Upon arriving at the capital city, he went to the royal Inn and set himself up right before the ceremony, he seamlessly went through the process as he had already experienced all of it the year prior. The introduction ceremony for the upcoming exam began, it had all the captains in attendance as originally intended. The Xanarc had given them an earful about the lack of attendance in the last one. Tohgi conspicuously stood out with his reiki feeling even lower than last year.
Diaz: Tohgi… is it not?
Tohgi: Yes captain.
The attention of all the candidates were drawn to Tohgi. They were shocked to see that he seemed to have a personal relationship with a captain or the order.
Diaz: Your reiki seems less than I remember, I might have overestimated you over time, are you sure you want to go through this again? My offer still stands
Diaz looked at Tohgi curiously, she still hadn't figured out why Aspen, a man well known for his nonchalance, had taken notice of him at the previous examination. Tohgi cheekily responded.
Tohgi: I would respectfully turn down your pleasant offer, if I fail to become a knight I would be willing to negotiate terms.
Sabueso: you seem fairly confident, but from what I can see nothing has changed.
Tohgi: Captain… If I remember correctly you said the southern quota was there for a miracle child to join your ranks right?
Sabueso: that is somewhat accurate, what of it?
Tohgi: I forgot to introduce myself properly last year, my name is Tohgi Akura…
Tohgi released his reiki and his perceived reiki pool grew exponentially.
Tohgi: The miracle you were waiting for.
Everyone in the arena was taken aback by the increase of his reiki.
Candidate: Where did all that reiki come from?
Candidate: It's nothing special, C rank at best, what are you amazed about?
Sabueso instantly became apprehensive of Tohgi, what he had just witnessed, was a feat not accomplishable through regular means. "Bane Magic" a ritual performed through blood sacrifice, commonly referred to as juju or curses, the power achieved through juju was seemingly boundless, but Tohgi did not show any signs of using it.
Sabueso: How does one go from barely having any reiki to this in one year? (Did he dabble in curses?)
Tohgi: huh?
Tohgi showed signs of confusion at the questioned posed to him by Sabueso. The pretence in his tone and expression were clear as day, a ploy to fully illustrate his sarcasm.
Tohgi: It seems I misunderstood the meaning of the word miracle, captain.
Sabueso became irritated by the casual sarcasm Tohgi responded with.
Sabueso: Is that mockery?
Tohgi: Not at all, but I thought an unexplainable phenomenon classified as such, if I'm mistaken I would like to be corrected.
Aspen: (not only does he now have enough reiki, but he is also capable of concealing it) What's your reiki class?
Tohgi: (It Is Mr. Knight…) C rank, captain.
Aspen smiled, pleased by the defiance Tohgi showed towards the status quo.
Aspen: How do you feel about the colour red?
Tohgi immediately understood the hint Aspen had given him.
Tohgi: I think it would suit me just fine
Aspen: What do you think Diaz?
Diaz smiled, amused by the potential unrest appointing Tohgi would cause as well as the bizarre relationship between Aspen and this random southern boy.
Diaz: I usually prefer my food without dressings, but he should look appetizing.
Sabueso: Aspen, what are you trying to pull here?
Aspen: The minimum requirement is met, magic quality is irrelevant to my squad, I see no issues with his appointment.
Sabueso: There is a very obvious potential issue with a sudden spike in reiki.
Aspen: I highly doubt it would not be noticeable, if anything goes wrong I would bear the responsibility.
Sabueso was withdrawn to the fact that Aspen would not let go of a decision he has made regardless of whatever he threw at him and gave in.
Sabueso: do as you please!
Aspen: It's settled then, welcome to squad five, you're exempted from the examinations
Tohgi: That was easier than I thought.
Aspen: come with me, I'll leave the rest to you guys.
Squad IV captain: You're still going to abscond after the Xanarc asked us not to.
Aspen: What do you mean? I was present for the introduction, motivated the fledglings and even picked one. I have done more than was asked of me.
All the captains sighed simultaneously.
Squad IV captain: You're the only one capable of drawing such a conclusion from the scenario that just played out.
