Renewal

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As Guiche started pulling Montmorancy away from the group of tables, the other nobles started rising from their tables, chuckling and nudging one another as if they were watching prime entertainment. However, none of them were saying anything about the peasant - they were all saying "Guiche" this and "Guiche" that, and occasionally, "Poor Montmorancy" or something of the kind. The blonde-haired gentleman continued trying to walk away from the crowd, but as the peasant continued excitedly shouting words, the brown-haired girl's eyes followed those of the crowd and quickly found Guiche. "Lord Guiche! There you are!" she exclaimed, entirely ignoring the peasant as she quickly walked straight over to Guiche.

As the brown-haired girl approached Guiche, he looked over at her in shock and absentmindedly stated, "Oh, Katie!" Then, as if reflexively, he twirled, removing his hand from that of Montmorancy(who stared at him in shock, trying to figure out what was going on) as he cleared his throat and mumbled "ahhahah..." as he adopted a brilliantly confident demeanor. As Katie approached, Montmorancy leaned in closer to him, staring at his facial expression as he lifted his left hand to scratch the side of his head, flustered. As she stopped in front of him, he calmly greeted her, saying, "Uh, hi!" The commoner in the background continued speaking, but the three of them were all too heavily focused on one another to comprehend his words. As Katie started to speak to Guiche, "I've been looking for you, Lord Guiche!" Montmorancy's surprise vanished, replaced with suspicion as she murmured an accusatory, "Hrm..." while watching Guiche's friendliness with the "Katie" girl.

"I brought my homemade souffle to the tea party, you know, the one you and I talked about last night," she commented, holding up a closed picnic basket with an innocent smile. Guiche felt daggers from Montmorancy's evil eye and stumbled a bit in his confidence, murmuring, "Oh...well um...that's very-"

"Last Night?" Montmorancy hissed, glaring at him angrily.

"Ah, well, you see, what I meant was-" But at this point, the peasant's words about him cheating were heard much louder than his own, causing him to become even more flustered as he retreated slightly, still trying to recover from his situation as he grimaced and let out a short, "Gah..." in his frustration.

"Guiche! What is the meaning of this!?" Montmorancy growled, the venom in her voice starting to fowl the innocent expression on Katie as she too started to frown at him.

"I don't know what you've been babbling on about, peasant, but you're going to create a needless misunderstanding with these ladies" he declared, eloquently sweeping his hand to gesture condescendingly at Yves's familiar. By the time he said this, nearly everyone in the courtyard was either looking his way or wondering what was going on. The servants and maids weren't able to penetrate through the crowd of nobles who were attentively watching the entertaining scene.

As a few nobles from tables further away walked over, right as Guiche finished his gesture, a portly and gentle noble with an owl on his shoulder calmly asked, "What's going on?" Another then walked up beside him, a more skinny fellow with a cat at his heel as he declared, "It looks like Guiche is picking a fight with Yves's noisy familiar...or maybe it's the other way around."

At this point, however, the familiar once again pointed out just what the girls wanted to hear. Guiche gasped as he heard the peasant's words, trying to act as if he didn't know, and turned just in time to hear Montmorancy yelling at him, her face bright red with anger. "So you really have been going out with another girl! RRRRRRHHHHGGGGGG!!" As she growled at the end, her face contorted with anger. Seeing this, Katie then chimed in, the last glimmer of innocence and hope fading from her expression as she gasped, "You...you've been two timing me?!"

Guiche, desperate to calm down the ladies, quickly threw on a desperate smile and pleaded with the angry one first, "Please, Montmorancy! Do not contort your face, one that is as beautiful as a rose, from mere anger! This is all a misunderstanding!" But as he finished speaking, Katie butted in, "Oh how could you! You told me that I was the only one!"

