Rebirth of the Phoenix God

"Those decorations sure are nice!"

Full of good spirits, Kaisha pulled Fen's hand as she moved through the street almost jumping. Even though the incoming period of assessment during which they would fight for the better slots for the event was looming over their heads, this energetic girl made it a point to spend some leisure time with the young arcanist.

"Aren't we partners?"

That was her only response whenever Fen attempted to push this wasteful proposition away. Despite what he said to Firo, he already used this strange new power of his twice before going to sleep. After the second attempt, his body was nearly unable to reach his bed, but using the last sprinkles of energy from his muscles, the young man managed to somehow return to his place.

And right now, instead of training, even more, to prepare for the inevitable problems during the tournament, he was actually on something aking to date with Kaisha? All matters with Firo aside, wasn't this akin to befriending the potential enemy?

Fen was a realist. Just like his entire life was turned all over with a single visit of Inquisition, expecting that he will manage to weather through the tournament without anyone taking notice of his special abilities, would go against common sense.

Instead of preparing for the opportunity that he will be found out, Fen was actually figuring out how he should act if everything goes according to the plan!

"They sure are."

Initially, the young man considered this time-off as nothing but a waste. But all Kaisha had to do to swept his moods aside and make him enjoy the time with her, was to appear.

Already from the moment where her thick hair seemed to form a mask around her face as she stormed directly into the archarity before anyone could stop her, Fen was unable to resist her scheme. Forcefully pulled away from his training grounds just as he was about to go with yet another attempt at refining his body, he quickly came to enjoy just randomly spending the time with this girl.

"Anywho, what do you think about the entire tournament? For me, it's quite strange that we are supposed to show the results after only a few days of learning, but who am I to decide what's best?"

Moving from stall to stall in a determined search for something, Kaisha didn't look like a challenger to be, but just a simple girl from the city, enjoying the event to its fullest.

"Well, to say that its early is a little understatement, don't you think?"

Breathing out heavily, Fen looked at the figure of the girl before moving his eyes away. If only he had a bit more time, just a few more days, then he could learn everything the could from Firo and just escape the city. With his robes and the minimal knowledge, he could easily escape from the scrutiny of the church, as long as he was willing to do his best at travelling as fast as he could.

Yet in his current situation, the chance to learn just a bit more from Firo or Draconis made it worthwhile to act normally. After all, how could the young man tell whether running would bring more attention to his person than just acting like a normal student he was pretending to be?

'How much I would give to just live my life like a normal person…'

As the two of them walked through the busy streets of the city, Fen couldn't help but longe for this kind of normal life. While some might consider it to be boring, what could be better than properly doing one's job, finding someone one would want to spend the rest of one's days with, and just enjoy the calm and peacefulness of slowly living through one's life?

Maybe if Fen was born in this kind of typical normal family, with enough prospects for the future to not be worried about everything, then his other potential self would aspire to be some kind of hero?

As the reality proved, being someone special was not the grounds for becoming a hero, but for becoming either a heretic or a rebel. Maybe this wasn���t the case in other countries, but sadly it held true for the entire empire. That's why, obtaining the classification to advance into arcanist's academy outside of Imperial borders, was one of the main aims for the young man!

With Fen once again surfing on the sea of his thoughts, Kaisha both noticed and respected it, allowing the rest of their walk to the class to remain silent. Just by walking beside her, Fen could feel somewhat calmer, as if her sheer presence had some wondrous effect on him.

'Is this because of the two of us being partners?'

As randomly as this idea appeared, it disappeared from Fen's mind just as quickly. Outside of training together and spending more time than they would otherwise do, there was no other connection between then sparked by the said partnership. Most likely, all the affection that the young man was slowly starting to feel towards this energetic girl was nothing more than just the feeling of friendship.

Sadly, after the huge betrayal of Basil back in the village, as soothing this feeling was to Fen, he was repulsed by it at the same time. Given how she picked to follow the path of the church, Kaisha was bound to end up on the other side of the barricade once all the pretence would be gone. At least, by befriending her he could prepare himself for the inevitable backstab once she would learn about his true self!

But that didn't mean the girl was bad herself. Anyone whose alleged friend would hide this kind of information, shouldn't be able to put trust in said friend anymore. That's why, Fen already knew what would happen, so he could at least prepare himself mentally for that.

"It seems that we are right on time. Let's have some fun during the lesson!"