Lucius grinned inwardly, feeling a slight sense of confidence and assuredness as he immediately came up with the answer to Elrond's question.

I have already been dealt my hand. Not only that, but I am willing to take on the risks. What else is there to say?

"I will stay," Lucius said, his eyes burning with much intensity as he stared right back at Elrond, showing his unwavering spirit and resolve. "I care very little about how hard it'll be for me to stay in this academy, nor the sacrifices I'd have to make. If you are indeed truthful, then shall hold you to your word and use Antebellum the best I can to achieve my dream, and yours, for that matter."

"My dream?" Elrond said, confusion apparent in his face.

"You wish to return to Earth, do you? All Outworlders do, I'd imagine," Lucius explained with a straight face, unlike Elrond who just stared at him incredulously as if he had just swallowed a bug. "The prophecy that sent me here might not be real, but I can at least try to find a way to make things better for the people around me. After all, that's what heroes do, is it not?"

After saying what was truly in his mind, Lucius, for the very first time, saw Elrond laugh in a loud, sincere manner—catching him completely off guard. He'd seen the elf act nonchalant, carefree, and most of the time, sad, but never like this.

"Spoken like a true hero," Elrond said with a small, wholesome smile on his face. "Though I do think that my dream is far beyond me by now, at least I'd have the satisfaction of helping someone else with the same drive that I once had. I hope you never change, Lucius."

Lucius couldn't help but note the melancholy in Elrond's tone before it was quickly replaced by a lighter, yet more serious one.

"...Especially now that you'll probably start to hate me. No. You will, I'd imagine."

Lucius slowly backed away from Elrond, understandably disturbed by the elf's ominous words.

Curses! Is he going to kill me or something?

"Now that you've made your conviction pretty clear, what's left to temper in you is your actual strength, and I'll be helping you in that regard until you are on equal footing with your classmates." Elrond said, his eyes never leaving Lucius as he continued, "It'll be a tough—no, even hellish month for you since I'd have to get you ready once the next Labyrinth Dive of the Primus students comes by."

Oh, thank the gods.

Relieved by the fact that he simply misunderstood Elrond's words, Lucius cleared his throat and said, "W-Well, what else is new?"

"Hah. I almost forgot that you were raised by the Asherii for a second there. For now, show me your Virtus."

Lucius nodded and complied.

"«Revelare»."

 

---

Virtus

112.4

---

 

"Good. I see that you've been training on your own."

Grinning smugly, Lucius said, "I've also obtained a Student Agent's badge and a Questgiver that allows me to undertake quests in this academy. Although I think I could do better if you'd allow me to venture out in the city and—"

"Yes I am aware, and the answer is no," Elrond quickly rebutted. "The small, safer quests here in the academy should do for now since it'll be easier to train your stats when they're lower. Don't be so impatient in leveling up as early as you can. On that note, I'd also suggest not spending your Triforce Points in either your Corpus and Sensus while also neglecting your training like other students usually do."

"I won't. I was planning to save up Triforce Points and not spend them in my Corpus at all, seeing that it would indeed be counter-intuitive. Instead, I'll be spending most of them in my Animus since I do not have the means to train it at the moment. Not to mention it also coincides with the build that I wish to follow."

"Oh, a build? Now that's something I haven't heard in a while," Elrond said, rubbing his chin as he reminisced. "You know that much already?"

"I read a lot. This shouldn't be news to you."

"Touché."

"Hmm. Indeed," Lucius replied, thoroughly enamored with the foreign word Elrond just uttered.

"Well, I was actually expecting to do a short lecture about things that have changed in Elyssia first before we begin your training, but since you already seem to have a solid understanding as to what they are, I think I don't need to anymore. For now, show me what you've got."

"Show you what I've got?"

"Hit me."

"How?" Lucius asked confusedly. "Do I have to punch you or—"

"Anything. Punch, kick, tackle, heck you can even cast a spell. Just come at me and attack!"

"Right. Attack." Lucius grimaced inwardly as he looked at Elrond's excited grin. He was nervous, as he had never 'attacked' anyone before, or anything for that matter. He was strictly forbidden to practice combat in Askanar Castle, and he was not even allowed to train his body in any way lest he'd suffer the wrath of Castarossa.

Not only that, but books about combat were purged in the castle's Hall of Tomes as well, and thus the only source he could get his knowledge from could only be one thing—his stash of hidden novels.

