Chapter 10

The Clock Tower, for one of the biggest magical institutions in the world, was remarkably boring. With its library being only a more or less interesting place. The people here mainly were divided into two categories. Rich noble snobs that think that they are better than anyone else, and naïve enthusiasts that were so interfaced by wonders of magicaft that they do not see many dangers lurking just around the corner. Well, it is not like I can't understand the second group, after all, if I did not know that there are hundreds if not thousands of people sealed underneath tower only because magic association decided that they are too talented and thus dangerous, I would have been just like them. The unusual age of my body did draw a lot of unwanted attention. After all sight of 11 years old boy in the institution where the average age of students is 19 is quite eye-catching. But, thanks to my purposely average results in all of my courses. Talking about courses. I have enrolled in a total of 4 courses not more because it would be eye-catching. They are Zoology, Botany, Alchemy, and Modern Magecraft Theory. The first two are needed to collect potion ingredients without grabbing unnecessary attention. Alchemy well let's just say that it is a passion of mine with such great abilities such as Memory Partition, Thought Acceleration, and Transmutation. And the last one is the useful all-purpose course that covers a wide range of topics, furthermore course is taught by Lord El-Melloi II also known as Waver Velvet the survivor of previous grail war and a character that is of particular interest for me.

And while I was walking towards my next class lost in such thoughts a little girl 3 or 4 years younger than me was going in the opposite direction to me. And when she passed by my side her eyes suddenly have become blood red. But at that time, I did not give much attention to that.

-----later that evening -----

I was sitting in my room continuing my studies in the arts of Thaumaturgy when something unusual happened.

Bast: Shinji 5 intruders are coming from the southeast. They will reach your detection range in 15 minutes and our apartment in 20 minutes.

Shinji: Hm, interesting who it maybe? Bast, what are their power levels, and do they have any killing intent?

Bast: They don't have any killing intent so their goal should be either capture you or rob you. The majority of them have magical potential is varies from 7 to 10 Od. So, they are non-treat. However, one of them has the magical potential of 30 Od and if he is skilled enough, he may be able to defeat both of us, but if his education as a magus is lacking then he is too are not a threat. What are you feeling though? After all, you never separate your self from a new fancy ring of yours that enchants your intuition to the level of sequence 9 Seer, so your intuition should be able to easily if he is a threat or not.

Shinji: You are right. They are non-threat I just wanted to be sure. Now. Let's deactivate the majority of our defense measures leaving only the weakest boundary field. After all, we should not scare away our dear guest but if we wait for them without visible protection, they may become suspicious.

About 20 minutes later I was thoroughly pretending to be reading a book. But in reality, all my attention was on the lookout for a possible attack. After all, that is going to be my first battle in this life

Then it started. My boundary field was compromised, the invaders were able to pass it without triggering the alarm. Then a sleep gas started to fill up my apartment. Hm, they are either stupid or wasteful. The gas that they are using is magical in nature and it hypnotizes a person to sleep. However, why use something like that if there are cheaper non-magical alternatives. Well, whatever that is to my advantage after all. With my and Bast's current level of mental defenses, the gas is ineffective on us. After that I made it seem like gas has worked and closed my eyes while making my breathing more even.

Invader1: Hm, seems the gas has worked. Let's go in!

The five grown men in black suits and black glasses entered a small two-room apartment, with those rooms being magicraft workplace and bedroom of the owner of flat. Then they slowly opened the door of the workplace to see a boy of 11 years and his cat peacefully sleeping on the desk.

----Davids pov------

David did not why their young mistress took interest in the boy that was peacefully sleeping on his desk. He may have some talent according to the amount of Od coming from his body, But here are hundreds of people with more Od. He is from a long line of maguses but he is not heir to his family and almost any person that would be interested in the boy's family would easily find that Matou family is in decline so they could not possess any secrets that would interest Archisorte family. Well, that is not his work to think, he just needs to execute orders given to him. Jon, Erick take a boy.

However, when to of his comrades reached to grab an 11 years boy something unexpected happened. The boy opened both of his eyes and then used thaumaturgy to fry both of his comrades that were to close to him to evade with lighting.

Then before David could even properly react boy started to shine, a clear indication of him using magic to enhance his physical power and jumped straight towards him.

David: "Hm, you are coming for me, bad choice boy. In our group, I am the strongest."

And with those words, he too used magic to enhance himself.

Within less than a minute he and the boy have traded a number of blows on the speeds that unreachable for a normal human.

