Chapter 89: Returning To The Arena Again
'Is this true?'
As Jim walked aimlessly inside the academy, he started to talk privately with his old man.
'He… is absolutely right in everything he said.'
'So humans aren't weak?'
'You were never weak,' the old man sighed, 'if you were weak then why would the fairies have allied with you under their flag?'
Jim sighed while he felt the words of the old man made some sense. 'So this happened because the dragons killed the fairies, right?'
'It's more complicated than that,' the old man said, 'but this is the short version that you can consider as the truth.'
'What is the long story then? I want to hear the truth!'
'You are too weak to hear it now boy,' the old man sighed, 'in fact I would rather prefer not to tell you right away. You are still exploring your strength and can't properly handle such ancient facts.'
'But I would have to face these when I go to the battlefield world,' Jim was speechless.
'Indeed but such a thing would happen at the semi-semister period,' the old man defended himself, 'there is a long road ahead of yours and I believe in the next months your strength and the strength of your team would soar.'
Jim walked silently for a while as he thought about what he heard from Rami and his old man. 'So I will eventually leave the academy and join the human forces, right?'
'Not now,' the old man objected, 'you can't join them.'
'Why is that?' Jim was surprised here for a moment, 'am I a human?'
'You are,' the old man said, 'but you are much more than that.'
'A fairy descendant perhaps?' Jim asked, trying to seek more info.
'This… is a bit too early for you to know.'
'Then I'm,' Jim sighed again, 'if so then I should leave here and not stay. After all I'm not the chosen one.'
'You aren't,' the old man agreed, 'but you play a major role for that chosen to be born.'
'Hehehe, don't tell me I'll be his father.'
'Would you mind being so?'
The direct question of the old man startled Jim for a moment there. 'Well… I dunno what to say.'
'Hahaha, don't worry the chosen one won't be born by you as a father.'
Jim didn't know if he should be relieved to hear that or be quite disappointed. 'Then what is my role?'
'Too early to know.'
'Just give me a hint at least.'
'Never leave the academy, neither you or any of your team members.'
Jim was surprised by that. 'I can't control their decisions,' he said.
'You can, just use the slave contract you have on all of them and they won't do anything without your consent.'
'That's… lame.'
'That's the only way to keep you safe here.'
'I'm safe now by the truce.'
'For one year,' the old man sighed, 'what about the years to come after that?'
'I have my guardians… and the sexy chick as well.'
'They aren't enough,' the old man sighed, 'you didn't strike a deal with these two yet, and the seducer isn't strong enough to shoulder everything that would come at your way later on.'
'Speaking in riddles again old man,' Jim sighed, 'but this means I'm going to have a hard time here. Why bother to stay there?'
'You must stay,' the old man stressed again, 'this is your fate.'
'Screw fate,' Jim was helpless and angry about this.
"Here you are, I finally found you."
Just before he could say anything else to his old man a soft voice came with a chuckle from behind startling him.
"Siera?" he asked in surprise when he spotted the short fox girl in front of him. "What are you doing here?" he asked.
"Looking for you of course," she laughed before pointing to her cloak and added, "I'm a seventh year inner disciple, a privileged one like you. So you should start calling me your senior or even best mentor."
"C'mon," he laughed before adding, "we are friends, there is nothing like that between us."
"Shameless human," she laughed before adding in a serious tone, "I have to apologize first for my lack of support to you so far. My mom… she promised to help but…"
"Never mind," he gestured to her with his hands to stop, "everything went alright in the end, right?"
"Indeed," she smiled while feeling gratitude for his acceptance of her incompetence. "Now I came to you so you can return to the arena."
"Another challenge?" he muttered in a serious look over his face, "but I just signed the truce after beating up one of their kids. What? Do they like bullying this much?"
He acted tough and arrogant, but inside he was worried. His trump card – the two girls – wasn't available for him right now to use.
And the others were quite distracted by the injuries of the two girls. He doubted they could fight properly under such circumstances.
"No, you fought once and demonstrated your true strength," she laughed, "don't worry, they won't ask you for a challenge again unless some of them had bean butter inside their brains."
"I'm not worried," he lied.
"I know," she laughed before adding, "I want you to come for a totally different reason."
"Which is?"
"The selection of a guardian for you," she excitedly said, "damn, even me with all my family connections couldn't secure one except with paying a hefty price. And now three masters just stepped in voluntarily to adopt you as their direct disciple… I envy you, truly and literally envy you."
He couldn't help but laugh. "Who are they by the way?" he asked while walking beside her, heading towards the arena again.
He knew that elf master would try to add him as his disciple, but didn't know who the other two were.
"One is the elf master who was the judge at the acceptance trial," she said while counting on her petite fingers like a kid while her comfy and short tail was moving from right to left. "The other two is just a surprise, one came from the medusa pantheon, and the other is from the griffin pantheon."
"Wow," Jim couldn't help but exclaim, "isn't your clan under the medusa pantheon?" he asked.
"Indeed, and as far as I know their master never accepts someone so easily," she sighed, "my mother had to pay a great price just to secure a master for me, and he can't even be compared to the one offering to be your godfather."
"Interesting," Jim couldn't help but smile, "I should take the three as my masters then."
"Hahah, in theory you can," she suddenly said something he didn't imagine, "but your time… you would be busy like hell if you did that."
"Oh, can I do that? Is it allowed here?"
"Not against the rules as far as I know," she chuckled, "but to my knowledge no sane disciple did that for a long time. You have to know being a direct disciple for a master isn't just like going to classes and getting lessons. You'll have many assignments and dirty tasks where you'll be burdened by the lowly things they had and hated to do."
"Damn!" Jim cursed before thinking more about it. "I will take them then, better for my future," he decided while she only sighed softly from the side.
"Crazy human," she muttered, "greedy human."
He laughed and said nothing before heading back with her to the arena. There he found the crowded arena the same, but inside there was no one but a group of masters.
There was no one fighting anymore.
"Did the fights end so early?" he asked while passing through the long corridor following her steps to end up in the big open arena.
"Early? C'mon, they have been fighting here for hours," she said with a surprised look over her face.
"But I thought many fights would take place," he said with a look of loss over his face.
"They did," she nodded, "but none lasted long as yours. Here the higher grades bully the lower ones, so many fights would end soon by the surrender of the opposing team. They prefer to pay the price of the loss rather than losing the lives of a couple of their best members."
"This…" Jim didn't know how to describe this.
"Harsh?" she asked, "but this is how the true world works, at least our world here."
"Sigh," he couldn't help but recall the words of the old man, "I should then aim for the three masters," he inwardly thought, "that's the best insurance for my safety on the long run."
"Finally our delayed and lazy disciple arrived."
Just as he passed inside the arena, he heard this distasteful tone filled with mockery. "Pol," he softly muttered while the face of Siera changed. "He wasn't here when I went to look for you," she said in an apologizing tone.
"Never mind," Jim softly whispered, "destined enemies are fated to meet each other everywhere."