Martin was making his way to the library, when he realized he didn't even know the way to follow. The school was pretty big and it was easy to get lost.
Maybe he should have asked the Dean for a map, how he found his own class could be called a miracle of some sort.
Martin found himself looking at a plant vase, he couldn't help but think that he had seen the exact same vase before with its stony design, and that was when he realized that he had been walking in circles.
Facepalming himself, he decided to make a turn back and maybe this time, he would ask for directions from the students he saw loitering around.
Martin made his way through the direction he came from trying to look for someone he could talk to, then he heard the pained groans of someone from from a corner.
It sounded like the person was in trouble, Martin thought as he walked closer to the sound, he came to the end of the hallway and only needed to make a single turn before he came to another pathway.
Martin knew he couldn't just rush to be a hero, he had to observe what was happening to that person, this was a school and there was a high possibility that this person was being bullied, or worse than being bullied due to the pain he could hear from those sounds.
"Hand over those meal coupons Lance." a boy with a bulky looking body towered over another boy. His deep voice and heavy build proved that he was the leader of the group.
"I knew it had to be bullying." Martin whispered, he could imagine Axton in the place of that boy just like he had saved Theo years back, saving this boy would also make him targeted but he wasn't that Axton anymore.
Martin himself wanted to go over there and teach the boys a lesson when he remembered the strength he displayed the night before.
After a thought, he got discouraged, his strength from yesterday had broken his bed and his bathroom sink.
"What if I killed them?" Martin couldn't imagine himself killing the kids, he knew for them to bully someone else, it meant they had a high backing, they were stronger, and killing some students would definitely ruin him in this world before he could even think of becoming stronger.
He would be taken to jail of course, or worse still, he could die and forget about going back home.
"I don't have any more. You… you collected my last ones yesterday, I don't have any money to buy more." Lance stammered jolting Martin back to reality.
"F**k. He is just like me, poor and weak. No wonder he was getting beaten up."
Martin watched with keen interest, seeing that being powerful was the key to being respected in such a world.
"That's sad. What do you say Bill? Should we leave him?"
One of the boys who stood at the bulky boy's right side spoke with a sigh, but Martin could still hear the mocking tone that leaked from those words.
Then the boy who stood at the other side of the bulky kid spoke up, "If we leave him, don't you think he would do this again. We need to punish him."
Martin saw that the boy Lance visibly shook after he heard those words from.
He was scared, there was nothing he could do, he couldn't fight these people who were somewhat short of being called prodigies in the magic world.
Lance felt like he just needed to survive this ordeals for a while after his father had forced him to come to this school just so he could boast that he had a magician for a son.
However, Lance wanted to be an engineer and involve himself in the technological aspect of magic.
But now it was getting too much, he had been beaten every day of last week and he found it hard to even go to classes, he was already thinking of committing suicide maybe his father would then no longer force him to become a magician when he sees his dead son.
Lance closed his eyes and braced himself when he saw Bill raising his fist, getting ready to beat the living daylight out of him but strangely the pain he was expecting after some seconds didn't arrive.
Lance opened his eyes to see someone standing in front of him, the person had a very tall and sturdy back.
The mysterious person with a well built back had collected the full brunt of Bill's punch, then he widened his eyes and realised that his savior wasn't punched, rather he had stopped Bill's punch with his hand that was held up.
Martin didn't know when his legs had moved but he had found himself between the weak boy and his bullies collecting the punch for him.
Strangely, he had first planned to stand there and take in the punch but when he looked he realized that he could see the movement of the bully's hand so Martin raised up his own hand to hold the hand delivering the punch.
"What… who are you?" Somewhere with a red hair color that was darker than Martin's hair came forward and pushed Martin back while Bill had released his hand from the iron grip.
He couldn't help but mentally note down how the boy looked, this boy had stopped his punch mid-air by grabbing his wrist which meant he was able to see his hand, but what was scarier was the force he used to hold his wrist.
He had felt like his bones could crumble any moment. Bill wanted to leave immediately, as his fun was ruined, technically he wasn't having as much fun as you would think but it was the only way to keep his friends closer to him.
The red haired bully realized that no matter the force he applied to Martin he couldn't move him, then he suddenly realized that the eyes of this boy looked familiar, then his friend spoke confirming it all.
"Is this Axton... Axton Zavier?" A chuckle escaped after the question.
