Classes returned and the went over material that they had already gone over to refresh. Ludere found himself wondering what they had done while the students were out.

  Luckily he wasn't going to need to find that out. Cire had sent him a note through Rain, one of the girls in his class. Rain had the stripe showing that she was intending to pledge to religion. Her long brown hair was straight and slicked back into a ribbon.

  "This is for you. It's from the Senator's daughter," Rain said, handing him a rolled up piece of paper.

  "Thanks." He accepted it. "How are you doing?"

  She had never talked to him one on one before and he was curious what her experience had been. He didn't want to just outright say that.

  "It's been a week, but I'm sure you have been living through much of the same."

  He nodded. "I see you've got a brown ribbon on your hair. Were you thinking of a specific role within religion? Within the domain of the Fiddler perhaps?"

  She brightened at his words. Rain clearly had asked for this duty or Cire has put her up to it. Both could just as easily be true.

  "I have been an adherent of the Fiddler, yes. I love his message about teaching the people equally."

  "I have to say that is not what I thought you were going to say. You are aware of my special relationship with the Oracle?"

  She nodded. He knew what was likely coming next. There would be some ask centered around her needs with connecting with the oracle because it would benefit her. He waited but the ask never came.

  "I am aware."

  The other option was that she would wait for him to broach the topic.

  "She tells me a lot about what they do. I can make an introduction."

  "Thank you."

  "She's very nice. You really don't need to go through me to talk to her. I can't impress upon you how much she likes just talking to people. It's one of the best things about her."

  She was lovely to him. Her training made her very understanding and patient with people. Ludere did not think that he had that in him. It was one of the reasons that he had written off joining a religion at all. He wouldn't be able to have any sort of freedom of movement whereas in governmental military he might have that opportunity.

  "Thank you so much, Regnicus. I really appreciate it. When we're all done here I will call upon you."

  "Naturally. And since it's just the two of us left here in class, are you hungry?" He hadn't noticed it until just that moment but his stomach rumbled and it wouldn't hurt him to go eat with a new friend. There were so few women in the class that each one stood out. Whether this was a deliberate choice or just how the Empire decided to allocate its assets, he was not sure. The end result was that most of his peers were men.

  In front of the classroom, Marcel was still there, waiting for him. Marcel. Marcel, I've been very enthusiastic about being his bodyguard or helping out or basically anything he could to suck up to Ludere.

  "Ah. Regnicus. Rain. How are you both?"

  Ludere shrugged. He still had the note in his hand. If this was important, you should have opened it by now, but it'll be rude to open in front of two other. He would just...

  "We're wonderful. I was just delivering him a letter from a friend. The weather is wonderful this time of year isn't it?" Rain gestured to the cloud cover.

  " I guess it's fine as long as it doesn't pour down on us. Otherwise, I'm not going to be really happy."

  Ludere snuck a look at the note and it was in Celusian. He could wait on that. It was likely some note from their transcription. It wasn't like her to rush something to him in the middle of class. Though so something had to be up and he itched to look at it more thoroughly. But that would give away what was going on. Marcel hadn't been read into the full conspiracy of what they were trying to do so he was nervous to give the man more responsibility.

  The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.

  "Did you hear that? I I've been assigned as the Regnicus' bodyguard for the remainder of the term? It's such an honor to be able to serve one who has so handily beaten back dozens of demons."

  Rain laughed. "You did not tell me that. When was I going to hear about this?"

  Ludere wanted to slip away and not have to have another Conversation where it was obvious that his friends were social climbers and thought that he was their next Target. He wasn't and he shouldn't be but they kept thinking that he was a mountain that they needed to climb.

  "I did not think that I was going to be telling you about that. Apologies Rain. I don't want to get off on a bad sandal, but this is the longest we've spoken since class began."

  She smiled a truly wicked smile. He gulped. "... And now we're going to be best friends. Anyone that helps me get ahead is a friend to me no matter what else they do."

  "That's about right. He's a good man and he's killed enough demons to warrant being a regnicus twice over. Did Senator Celisar say anything about your recent exploits on the island when you were back?"

  They passed out of the main instruction building and found themselves in the cool misty morning air.

