17

Ende, 80 years ago

Within the castle of the Demon King, the demon himself was in the middle of firing off black beams at the party of heroes, that had made it this far into his castle and his forces of demons; Frieren quickly projected up a solid barrier of magic, layering it up to protect her and the others from the incoming blast of magic.

While the magic spells blasted against her shield wall, Himmel and Eisen dashed out from both sides to keep the demon king occupied while she and Heiter stayed back; the Demon king aimed his finger at Eisen who was already running at full speed towards him, and fired off a massive fire ball at the Dwarf.

Eisen's eyes widened as he had to leapt up into the air to avoid the incoming fireball, and retaliate back with a downward swing of his battle axe at the Demon king; the Demon King deftly brought up his palm to block the blow, while covering his hand in mana, he grunted in pain as Eisen's lightning strike caused the Demon King to falter for second.

Not letting up for his fellow teammate, Himmel was already running up towards the Demon King as well with his sword at his side, and jumped to cleave his sword into the demon's neck; The Demon King however was quick with his reflexes as he brought his arm up and blocked the blow while hardened his skin obsidian black, sparks flew against his skin as Himmel's sword raked against the hardened skin.

Frieren narrowed her eyes, the Demon King used one magic to block against Eisen's weapon, and a different one for Himmel's, this demon definitely had a repertoire of spells in contrast to the other Demons she had fought before.

Acting quickly, Frieren fired off a beam of magic at the Demon King, a seething red beam that scorched the floor as it zoomed at the Demon King faster then one could blink; Her spell connected against the Demon King's chest and sent him flying into the wall behind him and out through it, leaving Eisen and Himmel to collect themselves after landing on their feet.

As the Demon King descended down from his throne room from the hole his body created, he patted the burnt skin on his chest to put the flames out; his attention however was soon caught as Frieren and Eisen threw themselves out to chase after the Demon king, Himmel and Heiter would try to make it down as fast as they could while Frieren would use a spell to soften her landing while Eisen's durable dwarven body could handle the impact of the descent.

The Demon King grunted in annoyance as his body fell to the ground below, a good seven or so stories highl before he'd land into the courtyard of his castle; Frieren was the first to fire off another spell from her staff as she descended out of the air, from her staff aimed at the demon, a ball of lightning shot out that screamed like cackling static as it collided into the Demon's King's forearms as he brought them up to protect himself from the attack.

While the Demons King's arms had sparks dance along his arms and his body was just two stories from hitting the ground below, Eisen was running down along the castle brick wall; the Dwarf grunted as he jumped off from the wall he was running on, and swung his battle axe out at the Demon King.

Unable to right himself in the air, the Demon King was sliced into his side by Eisen, the force of the hit itself batted the Demon King out of the air and over into an arched column, his own body collapsing the structure along with his body going down with it.

Frieren fired off another spell down below her and Eisen, making the ground below them become gelatinous, allowing both of their bodies to bounce off from the once former hard ground and land on their feet on stable ground.

From the entrance to the castle behind them, Himmel had already ran as fast as his feet and body could take him, a resolute look was present on his face just like everyone else as he ran out past Eisen and Frieren, already knowing where the Demon King was.

Not to let his friend fight the Demon King alone, Eisen followed after Himmel in his dead sprint, the both of them running at the recovering form of the Demon King who was pushing stone bricks off from him to allow him to stand out from the rubble.

While the two of them fought with the Demon King again with their battle axe and sword respectively clanging against each time the Demon King blocked with his hardened mana skin spell, Heiter finally exited out from the entrance of the castle; the priest himself quickly catching his breath while leaning against the frame of the entrance from the overtaxation put on his body, he gulped down more air before fixing his glasses a bit to run again alongside Frieren to catch up with their friends.

While he carried his goddess book in one hand, he began to chant with his other hand out and palm facing upward, "Be thy goddess's sword, let not the life be extinguished, let the warmth of the goddess protect thyself!" He chanted, while an orb began to glow into his hand, "Göttinnenschild!" He intoned, while a bright yellow aura glowed around his body, before the orb fired off at Eisen.

Himmel had just been knocked back by the Demon King by a backhand blow, the swing of the blow had been a swift strike at his stomach while the Demon king himself was in the middle of shooting a conic blast of magic at Eisen; A bright shield was able to deflect the conic blast back at the Demon King while protecting Eisen, a resounding boom echoed as the Demon king was blasted by his own attack and sent flying off from the ground and across the courtyard.

As the Demon King flipped himself through the air to land and drag his hands into the ground to stop himself, Frieren had launched herself at the Demon king by using a spell to make the ground beneath her catapult her out into the air towards the Demon; with her Staff Raised and focused look on her face, she fired off a salvo of air cutting spells that looked like blades of wind.

