Chapter 92 - Take a Breather

Third Person’s POV (12 yrs. and 8 months old)

He took a deep breath, exhaled and looked into Ulysses’ eyes.

“I know that this time it will be dangerous, more so if the eleven of us joined in on the fight, but I’m confident that I can stand on my own along with my friends, so I’m not going to let you try and waste your life just to save ours.” said Ken, effectively widening the eyes of his companions, more.

Ulysses sighed.

“But Ken, we’re all doing this for you, you’re the only hope we’ve got for your future and the future of this valley.” said Lana, she couldn’t stand idly anymore while they bicker. “Can you please step out of this for us, for me?”

Ken felt his resolve falter, but he caught himself to the last second, blinked once and said…

“I’m sorry Master Lana, I will stand by my word, I will not want you guys to throw away your lives for ours.” The talk about throwing away their life, really confused the group, and were curious to know what Ken knew about it.

The topic was even more impacting on Allen, Saber, Lila, and Glen, as these were their parental figures that were going to… die for their sake, anxiety slowly crept into their minds, assaulting their thoughts, but they didn’t let it show as they anticipated for what their masters would say.

“And, if you’re going to try and make us sleep with a spell, you’re going to have to do better than that.” said suddenly, sounds of breaking glass rang all over the group as magic circles after magic circles were broken in an instant, a total of 20.

Alfred who casted the spell was dumbfounded along with the adults and Ken’s friends, he didn’t know what to think as his mind was assaulted by different thoughts, for breaking a magic circle was impossible and to see his son do it in front of his eyes made him go blank for a moment.’

‘There’s no recoil.’ as goes his thought of the experience, the mana he expended slowly entering his body.

Pretty much all of them were dumbfounded of what happened and had similar thought process, their brains fried themselves thinking how it was possible to break a magic circle, and a total of twenty on top of that, should they feel alarmed? They thought.

Ken just chuckled at their expressions.

“Thanks to our last battle, I’ve finally understood how to cancel out magic.” he said.

“What?!” they simultaneously said breaking out from their trance at his sentence, making Ken cover his ears.

“Geez, you guys didn’t have to shout so loud.” he said while pouting. It’s hard to imagine how such a kid can go about and be nonchalant and pouty while also achieving such a feet.

“That is not the only thing you’ll be taking from us young man, come here and receive your punishment!” said suddenly by Ken’s mother, she blinked to his side in a second, and held his shoulders, terribly, her aura emitted anger to the highest level she could muster while smiling.

Ken gulped, in fright of what his mother would do. The pair looked angelic if not stunning to anyone who would gaze at them, similar feminine, and beautiful features, with long black hair shining under the setting sunlight made the scene look even more ethereal.

But they’ll wonder why the scenery had such a heavy atmosphere.

“No!” exclaimed Ken and blinked away from his mother, and quickly tied his hair into a messy bun, he knows that his mother will not hesitate to grab into anything including his hair to get to him, his mother was a rowdy fighter in the past, up till now.

“I will not receive your punishment!” he said childishly and stuck out his tongue with both hands clutched to the side of his hips and leaning forward.

“Yes you will!” exclaimed his mother blinking beside him again.

“KYA!” Ken blinked out and the two started a blinking match between mother and son, and they appeared almost everywhere, in the air, on the trees, or on the ground. The group stared at the mother and son duo amused and at the same time awkward that the serious conversation turned childish in just minutes.

On a last dish effort, Ken appeared in front of his father followed by his mother, in a split second he blinked behind his mother, and pushed her into his father’s arms, making both his parents topple over.

Before the two would fall to the ground Ken casted his dark bindings using his dark moon magic.

“What is this?! *Grunt*” Lyn struggled to use her magic to blink out but the bindings would not let her, she resorted to freeing from the bindings but it only turned into a failure, and a mess of tangled limbs and something poking at her down there.

She stared wide-eyed at her husband and before she could scream or shout due to the embarrassment of her husband sprouting something down there, Ken casted his sound alteration spell and lowered the volume of her mother’s voice.

Ken upon seeing her mother go scolding mode, walked towards his parents, and held his mother’s shoulder making her look up at him.

“Ma, please don’t scold papa for what’s down there, isn’t that only natural?” He said, her mother laid her head on his father’s chest in defeat, cheeks flushed, Ken chuckled, removed the sound alteration spell, and released them from the bindings.

Alfred immediately covered the thing that needed attention down there nonchalantly while Lyn stood up, and dusted herself and made an action that indicated that she wanted to do something, but nothing happened, she just stood awkwardly doing a pose or something.

She realized that she can’t use blink anymore.

“Ma, if you’re still adamant on punishing me then I will not lift the spell hindering you from using blink.” Ken said.

“No fair, HMPH!” Lyn crossed her arms in front of her, while the rest of the group laughed off the antics of the mother and son duo, even the four newcomers had gotten used to this kind of interaction between the two since they had plenty of times witnessed similar situations beforehand.

“Now will you let me, us (gesture to his companions) participate in the war?” asked Ken. Lyn sighed at the stubbornness his son possessed and gave in.

