423 Rebellion Against My Beautiful Father

This excursion — the first one that Mia was in charge of — had already turned troublesome. If all Mia had had to do was smoothen out some trivial issues and conflicts, then that would have been okay by her; however, the moment Modred returned from scouting, Mia realized that things were about to take a huge turn for the worse. 

The fairies had been right. There was a small group of undead creatures in the realm, albeit far away from where the group from Da Xue had set up camp.

"Is this realm a lich's hiding spot?" Mia frowned. "But Mr. Hope checked this place out before, didn't he? He encountered no problems!"

"Maybe he was not focused on the inspection; instead, he came here to screw around with another woman who is desperate to become my second mom. I can't believe he didn't spot these undead creatures when he was here. Just how much fun was he having back then, huh? Why is he even screwing around with other women? Is my mom not enough for him? Seriously?" Mordred grumbled; Her misguided assumptions made her visibly upset.[1]

The female students believed that Baiyi had a thing with the Warrior Walker, the Fairy Walker, and Lady Assassin Walker; after all, they had seen him behaving flirtatiously and intimately with these drop-dead gorgeous women a few times. This made these girls, as 'grown-ups', feel a plethora of emotions: they were all happy for him, relieved for themselves, and a bit sad about it. [2]

Mordred, on the other hand, had always made her grievance known.

Nevertheless, to these girls, Baiyi — who was their teacher, godfather, mentor, and principal — was an invincible hero. Although he was strict about their studies, good at handling a feather duster, really creepy when he was angry, adamant that they should not wear anything short, and always surrounded by a bevy of beautiful women — Mr. Hope was still flawless in their eyes. To them, he could never fail a spot check. 

Hence, to the girls, Baiyi did not spot the undead because he was distracted. When had they ever seen Mr. Hope get distracted, one might ask. Well, every time he was with either of those three insanely bewitching women — the Warrior Walker, the Fairy Walker, and the Assassin Walker.

At this point, the girls consoled themselves in the fact that the three women never showed up at the same time.

'Maybe Mordred's conjecture is not unreasonable, after all.' [3]

Mia was not in the mood to entertain Modred's absurd line of reasoning, though. Worried about the abrupt turn of events, she asked, "What should we do? Should we go home? Or, should we request backup from Da Xue?"

"No!" Mordred exclaimed before transforming into a tall woman. She looked down at Mia, gripped her shoulders, stared hard into her eyes and enunciated her reply slowly, "We. Kill. The. Lich. Ourselves. Okay?"

"H-huh?!" Mia was startled. "But it's a lich… Isn't it really dangerous?"

"Bah! Pfft!" Mordred waved her hands dismissively. "I checked. The undead here are not many, neither is any one of them as creepy as rumors make undead out to be. In fact, they seem super dumb, loitering around aimlessly, oblivious to the face that a large dragon was hovering over them. Why fear these enemies, who lack self-preservation? Besides, you have to remember that we aren't alone here; we have dragons, a fleet of magical marionettes, and an assembly of courageous students! Does that not look adequate enough to defeat a lowly lich?"

After giving it some thought, Mia found Modred's words a bit reasonable. However, she quickly dismissed the idea with a shake of her head. "The thing is, according to Da Xue's rules, should we ever run into highly dangerous beings, such as liches, we should flee immediately."

"Pft!" Mordred would not be swayed. "That's an old-fashioned rule made by our boss, an old fuddy-duddy. He always acts unnecessarily conservative, refraining from doing anything useful just because he is not, what, 100 percent sure of success. He treats us this way too, for crying out loud; even the temperature of the soup we eat has to be within the range he is okay with!"

"Isn't that a good thing? It shows that Mr. Hope really cares about our welfare," Mia said, defending Baiyi.

"Oh, no, no. This is not caring; it is smothering," Mordred replied, shaking her head. Between her, Mia, and the other girls, Modred was the youngest, yet, right now, she was acting as though she was the wisest. She looked down at Mia and ruffled her hair before saying, "We have grown up, Mia. We're no longer the young girls tailing him wherever he goes. There are some things we must do, on our own, in order to truly grow into adulthood. Only then will he finally see us as adults and not as kids."