Throwing his hands up, the Demon King projected up a black barrier to block the spell, booms of air rocked into the demonic barrier of his own making; not done with her casting while she was flying through the air, Frieren brought her staff up to the side and ignited out a swathing flame blade out as she swung her staff out towards the Demon King.

The Demon King grunted in displeasure as he had to keep the barrier up to protect himself from the swathe of the flame blade that Frieren swung at him from out of her staff; as the Demon King lowered his shield down to quickly retaliate back at the elf while she was in the middle of landing on the ground from her impromptu self catapulting, from overhead of Frieren, Himmel had recovered quickly enough to sprint after Frieren and the Demon King, and leapt over Frieren with his sword raised.

Having to quickly react to Himmel's attack, but unable to cast a spell on his arms to harden them up, the Demon King was left with Himmel gouging a deep cut into his forearms while causing him to stumble back; The Demon King growled in anger at the pain and quickly retaliated this time by thrusting his hands out to fire off a conic blast at the hero point blank range.

Before the Demon King could fire his spell off however, Frieren had not let up on her next spell casting, as once Himmel had landed, she aimed her staff end at the Demon king's face; a blast of blue energy impacted and sent the Demon King reeling and flying off through the air into another part of the Demon's castle, where a tower was made for the ascent and descent to and from the courtyard and throne room.

The Demon King's head began to freeze over with ice as he flew towards the other wall, and impacted the stone wall with a loud boom, his body collapsing the entire wall down on him while the ice on his head shattered from the impact.

While the castle tower wall finished breaking down on the Demon King's body, both Frieren and Himmel were joined back by Heiter and Eisen; Eisen himself speaking up for the team as everyone kept vigilant for the Demon King to emerge from out of the rubble, "Heiter, we need a better plan, than to just batter the blasted Demon up!"

As the Demon King pushed himself from out of the rubble, stone dust falling off his form as he stepped through the hole in the castle tower his body made, Himmel smirked nonetheless as he stood by his allies, "No, I can feel it, he can't keep this up, I can tell he's not used to this amount of pressure!" he assured Eisen, before sprinting off at the Demon king, while deftly dodging the incoming beams of magic the Demon King fired at the Hero.

Eisen cursed in his dwarven tongue, "Fine then!" He grumbled and chased after Himmel to keep up the pressure with the human.

Heiter meanwhile spoke with Frieren as he focused on building his mana up, "I got a spell in mind that can boost a magic attack, start Casting your best and fastest spell you can fire, Frieren!" he requested, while his body began to flow white goddess energy.

"Right!" Frieren nodded in agreement as she thought up a spell in mind, and aimed her staff at the Demon King, who was in the midst of blocking each attack from Eisen and Himmel with his hands.

From there, the fight only dragged on as the upper castle parts collapse from the ongoing battle between the hero party and Demon King; spells belonging to the Demon king, Frieren and Heiter would go off, while clangs of Eisen's battle axe and Himmel's sword would resound through the air.

By the time the fight was over, Himmel was standing over the corpse of the Demon King with the entire castle having collapsed from the monstrosity that was the battle between the heroes and the Demon king.

Atop the pile of rubble that was once the Demon King's castle, Himmel pulled his sword out from the chest of the Demon King and stumbled back; Heiter had managed to catch his friend as the rest of the party had been able to catch up with Himmel and the Demon king's last throes of the battle.

As Himmel fell into the arms of his friend Heiter, he looked at his friend's face with a surprised look before he picked himself up; as the moment settled down for everyone to digest what they just did, Himmel turned around with his sword slack in his grip, but keeping it firm enough to hold it.

Freiren watched as Himmel turned around and slowly smiled victoriously, "heheh…ehhehe!" He began to chuckle, along with Heiter, before both men burst into relieved laughter; Frieren smiled in response while Eisen collapsed onto his rear end, this was a very hard won fight that she doubted she'd ever forget.

"I…I could use a…a good drink right about now…" Eisen groused while he held his battle axe beside him, earning raucous laughter from Himmel and Heiter as both too fell onto their rears after the exhaustion of the battle finally settled in.

Feel the onset of exhaustion as for herself, Frieren breath a sigh of relief as she stepped back and sat atop a large block piece of the castle; her staff in her hands, not wanting to let her guard down too much in enemy territory, who knows if there were any other demons that might come out from the rubble and attack them.

Himmel smiled back at his friends, his gaze settled on her, the two shared a smile; something inside Frieren made her feel something as she smiled back at Himmel, something about the moment made her feel she wanted to share more of something with Himmel.

