Alistair returns to his dorm room after making his way back to Utopia. The gaurds stationed on the borders of the city had questions of why he left the orphanage, but were satisfied upon his answer of completing a quest.
When he returns to his dorm room, he packs up the remaining shell pieces that he stored under his bed and the crystallized scralebit.
"Even though I'm not leaving forever, I feel like I'm saying goodbye for some reason... I will return though. After gaining enough power to defend myself I will come back for answers, no matter how long it takes."
He then thinks about if he is even able to age and die like normal human. Shaking his head to push those thoughts aside he decides to find that answer out at another time. As he heads towards his door though, he hears a commotion out in the hallway.
Listening closely, he is able to hear the voice of Ahmed and another group of students arguing. From what he can make out, it seems that Alistair is what they are arguing over. He cracks open the door to take a peak out and see the situation.
To his surprise though, he finally sees Michelle. She is part of the group that is arguing with Ahmed. Ahmed brought his underlings with him though which makes Michelle look like she is about to be overtaken at any second.
Weirdly enough though, Ahmeds group is not doing anything to shut her down other than talking to her.
"That brat needs to learn how to respect his betters! I don't know what he did to break out of my spell, but as long as he is in this school he can't get away from me that easily."
Ahmed points towards Alistairs room causing Alistair to duck his head back in to avoid being detected.
"Really Ahmed? You think that you can control everyone and everything in this school just because you are up on the student rankings chart? What would you do if Wato heard you ranting and raving?"
Michelle gives off a cool composed atmosphere as she crosses her arms waiting for Ahmeds response.
"You think I'm afraid of that cheating bastard? I-"
"Cheating bastard huh? Oh Ahmed, I thought that you had truly reformed from our last 'conversation'."
A young man materializes next to Michelle out of thin air as he looks at Ahmed with clear contempt
"Wato! I knew she had someone with her, figures it would be you. I'm not afraid of you though, you just managed to get in a few lucky shots last time. I have improved since we last met so you won't be so lucky this time."
Ahmed readies himself by starting to murmur a few incomprehensible syllables, causing a dark purple shroud to start to form. Before he is able to finish though, Wato disappears from his spot and re-materializes behind Ahmed.
Completely shocked by this situation Ahmed stumbles in his pronunciation for his spell causing the purple fog to dissipate. Before he could say anything else though, Wato sends a roundhouse kick into Ahmeds side causing him to fall and slide on the ground clutching his side.
"Ahmed, you know its against the rules to use magic on other students unless you are in a combat allowed zone of the school. The dorms are not those zones."
Michelle and Ahmeds underlings all think to themselves, "Didn't you just break those rules yourself just now?"
Ahmed coughs while gasping to regain his breathing. He points at Wato and asks unbelieving,
"How did you use a teleportation spell?! You need a conduit for that to work!"
Wato chuckles and responds patiently to Ahmed, "Simple Ahmed, while you were focusing on gaining followers, I proceeded to the next step of ascension. I have stepped onto my own path of magic. I could explain it to you, but you would not understand the complexities involved in spatial magic."
The hairs on the back of Ahmeds neck begin to rise as he understands the implications of challenging a person who starts their own branch of magic. That person is someone who truly contributed to mankind by pushing the boundaries of magical knowledge that humans possess.
He merely has been trying to understand the fundamentals of his own branch of magic this entire time. He is almost finished with the fundamentals and was about to begin researching into his own advancements pretty soon. After his first loss to Wato though, he decided to focus his attention elsewhere for advancing his status in society.
He decided to gain a following and become a major force, instead of focusing on his own personal growth. Upset at himself, Ahmed marks this event in his heart as he vows to correct his actions in the future to even the score between him and Wato.
"Come on everyone, our business here is finished."
Seeing that the conflict is dying down and things are coming to a resolution, Michelle breathes a sigh of relief before looking towards Alistairs door and seeing him looking at them all. Surprised she just winks at him and puts her finger to her lips signalling him to be quiet and wait for her.
After seeing this Alistair knows he has been spotted and nods his head before retreating back into his room. Before he does though, he sees Michelle and Wato whispering about something before parting ways.
Moments later, he hears a knock on his door. Opening it, he sees Michelle standing there looking at him with a proud smile on her face that practically begged for praise.
"Thank you... What was that all about?"
After getting her praise, Michelle contentedly begins to explain.
"A ranking tournament is coming up pretty soon that will decide the new rankings of the students. The higher the rankings, the more points you get allotted each month and the better recognition you achieve.
Ahmed felt himself hitting a wall with his own research into magic recently and has been recruiting students with the promise of protecting them from other bullies in school and guaranteeing them an adequate amount of food and resources. I'm told that you managed to break out of his spell that is supposed to be impossible to escape from without outside assistance.
He has been looking for you so he could perform tests on your body so he can figure out how to perfect his spells. After realizing the danger that would put you in, I immediately came to your aid. Can't have my friend turn into a lab rat can I?"
After getting the full rundown of the situation Alistair thanks his lucky stars that Michelle was there to save him. If Ahmed managed to capture him and perform tests, who could say if Alistair would survive?
"I am curious though, who is Wato? He seems even stronger than Ahmed, how did you get a guy like that to help you? Did you pay him or something?"
Alistairs curiosity becomes piqued when he recalls the fantastical movements of Wato in that fight. Michelle realizes that Alistair is amazed by Wato and offhandedly says,
"Oh, he's from the Yammi family. They are good friends of my family, money would not interest them in the least. The reason he helped is because I asked him too. He doesn't mind any requests from me because our families arranged a marriage between us long ago."
"Marriage?" Alistair feels he just learned something really crazy but does not understand what marriage is or why it could compel the strong to fight for the weak.