It had been hours now, perhaps a day since Malik had come to the Academy, and he was already hard at work.
The Shams beat down on a long and wide flat bed of stone atop a massive hill.
Old training dummies, inscribed with runes all over, half-rotted from time and overuse, littered the edges of this platform.
Grass, ever present in this land, poked through the cracks, and birds nested in the surrounding watchtowers.
It was apparent that nobody had touched this place in decades, preferring other less physical methods of teaching.
Well, that was going to end now.
Malik, without any introductions, had dragged them all here.
His eyes scanned them.
And they paused only on three.
For only them he bothered to remember.
Noor, surprisingly the same dancer he saw yesterday, an abandoned heiress to the Al-Ayan throne, was now elbow-deep in dirt, pulling thorny vines from the base of a rusted weapon rack.
Roya, or so she called herself, the same girl who laid into him yesterday, was now muttering curses under her breath as she scraped dried blood off the floor with a dull blade.
And Zafar, the real Stranger, who looked like he was about to vomit from just lifting a crate.
He groaned for the third time since this began, tripping over a bucket of dirty water.
"I didn’t come here to be a slave. This is a joke."
Malik stared at them and said nothing.
He was just standing there. Arms crossed, black cloak fluttering slightly in the breeze, that same blank look on his face.
Roya hissed at him, spinning around.
"Say something. You brought us up here for what, punishment? You think this makes you a professor?"
Malik glanced at her... then turned his gaze back toward the center of the platform like she hadn’t even spoken.
"Ugh, he’s annoying."
She returned to her work with a glare that could burn a hole through stone.
Noor glanced at Roya, not buying her bratty act, then back at Zafar, who was now sitting against a tree like he’d just run to the South and back.
"You know... maybe he’s waiting for us to figure it out."
Zafar barked, and Malik took a step forward.
One step. One thump of his Spine Splitter.
And everyone shut up immediately.
"I took up the library yesterday... I now know everything there is to know about this land."
No one interrupted, wanting to know what he was getting at.
"But there was one thing it didn’t mention."
They held their breath.
"It once trained a Sultanslayer."
With revelation, Malik paused his words and then pointed to the center of the platform, an arena.
"You want a lesson? Fight me."
Nobody moved for a second. And another, and another, and another, until Roya tossed her cleaning rag to the ground, her lip curling up.
She stepped up, blades flashing into her hands, glinting under the Shams.
Roya didn’t wait for some kind of signal; she almost immediately vanished into the shadow of the watchtower behind her, melting into it like water, and swam towards him.
Malik glanced at the moving shadow and raised his free hand.
With a snap of his fingers—
Fire erupted from his hand, high and strong.
It swallowed the entire area in light, killing Roya’s shadow.
She was forced out at once, and before she could even process that, Malik was already upon her.
His sheathed sword went forth, crashing into her side.
Her entire being twisted into itself as she was launched into the arena, landing in a roll, coughing up blood, a few bones broken from the attack.
Still, she managed to get back on her feet and face him, her demeanor no longer emotional.
She was as cold as a woman could ever be.
It appeared that Malik wasn’t the only one who did his homework.
By now, she likely knew all about him and knew that everything she said did nothing more than embarrass her and make her stand out as suspicious.
But she didn’t care for that.
She didn’t care that he was a major come-up, a Magi who was sung about in songs, who built everything he had with his own hands and blood.
She cared that he had come here for revenge.
It was obvious for someone who bothered to know all the facts.
Sure, his father sacrificed his life to save him, and he killed his own, but both had Al-Ayan involved, and these involvements weren’t exactly aboveboard.
So, she likely had it guaranteed that Malik came here for revenge.
And yet, her anger remained directed towards him.
Well, it was because her bullshit about him not being worthy was just a front... a front that she didn’t care to keep up any longer as she stabbed her left dagger at Malik’s flame.
Remnants of shadow formed beneath that flame and shot up in the form of a spike.
A moment later, the spike splattered into shadow around the flame, trying to smother it.
Roya concentrated all her Aether on that attack, fighting hard to extinguish his flame.
Their Divine Rank difference was too high.
His control was too good, his Aether too dense; no way she could snuff out his Hell.
But, fortunately for her, she didn’t need to.
Malik waved his flame away and stepped forward.
In that one step, he was already before her, staring her down.
He had all the time to attack but didn’t.
It seemed that she had caught his interest, or at least, her actions did, and for that, he planned to be a bit lenient.
Taking him up on that offer, she came at him, lunging for his throat.
He leaned back, and the steel missed flesh by an inch.
Another attack came; it missed, then another, and another, and another, and another, and another.
Malik was barely moving, yet she was simply unable to track him.
She didn’t bother attacking with her shadows again, knowing that he could instantly shut her down, so she kept doing the only thing she could, lunging once again.
This time, her blade sliced from the side.
Malik ducked and flicked a finger.
A spark of flame hit the stone near her foot—not to burn her, just to throw off her rhythm, and it did.
She stumbled, barely catching herself from falling... looking quite pathetic while doing so.
Malik looked down at her, not attacking despite the open window.
His eyes turned to Noor, Zafar, and the rest.