Despite his prior hesitation, Lucius halted his thoughts and took a deep breath before putting his hands up and sliding his feet far apart. He tried to face Elrond with some confidence in his posture but failed as he didn't know what in the world he was doing.

Lucius took a stance much like the one on the illustration he had seen from one of the novels that he habitually stole or salvaged from anywhere he could find them in Askanar Castle during his formative years. One in particular that opened his eyes to the beauty of hand-to-hand combat and its importance to heroes.

This should the Paragon of Fighting's fighting stance. A-Am I doing this right?

Then, he threw a punch—or something that resembled a punch, at the very least.

Lucius stumbled as Elrond evaded his strike with a sidestep, barely even moving his upper body.

"Oh, dear. What are you doing?" Elrond said as he stared at Lucius with a genuine look of confusion. "Come on, again!"

Lucius gritted his teeth and pushed onwards with his assault—throwing awkward punches that seemed to miss Elrond by miles. He tried to do a kick, but to his surprise, he suddenly lost his balance and took a nasty fall on the ground in his silly attempt. The humiliation from Elrond's chuckle was enough for him to stop lifting his legs beyond a few inches off the ground entirely.

...

The next few minutes that came after was utter mental torture. Despite his best efforts, Lucius didn't even come close to touching the Elrond's shadow even though all the elf did was move his feet.

"Alright, that's enough," Elrond said, putting an end to Lucius's awkward attacks. "This won't work."

"You think?" Lucius said before putting his hands down with a huff. "You saw my memories, didn't you? You know as well as I do that I don't know how to fight, so why make me?"

"I guess I was just looking for some hidden potential within you," Elrond said, shrugging. "Like latent prodigious fighting talents or something like that. You're the chosen one after all."

"And?" Lucius asked expectantly while taking very little note of Elrond's 'chosen one' babble.

"There was none whatsoever," Elrond replied with a wry smile.

"Oh." Though dejected, Lucius shook off Elrond's assessment and continued in a serious tone, "How do I improve then?"

"Ah, you have a long, long way to go," Elrond replied, a wide smile lining his lips. "But first, you're gonna have to learn how to throw a punch."

"Yes." Lucius agreed without any hesitation, as even though he didn't know squat about how real fighting was done, he did feel that something was off with his 'punching'. It felt light, slow, and more importantly, inaccurate. None at all like how the Fighting Paragon punched, as far as he could tell.

"Oh, and one more thing."

Lucius tilted his head. "What?"

"That silly stance you had earlier? Don't ever use it again."

Lucius stood silently for a moment before finally nodding with a barely noticeable frown.

"Good. Now, let's begin with our training, young padawan."

...

Curses! How could he? Calling the fighting paragon's stance silly. Well, it wasn't that silly...was it?

Lucius shook off the hesitation in the last lines of his thoughts as he walked along the halls of his dorm building. His arms ached after throwing a few hundred punches as part of Elrond's training, but it didn't hurt quite as much as his ego after hearing what Elron had to say about his stance—the Fighting Paragon's stance.

Despite his slight annoyance, however, Lucius still had a small grin on his face. Elrond, much to his surprise, was quite the efficient teacher. Despite only having trained with the elf for five hours, he learned more about unarmed combat than he ever could just reading about it in the library and putting what he learned into practice by himself.

Lucius's uplifted mood, however, didn't last much longer. As soon as he opened the door to his room, he saw a short, buck-toothed Ferrian inside. It was the building's dorm keeper, Leslie, lugging hefty bags filled with all kinds of items in his back before making his way to the door.

"What is going on here?" Lucius asked the dorm keeper, scratching his head. His confusion, however, slowly vanished as soon as he saw whose possessions were missing all over the room.

"What, didn't you know? Your roommate requested to change rooms," Leslie said as he threw Lucius an ostracizing look. "Seriously, you kids should talk to each other more before you do these things. Don't you guys ever talk?"

Lucius entered the room with haste as soon as Leslie got out. He looked around frantically, even checking the bathroom to no avail. There was nobody left in the room but him.

It was only after seeing a bunch of folded clothes and a note on the bed that reality finally dawned on Lucius.

His friend, Gilly, had left.

Lucius ground his teeth—his vision turning black as countless thoughts flooded his mind, but none were as intense as the hatred he felt for the one person that he deemed responsible for this happening.

Aries Dario.