The next day arrived and the headmaster can already be seen inside his office, going through paper after paper. While the issue about the whole Lich and Lost item incident has mostly been resolved, it unfortunately caused him to neglect his other duties like reading other reports or approving some requests. 

All in all, Leonardo lives his current day to day life almost always behind a desk which is why he happily takes any opportunity to take a break like the arrival of neophytes for example. Anything to break the monotony really. 

As he glanced over the never ending pile of papers he sighed as a very depressing thought came into his head. 

“I was once known as a great artist among many other things, now I feel like I’ve been reduced to a salary man working for a very shady company.” He inwardly complained as he swallowed it up and prepared to tackle his never ending job. 

Without any new big incidents happening, all that he was reading were basically reports about a mission taking out some supernatural monster that threatens a small town, or a few rogue mages going  about. While this may sound like a big deal, and it is indeed, at this point of his life he has seen and read so many of the same reports that it has become boring. Frankly these kinds of events are simply the norm for those who are in the know.

As the hours ticked by, a knock on the door was but a welcome occurrence for him as it meant that Mona Lisa had something to report, and hopefully it will be of a substance. With a smile on his face forming, he then looked towards the door before telling them to enter. “Come in!” Leonardo declared as the door opened revealing the familiar figure of Mona Lisa. She greeted the headmaster first before she stated her business for today.

“So, anything exciting going about?” He asked with expectation as Mona Lisa looked at him with a blank stare.“Unfortunately, there is none. Well nothing too exciting given your standards at least.” She replied, dampening Leonardo’s newfound enthusiasm. 

“Oh well, so what do you have for me?” He asked dejectedly.

“Well, firstly, our investigation regarding the blackened magic staff is yielding no results.” She explained. 

“Hmm? What do you mean?” Leonardo asked for a bit of elaboration. 

“It’s exactly as you heard. It seems very inert at the moment and no amount of stimulation is affecting it. But there is one curious thing. The black staff is kind of indestructible for some currently unknown reason. The researchers resorted to just hitting it with low level elemental spells and it did nothing. Not even elicit a barrier response of any kind, no black aura no nothing.” She explained as she showed images of the black staff that retained no damage after a fireball spell. 

“Granted this is still just the equivalent of poking it with a stick, so the researchers are asking for your permission for much more thorough testing as we have exhausted all the friendlier approaches.” She finally declared as Leonardo look to her with an amused gaze. “I see. Well, I do give them the permission but please do invite me during one of these tests because I do want to see what will happen and maybe I could do some tinkering as well.” He replied with a smile. 

“As you wish.” Mona Lisa then moved on to the next topic. “The card that was given to Mr Sylvester Clearsight is still a large and confusing question mark as we do not know if we should classify it as a Lost Item or not.” 

“Let me guess, it’s just as inert as the staff?” Leonardo jumped ahead.

“Yes.” Mona Lisa immediately replied.

“I see.” Leonardo then closed his eyes as he was thinking about what he should do next, until an inspiration came over. “Speaking of that card, would you be so kind as to bring it over here next time?” 

“Why?” Mona Lisa asked as she raised an eyebrow. 

“I wonder if I should just return that card to the one it was gifted to.” Leonardo mused.“Funny you should mention that Headmaster, because this next uh request comes from the Magician’s troupe. Well requests actually.” Mona Lisa explained. 

“Requests?” 

“They say it’s because they managed to solve that incident by themselves, so they think it would only be fair if they got a little bit more out of it, more than just the spell point rewards.” Mona Lisa explained.

“Okay fair enough, but why requests?” Mona Lisa’s face sank into a disappointed scowl. 

“The boys of that team wanted to know if there was a teacher who could help grow stronger and the girls wanted access to special books or something. I don’t know what is going on but they seemed to have contacted the twins separately and not together.” 

This revelation caused a smile to form on Leonardo’s face as he burst into a fit of laughter.

“I see, I see. It seems they found themselves swept up by a very childish argument but very well! Let me entertain their requests! It’s only fair. Tell them to meet me at separate times. I want to play along with their silly game.” He said with a joyous face as Mona Lisa once again sighed in disappointment. 

“I have a bad feeling about this.”

---

A few hours later, Rossa and Estelle found themselves called into Leonardo’s office. While obviously a bit elated over the fact that their request was granted, both of them were taking this very seriously hoping to get as much out of the arrangement as possible. The two were also carrying a folded piece of white paper in their hands.

