Happy new years!

"Well kiddos, I'm sure you know why I am here, but before we go into specifics I would like to state a few things honestly. First and foremost, I would like to tell you my name. My name is Aster. I-"

"Hmmph! You know the reason why you told us your name is to show a sign of respect, as not telling one's name is a sign of disrespect. It's the equivalent of thinking that the person you're talking to is trash, therefore he isn't worthy of your name. In this situation it can't be said that it's much different. You told us your name, but you aren't willing to tell us anything about yourself. You would only do that under one of the two circumstances: you want to keep us unaware of your background, if so then we ain't talking; you don't think we're worthy, if so then we ain't talking." Julie said this all with an almost completely straight face. If she had controlled her eyes to not radiate coldness then she would have a solid poker face, however something told everyone that the cold face was kept on purpose.

"Little miss, I was just about to go into that. If you had not interrupted me then you would have been acquainted with me."

"Not really. You had envy within your eyes, showing me that you wished to probably explain how you were jealous of Julius and Artemis's power. You would also have said I am Aster of the blah blah blah if you wished to explain yourself. You wouldn't have really left a pause." Julius's unwavering reply left the other kids stunned. To reply to someone, who was probably a high ranking member of the continent, without so much of a second glance was something a lot of adults wouldn't dare do. On the other side, the left eye of Aster was twitching uncontrollably. An insult sent by someone of higher status was okay, even someone who was of equal status was ignorable, but this little girl just insulted him in front of his possible recruits.

"Girl, you're the first one to make me angry in twelve years. I hope you're happy."

"I don't really care. I don't see the point in idling around. Just introduce yourself so we can get this finished with quickly."

At this point, Aster had a large vein sticking out of his neck. However he could do nothing to this girl and rather quickly introduced himself, "I am Aster from the Valhallan Combat Dojo. You know who the host or the judge is right? Well that is me-"

"-But we saw the host. He's at least 35. Also why are you called host instead of referee or judge?"

"Well it's because I use a labori. You all do know what a labori is, right?" Aster looked around and puzzled expressions were plastered onto all of the children's faces. "Urghh, how do you guys not know what a fucking labori is? Well I'm not your teacher and so I won't go into a super detailed or lengthy description. Just imagine a person, now imagine that person being controlled. That's a labori. It's very simple."

"That's not really a proper description. But it's k." It was Terra's turn this time to insult Aster.

"Just shut up. I shouldn't even have to lower my status for you brats."

"Weren't you the one that wanted to recruit me and Julius?" Artemis had slowly lifted himself up to a position where he was no longer lying down. Using the pillow as support, he sat up properly. "Although we are pissing you off, you should know your place in this kind of situation. We didn't come to you, you came to us. With that in mind, you should stop thinking that your status even means anything. In fact, me and Julius would probably have more status and power than you in the future. This isn't even counting the others."

This was the last straw for Aster, as he stamped out of the room angrily. This brought great alarm to the officials outside of the room. They wished to run to the kids and ask the situation, but they couldn't in fear of fighting with a force unnecessarily.

"Those fucking brats! To be fair, they were right, but that's beside the point. They had no right to do that shit to me." Aster had walked down several corridors since his conversation with the brats, but still remembered the conversation he had a few minutes back and it caused his walking to slowly become more aggressive as he thought about it more. As he turned the corner he found, to his surprise, a fairly handsome boy with medium-sized blue hair. His right foot leaned against the wall, making his knee stick out. He was standing in a position as if he was waiting for someone.

"Aren't you one of the brats?" Growled Aster.

"Yes I am."

"What do you want?"

"Do you have any powerful spells for darkness mages?"

"Of course I do, but why?" It was pretty obvious what the brat was implying, but to stop any unnecessary confusions, Aster led the conversation on.

"Well, it's pretty obvious that I want spells."

"Why don't you ask your teacher?"

"I'm not planning on staying there for too long. Once I get the opportunity, I will leave."

"So you're saying you'd join my sect in exchange for some skills? You don't seem like a very loyal fellow."

"Well it's not that I'm not loyal, I just don't feel a connection towards the adults. The kids are... interesting and I like my master, but that's it. That's not enough to convince me to stay. Also I'm not saying I'd join your sect, in fact I hate sects. They limit freedom. So yeah, what I'm saying is that I'll grant you 5 favours. Of course when you cash in these favours you can't just tell me to act like bait for you or suicide."

"Well, why should I accept? I mean you may be the friends of those two talented brats, but that doesn't mean you'd be talented yourself."

"Heh, what you see is confidential so before you see this, we need to make a blood contract. I've already made it, so you can just sign right there." Wess produced a short scroll and pointed his finger right next to place that needed to be signed.

