William sat his eyes over the few who attracted his attention from that battle.
"Not all of them of course," William rolled his eyes, and that made his face look a bit funny, "I want to meet with Kong, Lang, and Claine," William mentioned the three who caught his attention the most.
Kong left a deep impression on him, especially after learning the hammer technique. William liked this kid, and wanted to rope him in.
As for Lang, he was in the same class as him. And he was someone who left a good impression long before that battle.
Claine might have picked on the bad side of William for a long time, but that also spoke about how direct and daring this kid was.
Even though William felt some of Claine's stances and actions were a little forced a few times, even making William suspect he worked under the words of someone else, Claine still left a good impression as well.
Spirit masters weren't supposed to be docile or easy going dudes. In fact, most of William's past life friends came from clashing against them first before ending up being his friends or followers.
Lang and Kong held one more advantage than Claine in William's mind. The two were considered little leaders in their circle of the same age peers. And that meant if he managed to rope them to his side, he'd end up having more pool of talents to select from.
William thought about recruiting spirit masters from the academy. But when he thought about the high number of traitors there, he decided to wait a bit longer, keep watching others, before making any move to recruit any.
Yet he didn't need to do any of that with the kids who fought by his side and showed their true essence in the direst situations.
"These three?" When the old patriarch heard the three names, he could guess parts of what William had in mind. And for a moment, he felt like William was trying to do something that didn't follow his plans.
He wanted to recruit William and rope him to his side, but he felt like the latter was trying to do the opposite.
He gave William a deeper glance, feeling like he wasn't sitting with an eight years old kid, but someone on the same level of power and experience as him.
"Is meeting them a problem?"
"No," the old patriarch could only push aside such thoughts, deciding to wait a bit longer and let time expose the real intentions of William, "but they are required to rebuild the clan, just like others. So…"
William got what the old man wanted to say. It was a rejection, a sort of rejection that would prevent him from meeting the three right now.
"Sure, I can wait," William said this while the smile on his face told the old Kong something different.
It was as if William was telling him this: You can protect them from me as long as they are inside your clan. But they won't stay there forever and will eventually come back to the academy. By then, they'll be mine!
"They won't stay here for long, so you can meet up with them back at the academy," and in response to William's smile, old Kong also showed a similar one on his face.
It was as if he was saying to William: If you get the ability, let's see how you'll take my kids away from me!
"As for returning back to the academy," the two kept the weird smiles on their faces for a long minute before the old patriarch added, "you will return back with an elder."
The old patriarch paused when William gave him a weird look, "Ahem, we have matters to discuss at the academy and people to thank."
"Sure," William knew this was all bullshit. He knew that the old man would send this elder to just keep him and Berry safe. But from the weird look on the old patriarch's face, William felt there was something else behind doing this.
He might even go beyond that, letting that elder remain back at the academy to watch his actions there twenty-four seven. That was what William thought about at this moment.
William just prayed inside it wouldn't turn out to be Berry's father. 'That dude isn't that free, right?' he thought to himself when the old patriarch added:
"Go and prepare then. You'll all leave in two hours," the old man didn't want to see him again for quite some time.
Even if he got tons of questions for William, he decided to just keep them to himself for now. He'd wait and watch this troublesome kid from far without William realising it. And by time when this issue of cores would be forgotten by this kid, he'd return again with his questions.
As the meeting was over, William moved back to the back room section. The old patriarch gave him two hours to get ready, but he knew he got nothing to prepare before leaving.
"Humph! Did he think he could get rid of me this easily?" William knew the issue of delivering the monster cores would be solved by the elder that old fox decided to send with him. And that wasn't what bothered him.
These two hours were too little for him to do anything here before leaving. The old man wanted to prevent him from meeting any of the kids he sought to meet.
"Two hours… Not that long to take a tour around," William returned to the corridor to find Lina standing with Tina while Berry was gone.
"Where is Berry?" This was the first thing that jumped in his mind. After the last encounter with her father, it was easy to guess what happened to her.
"She was asked to leave by her father's orders," Lina said in a weird tone before adding, "are you alright? Is everything ok?"
"Sure," William realised that the last thing Lina saw was the crazy chase between that enraged father and him, "prepare to leave in two hours."