The Ancient Genes

Max parted his way with the rest of the committee members and went towards the Blacksmith Department.

Along the way, he could feel different kinds of gaze. Somewhere curious, some admiring and some….hostile.

But, Max didn't care and just ignored all of these people and walked towards the class.

As Max entered the classroom, he couldn't help but frown. He saw Shon along with a couple of other students standing in the last row even though the seats were clearly empty.

Max scanned the room and found a few familiar faces. But there was only one which he put in his eyes.

The guy sitting in the corner with slightly curled golden brown hair, his eyes had dark circles with a lifeless look in them. If Max remembered correctly, he was the 2nd Young Lord of the Tempest House.

Tyler Tempest 

The rumors didn't speak much good about him. Well, the fact that he had a few guys standing behind him didn't give a good expression of him to Max anyway.

Seeing Max enter the room, everyone's eyes immediately shifted towards him. Even though it was Max's first class, more than half of the Academy already knew about him.

Max calmly walked towards the seats and his eyes met with Shon but seeing that he any avoided eye contact, Max didn't do anything.

A help provided without the person seeking it, might not be a help to the person. At least for strangers...

As soon as Max entered the classroom, the sound of footsteps entered his ears. To be more precise the sound gave a clear of a pointed object hitting the floor, it was an indication that the person was wearing heels, Max could feel the icy aura closing in as well.

He slightly tilted his head and saw a girl with beautiful dark blue hair walking in. Her skin was glistening like a crystal as if she had been sculpted from ice.

As for whether she was pretty or not, there wasn't a need to question it….Max sometimes felt that there was no way for these people to not look good, they have sh*t tons of money to make themselves look good.

Max could feel the strong icy aura around her body, the girl was in the news recently and there was no way for Max to not know her.

She was Namen Frost, the daughter of Frost House.

The girl came into the classroom and took the very first seat with her friend or servant which seemed to have been left empty for her.

Max turned his back and as he was about to go ahead, he noticed Tyler looking at Namen from the corner of his eyes.

Max suddenly paused his feet as a thought emerged in his mind and he didn't walk ahead but instead just took a sit beside Tyler in front of everyone's surprised gaze.

Tyler turned his head and looked at Max, he clearly didn't know him. Max was just a random guy in his eyes.

"What are you doing?" Tyler asked, he was clearly looking irritated.

"Just taking a seat…." Max replied with calm.

"This is my seat, now get off…" Tyler waved his hand.

"Oh! You want me to stand by their side…" Max asked as he pointed towards the guys in the back.

"Do as you wish, it's not my business.." Tyler's reply gave a surprise to Max. He hadn't expected that.

'If this guy doesn't care, then why are these people standing there?' Max suddenly thought.

"What's wrong didn't you hear me?" Tyler said with a frown as Max didn't move.

"How big is your bum, you need so much space.." Max asked with a slight laugh.

Before their conversation could go any further, the door of the classroom opened and the teacher entered the classroom.

It was a man in his 40's unlike the general Blacksmith Instructors, he didn't have a bulky body but a lean one. His hairs were still black and weren't showing the signs of turning grey anytime soon.

"Why are you always standing there at the back?" The Instructor suddenly asked with scrunched brows.

Max looked at the group of students but no one dared to speak.

"Don't be afraid, you can speak your mind. I am here." The Instructor spoke as looked towards Tyler. It was clear that he was suspicious of him.

When the students didn't utter even a word, there was nothing for the Instructor to do, he allowed them to take their seats before beginning the class.

It was a theory class on Annealing and Case hardening. In their first year, their syllabus covered Hardening and Tempering only when it came to Metal manipulation.

Max couldn't help but feel a bit bored. He had learned this stuff ages ago. In his boredom, Max began to scan the class, he found that a few students weren't paying attention. Either they were ahead of the syllabus or weren't interested at all.

'Hmmn?' Max suddenly noticed that the guy beside him seemed to be daydreaming as well.

Max wasn't going to interrupt but when he noticed the page opened on his book, he couldn't help but feel curious.

"Who can explain this part?" The Instructor suddenly asked and a few people raised their hands.

A smile suddenly leaked on Max's face and he slightly moved his finger beneath his desk, the next instant, the tattoos on his chest began to give out a slight gleam as the spirit energy began to gush out of the spirit world.

Tyler who had been in his world, suddenly heard people taking a deep breath in.

"Well, that's unexpected….since it's your first time, let's give Tyler a chance…"

When the Instructor's voice entered Tyler's ear, he finally realised that his hand was in the air.

He couldn't understand what just happened and failed to noticed Max who was sitting beside with a grin on his face.

"What's wrong...just explain in short what case hardening and Annealing is…we haven't gotten the entire day…."

Tyler slowly stood up, and slightly tilted his head towards the book on the desk as he began to mumble, " We need to heat...the metal until.."

Max shook his head, even though he hadn't said anything wrong, Max knew that he was going to. The guy was looking at the textbook.  But the problem was, it was not this year's textbook but the one from the previous year...

Even though the beginning steps were the same, the ending wasn't.

Max suddenly took his book and pushed it on the top of the guy's textbook, "You don't want to embarrass yourself in front of your sister in law, do you?"

Tyler clenched his fist on Max's words and stopped himself from going mad as he continued to slowly read from Max's textbook.

Max could feel him boiling in anger and smiled. He suddenly turned his head toward the girl on the front row.

Namen Frost...she was recently in the news for being engaged with the Young Lord of Tempest House.

He might be wrong here, but this was worth giving it a try here.

…

On the other side, the chase had turned into a game of hit and run.

With Mark on board, Lear felt confident of getting out alive as long as they could continue to maintain the situation. They just needed to buy enough time.

At this moment, the man wielding a dagger activated his true spell, Lear could feel the mana flowing moving towards the guy as he sped up and shot up towards the sky like a bolt of lightning.

"Dodge!" Lear screamed and moved aside.  

Mark hearing Lear's voice moved as well and as soon as they moved, the man with a dagger fell from the air and a slice from his dagger left a deep cut on the concrete pavement.

It was not the end, as the other man activated their true spell and began to attack as their life depended on it.

Within a couple of seconds, smoke began to rise as they moved through the way. It became increasingly difficult for Mark and Lear to dodge and injuries began to appear on their bodies from the flying pieces of debris.

"We can't get out like this…." Mark suddenly said as he looked towards Lear.

"I guess so…" Lear said as his steps began to slow down and he stopped. "You can leave...this wasn't your fight to begin with…"

"I can't let my name of the Fire General be tarnished,"  Mark suddenly said as he stopped as well. Mana began to swirl around him like crazy. Even Lear began to feel oppressed by the domineering aura.

Lear eye's suddenly widened, right….he remembered now. The General…..Mark… Fire General Mark...It was him all along.

The Crazy Rookie

"Flare!"

Flames suddenly lit up Mark's entire body and it began to burn brighter with each passing second.

"Flames of the Sun God"

Lear looked at the guy, and he couldn't help but feel disappointed at his own actions.What was be doing? He wasn't supposed to be losing to anyone, he wasn't going to lose to anyone…he won't.... he needed to be even more crazier than anyone…..

Lear felt the mana within him surging. He was on the verge of a breakthrough for a while now. He was going to stake it here….Max's words from the past began to ring in his mind….his reason for coming to the capital…. 

Lear raised his hand and took a step forward standing beside Mark as he activated his true spell.