It was the next day, and I was currently in the medical wing. "How are you feeling?" I asked Aya as she laid in her bed. She woke up this morning, so when I heard, I came straight down to see her. King and Queen Eralith left when I showed up, they had a meeting with some of their personal elven guards.
"I feel normal, no injuries, I'm just tired, and it is hard to move at all." She responded horsely, I could tell she was tired. I was sitting next to her on a chair. "I can't believe what you did, you took down two Retainers, you were exactly how I pictured." Even being tired, the Lance sent me a warm smile. "You did great out there, without you, I would have died."
"Well, you were only in that situation because I was there, they wanted to capture me, so I thank you for being there to protect me." I smiled back at her. "Anyway, you really were only out for a day, you didn't miss much, but obviously they locked up Rahdeas."
"I figured, everything played out as planned." Aya responded. "Is Arthur, okay? I partially remember him being covered in those burn marks, but he was fighting like it did not affect him."
"Yeah, he is fine, he is currently healing in the room two doors down." I told her, I was also at this very moment, helping Sylvie and him absorb mana from the horns, I was doing my best to make sure I helped out as much as I could. "I'm sorry for giving you false info, Aya, I take partial blame for your struggle against Lyra, I forgot about the vibration spell she had that could disrupt spells." I lowered my head slightly, I did feel a little guilty for the pain I caused her, I told her to use illusion magic, and I am assuming it didn't work on her.
I felt a hand slowly rest on my head. "Veer, you can't know everything, you are fine, I am just happy we won. I heard we are having a celebration for completing our mission successfully."
I raised my head, looking at the Lance as she removed her hand. "We are, a bunch of nobles and some higher ranking war leaders are coming as well to see the bodies of the Retainers, and to celebrate their defeat." I shrugged. "It was my idea, but now I have to dress up."
"You know, at these things, people are supposed to bring dates." Aya said with a grin. "You have someone you can ask?"
I stared at the Lance, seeing if she was serious or not, I could not really tell. "I am a Lance, I don't need to show up with a date, Aya." I said questioningly. "And to answer that question, no, I have no one I could ask."
"Hmm." Aya was still grinning, even tired, she finds ways to mess with me. "How about Prince Kathyln? I heard the two of you get along quite well, and if I am right, she should be here in the castle."
I shook my head at Aya. "No, I am not going to ask the Princess to go to the party with me." I leaned back into the chair, thinking about what Erie said about Sylvie. She doesn't even have a human form yet, I know she gets one, but I don't know, it's hard to think that way about her while she only has a fox form and a dragon form. "What about you? Why won't you ask anyone?"
"Well, let me explain something to you since you are young, Veer." Aya laughed slightly. "We women, do not ask the men to go to a party hosted by nobles, the men are the ones who are supposed to ask." I nodded my head at her as she went on. "And I am a Lance, so I have to be pure in front of the people."
"What the hell?" I exclaimed.
"Haha, it is different for you, the council does not care what you do, one, because you are young, and two, they can't control you." Aya was right, I guess they don't really care. "So, you could ask Princess Kathyln, and to be honest, King Glayder might be happy if you did."
"Just stop, Aya." I said while shaking my head, trying not to think about it anymore. "Let's talk about something else." I suggested so I would stop feeling slightly embarrassed.
"No, no, no, a kid your age should have a crush, and be dating girls." Aya told me with a serious yet playful tone. "Even if you are not a normal kid, there has to be someone out there for you."
"Nope." I answered. "But if it will end this conversation, at the moment, if I had to, it would be Kathyln, but that is only because she is the only girl here, I know, and would take." I could see that this answer made her happy.
"See, I knew there was someone." Aya stopped grinning, it wasn't a crush though, it was just that she was the only one I knew here. "I'll stop teasing you, I'm sorry." I never really thought about life after the war, so having a crush on someone was of no concern to me.
"Thank you." I ran my hand through my long hair. "You think I should cut my hair?" I asked her, now officially changing the subject.
"Yes." She quickly answered. "You are eleven and your hair is almost to your shoulders, cutting it will go a long way with the ladies."
"Aya."
"I'm sorry, I only kid." Aya waved me off, it was nice talking to her like this. "But seriously, you should cut it, you look like you live on the streets."
"I'll have it cut before the party at some point." I liked my long hair, just not this long, it was starting to get uncomfortable. "I don't like going to these parties."
"You'll have fun, trust me." As Aya spoke, I felt something happen to Arthur, and it made me smile. "What is it? I know you are not smiling because of me."
