From there on out I operated on autopilot, responding with elegance when spoken to as the princess subtly guided us to a sweats café near the academy by pulling, tugging and pushing my arm, making it look as if I was the one leading when I wasn't even fully there.
'What am I doing… How am I doing it…' I wondered by the time the princess had taken us to a bridge over one of the two rivers flowing through the capital. The princess sat dangerously with her legs dangling over the edge of the bridge, resting on my arm as I stood at the edge gazing up at the moon and prayed for answers.
A while later, the princess said her goodbyes as a gold and silver armored knight came to fetch her back to the castle.
Once the princess was gone, the students who had been secretly following us also left, leaving me alone and continuing to gaze up at the moon.
"Luna." I said by coincidence.
"Yes milord?" Luna responded, walking out from the shadows, a fact overlooked since I was still dazed.
"What's the drinking age again?" I asked randomly.
"It's twelve?"
"Ah… Can you lead the way back then." I asked, turning to look at Luna, who's entire being seemed to be supplemented under the moonlight as her hair turned from silver to white under its glow and her silver eyes glowed with two white crescents. Her perfect skin only compliments her hair and eyes with a natural shine.
Of course, this was all ignored by me, who was too dazed to think and saw Luna far too much to take pause in the beautiful scene.
"..."
"Is something wrong?" I asked.
"No." Luna said, guiding us back. That night I dropped asleep like a rock, though once again I thought I could hear voices, specifically from Luna's room.
"There's only a few more years left. It might not mean much as I'm not a human, but I think you'll regret it if you don't be more direct with him now…"
…
The next morning was as usual, only I felt Luna's black cat which seemed to appear and disappear without warning and never made a mess was being awfully mean to Luna today as it kept trying to subtly get in her way as she prepared breakfast and my hair.
"Did you forget to feed him or something?" I asked out of curiosity while she did my hair.
"No. He's just grumpy. I got a little mad at him last night." Luna answered.
"Riiiight…" I said, not pushing the issue any further.
…
The next day went surprisingly well. Apart from being dragged over to the front of magic theory to sit beside the princess I had a relatively normal day. However, my senses were tingling, screaming that there was trouble.
My sister and her friends just made fun of my plan having gone awry at lunch and surprisingly it didn't seem any of the students were bad mouthing me despite the difference in status. My sister's theory was that I was just too handsome for the girls to say anything while too strong for most the boys to say anything.
As such, during herbology I sat beside the window and fiddled with it until I worked out how it was opened.
Sure enough, that very class…
Bang!
Everyone who was sleeping in the class suddenly woke up and turned to the entrance to see the door kicked open by someone. Said some strolled in like they owned the place and yelled loudly. "Dirksen! Get out here!" A red haired guy with medium length hair and glasses yelled out, the marks on his uniform collar indicating he was from the fourth year, meaning he was here by choice.
Safe to say though, I was long gone by the time that sentence was finished, out the window and running out of the school grounds.
"Hey! First year!"
Sadly, the academy entrance was blocked off by some other 3rd and fourth years.
"If you're with that red haired guy then back off or fight me!" I yelled, not stopping.
Evidently these guys were with the red haired guy as they immediately drew their weapons and prepared to stop me. Bad choice.
I drew my own sword and began using physical enhancement, acceleration and weapon aura.
No one in the group seemed to be above rank-2 and as such. I could somewhat compete with them. I didn't bother weaving around them and instead used weapon aura and the ocean splitting arts to cut through their ordinary weapons and mowed straight through them, quickly making it past the entrance and disappearing into the city's crowds.
…
That night I determined I definitely needed to be stronger for the next day.
I spent another 3000 points raising all my stats by another hundred. I also purchased a skill called blink for 950 points and used my last free upgrade to specialty rank on it. Lastly I spent 1000 exchange points in increasing my core energy by 5000. A total of 4950 points were used in one afternoon.
As usual, Luna looked after me as I practically died from the forced learning and strengthening as the skills were ingrained into my mind and reflex.
The next day after getting dressed, I checked my status.
[(Intermediate) area-sense] [(Mastery) physical enhancement+] [(Mastery) acceleration++] [(Intermediate) Imperial swordsmanship] [(Distinctive) Ocean Splitting arts] [(Mastery) Weapon Aura] [(Specialty) Mana Manipulation+] [(Specialty) Elegance] [(Specialty) Blink]> [(Advanced) Standard magic formations] [(Advanced) Elemental magic formations] [(Advanced) Magigliths] [(Advanced) Magic theories] [(Basic) Geography]> Alright. This was as ready as I could be without wasting too many hard earned exchange points. … The next day was about as expected. Instead of Moxia waiting for me there were two groups and a few teachers trying to diffuse the situation. The two groups were headed by that redhead who burst into herbology class and was made up of third and fourth years, while the other group was led by the princess and had most of our magic theory class in it as well as first and second years. However my sister was also there with some of her friends beside the princess, she was also a fourth year. "Well look who decided to show up!" Moxia soon shouted, being the first to notice me. "You sure were fast to run yesterday." The red haired guy sneered. "If there's nothing behind you to protect, I would say running away from dangerous beasts is quite reasonable." I responded. "What did you just call me?" The red haired guy asked threateningly. "A violent beast. You used force at every turn, tell me how you're not a violent beast." I responded with equal threat. "That's enough! Jodes, I have no interest in marrying you! Don't disturb people just because I'm interested in them." The princess yelled, clearly madened. "I can assure you that our engagement is set in stone." "What stone!? Do you even know how to chisel a stone!?" The princess responded, clearly taking his statement literally just to annoy him. The red haired guy, Jodes, was evidently foreign to the concept of rejection and continued pursuing someone 3 years younger than himself. Just then Jones turned to me and shouted. "I challenge you to a duel! Winner gets Princess Sally!" He threw a white glove from his pocket at me and I promptly sidestepped. "No. I refuse." I said flatly.