Chapter IV.XLV (4.45) - Headmaster’s Tutelage

  Kizu was reading, a book open in one hand while walking. Then he passed through Roba’s office door.

  The moment he stepped inside though, he snapped the book closed and prepared himself to be berated by the old woman.

  Only…this was not Roba’s office. Instead of glass walls that exposed the seabed, he stood on marbled floors with pillars flanking either side of the room. Behind a desk sat Headmaster Ballarfulur.

  The headmaster twisted his long, curling mustache and smiled at Kizu, beckoning him forward.

  “Welcome, Kaga, I hope you don’t mind me launching this on you so suddenly. My ward, Basil, mentioned you were one of the victors in his little obstacle course earlier this year. I had an opening in my schedule today and thought I’d switch with Roba for your tutoring. Though if you need more time to prepare for our meeting, I understand and will send you back to your regularly scheduled appointment with my assistant.”

  “Ah, no.” Kizu cleared his throat. It was so dry in the headmaster’s office. “This is fine.”

  “Very nice!” Headmaster Ballarfulur tipped his very tall hat to Kizu. “Your flexibility is commendable. Now, how about we take a peek at your current rankings. Starting with combat, at 288. You’ve been moving through that quite quickly. Tell me about your fight yesterday.”

  The fight yesterday hadn’t been particularly interesting. He’d been in a solo battle against a giant summoned toad. His monster leg had assisted him in dodging the beast’s acid tongue. Then he had launched chunks of stone into its mouth. Once it started gagging, a quick burst of speed forward and a chop downwards with his ice sword had sliced off one of its legs. From there, he simply kept dodging around to the lame toad’s back back and peppering it with more stones.

  “Why stones?” the headmaster asked after Kizu finished up summarizing his fight. “Wouldn’t it be better to just jump into it?”

  “I know there are toads and frogs in the jungle that secrete really potent toxins. Since I knew for a fact its tongue was acidic, I decided to keep my distance. Even that one attack with my sword was kind of a stupid risk. But I thought it was worth the gamble to cripple it.”

  “Why stones? Not fire or shards of ice?”

  “Sort of a little side project of mine,” Kizu said sheepishly. “Can I…demonstrate?”

  Headmaster Ballarfulur nodded. Then, with a wave of his hand, the marble floor behind Kizu cracked. A scarecrow popped out of the stone. It wore a top hat, shorter than the headmaster’s, and an open vest on its chest that hung from outstretched arms. Its button eyes and a pipe sticking from its mouth made it look all the more silly.

  Kizu gave the headmaster an uncertain look.

  “Go ahead,” the headmaster assured him. “I promise you this guy can take anything you throw at him. Don’t hold back.”

  Kizu raised his left hand and channeled, creating a stone. It twirled for a couple seconds until it grew to the size of his head. Then, rather than launching it forward with elemental strength, he brought up his other hand in front of it. He pulled the left hand back, the stone along with it. But between the two hands, space stretched.

  Kizu spun on his monster heel and took aim at the scarecrow and released the stretched space.

  The stone rocketed forward at incredible speed. As it smashed into the scarecrow’s chest it burst into hundreds of pieces, the scarecrow left rocking back and forth from the impact.

  While Kizu hadn’t expected to obliterate the headmaster’s clearly enchanted dummy, it was a bit disheartening to see so little obvious damage to something that appeared so dingy. Not even the pipe in its mouth had fallen out.

  “Interesting.” Headmaster Ballarfulur approached his scarecrow and tapped its head. “You’re combining elemental and spatial spells to slingshot your attacks at speeds unprecedented for someone at your skill level in elemental magic. A true master elementalist would struggle to hit a target with this much force relying on that branch of magic alone.”

  “Thank you?” Kizu said uncertainly.

  “Yes. You should take my statement as a compliment.” The headmaster turned around to face him again and beamed, strolling back across the office. “The force you just inflicted would burst through most stone walls or even kill an adult elephant. I daresay most magical monsters would even think twice before facing down a hit like that. Though I also imagine that while on your feet and dodging yesterday that your spells didn’t reach this amount of force?”

  “Yeah,” Kizu admitted. “The giant frog still went down after enough hits. But I never hit it full force. Really, I wanted to use it as an experiment and an exercise on positioning.”

  “Excellent!” The headmaster clapped a hand on his shoulder. “This is exactly the sort of initiative I want to see from my students! You Kagas are exceptional mages through and through. Inventive, creative, powerful.”

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  “Kagas? I don’t suppose you mean Finn?”

  “Him as well. I met with your younger brother a few days ago and helped him with a few of his own unique magical challenges. An interesting assortment of skills. Though I admit I was thinking of your sister when I spoke.”

  Kizu licked his cracked lips. “My sister. Anna. Will you tell me where she is now? I know it’s to the west. Beyond Edgeland.”