David: "How is that possible, amount of Od that we both have is roughly equal, and I am an adult that spent years of his life training but he is clearly a lot stronger than me. If not for his mediocre martial arts I would have lost long ago. My battle experience is the only thing letting me keep up. What a monster"

Then while his comrades were charging simple paralyzes curse. The cat that was peacefully sleeping on the desk stood up and jumped towards his comrades at speed and power that was not natural for such small animals. Then while he was shocked by events occurring. The boy used this opportunity to lift his hand pointing his palm towards him and saying.

Shinji: *Shoa*

Then a blast of strong wind pushed him hard against the wall. Then the last thing he saw before losing his consciousness was his comrades passing out from boys surgically accurate strikes.

David: "How?"

----Shinji's pov----

Shinji: Hm, that was too easy.

Bast: Easy, he says my ass. I fi did not intervene you would have been hit by their paralyzes curse. And it would have taken you at least a minute to break free from it. That is more than enough time to kill you or bind you more securely.

Shinji: But, didn't I have you to deal with things like that.?

Bast: I am from spectator pathway, to act so openly contradicts my acting you idiot!

Shinji: Yeah- yeah. "Hm, to think that calm and composed Bast would slowly start to turn into tsundere. I am shocked"

Bast: Are you are thinking that I am a tsundere?!

Shinji: No-no. I wouldn't dare. "It was dangerous. With Bast being sequence 8 Telepathist I should not let my face to reflect my thoughts so openly."

Shinji: Now, can you please use magicraft to read their memories and learn what was their objective. After all, you are a lot better than me in mental magic. "Yeah, I am teaching Bast magicraft, a mainly mental one. I once asked why she does not learn other types as well? After all, as she reaches a higher sequence the majority of what she learns will be useless, after all, she will have beyonder abilities that will perfectly replace all of the spells that she learned and will be easier to use. To that, she replied to me that she is not interested in magicraft and the only reason why she is learning it is to experience what it will feel like to be a high sequence beyonder of Spectator pathway so she can start acting beforehand. Quite clever, but if you ask me, she is just being lazy and sleeping 15 hours a day while being a beyonder decreased her need in sleep, so she should need only 8-9 hours of sleep each day."

Bast: Fine. But what will you do while I am working?

Shinji: I will clean up the room. Our small skirmish did not pass without consequences.

It was the true floor of the room that was slightly brunt from the lightning, and there were holes in the various parts of the walls formed from Shinji's own punches that missed their target. At the next moment, Shinji removed a cheap panting decorating the wall and showing a circle with a pentagram inside that was inscribed into the wall, the next moment he touched it with his hand and started to pour his Od into it. After that, the burnt marks started to disappear from the floor and walls started to magically repair themselves.

Shinji: "Transmutation is quite useful. Unfortunately using it to repair things is my current maximum, and I waste a lot of energy on it so to be more cost-efficient I need assistance from pentagrams and runes."

Shinji: I am done. What about you Bast.

Bast: Wait a minute. Those guys have pretty good mental defenses.

Shinji: Hm, now I am even more interested.

It took 15 more minutes to Bast to bypass their mental defenses.

Bast: I did it. But there is not much information here. Apparently, they are retainers of the Archisorte family and were ordered to bring you by their young lady.

Shinji: "Archisorte are branch family of the Archibalds the prominent magus family that controls El-Melloi faction in the Clock Tower, and with the death of the head of Archibalds in previous Holy grail war the Archisorte has inherited their place and title of lord El-Melloi. That means Reines El-Melloi Archisorte is interested in me. That is not good. She is the person that forced Waver Velvet to take place of the current lord of El-Melloi and made him shoulder all their family debts, and she did all of that while being only a child 7 or 8 years old. And all of that happened just half-year ago. Hm, approximately 8 years old kid with blonde hair and blue eyes that prefers to wear blue colored clothing. Isn't that exact appearance of girl that passed by my side on my way to the library earlier this morning. Her eyes have changed their color when she looked at me, which means that her mystic eyes can see through my 'The pendant of Secrets'.

I should behave more cautiously from now on."

Shinji: Did you learn the reason why she wants to kidnap me?

Bast: No. They were told to bring you. That's all.

Shinji: "Hm, it seems like she is just curious about magical reserves. And kidnapping, instead of inviting me is a form of precaution so I do not escape from her. Well, that can be used." Bast, Hypnotize them. Make them forget about our battle and replace those memories with memories of a successful operation and also add a specific trigger so when I will need it, I could easily take control of them.

Bast: Fine, but you have to help me. If I do it all by myself it will take too much time.

**Shoa is a word from an ancient minion that I made up After, all. Lotm has taught Shinji that language and not using it would be a waste.