Chapters 73-76 Revised (Patreon)

Well, I was surprised for the reaction when I mentioned I had decided to cut Chapter 73.  Every piece of feedback I got back about that decision was that I should leave it in, and I mean every bit of feedback.  It was unanimous.  Caught me off-guard.

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Chapter 73, The Pool

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The events of the first two days in the Academy set the precedent for the next few days. In the morning, Leon would wake early and meditate to mentally prepare himself for the day. Following that, he would meet up with his three ‘friends’ Charles, Henry, and Alain.

He wasn’t quite sure if he should use the term ‘friend’, but he decided to go with it for now as he lacked a better word. He never had a friend before, after all, so this was all new to him.

The unit would run to the training field for their Basic Combat lesson when the Senior Instructor arrived. Breakfast would be waiting for them, as would several hours of practicing basic stabs and slashes.

Leon, Castor, and Alphonsus would split off to join the other third-tier trainees in their sparring, gaining some experience in fighting other people, but for the most part, the third-tier trainees spent the lion’s share of their time talking and networking with each other. They were competitors in the Knight Academy, but the seizure of each other’s banners was just a game to them; they’d eventually move on from the Knight Academy, and the Instructors couldn’t let them develop rivalries that might lead to violence.

Of course, preventing harsh feelings wasn’t always feasible, but letting the young nobles spend time with each other and make friends amongst themselves went a long way toward mitigating that.

Leon, however, participated very little in these things, and the other nobles weren’t in much of a hurry to break that pattern. About all he did during the next few days of Basic Combat was spar with Valeria.

Valeria beat him the next day. She strode right up as the first challenger and pointed a long glaive at Leon, a challenge he was only too happy to accept. Unfortunately for him, after several minutes of back and forth strikes that left many of the other nobles with the conviction to never fight either of them one-on-one, Valeria got the upper-hand when she managed to sweep out one of his legs and followed up with a slash across his chest.

The defeat hurt, but it was almost entirely physical; once he regained feeling in his upper body, Leon held no grudges, and even exchanged a few subtle looks with her that promised more duels.

Sure enough, on the fourth day, Leon and Valeria fought again, to the dismay of both Alcander and Gaius. Leon beat her again, only to then lose to her on the fifth day, keeping their overall score even.

In the afternoon classes, Valeria continued to sit next to him, but neither spoke to each other all that much. Thing were still a little bit awkward between them, with Leon unsure of how to start a conversation, and Valeria seemingly paying him not much attention.

But, at the very least, this gave Leon time to work on his meager enchanting skills. The Instructor who taught the class only had them repetitively drawing and redrawing the seven basic elemental runes over and over again, refusing to let them stop until they could all draw them perfectly every single time.

Since this was essentially the only real enchanting experience that Leon had, it as a bit boring, but he counted himself lucky that he had at least that much; several of the second-tier nobles had clearly never drawn a rune before, perhaps coming to these classes simply because on the of the third-tier nobles they followed had done so. The class Instructor was noble-born, himself, so he felt no shame or fear in verbally chastising them for their lack of skill or motivation.

From what he could tell, Valeria could draw them perfectly every time without exception, and with such natural grace that he couldn’t help but marvel at her obvious skill. She seemed just as bored as he was with the class, but he still wasn’t able to strike up a conversation with her.

During these few days, Leon caught Gaius giving him some strange looks; some hostile, some just strange. Almost anticipatory. They creeped him out more than a little, but given how handily Leon had beaten Gaius during their spar in the Enrollment Test, he wasn’t too worried. If Gaius tried to follow through with his threats warning Leon to stay away from Valeria, then Leon was more than confident he could handle the noble again.

Following dinner, Leon got into the habit of providing some supplemental instruction for his three comrades. They would practice what they learned throughout the day, though there wasn’t any sparring like when Leon was instructing Charles before the enrollment test. When not watching them and giving some critique or training on his own, Leon would concentrate on inundating his brain and organs with mana.

It was a fine routine, but the weekend changed all of it. The Academy gave them the weekends off and even provided a small weekly stipend of one hundred silvers to each first-tier trainee, five hundred to the second-tier trainees, and two thousand to the third-tier trainees, so everyone had plenty of money to play around with, assuming they didn’t have expensive tastes.

Henry, Charles, and Alain made plans to wander around the city visiting various merchant forums and spending some of that money. They invited Leon to join them, but he declined. Over the past few months, he’d been spending almost all of his time with other people, and he found himself craving not only some time alone, but also some time outside of a city. To that end, when the Snow Lions was finally released for their weekend by their Senior Instructor, instead of following everyone else out of their barrack tower and toward the city, Leon turned around and vanished into the forest.

The surrounding forest wasn’t nearly as beautiful as the Forest of Black and White which, despite its name, was actually awash with a wide gradient of bright and vibrant colors. The forest Leon found himself in was mostly just the greens and browns that could be seen in just about every other forest, with only the occasional wild flower to break the monotony.

Despite this, Leon found the forest to be incredibly peaceful and relaxing. Unlike where he grew up, he didn’t need to rely on Artorias to feel safe here. He didn’t need to keep alert for tree sprites, the occasional streams he encountered weren’t filled with river nymphs, and there was no danger of running into ice wraiths no matter how late he stayed outside.

The environment still reminded him of his father and their home back north, though. Leon frowned for a little while before he managed to push it out of his mind.

He wandered around the forest for almost an hour before finding a place to relax. He had followed a small river upstream until he arrived at a huge rock cliff. This was the border between the forest and the artificial mountains created by a great many earth mages over a number of years in the west of the training grounds. The river flowed from a waterfall that had carved a wide recess in the cliff and left a small pool at the bottom.

This recess at the bottom was quite a bit wider at the bottom than it was at the top; Leon guessed an earth mage must have cut this extra space out from the cliff.