At this, Guiche was finally breaking, unable to think fast enough to think up a line that would convince the two, so once again, he desperately pleaded, "Both of you, just calm down! I can explain!-" However, as he did, Montmorancy slapped him hard enough that his jaw clicked, leaving a deep red mark across his cheek as she shouted, "You're a big liar!" Katie said the same words along with Montmorancy, but instead of hitting him, she simply turned to leave. As Guiche was hit, he toppled backwards to the ground, more injured emotionally than physically as he took a few seconds to re-compose himself and re-assess his priorities as Montmorancy turned to leave in a huff. Once he regained his composure, he sighed, then looked up to see almost every noble in the crowd laughing.

The portly noble who wanted to know what was going on earlier spoke after the familiar's odd comment, mocking, "You just got dumped, Guiche! And you deserved everything you got!" After this was said, Guiche growled as his eyes focused on the familiar once again. He averted his eyes from the familiar for a second to stand up, growling, "It appears that you do not know how to pay proper respect to nobility." By the time he was upright, his arms were crossed and he was offering the plebeian a calm, venomous stare.

After the peasant responded, Guiche grinned wickedly, then pulled a rose out from his black cape and pointed it over at him. "Very well. I see that the best way to settle this would be a duel." This statement caused excited chattering from the crowd. He grinned all the more, continuing, "You are nothing but a peasant, and a mere familiar to boot...yet you have mocked me, insulted me, and made two noble ladies cry." He dramatically pointed his rose over his shoulder and closed his eyes, as if at the remembrance of the atrocity he spoke of, then quickly opened his eyes and swiped his arm down to his lower right, expressing his distaste by saying, "You cad."

After a few seconds, Guiche then pointed his rose toward the plebeian once again, growling, "Go prepare yourself. I will await you at Vestory Square." With this, he proudly turned and walked off, with a few of the people in the crowd parting from around him so that he could get by. As Guiche left, however, Yves quickly stepped into the circle, right in front of Hayato and angrily whispered, "Hey you! What do you think you're doing!" as she grabbed his wrist with the hand which wasn't currently occupied by a book and viciously started pulling him in the same direction, away from the crowd which was now dispersing. "Why are you promising to fight in a duel without my permission?!" she growled over her shoulder, her tone slightly shaky and confused, but just as angry as it was earlier, "I'm taking you to apologize to him. Right now, he still might be willing to forgive you."
 
With the other female, 'Katie' finally approached, he just continued pressing on, mostly just random insults -- but he slowly began to die down with his incessant ramblings, and observed the situation with joy. It seemed like Katie and Montmorancy finally saw how 'honest' their boyfriend was, and Guiche was even being hounded by the other nobles. While he wasn't being noticed upon, he felt some personal pride with him demolishing someone like him, who thinks he can play around with women like that. It felt good, to actually do something for himself for a change, and not be ordered around. To actually -- help people out. He didn't really anticipate anything like a violent retaliation, but observing the situation, he was prepared to return his lethal force if necessary.

With loud, constant bickering from the crowd, it seemed like the three people in the middle of the circle were already in a heated argument. Montmorancy was rather violent, feeling it from the way she acted with Guiche. It seemed like this was the last, and final light to this powder keg. While the other, more docile girl Katie was handling this situation reasonably, Montmorancy was furious. Katie's innocent expression, and Montmorancy's disgust, hatred, and anger at Guiche worked to embarass him even more.

Then, suddenly, Montmorancy finally lost her nerve. She yelled loudly, screaming in frustration at Guiche's disloyalty to her, and Katie even lost that gentle yet confused expression on her face, now replaced with horror at the realization. Guiche really did dig himself an early grave by not thinking this through.

Even with him trying to explain everything to the girls, it was too late. Guiche was desperate, Montmorancy was furious, and Katie was shocked, and understandably sad. While he still flapped his gums, Montmorancy decided to resort to violence, her hand splitting his train of thought in two, all her anger and pain of discovering his infidelity delivered in that absolutely hard slap. It would serve as her final answer at his actions, and Hayato couldn't help but laugh. This was the sort of entertainment he would get if he watched a historical drama.

