"Say that again, trash." Glaring at Nian, the three Wilford clansmen began to crowd him.
At this moment, from around the corner came four members of the Meris clan, their expressions quickly shifted to a scowl at the sight of the three Wilford clansmen.
"What are you idiots doing? Looking for some trouble?" One of the four Meris clan members spoke.
The smaller Wilford in the center of the three spoke to Meris clansmen with his hands in his pockets.
"What do you guys care about? Don't tell me you're defending some piece of trash from your side that doesn't even have a hyper ability?.."
The expressions of the four Meris clansmen stiffened from their scowl, only to resume their scowl.
"Oi! Don't you bastards dare hide it. Our clan knows you want to be rid of him as soon as possible, so back us up, ok?" A small smirk hovered on the smaller Wilford's lips.
The Meris clansmen stood quietly as the Wilford clansmen that spoke snickered and turned back to Nian.
"Now then. What were we doing?" he cracks his neck lightly, and just as he was about to begin on his next line, a voice reached his ears.
"I'll be backing you up alright…" His smirk widened, but began to fade as he wondered why he saw a dark and fast something approaching his face.
With the sickening sound of flesh against bone, the smaller Wilford plummeted to the ground. The bulky Wilford clansman was startled at the sudden knockout of his relative, and quickly released Nian as he turned to see the super genius of the Meris clan rubbing his fist with a satisfied grin.
"Y..You dumb bastard.. Do you know who you're messing with!?"
With a yell he rushed toward Lucas, who seemed to easily avoid his charge before tripping him using only his right foot. This made the bulky Wilford rush towards the ground, but now without some effort at trying to keep balance. Lucas did Wilford a favor, and kicked him in the place where the sun don't shine, causing the bulky idiot to collapse with a scream of pain.
"It.. h.hurts.." The bulky child whimpered, but Lucas promptly ignored him as he turned to Nian.
"Be careful of these guys. If they bother you, just let me know." Lucas then turned to his cousins.
"Enjoying the show huh? Well, are you going to let them bully one of our clan just because he doesn't have a hyper ability? Remember, if they bully one they will see us as weak and uncaring."
Poking at their sore spots, the three Meris clansmen who were watching felt ashamed, nodding while taking their leave.
Soon after, a voice rang out.
"What's going on here!?"
This caused everyone's heads to swiftly turn to the staircase nearby. A monitor was walking down the stairs.
"Ahhh crap.." Lucas muttered, which made Nian look up after tidying up his collar.
By then, the surviving member of the Wilford group, who was as stiff as a cornered mouse, rushed to the monitor to explain the 'actual' happenings in this incident. But as luck would have it, bystanders were standing up for the actual victims of this case of Wilford vs. Meris. The monitor became confused for just a moment, and apprehended the real culprits of the incident. The yellings of the last surviving Wilford clansmen could be heard from even the upper levels, eventually leading to gossip circulating around the Meris super genius, again.
The day soon ended and Nian was lying in his bed after taking a shower. The good thing was the shower was connected to his room, which made things simple.
"This year is going to be something." He muttered as he gazed at the roof of his room.
The next day, the new generation had all obtained their uniforms with no coloured trimmings. Afterwards, they all made their way to their classes; which were numbered according to how talented and strong the child was.
The pace had gone well as the class was taught history of the mancer and how it came to play a leading role in humanity's defence against the Devourers. It also went on to explain several things regarding the mancers deployment.
The teacher pointed at the holo board and spoke.
"Although mancers and their pilots could one day become powerful enough to vaporize a planet. At this stage, humanity relies on 2 super weapons to keep SSS Rank devourers at bay. Does anyone know what these are?."
Nian grinned as he sat beside the girl who he had met yesterday. He was, at first, astonished at her being in the same class as him, but her intelligence didn't match with her being in level one. Even as she waved crazily at him, which embarrassed him somewhat, in the class of 100 he discovered that levels 1-3 were about the same, but the reason was to make it easier for the teacher.
Alexis was soon called by the teacher as she had her hands up. She then spoke up.
"The 2 weapons both obtained by fate links, also classifying as fate armaments, are known as the Tri Pulse and D.E Matter Missiles."
