Chapter 69: In a dark and gloomy place...

"Oh, am not leaving yet. I am not done with what I want to say. It's true I told you then to give me either the boy or the treasure, that you would forsake one. Actually, what I wanted was the boy." Micah said.

"Oh. You want the boy? Well, am sorry about that. I can't give him to you. You laid out your options and I went for the boy. Now what's the problem again? Why are you so unworthy to have a deal with? You are so fickle you capricious bastard" Jennifer said with a hint of anger in her voice.

"You can curse me all you want, I don't care, I just want the boy." Micah said with a raised voice.

"And if I don't surrender him to you?" Jennifer asked.

"You wouldn't want that. I discovered a special characteristic about the boy and I have reported about this to someone. Surrender the boy or this person is going to harm you" Micah said in a threatening tone.

"Oh. What bastard is going to come into the school and harm me? What courageous fool would come into an academy where there are more than twenty instructors in the saint emperor stage? I would love to see such a person and applaud him or her for their unparalleled stupidity" Jennifer said.

Micah smiled.

"You don't know what you are getting yourself into" he said.

"Neither do you. Now can you leave my office!" Jennifer barked at him.

Micah eyes turned evil.

He nodded his head with a smile on his face and left.

- Evening -

At a dark and gloomy place...

"So did she surrender the boy?" An elderly man with a closed eyes asked.

Ripples of power could be seen emanating from him. It caused the air to tremble.

"She didn't. Instead she gave up the treasure." Micah said.

"She did? She gave up the treasure of a sage stage-expert just for a boy" The man asked as his eyes snapped open.

The instant they opened, the eyes glowed brilliantly and rays of power shot off it into a wall.

Bang!

The walls exploded into smithereens.

Only someone in the grand saint emperor realm would be able to do this. Would be able to project beams of energy of their eyes.

It was an ability everyone from the grand saint emperor realm and above can deploy.

"Yes." Micah replied.

The man entered into a deep thought for a second.

In that second, he had thought of a thousand things.

All that he thought of merged into one conclusion.

That a powerful anciently treasure must have merged with Alex's body.

And the only way to retrieve it was to cut him up and bring out that treasure.

Just if he could have that treasure, he would become extremely powerful in the state.

He believed it was far better than the treasures of a sage-stage expert. Such treasures must be treasures forged by primeval godly treasure-forgers.

That would beat everything a sage-stage expert could have.

When it gets to his hand, he believed he would be able to unleash more power through it.

Why he arrived at all these was because no matter how he thought about it, from vastly different perspectives, a mid-phase entry stage-cultivator should be hopeless and powerless before a saint emperor stage-expert.

But this boy could destroy a link between himself and such an expert.

He vowed to get the treasure for he had a great plan.

He looked at Micah. Then he asked "Has she discovered anything peculiar about the boy?"

"Probably. Or maybe she just want to protect him" Micah said with uncertainty in his voice.

"She just want to protect him? I would see how far she would go about that. Micah, I will take it up from here" He said.

Micah nodded and flew away.

- Next day -

Knock!

Someone knocked on Jennifer's office door.

Come in!

A beautiful female voice sounded from within.

Then Micah came in.

Jennifer looked at him and asked "What are you here for again?"

"Nothing. I just came to return the one piece of the key to the vault's door I have with me" Micah said.

Then the piece appeared in front of him and floated towards Jennifer by applying his telekinetic power.

Jennifer was surprised.

"What's going on?" she thought inwardly. Then she grabbed hold of the piece and stowed it into her interspatial ring.

Then Micah left her office.

Jennifer began to wonder. "Hmm. Something fishy is definitely on. I have to be careful"

Anyways, she was glad Micah returned the last piece with him.

.......

A week went by peacefully.

Everyone in the academy were morose when they heard that the battle between the most prettiest boy in the school and John had been canceled.

The boys became unhappy at this development. They wanted John to tear his face away.

The girls too were sad. They wanted to see the prettiest boy in their school in action. They wanted to see more of him.

Since the battle had been canceled and Micah seemed to turn a gentle and amiable soul, he and Jake resumed classes.

On a certain day, he and Elena went to the weapon forging palace.

It was an extremely large palace that comprised of seven huge halls. Six of these halls were for different grades of forging and the seventh was a very large hall were all the apprentice met.

The grades of forging were from class-1 treasure forging to class-6 treasure forging.

These grades corresponds to the entry stage up to the saint stage.

In there, he met a lot of people in uniforms. Some in red, some in yellow and the others in violet.

He knew who these were. They were apprentices who had different levels of ability in forging.

He exchanged greetings with the ones he met on the way.

Then he left for the room were they would be teaching on forging for the entry-level.

In the hall...

Alex was seated amongst the other apprentice in here. He saw many of the student in his class here.

"So these guys take forging too?" he asked inwardly in a surprised tone.

At the front beside a large white board could be seen a man. He was the same instructor that taught Alex and the others weaponmaking in the class.

He was telling them how to forge treasures.

"Forging of treasures is split into eight stages. First, selection of materials. Second, the melting of the materials. Third, molding. Fourth, cooling. Sixth, refining. Seventh, remolding and eight cooling." he said.

Then he took a pause allowing the student jot down a thing or two into their notebooks.

Then he continued "What do I mean by selection of materials? This is selecting the material required to make a treasure. For example, if you want to forge a lightning sword, what material would you use?" he asked facing the students.

No one could respond. They were only looking at the instructor to give the answer.

He looked around to see if anyone raised their hand to answer the question. But he saw no one.

As he scanned, he saw Alex. Then he gave a smile.

He said "If you know the answer to the question, spit it out"

Alex nodded. Then he said "Electreumium metal. They are excellent lightning metallic materials that can be used to forge lightning-ability weapons" he replied.

"Good" the man said. Then he carried on with his lecture.

At first, Alex wanted to behave like he didn't know the answer. But since he was told to answer the question if he knows it, then he will.

The instructor taught for three hours before he left. Same with the other instructors.

Today was delivery of long, in-depth lectures on forging.

When Alex came out, he saw Elena leaning on a wall.

"Hey. How was lectures?" she asked.

"I enjoyed it. You?" he asked.

"Of course I did" she replied with a smile.

"So thought of registering as an apprentice yet?" She asked.

"Yea. Take me to the apprenticeship registration room" Alex said.

Then she took him there.