"Master we're late for dinner your mother won't be happy!"
Realising his mistake Kyle jolted into action and rushed into his bedroom to get changed. In this world people usually used loose robes for training like those seen in old kung fu movies while the day to day clothing of nobles and the upper level of society was similar to that worn by 15th century nobility in Europe. This included tights for men, Kyle saw this clothing and thought 'hell no' and started rifling through his closet to find something more to his taste. Eventually he found some loose trousers similar to khakis and a shirt which unfortunately had slightly ruffled collar and cuffs.
This created a strange impression and he wouldn't have looked out of place in a 1980's music video. Ignoring this Kyle finished dressing and left his room to see Miranda pacing around waiting for him. Seeing Kyle was finally out Miranda looked at him strangely as what he was wearing wasn't what he would usually wear to dinner with his family.
"Are you sure you wish to attend dinner dressed like that master?"
"Yes Miranda I'm sure. Also could you remind me to speak to the tailor and blacksmith tomorrow as I have some things to order from them."
"Of course master I will make sure to remind you in the morning."
Nodding his head Kyle had decided to have some new clothes made to his taste and with regards to the blacksmith, he'd decided to have a few weapons and some armour made rather than use what already existed in the market.
Finally Kyle was ready to head to dinner and meet his new family for the first time. Walking down the long hallways towards the dining hall, Kyle and Miranda passed a few servants who seeing Kyle heading towards the dining hall dressed as he was began whispering to each other. Miranda began looking around at these gossiping servants and started to worry if weird rumours may start circulating about her master. Kyle realizing Miranda's unrest just quietly took her hand and whispered in her ear.
"Don't worry about them, let them say what they want as it doesn't affect me."
Kyle then let go of Miranda's hand and continued towards the dining hall. What Miranda didn't realise was that the servants were whispering about her as she was walking next to her master rather than the customary 2 steps behind. One of the servants who saw this was one of Miranda's teachers. She decided that at the next opportunity she would need to educate Miranda in the correct decorum of a servant of a noble house.
Reaching the dining hall Kyle saw a pair of large doors with guards stood outside. These guards were 2 first stage eighth level warriors who were equipped with hard leather armour and armed with a seven foot long claymore sword. When the guards saw Kyle approaching their eyebrows raised as they saw what he was wearing. As Kyle approached the doors the guards turned and pushed the doors open allowing Kyle and Miranda to enter.
The dining hall was without a doubt massive. There were a series of twenty foot long tables arranged across the hall, all filled with various members of the family. These members were a mixture of all ages from young to old, but there was a definite separation within the different groups.
The group who was closest to the door were from the outer families, these being those who had married into the house or were otherwise ostracised because of a lower cultivation realm. These people usually dealt in the day to day running of the businesses the family owned. The next group were the stronger members of the family. These people were usually members of the guards or people who trained the younger generation in the hopes of producing a new talent.
Finally at the highest point of the hall the upper echelon of the family was located. These included of course Kyle's parents and his uncles and cousins, but it also included the strongest members of the family including captains and lieutenants of the guard and also some elders who had earned their place in the family.
As Kyle entered the hall everyone paused and turned to look at who the latecomer was. Seeing that it was the scion of the family many emotions erupted from the crowd. Due to his empathic sense Kyle was assaulted by these different emotions but some were stronger than others. The strongest of these feelings were pity, regret, anger and condescension the most worrying however was a sense of malice. With all of these feelings coming at him Kyle couldn't locate where this was coming from until it suddenly disappeared as if it was never there.
Kyle was confused by the appearance and then sudden disappearance of this malice, thinking about it this was probably from however poisoned him and as they've hidden in the family for so long they must have an unbelievable control of their emotions. Taking this as a cue Kyle took control of this sense and blocked out the noise. He would use this ability when speaking with one person or with a small group, but with this many people it was just too confusing and overwhelming.
Kyle started to walk towards the head table where his seat was, looking around him he saw many people were still staring at him and laughing behind their hands. In one of these groups which Kyle saw was made up of children from the outer families, was a kid about the same age as him but being a bit bulkier staring at him intently while another was whispering in his ear. Kyle could see something strange in the eyes of the kid staring at him while the kid whispering in his ear had a thin face reminding Kyle of a ferret.
At this point the bulky kid stood up and started moving towards him at a quick pace. Wondering what was going on Kyle halted his steps and waited for the youth to approach. When he was only around ten feet away from Kyle the youth stopped and stared, finally he spoke.
"Good evening do you know who I am?"
Thinking for a moment Kyle struggled to draw up a memory of this kid. The previous Kyle didn't really associate with many of the other children as he was concentrating fully on breaking out of his bottleneck. After running through his memories for a moment Kyle remembered a young member of the outer families who he trained with when they were younger. This youngster didn't have much in the way of resources but was determined and driven to be more than his parents who were only shopkeepers.
"Are you Bruno who I used to train with?"
"Yes it's good you remember me. You used to look down on me because I'm from the outer family, but look at us now I'm already in the third level and you still aren't even in the first."
Hearing this Kyle was confused as he never looked down on Bruno and in fact had considered him one of his only friends, until Bruno entered the first level and went to further training. Kyle then remembered the ferret whispering in Bruno's ear before he came over and he believed someone was trying to cause problems. Whether this was related to the poisoner or not Kyle wasn't sure but he didn't think so as this seemed to be clumsier than dangerous.
"I think you must be mistaken about something, I've never looked down on you."
"Lies! I've heard what you been saying about me so fight me."
Looking towards Bruno's clique Kyle could see the ferret looking over with a look of satisfaction on his face as he was about to see one of the children of the upper level get beaten up while he wouldn't receive any punishment. None of the older generation intervened as this is a battle oriented world and the children needed to fight to get stronger. Kyle's mother was about to intervene but was held back by her husband. She looked at him in anger to which he just said.
"He's different today let's see what he can do."
Bruno cycled his mana and began to execute his 'tyrant fist' skill while starting to rush towards Kyle. Kyle for his part just looked at Bruno, as he came closer he seemed to slow down. It was similar to bullet time from the movies in his last life. Confused Kyle quickly inspected himself and found that he had subconsciously cycled his mana into the third node in his brain. 'This node must govern reaction times and reflexes'. Regardless as Bruno got closer Kyle remembered the Aikido lessons he'd taken in his last life. There are no true martial arts in this world as they use skills to make up for the shortfall, however if you had a Bruce Lee or a Mike Tyson who also cultivated nobody in the nearest few levels would be able to compete.
When Bruno's fist was less than 8 inches from Kyle's face, Kyle brought his hand up and caught Bruno's wrist. Pulling his wrist around Kyle pivoted moving closer to Bruno putting him off balance finally pulling his wrist down and then back Kyle flipped Bruno in the air. Bruno came crashing down onto the stone floor being winded and confused. A few of the people were cheering when Bruno attacked as they thought they would see a good show from the newest rising star, only to see him put down without any skills or mana. This confused everyone in the hall because how can you defeat a skill without using one to counter. Kyle ignored all this and continued towards his parents table while turning to Miranda and said.
"I wonder what's for dinner I'm getting quite hungry."