Present, Teufel

The supposed upcoming second part of the exam, that had been decided out of nowhere on a whim by Serie herself, had been delayed for everyone that wanted to take part in the little tournament to become a second grade mage.

Seated in one of the rooms of the Mage Association Building, Teufel sat with Fern where there was a long table and a wall of books for people to study magic from; Fern was looking up a book about how to cast easy fire, while Teufel was seated opposite of her at the desk with a book of her own.

From what she could overhear, Serie wanted to face her mother while the rest of the mages would be facing each other; something about wanting to face the Frieren that fought the Demon King.

She had seen Serie and her Mother walk off back towards the building to discuss the matter more privately, while Sense had apologized to the mages in attendance, and assured they didn't have to take part in her Master's inane whims; but she did not say the opportunity to become a second grade mage was off the table.

That brought up Teufel's point in time now, and everyone else's, Serie had told everyone to prepare themselves if they wanted to participate; from what Teufel had noticed a lot over the years as a mage in this world, often a mage would specialise in a spell while also keeping a repertoire of other spells.

One couldn't be a one trick pony afterall, and you couldn't call yourself a mage if all you knew was one spell, but it did help a mage to focus on a spell to specialize it and bring it to its full potential, while still keeping a few other spells under one's belt.

The ironic twist is that her mother explained what Demons do with their own magic spells, besides what the Demon king was able to do; Demons would rely on one magic spell of their own, and rely on it alone, building themselve up to become proficient with their magic spell. Qual was a prime example.

Gazing her eyes to the window of the room, while Fern held her book in her hands, idle flipping a page once she was done with the page she was done reading, Teufel continued to dwell on the upcoming 'mage tournament'; it wasn't a bad concept, it would help the mage association filter out what mages were capable of actual combat, and it would allow the participating mages to see where they stood in the world of magic.

So long as it was stressed that killing your opponent was a disqualification, Teufel was fine with this impromptu mage tournament; It would rob the world of the aspiring mages that wanted to do more in life after they leave this place, no doubt they had ambitions that lead them to this point in time.

A waste of human life if a mage test cost the lives of the participants, they were not enemies here, merely opponents if anything else.

Of course, that was wishful thinking on her part; Teufel had managed to inquire what the tests for the rank for First Grade Mage are like, rumors of various different tests are done and would often take the lives of the mages that took part in them.

A rather cut and dry way of cutting the chaff, but considering what she did in her last life just so she could try and fail her battalion of men and Visha, only for them all to succeed…she would be better off calling herself a black kettle…but in her defense, half of those shells were not live, and all other the men and Visha knew the basic mage shield to protect themselves.

"Hey Teufel." Fern's voice broke Teufel from her thoughts, earning her attention as Teufel looked up from her book about recipes on cooking frogs, "If we end up facing each other, what's going to happen? I mean, I don't think-"

Teufel cut Fern off, "Fern." she said, giving the girl a firm look, "Be honest, do you really believe you should take part in the test at all? You've already earned the rank of third." she pointed out with a gentle tone.

"Well…you're not wrong about that…" Fern mused as she looked a bit in thought to herself, cupping her chin in the process, "I mean…I can always take the next second grade or first grade mage test some other time…" she added with a sideways gaze.

"But it's not like a life or death fight, right!?" Fern spoke up again, her gaze fixated back at Teufel, "And the chance of us facing each other are slim if I do choose to participate!" she said.

"Hmmm. Yes…" Teufel nodded in agreement, "But that still questions if you can fight against a mage one on one."

"Well…" Fern paused to say, pursing her lips a bit as she thought about it, "I mean, it's not like I need the next grade rank right now! But I would like to know where I stand compared to the mage I might fight against If I choose to participate!"

Narrowing her eyes at Fern's reasoning, it would help the girl by throwing her into a fight with a mage, rather than some monster that would kill her without a second thought; it would allow Fern some sense of combat, while the mage opponent had no reason to kill the girl to pass the test.

Tapping her fingers against the table, Teufel stopped tapping and spoke to Fern, "Well the choice is ultimately up to you, it would be a safer environment for you to experience combat, that is, if Serie makes sure no lethal damage is allowed in the test." she nodded to herself at her answer for Fern.

Frieren

Frieren sat apart from Serie as the elf herself sat on a simple chair, at present, Serie, Sense and Frieren occupied a vacant room, a long table with several chairs for people to sit at; Serie smiled an impish smirk while Sense glared softly at her back, Serie sat cross legged on her chair while Frieren sat on her chair with her legs hanging off the edge.

Serie began to speak with Frieren with an ever present smirk, "Now that we are relatively alone, Frieren, you know you don't have to face me, but my curiosity of how you fought the Demon King, has had me burgeoning to see the Frieren that fought the Demon that day."

