“Where’s who?”

As the man asked his wife that question, one of the three pairs of shoes on the shoe rack behind him, slowly began disappearing, from the toplines down to the soles.

“This guy!”

Seeing the lost expression on his face, the platinum blonde-haired woman’s brow twitched in annoyance, however, the man only placed his hand on his chin before asking.

“Is there anyone else living with us here?”

“Obviously Not. We’ve been alone in this house since we got married seventeen years ago, now quit your bullshit and go take a bath.

Your stink!”

After saying her piece, she stormed off in anger, leaving behind her husband who began to sniff himself to see if he really did stink.

“But I’m not?”

He shook his head and was about to take a step forward when he suddenly felt like something was out of place.

He hurriedly turned and looked around but he saw nothing wrong, however, when his gaze fell on the shoe rack, that strange feeling intensified.

The man took a few steps down the corridor and peeked into the kitchen, confirming his wife was still occupied cooking, before running back to the foyer.

He took a deep breath before gathering a small amount of magic power into his eyes and gazed at the shoe rack; however, he still didn’t notice exactly what was wrong.

‘Maybe If I backtrack...’

As he had that thought, his eyes glowed blue and six rings of similar coloured light appeared around his wrist which he slowly rose and pointed towards the shoe rack.

‘Tim-!’

“Oy! Idiot husband! What are you still doing there?”

His body shook as he heard his wife’s voice and hurriedly turned around, however, it seemed that she was still just shouting at him from inside the kitchen, so he quickly made up an excuse and dispersed the magic power he had gathered.

‘I’d check later.’

The glow in his eyes dimmed and the rings of light on his wrist vanished as he ran towards the kitchen and shouted to his wife.

“Add more chicken for me. And marinate it too!”

“This sword-loving idiot! Do you think it is easy to prepare that on such short notice?”

Although she said that, her hands were already moving to open the fridge and take out another pack of chicken, an action that made the man smile upon seeing it.

While this was happening, the third bunch of keys on the key rack, slowly began disappearing, just like the shoes had done, however, the man was too engrossed in his conversation with his wife to notice.

By the time he had been kicked out of the kitchen by her, the keys had already disappeared completely.

“Fried chicken with Mac and Cheese 🎶”

As he walked up the stairs while singing that strange song, the ambient magic power around him fluctuated slightly and a blue glow flashed in his eyes.

*TICK! TOCK!

The sound of a clock ticking signified the activation of an ability; however, the man went back to his daily life, none the wiser.

ꕥ ꕥ ꕥ

Knight’s Training Ground

Eris Main Residence, Gerfast

Great Western Empire

August 5th

Year 1050

Evan.

“Tier Two Magic: Lightning spear.”

Although she had no need to call out the name of the spell, to increase the chances of success of their plan, she still did so.

Lightning emerged from Laurene’s right arm and flowed down to her staff, it then increased in intensity before being fired at Evan.

*BOOM!!

It exploded without a loud roar, hitting Evan who was concentrating on defending against the Magic Bullets.

The lightning bolt could turn a small-sized tree into charcoal almost instantly, and it was twice as strong as what a level 10 mage was supposed to be able to cast.

Some of the sand on the ground melted and lost its crystalline nature from the blow, causing the people watching to have strange expressions on their faces.

‘These kids are less than level twenty, right?’

It was then that the voice of one of the knights who was quite well versed with magic rang out in surprise.

“That’s a tier two spell! Something only level 35 and above should be able to use!!”

The two rings that surrounded Laurene’s spell circles were irrefutable proof of the fact that she just used magic meant for those who were 25 levels higher than her.

‘Loved by Mana, was it?’

Those were Evan’s thoughts as he walked out from the epicentre of the attack. Although his shirt looked like a mess, he didn’t have any injuries whatsoever.

Laurene had expected this, after all, even if he was currently weak, he would not be qualified to be the leader of the seven heroes if a single tier two spell could take him down for the count.

Looking closely, a thin layer of white light could be seen surrounding Evan’s body.

Without giving Laurene any chance to cool down after using her magic, he kicked off the ground and dashed towards her.

**SWISH!! CLANGG!!

The princess didn’t back down and met his incoming slash with her staff. She didn’t even attempt a contest of strength as she was aware that she would undoubtedly lose, so she tilted her staff and let his blade slide off.

Evan quickly pulled back his sword and struck again, making consecutive slashes while twisting his body and his sword in a smooth flowing fashion.

He delivered multiple blows simultaneously, with Laurene displaying amazing staff skills in blocking his blows, but in the end, she was a mage, one who was half Evan’s level.

Defending against his attacks for long was not possible for her.

In fact, the only reason she had been able to block his consecutive slashes was because he held back his strength. This was an ‘exhibition match’, as such, it would defeat the point if he overwhelmed her quickly.

After all, the goal of this duel was not for either of them to win, but for them to showcase a bit of their battle prowess.

She took advantage of the small lapse in between strikes and ducked out of the path of his sword, before rolling backwards to avoid the reverse slash that came afterwards.

Hurriedly standing up, she shook her hair to remove the sand that got on it before raising her hand towards Evan.

Since her ‘cooldown’ was over, she fired a few magic bullets of varying elements to distract Evan, bullets which he blocked with relative ease.

The princess didn’t even blink as she tossed her staff into her outstretched hand and activated another spell, one that allowed her to magically focus the might of the formless wind around her staff.

“Wind Storm.”

A green two-ringed magic circle manifested in front of the staff before a miniature whirlwind spiralled towards Evan.

“Have some of this too.”

With her free arm, she generated a ball of flames which she tossed into the whirlwind, giving it a red hue as the flame-infused whirlwind shot towards her opponent.