"Um, Mr. Hope is five thousand years old; he considers everyone a kid," Mia replied weakly.

"I was not referring to age! I was referring to how he treats us," Mordred said, then to really persuade Mia, she doubled down, "Think about it; if we solve this small matter on our own, after which we continue on with the excursion and return as planned, there won't be anything for anyone to harp on! Don't you see? This is the first time we are leading an excursion. If we flee just because we encountered a teensy-weensy problem, what would Papa think of us? What do you think our sisters would say about us? What do you think the students would say about us?"

If Mia was not won over at this point, it would be a surprise. After all, the other girls still saw her as the 'youngest and most inexperienced sister', and they were not wrong. However, this hurt Mia's ego more than she would admit. She was a Legendary-level sorcerer, was she not? Even if this did not mean much at Da Xue — a place filled with geniuses and powerful experts — it was a big deal in the community at large. She was, by herself, a force to be reckoned with! 

Instantly retreating because of a small situation was ill-fitting for someone of her status, was it not? Even if she did forego that thought and retreat, Da Xue would still need to expel the lich from this micro realm, which could be considered one of its training grounds. If the enemy was just a lich, why could she not just deal with it herself? This situation would help tamper the students under her care and save her sisters, and other professors, the effort of dealing with the lich themselves. 

When Mordred saw Mia's expression changed, she pushed harder. "I know you're worried, but do you honestly think the two of us aren't enough to beat up a stupid little lich? Don't you want to open that storage pouch of yours and use the scrolls and other stuff in it? Even if we lose the fight, we are capable of fleeing; we would only have to endure a few taunts if that happened. If worse comes to worst, we would only have to suffer a beating from papa. So what? I'm getting better at my transformations now, and I'll be able to secretly cover my hands, back, and butt with draconic scales; by then, those feather dusters will be nothing to me!"

"To you! It'll definitely still be something to me!" Mia laughed, trying to hide her worry. 

"You have even less to be afraid of! I'll give you some of my draconic scales, to shield your skin from the blows. However, you'll still have to act as though you are really, really hurt; cry harder and wail louder to make it convincing. He's bound to soften up after seeing you like that, and he'll do his best to mollify you," Mordred said. "I mean, you're his 'precious baby'! Do you really think that he's going to be as hard on you as he is on us?"

"B-but, I thought that smart and docile girls, like Big Sister Dale and Nota, are his favorites. If not, then maybe girls who are competent at whatever tasks he delegates to them, like Vidomina. As for me, well..." Mia lowered her head, losing her confidence. [4].

Mia could not see the look of envy that Mordred had directed at her. 'If only Papa could love me the way he loves you, then Mom… Mom would not have to cry so much...'

Afterward, Mia agreed, and the pair decided to obliterate the Lich and continue the excursion — something their sisters would not have expected from Mia. 

In Duat, Baiyi had no idea that the troublesome brat, Mordred, had goaded his favorite daughter, Mia, into doing something she knew that he would not want her doing. If he ever found out, he would need more than his basement full of the feather dusters to deal with her! 

Amongst the girls, Mordred was the most immature, and she was a dragon! Not just any dragon, though; she was a descendant of the Third Voidwalker! Baiyi did not want to call someone else's kid his own [5].

The Voidwalkers were hidden by a barren hill littered with black boulders, watching the black castle on the horizon. Suddenly, Baiyi said, "Say, do you think Mia and Mordred have encountered any trouble?"

"You have been worried about that?" The Blacksmith Walker, who was cleaning out his weapons, asked. "What is there to be worried about? They have all grown up into strong existences. Furthermore, they are adventuring in a safe environment; it's almost no different from sightseeing. Man, I really think you're smothering them. Back when my own children were as old as these girls are, they were already… already…"

The Blacksmith Walker trailed off at this point, lost in the memories he had of his wife and children, who had all died tragically. In his silence, an expression of pain appeared on his face, and after a while, he muttered, "M-maybe… If I still have my children with me, I might dote on them even more than you do these girls…"

Unwilling to let the atmosphere become all doom and gloom, Baiyi hurriedly changed the topic. "It's not that I worry for their safety; I know that the girls can protect themselves well enough. I'm just worried about the students in their care. Before today, both girls have yet to lead an excursion, but, by some miracle, they were paired together... somehow. Don't you find this dangerously similar to a recipe for chaos?"

