Tale of Discovery

Chapter 138: Lightwood ; Tempest Wizard

"Wales!" Lizette exclaims the moment she notices my arrival and runs toward me.

She once again embraces me before moving back and checking my body from head to toe while asking,

"You're not hurt, are you?"

I chuckle before shaking my head and saying,

"Something like this wouldn't be able to hurt me."

Then, I turn to look over at a man that seems to be of higher rank compared to the rest of the soldiers and say,

"Round up as many men as you can and head out to see if there are any places that require assistance."

"Yes, Your Grace!" he replies before heading inside along with the company of two other men.

Shifting my focus back to Lizette, I say,

"We should inside."

Agreeing with me, she nods her head before holding on to my arm once again and dragging me inside.

Aruru and Gabriel follow behind us as we make our way to the lounging room we were in previously.

---

After hours of spending time with Lizette in the castle, the time for returning to the academy arrived.

During my time here, I got to find out more and more regarding Wales Tudor.

What really piqued my interest is that the girl Tiffania Westwood that I had found in Matilda's memories is my cousin.

Anyway, I bid Lizette farewells before creating a portal to the academy.

Aruru, Gabriel, and I pass through it and arrive at somewhere near the outskirts of the academy.

We continue the rest of the way back to the academy on foot at a leisurely pace.

Once we enter through the academy's main gate, Louise, along with Tabitha and Kirche, notice us.

Louise immediately runs over toward me with an excited look on her face.

"Victor!" she exclaims while pulling out her wand.

The heck?

Once she's in front of me, Louise begins to excitedly tell me about what happened to her a few hours ago.

Apparently, she had felt a weird sensation, so she panicked and checked herself to see if anything is wrong with her body.

She saw that there was nothing wrong with her, so she decided to use magic to make sure that there is nothing wrong with her body.

To her pleasant surprise, she was not only able to cast her magic much easier than normal but also successfully the one she wanted to, albeit it being weaker than normal.

"Louise, I understand the part about it being easier for you to cast magic," I say dubiously, "But, what's this about you succeeding in casting magic?"

Right after my words fade off, a red hue covers Louise's face as she looks down at the ground and murmurs,

"It just usually doesn't work."

"This pipsqueak wouldn't shut up about it," a voice suddenly resounds behind Louise.

Looking over, I see Kirche walking over along with Tabitha.

"She has been speaking of the matter with her magic ever since she found it," Kirche says.

"Who are you calling a pipsqueak!" Louise exclaims as she points her wand at Kirche and begins chanting.

In response to this, Kirche laughs and says,

"Even if you can cast spells, they're much weaker than normal."

She then proceeds to pull out her wand and point it at Louise before chanting.

Letting out a sigh, I mutter,

"Aruru."

Understanding my intentions, Aruru forms two small needle-like objects made of light and throws them at the wands.

Both Louise and Kirche are surprised to find their wand suddenly snapped in half.

In response to this, Louise doesn't do much and just examines her broken wand, while Kirche gets a little worked up as she faces Aruru and exclaims,

"What was that for?!"

Unfazed, Aruru peers into her eyes and says monotonously,

"Master's orders."

As if realization just dawned upon her, Kirche's face has a somewhat unnatural look before it goes away and gets replaced with a wry expression.

"Now, I must get myself another wand. How annoying."

Letting out a sigh, I wave my hand and create two brand-new wands and throw one over to each one.

Both of them surprisingly have quick reactions as they catch the wand.

"This" Kirche says with a serene expression, "Is Lightwood!"

Hearing her, Louise is stunned for a few seconds before she begins to hastily examine her own wand.

Soon, a smile appears on her face as she looks toward me and expresses jubilantly,

"You're the best!"

It seems like whatever material these two wands are made of is precious.

Is it because it's rare? There is a high chance that it has to do with its durability or effect on a magician's magic.

There has to be such an effect, as Louise and Kirche wouldn't have reacted like this if it was otherwise.

As I'm deliberating on the matter, I sense a gaze on me from the side.

Moving my eyes, I set my sight on Tabitha who's expressionlessly staring at me while holding a staff close to herself.

Now that I think about it, she prefers to use a staff over a wand for some reason.