"I think we have a new white core mage." I told her as I stood up, I could feel Arthur's core, he finally did it, of course, it was with my help.
"Your brother hit white core?" I nodded my head at Aya. "That is amazing!"
"Yeah." I motioned for the door. "I'm going to go congratulate him." If he still has mana from the Uto horn I gave him, he should be able to get further into white core, even though there aren't any stages.
"That's fine, give him my congrats as well." Aya said, and then as I was walking out, she added. "Oh, if you see Kathyln, don't be afraid to ask her to be your date."
"Aya." I shook my head and exited the room. Arthur was finally white core, that was all that mattered now, in battles we would have a better chance at winning. I approached Arthur's door, and opened it, standing up was Arthur, who turned to me as I began to speak. "Congrats on reaching white core."
I wasn't using blood oath anymore, even for Sylvie, I was taking a minor break. "Thank you." Arthur replied with a determined smile. "I'm close to catching you."
"Not quite, my core isn't what makes me stronger." I was only strong because of my blood magic; I didn't have a massive advantage when it came to swordsmanship.
"That is true, but let's be glad I finally managed to reach white core." Arthur closed his eyes, and I sensed him manipulating the mana around him. It was a lot easier when you hit white core, it was something I noticed, but that makes sense. "I got to get used to this."
"Yeah, it took me sometime to comprehended everything, you also should be able to fly now." I told him, I think I tried as soon as I hit white core. "I mean, I don't even like flying when in a battle, it's hard to be fluent in sword swings." If I didn't have blood magic, and couldn't remove mana from people, my weakness would be a battle in the sky.
"I agree, I'm sure I'll prefer fighting on the ground." Arthur opened his eyes and sat back down, I noticed that Sylvie wasn't even in here, I could feel her, she was in the bathroom for some reason.
"Why is she absorbing mana in the bathroom?" I asked him, curious on why she was not doing it out here.
"I don't know, but ever since she started absorbing it, she's been quiet, and won't stop even when I ask her to." Arthur and I were both looking at the door to the bathroom now. "She gets upset with me when I try to stop her, so I stopped, she wants to get stronger."
"Don't we all." I went over to his couch and took a seat. "To bad I think I hit my limit for a while, even with all these horns, I don't think getting into integration stage will be that easy." I don't even know what I have to do.
"You may be right, I don't know much about that stage anyways, but even at this strength, we won't be able to just win the war by ourselves." Arthur paused and turned to me. "We will only win with good planning."
"Good planning, and new strategies." I thought about what we should do. "First, when you take your time off to train, which I still think you should do, you should let me go to Elenoir."
"Why? I prefer it if you were not in the field if I was not going with you." Arthur told me, but if we do that, we will lose the war for sure.
"I am going to stay in the Kingdom, no battles, this is going to sound crazy, but I have a plan to defend Elenoir, that is the first Kingdom to fall, besides Darv which already fell to some degree." I needed to defend the border of Elenoir, and I had a plan on how to do that.
"If you stay in the Kingdom, and out of battles, I won't care." I gave him a look of disappointment, I wasn't going to look for battles, but if there was one, I wanted to help out. "What?"
"If I can save lives, and win a battle, I'm going to do that." I told him, I was going to do what I wanted anyways, but I wanted him to know.
"Fine." Arthur shrugged at me as he sat down on his bed, facing me still. "So, they attack Elenoir, they attack the Wall, then what? And how?"
"I told you that they attack the wall with mana beast, which we should be able to handle, but they also launch an attack at a similar time on Elenoir." I paused, thought about it for a second, not wanting to give him totally false info, which none of this was what I believed. "Basically, right now, Alacrya has people searching for Zestier in the Elshire Forest, because they know if they take that, they take Elenoir."
"Okay, so they are in Elshire Forest, how are they even going to find Zestier, it is too far into the forest, even if someone gets there, traveling through the mist with the elven soldiers there seems impossible." To be honest, I thought the same thing, but it is possible.
"They sacrifice mages basically, they have these types of mages known as Sentries, which specialize in detection and sensing, and some of them are able to mark where they have been, so they make a path through the forest, and eventually find Zestier, and claim it." I told him, and he seemed to understand what I meant by all of it.
"And you have a plan for that?" Arthur asked me skeptically.
"Yeah." I said. "The attack on the wall, one of us has to be there." I sighed, knowing that all we would be doing was slaughter mana beast. "Whoever is would just be killing mana beast for a while, it doesn't matter who."
"Wait, Veer, what is your plan for the Elshire forest?" Arthur stared at me, and I smirked.
"I am going to create my own army, well, it is going to be more like a unit."