Chapter 33 (Patreon)

There was actually more to the fight than just ‘don’t kill your opponent’, no doubt Luvia was trying to be dramatic. Really, it was just basic etiquette things, like don’t purposely blow up the building, don’t hurt spectators blah blah, common sense things.

“This will be an open match, any spells are acceptable as long as the rules are followed.” Luvia stated, facing the crowd, hyping it up.

She was really trying to embarrass Rin here, honestly these just went past amusing and fell flatly on annoying. I’m sure in her mind, this Alistair would defeat me then she would gloat and blow it up saying how ‘Rin’s Friend’ was so easily defeated. Basically, just twisting in the knife after she won their earlier spar.

“Can we just get on with this? I need to get back to my workshop.” Rin replied with detachment, much to Luvia’s annoyance.

“Hmph, Lets see how long you can stay so relaxed.” Luvia frowned, turning back to the arena. “Let me introduce our fighters! On the left we have Alistair Edelfelt, third son of the second branch family. Even with being the third child of the second branch family, he was able to pioneer a new path for his own Thaumaturgy only using the basics of our families’ specialty.”

Hoh? His own path, maybe that’s why he was ‘elevated’ to the position of Luvia’s bodyguard? She’s the most talented of her family or did she have a sister? I vaguely recall that she was someone extremely important to their family line, basically one of or the next in line to lead. That’s probably why she had several bodyguards following her around.

A branch family member, and not even the first child, no doubt he received very few resources and had to rely purely on his own skills and talent.

My interest was piqued now, a ‘new path’ I’m curious what he’s used their Jewelcraft as a foundation to achieve?

“And how about a welcome to a new member of our prestigious institute, coming from the East, a first-generation magus and a Runecraft Practitioner, Wilhelm!” She exclaimed.

Well, wasn’t that the unholy fucking trifecta of nonsense that the people here look down on. I could hear the laughs and jeers directed toward me and feigned ignorance.

I looked around and caught Artoria’s eyes. I raised an eyebrow as she looked back at me. Only receiving a small nod, but I could pretty much understand her message.

Bounded Fields sprang up around us, a defense mechanism that allowed the fighting to not carry over to any bystander. Not something absolute but it was the bare necessary for a type of facility like this.

“Begin!” Luvia shouted as all the mechanisms fell into place.

Well, bonus points to my opponent, he didn’t act cock and immediately acted, Reinforcement covered his body, but instead of charging right at me, he dashed to the side and threw a handful of gems into the center of the area.

No that wasn’t quite right, they weren’t quite ‘gemstones’ they were pieces, like a few were shattered into dozens of smaller ones, Topaz’s if my eyes didn’t fail me.

They sunk into the ground as their mysteries actualized, ignoring the tiles and other barriers to their target. It only took a moment for something to rise up.

“Golems, now that’s a surprise.” I said honestly. “And they even looked above average, curious, I know it takes a bit of effort to makes golems of this quality, and you did so instantly.”

Alistair came from my side, every step he took practically dug into the ground as he charged with an overhead fist. I ducked, knocking his fist away and used his own momentum to throw him towards the wall.

Surprisingly, he was able to fold into my own ‘attack’ and reorganized his fall to catch himself from suffering any damage.

I suppose it has been a while since I’ve fought someone in hand-to-hand that could move at this kinds of speeds, perhaps I’m rusty?

Hats off to my opponent, his Golems didn’t allow me breathing room as they also moved to surround and attack.

He also didn’t reengage, opting to allow his disposable minions to wear me down and gauge my reaction. Say what you will about the Edelfelt, but they sure train theirs well.

“Curious thing you are.” I said idly as a massive stone ‘fist’ swept down at me. These things lumbered one or two heads over me, but they were a bit impressive on their feet. Their coordination wasn’t bad either, were they perhaps mental commands from their caster or ‘preprogrammed’ already? They weren’t stumbling over one another as they all closed in on me. Well, this would be uncomfortable if I allowed this to happen. I allowed runes to swirl around my hand, forming into a Runic circle. “Lightning” I lazily called out as a large bolt discharged towards the closest one, blowing off its stone head.

“Now aren’t you a gift that keeps on giving.” I couldn’t help but grin as I saw the head reform without any inherent damage to the golem. I loved to see new spells, especially ones like this that were very ingenious in their applications, but I think all good things must come to an end. “I believe I understand now.” I stated, weaving throw the mass of stone limbs swung at me. “Distort” A simple illusion spell I learned from Skyrim, the numbers of me in the arena now number in the twenties as I confused the animated earth constructs.

This spell was quickly turning into one of my favorites. “Topazes.” I said decently loud, making sure to gather attention on me. “Jewelcraft and the Kabbalah. You use the connection Topazes have to Yesod of the Sefirot, a common enough application but quite intelligent. Specifically, you pull on the ‘Tree of Life’ to grant the golems ‘life’ at the cost of the magical energy supplied via the Topazes. This also has the added benefit of now allowing them to ‘die’ while the Topazs still supply them with magical energy. Usually a gem used to Heal, but you are using it to sustain ‘life’ via magical battery and thus they are essentially ‘immortal’ until either the gem is removed or the magical energy runs out.”

