Chapter Eight
The next day passed quickly. When it finally got time for Battle Tactics, I went to Sir Douglas. “Sir, instead of fighting Brent today, can I battle my team mate?” I asked, and saluted sharply. He looked at me.
“Why?” He asked disapprovingly.
"You don't think Brent is a match for you anymore?" He asked.
"No, my new roomie refuses to acknowledge us as equals. I plan to fix that.” I said.
He smiled. “Go ahead. All groups need a leader."
“Lance! Cynthia! Come up.” Sir Douglas boomed.
“So your name is Cynthia? Nice name.” I told her and got on the battle platform.
She just growled. “And… Begin!” sir Douglas called.
I waited for her first move. She threw a weak bolt at me. I smirked. “Is that all you have?” I asked.
I moved to the side and dodged it. “My turn.” I said grinning.
I had wanted to try this spell for a while. I slammed the ground and a cage erupted around her. Then spikes shot up from the ground under her. She barely had enough time to break the bars, and doge it in time. “I almost had you!” I called over, mockingly.
She glowered. “You’re not half bad. I'm taking the kiddie gloves off.” She said.
She launched a wave of magma at me. I smirked. “Shadow!” in a flash he appeared. Seeing the fire, he jumped up, and shot out his own. They hit in the center of the field, and stopped. I smiled grimly. Shadow nodded and disappeared. I grabbed my robot from my Lake. Time to try a new spell.
“Sequence 9! armor form!” I yelled.
The robot jumped at me and engulfed me. I moved my hand in my suit of robot armor. The action was smooth, like the armor was outer skin. It was perfect. I looked at her. “You’re lucky that I don’t have my sword and shield yet.” I said.
I jumped forward. I pointed my hands at her and a vortex of lightning launched at her. She paled. “A level 10 move? What are you?" she cried, and the lightning covered her. I heard the shield snap. She jumped out of the vortex, in a robot suit of her own. I raised my eyebrows. “It looks like I have to finish this fast; my robot is low on charge.”
She launched a powerful bolt at me, and I crossed my hands to block it. The bolt slammed into my hands, and I flew into a wall. She smirked through her armor. "Guess you aren’t as strong as you thought you were, huh?" she asked, mockingly.
But, her breathing was labored, and she was obliviously tired. Raised her hand, and a black spear appeared in it. "I'm so screwed." I thought to myself.
“I don’t think so. Don’t forget about me… Why don’t you try this one…?” The voice rang through my head. I didn’t have time to think. Suddenly, A spell that I had found in an ancient book in the library surfaced. I raised my right hand into the air. She jumped forward at me and threw her lance. I summoned my blood shield and sent it back. She dodged it, but it was too late. “Lightning Rod” the ancient spell shook the arena.
Beams of black lightning shot from my hand and engulfed her. Then the screaming started. Horrified at its power, I stopped it. Cynthia collapsed in a heap on the arena, her armor fried. It melted back into a laptop. I grabbed it and dropped it into my Lake along with my own.
“Class dismissed.” Sir Douglas said, shaken. I grabbed Cynthia, and Bakar and I walked off to our dorm. He looked at me. “That was new. You should update your robot soon. I bet that spell will level it up”. He looked at Cynthia, who was now over my shoulder.
“Well, I hope that teaches her a lesson.” He said, in an attempt to act mean, but it just wasn’t for him. We both knew he couldn’t stand hurting people that were innocent.
As we walked, chatting, Brent appeared around the bend. “Well well, it looks like the two sissies got a girlfriend. The couldn’t find two, so they have to share one!” He said, snickering at his own joke.
He and his gang laughed, and sauntered off. I growled. “If I wasn’t holding Cynthia, I would use lightning rod on that jerk.”
We got to the room right as Cynthia woke up. She jumped out of my hands and looked around. “What happened?” she looked at me and paled.
“How? How did you beat me?” She said, horrified.
“Well, for one, I actually tried.” I said. “You were holding back. But after my display, do you think you can respect us now?” I asked, annoyed. She sighed. “I guess I have no choice.” “My name is Cynthia sixhammer, seven star blackmage. And you?”
“I am Bakar Lightsword. 6 star healer.” Bakar said.
“I am Lance Starfinder, 10 star shadowmage.” I said, without thinking.
They both jumped. I was confused for a moment, but then I remembered what happened. “Blast! I never told Bakar!” I thought, horrified.
“Lance!? Your last name is Starfinder? You said you didn’t know your last name! You are the one the prophecy spoke of aren’t you?” Bakar asked, rattling off questions like a chain gun.
