The Magician of Sound

"Yo, my beloved student. You're finally here."

Seeing the familiar face that had instilled a trauma into him, Kai's face distorted a little bit. With a normal expression, Ria Ross pushed the door wider and waited until Kai regained his calm before saying, "Come on, you brat. I didn't teach you to have that kind of expression."

Kai took a deep breath before he said with difficulty, "Nice to meet you again, Teacher. It's been a few years."

"A few years? It's been ten years, six months, fifteen days, and twenty-three minutes." Ria Ross snorted. "That long since I last saw you at the airport a decade ago."

"You even know the exact time…" Kai sweated profusely, trying hard to control his calm expression.

"Haha…" She laughed out loud before taking a look at Michelle and the others. "Hmm… You even brought the shadow princess, space girl, and little Aries."

"Space girl?" Tasha opened her mouth in surprise, not knowing where the nickname came from.

"Little Aries…" The corners of Ayaka's mouth twitched a little bit as she had been calling her with that name since she finished the operation.

Meanwhile, Michelle didn't have a change of expression as many people in school called her that.

"Anyway, come in first." After pushing the door wide open, Ria Ross walked inside while waving her hand, motioning them to come.

Kai took the first step inside, following Ria Ross to her study room where Ayaka previously asked her to make her a Zodiac.

"Welcome to my house. And happy birthday, Kai," Ria sat down on her chair as she greeted them once again. "As you've seen, this is my study room."

"Uhm." Kai thought for a moment and said, "Why did you call me here?"

"Haha… Why do you ask? Do you want to go back now?" Ria placed her hand on the table before supporting her chin.

"No…" Kai glanced left and right, not knowing what to answer. He took a deep breath and looked at her with a serious expression. "I mean, Teacher isn't someone who would ask me to come just because. I think Teacher has something important and wants me to see it."

Michelle and the others didn't let out a single sound and watched how their conversation unfolded. Only Michelle knew that Kai actually overcame his trauma a few years ago. It was because he knew that everything she did had him as the priority. If not, she would have continued the Zodiac project instead of giving it to the government.

However, Kai didn't act with confidence because no matter what he did, Ria always outsmarted him. No one would be happy when they always lost unless they were a masochist.

"You're right. I have a few things to tell you… like the reason I asked you to come here," Ria Ross proved Michelle's thought once again. "Let see, you came here… first is for that girl, little Aries. The second reason would be the upcoming raid mission in Canada. The third is to fight me again."

"Everything except the third reason is right." Kai closed his eyes and shook his head helplessly.

"Hahaha… I let my intention slip." Ria Ross fixed her grey hair while grinning.

"You purposely let it slip."

"Haiz. This is my fault for teaching you not to leave small details… you're picking it on me right now." Ria sighed in defeat.

"Teacher, We've had enough of your jokes." Kai scratched his cheek, putting on an awkward smile.

"Fine." Ria shrugged before turning around and reaching for a long briefcase behind her seat. She laid the case on top of her table before opening it.

"!!!" The four of them were amazed as soon as they saw the thing inside the case. It was a pair of swords similar to the ones they saw a few months ago.

The two swords both had black handles with a few white straps to soften their contact with hands. The swords had two colors: Black as its base color and a green pattern similar to Kai's magic circle. One spot stood out the most. Right above each handle was a spherical metal. It looked like a glass made of metal with its inside empty.

Ria looked at the swords first before explaining, "I've remodeled them according to your problem. Thanks to the concept of little Aries, I only needed to look for a metal that wouldn't break because of the vibration."

"Ah. It's Teacher's specialty." Kai nodded with a smile.

"Specialty?" Ayaka was the most curious one about this. She had stayed here for a while, yet still knew nothing about it.

"Teacher, what kind of training do you actually give?" Kai furrowed his eyebrows, not expecting Ayaka not to know Ria's magic.

"Hmm… I only taught her martial arts to refine her fighting style. She… I didn't use my magic at all." She shrugged.