As he explored this place, Leon felt a profound sense of seclusion and isolation. The cliff boxed the pool in on three sides and the bottle-necking of the chasm created by the river and the forest just beyond obscured much of the fourth side. After spending so much time around other people, a place like this was exactly what he needed.

Further reinforcing his theory that this entire recess in the cliffs had been deliberately made, on the wall behind the waterfall, Leon found a small, raised tablet inscribed with three runic circles. They didn’t seem dangerous as far as he could tell, so out of curiosity, he activated one of them. Immediately, he felt the ambient magic in the area flow into the pool, and the water became as clear and pure as his bath back at the Snow Lion’s tower.

Leon smiled in excitement as he activated the second runic circle. Again, he felt the magic in his surroundings flow into the pool, though he didn’t see anything happen immediately. After a minute of slight confusion, he noticed that the pool had begun to steam like a hot bath or hot spring.

He hurriedly activated the last runic circle. Over the course of ten seconds, the roar of the waterfall died down. Nothing else about the waterfall changed, but the loud noise of the water falling off the cliff and hitting the pool had been silenced.

He put his satchel down and began taking off his clothes. He hesitated a little before removing his pants. He had always bathed outside when he lived in the Vales, but this time was a little different, and he couldn’t help but be nervous that someone might come and see him while he was vulnerable. After a few moments, he decided to at least not to remove his undergarments, then slid into the pool—his fears weren’t going to stop him from relaxing as much as he could while he was here.

The water was hot, but not unbearably so. A mortal might have been a little uncomfortable by the temperature, but Leon enjoyed it immensely. He spent the next few minutes happily swimming around, letting all of the tensions and anxieties that had accumulated over the past week and the months before just melt away.

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“Ooooooh, this is going to be sooo relaxing!” said Asiya. She and Valeria were walking along the base of a cliff while carrying a couple of small packs. They were following the directions that one of the knights serving Asiya’s parents had given them that directed them directly to the pool that Leon had stumbled upon.

“I’m sure it will be, but why did you have to bring me along?” asked Valeria, her face twisting slightly in exasperation.

“I couldn’t leave you all alone in that tower! You need to get out and see the sun! Besides, if anyone needs some time to relax, it’s you. Those morning duels you have with… what was his name again?”

“Leon.”

“Right! That guy! You two go at each other like you’re out for blood! That has to be tiring! Ancestors know that I would killfor a good soak in a place like this if I had to do what the two of you did every day!”

“… Well, I must admit that it has been thrilling. It’s rare to find someone who can fight me on equal terms without being older or closer to the fourth-tier…” Valeria looked a little pensive as she said this, staring out into the forest but not actually looking at anything. Asiya didn’t care to hear it, though, as her beautiful face scrunched up in mock anger.

“So training with me isn’t thrilling?”

“It is!” Valeria said emphatically after realizing how insulting what she said could be.

“But not as much as with that ‘Leon’ guy?”

Valeria frowned a bit before answering. “You two have very different fighting styles.  His is almost animalistic, completely forgoing defense. I’ve never fought anyone like that before. It’s very hard to attack him when he’s constantly putting pressure on me.”

“But you have beaten him twice…”

Valeria’s frown turned into a smile of pride.

“Do you liiiike him?”

Valeria’s face froze in shock at her friend’s question and teasing expression. Asiya smiled mischievously at her. She knew Valeria was weak to this kind of question, with the only exception being if she truly hatedthe person they were talking about, which was quite rare.

“Ooooh? You do, don’t you?” Asiya stared at her friend as best as she could as they walked at the base of the cliff, her impish smile teasing her friend almost as much as her words.

“No!” Valeria replied, though she wasn’t too convincing.

“That seems a little too emphatic… are you suuure?”

“I don’t likehim! Besides, I think Elise already has her eye on him.”

“Right, she does, doesn’t she…” For a moment, Asiya looked thoughtful, then she began looking around. “It should be around here somewhere. It’s at the bottom of a waterfall, so we should be able to hear it.”

“Hey, look at that!” Valeria pointed several hundred feet further on. The two women could see mist wafting out from the cliff and the small river flowing out from the fissure in the cliff.

“Is someone already there? I didn’t think anyone would know about this place! Let’s go see who it is!” Asiya darted out and made for the pool.

“No wai-“ Valeria tried to stop her, but Asiya had already taken off. She sighed and ran after her friend.

The two women curiously peeked around the corner when they arrived at the recess in the cliff. Leon was no longer swimming, but had taken to reading some of his books by the edge of the pool. Asiya’s eyes widened in excitement when she saw that he was almost naked, but Valeria’s face immediately went scarlet and she ducked back around the corner.

Asiya hardly noticed Valeria’s reaction; she was far too busy checking out Leon’s fit and muscular body. It was clear to her that the physical benefits of magic were not wasted on Leon. She was only jolted back to reality when Valeria pulled her back.

“What are you doing?!” Valeria had to hold herself back from shouting, but Asiya would’ve had to be deaf to miss her disapproving tone.

“I’m only taking a look. I’ve never seen a guy without clothes before. Besides, it’s not like he’s trying to hide, so why shouldn’t I enjoy the view?” Asiya peeked back around the corner just in time to see Leon lean back, putting his taut chest and abs on display. Asiya’s eyes nearly popped out of her head as she took in the sight.

Valeria pulled Asiya back again. “Stop that! You shouldn’t be so crude!”

“Oh, come on, Val! Don’t tell me you’re not curious too? Don’t you want to see what he’s got? I mean, he’s not the most handsome guy ever, but he’s still pretty cute. And being a third-tier mage doesn’t hurt…” Asiya gave Valeria a lecherous smile and went back to stealthily peeking around the corner of the recess at Leon.

