'Ah... I'm finally back in class again. It felt like forever since I were last here...'

After all, with everything that had happened lately, I haven't had to time to calm down and attend class just to sleep through it like I normally did.

CLANK—!

It was then that professor Ferden entered the class. She then shouted as soon as she got to the podium.

"Attention!"

With 50 pairs of eyes now staring at her, Anna cleared her throat before speaking up again.

"Everyone probably already know this considering the fact that you guys are still here in class, but summer vacation has already been delayed for a month"

Before anyone can voice out their dissatisfaction, however, Anna hurriedly continued.

"Don't worry too much. The faculty board has decided that the summer vacation will be extended to compensate for the month you had lost"

Instantly, the class broke into cheers.

After waiting for the students to calm down, Anna continued.

"And to compensate for recent incidents, the Avaron faculty board has unanimously agreed to take class 1-1 on a summer-long trip to the beach in duke Pyrian's territory"

"Of course, you can choose not to participate in it if you want to. We can't force you", she added.

Every students had an expression of immense joy on their face. The cheers were so loud this time around that I had to physically block my ears to prevent myself from going deaf.

'It's just the beach! Why do they have to be so excited about it? Well... it's understandable that they'd be excited'

After all, they were going to spend about 3 months on the most famous beach in the Empire, with Avaron covering all of the costs at that.

'If they're lucky, they'll get to see the Wall of Fog also'

"The vacation starts next week so you have until Saturday to decide whether you want to go or not", Anna shouted on the top of her lungs as she tried to be louder than the cheering students, but to no avail.

Scowling in frustration, she stomped out of the classroom immediately afterwards.

As I was about to just block off my hearing entirely and fall asleep, however, I saw Raun approaching me from the corner of my eyes.

'Dammit... right as I was about to sleep...'

"Ay Theodore!", Raun said as he slapped me on the back.

I massaged my back as I frowned at him in annoyance.

"What do you want?"

Already being overly used to my grumpiness, Raun didn't take my rude words to heart and continued.

"You're going to the beach, right?"

"...I'm not sure"

After all, I could be using the summer vacation to train and increase my strength instead of playing around on the beach.

Pausing my thoughts there, I glanced at Raun, who was looking at me with an expression of shock.

"Wh- What? What's more is there to think about? This is a huge opportunity!"

"How so?"

'Are there secret training places on the beach or something?'

The chances of that actually being the case were extremely low, as there were no mentions of such places in the novel.

And, as I had expected, Raun wasn't taking about training or increasing our power.

"Is that head of yours empty? Of course it's a good opportunity! Don't you want to see the pretty girls of our class in bikinis?", Raun suddenly shouted, garnering attention from the whole class.

-YEA, THAT'S RIGHT! YOU SPEAK OUR HEARTS, RAUN!

-WOOOOOOO! GIRLS IN SWIMSUITS

Raun then crossed his arms and lifted his chins up high in the air to indulge in the cheers.

His smug expression of pride soon turned into pain though, as Amelia quickly walked up to us and pulled on his ears.

"Ow! What are you doing?", Raun winced in pain.

Ignoring him, Amelia looked at me with a pleading gaze. "Please ignore him. If you become lecherous like this idiot like here, I'm afraid that Krista will be severely disappointed in you"

'No she won't'

I was fairly certain that Krista wouldn't care about what I did as long as I continued to be her brother, and Amelia must have known about it too.

'I guess she just doesn't want a second Raun to appear... I can relate to that'

However, I still couldn't help but to think about Raun's words.

'Should I just go...?'

After all, I was a 16-year-old boy. And like any other, I didn't want the memories of my youth to only be constant trainings.

'And... maybe Eleanor won't be able to protect the plotline alone there...'

Although this part of the novel was mainly... slice of life stuff, it still served to strengthen the bond between Arthur and his harem. Thus, it'd be bad if something went awry when I weren't there.

Before I could think about it any further, however, I saw Ria slowly approaching me with a [Soundproof sphere] in her hands.

BAM—!

