Paley woke up feeling strangely refreshed and well in the lukewarm water of the mana zone's lake. He sat up slowly, taking a deep breath, and found that he could move his legs without the stabbing pain of five holes in them.
He carefully unwrapped the bandages covering them to find they were fully healed. There was no sign of any injury. In fact, his skin seemed even smoother now.
"Looks like you were right," Madella walked into the shallow waters and took a seat next to him, resting her head on her knees, "There is something here that heals you."
"Yeah..." Paley stared into the distance, looking for something, "I saw a girl here once. She was glowing pure white. I thought it was a dream, so I didn't mention it to anyone. She was-" He hesitated, grinding his teeth, "pretty."
"Oh? What's this? Tell me more." Madella teased.
"That's it." He shrugged, "She disappeared, and I went back to sleep."
"Aw." Madella seemed bummed out.
"That duel yesterday... It feels so unreal." He lifted his knees and rested his head on his knees, mimicking her.
"Yeah, it does." She pulled him in, placing his head on her chest, "And I'm so proud of you." she stroked his black hair.
"I thought you were going to be mad at me."
"Why did you think that?"
"Because you hate violence."
"I do hate violence. But I was more worried about you getting hurt there. And would you look at that? You got so hurt." She laughed, "Besides, there are some people who deserve to be taught a lesson."
"So..." Paley teased.
"Oh, that's not what I meant, silly," She ruffled his hair and slowly turned more serious, "Listen, Paley. First, come words. Then comes action. Got it?"
"Got it,"
They returned to the orphanage, where the orphans were astounded by Paley's impossible recovery.
"Paley, your legs!" Jurie and Teerom were the first to see them since they were chatting outside.
"How?" Teerom poked at his bare left leg (Hiruyo cut off his trousers at the beginning of the thighs to make it easier to remove the swords and bandage his legs).
"Believe it or not, there *is* blood in there," Paley joked about his paleness as he went into the cottage to meet the others.
"Hey!" Adimia and Reben jumped up from the table, where they were playing cards, "How are you?" They asked.
"Great," Paley replied. He spent the rest of the day resting and eating to recuperate his mana because it was all used up overnight. Madella checked on him about twice an hour until they all went to bed.
The next day, at school, something unexpected happened to Paley. Everyone from Stage 1 to Stage 6 was waiting for him outside, and they all cheered when he turned the corner and came into view.
He stopped walking, hesitating to go anywhere near the excited crowd waiting for him.
"Come on, Paley." Jurie urged him forward, but he didn't budge.
"I hate being the center of attention," Paley said, giving her a look of anxiety.
"You just gotta talk to them."
"They're going to ask question, after question, after question; I don't want to talk to them." He shook his head.
"They all admire you." Rauba tugged at his sleeve, "You should listen to Jurie." She said.
"Rauba's right, Paley. A hero has to talk to the people he saved." Adimia put his hand on Rauba's shoulder and grinned.
"I don't think beating a noble makes me a hero." Paley sighed and decided to continue walking.
"The families you helped would say otherwise," Reben contended.
"Fine. Have it your way." He made it clear with his expression that he didn't want to be anywhere near that crowd full of enthusiastic people. Dillie was at the gate, waving at him, and slightly behind her, partially hidden by the students, was Libon and his cronies. He had an uncomfortable, awkward look that pleased Paley as he walked into the school.
"Hey," Dillie greeted and walked beside him into the crowd.
"Hey," He greeted back as the first few questions bombarded him. Soon, everyone was shouting and pushing to ask their question. Some girls wanted to be his girlfriends, but they were quickly taken away by Dillie and Bacha and locked inside the school.
"Everyone, I..." Paley stepped back as they moved toward him aggressively, still shouting questions. Teachers - apart from the headmistress who watched from the front doors - also joined the crowd.
"Everyone, shut up!" Paley shouted, immediately silencing everyone and making them stop pushing each other. The orphans and Dillie were shocked; this was the first time they heard Paley raise his voice at people.
"We're going to be here for ages if I try to answer all of your questions. I don't want to miss Magic class, so I'll answer your questions at lunchtime. Happy?"
"Yes..." Some of them said, and all of them nodded.
"Good," Paley made his way through the crowd and into the school, where he went to his class after splitting off with the others.
As he chatted with Adimia and Dillie, waiting for the lesson to begin, he found the uncomfortable stare of Libon at the doorway. When he turned to ask him what his deal was, he ran off like some clichè girl with a crush.
Paley hoped that by lunchtime, everyone would've forgotten about him, and he'd get to chill in the magic club, but his hopes were crushed by the stampede of students approaching down the corridor. There weren't as many people as before, only about thirty-four. Most were from Stages 4 and 5, and they all had the same question.
"Paley! Can you teach us magic?" They asked one after the other.
"No," Paley replied bluntly to each of them, even the ones offering to pay him money.
"Please! I'm an Earth-type too!" A boy stomped.
'And I'm a Quimnia,' Paley thought in his head. "I don't want to teach anyone magic. That's all." He shut the door and returned to the magic club, who were all in low spirits after he rejected their requests too.