Staring back at the other Elf, Frieren spoke with a careless tone, "Serie, you know very well I wasn't alone in that fight, if it wasn't for Himmel, Eisen and Heiter, I alone would have never beaten the Demon King…but I can't deny it was a very mana intensive fight."

Visions reeled through Frieren minds of every spell she had to use in the fight against the Demon King.

Serie offered a simple smile in response, "Oh, I know that, but I can only imagine the amount of spells you used you've learned over the centuries…I am quite curious what grimoires you learned from, what Flamme taught you, other than suppressing your mana to deceive the demons." She said back.

With a frown on her face, Frieren shrugged back at Serie, "Quite honestly, I think I learned more in the ten years I fought with Himmel, Eisen and Heiter on our way to kill the Demon King, than my entire life…we came across so many dungeons with treasure in them…" She answered back with a growing smile.

Rather than stay in one spot and watch humanity grow, the mere ten years she experienced a measly eighty plus years ago, almost feels like a lifetime ago, the more she dwelled on the brief time she traveled with the hero party. It made her feel wanting to experience it all over again, the thrill of the exploration and dungeon delving, fighting dungeon monsters, finding treasure at the end of it.

It was one of the best ten years she had ever lived, and Frieren would never forget those ten years for as long as she lived.

Serie continued to express a small smirk as she conversed with Frieren, "Let back on topic though, Frieren, I'm willing to part with two Grimiores, if you face me this one time." She stated with two fingers raised and expressive smug smile.

"..." With widened eyes, Frieren's attention was caught, "hmm…make it three…" she demanded instantly, giving into Serie's request be damned, the elf was offering grimoires in this test for her. She would bargain with the other elf if Serie was actually wanting to fight her that badly, to face Frieren the slayer.

Sense, Speaking up on the matter, glanced between the two with a disapproving frown, "Might I remind you, Mistress Serie, that this place nor the testing grounds is not the best place for mages such as you to throw around destructive spells of such caliber, most of which I could only imagine casting." She warned, before speaking again of an afterthought, "…relatively speaking of course."

Frieren was pretty sure that Sense meant that she could imagine the spells, but casting them was a different matter altogether.

With a bit of an impish smirk, Serie gave her apprentice a sideways glance, "Oh relax, Sense, I'm pretty sure we can move this entire test to somewhere else." she assured her apprentice, earning a slow nod from Sense in appreciation.

Serie then looked back at Frieren with a bit of a frown, "And your deal…I can consider your request…I have plenty of grimores afterall." she said with a grin afterwards, but quickly squashed her grin down as she stared at Frieren, "Of course, that's only if you last more than five minutes against me." She challenged Frieren with a narrowed look.

Frieren was pretty sure, while Serie was ahead in age, the two of them in a mage fight would be more of a fight of attrition, if she was being generous to herself. The allure of her requested three grimoires had her.

While she could have asked for more than that, she didn't want to be too greedy…or did she? "Would you have agreed to my request, If I had asked for more than three Grimoires?" Frieren asked the question in her mind with an earnest look on her face.

Offering Frieren a simple smile, Serie spoke in an amused tone, "Nope. I'd have brought it down to less." she answered plainly, "I already offer one book for any mage that passes their first grade mage test, giving you any more than that is an acceptable amount, considering you are facing against me." she stated with a smirk.

Blinking a bit at that information, Frieren voiced her thoughts, "Then wouldn't this make it more of a first grade mage test for me, if you offer grimoires as the reward?" she questioned with a curious look on her face.

Forming a more amused look on her face now, Serie spoke back to Frieren, "You're not wrong Frieren, in fact, this would make it easier in the long run for you! Afterall, with the rank of a first grade mage, it would allow you to travel anywhere!" she answered her.

'This is probably true', were Frieren's thoughts. There were times with customs and checkpoints throughout the countryside demanding certain certifications, and Frieren could only assume this Mage Association would last longer than the last time she earned her necklace to show she was a mage. "How often do I need to come back to reinstate my certification?" Frieren asked.

As much as she loved her daughter, she was very pushy about getting papers and other stuff to show who she was, something about the developing world of humans will probably be more bureaucratic as times went on.

She really hoped it didn't get that bad where she had to have papers for everyplace she went.

Serie spoke up with a plain tone, "Reinstatement? That?" She began to question with a brow lifted, and answered, "We have a few branches built around the countryside, so I suppose you don't need to travel from across the countryside every ten years to update your certification at one place." Serie answered.

"Fine then…when should we start?" Frieren asked Serie, earning an excited smirk from the other elf and a cautious gaze from Sense of the mounting battle that will play out between the elf mages.