Hayato simply stood there, his hands folded behind his back, as he gave a rather condescending smirk -- remarking on his victory. His eyes met with Guiche's seeing the nobleman's embarrassment as his little tango with the two girls brought to an abrupt halt. Guiche's venomous stare was met with Hayato's own confident smile and leering gaze. Even as he stood, he made no effort to approach, or back off. "It appears you don't have proper respect over women, it seems."

Seeing his malicious grin, and him reaching into his clothing, he immediately flipped the holster's cover, reaching in to hold the grip of his pistol, fishing out the handgun from his holster as he slides it out, his index finger resting over the trigger guard of his firearm as he points the barrel of the gun at Guiche's direction. Expecting him to pull something out, he was instead greeted by the sight of a rose. He maintained his footing, looking at him with an intense glare. "I opened their eyes to the truth, nothing more."

While he listened to Guiche say something about 'Vestory Square' or something, he holstered his gun, breathing deeply as he saw Yves quickly dart towards him, and suddenly whispered her anger at how he stirred up some drama. While being pulled out, he replied, still filled with the confidence after beating down a nobleman with words. "An apology? For what, being honest? I'd very much like a chance to beat him again, the scum..." He mumbled more, but decided not to physically escape her grasp, but rather make her understand the reason why he did those things. After all, he wanted to increase his standing in this society at least. What sort of self respecting person backs out of something like that? "Apologizing will make things worse for both of us... I think? I mean, aren't these duels like... sacred or something like that? Pretty sure he'll only accept my apology at the tip of a sword."
 
Yves stopped as her familiar responded with impudent questions. She took a long, deep breath as she continued to grip his wrist. Her hand was shaking just a little, either due to emotion or adrenaline. But instead of allowing herself to unfold in public, she masked her thoughts behind a calm, composed expression. Once he was done speaking, she turned around and peered into his eyes with a incredulous pity. "You really don't understand anything, do you!?" She pointed over in the direction Guiche left in and, furrowing her brows, she continued, "apologizing to him is a thousand times better than letting him take out his frustrations on you in public. The only sacred thing about a duel is the oath to show up."

After saying this, she focuses her eyes, adopting more of a stern look. Her peripheral vision picked up a few of the nobles as they started to pay attention to them once more, She focused in on him once again and didactically pointed out, "Peasants never win against nobility. You'll be lucky to get out of a duel without fatal wounds, especially after that skit you pulled!" She then turned and continued to try pulling him along as a few of the nobles started to speak behind them. "Oh dear! This is going to be good!" "I wonder which spells he'll use." "This has been a rather eventful week so far, hasn't it?" Under her breath, she commanded, "just...humble yourself and get it over with." and wiped her eye with the sleeve of her free arm.
 
Hayato simmered down as Yves scolded him, his attitude slowly settled down. As the man was being stared down and berated by Yves, he crossed his arms, distasteful at what she was saying. "I'm only doing this just because... I want to be taken seriously. Seems like either you're a lowly peasant or you get born rich. And apparently being born rich means you get to play dirty without consequence?" He seemed to be ranting a bit, but he held his ground. Hayato wasn't a good man by any standard, but he wasn't a 'dick'.

"I'm not going to apologize to him. I'm going to make him pay for doing that to girls. That's not right, you should know that by now." He tried to defend his position, but he did feel for her. He was threatening to shatter her reputation to the lowest if he lost, and she would have a lot riding on him. "If we pull out now, he'll just ridicule me. It's now or never, Yves." He understood that she was scared, and on the verge of tears, as he gave her a bit of a confident grin. "I... I have a gun. If that helps."
 
Yves stopped trying to drag him along after realizing that he was posing resistance. She didn't bother turning towards him, as she could tell from the tone of his voice that he was resolute. She took a deep breath as he said her name, then quickly turned around and watched him with indifference as he commented about a "gun." She waited for a second with her arms at her side, then gracefully brought a hand up to her face and tucked a loose lock of hair behind her left ear. She then pierced his soul with her gaze and said, "tell me, Hayato the peasant: are you confident you can win with this, 'gun' of yours?" She analyzed his entire body as he responded with enough intensity and focus to unveil the secret bindings of the universe, and, upon hearing his response, released a sigh of defeat and waved casually for him to follow her as she started walking back to the dorms.

