Plan B?" Ellice asked Lukas, who seemed to be deep in thought. He had teleported them to the dimension where he had imprisoned Fiske.
"Yes. Based on her actions, it felt like she didn't care if you left the cult. If she had wanted you, she would have tried to seize you by all means, but I sensed no hostile intent from her," Lukas explained.
"Hmph, you're the Slime Lord or so you say. I was expecting you to finish them off," Ellice snorted.
"The previous Dragon Lord could force me to use forty percent of my power. If the new one is stronger, he might make me use up to fifty percent," Lukas said.
"I don't get your point. That's no excuse for not taking care of them last night. You had the highest chance of winning," she snorted again.
"I don't take chances," Lukas said calmly.
"So... just how much did you hold back during our duel?" Ellice suddenly asked.
"Trust me, you don't want to know. You can't understand the difference between us. It's wider than you can imagine," Lukas replied.
"You don't know how to talk to a girl. I guess slimes don't do that," Ellice said aloofly.
"Really? But I can sense you no longer act stoic around me. It seems I managed to sweet-talk you," Lukas smirked.
"You're shameless," Ellice blushed hard.
Lukas walked over to where Fiske was lying and examined him closely. "He seems to be mentally drained," he said calmly, then placed his hands on Fiske's head. A blue light encapsulated Lukas's hands and shone brightly. Lukas closed his eyes and concentrated for a while. Ellice pondered on what Lukas was doing but didn't ask any questions, as it looked like he needed extreme concentration.
Suddenly, Lukas opened his eyes and muttered to himself, "It's done."
After noticing that Lukas was finally finished, Ellice asked, "What was that all about?"
"I restored his mental state and all his lost mana," Lukas replied without taking his eyes off the unconscious Fiske.
"And why would you do that?" she asked with complex feelings. "If it were up to me, I'd say he should rot here." She added with furious eyes. This man, who claimed to be her uncle, had been involved in the death of her parents. She had looked up to him as her mentor and followed all his bidding without complaint. She didn't want to be a member of the cult, but due to his threat of being kicked out of the clan, she couldn't help it. If she had been kicked out, she would have nowhere to go. All this had built her into what she was: a stoic, cold-hearted individual with no emotions for anyone, a hollow person whose only purpose was to serve without complaint.
But all this changed when she met Lukas. She didn't know why she felt a certain closeness to him right from the day she dueled him. She tried to discard the "useless" emotion, as she called it, but her efforts were fruitless. She didn't understand. He had always been so sincere and kind to her, even when he knew about her plot to kill him. She felt a sudden thing in her heart that hadn't been there before start to pound. Is this what they call love? Is this... AHEM. She then cleared her thoughts and spoke, "Why did you restore his state?"
"He's still the professor, isn't he? What would the academy do if they suddenly found out that an archmage has gone missing?" Lukas replied.
"Oh... you're right," Ellice said, realizing that fact. She hadn't even thought about that. All she had been thinking about was Luk... AHEM... AHEM... "What's wrong with me?" she thought.
"What's wrong, Ellice? Your cheeks are all red," Lukas said with a smile.
"Uh?" She turned her face away in embarrassment. "Hmph," she snorted.
Lukas looked at Ellice with eyes of amusement. He found the way she acted funny. She had always carried an unapproachable aura, so he never knew there was a soft side to her. Although he knew that it was her experiences in life that gave her that cold nature, what he didn't understand was why she was suddenly acting like a child in front of him.
"Why are you staring at me?" Ellice snorted with her cheeks puffed up.
"I don't know," he replied.
Suddenly, they heard a soft groan from Professor Fiske, who was still lying on the floor unconscious.
"What effect does the magic you used on him have?" Ellice asked with interest.
"I took away all his memories about the cult and me. He'll still remember everything else, apart from those related to the cult or the dragons," Lukas replied.
"Whoa, there's such magic?" Ellice asked with piqued interest.
"My magic isn't magic; they're called skills. I can shape my body constitution into anything. So, literally, any magic I see, I can change my spiritual and physical structure to allow me to do that same magic."
"So... whose magic is this?" Ellice asked.
"It's the magic of a certain human from 300 years ago. He was what they call a telepathic mage with the ability to read minds."
"So you're a copycat, huh?" she said in a tone of mockery.
"Well, you can say so," Lukas answered.
Lukas's eyes suddenly glowed red as a magical glow encapsulated the whole place.
Ellice didn't bother asking what Lukas was doing, as she had complete faith in him now... Um... no, I don't trust him yet.
Suddenly, Lukas, Ellice, and the unconscious Fiske appeared in the library again. They had left the library at 7 am and then entered the dimension where Fiske was 12 minutes later. It took them 34 minutes to attend the cult meeting and come back to the dimension. So, the current time was 7:46 am. This was because, in the dimension they had been, time stood still. Ellice, who was unaware of this fact, was shocked that it was still morning. She had been trying to come up with an excuse for why she skipped classes, but she discovered that she still had 14 minutes left until class time.
"How is this possible?" Ellice said after the realization.
"We were in a dimension where time stood still. What do you expect?" Lukas said.
"Just how many surprises do you have for me?" Ellice snorted.
"This is only the tip of the iceberg," Lukas said.
"Whatever," Ellice replied.
"I guess this is goodbye for now," Lukas said as he disappeared out of Ellice's sight.
Lukas walked to his dorm room to search for Anos and Branson so they could go to class together as they usually did. He spotted Henry running towards him with a panicked look on his face. "Where the hell have you been, Lukas?" he asked, panting heavily.
"I was just talking with Ellice," Lukas said.
Henry was startled for a while but quickly regained his composure. "Wow, that's a home run, Lukas. I never expected you to be able to break through her ice since you're both ice users. How did it go?" Henry asked with excitement. His previous exhausted face had now been replaced with a joyful look.
"I'm sorry, it's not what you think," Lukas replied.
"Yeah, whatever. Even if it was, you wouldn't spill," Henry replied, frustration evident in his voice.
"Where's Grey?" Lukas asked.
"Oh... early this morning, some soldiers from the kingdom of Eclesia came. They said his clan needed him for something urgent, so they took a leave from the academy," Henry explained. "They looked fishy," he added.
"Something urgent, huh?" Lukas thought to himself.
They arrived at their classroom, which was bustling with noise since the professor had not arrived yet. "Did you hear the news? The Ice Goddess is now going out with Lukas."
"Yeah, I heard. It happened right after she ditched Simon's proposal."
Lukas could hear all these whispers even before he entered the classroom. "If Ellice were here, she would have frozen them all to death," he thought to himself as he entered the classroom with Henry.
"Talk of the devil and he appears," someone whispered.
Lukas ignored them and calmly took his seat.