  “How about we review your other rankings before we hop into that topic?” The headmaster spun his chair then sat down, reclaiming his position behind his desk. “Your astronomy tests haven’t progressed far beyond the original burst at the start of last semester. You stand at 204 at the moment.”

  Kizu winced. With the return of the Tainted students he’d fallen back a couple ranks. “With so much to read on other subjects, I just haven’t really been prioritizing it,” he admitted.

  “I understand. It’s far easier to knock off a hundred ranks at the bottom of the ladder in different subjects. It feels like more satisfying progress, despite how much simpler it is in comparison. But I urge you not to ignore any subject at Shinzou Academy. We do not teach useless topics.”

  “I understand.”

  “Divination on the other hand seems to be a different story,” Headmaster Ballarfulur continued. “Your ranking has steadily improved. You’re now at 68. A very respectable rank for a third year student. Are you enjoying Professor Grove’s lectures?”

  “Oh absolutely!” Kizu brightened. “It was actually her class that gave me inspiration for that attack I just showed you.”

  “Your studies in divination inspired your elemental and spatial attack? Fascinating! Please explain. Did you see your attack in images of your future?”

  Kizu shook his head. “No, nothing like that. But we’re working on combining divination spells with other spell branches and it got me thinking about different combinations of my current arsenal.”

  “That’s exactly the sort of mindset we hope to cultivate! Do not view all branches of spellcraft in a vacuum, instead visualize them as a tree from which all your magic grows from. Everything can be connected. I’m extremely glad you’re applying your different talents. And next let’s chat about history and politics. Rank 598 and 645 respectively.”

  “Is there something wrong with those ranks?” Kizu asked slowly. He’d been quite proud of his last test results. He spent a great deal of time studying those two subjects these last few weeks.

  “Not at all! Professor Krimpit even mentioned you were more studious in his Politics F class than History F last semester.”

  “Krimpit said that about me?” Kizu found the idea of the crotchety professor saying anything remotely positive about him absolutely mystifying.

  “Not in so many words. And it took some prying on my part. However, that was the impression I received. I am quite talented at reading between the lines.”

  “Ah.” That made more sense.

  “I am proud of you. I know attempting to view others in a different light is never an easy task. And Professor Krimpit’s obstinate personality and contrarian opinions in particular does not make it easy. He is, however, an extraordinarily intelligent man. I often wonder if he has somehow enchanted his brain to retain information. Truly a gem of the academy.”

  “Okay.” Kizu glanced around.

  “Next, Rejuvenation and Restoration has no movement. No surprise there. Professor Taroe filled me in on his first semester curriculum. If anything, I would be concerned if that ranking moved. You’re not to learn how to heal until next semester.

  “Conjuring, on the other hand. That one is a mystery.”

  “I…I have been trying!” Kizu insisted.

  “I find it fascinating that you started your first semester at rank 799 and somehow dropped down to 800. You are now below someone who naturally cannot summon due to soul damage.”

  Sene. The headmaster was talking about Ione’s twin. Her opposite. Kizu frowned. When had his ranking dropped to 800? He thought back to when that might have occurred. After a minute of pondered, Kiz felt confident he’d been rank 799 before his expedition down into World Dungeon to save Anata. The month he spent inside the time dilation prison must have put it out of his mind.

  The 800 rank only appeared after he’d met Otochi. Otochi, who now had an insane copy of Kizu as a slave. Had Otochi done something to his soul in their meeting? Kizu didn’t remember any sort of attack like that. The Blood Lord had drunk his blood. But was that really all it took to create a copy of someone? Maybe? He didn’t know much about the capabilities of a Blood lord. What else had happened in the World Dungeon though? He fought bloodspawn, fell into a trap, met little lucky magical critters.

  “The mirror!” Kizu knocked over his chair as he burst from his seat. Then he started pacing, the headmaster watched on, the comforting smile never leaving his face, though Kizu thought he spotted a spark of concern in the kind man’s eyes.

  “I found a mirror in the World Dungeon,” Kizu explained. He ran a hand through his hair as he thought it through. “It copied my appearance and moved my reflection like it had control over my body. We fled right after. But…what if that was a piece of my soul reflected in the mirror? Like Sene and Ione, I had a chunk of my soul split and put inside another entity.”

  “That…is a possibility,” the headmaster admitted after a moment of thinking it over. “Taroe did inform me about your doppleganger’s appearance in Hon. If the Blood Lord had access to such an artifact it is not beyond reason he might have created a substitute body for it. There are records of him performing experiments with a powerful soul mage in the past. He is known as quite the competent weaver of flesh.”

  “Can I…I mean, what can I do about it?” Kizu asked.

  “At the moment? Nothing, I’m afraid. However, information is not a useless commodity. Knowledge in itself is often far more powerful than any spell.”

  “I suppose.”

  “Let us not dwell on the topic. Your next ranking, brewing.”

  Kizu struggled to focus, his mind still caught on the theory of his missing soul piece. But the headmaster was right. For the moment, the best path forward was simply to devote his time and energy to his studies.

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