"Do you force yourself to teach me magic?" Dillie asked, worried that he thought of the afterschool training sessions they had together as wastes of time.
"He teaches you magic!?" Diz suddenly jumped up, outraged.
"Of course, I don't force myself. I refused them because they're not as important to me as you are." He answered Dillie with bold oblivious honesty.
"O-Okay," She looked down, unable to look him in the eye, and blushed.
"Isn't that a little biased?" Diz asked in a frustrated tone.
"What's wrong with being biased about the people you like?" Paley's words continued turning Dillie's face a deep shade of red, "If you had to choose between saving your husband or some random stranger, you'd obviously choose your husband."
'Husband!?' The word made Dillie's head spin with dreamy thoughts.
"You're comparing loved ones dying with teaching magic!"
"And?" Paley continued arguing with Diz for about five minutes until Libon suddenly burst into the room with his two cronies. He had his five servants with him; two girls and three boys, all students.
"Paley," He approached Paley, who readied a spell secretly, "I'm sorry!" He suddenly bowed, taking him by surprise.
"We have to go to court after school." Libon stood upright and began explaining. Paley immediately thought that Libon wanted him to not screw him over during the hearing, which he was definitely going to do. But Libon surprised him yet again, "I want you to be honest about me cheating." He said.
"You sure? They're probably going to strip you of your family's noble title." Paley smiled maliciously, "And you will have to be my servant." He was trying to annoy Libon, who should've become infuriated with the idea of being his servant.
"That's something I'd like to talk to you about," He fidgeted with his hands. His cronies seemed to grow more and more excited as well, "Last night, I was thinking about everything; yesterday's duel and everything else bad that I've done... I respect you and I admire you! Please accept me as your apprentice!" He bowed again; his cronies too. They wanted Paley to be their leader too.
'Well, isn't this nice?' Paley thought. The others in the room watched in awe. After all, a noble was bowing and requesting to be a peasant's apprentice. "I don't want an apprentice. I don't want to teach anyone anything." Paley said with a hint of frustration.
"I don't want you to teach me magic. I want to be working under you from now on. As your apprentice." Libon continued bowing, and so did his cronies.
"Hm? Wait, what does being an apprentice even mean?" Paley asked.
"You don't know?" Libon turned to the one on his left, "Explain to Paley, please." He requested.
His crony stepped forward, adjusting his oversized glasses, and explained the Mage system.
"Mages, like knights, have ranks. Local mages are the bottom rank; they're your blacksmiths, tailors, workers in general. After them are the normal mages called foot mages in the army (but they can also be monster hunters or something like that).
They use their magic to fight, and they have subranks going up to three tiers each. They're Lifliol, Setred, Ankonge, and Reju. Ankonge and Reju ranks often have apprentices ranked Lifliol or Setred, maybe even unranked. These apprentices help their masters and fight alongside them in battles." He explained.
"So you're pretty much a servant?" Paley boiled it down.
"Yep, that's right. We'll work for you." Libon smiled awkwardly.
"Alright, fine. Are all three of you going to be my apprentices?" Paley crossed his arms, trying to end the conversation as quickly as possible.
"All eight of us." Libon turned to his five ex-servants, "They used to be my servants, but I unbound them this morning from me. I thought it would help me prove that I changed to you. But they decided they wanted to be your apprentices too. Would you let them?" Libon asked, and they all gave Paley puppy eyes in hopes he accepted.
"Alright, how about this? Libon, you'll be the leading apprentice, meaning that I won't have to do any work to manage all of you. None of you have to report to me or anything, just do whatever you want. Of course, since you're my apprentices, I'll help you with any *serious*" Paley made sure to stress that word, "problems that you have. Alright?"
They all nodded excitedly.
"Oh, I almost forgot." Libon took out the panda chain he'd taken on Monday, "Here you go. I'm sorry for taking it."
"Oh, right." Paley forgot about the chain but was pleased to get it back nonetheless. He put it on, slipping it under his shirt.
"You should all introduce yourselves to your new master." Dillie butted in. She was brimming with joy at seeing Libon change so much.
"Right." The boy on the right of Libon began, "My name is-"
"Just write them down on this. Otherwise, I won't remember." Paley motioned to a sheet of paper on the desk.
They all wrote their names and brief introductions too, starting with Elhom, the one who had just tried to introduce himself. His hair was short, brown, and slightly curly, and he had big dark brown eyes. Next was the one with oversized glasses, Tugas, who had very short black hair.
Then were the five ex-servants, Iji (boy), Ketto (boy), Homar (girl), Negie (girl), and Ott (boy). Paley didn't realize there was a small ritual for becoming someone's apprentice and had to do it. It didn't affect it, though; it was more of a traditional thing.
The soon-to-be apprentices all kneeled before Paley, making him hugely uncomfortable. To add to that, they each kissed his hand and pledged: I declare thy, with loyalty and with honor, my master. To which Paley had to reply with: I declare thy, with respect and with honor, my apprentice. Dillie, the magic club, and the headmistress all clapped for them.
"We await your command, master," Libon said. Paley was still surprised that overnight a narcissistic asshole noble could become like this: half-bowing and calling a peasant master.
"Get me some water." That was Paley's first order.