Valeria stared at Asiya in disbelief. She’d known Asiya for years, but her bronze-skinned friend was still finding ways to surprise her with her bold and almost shameless actions. But Valeria found her eyes drawn to the corner, just past which lay a fit third-tier mage practically putting himself on display. She tried to banish her lascivious thoughts, but the quick glance she’d already had at Leon was stuck in her mind.

Valeria quietly sighed and slowly joined Asiya in furtively staring at Leon. When Asiya saw what Valeria was doing, she giggled and pulled back a little, making some room for her friend. She gave Valeria a few seconds to get an eyeful before loudly whistling.

Valeria immediately jerked her head back and glared at a grinning Asiya. Leon had thought he’d misheard for a moment before looking in their direction, so he didn’t see either one of them.

“You bitch,” whispered Valeria to Asiya, who could barely hold in her laughter. “Come on, we’re leaving.” She grabbed Asiya’s arm and almost dragged her away.

Leon, being on edge after hearing Asiya’s whistle, heard the two of them leaving from the rustling of the leaves under their feet, but by the time he had hurriedly dressed himself and went out to see what was going on, they were long gone.

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Chapter 74 - A Battered Pride

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That Saturday was a bright and beautiful day, perfect for exploring the city and seeing the sights. The weather in the capital was perfect and the forums, pools, and bathhouses were crowded with the city’s occupants. The many parks, bars, and restaurants were just as packed.

Most of the third-tier trainees who had taken their time off to venture into the city didn’t see any of this, though. A few of the nobles had estates in the capital, so that was where they spent their time, but Gaius and Tiberias—though possessing large estates—weren’t among them. They and about twenty other third-tier trainees were relaxing in the lavish lounge on the first floor of the Heaven’s Eye Tower.

There were a couple hundred other nobles, knights, and public officials who were in the lounge as well, so none of the trainees stood out.

Gaius and one of the other nobles in his and Leon’s cycle, a young man named Tiberias, were sitting in a private booth together, though the curtains were pulled back to let everyone else in the lounge see the two young noblemen talking. Gaius had come here alone, but when he’d arrived, Tiberias had already been there, so he’d gone over to chat with his fellow nobleman. Tiberias was, like him, a son of a Duke, but unlike Gaius, he was his father’s heir, meaning that someday, he’d be one of the most powerful and influential nobles in the entire realm. Gaius would probably be relegated to managing some of his family’s affairs or a career in the Royal Legions since he had two older brothers.

Still, Tiberias warmly welcomed him when he walked over, and the two spent a significant amount of time chatting away. Tiberias was the leader of the Black Vipers, and with Gaius as the leader of the Deathbringers, they were technically opposed to each other, but they didn’t let that stop them from being friendly to each other. The game at the Knight Academy would end at the conclusion of their training cycle, while their relationship as nobles could last their entire lives.

“… and then he woke up with his entire face covered in it! I think he still smells like her to this day!” Gaius narrated, a wide smile on his face as he told a story from his childhood in his family’s home Duchy of Lentia. “Let me tell you, my brother was furious. Many of his personal magical accessories had been stolen while he’d slept, and he wanted them back. He searched Lentia up and down for that woman, but he never found her again.”

Tiberias politely chuckled and said, “I can’t believe Gratian did something like that! Surely he knew that that woman only wanted him for his money! That’s what all commoners want from us!”

“I know, but my father understood why he couldn’t resist. He bemoaned the tendency for young men to chase a pretty face without thought for station, but Gratian wasn’t even punished. My father even hired a new pretty maid to replace the one that stole from Gratian, and to my knowledge, Gratian never touched her.”

Tiberias chuckled again, his noble and handsome face turned up in a genuine smile, his brown hair styled to perfection—not too long, not too short, with a slight parting in the center—and his clothes pulled tight across his lithe and densely-muscled body. He wasn’t nearly as muscular as many other mages, but he still had a body that hinted at a great deal of physical power contained within him.

“These commoners, I swear,” he said. “I suppose they’re good for a little bit of fun now and then, but it’s always frustrating when they get ideas about what’s rightfully ours… Speaking of which, you have your own business with that one barbarian, don’t you?”

Gaius’ smile froze on his face, but he carefully kept it up, unwilling to show any weakness here, in the lounge of the Heaven’s Eye Tower, where all the most powerful men and women of the realm could see him and Tiberias. He then took a second to force himself to relax enough to reply, and said, “Yes, I have some business with him. In fact, I’ve gotten some of the weaker trainees in my unit to take care of a little bit of that business today, and all it took was a handful of silvers each. The barbarian may think himself invincible, and he’s certainly skilled enough with the blade and strong enough in the magical arts to make retaliation… problematic without tarnishing my reputation, but his friends are not.”

“Ahh, a good strategy,” Tiberias whispered in thought. “Commoners and peasants will always sell each other out for the promise of a few coins. If those baseborn bastards have even half a brain in their skulls—a dangerous assumption on my part to make, but for the sake of argument…—this should show them exactly why being friends with such an uncouth savage is such a bad idea. Friends of savages tend not to live long…”

Tiberias trailed off as he finished his statement, his eyes drawn by something over by the door. When Gaius turned his head to look, he saw that one of the most beautiful women he’d ever seen had just walked in. Her hair was long and fire red; her body tall, athletic, and bearing a perfect hourglass shape; her piercing green eyes glittering with intelligence on her flawless heart-shaped face; her bearing proud and commanding, causing nearly every eye in the lounge to follow Gaius and Tiberias’ example as she confidently strode toward the back of the lounge where the magical lifts awaited her. She barely looked at anyone, but those she did spare a glance received a warm smile and a nod of appreciation.