.....

After closing the door behind Hayato, she groaned and locked the door. "You may just be a lowly, ignorant, rude, and slow-minded peasant, but whatever the customs are from whence you came, you seem to have a pretty resolute understanding of them." She then pulled out her wand and, whispering a few words, caused a bit of ice to form around the cracks of the door and closed window. She then closed the binds of the window, walked over to the table, sat at the singular chair, and motioned for Hayato to approach. "Show me this 'gun' of yours and tell me what it does." she demanded in a condescending and arrogant tone. She then held out her hand so that he could place the device in it.

As he spoke, she moved it around, discovered that it had moving parts, and nodded at him, as if she understood what he had said. Entirely ignoring what he said, she held the grip like she saw him do, placing her finger on the wrong side of the trigger, and started speaking the words to a spell. Nothing happened. "It doesn't seem to be a wand...which makes sense, since you're a peasant." She then focused on it a bit more and, after finding the magazine release, she pressed it and watched in shock as it made a click sound and one of its parts fell out. She bent down, picked up the magazine, and eyed it curiously. "So this is a weapon, and it uses these tiny things to destroy stuff?" she asked, raising an eyebrow over at him in disbelief. She slammed the magazine back in and sat back into the chair as she handed it back over to him.

She meshed her fingers together, rested both elbows on the table, and rested her chin on her conjoined elbows, then closed her eyes and took a minute of silence to think deeply to herself. Once this minute was over, she looked over at Hayato and eyed him up and down with calculations flying through her mind. "You are my familiar, so I don't want you to die. If you use that and it's as powerful as you say, you better be prepared to be executed for killing a nobleman." She paused for a few seconds as she continued thinking, then continued, "If you can hit him with it, but don't kill him in the first shot, he'll kill you in an instant, especially since it can't counteract magic." She then shook her head, disillusioned, and said, "you just...don't have a chance. It's impossible. Give up and apologize to him. That's an order." She said "order" very sternly, but as she did, she stood up and walked over to the bed. After that, she waved her wand to undo the ice around the door and window.

....

Yves led her familiar to Vestory square shortly after meeting with him in private. A rather large crowd was waiting around, mostly first-years, along with a very small number of second and third-year students. Guiche was waiting in the center of the crowd, with the students giving him a very wide berth. As soon as Yves and her familiar walked into the center of the crowd, Guiche grinned. "I respect you for actually showing up." he commented, grinning wildly. The red-haired aristocrat leaned sideways and casually commented to a blue-haired lady beside her, "you know what? That peasant is starting to amuse me." as he walked into the middle of the circle.

A second after Guiche spoke however, Yves barged through the crowd shouting, "Hold on!" Once she got through, she marched up to Guiche and declared, "Guiche, stop this right now! You know darn well that duels are forbidden." However, Guiche grinned back at her charismatically and responded, "True, but only between two nobles. He isn't nobility, so the rule doesn't apply." As he said this, he pointed at Hayato with a sly grin. "But...that's because a case like this hasn't occurred before!" Guiche didn't even acknowledge her argument, but seeing her desperation, he offered a knowing grin and responded, "Now, Yves...I don't want to get too personal...but are you perhaps feeling attracted to this peasant?"

After he asked this question, Yves's expression dropped to a dangerous level of malice as the crowd around them started to laugh, amused at the thought. "How...dare you!" But she recollected her composure as she spoke. "No one with any decency would sit idly by as their familiar got shredded into mincemeat!"

But, in response, Guiche waved her off, drawing his rose wand, and said, "Well, no matter what you say, this duel has already begun!" With that, he swung his wand up and immediately, ten rose petals shot to the ground in front of him. Each one exploded in a bright flash of light and out from the ground, where each rose bud implanted itself into the ground around him, a huge, bronze suit of armor with a weapon rose from the ground. Guiche then grinned proudly and announced, "My name is Guiche the Brass, therefore, a brass golem (a Valkyrie, to be precise), shall be your opponent." He then immediately sent one of the golems towards the peasant, making it dart over to the peasant at lightning speed to try to punch him with it's heavy, brass gauntlet as the other nine formed a defensive line between Guiche and the peasant.
 