In response to this, Aster bit his thumb and let the blood flow down. He pressed with his thumb against the scroll, allowing the scroll to absorb an adequate amount of his blood.

"Aren't you going to do it as well?"

"Wow pops, how do you not know this stuff? No wonder you got bullied by the rest." Hearing this caused Aster to grind his teeth in silence.

"I'm only nineteen. That's six to eight more years of life than you, but I was also born into a large sect and so don't have much experience in the outside world. Wait come to think of it, how are you so... smart? No not smart, is it cunning? So yeah, how are so you cunning? You shouldn't have much experience in the outside world."

"Would you believe me if I said that I was born with a horrible childhood?"

"No, I wouldn't."

"Why not?"

"Doesn't seem logical. Normal civilians, unless extremely talented in something like the art of war, are useless. This makes it so that all rich or city lords are people with a lot of elites or are elites themselves. Now considering that the army are probably recruiting from villages, there is a very low chance that an expert would be in village, and so people wouldn't be degraded or treated as slaves. If an expert was in a village then the army would also stay clear of that village, in fear of angering that expert for no reason. Now put this together and you find that you're probably from a village of mortals." Hearing this made Wess raise an eyebrow, but nothing more.

"That doesn't explain my talent."

"That's simple. You were abandoned at birth, inherited a legacy or one of your parents is an expert. Those are the most logical explanations, but there could be other possibilities."

"Wow, your guesses are pretty good. You got it spot on."

"Now, show me you power!" Irritation was evident on Aster's face.

"Okay. Remember not to tell, well, unless you wanna die." Before allowing Aster to retaliate, Wess put both of his hands in a position that resembled the spell 'Light Burst'. Aster immediately felt a chill in the air, and put on a fighting stance. The mage essence in the air was slowly being absorbed into Wess's hands. Wess's body was surrounded by chilled air.

"What the fuck. This is extremely freaky, and what the fuck is this feeling I'm getting from him. I've never gotten this feeling before and I've duelled like almost 100 times."

Suddenly, Wess's bloodshot eyes opened and blood trickled down from it. His eyes had a cold look to it, and from his hands something very dark was appearing. All of Wess's clothes swayed violently, even though there was no wind in the corridors. Faint particles surrounded Wess's hands and started to form a dark, ominous light.

HHHHHHHHHHHMMMMMMMMMM

A beam shot out of Wess's hands and crashed into the wall, causing several tiny pieces to fall to the floor. The beam of light had broken several layers and Wess could see that he had broken into the men's bathroom. Luckily, almost everyone was spectating the current matches in the arena, therefore no one was here to see what Wess did.

"You... You should understand the fundamental laws behind each magic type, and that there is no way to do this with darkness type magic. No one in history has done this." To make breakthroughs like Wess has done you need a combination of talent in the specific magic, talent in the aspect of that magic, brains and enlightenment. You could get this enlightenment through constant pondering and meditation, or just getting it luckily with the spur of the moment. Wess's was a combination of both, because it couldn't happen with one month of pondering, however that one month of constant pondering allowed his brain to soak up new ideas and he was more acute to his own surroundings, increasing his chances of getting a random or lucky enlightenment.

Wess's current body was not horrible, but definitely not in great condition. His sleeves were in pieces on the floor, and there were several cuts on Wess's shirt. His eyes had blood drooling down it, and his eyes were covered in red, but that was just it. There wasn't any internal damage, nor was there any visible external damage.

"Well, when will you give me some spells?"

"Oh, well here." Aster casually threw a small scroll towards Wess. However his arm suddenly felt as cold as death when he threw it to Wess.

"Tut tut tut. Looks like you know nothing of blood contracts. Blood contracts are basically sealed with our thoughts and wills. It was obvious when I said I wanted spells that I meant good or strong spells. You knew this of course, and so that was your thought at the time. You knew what I meant and signed the blood contract while knowing it. This meant you will have to acknowledge our agreement."

"I said I'd give you a spell, but never said when."

"Do I have to repeat what I just said? I literally just said that it's our thoughts, and I of course thought that I'd get it soon. Maximum around two months." Actually Aster already knew this, however he wanted to see if he could get any reaction out of Wess to see if he was bullshitting. Unfortunately, there was no reaction so Aster knew that Wess was talking the truth. Wess had surprised him a lot, but keeping emotions in check was an impossibility for someone this young. Knowledge was rare, but possible. Unless someone is emotionless, which the kid probably isn't judging from his greed, there is no way for the kid to be able to control emotions this efficiently.

"Well, better over and done with. Come with me." Aster walked off slowly, with Wess following right behind. Wess silently hid the scroll within his tattered clothes.