I paled. “I’m sorry Bakar. Harvester told me I had to keep it secret. Please don’t tell anyone” Cynthia looked at us.
Again, something like recognition flashed through her eyes, and she moved towards me. She stopped middstep. “Something tells me this year will be quite interesting.” She said, and turned around.
After an hour of pleading with Bakar, he finally forgave me. I decided to record my new spell on my laptop and check its status. I grabbed it out of the Lake and opened it. I tapped the black dot and transferred my Lightning Rod spell into it. I looked at its description. Level 50! That was something. “That spell is powerful; I could have killed Cynthia with it. I had best not use it on anybody I know.” I thought.
Cynthia reached for something, and panicked. “What's wrong?” Bakar asked.
“My laptop! It’s not in my lake! “She said, horrified.
I couldn't help it, I snickered, remembering I had it. She glared at me. “What's so funny?” She asked.
“What would you give me if I found it for you?” I asked, holding back a grin.
“A slap in the face for not giving it to me already.” She said.
I laughed and pulled the laptop from my Lake to give it to her. True to her word, she slapped me in the face. Bakar burst out laughing. He laughed so hard, he had to sit down on his bed to stop himself from falling over. I glowered at him, and threw a mage bolt at him. He batted it away easily, but in the process, knocked something off the wall. I bent over to pick it up, and saw that it was a calendar. There was a date circled in red, today. Suddenly, I remembered. “Bakar! Today is a month from when we talked to Max! I can get my stuff now!” I said, practically hopping. He grinned. “Let’s go!”
Bakar and I turned to leave the room. “Wait!” Cynthia said, hesitantly.
We turned around. “Can I come with you guys?” I looked at Bakar and grinned. Bakar raised his eyebrows suggestively at her. She reddened. “It’s not because I like you two!... it’s because…because…I want to see if that guy will make my robot weapons too! Yeah that’s it!” Bakar chuckled.
“That’s fine, we can ask him to do it for you. You don’t have to come” Bakar said, goading her.
She frowned. “He can’t make the measurements without me can he?” She asked, seeming slightly worried.
We burst out laughing.
“You can come with us Cynthia.” I said, still laughing
She looked at me appreciatively. Bakar raised his eyebrows even higher.
“Lance and Cy-” Was all he got out before a long black scythe was hovering in front of his neck.
He looked down the shaft, into Cynthia’s eyes. “Would you like to continue?” Cynthia said, smugly.
He shook his head as much as he dared. “I’m fine thank you.” He said.
We headed off to meet Max.
A month passed. All three of us had gotten very close. Bakar and I decided to tell Cynthia about the secret library. So after classes on a Friday, when we were all in our room we went over to her. “Hey Cynthia.” I said, still wonder
ing how she would take it.
“Hey Lance. Whassup?” She asked, completely different from when we had met her the first time.
“Bakar and I have decided to show you how we became so powerful. But you can’t tell anyone. Understand?” I said.
A huge grin came over her face. “I was wondering how you guys got so strong! Let’s go!” She said, and jumped out of bed.
Bakar burst out laughing. “What?” she asked annoyed.
Between laughs Bakar managed out, “We can go…but you might want to switch your nightgown to some real clothes.” He said.
“Some people might wonder what is going on.” He continued.
She reddened and ran into the bathroom. A few minutes later, she emerged wearing a tee and shorts. Still laughing, Bakar invoked the teleport spell.
“Master. We have sent Abel to deal with that meddling mage that discovered our agent and terminated her.” The hooded man said, unhappy.
“Good.” How much longer?” The evil voice asked, obliviously not pleased, but not mad either.
“Not much. My guess is a few months.” The hooded man said.
After we showed Cynthia the library, she wouldn’t leave it for anything, but for classes. It only took her a few weeks to catch up to us. But I was studying too. Midterms were coming up, and something foreboding was happening. There were constant sightings of monsters, and students were disappearing. We also heard that our Familiar teacher was replaced by another teacher called Mr. Sarong. We never got to see him, since I was kicked out of the class along with Bakar for already having powerful familiars.
I spent all of my time studying for the tests, and wouldn’t do anything other than that on the week days. On the weekends, I would stay in the library all day on Saturday, and train in battle with my robot and Shadow on Sunday.
Soon it became time for the midterms. On the day of midterms, we walked into the auditorium for instructions on our midterms. A teacher walked up to us. “The teaching body is very well aware of your outstanding abilities, so your midterm exam will be more… dangerous than anybody else’s. It will Be life and death. You must stay in the wild for 2 days with ring two and three monsters.” The teacher said.
