. The school authorities highly encouraged competition among the students in recent years due to the decreasing number of stellar mages the school was producing. In fact, the school ran mostly on student leadership. The higher ups would not interfere unless there was something major involved. Strength was the deciding factor as only the strongest ten student mages were part of the leadership community. However, among all these places, Telfer did not find anything that pointed to a treasury of some sort.

Shit, looks like they won't just point me to where it is huh? I could hope to join the leadership community but it wouldn't be fast enough...

A line appeared between Telfer's eyebrows.

"Kevin? Are we not going out to get you some stuff now?"

Azuma asked Telfer.

"Right, I was just amazed by how big the school is. Let's go then."

Telfer quickly replied. They had taken a 4 whole hours to explore the school. It was going to be 8 soon.

Azuma and Vincent brought Telfer around town, recommending to him some of the best locations around town. The thing that shocked Telfer the most was the luxury the people of Vestak lived in. Hovercars zoomed past Telfer. A train system that powered by spatial magic and electricity. Everyone that walked past wore expensive, branded goods. There was even a woman who had a spatial ring on every single finger. Stores proudly displaying magical equipment worth millions of dollars. A fountain on every single space that allowed.So this is wear all the electricity and water goes... Even though there is a slum bordering this city. After spending an hour shopping, Azuma and Vincent brought Telfer to one of their favourite restaurants. The food at the restaurant was extremely costly, however, Azuma had the price slashed by half.

Azuma said casually, "Oh, my family owns this restaurant. It's run by the Kazuhiro Association."

"Isn't that one of the most powerful organizations? They practically run the economy in the country."

Telfer said questioningly as he remembered seeing the Kazuhiro Association being plasted all over the city in advertisements.

"Yeah, but I'm just from a branch family so I don't really have a say within the organization. Anyway, what do you think of Vestak City? It's practically the centre of magic and technology in Fruinga. I almost forgot, how are your preparations going into the Freshman Competition next week? You're a transfer student right? You should have some powerful magic."

Azuma waved off Telfer's remark and asked him instead.

"Freshman Competition? I did not hear of such a thing. What exactly is it?" Telfer asked as his eyebrows came together.

"It's an annual competition the school hosts at the end of the first term. Apparently, the prize pool for this year is larger than ever before. There are rumours of a treasure sword as well. Some are saying that the school is investing a lot this year in order to produce quality mages. Maybe it's for the National Magic Competition that are coming around next year. If the school performs on the National stage, there will be no doubt it will start flourishing again. Have you truly not heard of anything like this? Did you not research while transferring over?"

Azuma inquired.

"Oh, not really, I was stuck in Blackmaw Stronghold after all. I did hear Vestak Magic School was quite prestigious before its decline in recent years. How far do you think Poison Hand will take me?"

Telfer asked almost immediately. A treasure sword. That's mine for sure.

"Poison Hand? If you train hard enough, you can reach the top 16. I doubt you can rise above that. There are some geniuses in our cohort after all. Nevermind less talk about fighting, let's eat."

Vincent said impatiently as his eyes gleamed at the magical beast dishes spread out on the table.

Telfer picked up a piece of meat that looked like roast duck. Here goes nothing... The meat melted in Telfer's mouth and a satisfying feeling emerged from his mana organ immediately. It was the same feeling he had experienced during cultivation but there was an additional system notification.

"Host has consumed magical beast and Host's intelligence has increased by 0.1"

Telfer immediately stuffed his mouth with the various dishes on the table. Who knew eating food would reap such benefits?

Countless notifications surfaced.

"Host's intelligence has increased by 0.1"

"Host's energy has increased by 0.1"

"Host's strength has increased by 0.1"

"Host's stamina has increased by 0.1"

"Ah, that was a good meal."

Telfer rubbed his belly and licked his lip.

"I know right? Being roommates with Azuma is the best thing in the world."

Vincent followed up.

"Am I just a food provider to you?"

Azuma scowled at Vincent.

Telfer looked at his 2 roommates and chuckled. I guess I don't have psychopaths for roommates then.

The three of them joked and laughed as they started heading back to their dorm.

All of a sudden, Telfer said, "You guys head in first, I'm going to stay outside for abit."

"Ok, just make sure to be back before the 11 o'clock curfew. Night."

Vincent yawned as he waved to Telfer. Telfer sat on one of the benches outside the dorm and opened up his status window.

Status Window Titles: None Name: Telfer Berkley Age: 12 Race: Ghoul Gender: Male Alignment: ??? Stats Health: 110/110 Heath regen.: 5/min Energy: 60/60 Energy Regen.: 1/min Mana: 15/15 Mana Regen.: 0.5/min Strength: 6 Agility: 5 Dexterity: 6 Stamina: 6 Intelligence: 6 Wisdom: 4 Skills

Ghoul:

Magic Spells:

Poison Hand

Cloak

My intelligence increased by a whole 2 points... The amount of mana in my mana organ has increased by quite a bit.

The stat boost across the board was welcomed by Telfer, especially with the upcoming Freshman Competition. Upon thinking of the Freshman Competition, Telfer started sweating profusely. A treasure sword. He had to win at all costs to gurantee himself to have a shot at it no matter what. Train hard enough just to reach top 16? There has to be a way to reach number 1. Poison Hand was not going to cut it. Then his corporate businessman mind said, what are the weak points of mages? What do I have that they don't?

Wait. Poison Hand looks like my transformed arm.