The teacher chuckled before grinning as she continued, wanting to test Alexis who proved to be a good student.
"Anything else to add Ms. Alexis?" The teacher asked.
With the other students, who were all mostly commoners or nobles with little to no care about mancers having been forced by their family, only a small percentage of level 1 students would be serious about progressing.
"D.E matter missiles were originally 2 in number but one was used to fend off the only SSS rank devourer to have been found. The result was that the SSS rank devourer was wounded badly and had vanished. The Tri Pulse originally with a charge of 100% has had 10% of its power used to fend off a horde of devourer beasts that threatened to breach into the 983rd sector. The result was that all hundred thousand or so devourers, ranging from A-F rank, died with their cores as well as their bodies disintegrating."
The teacher was astounded and couldn't help but clap. Several other students began to clap as well and some even whispered as Alexis was in the spotlight, most eyes looking upon her beautiful appearance and intelligent display.
"Very good, Ms. Alexis. I'm not sure you belong on level 1, but because you are such a rare student I will have to keep you here for myself." The teacher gave a soft chuckle and even some of the students laugh as Alexis face turned red, so she quickly sat down.
For the next few days, whenever class was over, Nian would spend some time with Alexis, but whenever Lucas came by, she always had some inexplicable reason to leave. Over the next few weeks, finishing classes and making small talk with Alexis, with the addition of her strange disappearances whenever Nian and Lucas were hanging out. Then there was the problem with Lucas's tag-along, Mita.
Of course Lucas tried his best to ignore her obsessive nature at times, but he realised she wasn't such a bad person. Out of all the girls who had confessed their love to Lucas, she was the only one persistent enough to be near him around the clock, excluding the times when they had to be apart. Mita was also great to have on hand for being a young lady repellent. Lucas was never bothered by the hordes of lovestruck girls whenever Mita was around.
Mita also showed her devotion to the mission of marriage, by ignoring Nian, and not treating him like an obstacle to climb over. But whenever she had to acknowledge Nian's presence, she did not do it with disgust, or any ill feelings. He was simply... there.
At the end of the month, with things going smoothly, Yuto came and delivered Nian's F rank devourer core. The core itself was no larger than a tennis ball, but it was strangely hard when compared to its glassy appearance, while its center emitted a faint, blue light. This was given to Nian at the cafeteria as he and Yuto sat at the same table.
This made many of the onlookers jealous, as rumors had already spread about Nian being trash, and the core given to him was undeserved, despite his status of the Meris Clan. Yuto used his eyes to judge the people who let their eyes twinkle with an unnecessary evil.
"Hahaha, be careful with that core now, by the way, have you summoned your fate card yet?."
Nian gave a confused look.
"Fate card? Wasn't I supposed to get one during the first day?"
Yuto laughed before he spoke.
"You don't get it physically. Remember when the lights in the hall dimmed? At that moment, your fate card materialized inside of you. Try to command it to go into your hand. Like this. Appear."
As soon as Yuto spoke, a transparent card appeared in his hand. It had a faint glow displaying a picture of him with an E rank mancer title by his name. Nian was surprised at this and quickly did the same.
"Appear." He commanded.
In his hand a similar card appeared with a picture of him, but it showed the words ""Star Mancer Student First year"". A very precise information card that also displayed his hyper ability, or lack thereof. This slightly annoyed him, as it felt as if it was being rubbed in.
He looked at Yuto and spoke the question on his mind.
"Why are you only an E rank senior? Lucas has two D rank hyper abilities, are you and him equal?" Yuto's face stiffened slightly, but he soon burst out laughing as he responded.
"It doesn't work like that. Ability ranks and mancer ranks are totally different. Someone could have an A rank hyper ability, but if they begin at that moment to start as a Mancer they will be classified as F, as they would need to work their way up and be recognized by Fulcrum. Fulcrum analyzes their skills and experience periodically, and only then will the fate card change to show the difference in ranks."
As Nian listened he began to understand his mistake and nodded at Yuto's explanation. After Yuto finished, Nian casually pressed his Devourer core against the fate card and the core lit up in response before disappearing.