Chapter 23: The Appraisal Ceremony Ends

Lucius's interest was finally peaked by this and he paid great attention to the baby. Unlike the other babies, this one seemed to be much calmer and also seemed to have a healthy skin. It was evident that it was properly being cared for.

He also heard the name 'Great warrior Delia' which made him realized that this may have been an inherited gift perhaps, but without more information, there was little he could think of further.

It was now that Kiana stood up from the bench.

"Guards! They are to be protected and more squads are to be called in." Kiana ordered.

The public seemed a bit anxious after hearing her words and wondered if everything was fine. John and Alessa had a similar reaction but then calmed down after seeing the smile on Kiana's face.

"Congratulations! The lord will be extremely happy upon hearing the gift of your child. Baby Cia will be a great warrior one day." Kiana stated.

Alessa had a pleased expression on her face after hearing her words and John took a breath of relief.

"You do not need to go back to the army anymore Lieutenant John, I'm pretty sure the lord would rather have you close by. After all, your daughter will one day be a great person." Kiana said with a wink.

The two parents had a short discussion with Kiana while a guard went back to the mansion to call for the squads. About ten minutes later, fifteen guards were present at the hall and the security was greatly increased.

"Come sit with us, I'm sure lord Asher would like to meet you too." Kiana invited.

Asher blinked his eyes in agreement as he truly wanted to gain more information. He also wanted to know what the gifts of these two parents could be so he could derive a hypothesis.

"Ah, this is lord Asher? Forgive my rudeness… I didn't recognize you." John said.

Asher blinked again to show his acknowledgment, and Kiana translated for him.

"Lord Asher appreciates it and is fine with it. He is currently still unwell and is thus unable to speak. But he should be fine soon, once the priest of Alana comes here." Kiana replied.

"Priest of Alana? Oh wait, before coming here I got a report that one of them was on the way." John said.

"Really?" Kiana asked and even Lucius looked on intently.

"Yes, it came from one of my subordinates thus I can confirm its true. It was in a personal letter, thus it is likely that you will be getting a formal letter soon enough. But according to his words, the priest should be here in a day or two." John answered.

"That would be great! Once lord Asher is healed, things would be back to good. Thank you for the information Lieutenant John, I'm sure madam Lita would be very appreciative of it. Perhaps you all should wait for the dinner tonight." Kiana proposed.

Lucius was getting to learn more things about Kiana now.

'So she has a certain level of authority too. Able to command guards like that and even a lieutenant while also inviting them for dinner… Hmm… what is her true identity? There is no way she can be a common servant maid.' Lucius thought.

"We would like that too, miss Kiana," Alessa replied and John nodded in agreement.

They then went silent as Priest Maleck called in the next child. This time it was a boy that looked to be of five years of age. The boy seemed to be excited and kept on playing with his hands.

Maleck looked at the boy, and a smile appeared on his face.

"Oh already playing with your gift, very good." He said.

"Yes, priest Maleck. He awakened the gift a week ago and since then hasn't stopped. We know it is a wind type gift but still want to know its name." The parents of the child spoke.

"Ah… I see. So he had a partial awakening and hasn't learned of the name on his own." Maleck said.

"Yes." The response.

"Well, that is still very impressive. Come on place your hand here and I'll determine." He instructed.

The boy curiously looked at the floating sphere before placing his hand on it. Then almost instantly it started glowing in a yellow light, showing that it was a rare rank gift.

"The gift that your child has is… Far Caller." Maleck announced.

"Far caller? But his ability seems to be different?" the father of the boy asked.

"Far callers are able to direct the wind to assist in long distance communications. While they can also manipulate the wind as he is doing right now, it cannot be raised to the point of being used as an offensive skill." Priest Maleck explained.

"Ah! I understand now, priest Maleck." The parents said before letting the next couple came forward.

Lucius watched on as one by one, more children got appraised. There were a few rare ranked gifts, but he soon learned that they were the bare minority. After about nine rare gifts, no more of them appeared and the rest were just uncommon and common ranked gifts.

'So the common ranked gifts give out a while light, while the uncommon ones give out green light. Wonder what color light the legendary gifts give out.' Lucius thought.

About two hours passed before the entire appraisal ceremony was finished. The commoners were the first ones to leave the hall as they made way for the carriage that was coming for Lucius and the others.

"So where do you want to go now, Asher? The market, the lake, or the Artificers guild?" Kiana questioned.

Lucius blinked thrice to show his response.

"Ah, so the artificers guild it is then. We will complete our errand first then." Kiana said.

They were about to climb into the carriage and head their way when a guard came galloping towards them. He was already shouting from afar and telling them something.

"Lord Asher, Miss Kiana, the madam has called you back to the mansion urgently." The messenger guard said.

"Why?" Kiana simply questioned.

"The priest has arrived!"