"Baran caught him trying to stage an appearance as part of the knights. In an attempt to flee after being found out, he took down 20 of some of the Palace’s best men before a mage stopped him," Jarius explained a situation that happened in his Palace, Wyvern’s Keep, about 4 days ago.
"Zahka? Has this been confirmed, Your Grace?" Captain Melisende of the Red Orcas had asked.
"Yes. Mumbleton got into his mind. His assignment came from the Lord himself, Cithron. He was asked to report everything that goes on in the Wyvern’s Keep, anything out of place," King Jarius answered.
"Your Grace, was there no reason why such a mission was assigned to him?" Captain Melisende followed with another question.
Jarius shook his head and said, "He was simply told what to do, and with that he proceeded with the mission."
"For a Kingdom that doesn’t practice nearly as much magic, one would think they would be more cautious," Azam said, shaking his head disappointedly.
"From what we could gather, he’s at a martial artist rank called Master. And given his experience, they didn’t expect he’d be caught all too easily," Jarius said, then stood up and walked closer to the captive man.
He said, "I kept you alive long enough so that I could present you before my Captains this day. You’ve outlived your purpose," then stretched his hand towards the prisoner.
An invisible force immediately took hold of the prisoner’s body, then it lifted him off the ground. The prisoner made the attempt to struggle to break free of the whole thing, but it was all in futile efforts.
Jarius then folded the hand he used in lifting the prisoner, and with that, gravity crumpled the body of the man as if it was like paper.
Bones cracked, crunched, and got crushed. The blood that would have supposedly splashed around the room instead floated around the crumpled body. A gravitational field stopped it from moving past that point.
Jarius didn’t want nor need any of the blood stains around him. So he motioned out his fingertips, and the force of his gravity flung the crumpled body away towards the exit door, as if someone was hurling away a ball of crumpled paper.
The body, along with the floating blood drops, had all smashed around the doorway leading into his throne room. It was a gory sight of intestines and body parts soaked in blood.
"See to that being cleaned up immediately," Jarius commanded, then proceeded back to his seat as both knights before him nodded and left.
"Your Grace, do you think Lord Cithron has found out that Thyrak is gone? Perhaps this is a feeble attempt to grab whatever necessary information before they make an attempt at war," Captain Daegal of the White Vortex voiced out.
"Maybe he did, maybe he did not, maybe this is even for a different ploy altogether, but I have decided on what to do," Jarius said with an expressionless face. Then there was a brief pause before he added, "I’m going to remind each and every one of them that I am their King and I shall not be trifled with."
Then Jarius turned towards Mumbleton and said, "See to it that every Kingdom receives a letter. Tell them I’m summoning them for a feast."
Mumbleton nodded and said, "Yes, Your Grace."
....
Back at Xathia, the mages had concluded the first practice attempts at casting Quiet Tongue, and as expected, most people failed to get it at first try.
Especially those who it was their first time practicing supplementary magic.
Aiden showed instant usage of the spell, being the first to quickly show it without even the slightest delay.
Others like Ambrose, Laela, and Kayden too did a good job at casting and getting it on their first try.
Arianna didn’t have much luck with getting a hang of the spell. It was as if her mind was also jumbled up trying to figure the instructions the right way before casting the said spell.
The next spell that Captain Charlotte had taught them was another Basic Level spell called Mice Steps. Its purpose was to cast a spell that muffled the sound of footsteps.
She showed a sample usage, of course. She cast the spell and walked around the field without the sound of her feet being heard.
Then it was time for the initiate mages to attempt usage of the spell, and of course it was the same situation as before with Quiet Tongue. Most people couldn’t get the hang of it, but only a few could.
Though there were those who couldn’t cast Quiet Tongue at all or even effectively, but could cast Mice Steps. And of course for Aiden, Mice Steps had been copied fully.
"That brings us to the end of this session. I hope that some of you who are still unable to cast a supplementary spell would still put in the practice. You all should know this: understanding and displaying a supplementary spell is part of the conditions you must fulfill to be considered worthy of the Magic Apprentice Rank," Charlotte spoke out well so that she was sure everyone heard her, then she said finally before turning to leave, "That will be all."
The mages started muttering between themselves as they walked back to their respective guild wings.
Mage Apprentice rank wasn’t anytime soon for most of these mages, and even for the top performing initiates, it might still be a little while more. They were still a few stars away from being stage 2 initiates and a couple more stars before they could be stage 3 initiates.
At stage 3, mages would send in an application to the Grand Magus to come conduct a test for them.
Once the application had been accepted, she would then invite the mage who applied to be given a new rank, to fulfill the condition of showing her a usage of a supplementary spell.
....
Whilst the mages made their way back, Aiden, walking with Laela to his side along the corridor of the general wing, saw the sight of a young and timid looking boy with bruises on his face stepping out of the Library carrying some books with him.
This boy walked towards their direction, and when Aiden looked properly, he could see that his badge ranked him as an Initiate.
However, given that the classes had just ended, no initiate should have been able to reach the library by now, and much less even take books out of it.
So this meant that this initiate was probably never at the lesson earlier with Captain Charlotte.
This timid kid was Oliver, son of the Blacksmith, Garant.