Telfer remembered using Poison Hand the first time. It had a somewhat similar colouration to his transformed arm. He could pass off his stupidly powerful arm as Poison Hand. It could definitely smash a mage to pieces if he restrained his ghoul cells to his arm.

I shall call this move Mass Transfer... I have to work on transferring ghoul cells to my arm faster to make it usable. But what if I run to someone who specializes in defense? I'm pretty sure there are other mages like Vincent that have powerful bodies...

Telfer sighed as he transformed his left arm again and again. The current transfer took at least 3 seconds. He could get hit by a spell within those 3 seconds. Suddenly, a flash of inspiration went through Telfer's mind. Telfer restrained all his ghoul cells to his left arm. The arm started to lose its form. No! Hold it together you piece of shit! Telfer's hand was screaming with pain but he continued. Come on! I'm not done yet! Telfer's arm started whirring. Telfer scanned the surroundings and spotted a rock. Telfer hefted his arm and went over the rock.

*BANG*

The rock shattered into dust, as if it was no longer there. Instead a pool of acid laid where the rock once was. The acid quickly disappeared but the noise seemed to have made some of the students wake up. Telfer darted into a bush.

"WHICH FUCKING MORON DECIDED TO TEST MAGIC HERE? TESTING ROOMS EXIST FOR A REASON!"

A resounding shout echoed throughout the dorm area.

Telfer ignored the shout and glanced at his now deformed left arm. Although his hand was screaming with pain and covered in sweat, Telfer smirked about his impending victory during the Freshman Competition. Telfer opened up his status window as he waited for his hand to heal.

Status Window Titles: None Name: Telfer Berkley Age: 12 Race: Ghoul Gender: Male Alignment: ??? Stats Health: 50/110 Heath regen.: 5/min Energy: 30/60 Energy Regen.: 1/min Mana: 8/15 Mana Regen.: 0.5/min Strength: 6 Agility: 5 Dexterity: 6 Stamina: 6 Intelligence: 6 Wisdom: 4 Skills

Ghoul:

Mass Transfer (Work in Progress)

??? (Work in Progress)

Magic Spells:

Poison Hand (Poison Magic)

Cloak (Illusion Magic)

Still a work in progress huh? It's still not usable yet. Today's a Monday. Assuming the competition is next Monday, I have 6 more days...

Telfer headed back to the dorm to sleep. As Telfer dozed off to sleep, unbeknownst to him, the glyph on his back had lit up for a moment.

November 11 Year 2367

Telfer woke up to sound of his roommates moving about. It was 6.30 in the morning. 13 more days to get the damn sword. Telfer quickly got himself dressed and accompanied his roommates for breakfast in the mess hall before going to class. Class was practically the same as yesterday. With the help of Mr. Dawson, his wisdom had increased to 5 while cultivating increased his mana pool to 16 and intelligence to 6.2. However, instead of being dragged around by his roommates, he decided to go to the library.

Let's see... first up will be researching Poison magic.

Telfer went to the computer and typed in "Poison Magic", finding a book that suited his needs. He went over to the shelf and found the book before sitting down to read it.

The first spell that every Poison Mage learns is Poison Hand. This will be followed up by Poison Mist, Poison Arrow, Poison Pool, Poisonous Image and Poison Rain After this, the next 3 spells will be constructed by the mages themselves. Hence, from the 7th circle onwards, Poison Mages will now be unique and feature their own unique spells. This is a common trait within all mages of 7th circle and above. Moreover, most Poison Mages will study a second magic to support their Poison Magic. For example, a mage could pick up Shadow Magic as a support magic to increase their power in close range combat.

Telfer summarised after he had pored over book after book. The first 6 circles were pre determined. Everything from 7th circle onwards was left to himself. Telfer stood up and stretched. He had spent 3 hours in the library. It was time to practice his new skills again. This time, Telfer remembered to use the Testing Rooms. He was improving slowly but surely. 1 hour and a mangled left arm was the cost. The result? Mass Transfer now used 2.5 seconds instead of 3 while his new move slowly gained progress. The amount of energy it required decreased from 30 to 27. After training, Telfer would eat dinner at the mess hall before going to sleep. This practice continued for the next 3 days as well.

15 November Year 2367

Telfer woke up at 8 o'clock. He had just finished the 4th day of his hellish routine yesterday. There was no school today so Telfer was free to do whatever he needed to.

*Ding*

A notification had came from "Unknown". Telfer narrowed his eyes and clicked on it.

"Hello assassin 150, we believe that we have the location of the treasury. We will send it to you now. However, we also believe that it will be extremely difficult to bring out the Eternal Harmony due to the glyph array that is set up in the treasury. Hence, you are to meet your partner who is one of the students at Vestak Magic School. Please meet him outside the Beast Keeping Area at 0900 hours. Everything else will be explained by him. We wish the best of luck. Regards, The People's Blade."

A partner. Am I not the 150th person they have sent to steal the sword? Why is there another person? If he is a psychopath, I won't mind smashing his face to pieces.

Telfer dressed himself and left for the Beast Keeping Area.

Where is that fucking psychopath?

Telfer stood at the entrance to the Beast Keeping Area, looking around warily.

"Sup dude. Over here."

A hushed voice came from behind Telfer.

Telfer spun around, winding up his left arm. However, the massive white wolf snarling in front of him immediately dispersed any thoughts he had.

"Woah, you need to calm down before I give my wolf friend here a morning snack. I know you met a psycho but not everyone is like that."

Standing beside the wolf was a lanky grey haired youth dressed in the Vestak Magic School uniform.

End of Chapter