My praise wasn’t unwarranted, this guy was truly talented. Well, since he showed me something so nice, I may as well return the favor. I materialized the runes around me, moving my hands fast enough to string the sentences together. I made a few calculations and first summoned a large Runic Circle under my feet to help facilitate casting. “Freezing winds of Jotunheim.”

The cold air exploded out from me, instantly freezing everything in the vicinity. IT even crashed against the Bounded Fields in the area, cascading and threatening to break free from the confines. I made sure to reel back all the excess, but this was a spell that didn’t want to be caged.

The Golem froze solid, unable to move and I assume I burned through the magical energy supplies with the Topaz pieces with this wide-scale attack.

I swept my hand and undid the Bounded Fields around the arena, I just looked at the shocked faces of many would-be mages staring.

“Well, Alistair should be fine if you want to go excavate him.” I walked over to Luvia with a smirk on my face. I didn’t want the guy to die, he hasn’t even said a word to me, merely following the directions of his ‘family head’ or whatever. And he was quite talented, it would be a shame if he died like this.

“You…..how?” Luvia looked utterly dumfounded.

“How unthoughtful I seemed to have forgotten to full introduce myself again.” I gave an exaggerated bow. “Wilhelm Henry Schweinorg.” Gods I loved say that.\

“S-Schweinorg?” She stuttered as her face paled.

And there it is. The peanut gallery also was having a conniption I think I saw a few that were throwing around insults bolt out of the area.

“How was that, pretty good, right?” I looked towards Rin and Artoria. The latter of whom just nodded like she expected it. Yeah, she probably saw through me already, but Rin was also a bit surprised at my power.

But I think she just pushed all that away as an evil smile grew on her face and she turned towards Luvia.

***

“Her face! It was priceless!!” Rin laughed heartily as we walked down the halls. “And then you were like ‘Excuse me I wouldn’t want me Asian Barbarianism to contaminate you any longer’ when she tried to apologize after hearing your name!”

“Yeah she was getting on my nerves.” I just nodded.

“She should keep her head down for a while now, alteast I won’t have to hear that bitch’s laugh until her family is done punishing her.” Rin happily jiggled the bag full of jewels. “And she has to pay me even more gems! I wish I could see the look on her face when she has to go to her family and beg.”

“Well, I’m glad you like my present.” I just smiled, recalling a few memories of this girl from my last life. It was amusing how she never even considered 'declining' the gift I gave her. 

“…..are you really Zelretch’s grandson? You said you were a first-generation.” She looked at me as we turned a corner.

“We have no blood connection, if that’s what you’re wondering.” I said honestly. “But yes, we are related and the best way I chose to address it was being his Grandson, it makes it simpler for all involved.”

She just signed. “You have that same ‘I know more than you’ look that the old man does.”

“I wonder if he’s home….” I said quietly as we approached his ‘room’. It was more like an underground mansion. The place was hard to describe, a lot of the infrastructure was actually underground as it got closer to the tomb the better the atmosphere for experiments. “Lets see if I remember how to do this.” I began tapping the door in various places. There was no ‘handle’ it was magically locked in a very intricate way, but it seemed like it was the same as I recalled. “ There we are.” I said as the doors disengaged and all the traps and defense turned off.

“I guess you really do know him then.” Rin finally acknowledged “I don’t think anyone would be brave enough or stupid enough to actually try to break into here.”

“You’d be surprised.” I said with a small chuckle. ‘He’ didn’t get that mask of a Prankster without good reason. In fact, it all started with some idiot breaking into his workshop and stealing an old prototype for his jeweled sword. You mess with one guy who pissed you off, and you suddenly get labels thrown at you. “Wonderful, he isn’t here yet!”

“Why is that wonderful?” Rin looked at me in confusion and Artoria followed us inside. She seemed relaxed enough, I guess they’ve both been here long enough to not tip toe around everything.

This was technically his ‘Workshop’ but really only one portion was dedicated to that, another was for Rin’s own workshop and various other living spaces. Hell, there was a room that was specifically Zelretch’s office, the target of my attention. “Because I can now raid his liquor cabinets.”

“Will you now?” A voice grabbed all our attention, and I felt a chill run up my spine as my eyes widened. The family face that I saw a thousand times when I looked in the mirror of my memories, the same eyes, the same ‘look’.

I didn’t even fucking sense him, I didn’t feel any speck of his presence as he used the Kaleidoscope to appear here.

“Master.” Rin said respectfully.

“Rin, I hear you got into a fight today.” He smiled ever so gently, but dear god did it give me anxiety for some reason.

It was like an invisible pressure weighing down on me.

[He’s strong] Ddraig spoke up. [Your memories don’t really do it justice]

Yeah, I was really a monster in my previous life.

“It was nothing, just a stupid spar.” Rin huffed in annoyance and Zelretch just chuckled, turning towards Artoria.

“What a beautiful flower.” He flipped his hand revealing a pot with some soil already inside it. “It would make a lovely decoration.”

“Thank you, Wizard-Marshall.” Artoria said respectfully.

“And my ‘Grandson.’” His eyes bore down on me, I felt so insignificant for the briefest of moments before he pulled back. “I see.” He stroked his chin. “I assume we have quite a bit to discuss.”