Chapter 98: Aiden vs The Assembly?
But that didn’t last long either, because at that point Talen’s magic energy surged high, and in his eyes, you could see that glow of magic. Due to his energy spike, the technique’s effect from Aiden, which wasn’t as strong as Talen had originally cast, could not hold him down for long either.
Aiden’s eyes immediately took on the draconian form, knowing fully well that this scuffle might just turn into a much more serious battle.
Talen took one step forward, and with his distortion magic, that step forward covered the entire distance between him and Aiden. He had used his magic to distort the distance between them so that a single step forward would equate to the several steps it would take to cover that same range.
That had instantly taken Aiden by surprise, especially as Talen had suddenly appeared in front of him.
Talen’s hand was already stretching out for Aiden’s neck in practically the same moment as his arrival when suddenly Aiden himself used Void Step to quickly teleport out of range and appear in a different corner.
However, just as Aiden had made his reappearance, black arrows made from Ynes’s darkness magic had traveled toward him in quick succession. She had recovered from the vertigo not long after and, without much thought, unleashed her attack toward Aiden.
Thankfully, Aiden’s Dragon’s Sight full rotational view had caught wind of the incoming attack before the arrows even got too close.
"Switch..." Aiden muttered, using his space authority skill to swap places with Ynes. This skill exchanged their positions, making it so that Ynes was going to be the one to take the brunt of her own attack.
The moment Aiden took Ynes’s position, which was in the midst of other mages from the Assembly, he immediately used the Force spell to telekinetically disperse them all away.
By doing this, he had intercepted any sudden attempts at casting a spell at him. None of them could also react quickly enough to use a counter spell due to how suddenly Aiden had appeared at Ynes’s position while near-simultaneously casting the force spell that dispersed them.
Additionally, they had also been taken by surprise with Aiden suddenly swapping places and appearing before them. The magic and fighting style wasn’t something they had seen or faced before.
Just at that very moment, Piers had teleported right back into the midst of the commotion with Captain Katherine.
"What in the nine hells..." Katherine muttered at the sight she saw.
Without paying any regard to the Captain’s entry, Talen was just about to cast another spell with his arms stretched toward Aiden when the side of Katherine’s eye noticed that movement.
"Talen! Stop right this moment!" she commanded while pointing her sword toward him. She had been standing some meters to his side.
Ynes had blood on her right hand from using it to defend against her own darkness magic arrows. With that scowl on her face, she was just about to cast another spell at Aiden when Katherine lost it.
"HAVE YOU ALL GONE MAD?!" the captain exclaimed as her mana pressure surged so high that its strength cracked the ground beneath her.
"I dare anybody to cast one more spell right before me!"
That was an absolute threat from the Captain. It didn’t matter who it was - they simply stopped, even Aiden, who seemed determined to fight everyone there, stopped and took a more straightened position.
-----
Not long after, the other guild captains arrived at the scene, and it looked like the situation had calmed down a bit. Each one stood by their mage’s side and had heard different accounts of what happened from them.
Their stories, however, had one thing in common - Aiden was the villain in all of them.
"Aiden, what the hell were you doing?" Katherine asked after hearing the full account of everything from Piers. Right now she was standing before them both at one corner of the hall.
Aiden had his face looking downward, as if avoiding the Captain’s gaze.
"I’m sorry, Captain..." Aiden said, without arguing.
At that point, Thamoryn stepped in. She had been informed in her chambers about the happenings at the halls for exams.
The commotion in the halls became still as she walked in, with no expression on her face nonetheless.
Then she turned toward Ynes, the head of the Assembly, and asked, "What happened here?"
Ynes went on with explaining what happened, and although her account was the most suited to actually stating what occurred, Aiden was still painted as the villain. Not that he had acted in self-defense against them.
Thamoryn gave Aiden one look and said, "You may be a gifted mage, but an affront to the Assembly is like a direct disrespect to any of the captains here or myself. That, I cannot have."
Aiden said nothing and had his face turned to the side.
Then Thamoryn turned toward Ynes and said, "I’ll have that petition."
Ynes nodded affirmatively, and then the Grand Magus turned back toward Aiden and said, "The punishments you were given are what you shall do, without questions and without reassignment."
A frown appeared on Aiden’s face, but he said nothing more.
"Now, everyone except the Captains, leave this place," Thamoryn commanded, and one by one the other mages left, leaving just the captains with the Grand Magus.
While Aiden walked toward the exit, the system sent him new messages:
[Technique Copied: Distortion Magic: Faster Pace (A)]
[Technique Copied: Darkness Magic: Black Arrows(A)]
Aiden made the system messages disappear almost immediately as they came, given that he wasn’t in the mood for any of it.
He reached the guild and walked past the worried faces of everyone without saying anything, all the way to his room.
Both Laela and Arianna had more worry on their faces than the others.
Piers also had a somber look on his face when he had walked in, and a few of the guild members started asking what had happened.
Even Kayden couldn’t pretend like he wasn’t curious to want to know what happened.
-----
Back at the exam halls where the Grand Magus and the captains were, Torsten, captain of the Hollow Pact, said, "I didn’t think this new initiate would be able to fight against senior-ranked mages this early..."
What Torsten had just mentioned was a thought that most of them had in their minds.