  "Unfortunately he was low on time and I couldn't get much out of him but he I am certain knows what's going on especially since I sent him a letter."

  Marcel places a hand on his shoulder. "It's unfortunate how much of our lives are going to be dictated by people that we don't wait to speak to via letters and scrolls sent across a far distance."

  "Isn't there a Will construct that lets you send messages far away? Or was I hallucinating that."

  Ludere didn't recall such an item but it made sense that there was something like that. He couldn't imagine how it would be made but he could imagine it. And from his understanding there was so many things that one could imagine that did not make effective constructs. This was something that if it didn't yet exist, needed to be created.

  He sure as heck wasn't going to be the one to do it though. He would get Cire or Mila to take up that job.

  "I don't think that I've heard of anything like that. Imagine being able to send a message faster than a transport though. That would change warfare as we know it," Marcel said. "Not that there's much of that for us to do anymore."

  "A lot of what's been talked about in class is what military is going to do now. I know that it's been a hot topic in the Senate. At least my father said it was. Up until recently I had no idea that we could ever draw down the legions. Without a competing nation, there's not really a point to having a military, is there."

  If he recalled correctly, Rains father worked in government meaning her pledge to religion might be unrelated to his lineage. He failed to remember if she had any siblings. That had not been in his briefings. He felt odd thinking about how he would ask either of them and noticed that they had finally arrived at the cafeteria.

  ---

  There wasn't much else that he wanted to really do with the spear but the fact that it had the personality of a demon meant that something had happened. He took it out early before practice, taking it out to the practice grounds where they all warmed up together. He wasn't the only one out there. Dozens of his classmates were there but neither Mila nor Cire had arrived yet.

  He sighed as he placed a hand upon the spear.

  "Now I need you to understand that whatever advantage you think you have, I hold all the cards here."

  "Human."

  "Go ahead. Let's hear it. Out with it. You're not getting anything you want except to talk with me."

  "Why would one such as I need to talk to a human. You are vile creature and nothing you say can ever change that."

  Ludere whistled. He brought the spear fully out of the container. Calling it a bag just felt wrong though that was effectively what it was. Instantly the voice started up.

  "There's got to be some reason that you're keeping me around. Dascaire isn't for the weak. I tire of this."

  "What does Dascaire... What does it mean?"

  It was like the spear rolled her eyes. How long had it been since he started thinking of the spear as a female? This whole setup was off.

  "You have Spirit Magic but you don't know what a Dascaire is? Of course this is going to come as a shock to you."

  He waited for her to tell him. Details were not forthcoming.

  "I don't suppose that we can work out a deal?"

  "What do you even have to offer me? Stupid humans, always thinking that they are better."

  He held the spear at arms length, studying it. Of course the spear was not giving him anything.

  "Look. You're stuck in my favorite weapon. I did not plan for this to happen, but that's what happened. We are stuck with each other."

  "You are stuck with me. Unless you destroy your precious spear. Go ahead."

  If there was one thing he did not want to do it was to go around and get another spear. This one was bespoke. It simply worked well for him.

  At least when it wasn't insulting his heritage.

  "You humans thinking that you have this divine right of it because of where you're born. You have nothing. You are nothing. Alius becomes you."

  There was something to that. "Alius?"

  "Rek." She was saddened silent on the matter. she let him go through his spear forms without so much as a peep. It was like he had beaten her back. She wouldn't admit it but there was something. He just wished that he could figure out what he could do with Spirit Magic on his own. It wasn't his best skill by far- still stuck at two.

  He couldn't figure out any path to get it to a higher level and that weighed on him. He should be better. He could do more. The visions had been ground breaking but now it just felt like that's all it had been, just visions.

  With each movement, Ludere felt the spear want to give way to him. It wanted to be moved a certain way. He whipped it around his body in a showy move that would not work in actual combat then drove it into a series of three thrusts that felt natural.

  With Spear Proficiency, he felt the practiced ease of using his spear in combat. This felt like he had been born with it. His strength flowed out and then he saw Mila walking up. Around him several of the students were also watching him as he moved.

  "You look possessed," she said. "Are you using Will?"

  He paused. "No."

  "Then why are your eyes black?"