Is there any staff in my database that is made up of such a material?

After looking around for a short while, I'm able to find a staff made of the exact same material used in the wands.

However, it looks a little eccentric.

That's not all, as the moment I focus on it, a name appears in my head: Staff of Tempest.

Deciding that this is a proper gift, I create it.

However, what I didn't expect was for Louise and Kirche to drop their wands out of shock as they look at the staff with widened eyes.

It seems like I have severely undermined the importance of this staff as even the expressionless Tabitha has a shocked look on her face now.

Silence ensues as none of the girls utter a word.

After a whole minute, I decide that this is going nowhere, so I grab the staff and present it to Tabitha while saying,

"This is my present for you."

Tabitha gets even more shocked as she drops her staff and looks into my eyes as if checking to see if I'm pulling her leg or not.

Finding her actions a little adorable, I fix the staff into the ground, gently pat her head and ruffle her blue hair with my fingers before saying,

"Presumably, this staff is called Staff of Tempest. Do you happen to know anything about that?"

My words seem to turn on some unusual switch within Tabitha as she hastily begins to tell me about the legend of the Tempest Mage.

A long time ago, there was a man that performed extraordinary feats that are still spoken of nowadays.

One of his most important accomplishments was crafting the Staff of Tempest.

However, upon the death of the Tempest Mage, his staff disappeared along with him.

This legend is wide-spread among the nobles as they all admire the feats of the Tempest Mage, which consisted of saving the Tristain Kingdom from a rebellion, training the descendants of Germania to the point of making them the strongest, and much more.

Tabitha is a huge fan of this Tempest Mage as she usually reads books related to him, so this staff holds a high significance to her.

"Then, that's great!" I exclaim while ruffling her hair once again, "You get to use the very staff that the Tempest Mage used."

Although, I highly doubt that they're the same, there definitely is a connection between the two.

My database works in a rather quirky way. If something is well known, it appears within my database, with the price of creating it depending on how commonly it's seen.

There is an exception to this, which is if a lot of people sincerely believe in something, it would also appear in my database. However, it would cost much more than an object that was seen.

So, seeing that the Staff of Tempest didn't cost much energy suggests that the real one is out there and being seen by many.

"Tabitha, where did the Tempest Mage die?"

Being the fan she is, Tabitha immediately replies,

"Gallia."

The Kingdom of Gallia, huh? This means that there is a high chance the 'original' staff is somewhere there.

I have to make use of this chance to interact with Tabitha and find more about the staff as a precaution against any troubles that it may cause in the future.

My thoughts are suddenly interrupted by a sudden soft sensation pressing against me.

Shifting my focus back to reality, I find Tabitha softly hugging me without uttering a single word.

Not minding it, I hug her back and pat the back of her head.

After a few seconds, she lets go of me and grabs the staff fixed into the ground.

She then begins to pull it a little before it gets out.

While Tabitha examines her staff, Kirche and Louise are both staring at it curiously in silence.

"We should head inside," I say.

They all agree with me unanimously as they all follow me back to the main academy building.

I need to have a talk with Osmond sometime regarding the matter with Matilda.

That's to figure out whose side is he on and inform him about my ascendance to the throne.

---

"You girls rest here, while I have to go do something important," I say to Aruru, Gabriel, Ddraig, and Louise.

Once I've confirmed that they don't have anything to say to me, I leave Louise's dorm room.

I then check my surroundings to make sure that no one is around before muttering,

"Tia, you're leaving the place you're in."

[[What?]]

"Be prepared," I say as I focus on 'ejecting' her.

[[Wait a min-]]

Her voice gets cut off as she appears as a figure made of light appears in front of me before it fades away and reveals a messy-looking Tiamat.

"What were you doing?" I question while looking at her messy clothes and hair.

"Taking a nap, obviously," she replies with a scoff.

"Sure, if you say so," I say dismissively, "We're going to be taking a bath soon anyway, so it's not that much of an issue."

Tiamat's eyes widen as she swiftly moves her head to look me in the eyes and says,

"What do you mean?"

Shrugging my shoulders, I place my hand on her shoulder and say,

"What else could it mean."

Before she can utter another word, I mutter,

"Arena."