"Oi Theodore", she slammed the sphere on the table as soon as she arrived before me.

After confirming that the sphere was working properly, she heaved a long sigh before staring straight into my eyes. "I don't like you, and I'm sure you don't like me either. So I'll make this quick"

"..."

"Noah told me that you saved Sylvia from the kidnappers... and he also told me to compensate you for the troubles you had to go through. So you can request me anything. Nothing too absurd though"

Although I was a bit confused by her sudden statement, I soon nodded my head in understanding.

'What the fuck...? Does every Ecertold have a kink for compensating people or something?'

My thoughts did hold some truths since Sylvia, Evanos, and now Noah had compensated me in one way or another.

Not that I was complaining though. After all, I had been looking for a reason to get Ria be indebted to me for a long time.

As such, I knew what I wanted to ask of her as soon as she finished her sentence.

"I want tickets to the upcoming auction in your father's territory"

"Huh?", Ria looked at me like I was some kind of fool. "You're a student of Avaron. Just show your insignia and the guards will let you in"

"Not that", I quickly shook my head. "Not the normal auction. I want tickets to the Wezardis auction"

"YOU!", she widened her eyes in shock. "HOW DO YOU KNOW ABOUT IT!?"

In response, I merely shrugged my shoulders.

Eventually, Ria calmed down and sighed. "Forget about it. If you had enough information gathering capabilities to figure out where Sylvia was held at even before the Nightcrawlers did, it's no surprise that you know about the Wezardis auction"

She then took out a unique-looking card from her Space pouch. "Here you go. You can invite up to 5 people to the auction using this card"

"..."

"Anything else?"

Judging by her tone of voice and the way she was glaring at me, I guessed that she really didn't want to deal with me any longer.

'Much as I want to infuriate her even further out of spite, doing so wouldn't be beneficial for me'

As such, I threw the card into [Alternate storage] and plopped down to my desk with a yawn. "Nothing. You can go now"

"Great!", her voice seemed a lot more cheerful than before as she quickly moved back to her seat right besides Sylvia.

'...Does she hate me that much? What did I even do to her?'

To be completely honest, I did kill her inside the dungeon, but dying once every few years is normal for Phoenixes, right?

It was then that I noticed Kasumi also moving towards the table.

'Seriously? Three people in the span of 5 minutes? What even is this?'

It also didn't help me that 2 of them were considered beauties in this class. Thus, I had to keep myself from breaking down in cold sweat when I felt gazes of jealously slowly falling on me.

After what felt like an eternity of me enduring piercing glares from the males students, Kasumi finally arrived at my table.

"State your business quickly and get out of here already. I don't want being torn to shreds by other students as soon as class is over"

Kasumi looked at me confusedly as if she didn't know what I meant. "Uh... okay? I'm just here to deliver something to you anyways"

She then took out a red book. "Her highness sends you this"

I took the book out of her hands and inspected it closely.

'Good... there aren't any traps...'

Although some might call me paranoid for checking for trap on a mere book, I knew better than to take my chances especially considering the fact that I had just threatened the Imperial princess with her life yesterday.

As I was about to look through the content, however, Kasumi suddenly spoke up again.

"This is just my personal request but... her highness stayed up all night to write this book for you. So you'd better treasure it"

It was lucky that Kasumi said this in a small voice. Otherwise, I was sure that the nobles in this class would have had no qualms killing me on the spot.

"So Eleanor pulled an all-nighter making this, huh?"

Kasumi made a surprised face at me calling Eleanor directly by her name, but I promptly ignored her.

'She does value her life after all...'

One of my biggest worries was that she had gone through so many regressions that she had become a crazy suicidal bitch that had no regards for her life. But now, it seemed that I was worried for nothing.

I then opened the book and inspected the contents.
...

After spending 10 minutes skimming through the book, I closed it, threw it into [Alternate storage] and smiled in satisfaction.

'Hehahaha! It was a good idea to make an alliance with her!'

What contained in the book was information regarding the second half of the second novel, or 'timeline' as our regressor liked to call it. 

'And this too! She's not a regressor for nothing!'