"What chaos? You speak as though they were going to be pursued by a horde of undead creatures," The Lich Walker replied, chuckling. "Your youngest daughter, Mia, is a Legendary-ranked sorcerer, equipped with state-of-the-art gears; do you really think all that is not enough to help her to take care of a few students? We have yet to talk about that dragon, you know — the one with the blood of the Divine Dragon rushing through her veins."

"Oh, great; thanks for bringing up the source of my headache. Here's the thing about Mordred: it doesn't matter how 'obedient' she acts; she is a dragon. Her primal instincts will not let her stay put for too long. Even Aya and I have — eh, let's just say — problems bringing her up. We often try to control her, teaching her to suppress her urges, but can one really suppress their nature?

"I'm worried that it will blow up in our face one day. I dread the day Mordred reaches that stage in puberty where she rebels against everything adults say," Baiyi explained. "I can only hope that when that time comes, we can handle it well, without making any major sacrifices. Please, Mordred, don't you pull off thatfor visiting.

"Good. It seems they took my bait." Baiyi smirked. "Now, our target is at its weakest. Time to move out."

The reason why they could stay there without being discovered was because of the Assassin Walker, who had used her skills to perfectly mask their tracks and scents. Furthermore, Baiyi had used one of the Charlatan Walker's illusion spells on the undead that the Lich Walker had stolen earlier, making the undead take the form of the Voidwalkers themselves. The Scholar Walker finished the job by marking the decoy undead with the aura of the living, fooling the enemy into chasing after them with the strongest force. Now, the castle was at its weakest. 

There were a few reasons why they had chosen not to butt heads with the undead army. First, it was troublesome. Second, they may have ended up fighting a war of attrition. Third, they were worried that something unexpected may happen should they waste too much time. Hence, they decided that infiltrating the black castle was the most efficient way to achieve their objective. 

"Stay vigilant while we're in there. Our enemy possesses a certain power over the Laws of Space," Baiyi said to the Voidwalkers. 

"You know," he added, "Is it me, or are the undead a lot fewer in number than expected? Is this just an illusion, or was our estimation wrong?"

Nobody could answer him, not even the Lich Walker. The possibilities were too many to count, to begin with. Moreover, undead creatures were better at hiding and covering their tracks than humans. They could be hiding under the ground or behind the door. 

The undead were just really good at hiding, period.

"We need to prepare for an ambush; if that happens, I'll instantly begin using forbidden spells to clear the way. Please, know not to get caught in the crossfire," Baiyi said. "After the forbidden spell bombardment, the Scholar Walker, Blacksmith Walker, and Hitman Walker will help us push back any enemy reinforcements. The Assassin Walker, Lich Walker, and I will go straight for the boss. Any questions?"

No one had any questions as the plan was simple. They were just worried that the answers they sought may not be in the black castle. 

In the black castle's great hall, a vampire stood facing the Grandruler. This vampire had on a red robe, and its fangs were visible beneath its upper lip. "Your Majesty, Galthran and Charnal have also led their respective armies away. Those that remain may be inadequate to defend the castle should the enemy suddenly attack. Your Majesty, shall we—"

"That is unnecessary," replied the Grandruler, who looked confident, cutting the Vampire off. "If they dare to come to us, I will make them rue that decision." As said before, Mordred here is really 60% copy-pasted from the character "Saber of Red" from Type-Moon's Fate series, except here she's a dragon and her mom is Aya rather than Morgan le Fay. "Rebellion Against My Beautiful Father" is her Noble Phantasm in the series, 'cause she ultimately rebelled against her own "father"…