Ahrden visited the school a lot less often than the other students because he was allowed to pursue his class from home. Although he wasn't required to go to school every day, there were weekly visits he needed to attend where he would demonstrate the progress he had made to someone who knew absolutely nothing about the arcane arts. Ahrden did his best to get away with stretching out these weekly visits as much as he could, sometimes showing up only once a month.
When he did come to the school, he could get a glimpse of the average life that the students at his age had. At first, when he met the students in his year, the ones who were his friends before the Choosing greeted him, although quite reluctantly. They never stopped to talk to him, but at least they acknowledged his existence. Initially, the whole thing seemed a misunderstanding for them, and they were sure that one-day Ahrden would join the rogue class as he had previously told them he wanted to.
As time went on, these friends saw that nothing happened, but more importantly, Ahrden didn't want anything to happen. Rumours born from fear and not knowing started circulating regarding what he was doing at home, and everyone started getting out of his way when he came to the school. Ahrden didn't remember when was the last time he spoke to the ones who were once his friends or when someone came up to him to ask how has he been.
These visits became increasingly painful for him, something he needed to learn to cope with, until one day, he was confronted for the first time.
'Go back to your library, freak,' Deren, the warrior prodigy, said loud enough that everyone in the corridor could hear it.
Ahrden knew very well that he still needed to concentrate hard for most of his spells to work and that he had never tried to use them in a high pressure situation like a fight. He also knew that he was going to fight Deren, who counted as a deadly warrior by then.
What Ahrden could work with were the basic moves, where he directed the arcane energies in simple ways, but even that failed many times when he was practising it in his cosy study.
Finding himself on the edge of a circle made by students, Ahrden turned and looked over at Deren and saw that he too, was expecting him to not shy away from the fight. For the young warrior, the situation seemed ideal, and Ahrden was very much aware of that. He had the crowd around him, he was a student of a class that progressed the fastest in the early years, and he had already been titled as the best by many of his teachers. On the other hand, Ahrden was a student of a class that most doubted even existed, which he mostly learnt alone from home by reading books. While it was true that, unlike the other classes, the arcane arts had no upper limit when it came to becoming more powerful, it was just as important to know that at the beginning, by far this class had the slowest progression among any of the other ones.
The only thing Ahrden had on him was a thick and heavy tome he was bringing to his reoccurring meeting. He had finally decided to bring it with him after he could no longer bear to listen to the begging of the teacher he was going to meet with. The teacher was a potion-maker, a profession that they believed to be the closest to the arcane arts, something Ahrden agreed with. She kept asking him to bring a book he learnt his spells from so that she could have a glimpse of what he was doing. After refusing to comply for many months now, Ahrden finally decided to bring it with him, which was probably why he was called out that day.
Reaching out with the swiftly gathered arcane power and feeling the world around him was a complicated task on its own. The problem was that everyday objects had little ties to magic, so it was hard to locate them with the arcane senses. Being the beginner that he was, Ahrden was working on perfecting the technique, but he still had a long road ahead of him. On the other hand, the book was so saturated with potent magic that Ahrden could feel it pulsing through his senses.
Using a simple spell, Ahrden sealed the book's covers shut because he intended to use it in the fight. Given the nature of the situation and how foreign it was for Ahrden, he needed to rely on simple spells, and since he doubted that he could execute even those under pressure, he settled with using the one aid he had with him.
'Go back to the shadow of your family. That's where you belong, boy,' Ahrden replied after he had readied himself.
He knew that this was more than enough to seal the fate of their encounter, so he wasn't surprised when the fuming Deren started towards him. Ahrden reached out with his power and wrapped it around the tome, which he could feel with ease, unlike anything else around him. He lifted it next to his head so that the front would face the approaching warrior apprentice and let go of it.
Everyone's eyes went from the two of them to the leather-bound book when it kept on floating in the air. Gasps spread over the onlooking crowd, and Deren got so startled that he almost came to a stop.
Ahrden lifted his fist and prepared to strike his opponent with a punch that lacked all technique and precision. Deren instinctively turned his attention back towards him, and after seeing how, unskilled Ahrden was, he decided to let him try to hit him. Deren adjusted to block his attack while already preparing a counter-attack. Focusing on the incoming fist, the young warrior didn't see nor did he suspect that it was all just a decoy. Deren noticed it too late that the heavy tome flew past Ahrden's fist and hit him in the jaw before he could even react to it.