Not just that, there was also all the information I could have wanted on the current and future Void lords. And there was a section specifically dedicated to the current location and power levels of Void lords that actually had no impact on Arthur's growth. 

'Void Lord of Distance, Despair, and Jealousy! I can hunt them all right now and ransack all of their belongings without much risk!'

Before I could pat my past self on the back for having had the guts to threaten Eleanor with her true name, however, I noticed Max walking towards me in the corner of my eyes.

Being in a good mood, I turned to my side and faced him confidently.

"You're not even trying to hide the fact that you're a Halfling now, huh?"

'It's not more I can hide it anymore. And I don't need to wear sunglasses either since I had more of the same kind of lens I gave Sylvia'

Instead of actually voicing my thoughts out loud, however, I merely gave him a provocative smirk.

"What are you smiling for, filthy Halfling?", he scowled.

In response, I kept my smirk up while slowly infusing mana into my Eyes.

'Oh? He's still here? Guess he developed a resistance of some sort to my Eyes after being scared by them countless times', I looked at Max with intrigue as he still stood his ground despite very obviously shaking in fear right now.

Eventually, he managed to gather his courage and spoke up in a loud voice.

"I CHALLENGE YOU TO A DUEL, HALFLING!"

Of course, thanks to Max's extremely loud declaration, everyone were looking at us.

"Okay, I accept"

"HAH! LOOK, EVERYONE! THE HALFLING IS SCARED A— huh? What did you say?"

"I said that I accept your challenge"

Max hung his mouth open, clearly not expecting me to accept his duel as fast as I did.

'Well... he's not the only one that is surprised...'

After all, Arthur, Sylvia, Eleanor, Ria, Raun, Krista, and Amelia were all having the same shocked expression as Max.

Max, still having not recovered from his surprise, stuttered as he bolted out of the classroom. "O- Okay then, we'll fight after class in arena H-5!"

Instantly after Max left, Krista rushed up to me and put her hand on my forehead. Her blue eyes stared at me with concern.

"A- Are you okay? Your forehead is not hot so you're not sick... did he threaten you to accept the duel or something?"

"No... why are you reacting this way?", I looked at her confusedly.

"Oh my god you're possessed!", she shook my shoulders in despair. "The Theodore that tried his best to lay low, even to the point of asking me not to do anything when he was being bullied, is now accepting the duel from a son of a Marquis! GIVE ME BACK MY THEODORE!"

"Oh, that?", I patted her head reassuringly. "Don't worry too much. I haven't gone insane yet. Do you really think I'd accept his challenge without a plan?"

"I- Is that true?"

"Yes"

"Thanks god you're not wrong in the head!", Krista sighed in relief. "But what are you planning to do?"

"You'll see soon..."
...

Standing on the raised platform of arena H-5, I looked around the spectator stands.

'It's filled to the brim... Max's hell-bent on humiliating me, huh?'

'Speaking of Max...'

He was so insignificant in my eyes that I didn't even notice him trying to provoke me through trash talk for the past 5 minutes.

'Not that he actually can provoke me though'

I've learnt that the best way to not trigger my really short temper was just to view everyone weaker than me as mere insects.

"—I'll show everyone that you're just a fake! Fighting the <Ant's nest> dungeon boss alongside lady Ria? Hiding from the <Nightcrawlers> for almost 5 days? Nothing but flukes! I shall wipe the floor with you and make lady Sylvia pay attention to me!"

'I'm pretty sure Sylvia already had her eyes on you'

Not in a good way of course, as he was basically a stalker.

Max then continued giving speeches that basically told people that I was bad, and he was the good guy or whatever.

'Annoying...'

Enduring his speech was akin to watching an ant trying to crawl up my arms. It felt boring and fairly irritating, but ultimately harmless.

'I should just smash his face in right here— no, remember the plan!'

My plan was to fight Max for a bit and get defeated. It might sound like a stupid plan, but it would pay off hugely if I successfully pulled it off.