“Who… is that?” Gaius wondered aloud, being unfamiliar with the local nobility—and from the way she carried herself and the black silkgrass dress that hugged her body in all the right places, he knew that she was noble in every sense of the word. She was gorgeous, though she didn’t move his heart the way that Valeria did.

Tiberias grinned possessively, his eyes following her across the room even long after Gaius had turned back to him. “Elise, the daughter of Emilie, the local Tower Lord, and the mother of my future children,” he growled.

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Henry and Alain spent most of their day walking around the various merchant forums in the city. They never bought anything, but they did stop for a bite to eat at a rotisserie stall. Charles had split with them about an hour before, saying something about needing to train, which both other men accepted even as it took them completely off-guard.

“So what now?” asked a bored Alain. The one hundred silver coins they received as a stipend couldn’t buy them very much, so there wasn’t a whole lot for them to do.

“Hmmm…” thought Henry. “Maybe we could hit up the beach. Might be some cute girls there to talk to.”

“As tempting as that is, I’d better not.”

“… Right, you already have three kids on the way.  Best not to add to that number until you graduate, at least,” responded Henry while throwing his friend a mocking look.

Alain, for his part, ignored it. “Want to go hang out with Charles?” he asked. “Training isn’t really how I envisioned spending most of today, but it’s better than wandering around bored outta my gourd.”

“Sure. Not a lot else to do without more coin, anyway.”

The two started walking east, toward the lower end districts. They exchanged a few jokes and jabs at each other’s expense, but before they had even left the western districts that bordered the Knight Academy, they rounded a corner and almost ran into another first-tier trainee from their cycle, someone they kind-of recognized, though which unit he was in escaped their immediate recollection. This startled trainee almost jumped out of his skin when he saw these two and immediately turned around and ran off.

“Whoa, what the hell was that?” asked Alain.

“Not a clue…” said Henry. “But that was rude as fuck, just running off like that soon’s you see someone! If we get a chance to spar with that guy, I’m going to knock his block off!”

Henry and Alain put this seemingly minor incident out of their minds, turning their attention back to their wandering of the streets. They didn’t notice when that trainees started following them a few minutes later, a small group of other trainees at his back.

“Man, I would literally kill for some of Old Salem’s mead,” said Henry as they turned down a fairly deserted street on their way toward the park where Charles said he was going to train.

Alain was about to mutter his agreement, but four young men—who they also recognized from the Academy—ran up from behind them, grabbed their arms, and started quite roughly hauling them into a nearby alley.

“What the hell are you doing?! Let go of me!” shouted Henry while wildly attempting to shake his arms free and having no success. He also hoped that the sound of his loud yell would attract some attention their way, perhaps even enough to get these people to let him and his friend go, but his luck wasn’t so great; not a single person appeared in the seconds after he raised his voice, and certainly none of the local Legion forces that enforced the law in the capital.

Alain didn’t say anything, preferring instead to use his prodigious strength to try and break the hold the two fellow trainees had on him. He managed to throw one of them off of him, but the original trainee they’d ran into sprang out from the alley and swung his fist into the side of Alain’s head. The young man he’d managed to throw off wasted no time grabbing his arm again and the two Snow Lions were dragged into the alley.

The other trainees didn’t say a single word to them, only taking turns kicking and punching the two, ensuring that while neither suffered any broken bones that might to missed training and awkward questions, Henry and Alain were still bloodied and inflicted with a great deal of pain.

In a few seconds that felt more like a few minutes to the two Snow Lions, they were brutally beaten, then left on the filthy ground in the alley as the other trainees finished up and scattered before they were seen by anyone else. One of them spared a kick for both Henry and Alain, driving all the air from their lungs before all five trainees vanished into the city.

“Ugggh…” Henry groaned, one of his eyes already starting to swell shut, blood pouring from his nose, and a few marks on his face that promised to become shiny bruises—and that was just his face. The rest of his body ached in a way that he’d never experienced before, and he knew that he’d be black and blue just about everywhere in a few hours.

Alain could only cough and retch, his body and countenance similarly brutalized. There wasn’t likely any permanent damage, but that didn’t dull the pain.

It took the two Snow Lions half an hour for the pain to die down long enough for them to struggle to their feet. They were battered, bruised, and bleeding. Their faces were swelling in several places and Alain walked with a noticeable limp. They scrapped all plans to meet with Charles and instead made their way back to the Snow Lion’s tower.

Despite their injuries, they were still first-tier mages, so there was no question in their minds about whether they would make it, but they still kept on a constant look-out for any other trainees they might encounter on the way that could promise a second round of what they’d just suffered.

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“Listen,” Gaius said as he and Tiberias prepared to part ways, “I won’t be satisfied with this little bit of petty revenge. I want to humiliate that inbred savage at least as much as he humiliated me! And I think a good way to do that is to target the Snow Lions as a whole.”

“Are you not already doing that?” Tiberias asked, pausing as he rose from their table.

“Yes, but a few beatings aren’t enough. I want something a little more… official… Something that will hopefully, if he isn’t the brainless brute the rest of his race are, teach him the folly of reaching above his station…”

“I’m going to need specifics, Gaius,” Tiberias responded, though the pleasant way he smiled made it seem like they were only talking about the weather.

“I want their banner, and I would like to ask for your help in seizing it. My unit was one of those that drew the short stick and only has three third-tier nobles. Fortunately, the Snow Lions also drew that short straw, so we’re about even. But I want to be a little uneven. I’m not asking for the young nobles from your family’s vassals that accompanied you to the academy, and I’m not asking for your unit as a whole. I’m only asking for you. Will you accompany me to discipline this filthy savage?”

Tiberias took a moment to think, but when his noble gaze drifted back in Gaius’ direction, he smiled and said, “I suppose I can make some time for that. Just let me know when, and I’ll storm their tower with you.”

