-5 Days

The crisp morning air still lingered past breakfast time. It could even be said to be a little bit chilly, probably because it had been raining all night last night. The distinct smell of fresh earth wafted in the air, giving everyone that inhaled it a feeling of rejuvenation.

At this time, Satoshi was seated on a bed in the infirmary. He was concentrating on the holographic display of his communication terminal. On it, there was a piece of news about the latest announcement from the Universal Council of Elders.

The Universal Council of Elders was an independent body that consisted of prominent academias from almost every organization of power and authority in the world. Their main concern was to maintain their independence from any other agendas for the sole purpose of fair pursuit, distribution, and dissemination of knowledge.

Thus, they mainly worked as a watchdog and gatekeeper for both the academia community and government to make sure everyone adhere to a certain moral standard. In the more practical sense, for example, the Universal Council of Elders was responsible for organizing things such as Academia Scholastic Trials and the like.

Satoshi was unconscious for two days after the incident and yesterday the Universal Council of Elders had made the final announcement for the upcoming Academic Scholastic Trials. It would start five days from now.

Satoshi turned off his communication terminal and put it down by the bedside table. He was nervous that the thing he had been preparing for was finally upon him. yet, he felt not in the slightest bit to be ready.

"Are you okay, Uncle?"

A small voice awakened Satoshi from his thoughts. It was Ashya and she was seated beside Satoshi's bed, watching him all this time.

"I'm fine, just excited for the trial is all," Satoshi answered Ashya with a big smile.

"Are you sure you will be okay…with your injury?"

"Hahaha, what are you saying, your uncle is strong you know…this much is nothing to me."

Ashya wasn't convinced by Satoshi's answer.

"Besides, didn't I have the best teachers in the world helping me prepare?"

Ashya averted her gaze toward a part of the infirmary that was prepared for guests. Seated around a table were Sepphira, Tellrog, and Unsui. They were happily conversing with Mahalini.

The three teachers and the present elders at that time were beyond surprised yesterday. As they were rushing to treat Satoshi, something unexpected suddenly happened.

The flow of neutralizing elements from the formation was suddenly blocked off from entering Satoshi. Then an influx of bluish elemental energy was expelled from him, causing great surprise.

As the elders were busy neutralizing the expelled energy Satoshi's condition rapidly stabilized. The injuries on his body were even healing at a concerning rate.

After some time, most of Satoshi's injuries were unexplainably healed. He even gained consciousness briefly before falling back to sleep.

Sepphira and the other teachers took control of the unexpected development. The elders present at the time were firmly instructed to keep what happened a secret and would later be instructed on how to answer any incoming questions about the incident.

Ashya and Mahalini came to see Satoshi as soon as they got news about the incident. They weren't able to see him on the first day, but they decided to wait until Satoshi regained his consciousness. Luckily, they didn't have to wait long.

Mahalini suddenly looked at Satoshi and stood up from her seat, followed by the three teachers.

"So you sure you want to stay here and not return with us?" Mahalini asked Satoshi.

"Yes, I think I better stay here since the trial is going to start very soon."

"...Alright then. If you need anything don't hesitate to send words to us, Mulah wanted us to make sure you get that."

"Got it, you have nothing to worry about."

"Good. Then we better get going now and let you rest. Oh, almost forgot, Oda sends his regards. He is currently very busy with something but he will visit you the first chance he gets."

"Oh, is he still staying in the mansion?"

"He is, and judging by the state of the guest house he's staying in, he's in the middle of some big investigation. Numerous letters were sent to us every single day addressed to him."

Mahalini might not know what Oda was working on right now, but Satoshi had an inkling of what it might be. After their last conversation together, Oda had been pouring the majority of manpower and resources into collecting information about the Power Tribunal and their past deeds. His main lead being Kirgio.

Mahalini and Ashya said their final goodbyes despite Ashya's willingness to leave. Sepphira sent them off, leaving Satoshi in the infirmary with Tellrog and Unshui, who watched Satoshi silently and awkwardly from the side.

Satoshi felt something was up with the two of them, but before he could think of anything Unsui came asking his question.

"So…did you have a good dream?"

Tellrog coughed out and spat the tea he just sipped to get out of the awkward atmosphere. He elbowed Unsui on the arm and gave him a stern look.

Satoshi was confused by the question, and especially by Tellrog's reaction.

"I did indeed hav-"

"Alright, let's discuss what happened." Sepphira's voice suddenly came as she returned to the room, cutting off Satoshi's answer.

She stopped and gave Satoshi a look before softly asking him, "Are you up to it?"

"Yeah, I think so."

Satoshi began recounting his version of the event that led to the incident. He told them the idea behind the hand wraps and what he was trying to achieve.

Initially, Satoshi planned to use them for the demonstration part of applied studies subject of the trials. He was taking inspiration from his experience with developing his water-light print technique and was trying to combine it with combat magic. The containment enchantment on the hand wraps itself was based upon the old periodic table of the elements from the Second Era.

"Wait…are you telling me you developed the water-light technique yourself?" Tellrog interjected.

"Yea, I did."

The three of them were surprised to learn this new detail about Satoshi, especially Tellrog and Unsui. This was their first time hearing that Satoshi had a self-developed technique.

While Unsui knew that Satoshi could perform a water-print technique, he didn't know the variation Satoshi had developed for the technique. Same with Sepphira, even though he heard about it from Mulah before, she didn't know that Satoshi had developed the technique further by himself.

