Rey was in a state of shock, he couldn't believe he lost. How did he lose, he was a soldier and an adventurer. He may not be the strongest in his peers but he fought, and risked his life, he had the experience. Additionally his potential was high, that's why his grandfather sponsored him to attend Magnus instead of his other siblings.  How did he move so fast, why was he so strong. He looked like a sheltered rich boy, who couldn't even hurt an ant.

 

“I'll get stronger, I am weak.” Rey murmured while he gripped his fist.

 

He sat behind the class and had a deep thought. While his mind was out of this plane, his friends were concerned about him, after all he got his ass beaten.

 

“Boss, are you okay?” Minion said worryingly.

“We'll beat the crap out of him boss! We'll gang him up!” Minion two said.

 

“No, and I'm fine, just give me a breather.” Rey reassured his boys.

I almost killed him. Ezekill thought, while shivering as he realized he almost squeezed the guy to death out of anger.

 

Ezekill gazed at both of his hands, his hands felt cold, his hands were sweating. He almost had his first murder, if Elena didn't shout he would gripped harder until the shield couldn't withstand the force and that would end him.

 

Ezekill and Rey spaced out in realization of their actions, while Elena was teaching the class.

 

“Ahem! You two boys, may I have your attention!?” Elena said.

 

Ezekill snapped back to reality as he heard Elena's howl, and put his attention to her.

 

“Good, now let's get started.” Elena said.

 

“So, before we started, some idiots decided not to attend the lecture, and dared to insult my apprentice, and ended up being beaten by him.” Elena stared at Rey and his minions.

 

“I'm a fair teacher, I give second chances but if you dare skip my class again, and insult him again. I'll beat you myself and your entire family.” Elena smiled.

 

Her tone was terrifying, her calm voice was threatening enough to make Rey go cold. Everyone murmured,the class was curious about the relation between Ezekill and Elena to the extent of threatening an entire family.

 

Oi oi what the fuck! When did I become your apprentice! I don't remember applying for an apprenticeship to anyone! And what's this favoritism, I'll be antagonized by the whole class! He thought.

 

“Eh, no wonder you're so strong, you're trained by the Black Witch herself.” Yvonne was amazed.

 

Now she took all my hardwork, my father and gunther trained me when I was little. Ezekill thought while he let out an ‘haah’.

 

Ezekill scratched his head and let out an awkward laugh.

 

“Ez, your father got you an expensive tutor, no wonder I didn't see you in the Ascion academy.” Roy said.

 

Now the self taught thing is now closed, there's no way they're going to believe me when I said I experimented and taught myself magic. Ezekill thought as he sighed.

 

After a few minutes, Elena redicussed the lecture she taught in the magic lecture.

 

“You can't learn magic by just listening, that's why Practical is a major subject and why it exists.”

 

“You will learn more by doing it, having hands-on experience is a must if you want to master magic.”

 

Elena constructed her magic circle to demonstrate. She moved her hand forward, and a magic circle appeared into her hands, it was faster than Ezekill's construction. At first it was one layer of magic circle, she fired the magic a molten rock bursted from the magic circle. She halted the ball-like rock suspended inside a cube barrier.

 

Everyone was astounded, they couldn't stop themselves from expressing what they felt. A buzz of woah was heard from the crowd, they had never seen that type of magic before. Ezekill was also amazed, he wondered if the cube-like object was solidified gas similar to an aerogel.

 

Elena cast another fire bolt, but this time the shape it fired looked like a nail or a spike. It was also stopped by a cube.

 

Yvonne raised her hands,“Professor, how did you do that cube magic?”

 

“What you saw was weave, it's one of the ways to use magic but we're not here for that. It's an old way to use magic and a lot more complicated than the modern one, and a bit weaker if you lack the knowledge.” Elena answered.

 

“So, back to the topic. What you saw was that I modified my magic. See the difference of the shape, the spiked shape is designed to penetrate and go through armor. Not that it mattered though, anyways the purpose is to learn to be flexible.” Elena said.

 

Elena showed them again how to modify their magic circle, but slowly this time. So the class could follow her instructions.

 

“Everyone do the five steps, and hold the magic circle, don't release just yet.”

 

Elena walked in rows to check her students.

 

“Good, now visualize an image of something sharp or that you want to penetrate something or whatever the heck you want but it would be easier to start simple.”

 

I think I have done this before. Ezekill thought

 

After a few minutes Yvonne's magic circle was fading, and blinking. She grinned her teeth as hard as she could trying to hold out, and not lose concentration. She put her two hands forward trying to maintain stability, her hands started to shake, her sweat glands secreting sweat. Not long after the magic circle broke, and she had a labor breath. Her hands were on her knees.

 

“I'm not very good with this, I grew up only using healing.” Yvonne said as she panted.

 

Elena sighed, “I guess you need to practice another magic, you need to get used to it if you want to defend yourself.”

 

“Yvonne, you go there and practice, and the rest of you try what I did.” Elena said.

 

Ezekill focused on making the stone bullet at the size of point fifty BMG, and fired it like a machine gun.

 

I pretty much set the size, shape and speed, but how many rounds does it fire for one magic circle. Well let's try fifty rounds first. Ezekill thought.

 

As he focused, the size of his magic circle got bigger.

 

“The size of his magic circle got bigger, I wonder how many modifications he made.” Elena murmured.

 

“Are you done everyone?” Elena said.

“Now release!” Elena said.

 

Elena touched the wall, and  her hand waved like water as she weaved magic to reinforce the wall from the incoming blast. Everyone took turns casting their magic, the room vibrated and roared as the magic hit the wall. Rey tried Uno's technique that he saw during the entrance exam, but he couldn't duplicate many magic circles, he only succeeded in forming two magic circles. He released his magic, the power difference was noticeable. There was room to grow.