As they went out of the still very unusual elevator system, they once again found themselves in that very eerie and lonely corridor that led towards the headmaster’s office. 

“Okay, looks like we have gotten our approval. Now let’s try to leverage a bit more from this meeting as well.” Rossa declared.

“Yup, though I guess we need to try and not make it look too obvious though. We’re still talking to the headmaster after all.” Estelle replied. 

“Yes, I know. But this is a very rare opportunity. I can’t let this slip by so easily. Remember what our lines will be if he ever asks why we want to get stronger.” Rossa said in a serious tone. 

“Don’t worry. I got this!” Estelle proudly declared.

As the two knocked on the front door, a voice from within told them to enter. “Come in!” The voice declared, prompting the two girls to open the door and once again they found themselves face to face with Leonardo Da Vinci. The headmaster smiled as he gestured for them to have a seat at the sofa placed inside. 

“Do you girls want some tea?” He offered. 

“Please don’t bother yourself with it dear headmaster.” Rossa declared. 

“Our visit will be brief and we know that your time is rather precious.” Estelle followed up.

“Oh, these two are quite courteous. Though part of me feels like they’re doing this to give a good impression of themselves.” Leonardo thought as he laughed inwardly. “So, state your business then.” Leonardo declared as Rossa and Estelle looked at each other and gave themselves a nod. 

“We would like to have permission to view higher level books or learning materials from the library.” Rossa asked politely. 

“And to make things easier, we both created a list/outline of the topics we want to tackle in order to make ourselves much more efficient.” Estelle followed up as the two girls handed over the folded sheets of paper to Leonardo. 

He then saw that these two girls were much more serious about this endeavor than he thought, for they gave him a list of what they think are the key fields they wanted to focus on. While some of these will be tackled later on in their university life, it would still take them a good year or so to reach these.

“Hmm, I see you two have given this whole thing a lot of thought. I’m impressed!” Leonardo’s outburst seemingly catching the two girls off guard. “It wouldn’t really surprise me that you would want to get stronger after the incident, so I won’t pry for any further reason.” Leonardo declared as the two girls let out a sigh of relief. 

“Very well, I will be giving you two limited access to higher level books in the library for the time being until you two think that you have made enough progress. How does that sound?” Leonardo said as he gave the two a very bright smile. 

“T-that would be really great headmaster!” Rossa replied with glee, almost unable to hide her excitement. 

“Thank you so much headmaster!” Estelle then voiced her own jubilation. 

“No need to thank you so much. This is your I guess extra reward. Now then, your IDs will be given special limited privileges starting tomorrow, do make the best out of it.” He commanded. “Now run along you two, I’m guessing you still have one more class in the afternoon right?” 

“Yes, Thank you for your time!” The two girls said in unison as they excused themselves with radiant smiles on their faces. 

“Ah youth!” He quietly thought to himself as he eagerly awaited the other half of this charade. 

A few minutes later and the boys' side of the Magician's troupe arrived at Leonardo’s office just missing the previous pair who just left, but in comparison to the girls, Sylvester and Artian seemed a little down. “Huh, now I wasn’t expecting this.” Leonardo quietly assessed. “Even Mr Sylvester is in deep thought.”

“So, what brings you here?” Leonardo asked. 

“Well to be honest. We both really don’t know.” Artian dejectedly replied. 

“Yes. We came here hoping you could recommend us a more personal teacher but we have no idea where we should be focusing on. Not like we can have multiple masters at the same time anyway.” Sylvester explained as he slumped on his shoulders. 

“Damn it. At this rate those two might start mocking us over this.” Artian continued with his dejected mood. 

“Well, they would be mocking you and not me since you dragged me into this mess.” Sylvester immediately made a rebuttal.

“Shut up dude, you’re not helping.” 

“Ahem” Leonardo then tried to get their attention. “Since you two seemed confused about what you should do next, I think I have just the right person to give you that clarity.” Leonardo said with a smile. 

“That guy rarely teaches anyone really, but if I make the request, I’m sure he’ll happily comply. But at the end of the day it will still depend on the two of you.” Immediately the two boys shifted their attention towards the sly smile of the rainbow haired headmaster.

“So, are you guys interested in a quick detour?” Leonardo said in a vaguely teasing manner.

“Detour?” Artian and Sylvster said in unison, confused over the meaning of his words.