'Max would definitely lose all interests in me if I lose... and all the students that had been suspecting that I had been hiding my strength would be put off by my loss'

Pausing my thoughts there, I glanced at Max, who had just finished his speech.

'He really isn't taking this seriously huh?', I thought as I saw him arm himself with a long spear in each of his hands.

Although dual wielding spears looked somewhat cool, it was entirely impractical.

Sighing, I decided to use the weapon I was most familiar with: The longsword.

Seeing that we were both ready to fight, the referee signal for the fight to start.

"BEGIN!"

BAM—!

As soon as the fight started, Max kicked the ground with all of his strength and exploded towards me with his peak <E+> rank speed.

WOOOOOSH—!

A wooshing sound could be heard as Max's spears shot towards me.

In response to the potentially deadly attacks, however, I desperately tried to hold in my yawn and dodged them.

"HEHAHAHA! LET'S SEE HOW LONG YOU CAN KEEP THIS UP!", Max laughed maniacally

'Yeah no, I can do this all day'

To be completely honest, Max's strength and speed was impressive. Very few people could reach <E+> rank at the age of 16 like him.

'Well... sucks for him that Arthur's here though'

After all, Arthur and his harem's monstrous power had taken all the spotlight from him.

It was then that I noticed that I was doing something wrong.

'Ah that's right... I'll have to get hit to make it look convincing'

As such, I deliberately let him hit my forearm.

Spurt—!

Seeing that his attacks had connected, Max laughed loudly and then proceeded to increase the speed of his attack.

I, on the other hand, was frowning in frustration.

'He's even weaker than I thought... the wound isn't even that deep'

It was then that Max thrusted his spear towards me again. 

Taking this chance, I used my sword to block his strike while very discreetly using <[III - Roteare style]: release>.

Crack—! BOOM—!

With a loud boom, the blade of my sword exploded in half. The upper half of it was flung outside of the arena due to the immense force.

After a few more seconds, of blocking Max's slow— uh I mean fast attacks with what remained of my sword, I suddenly realized something.

'Ah, I should perhaps attack him back a bit'

<[F - Mana blood]>

Forming a blood blade on top of my broken sword, I jumped back a few meters and readied my stance.

'Let's lose in the most spectacular way possible, shall w—'

Before I could finish my thoughts, however, I caught something twinkling in the corner of my eye.

It was my broken blade shinning in the sunlight.

"SHINY!"

I kicked the ground and rushed at the blade with maximum speed.

"MINE! MINE! MINE! MINE!"

Not long after, I arrived before the blade. Picking it up, I held it in my chest as if it was the greatest treasure.

-Pfffft! HAHAHAHA! WHAT IS HE DOING?

-'SHINY!'! Pffft! What a fun way to give up!

Hearing jeers from above, I woke up from my trance.

'What the fuck did I just do...?'

In fact, this wasn't how I planned to lose, not by a long shot.

'Let's see... I saw the blade shinning and... oh...'

I realized that it was probably the dragon's treasure hoard instinct that made me act like a fool in front of everyone.

Due to me having higher concentration of draconic blood now, I couldn't just brush off the instinct like before.

'At least the plan worked?'

I wasn't sure if my loss was convincing enough, considering the fact that Max was nowhere to be seen when I turned around.

Sighing, I decided to focus on the problem at hand right now.

'I need to fix this, fast'

After all, if this was a real battle, I'd been dead many times over thanks to that ridiculous stunt that I was forced into doing.

Luckily though, I knew just who to ask for help.
***

Max stared at the filthy Halfling who was holding the broken blade in his hand like it was the most precious thing in the world with cold sweat trickling down his forehead.

"Wh- What's with that speed...!?"

Theodore was fast. So much so that he could have ended the battle any time he wanted by simply moving behind Max and knock him out.

"Th- That means..."

He was deliberately slowing himself down to match Max's speed.

It was then that Max's lackey came down to the arena to suck up to him.

"Young master! I knew you could do it!"

"That Halfling wasn't even a match for you!"

"Hahaha! Did you see how fast he ran away when he realized our young master's greatness?"