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Chapter 75 & 76 - Leon's Comedic Retribution

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Leon made his way back to the tower fairly early, only an hour or two after midday after spending a good portion of the morning at the pool he’d found. Unfortunately, that moment when he’d been disturbed by someone had ruined it a bit for him, and he hadn’t cared enough to follow the tracks and see who it was. Instead, he continued to explore the mountains in the west for a few hours before heading back.

He heard a slight commotion as he walked in through the outer door. When he walked in through the inner door, he saw a dozen first-tier trainees huddled around a table. He was about to ignore them and continue to the top floor, but he noticed something that made him freeze just as he was about to start climbing the stairs: Henry and Alain, covered in blood and bruises.

From the hurried way they were talking, Leon quickly learned that the two had limped back to the tower only half an hour prior. Their injuries were awful to look at, but they weren’t so bad that the healing spells in the first-aid boxes scattered around the tower wouldn’t make them right as rain. The only problem was that none of the trainees around them knew how to use the spells, and as they were trying to figure them out, three more injured trainees had returned to the tower.

Leon walked over to Henry and stared at the bruises and cuts. Henry had his shirt off, so Leon could see almost every place where he had been hit, as they had all started turning purple or dark red. The man was an absolute mess.

“What happened to all of you?” Leon asked calmly and quietly. Henry appreciated this attitude, as most of the other trainees had started to panic when they couldn’t get the healing spells to work properly.

“We were attacked on the street. After talking with everyone, we think it was some guys from the Deathbringers, but it’s hard to be sure given that we spent most of our time in their presence trying to protect our heads,” answered Henry.

“I’m sorry, I just can’t get this damned thing to work!” complained a nearby trainee, who was pressing a healing spell on Alain’s bruised stomach.

“Well don’t press down so hard!” responded Alain with a wince of pain. Leon could tell the trainee was aggravating the big guy’s injuries just by pressing down on them without successfully activating the healing spell.

Leon gently pushed the trainee aside and placed his hand on the paper. The trainee didn’t argue after seeing who was doing the pushing.

Leon’s magic gently flowed out of his hand and into the glyphs written on the paper. Most of the glyph was built around a small runic circle made mostly of light runes, and that was where the spell was activated and powered.

The glyph on the paper glowed with a bright golden light for several seconds and the bruise on Alain’s stomach disappeared.

“Simply rubbing the spell on an injury won’t activate it, you need to channel your magic into it as well. Look for this circle in the glyph.” Leon indicated the runic circle to the watching trainee. The magic that flowed through the glyph had almost destroyed it, but the circle was still identifiable. The trainee enthusiastically nodded and started treating the other four’s injuries. He quickly explained what Leon had just told him to the other trainees who were helping these five injured Snow Lions, and soon enough, all five had almost completely recovered.

But, ‘almost completely’ still wasn’t ‘completely’. Alain’s left eye was still slightly swollen and the other four still had some visible bruising on their face and torsos.

“So, tell me what happened. In detail,” Leon demanded of Alain and Henry. He controlled his voice well, but the slight undercurrent of killing intent he was emitting betrayed his anger. He didn’t consider himself an overly proud person, but someone attacking people he was friendly with—people he’d agreed to train—infuriated him. This wasn’t just an attack on them, but an attack on him, as well, and he couldn’t just stand by and let this go unpunished.

Henry bitterly recounted how he and Alain ran into the first Deathbringer trainee, only to be jumped by that group several minutes later. He narrated how they’d managed to return home, and how they’d shared information with the others who’d been likewise jumped, and how they’d puzzled out who’d attacked them.

When Henry was done, Leon looked over to the other trainees, who all corroborated the story.

Leon was tempted to say that Gaius was behind his. He didn’t think that he had any other enemies at the Knight Academy, and Gaius had made some pretty specific threats to Leon, but on the other hand, Leon kept his mind open for other possibilities. This wasn’t necessarily about him.

While this was going on, Castor and Alphonsus, the other two third-tier trainees who were in charge of the Snow Lions, returned to the tower. There wasn’t anything in particular they had wanted to do in the city, so they came back after spending a few hours in the Heaven’s Eye Tower.

Alphonsus wasted no time heading for the stairs, largely ignoring the gathered first-tier trainees, but Castor curiously glanced at the group tending to their injuries. The healing spells had healed most of the damage, but the five who’d been jumped were still visibly injured. Leon saw Castor’s eyes widen as he froze in place at the bottom of the stairs, and Leon was gratified to see that as soon as Castor got over his shock, he came almost running over, a curious Alphonsus in tow.

“What happened with these guys?” Castor asked Leon.

“They were assaulted while in the city. Seems to be by trainees from the Deathbringers.”

“Are you sure?” Castor asked after a moment of thought, his face one of serious contemplation.

“Wasn’t there, but I believe them,” responded Leon in a serious tone.

Castor frowned and looked back to the five injured trainees. “If that’s true, then this is going to be a little difficult to handle…”

Leon fought the urge to roll his eyes. He knew how to handle this: attack the Deathbringers, gain vengeance for their injured trainees. It wasn’t something that needed a great deal of thought. He supposed that the reason Castor was hesitating was that he’d fought Actaeon, one of the third-tier nobles from the Deathbringers, during the morning duels that week and lost fairly quickly.

“Do you have any proof that it was the Deathbringers?” he asked Henry.

Henry blinked in momentary confusion at why Castor was asking him this, before seeming to shut off a little bit. It was only after a quick nod from Leon that he sullenly stated, “We saw who it was. We recognized them. They didn’t hide their identities.”

“But can you prove definitively that it was the Deathbringers?” asked Castor again, with a little more insistence this time.

“What proof is there to be had?! Do you want to compare their fists to my bruises and see if they match? It’s not like they left a signed confession with us…” Henry’s tone was a mix of rising anger and incredulousness at Castor’s question, and a notable lack of respect.