Tellrog was the one most surprised out of the three of them since this was his first time hearing about any of this. Now that he had heard this, the fact that Satoshi could do what he did in the bunker made a bit more sense.

"But still…that and this are a completely different thing." Tellrog finally gave voice to the last bits of confusion in his mind.

"What do you mean?" Satoshi asked.

"He is referring to how you wielded those elements," Sepphira explained.

"Huh? What do you mean by different…I just did what I usually did with the light an-"

"It IS different. What you did with the light could be considered matter manipulation at most. You did nothing to change its innate properties, nor did you utilize it in any way that resulted in alteration of elementary particles configuration, and alchemical properties."

"What you did within the bunker was using the trace elements on the hand wraps as catalysts to invoke changes of elementary particles configuration and alchemical properties within you, which then you used to make an attack."

"That could no longer be considered matter manipulation, that is elemental manipulation. You performed elemental magic." Sepphira ended her explanation.

Satoshi was at a loss by the end of Sepphira's explanation. Now that he was thinking about it, it was indeed as what Sepphira just explained, but he never thought about it in such a way before. In Satoshi's mind, it was nothing more than a natural extension of what he had always been doing with the light in his water-light printing technique.

Satoshi looked at the three teacher's expressions and he could see that it was not supposed to be a simple matter. Yet, he had done it in a very natural manner, albeit failing in the end.

"And to think you used six elements…" Unsui sighed.

"It was five elements."

"Huh? We clearly felt the fluctuation of five elements…"

"There were two portions of the same element, kalium, that was probably why the last technique failed."

Satoshi began explaining in detail about the different elements that he used. He also explained in detail the effect of each element and the result of their combination according to his hypothesis.

The three teachers concluded that if he was to succeed in executing the technique, the power would be enough to flatten a small hill. Satoshi remembered what he saw within the scene in his mental realm, how the technique blasted a colossal stone mountain into nothingness.

Since it would be weird to explain and Satoshi wasn't sure himself about the nature of his experience, he decided to keep it a secret.

Another thing that Satoshi had just realized was the fact that the three teachers in front of him were not able to distinguish the elements perfectly. Unlike the mysterious figure that he met in his mental realm that was even able to tell that there was an extra portion of the same element.

That meant whatever or whoever that mysterious figure was, it was clearly a step better than the three teachers, or more.

The next thing they did was to settle on one thing, Satoshi was not going to use the hand wraps on his applied studies portion of the trial. At this point, the danger to do so greatly outweighed the benefits, so they agreed to come up with another plan.

Satoshi himself didn't mind the arrangement. Since he met the mysterious figure Satoshi had learned a great deal about the potential of his seemingly simple idea. Thus, he decided to keep such things a secret to avoid unnecessary trouble and complications.

"Satoshi, if I may, I think it is better for you to keep the technique to yourself even after the trial." Tellrog suddenly added.

Satoshi was surprised that Tellrog would suddenly suggest such thing, and from the sound of it, it was due to an entirely different reason than the one Satoshi was thinking about.

"Why?" Satoshi asked.

"It had something to do with you," Tellrog answered, unsure whether he should explain further or not.

Sepphira heard Tellrog's hesitation and took over the explanation part.

"The fact that you could use elemental magic despite being an Aspirant is rare. Not that it has never happened before, but still very rare nonetheless."

"I believe what Tellrog meant to say was, there is something about you that made it possible for you to do what you do."

"Something about me?? What do you mean?" Satoshi was startled, his mind went directly toward the mysterious figure.

"For someone to utilize the power of the elements requires a great deal of comprehension and mental power, something that only those on the ranks of Master can do, you already know this."

"But that isn't always the case. There are also those that can manipulate certain elements despite not being of the Master rank. In most cases, this could be attributed to their natural affinity to certain elements. Mulah would be a good example of this."

Satoshi pondered and it made sense to him. Mulah, despite being an Elder, a rank equal to those of teachers, was able to attract the attention of Xinjia-kor's Imperial Descendants Hall of Research. The reason was mainly not because of his brilliant mind, but due to his natural affinity to metal-fire type of energy that enabled him to more easily manipulate certain elements with that properties.

"Despite the failure, you did manipulate five different elements from four different categories. We have never heard of any such type of affinity."

"That was beyond the realm of affinity. That was creative comprehension."

Satoshi looked at Sepphira confusingly, he didn't understand the implication of what she just said.

Sepphira knew that Satoshi wouldn't understand the gravity of what she just said. After all, this was way beyond his current level of understanding.

"It is something only those in the realm of Grand Master could do."

Satoshi instantly understood Tellrog's suggestion to keep things under wraps. If the world were to find out the there would be an uproar. Things would be different if Satoshi were to have a certain degree of personal power of influence that could work as leverage, but since that wasnt the case it would instead only invite troubles upon himself.

Thus it would be better to keep it a secret and tread carefully.

After the explanation, they decided that Satoshi would proceed with enchantment inscriptions as his applied studies subject. it was actually Unsui that suggested on the matter. Since he and Satoshi need to come up with some ways to alleviate the danger of using the hand wraps in the future anyway, Satoshi quickly agreed to the suggestion.

Another reason was due to Sepphira's insistence. She firmly insisted that Satoshi should not continue with the combat magic subject due to fear of further injuries.

With everything settled and agreed upon, the three teachers left Satoshi to allow him to rest. Tomorrow, they would resume the preparation, after all, there were only five days left before the trials would begin.

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