In response to the praises, however, Max merely ignored them and walked out of the arena with fast steps.

'It can't be... I was bested by this... this thing...?'

The fact that Theodore was basically toying with him before deliberately throwing the match in that ridiculous way made this fight Max's most humiliating moment.

"YOU INSIGNIFICANT FUCK!", he screamed on the top of his lungs as he snapped his head around to glare at Theodore.

However, his shout was drowned out my the spectators, who were all roaring with laughter.

"THIS IS NOT OVER!"

He then hurried back to his room and called the Necromancer that he had made contact with beforehand.

'Theodore Gray... I originally wanted to save this for Arthur but... it looks like you're a bigger threat than him!'
***

On the spectator stands, almost everyone were laughing at Theodore for his ridiculous way of ending the battle.

However, there were people who noticed his strange display of immense speed at the end.

And Lucy, the vampire, was one such people.

'He's fast!'

However, she soon discarded such thoughts from her mind.

'No, that's not important right now!'

She was much more interested in what Theodore did just before jumping off the arena: Willing his blood to form a sword.

'So I wasn't mistaken!'

She had suspected Theodore ever since she caught a whiff of the familiar scent of vampiric blood in him. And, during the Keras forest incident and this fight just now, he had displayed the ability to control his own blood.

Thus, she couldn't help but to smile widely in excitement. After all, if her guess was correct—

'I'LL HAVE ANOTHER BROTHER!'
***

"Are you sure you want to do this?"

"I'm sure", I nodded my head.

Sylvia, who had just asked the question, looked unsure if she should follow through with my request and train me on how to hold back my instincts. But eventually, she sighed and decided to do it anyways.

We arrived at training room, where no one ever uses for some reasons.

Well, mostly no one.

"What is she doing here?", I frowned as I saw Lucy sitting on a bench, apparently waiting for us.

"She said that she wanted to watch", Sylvia said as she drew a long line across the training ground using a chalk.

Although I found the presence of Lucy weird, I eventually just accepted it as it was.

"So", I asked as I saw Sylvia finishing drawing the line and moving towards me again. "What do we do?"

In response, she took out a blue rock and threw it to the other side of the line.

Woooosh—!

As the rock flew through the air, my eyes couldn't help but to be glued to it.

'Wh- What's this feeling?'

It was almost as if the rock was made just for me. 

'That's right! It's made for me. IT'S A PART OF ME! I HAVE TO GET IT BEFORE SOMEONE STEALS IT!'

As soon as I was about to rush towards the rock, however, Sylvia swept my leg and made me fall to the ground.

THUD—!

"Ow!", I lets out a wince of pain as I massaged my sore butt.

"That rock is one of the baits that old dragon hunters used to lure dragons into traps hundreds of years ago", Sylvia explained with complete disregard to my pain.

I, however, couldn't care less about her words. After all, the most precious thing in the world was right before my eyes.

BAM—!

I kicked the ground below me and shot towards the rock.

Sighing, Sylvia extended her hands towards me and chanted.

<[Ice wall]>

THUD—!

I crashed into the wall of Ice and fell to the ground with a thud.

<[Portal]>

The ground below me then distorted, before I was transported to right besides Sylvia before I even knew it.

Now blocking my view of the shiny rock, Sylvia spoke up again.

"You'll have to practice self-control. As soon as you cross that line, I'll beat you up and bring you over here again until you can fully control yourself. Now do you still want to continue with the training?"

With the rock now obscured from my view, my mind regained its clarity again.

'Scary...', I shuddered.

It wasn't just the fact that the rock practically controlled my mind that was frightening, as what Sylvia had just said was equally as frightening.

'Getting beat up by Sylvia... what is this masochistic training?'

"Is this the only way?"

In response, Sylvia sighed as she gave me an apologetic look. "Unfortunately, it's the only way. Every dragons in the Ecertold duchy has to go through this kind of training from a very young age"

"Alright then", I stood up as I braced myself for the beatings to come. "Guess I have no other choices"

Nodding, Sylvia stepped aside, giving me full view of the shiny rock again.

