Chapter 132: Just Another Day in the Draven Mansion [Part-1]

The sun climbed up the sky in the afternoon light, as the maids and servants bustled around the corridor leading to the main hall, walking here and there on their own work, while the knights remained stationed at different positions of the mansion.

Outside, in a relatively secluded part of the garden, Evelyn sat reading a book while softly stroking the little dragon’s scales.

Inside the mansion, Cassian was busy under the massive baggage of paperwork in front of him, while Sylvia brought tea for him, serving it on the table and placing her other hand on his shoulder as she pushed the cup in front of him, gesturing for him to drink first before engaging in more work.

Somewhere along the house, in the library, Nora sat near the corner, reading some new, weird book while learning new ways to bring trouble for Neo. And lastly, our Neo was sleeping peacefully inside his own room, his body lying lazily on the bed as if he hadn’t slept for days. That was not entirely wrong, as in the last few days he had been busy with daily drills, and even yesterday his father had specifically called him again to teach him swordsmanship, and he had learned one truth, that he couldn’t become as strong as the swordsmen, as he was actually suited to be a mage.

His physique, even though strong enough to obliterate massive boulders with a single punch, was still not suitable for using a sword, or perhaps he was simply more suited to being a mage than a swordsman.

His father had been a little disappointed to learn that. It was not that he actually thought Neo couldn’t become any stronger, but that Neo couldn’t work hard on developing his swordsmanship, gain mastery over the sword, and awaken the Sword Aura.

Sword Aura is a manifestation of pure physical and martial resolve, and a person can awaken a Sword Aura only when he has achieved enough mastery over the sword. The Sword Aura opens a new ’path’ for swordsmanship by breaking through the current limit and going beyond what was felt impossible before.

It was also rumoured that there was a person who had once achieved the pinnacle of swordsmanship, and that his Sword Aura had become so strong that he could destroy the whole Empire with a single swing of his sword.

Just like the ’Path’ of the ’Swordsman’, there was also a similar ’path’ known as ’Mage’. A mage had to walk the path to achieve high mastery over spells, and to achieve a specific mastery over one of their best magics and hone it to a different level. A mage who achieved such a realm of mastery became famous around the Empire and was given the title of ’Archmage’. In the history of the Velkrath Empire, there had been several Archmages, from generation to generation, in different noble families.

They were from noble families because even a commoner could become a noble if they achieved a feat and were recognised and branded by the Emperor himself. The titles and power were handed to them, and a lot of people, generally commoners or even lower nobles, thought that getting power had various benefits, not knowing that they were only making themselves servants of the Empire, as they ultimately had to work under someone’s control.

As the sun rays fell over Neo’s body through the gap in the curtains, Neo stirred awake, opening his hazy blue eyes and staring at the ceiling for a moment, as if trying to find out whether he was really back in his room or had actually fallen asleep at the training ground.

Neo pushed himself up to sit on the bed, rubbing his eyes to push away the sleep, and flicked his eyes to the clock on the wall, where he realised that he had woken up late and it was already twelve in the afternoon.

Surprisingly, no one had even come to wake him up, even though it was almost time for someone to call him.

’Probably Mom told the servants to let me sleep after watching yesterday’s training...’

Neo shook his head, stood up, and walked towards the window, opening the curtains of the room so that the warm light fell over his figure and spread behind him, immediately brightening up the dark room.

Neo then moved away from the window and walked to the washroom to brush his teeth and take a shower.

It took him around twenty minutes to finish washing, and he walked out wearing a loose white t-shirt with a black jacket over it. He walked towards the mirror, admiring his look once again while styling his hair to look more presentable, and then made his way towards the door, opened it, walked out, and closed it behind him. He walked through the corridor, looking outside through the passing windows to where the knights’ training ground stood, as the loud shouts and cheers of the knights could be heard from the distance. They might have been cheering for a practice duel occurring between the knights.

The knights in the Draven mansion had their own rankings. There were a total of ten battalions in the Draven Dukedom, each consisting of quite a number of knights, ranging from fifty to five hundred in each.

Each group of knights was trained by the commander who led them, and each battalion was famous for its own skills and abilities.

The battalions were ranked by numbers, but that criterion also fell short, as there was one other battalion which was also Cassian’s personal battalion, specifically trained by him, and which was famous all around the Empire by the name ’The Crazy Bull’.

That battalion mostly did not stay around the dukedom, living mostly at the border, always crazy about getting engaged in some brand-new battle.

’The Crazy Bull’ was famous for its instant-killing battles. They didn’t know the meaning of the term ’hesitation’, and all they knew was to ’kill’ the opponent in front of them.

They were crazy enough that no one dared to speak even a single word about them in the entire mansion.

Neo shook his thoughts away, as he himself didn’t actually know much about them, since he had never gone to the actual border of the dukedom and had never seen even a single member among them. So he pushed away those nonsensical thoughts and continue walking through the corridor.