There were whispers of displeasure amongst the candidates due to the sudden turn of events. "what's the meaning of this?" "Why does a southerner just walk into a squad?" "Does he have ties with captain Aspen?" "Simply because a southerner has the C class reiki he's treated special." "They treat them special to make them feel less worthless than they are." "To think that actual nobles would fail this exam and a commoner just walks into a squad for some political agenda. Disgusting!" The complains were unending, Toghi and Aspen left the venue to get him retested.
Aspen: do you have a problem with doing all your tests right now? It would be tiring but I really have no interest dragging out the process.
Tohgi: That's not a problem, It is preferable even, we can start with durability.
Aspen: Smart, it depends majorly on fatigue.
Tohgi: ("go home kid, you don't belong here" I guess he was cold to show me the reality of my situation)
Aspen: you know there aren't that many people that would accept you as a knight right? I hope you're prepared for that.
Tohgi: background noise never really affect me.
Aspen laughed, amused by Tohgi's disinterest in the society he has thrusted himself into.
Aspen: You are an interesting fellow; I hope you would still be as defiant as you are in time
Tohgi: Are you not going ask about how I suddenly have reiki?
Aspen: Like I care, I would only be interested if I needed to boost mine, do you think I'm lacking?
Tohgi: I still can't quantify how much reiki I felt that day, I tell myself it's just an exaggeration by my imagination, but something tells me I'm wrong.
Aspen: Well that's irrelevant, I was a bit surprised by the fact you carry a grimoire now, did you change your fighting style to accommodate reading? From your last report you battle in close quarters.
Tohgi: oh this? Improvisation, I would be wasting a lot of reiki trying to compress my spells or a lot of time trying to chant the entire spell so I got an idea on how to do both without doing any.
Captain Aspen: hmm?
Tohgi: hahaha, I'm a real genius, I'll explain.
Captain Aspen: very modest.
Aspen was genuinely uninterested in the semantics of how Tohgi planned to cast spells, but Tohgi was determined to show off his ingenuity regardless.
Tohgi: As we all know, there are four stages of magic casting. Release: to allow the reiki flow out of your body – Characterization: to give an attribute to your reiki, (in my case plant) – Formation: to give form to your Reiki using magic codes or words – Execution: directing your reiki to perform an action. Battle mages that use magic are broadly classified into chanters and readers. Chanters usually compress spells to make them as short as possible by imbuing the long spells into simpler words with reiki, this is a waste of my limited reiki. Readers on the other hand, read the spells from a source which is easier to do and consumes less reiki, but it is time wasting.
Captain Aspen: Oh.. I see, as a long serving captain I didn't know any of this.
Tohgi: I'm ignoring that comment and moving on, I can't explain my brilliance without explaining the basics. So my improvisation was this, rather than write the spell in just ink, I imprinted on the page with concentrated reiki, infusing the paper with my reiki and essentially making them one, so if I call out the name on the page as a spell, like so. Buloke Blade.
The grimoire flipped to the page containing the spell Tohgi had written under Buloke Blade and a sword made from wood took form on his palm.
Tohgi: the words written on that page would be activated with no extra reiki needed, like a reader but in less time like a chanter.
Captain Aspen: Oh, that's actually smart
After listening to his explanation and seeing the spell play out, Aspen was genuinely impressed by the process Tohgi had created. The sincerity he showed when complimenting Tohgi excited Tohgi into furthering his explanation.
Tohgi: Oh, thank you… and that's not all! The grimoire would obviously be reinforced but this is the cool part
Tohgi sliced the grimoire into pieces using the blade he just created and the floating pieces merged back together
Tohgi: reconstruction magic, because the grimoire is infused with my reiki and technically made from plants, I can reconstruct it, like accelerated grafting.
Aspen: Too much information now (he put in the effort to cover the gap between himself and us, a unique grimoire, good battle sense and an innovative mind. At this point he has surpassed most if not all of his peers, yet he would always be plagued with being a southerner)
Tohgi completed all the 6 tests except the combat skill and was asked to wait for his report card.
Tohgi: why wasn't my combat skill tested?
Aspen: The combat skill is usually only tested in the examination by averaging the six categories and deducting or increasing points based on the judges. Outside the examination period combat skill is basically just an average, which makes it redundant, but it is still required for your report card.
Tohgi: Oh I see
Examiner: your report card sir
Aspen: Let me see...
END!