"MINE!", I immediately screamed and ran towards it at max speed.

As soon as I crossed the line, however—

<[V - Cosmomancy] - First circle: Empyrean starlight spears>

—Spears made of bright white Light fell from the sky and impaled the ground right in front of me.

Woooosh—!

Dozens more spears also fell in a circle around me, effectively trapping me.

I grabbed a spear by its shaft, wanting to break it to free myself. However—

Tssssssss—!

—I couldn't break the spear, and all I managed to achieve was getting my hands burnt.

<[Portal]>

It was then that the ground below me distorted again, and I appeared right besides Sylvia.

"What—"

Before I could even voice out my confusion, Sylvia raised her fist up and punched me in the face.

BAM—!

"Try harder to control yourself!"

"LIKE HELL I WILL!"

<[B - Ash veil]>

I covered the area around me in ash, obscuring Sylvia's view of me.

'Let's see if you can stop me now!'

I lumped ashes together, creating 5 different vaguely humanoid figure. I then took out the grimoire and infused my mana into it, making the humanoid ashes look exactly like me.

Dispersing the veil of ash, I commanded the humanoids to simultaneously run towards the rock with me.

However—

<[Sprinkler]>

BAM—!

—I suddenly felt something hard hit against my head.

The impact took me off balance, and I fell to the ground.

Confused, I glanced around, only to find Sylvia sitting on my back with her fists bloodied.

"H- How did you know where I was?"

Sylvia ignored my question and healed me with her Water magic.

It was then that I noticed little droplets of water falling from the ceiling, making it look as if there was rain inside the training room.

And my, well, ash clones, they were flailing on the ground with their heads half-gone.

'I- Is [B - Ash veil]'s weakness water?'

That did make sense. After all, I soon found out that I wasn't able to will wet ashes.

"Again. We will do this until you can control yourself!", Sylvia shouted, snapping me out of my thoughts.

'Right... I'm supposed to train...'
...

I stared at the shiny rock nervously, desperately trying to keep myself from lunging at it.

I then glanced at Sylvia for her movements, but she was standing still like always.

As I was about to move, however, memories of me being beaten up for the last several hours surfaced in my mind. Those painful memories made me freeze on the spot in fright, not daring to move even a muscle.

After 30 more minutes of me holding myself back, Sylvia finally walked towards me with a smile.

"Congratulation. You passed—"

"AH! DON'T HURT ME!", I covered myself defensively as soon as Sylvia moved.

Sighing, she walked past me and collected the rock.

"Anyways, your training is done. The pain is now engraved in your body so whenever you feel yourself losing control, think of... me beating you up today...", she said with a somewhat dejected voice.

'FINALLY! IT'S OVER!', I sighed in relief.

I never wanted to do anything like this ever again. If it wasn't for the need to correct the really annoying instinct, I'd have never even asked her to train me in the first place.

Before I could celebrate out loud though, I noticed Lucy walking towards me.

'Right... I forgot that she was watching us...'

"What are you doing?", I asked in confusion as she lifted my arm up and scraped the blood off it.

Ignoring my question, she took out a vial of blood from her pocket and chanted.

<[Blood resonance]>

Instantly, both my blood and the blood in the vial glowed green for a few seconds, before they evaporated completely.

"..."

"..."

"What the fuck was that?"

Before I could take in this absurd situation, however, Lucy threw the empty vial to the ground and clung to my arm like a Koala.

"I KNEW IT! YOU WERE MY BROTHER AFTER ALL!"

'Brother...? Don't tell me...!'

"L- Lucy...", I stuttered as I looked at her with a horrified expression. "...Th- That blood! Is it—"

"YES!", she screamed, interrupting me. "IT'S FATHER'S BLOOD! YOU'RE REALLY MY BROTHER! YAY!"

In contrast to the cheering Lucy, I was absolutely horrified.

All the colors were drained from my face as cold sweat trickled down my forehead.

'Shit! Shit! Shit! SHIT! WHY HIM!? WHY THE DID HE EVEN BOTHER TO FUCK MY MOTHER?'

