Chapter 153 - Esna Wood, Potential Academy Student

"Lemme get something straight, so you want me, to go with you, to a school filled with devils and many other races, where 14 year olds being stage 5 hunters is apparently a normal thing."

"Not exactly normal but yeah, by the way, what's stage 5?"

"That's where you currently are.

I don't know how you guys rank your strengths but we use stages over here.

Each stage has three levels, lower, mid and upper."

Arthur pondered on Esna's words about the way strength was ranked in her world. It was similar to the existence level/realm method that Arthur was familiar with.

'If bronze realms are stage 1s, then silvers would be stage 2s, golds, stage 3s, masters would be stage 4s and grandmasters would be stage 5.

It checks out well.'

"What stage are you?"

"Can't you already tell? I'm a lower level stage 4."

Esna answered while raising an eyebrow, hearing her, Arthur confirmed his thoughts to be correct. After all, Esna appeared to be an inferior stage master to Arthur.

"How are you a stage 5 already, I barely got to stage 4 after my dad got hundreds of monster cores and  other strength enhancing resources for me.

And I've been using them for as far as I can remember."

She glared at him with a jealousy filled gaze as she thought about how their levels were so far apart even though they were only just a year apart in age.

"Anyway, about my proposal for you, what do you think?"

Arthur changed the topic back to the suggestion he made to her a few minutes ago.

He asked her to follow him back to Kreiz and be enrolled in the academy as a second year student. He had many reasons for this.

One of which, was simply to keep a member of his race closer to him.

Another was to run various tests on her to discover the similarities between the both of them. 

'I don't know if she has that negative energy that is literally the bane of divinity or its jut something unique to me, I also want to see what happens when she faces a hostile half god.

I awakened my authority when I faced the Valkyrie, I wonder what would happen when she does.

She would definitely not awaken an authority but she may gain some other unique god slaying ability.

Good thing that Lewis' cousins made him keep some of Jarox's kids alive. He killed all the Valkyries though.'

To Arthur's suggestion, Esna naturally wanted to disagree. She had lived on her home world all her life, being told to suddenly leave was not something she would normally agree to.

However, she remembered the scene of Lute holding down her father who she believed to be the strongest person ever.

This made her to think about the possibility of Arthur threatening her with her father's or her friends lives.

She also remembered Arthur stating that there were about a dozen people on the space craft on her father's level.

As the daughter of the strongest stage 9 hunter in the world, she knew just how strong stage 9s were and how much destruction they could cause.

This made her think of the possibility of Arthur ordering the other stage 9s/ transcendents with him to wreak havoc in her world if she refused to go with him.

Seeing her hesitation to reply, Arthur began thinking of ways to convince her to go with him. Unlike what she feared, he did not intend to threaten her in any way.

"Aha! That other world that has been sending monsters your way, I can get Lute to wipe it out.

There would not be monsters anymore and there would be peace in your world. It's a good bargain right."

Arthur decided to appeal to her with the safety of her world, he was sure she would definitely agree to go with him if he said this.

Hearing what he said, Esna felt that it was not a bad idea. She did not fully know why Arthur wanted her to go with him, but she could guess that it was probably to figure out what sort of special abilities she may possess, being a member of his race.

'Besides my high magic capacity and my 'Memory Palace', I don't think I have any other skills but who knows?'

While she was thinking this, Arthur had called Lute back into the room and was telling the latter about his plans.

Hearing his idea to get rid of the sources of the monsters, Lute placed a hand on his chin and thought about it for a minute before replying.

"It may seem like a good idea now but not so much in the long run.

This world was once a normal world, however that was thousands of years ago. The current world runs on this monster hunting system, most of the sources of income of its inhabitants are because of the fact that these monsters exist.

Suddenly taking it away would cause major economy crashes in not one but all of the nations of this world.

A lot of people would also be suddenly rendered jobless and this would lead to increased crime rates and other potential drawbacks.

The jobless people with powers and abilities would become the new monsters that terrorize this world.

As such, i believe it is not a good idea."

Arthur and Esna had their mouths wide open in surprise at Lute's analysis. Esna, due to her surprise at how bad things could get just from her intention of destroying the source of monsters that terrorize her world.

As for Arthur-

"Lute, can the contract you have with my mum be nullified? I really want you as my secretary now."

-He was trying to poach his mother's subordinate.

"Unfortunately, your highness, soul contracts cannot be nullified so easily."

"Tsk..."

Lute chuckled lightly seeing Arthur click his tongue.

'It seems the incident from earlier is off his mind now.'

Having spent a lot of time with Arthur, he knew fully well how much his ego would be hurt after being suppressed so easily by another being.

One who wasn't even on the level of the beings he was fated to battle with in the future, as such, seeing Arthur joke around made him feel relieved.

"Anyway, what do you suggest we do?"

Arthur's question brought Lute out of his sea of thoughts. He pondered on it for a few moments before replying.

"If you want to take out the source of the monsters, it should be a gradual process that would take centuries to complete with the least side effects.

Right now, the best you can do is to limit the amount of monsters that get sent through and prevent that other world from attempting to conquer this one like they have in the past."

Pointing to Esna, he continued.

"Her father said that when he went over there, the denizens of that one proclaimed their intention to use the monsters to reduce the population of this one so as to make their conquest easier."

Esna had her mouth open in surprise once more, as she never expected that to be the reality of things. Arthur on the other hand, attempted to poach his mother's subordinate again.

"Lute, can you make two soul contracts of the same nature?"

"Such action would be unwise as the load on the soul of the subservient one in the contract would increase.

Although I can take it, I'd rather not."

"Tsk..."

Once again, Arthur failed and clicked his tongue in annoyance causing Esna to stare at him with a questioning look on her face.

◇　◇　◇

Arthur called Esna's father into the room and told him about his plans after her agreement to follow him. She was also curious about the rest of the universe and the things that existed within.

Naturally, Esna's father, Richard, objected to this, however the glares he received from a certain group of transcendents made him have second thoughts.

Hearing Lute talk about testing out a new large-scale spell while looking towards his world changed his mind instantly.

'She'd be safer over there than here with me, yes, she definitely will.'

He repeated that thought to himself as if trying to convince himself that was the real reason he was letting her go, not because he was threatened.

All in all, he couldn't object much after Esna willingly agreed to go with Arthur. 

"Well, that's taken care of."

Arthur held out a hand towards Esna for a handshake as a sign of agreement. Noticing this, she obliged and shook his hand.

However, the moment she did, something happened.

The law of time that had not shown Arthur any strange visions of possible futures since the last lucid dream acted up.

"Huh?"

Lute, who noticed the change in ambient law essences, turned towards Arthur in surprise. Tasha and the other transcendents also looked at him with questioning looks on their faces, wondering what he intended to do.

As for Arthur himself, he was currently experiencing something that felt familiar and unfamiliar at the same time.