“Are you calling us liars?!” asked Alain with growing fury. The other three assaulted Snow Lions appeared to be of varying levels of anger, but all were obviously annoyed at Castor’s requests for proof.

Castor interposed himself between the two and glared at Alphonsus before he could talk back to make sure he wasn’t going to shout at them and make things worse. After Alphonsus shrugged, glared at Alain, and then stepped back, Castor continued, “You all want revenge, right? You want retaliation?” Castor asked, looking at the five in turn, then moving on the other half dozen or so trainees who had gathered around.

“We do!” shouted Henry, with a few of the others nodding in agreement. Many others didn’t, though, preferring instead to see how the three third-tier mages fell on the issue.

“We don’t need to immediately jump to violence! If we do, nothing will end, we’ll just end up in a conflict with them throughout the entire rest of the training cycle! It’s best if I go and talk with Gaius and work out whatever this is with him. It’s best if we can settle this like men, not like animals!”

Before Henry, Alain, or any of the other trainees could respond, Leon spoke up. “I think it would be better if you go there in a position of strength. I’ll go and get revenge, and then you can go and talk with Gaius.”

“I’d rather you didn’t,” Castor replied as he turned to fully face Leon and regard him with all the dignity he could muster. “Things may work differently where you’re from, but in this Kingdom, we resolve our disputes differently. I’ll go and speak with Gaius and we’ll get all of this sorted out. There’s no need to jump immediately to violence.”

Leon gave Castor something that resembled a look of pity; he didn’t like Gaius, and he didn’t trust him to speak with Castor in good faith. He couldn’t envision a scenario in which Castor’s plan was going to work. When he glanced at the rest of the first-tiers, he could see his sentiment shared.

With a sigh and a shake of his head, Leon turned away from the other two third-tier trainees. No matter what they said, he would go and attack some Deathbringers the next morning, and he knew for sure that there were going to be some willing first-tier Snow Lions at his back when he did.

---

“Those peasants should just do what they’re told. Who do they think they are to question our decisions?!” ranted Alphonsus in the third-tier common room a few minutes after he and Castor left. Leon had stayed below for a few minutes, though he hadn’t said why.

“They’re angry. Some of them were assaulted today,” responded a much calmer Castor.

“And you said you’d take care of it! What more do they want?!” Alphonsus was almost shouting now, only kept in check by how composed Castor remained.

“I said I’d talk to Gaius. They don’t want to hear anything about ‘talking’, they just want their revenge. I understand that, but we’re one of the smallest units this cycle. I don’t want us to make enemies yet, we can’t afford to,” said Castor with a thoughtful look.

As Castor said this, a voice resounded through the common room. “Enemies aren’t always chosen. Regardless of what you want, the Snow Lions have enemies now.” Castor and Alphonsus glanced at Leon, the source of this voice, as he entered the common room.

“Ah, here comes the barbarian now, sauntering like a conquering hero!” Alphonsus bitterly spat. “This is your fault, I’m sure! You humiliated the third son of House Tullius and now he’s put our unit on his shit-list!”

“Don’t blame me for this. I didn’t force the Deathbringers to do this! I’ve been trying to ignore Gaius and let this whole thing blow over!” retorted Leon in uncharacteristic anger.

Castor sighed and held up his hand, stopping Alphonsus from escalating the disagreement into a full-blown argument. “Indeed, the Deathbringers made the decision to attack our people, and only they can be blamed for that. But we should think carefully before we do anything to intensify this any further. De-escalation is what we should strive for, not escalation.”

“Yes, let’s just let them walk all over in the streets! Say, how will you be spending the day while our people are being assaulted in back alleys and left bleeding on the ground? Sipping expensive drinks at a fancy local club?” asked Leon, his words dripping with sarcasm.

“And what would you have us do?” demanded Alphonsus.

“I’m going to do the same to them that they did to us: ambush them and leave them bleeding on the ground.”

“We can’t be fighting a war in the streets!” responded Castor emphatically.

“It won’t be in the streets. I’m going to hit them tomorrow morning before they leave the forest.”

Castor sighed again and leaned back in his chair. After a few more moments of thought, he said, “Whatever. Do what you will tomorrow. I don’t like this at all, but I suppose it might be easier to talk to the Deathbringers if they’ve been bloodied too.”

Leon smiled in anticipation, and after a moment of silence, turned around and went to his room.

Just before he entered his room, he turned around and said to Castor, “I suppose I can at least try to talk first. Probably won’t get far though…” He chuckled to himself as he stepped into his room, but Castor at least nodded in acknowledgment.

“What the hell are you doing?” inquired Alphonsus quietly once Leon’s door was closed. “You should’ve stuck to your decision! It isn’t his place to question you!”

“He’s a third-tier mage, Alphonsus, and technically our equal. He has every right to question me. Besides, even if I told him not to do anything tomorrow, do you think he’d listen?” Castor sounded exhausted from the day’s unexpected trouble. He closed his eyes and stretched, intending to make like Leon and go to his room. He doubted that his words with Gaius would have any effect, so he needed to rest up and ensure that he was ready for the war this was going to bring.

---

The entire dining hall was tense enough to cut with a spoon the next morning. The Snow Lions had to endure the smug faces of the Deathbringers staring at them from across the hall, though they returned every glare and scowl they received. The atmosphere grew so charged that even the third-tier nobles were affected, with many eyes constantly flitting between the third-tier Snow Lions and Deathbringers.

Few looks were spared for Leon, save for a few self-satisfied smirks from Gaius and some oddly embarrassed glances from Valeria. Whenever Leon glanced in her direction, he’d catch her staring at him, only for her cheeks to redden further and her head to snap so that she was looking in another direction, and all to the tune of her bronze-skinned friend’s chuckling. Her behavior was strange—especially so given the icy stoicism that Leon had come to expect from her over the past week—but Leon put it out of his mind. He needed to focus on the attack he was going to lead in an hour or two.