Ayaka looked down, ashamed, and commented, "Professor Ria. You don't need to mind talking about me. You can just say I'm too weak for you to use your magic. You didn't even use your hand."

Kai stared at Ayaka for a few seconds, knowing how she felt. In fact, he could only make her use her hand after four months of continuous fighting. Kai explained, "She is an A-rank earth magician. However, she somehow managed to evolve her magic, like how Michelle's dark magic evolved into shadow magic. So, her magic now is metal magic.

In fact, Michelle got the inspiration of shadow magic from Teacher."

"Yeah. It was after you became a Zodiac. I thought about getting stronger and somehow stumbled at her place." Michelle nodded. Ayaka was astonished to hear this, while Ria Ross looked annoyed.

"Enough about that talk! Take a look at the body of the swords first… I combined a few metals and made it durable enough to work under high vibration. It wasn't really hard to make since there's already a record of it from the previous era. The problem would be this spherical thing that will hold your vibration." She pointed at the spherical spot.

Kai and the others observed the spot. "How much vibration can it take on?"

"I used the Supersonic Blade video as my reference. The waves can vibrate the blade twenty thousand to forty thousand times per second. It's only used in bakeries though. This one can handle one hundred thousand to one hundred fifty thousand vibrations per second. The sphere was previously very brittle and kept breaking.

It only stopped breaking after I changed the metal into the hardest one that I could synthesize."

Kai nodded before taking out the sword from the case. "Can I test it, Teacher?"

"Sure. Just get a bit farther away, since it's a double-edged weapon," Ria Ross nodded before pointing at an empty space in the corner. "You can try to swing it around there."

Kai glanced at the empty spot, nodded, and walked there. He made a few swings and told his experience, "The weight is the same as my previous sword, and the length is also similar. The sphere is disturbing me a little, but there should be no problem with its performance. I just need some minor adjustments."

"Sure. There should be no problem with the design. How about you activate the vibration?"

Kai nodded and created a magic circle that enveloped the sphere. This spherical magic circle was to reflect the sound completely so it would keep crashing to the metal and let the sword vibrate.

Kai waited for a while to let the sword vibrate. Although he couldn't pinpoint it, it looked like the sword was vibrating a hundred thousand times per second. There wasn't a change in the sword's appearance because it vibrated at a speed high enough to be invisible to the naked eyes.

"Cut this." Ria threw a wooden log at him.

Without hesitating, Kai slashed at the wooden log. Surprisingly, it had no resistance from the sword as it was sliced into two by his sword.

Ria didn't stop there. She quickly grabbed a piece of metal and threw it. "This one next."

Kai sliced the metal once again.

Clang!

Out of his expectation, the sound of clicking metal echoed across the entire room even though the metal was sliced into two.

"How is it, Kai?"

"There was resistance from the metal for a split second. It took away a portion of the vibration."

"Hmm… as expected. This is why we separate fantasy from science." Ria let out a long sigh.

"Yeah. It can coexist, but it wouldn't be the same as we expect." Kai nodded.

Michelle and the others were confused by their conversation but kept their silence until Ria explained it. "There are a few problems with this vibration magic. The first problem is the science itself. People tend to think it would be an overpowered weapon, yet in reality, we need a material that can stand the vibration. Another one is the resistance he felt earlier.

He would need to keep pumping the sound to create more vibrations. In other words, the fantasy has been broken by this science.

"The second problem is the design. It's hard enough to make a design that can stand a high amount of vibrations. You can't even see the sword vibrating because it's vibrating so quickly. And there's also this shock breaker so the vibration doesn't flow to the handle and the user. It took me three years just to design this.

"After that, the sharpness. While it does increase the sharpness, it's not at a level where it can cut through anything. The metal I threw at Kai was a brittle metal, and it already gave resistance. If it were a hard magical beast's shell or a harder metal, he might not be able to cut it. Of course, he can just increase the amount of vibration, but it comes back to the first problem.

In conclusion, this Vibration Sword is good, but it's not really extraordinary… Such a shame." Ria Ross shook her head in disappointment.