 Evan, however, simply tossed his sword into his left hand and stretched out his right hand towards the incoming whirlwind.

Just when the spectators were wondering what he was planning, a green magic circle manifested in front of his outstretched hand, and an exact copy of the one Laurene just generated.

From it, a similar but slightly smaller whirlwind shot out towards the incoming spell, colliding with it halfway as the two spells began tossing and turning at each other.

Evan’s spell was slightly weaker, but he couldn’t care less as he flipped into the air, and while upside down, tossed two more wind blades towards Laurene, before landing back on the ground.

The thin layer of light on his body glowed a bit brighter, causing the Duke who arrived with the Emperor to notice it.

‘He’s awakened to paladin?’

That was the bloodline skill of the Del Eris Family, Paladin.

It gave the user basic strength and defensive boosts, alongside the effect of amplifying the power of each attack done by a sword. The amplification increased exponentially on each consecutive attack.

The sword in Evan’s hand began glowing slightly, as he landed on the ground and immediately released an arching slash upwards.

Since Laurene was distracted by the wind blades he tossed at her, he expected her to get caught off guard by his sudden attack, however, his sword was met with unexpected resistance.

‘Huh?’

The sound of glass shattering rang out as his sword broke through a thin translucent barrier of magic, slowing the speed of his slash and giving Laurene enough time to turn around after controlling what was left of the whirlwind to clash with the wind blades and block his slash with her staff.

His eyes narrowed as he pulled his sword back before immediately striking out again, his blade moving like a whip several times, with the sword’s acceleration creating afterimages.

**PITT!

Blood splattered out.

Even with the help of her high perception, it was still difficult for Laurene to completely grasp the movements of someone with an agility stat that was an entire Rank above hers.

So naturally, injuries were unavoidable.

Although Evan had swung from a distance which the sword could not reach Laurene, a line of blood was still drawn on Laurene’s cheek.

Upon seeing his daughter get injured, the Emperor was incensed, however, he didn’t rashly try to break up the fight as that would be detrimental, given the power gap between him and the two young heroes.

The degree of strength control required to break up the fight without either harming them or causing them to receive backlash due to their interrupted spells or techniques was not exactly something the current him who wasn’t calm, was confident in.

He had already given the word for the Captain of the Imperial guard who had come over to the Duke’s residence with him, to be summoned to handle it instead.

As for the Duke’s knights, Evan had given them orders not to interfere and they were not going to unless the Duke himself said otherwise.

Besides, if anyone of them interfered and caused any of the two to be injured, they would not be able to bear the responsibility for such an action.

Meanwhile, Evan continued swinging his sword wildly, moving the blade in a curved fashion like a whip.

‘Indeed, this technique…!’

A look of recognition flashed through Laurene’s eyes upon seeing this. That was natural, as it was one of the previous ‘Second’s’ favourite techniques.

Although she tried to pull back multiple times, Evan did not let her, closing the distance immediately and delivering another whip-like slash.

She instantly deployed a magic shield with lightning magic, blocking the slash, but sadly, it was not a technique that ended in one or two hits.

It was faster than her earlier lightning magic bullets, with the blade’s line of movement proving difficult to read.

It was something that some knight apprentices would find troublesome, much less a level 10 mage like her.

**PINGGG!!!

The lightning magic barrier was pierced like a piece of cloth, as Evan utilized a single-point attack to break through the shield that thinned due to spreading out over a large area.

‘Blocking is impossible, avoiding is the only way.’

She moved her magic power inside her body and activated body-strengthening magic, planning to jump out of Evan’s range, however, it was at this time that the young hero finally decided to bring things to a close.

He made a signal with his right hand, something Laurene caught at the corner of her eyes as the light attacks he was delivering with half his strength turned heavy.

“Firestorm!”

Laurene decided to make things flashy, casting another tier two spell, one that created a small storm of flames, making Evan instinctively back away for fear of being burnt.

‘Well, that’s it with magic. Casting multiple tier-two spells, although at reduced potency, was a bit too much for me.

But that should be enough to show off.’

Those were her thoughts as she moved her fingers around and manipulated her energy, an energy that wasn’t magic.

When the firestorm died down, Evan charged forward at a faster speed than before, his sword glowing brighter as he poured magic power into the blade.

The calm look on Laurene’s face showed she had some sort of trump card she hadn’t used, but that wasn’t enough to make Evan back away.

As soon as he got in range, she instantly took action, unleashing her trump card on Evan.

“Holy Spear.”

A divine spell was cast, one that made use of a different energy type; Divinity, not magic.

The National Religion of the Great Western Empire was the ‘Church of Artemisia’, one that served the goddess with the same name, Artemisia.

They had claimed the princess was a candidate for the position of ‘saint’ and was to be sent to the church for training once.

Although the Emperor denied their claims, they still stood their ground.

This was the reason why.

The princess possessed the ability to use a limited amount of Divinity, an energy type higher than the holy magic majority of the church always used, one that only very few bishops and cardinals were able to use.

Her attack was supposed to be strong enough to break through the defences offered by Evan’s paladin skill and damage him greatly, however, for some reason Evan felt he could block it without problems.

And that he did.

Although the spear hit him directly in the chest, he took no damage whatsoever much to Laurene’s surprise. Furthermore, the princess suddenly lost strength in her legs and dropped to the ground.

Looking up, she saw Evan’s sword placed right under her chin.

“I win.”

He smiled lightly as he pulled his sword back and stretched out his hand to help her up. He quickly used the paladin skill’s limited healing ability to heal the cut on her face.

This was because the Emperor was already storming over angrily with the Duke and imperial guard captain in tow.