The tome hit the floor first and slid further behind Deren, who hit the ground a moment after it too. Recovering from the ambush, Deren rose to his knees with both hands still on the ground then got up to a standing position again. After a short battle cry, he charged at Ahrden with full speed now. Ahrden no longer hid his gestures which clearly belonged to a class no one had any experience with. He kept his nerves when he saw Deren charging at him in a straight line and gesture for the book to come to him, murmuring a short spell that drove even more power into the object.
When the book connected with the back of Deren's head, he went out cold before even hitting the floor. After he had tumbled to a pile on the ground, Ahrden walked over to where the book has landed and called it up to his hands. When he did, he walked back over the unmoving body of Deren then stopped.
This was the first time Ahrden had been in a real fight. His heart was beating fast, and his senses tunnelled on his foe, who was no longer a threat. With everything that was going on, he didn't hear the footsteps behind him, and when he turned to go where he was originally headed, he could barely register the fist that connected with the side of his face. The world went instantly black around him.
--
Ahrden was sitting in a small and uncomfortable chair positioned in front of the headmaster's vast desk with Miksten himself sitting behind it. After Ahrden blacked out, he didn't know what happened, but he woke up in the waiting room before the office with burses on one side of his face, which was slowly swelling as time went on. When he came around, he cleaned off the dried blood from the corner of his mouth and shortly after that, he was called in by Miksten.
'You were allowed to pursue this foolish dream of yours out of respect towards your father, yet you don't obey the weekly meetings, which is the one thing that was asked of you, and when you do come here, you make trouble by starting fights with the other honourable students. I cannot start to imagine how disappointed your father must be with you.'
'By disappointment, you mean how I beat your best student?'
'You beat him with a book!'
'If I had used what was inside the book, you would need to look for another best student.'
'You are a disgrace!' Miksten bellowed.
Silence settled on the room. Ahrden had never seen the otherwise composed headmaster yell the way he just had. Miksten who could make students shake from fear just by looking at them had no power over Ahrden as he strictly speaking wasn't his headmaster. Ahrden had no idea where he got the courage to speak to him like that, but it came naturally to him and felt right. He wasn't afraid, he was not frightened nor was he heated the way Miksten was. Ahrden was calm, measured and eagerly awaited what else would follow as if this whole thing was a game. Miksten's words were painful for him, but he understood where all of this was coming from and because of that, he could rise above it.
'I need you to stop pursuing this class. I'll do another favour for your family an unprecedented one and let you choose another class. A worthy one.'
Ahrden could not believe what he was hearing. His untouchable opponent was wounded and he couldn't help but take advantage of that.
'I'm powerful. More so than you can imagine.'
'You don't seem to understand how unparalleled it is for me to offer you a chance to correct the mistake you made on Choosing day. You'll choose another class.'
'You don't seem to understand me. And because of that. You fear me.'
'Silence!' Miksten shouted as he stood up from his chair while smashing his fists on the surface of the table. 'You are alone. You have always been, and you always will be. That is why you got beaten today, and that is why you will always be in the future.'
'The path I'm on is too hard for any of you to follow, but there is strength in standing alone. Soon I will be more powerful than any of you.'
'You are dispelled.'
'You can't do that before the Trials.'
'I'm the headmaster. I can do anything.'
'You are not above the law.'
'What do you know about the law.'
'I'm the one with the books, so you tell me.'
Silence fell on the office once again. This was the unquestionable domain of Miksten, the place where even the president of their nation could only ask but not demand. When Ahrden walked out through the door, which let every sound through like it wasn't even there, he was holding his head high, while the headmaster remained in a standing position with his face so red it was chilling. All who had gathered there after Ahrden had gone in could get a glimpse of the scene that they could only hear so far. The notion of the headmaster's unquestionable domain was shaken; its foundation was weakened.
Seeing the crowd waiting there, listening to everything that have been said, gave Ahrden an idea that he knew he should not act upon. Despite his instincts, he turned back towards the headmaster.
'I'll be back in a week. For my assigned progress check.'
With that, he walked through the narrow corridor that formed for him through the crowd as the core of the headmaster's authority was defaced.