What Lucy did had just confirmed that duke Alucard Fertilus was... my father.

Although some might be overjoyed that their biological father was one of the Great dukes, I wasn't. Especially not when I knew what his ideologies were.

'He despises mixed blood... I'll definitely be dead if he finds out about me!'

As such, I stared at Lucy, who were still rubbing her face on my arm, with a wary gaze.

"Fine, you got me good. What do you want?"

After all, there was no way she didn't know what her father did with his non-pureblooded children.

'She definitely wants something from me!'

In response to my question, however, Lucy just tilted her head in confusion. "What do you mean? Why would I want something other than love and affection from my brother?"

'She's not lying...?', I thought as I studied her... extremely innocent expression.

It was then that I remembered what her personality was like.

'Ah of course... she has the mental age of a 8-year-old child when she's not in battle'

Thus, I knew what to do with her.

"Lucy, hear me out, will you?"

"Sure!"

"Can you keep the fact that I'm your brother a secret?"

"Huh? Why?"

Sighing, I continued. "I need time to... prepare a surprise for our father. It will take a few years but it'll definitely be way more fun if he doesn't know about it!"

Lucy nodded her head fervently at my words. "Got it! I'm looking forward to your surprise!"

She then ran out of the room with a wide smile on her face for whatever reason.

Sylvia, whose presence I have forgotten about until now, approached me with a worried expression.

"There's no surprise, is there?"

Sighing, I nodded. "Yep. I just don't want to be killed right now"

"I see..."

Staying in awkward silence for a while, I spoke up again. "Will you also keep it a secret?"

"I will"
...

A day had passed since the extremely masochistic training I went through and the... disturbing information that Lucy had given me.

It was after class, and I was on the couch, pretending to be asleep, while Sylvia was sitting on the floor and infusing her mana into the egg like always.

After a few hours though, I was startled by Sylvia's loud shout.

"THE EGG! SHE'S HATCHING!"

I instantly stood up and marched towards where she was.

'Finally! It has been months since I've gotten the egg. I hope that having a Wyvern is as worth it as how Lyra made it out to be'

Cra— Crack—!

The egg slowly hatched open, with cracks forming on its previously smooth and shiny surface.

Sylvia watched the egg cracking with shinning eyes full of anticipation. 

Meanwhile, I was starting to get impatient.

"This is taking too long. I'll just crack the egg myself—"

"No!", Sylvia shouted. "It'll be bad for her if she don't come out of the egg by itself!"

"How so?"

"Well...", Sylvia looked flustered for some reasons. "...I'm not sure myself but that's just how it is"

For whatever reasons, I decided to accept her extremely lackluster explanation and stood in my place as I agonizingly waited for the Wyvern to break out of its egg.

Thud—!

After a few more minutes, a large white fragment of the egg fell to the ground.

"Sh- She's here!"

Immediately after Sylvia finished her sentence, the entire egg crumbled into pieces.

However, what I was laying my eyes on wasn't a small reptile like I had expected. Instead—

"Wh- What? Is she not a Wyvern...? But she's cute!", Sylvia squealed with twinkling eyes.

—It was a little girl, around 3 years of age. She had silver-white hair like Sylvia's, and gray eyes like mine. There were scaly wings protruding from her back. She also had a scaly tail, but instead of it being a dragon's, her tail were slightly longer, with a stinger like that of a Wyvern's attached to its end.

With shaky steps, Sylvia slowly approached the girl and caressed her hair as if she was a mother caring for her child.

"Glacia..."

The girl— no, the Wyvern shuddered in surprise as soon as it felt Sylvia's touch.

"Ah! Glacia, don't be scared! I won't harm you!"

Slowly sitting up, it rubbed its eyes a few times before alternating its gaze between Sylvia and me with a childish smile on its face.

It was then that I finally recovered from my surprise. Coldly staring at the Wyvern before me, I slowly picked <Distorias> up from the table.

"Awwww! Look, Theodore! Isn't she cute—"

<The second movement of [V - World splitter]: Rupturing thrust>