"Yeah… I was thinking the same thing. Our toy finally returned to us." The red haired turned over to Bill with a side glance, as if telling him that they had found a new play thing.
Martin then understood why his left hand was trembling, it was the reason he had used his right hand to stop the punch.
Axton knew this bad kids, and he had suffered a lot in their hands.
In his past life, Martin was never bullied because he was the grandson of the richest man in the world but looking through Axton's memories, he felt a feeling that he thought had died since he came out of that deadly mission. It was fear, Axton was afraid of these kids.
He remembered each of their as he stared at their faces.
Jin was the red haired boy, Rob was the second boy, he had a darker hair shade, brunette maybe, the passageway was not too bright and it was hard for Martin to see his hair color and the last kid was Bill, the powerhouse of the trio.
"Come on Bill, put him in his place and he would learn to mind his business." Rob said as he gave Bill a pat on the back.
Bill mentally sighed, he didn't want to do this at all.
There was something different about this Axton, he didn't look like the same kid he had played around with some years back, he subconsciously held his wrist, he could still feel the pain.
Axton had been bullied by a lot of kids back in those years, he was the main target and he was so compliant, he didn't even bother to fight back that was what even pushed more bullies to him.
Bill had thought the boy killed himself because of the depression that came with bullying, he understood it because he was once a target, but after he trained and fought back, no one dared to try such with him again but again, Axton had no talent.
Bill moved his feet forward but he was held back by Jin.
"Let me handle him Bill, I need to let loose a bit." Jin moved forward, who did Axton think he was, just because he now looked buff, he was still that weak kid in his eyes.
Martin looked at the boy's movement and thought one word. Slow.
Yet Axton's body was trembling, he couldn't find a way to control it but he needed to think fast. Jin was fast approaching.
Martin took a deep breath, his eyes could follow every of Jin's movement. The way he sidestepped, the movement of his body as he threw his hand back and was about to deliver a punch.
Martin dodged it, it was easier than he thought, then he brought his trembling hands forward, clenching them into fist.
He needed to control this body.
"Easy now… Deep breaths, We can do this." By saying this, Martin was building up his confidence and in this way, the brain would relay these messages through his nerve cells to his body.
At that, it looked like Axton's and Martin's memories had blended together and their Martin's previous image and soul immediately blended with Axton's image and at that moment, Martin got full control over the body.
He felt like he had fully become Axton and there was no Martin or Axton, there was just one person. At that moment, he became the full image of Axton Zavier.
His body calmed down just in time for him to sidestep Jin's attack, causing Jin to miss and due to his momentum, he could not control his movement, and his body shifted forward.
Seeing the opportunity, Martin turned and used his right elbow to land a hit on the bully's nose.
Jin found himself stumbling back, his nose felt like it was fire and it was bleeding.
"Argh, my nose!" Jin held his hands over his rushing nose as he glared at the boy that had broken his nose.
Seeing Jin's reaction caused Martin to chuckle and steam flew out of Jin's ears as he looked at the silly smile on Martin's face.
This poor disgusting orphan was mocking him.
"Bull shit!" With that word, Jin immediately activated his rune, and that was when Martin knew it was about to go down.
There was no way for him to block such an attack especially when it was magic.
"Jin, calm down. You know we can't use magic on school grounds." His buddy, Rob tried to hold him.
"Shut it Rob. I need to put this bastard in his place." Jin rubbed his bleeding nose, and that all too familiar symbol appeared on the back of his hand.
Martin looked at the rune on Jin's hand as it shone with a slight blue color.
"Wind Rune: Wind blades." Jin ordered the molecules of the air to bend to his will and they obeyed him, compressing into thin razor-sharp blades and they curved according to his intent and moved quickly towards Martin.
Martin realized that Jin had not been slacking around in his trainings or whatever he was doing to go stronger, and his wind blades were fast, he saw the light trails left behind by the wind blades as they moved closer to him but he couldn't see the blades as they were invisible.
There was nothing he could do, he had to find a way to protect himself and the kid that had been bullied.
Where was the boy in the first place? Then his eyes widened...
"Yo kid, get back. what are you doing?"
Martin saw that Lance was in his front with his hands wide ready to accept the injuries brought about by the wind blades.
Lance had no fear at that moment, he felt glad that he could save someone even if it meant putting his life at risk.
At least it was better than dying from drug overdose, now he could actually die a memorable death.