We looked at each other. No problem. An hour later, we went out into the wilderness. The first thing we did was look for a camp ground. After an hour of searching, we finally find a suitable campground. It was a small clearing, with densely packed trees around it. But, the trees were so densely packed; it would be trouble to escape if we were attacked. Next, we decided to go look for something to eat.
Suddenly, I had a great idea. “Hey guys. I have an idea. I can use a spell I thought of to link our minds! Then we can talk telepathically. I’m not sure it will work though. It has never been attempted. And also, if you have any thoughts that should be kept secret, they will be shared, until you learn to shield your thoughts. Shall we try?” I asked.
“Sure” Bakar said, enthusiastically. Cynthia looked worried, but Bakar had already said yes, so she didn’t really have a choice. “All right…I guess”. I took a breath, and cast it. “Did it work?” Cynthia asked, still worried. I thought “Yes” as hard as I could at her, but she didn’t seem to get the message.
“I guess not” I said, put out.
She sighed, with what looked like relief. I sat down to think on what went wrong. “Thank my lucky stars that didn’t work! If it did, Lance everything on my feelings, and how much I like him!” I jumped startled.
That sounded like…Cynthia. I looked at Bakar. He started smiling. “Is that so?” Bakar’s voice sounded in my head.
Cynthia jumped. “It worked??” this time, instead of shoving my thought at her, I just opened a gate in my head. “Yep”
Cynthia turned beet red. “I better not hear any teasing about this you two” Bakar snickered “You wish” “She likes me too? That’s just plain awesome! I wonder if this place magically makes your dreams come true… oh crud… Did I close the gate…? I thought to myself
Bakar was rolling on the ground laughing. Apparently not. I sighed.
Cynthia got even redder, and I was probably just as red as she was. “It looks like you aren’t quite as smart as you think you are!” Bakar said, laughing. “All right love birds, that’s enough. We need food. Split up.” Bakar thought at us.
He jogged off to the north. I flashed Cynthia a smile and jogged off in the opposite direction.
An hour later, we all returned to our campsite. I had caught a deer, and Bakar had a few strawberries. Cynthia snagged a monster that attacked her, but we didn’t know if we could eat it. I looked at the monsters long claws. I grabbed one of them and pulled it off. It was about six inches. As an experiment, I cut off part of a tree with a spell. Then I imagined the claw and the wood melding together, the wood becoming condensed into a handle, and the claw flattening and becoming more curved, and sharp. In a few seconds I had a knife. It had a plain wooden hilt, with an equally plain blade. It didn’t seem like anything special. Then I imagined lightning flowing into the knife. It crackled with power, and runes covered it. I grinned. “Looks like swordmage aren’t the only ones that can make weapons.” I said, triumphantly.
I tossed the dagger to Cynthia. She looked at it. “What’s this?” she asked.
“Throw it at a tree” I said.
She shrugged and chucked at the nearest tree. It flashed and disappeared. She frowned. “Not too effective.” She said.
I grinned. “Look behind the tree.” I said.
She walked behind the tree. Sure enough, the knife was there. She looked at the tree. “Where is the cut?” She asked.
I laughed. “What’s so funny, Lance?” she asked, annoyed.
“Poke the tree.” I said.
She poked it, and it fell into a million pieces. She jumped. “It’s that fast?” She asked, amazed.
“Apparently it is.” I said.
I pulled another two claws off the monster, and made a knife for Bakar and Myself. “Thanks bro” Bakar said.
“It’s late guys. We should get some sleep huh?” Bakar sighed.
“I guess so. Well, summon the tent lance.” He said.
I muttered the spell and the tent appeared. We all packed into it. “Dang it. This tent is too small. We are all smushed up; but we can’t sleep outside because monsters can attack us without wards. Well, we will have to use this for one night. Ill fix it in the morning.” I said. “I wouldn’t mind that too much” came the thought from Cynthia.
She reddened remembering the telepathic connection. She closed her gate. “One word equals one finger”. She said.
Bakar barely held in a laugh as he set the wards on the tent. When they were all set, we went to sleep.
We woke up early in the morning. We got out of the tent, and I dispelled it. We looked at each other. “What now?” asked Bakar.
“Well, let’s go look around the woods. We have a day left.” Said Cynthia.
“Why not” I shrugged.
We walked off, to look around the woods.
As we walked, we heard the sound of battle. We looked at each other. “It’s probably just some monsters” Cynthia said, but sounded unsure.
“Let’s go look” I said.
We ran towards the sounds. When we got there, there was a man with a staff, fighting the largest monster I had ever seen. I stood frozen, watching the epic battle. “C’mon guys! We have to help him!” Bakar yelled, and jumped into the fray.