“Fine, I’ll let you participate, that is if Klein let’s you participate.” she said looking at her gleeful son that sprouted a beaming smile, Ken stared earnestly at his master.

“Okay, I will let you participate as well.” said Klein.

“What the?! I thought you would not allow him!” said Lyn in outrage, but not really that angry.

“You didn’t say anything, and for the record, you gave permission first, I just went along with it.” replied Klein nonchalantly, after witnessing two stupidly seemingly impossible feats to accomplish done by his student, how can he not let him participate.

Lyn proceeded to rant and turned her husband into her own punching bag, leaving him with bruises in so many places, except that part, being one of their iconic symbols as partners, Alfred was more of the researcher, while Lyn was the fighter, despite Alfred being stronger than Lyn.

Alfred sighed in defeat at the antics of his wife.

“Does this mean that you’ll allow the others to participate as well master?” asked Ken.

“I will let them, but remember to keep yourselves safe at all times, understood?” said Klein, looking into each eyes of his students.

“Yes Master!” the group simultaneously replied while bowing.

“One more thing, Ken you will not be participating in the first day of battle, along with Wilbert.” said Klein.

“Eh?” immediately the smile on his face fell down to a frown, he wanted to reason out again but Klein gave him that warning look.

“This is an order.” added Klein, making Ken’s face fall down even more into a sad puppy. Bloody hell, why does this student of mine had to have such a stupendous way of thinking! Didn’t think that I’d catch on now did you, well you’re wrong, thought Klein.

He knows how much of a disaster it would be if Ken would be given the chance at battle in the first day, especially with that look, that look of overdosed battle sensation, a look that he was familiar with all too well.

But more importantly, they’ll need to keep their aces hidden until needed, and that would be them.

“Alright, everyone take a rest while dinner is being prepared, and you all can spend the night today, our recent information tells us that the demon army will likely arrive tomorrow morning, so we’ll all need the rest we can get.” said Klein, together with the other two masters they walked inside the village.

Just as the masters entered, Raze, Cloud, and Rain walked out of the village.

“Everyone’s here, come, dinner’s ready, the villagers have all prepared different food for everyone.” this time it was Rain who spoke, the group nodded grateful for the news and entered together with the three.

“Your highness!” everyone turned around to look at the person who shouted and found the general and judiciary warrior lions of King Raze, running towards them along with a few reinforcements.

“Riven, Trun, great, you’ve both arrived, I hope that you didn’t encounter problems along the way.” said Raze, he commanded for all of the newly arrived reinforcement of about five battalions with forty lions each to proceed right inside, there will be personnel that will lead them to where the pride is situated at a house of the caves.

Combined with the three battalion that they traveled with to get here, it would be a total of eight battalions, the lava wolves pack have about half of the lion’s numbers while the esper wolves pack are of similar numbers to its cousins.

‘Guess we’ll have to make due with this, then, I’ll need to create a battle plan, first things first in the morning, to scout and assume the numbers of our enemies.’ thought Ken to himself.

Riven and Trun reported that they didn’t really have that much of a problem in their journey here, and so they had relatively arrived safe.

The group finally went inside of the village and took the rest for the night, had dinner and all went to sleep, but with defensive spells and guards scouting the perimeter of the village.

‘I wonder why this is happening though, yeah I get that the demon gate opens every six years, but what did my parents and the adults do to summon even stronger monsters, or better yet, demons into this world.’ thought Ken

Him along with his parents were situated at the cave of Klein, they didn’t have to worry over a cover above their head and just slept in what looks to be a sleeping bag, except it’s more of a mat with a makeshift pillow and a thin blanket.

Lucky for them, his parents knows how to make themselves comfortable and unbothered with an arcane spell that negates the cold, keeps them warm inside, and slightly deters the wind to not bother them much while they sleep, it also comes with a regular barrier and a sound barrier, the caster being able to adjust the spell’s area of effect.

A spell his parents like to call ‘Adaptation Curtain’. A spell similar to his, but his was a little bit on the lower quality side, still, it’s quite good for a spell. Ken gazed at the fire situated at the center of their perimeter.

The spell covered about a ten meter radius, situated at the center is the burning fire giving light to the surroundings, other than that the mountain lions also settled on this cave with their large number, some were sleeping on the flower field, while some at the center circle, together with them.

Celine’s family and tribe was accommodated by Master Lana along with Wilbert’s Family, the rest are at their homes here in the Village.

‘Thanks to father and mother’s spell I’m sure all the sound around us will keep us up all night.’ Ken looked up above and wondered at how this cave flows with the same time frame as the outside, even the hole on the ceiling showed the stars of the night.

‘Sleeping in my battle clothes had always been uncomfortable, but this will make do, good thing I have a cleansing spell.’ He stared some more of at the stars above, his eyes droopy. ‘On second thoughts, let’s change clothing.’

Ken fell asleep with a thought in his mind, to find out the answer to his looming question of the arrival of demons to this world, right before he explains why he can cancel out spells and restrict other people’s abilities to cast them.

‘*chuckle* I bet my friends are shocked how I was able to do that.’ He thought. Indeed they are, thought White.

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