 

Roy tried to make his firebolt the same as Elena's. He closed his eyes, his mana started to heat up as he made an image. “Make the burning ball to a sharp burning spike.”

 

Roy released the fire bolt, it exploded as it contacted the surface. The angle was a bit off but it was perfect. That was just like him, learned by the books.

 

When it was Ezekill's turn to fire his magic, everyone was startled. A chain of explosions ringed into their ears, a deafening salvo of stone bullet erupted when it hit the marble wall.

 

HE rounds heh. Ezekill thought while a smirk was shown in his face.

 

“Good, but your opponent won't give you time to modify, everyone of you took a lot of time to do a simple modification.”

 

“Keep practicing, and good work everyone.” Elena said

“Everyone should follow the creativity of Ezekill.” She added.

 

Oi stop the favoritism! They’ll antagonize me! Ezekill thought.

 

Elena left the students on their own device, Elena walked through the door with a grin on her face scheming something, and jerked it open as she left the gym-like classroom, she closed the door back.

 

“Now class, what would you do, do you idolize him or antagonize him.” She murmured as she leaned.

 

Elena weaved magic to enhance her hearing, she put her two hands on the wall as she leaned through the door. Her ass was sticking out the perverted old man behind her blushed. Elena noticed and called him out.

 

“Walter, I thought you don’t like leftover adult women like me.” She turned to him and smiled.

 

“I generally like women no matter the age, ahem so what are you doing?” Walter avoided eye contact with Elena, he scratched the side of his beard.

 

“I’m preparing my class for the magnus fest. Rivalry tends to make their growth faster. It's a luxury we adults don't have, '' Elena said.

 

“How typical of you, setting up a rivalry wouldn't that divide them? Well good luck since I have prodigies in my class, and everyone is united.” Walter grinned.

 

“Oh my, we’re too old for this rivalry thing but no it won't, and it's also about knowing each other. The earlier they know their strengths and weaknesses, the earlier doubts are erased.” Elena smiled.

 

“You women really like to make things complicated,” Walter replied.

 

“Relationships are complicated, knowing your partner's ins and outs tends to make the relationship stronger.” Elena said.

 

“Yeah yeah,” Walter replied.

 

Walter walked out, Elena resumed on what she’s doing. Meanwhile inside the classroom, some of them practiced their magic while the others approached Ezekill. Ezekill suddenly became popular, afterall he displayed a feat that no one could imagine. The people around him blasted him with questions, the tightness of space made him anxious. Being surrounded by people who he didn't know so well find it stressful. The class chose to make him their inspiration, instead of idolizing or antagonizing the youngest student inside the gym.

 

“Can I call you Ezekill!?”

“Can you teach me your technique?”

“How did you do that?”

“Why are you so fast?”

“I'll catch up! Soon!”

 

Got dammit Elena! Ezekill screamed inside.

 

Ezekill responded to their questions one by one, Ezekill smiled upon them hiding the fact that he finds attention stressful. Ezekill prefers to be with a few selected good friends, Roy stepped in as he noticed the sweat behind Ezekill's neck.

 

“Professor will be back, we shouldn't be slacking off.” Roy said while breaking them up.

 

Rey strolled towards Ezekill, Rey grabbed his shoulder. Roy noticed and gripped Rey's arm. 

 

“Oi! I won't lose next time,” Rey howled, he shoved Roy's hands and removed himself from Ezekill and walked away.

 

Rey marched towards the door, his minions tried to follow but they were stopped by Rey himself, they obeyed and stayed.

 

Elena noticed him approaching, she pretended that she just came back. Rey opened the door, he saw Elena outside.

 

“Where are you going boy?”

 

“The gym is too small, I need a bigger room.” Rey answered while he continued to march.

 

“Suit yourself, as long as you practice.” Elena smiled.

 

Rey strolled through the halls, as if he was looking for someone checking each room. He slammed every door he walked through, he didn't care if there was an ongoing lecture. The person he was looking for isn't here. So he decided not to waste more of his time trying to find him, since there was a lot of opportunity to see him. Instead he marched outside the school building and went through the range.

 

“I didn't set my defensive field up faster, he had reached me before I completed my casting.” He murmured while he gripped his staff out of frustration.

 

He lifted his staff up, a magic circle was constructed at the bottom, he pulled down his staff, the magic circle appeared on the dirt, the dirt ground started to ignite and spread. The ground was burning.

 

“Still too slow, I need to do it faster.” He murmured.

 

He lifted his staff again, and redoing the same process.

 

“Faster!”

 

He kept practicing, he repeated the casting again, and again.

 

Back inside the classroom, the order had been restored, everyone was training their magic modifications in order to master it. Ezekill wasn't exempted from the process, he did what everyone does. Repeating their modified magic, Ezekill repeated dozens of times until he used the last drop of his mana. He drew his sword, refused to stop training just because he was out of mana. He swung Crystalis with his longsword routine. Cold sweat poured out, he was in labored breath. His arms started to protest.

 

Elena got back inside seeing her class was in full spirit, it made her smile reminiscing her youth,  but the time ran out and she dismissed the class.

 

Ezekill was called out by Yvonne, “Ezekill!” Yvonne caught his attention.

 

“Yes, Yvonne?” Ezekill replied.

 

“Do you mind teaching me offensive magic tomorrow? I had trouble grasping the principles of offensive magic.”

“I can't stabilize my magic circle.” Yvonne added as her frustrated tone seemed obvious.

 

“Yes sure, not a problem.” Ezekill replied

 

Yvonne smiled, she took his hand and bowed while holding. Ezekill was confused.

 

“Ah! Sorry it's a high elf tradition in showing respect!” she said.

 

“I see,” Ezekill smiled.

 

“See you tomorrow then,” she smiled back.