Alastor couldn't explain it, but it felt like there was a force pulling him and stretching his mind, every word of Lirians held an enticement that he couldn't explain.
It was almost as if the world itself was using a million strings to weaved him into Lirian's path, he felt an overwhelming urge in every corner of his being urging him to do as the prince candidate said.
It didn't help that Lirian's way of speak both ignited and fuelled the hate he felt at that moment.
"How do you know that it was Lady Efrideet?" Alastor asked through gritted teeth, as that urge only grew, it felt almost impossible for him to resist, but resist he did with all his might.
Lirian hid his smirk, he could tell from the shaky breathing of Alastor that he had already gotten to him, all that he need was a little push.
"You'll need my mother's clearance to get access to the knowledge about some of the powers of a diviner," he lied, "You can imagine how useful this knowledge can be to the empire, so naturally they won't hand it out, and my mother only told me because Efrideet is targeting me."
Lirian moved his head around and feigned to be focusing on his ears, pretending to make sure no one was within earshot of him, then he whispered softly.
"One of her abilities is to remove impulse control temporarily, and it's also possible to slightly influence the behavior of someone, it only works for a few seconds at a time, but if you target someone at the most opportune of times."
Lirian chuckled, "Well, there is no need to tell you since you've already had first-hand experience."
"Since I told you, you'd best keep it quiet, I can get into so much trouble for telling you this," Lirian said with a playful smile while putting his finger to his lips.
The change in Alastor was instantaneous and Lirian could feel him on the edge of accepting, "I take it that we have a deal!" said Lirian expectantly.
Alastor looked at him hesitantly, if what Lirian told him was true, then he had already been manipulated by an external force once he wouldn't allow it to happen again, "I need some time to think about this,"
Lirian was slightly surprised, but he was glad to receive such a response, 'It would appear that he is already taking what I told him and using it to better his decision making, he won't allow himself to act on impulse again.'
"Take as much time as you like, you have two-hundred-years, but try to make up your mind before that, you've been retired for a while and battle formations are always changing so you'll have to brush up a bit."
Alastor scoffed at him, he might have been out of the field for some time but he never stopped studying war.
"Oh, and just so that you know you aren't the first seventh-grade second accord member to agree to join me, so try not to get too confident," Lirian added with a chuckle.
"Who?" Alastor asked almost the very second that Lirian finished speaking, to say that the news was surprising was an understatement, he was almost certain that Lirian would deny him the knowledge, but to his surprise Lirian pointed and as he looked in the direction Lirian pointed his gaze fell onto Anya and he had small heart attack.
"So, can you tell me, do you think that I'm out of the race?!" Lirian asked with a smug look plastered on his face.
Alastor grimaced before chuckling like a fool, "I was a fool for pitying you and I feel sorry for all those that still think as I did just a few minutes ago."
"But if you really want me to join you then you must start by proving that you can still fight, in a few weeks when you've fully adjusted beat everyone in your class, you were more than capable of doing it before, and now it's the minimum requirement."
"Very well call them up, I'll fight all of them together," Lirian grinned and spoke just as Alastor turned around.
Alastor turned back, "I said when you've adjusted,"
"But won't you be more impressed, if I can do it now, it's only been a few days since I woke up," Lirian spoke with his usual bravado.
Alastor looked at him curiously, "Very well," he said and got moving to gather the class.
It took a while for all the students to finish the obstacle courses they were doing, by the time everyone arrived Lirian had already taken a sword from the racks and stood ready across from them.
"Lirian wishes to test himself by challenging each of you," he began to explain the more he spoke the more the students began to frown.
One of the boys Damien Uldwin whispered while looking at the commander, "His blind sir, this doesn't seem right,"
Sarah Jane came up to the commander and looked at him coldly, "Sir you can't do this,", she said severely, "If you make us do this, I'll have to report it to the family."
Alastor did not look happy as he realised what she was implying, she along with her entire class thought that he was doing this to bully Lirian.
After all, he had lost everything because of Lirian in a way, and it seemed like he was using his authority as a teacher to make Lirian's life harder than it had already become.
Lirian was sitting back and waiting, but once he started to hear what they were all saying the voices started to whisper in his head once more.
"Do you hear that, they think you're weak, they are going to use this opportunity to take all the power you've gathered,"
"Can you hear them scoffing, as if it's an insult that they have to fight us, hahahaha, how many others wish that they could live after a fight with us, and now look at these ungrateful ignorant children, getting a free pass and they dare to scoff at us," the voice of number 12 roared in hate and Lirian felt the anger seep into himself.
He walked forward with a frosty expression, "The commander made a mistake with what he said, I won't be fighting you one on one, all of you will be coming at me together," he said with an icy air around him and he exuded confidence with every word.
"Ah crap," Mordred cried out, "His gone and changed again, this time he is more like a demon, so that's the next step, I don't even want to know what comes next anymore."
"Hey," Eido cried out in outrage, "Demons aren't bad," she said pointing to herself.
"Oh whatever," he said glancing at the perfectly innocent demon, ", but I did read a couple of old stories about the scary demon race."
"Hey Lirian," Lucas said coming closer, "I get that you want to prove yourself, but this is dangerous we are all cultivators now, we could hurt you," he said sincerely, he only wanted to help Lirian out of this situation.