The end of breakfast couldn’t come soon enough, and almost everyone in the hall was quite eager to leave as soon as their Senior Instructors ordered them to.

The Snow Lions’ Senior Instructor took them back to their tower and dismissed them, giving them only a cursory speech about safety and what time they were expected to be back.

The nobles immediately made their way to the stairs. Castor hesitated before heading up and looked back at Leon. Leon didn’t return the look, instead choosing to watch a few dozen first-tier trainees gather their weapons and make last-second preparations.

For a moment, it seemed to Leon like Castor was tempted to join them. But that moment passed quickly. The third-tier noble shook his head and followed Alphonsus and the second-tiers upstairs.

“Everybody ready?” asked Leon several minutes later. There were a little over thirty first-tier trainees before him who’d been sufficiently enraged after hearing about the attacks the previous day to pick up arms and join Leon in a retaliatory strike, including Charles, Alain, and Henry. Not as many as Leon expected, but enough to work with. After everyone nodded back at him, he simply said, “Then let’s get moving.”

He immediately led them out of the tower and turned north-east. He’d spent much of the previous night studying the maps that the Academy gave its trainees of the training grounds. The towers for the Deathbringers and the Snow Lions were relatively close, only about a mile apart.

But Leon wasn’t taking his group to the Deathbringer’s tower. Instead, he was taking them to a point he’d marked on the road that connected it to the training field. The road curved around a small hill dense with vegetation at this point, which would allow Leon’s group to watch the road without being easily seen.

Having spent most of his life wandering around in a forest, Leon’s sense of direction was uncanny; the group arrived at the hill in less than fifteen minutes. They moved with notable swiftness, and the weaker trainees needed a few minutes to catch their breath. Leon wasn’t too worried that they’d missed their targets, as they wouldn’t be in as great a hurry as the Snow Lions were, not to mention the nobles typically took longer to leave their towers than the commoners, so even if they missed the weaker Deathbringers, they might still bag themselves a few nobles.

The group waited a couple hundred feet into the tree line while Leon sent Henry and two others to watch the road. After about twenty minutes, Henry ran back to Leon.

“They’re here!”

“You sure?” asked Leon.

“Absolutely,” replied Henry through gritted teeth.

“All of them?”

“It’s them, all five who attacked me and Alain. They’re following some second-tier noble.”

“How many do they have?”

“At least three second-tier nobles, plus about a dozen first-tier guys.”

Leon nodded to Henry, then called out to the rest of the group, “Alright! Let’s move up!”

The forest was thick enough that the Deathbringers didn’t notice a thing as the group moved forward. Leon made sure they spread out to cover a little more ground, just in case any of the Deathbringers ran away.

When the Deathbringers finally came close to their hiding place, Leon emerged from the forest alone with the rest of his group waiting in the tree line. He calmly walked out like he was just out for a stroll until he came to a stop in the center of the road, blocking the Deathbringers from passing by.

The group of Deathbringers stopped and stared at him for a moment before several of them broke out into smiles and began walking towards him. Leon just stoically watched until they came close enough to speak comfortably without shouting—which also happened to place them in perfect position for his ambush.

One of the second-tier nobles stepped forward and said, “I know you’re from the uncivilized Northern Vales, but surely your savage mind understands that the smaller group makes way for the larger? We’re coming through and you’re in our way, so it would be best if you were to remove yourself from our path!”

A second noble added with a smile that was both provocative and condescending, “Or don’t. I wouldn’t mind removing you. Shouldn’t be too hard with all the people we have…”

Leon, ignoring their threats, addressed the host of a dozen first-tier trainees behind them, “You are the ones who attacked those in my unit yesterday, aren’t you?”

The nobles looked a little taken aback. They weren’t used to being so blatantly ignored.

“Yeah, that was us,” confessed one of the first-tier trainees without a hint of remorse in his voice. In fact, he seemed almost proud of it, though saw that he was staring more at the second-tier Deathbringer than he was at Leon, so he figured that it was mostly just a show of loyalty.

“Who cares if it was?” said another.

“What, did you come here to piss and moan about it?” said a third with a mocking tone.

“No,” answered Leon immediately. “I’m here to get you all to publicly apologize and pay my people appropriate compensation, otherwise I’ll leave you just as battered and bloodied as you left my guys.”

The three Deathbringer nobles stared in shock at the completely serious Leon for a moment before bursting out into laughter. Their amusement spread to their first-tier underlings who also started chuckling at Leon.

“Hehehe… I don’t think you understand what position you’re in, you faithless animal!” said the second noble when he managed to stifle his laughter. “No one threatens our people and gets away with it!”

“Indeed! The standards of this Academy must be slipping if this fucking clown can manage to enroll!” shouted the third noble.

The first noble smiled derisively at Leon before adding, “It seems the accident that let this barbarian rise to the third-tier makes him think he’s better than us! Now, I realize that basic math may be a hard concept for your primitive brain to grasp, but we outnumber you fifteen to one! It doesn’t matter that you’re in the third-tier, we’re still going to break every bone in your body!”

Leon felt fury rising in his chest, a fury that he knew was coming from Xaphan. The demon had been quiet these past few days, but Leon knew he was occasionally watching what was happening outside. This short exchange had left the demon burning with a rage that made his own flames seem insignificant.

But for all the strength of his fury, it was dwarfed by Leon’s.

[Those ones need to die,] said the demon through clenched teeth.

[They won’t be dead when I’m through with them, but they might wish they were…] responded an equally furious Leon.

The first noble made a quick gesture and the dozen first-tier underlings quickly spread out and surrounded Leon.

Leon was confident in his skills, enough to be relatively certain that he could take just about any other trainee in the Knight Academy one-on-one save for Valeria, and even then, his record with her was tied. Still, he didn’t think he alone could take on all of these people and win. But he wasn’t alone.

Leon smiled, having gotten what he wanted, and waved over his shoulder at the waiting Snow Lions.

Before any of the Deathbringers could react, three dozen Snow Lions poured out of the forest and were upon them. The three Deathbringers closest to the tree line couldn’t even raise their training weapons quick enough to block; the Snow Lions cut them down in an instant with the stabs and slashes they’d learned during their Basic Combat classes.

Leon drew his own training sword and sliced through the two Deathbringers between him and the nobles in one quick motion. Leon surged forward and engaged the three second-tier nobles.

The fight was over in a matter of seconds. The Snow Lions completely overwhelmed the surprised Deathbringers and left all twelve of the noble’s first-tier underlings stunned and unconscious from their training weapons. Some of the Snow Lions even got in a few extra hits on those who’d ambushed them, leaving some of the first-tier Deathbringers with a little more than a few quick stunning slashes. One in particular looked like he lost a few teeth from a Snow Lion fist, while another was left fountaining blood out of his nose. It wasn’t quite to the level of how beaten the five Snow Lions had been, but it didn’t necessarily have to be; this was more about salvaging honor and pride than inflicting grievous harm.

Leon, while all that had gone on, had disarmed the nobles so quickly that they hardly had a chance to draw their weapons, let alone use them.

Their ambush was so successful, in fact, that some of the Snow Lions were a little let down at the anti-climax and started staring at the three surrounded nobles.

“If you were smart, you’d make with that compensation…” said Leon with a confident smile as he threw their training swords into the forest.

“Ha! As if we would ever do something so shameful!” laughed the second noble, though his voice was wavering in fear as he stared around at the Snow Lions staring at him with starved looks.

“Indeed! If you intended to harm us, you would’ve done so by now!” shouted the third noble, who then chuckled at Leon in derision as if certain Leon wasn’t going to do so.

The first noble looked particularly irate, and his chest swelled as he took a deep breath and began to shout, “We serve Gaius Caecilius Tullius! You are all going to be stomped into the dirt where you belong when he hears of this! Attacking us unprovoked will only serve to see your unit isolated and crushed! You will be this training cycle’s punching bag! Don’t get used to this, swine, for in a few short weeks, Lord Gaius will make sure that you never taste victory again!”

Leon slowly sheathed his training sword and stepped forward, to the delight of the nobles whose smiles grew even wider.

“I’m terribly sorry…” he started, to which the nobles started laughing. However, their laughter was smothered as he continued. “… because it seems that I’ve given you the impression that I was joking. That could not be further from the truth.”

Leon started walking forward with an ominous smile, an aura of killing intent emanating from his body causing one of the nobles to shiver in momentary fear.

“You seem to have found much of what I’ve said today funny. Do I really amuse you so much?” he asked as he neared the first noble.  The fire that the nobles had exhibited only a moment before withered under the weight of Leon’s terrible gaze and shiver-inducing smile. Leon doubted any of them had ever encountered someone willing to act against them like this, let alone a real battle. At the most, he figured they’d been hunting a few times. Not enough to give them enough killing intent to resist what the Forest of Black and White had instilled into him.

Leon clenched his fist and drove it into the first noble’s cheek. The noble dropped like a bag of rocks and Leon followed up with a kick that made the noble fly over to the watching Snow Lions. They treated him about as gently as Leon just had, practically descending into a cloud of fists.

Leon paused before moving on to the next noble. “You don’t seem to be that entertained anymore. Are my jokes no longer so delightful?” His tone started fairly playful and mock hurt but turned extremely menacing and disquieting by the end. Leon slammed his foot into the stomach of the second noble so hard that the noble crumpled and emptied his stomach all over his very expensive looking shoes. Again, Leon punted the noble over to the waiting Snow Lions.

Leon finally turned to the final noble, who felt his hair stand on end. His arrogant demeanor had collapsed, and he couldn’t maintain a straight face, constantly twitching between various looks of fear and terror.

“Why aren’t you laughing? Hmm?” Leon’s words echoed in his ears and the noble found himself unable to form any words. Leon punchedthe noble in the face so hard that he was knocked flat on the ground. He didn’t try to get back up, so Leon contented himself with throwing a few kicks at him.

“You still don’t find this funny, huh? I’m suddenly not so hilarious?” Leon said with both exceptional rage and a strange sense of delight in being able to cut loose with the frustrations that the past few months of dealing with the Bull Kingdom had given him. He needed this catharsis, he was realizing. He kicked the noble a few more times before stepping back to let the waiting Snow Lions tear into him.

“That’s a shame,” Leon said sarcastically as he calmly watched the Snow Lions rain blows down upon the nobles. “I thought I might’ve had a good future in comedy.”

---

---

And so it is.  I was hoping to get out at least another chapter today to make up for missing this two weeks ago, but it's late and I'm tired and I still need to do a final read-through of tomorrow's release.  That one should be fun.  One last really romance-heavy chapter before we set that stuff aside, at least for a little while.  Leon's got some stuff to think about for a while.

But anyway, I'm supposed to be talking about these revised chapters, aren't I?  I honestly don't have much to say that hasn't already been said in previous revised chapters.  Just ctrl-c ctrl-v that stuff in here.

But, you know, if you see something that you don't like or that you think I should give another pass, let me know in those comments down below!  And maybe give me an opinion for these chapter titles, they're functional but they're not really doing it for me.  In fact, I'm about as confident in these revised chapters as I have been for pretty much all the last few revisions, which is to say, not very.  So let me know what you think, especially if you share this opinion!

So, yeah. =)