He was seriously just at his wit's end at this point. Why oh why did he even speak up? Is this some sort of 'power-trip' fantasy of his? If so, he really wants to wake up. 'Maybe when I finally get my ass beat for talking too much I might be able to wake up from this nightmare...' His thoughts drifted back and forth, but then, he realized that she was actually speaking to him, as he regained focus, his gaze shifting back to her eyes -- as he was lost a bit in a realization. If this was a risk, he had to do what he can to save himself from the consequences. He had to man up, and so -- with a sudden burst of confidence, expressed his passion for his firearm. "It can shoot a forty caliber bullet into a can at a hundred yards away. I'm sure it can take care of some guy like Guiche." As she sighed heavily and motioned for him to follow her, he did so -- uneasily cradling the grip of his pistol, doing as told.

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

Hayato stepped in, but was rather surprised to see her chanting some magical incantations again. This time, instead of something that could easily be dismissed as something a very skilled magician in the real world would do, she actually froze the gaps in between the door frame and the door, and with another investigation, the closed windowsill was now sealed shut with ice. Although not a large amount, it was clearly very effective, as he tried to turn the knob slowly and pulled, but to no avail. He turned and approached Yves. "Yeah, here." He pulled out his very slightly modified Glock 23 -- safety still on, loaded with a full magazine from a Glock 22, which makes it so that it can house 15 rounds instead of 13. The slide was painted to suit his personal preference, and was painted a still rather clean coat of cherry apple red. With her demanding it from him, he does give it to her, but checks if the safety was still on and such, but he left the magazine in -- too used to his range buddies borrowing his gun with the intention of using it, and knowing that they were trained -- which Yves isn't.

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"Essentially what it does, is that it uses a small explosion to propel a piece of metal out of the gun's barrel." He points to the barrel of the gun, as he then continues blabbering about how the gun works in fuller detail, explaining the fine aspects of how the bullet is propelled, how the parts work in conjunction and such, not really noticing that she wasn't listening at all -- and instead was dangerously close to placing her finger over the trigger. Motioning to stop her, he was about to say something regarding trigger discipline, not noticing that he himself didn't listen to what she said about his gun not being a 'wand', but then he stopped -- after she pressed the magazine release and the magazine heavily clunked to the ground. After she picked it up, he started explaining how and why the magazine works, but still his words fell on deaf ears. He noticed this time, and stopped talking after a few short moments -- hearing her finally ask a question.

"Yeah. That's basically what it is. It's like an arrow, except smaller, and is known to pierce deep into human skin, causing severe damage with the arteries... and the inside stuff, you know." He exclaims, and as Yves explained how killing Guiche would be a crime that would result in him getting executed for murdering a nobleman, and doing anything other than killing him would probably mean him dying -- painfully, he listened to her, hoping she had some insight on the matter. Typically, she still tried to make him give up on the duel. "No. I'm going to win this, no matter what you say. I don't just leave things I started unfinished." A painful lie, but admitting that he wasn't ready would make him waiver and tremble in fear. He had to change that, and this is a massive step forward. Of course, most massive steps forward don't often involve fighting someone that can potentially freeze him to death with a few creepy sounding whispers, but at least there was a starting point.

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

With his head in the sky, he took a deep breath as he stepped into Vestory Square. He was nervous inside, yes, a large group of people gathering to witness a peasant willingly subjecting himself to be beat up and possibly killed by a male gigolo masquerading as a 'noble', but whatever the case, he had to shake off those feelings. It was still hard not to show, but his forehead was slightly damp with the precipitation of sweat, as he wiped it off with his free hand, his right hand already gripping his pistol. With Yves beside him, he somewhat felt better that at least someone was at his side. If she wasn't he would have tried to run away, instead of live in this fantasy world. Maybe he would gain some powers or something, or Guiche proves to just show up to intimidate him and would probably be a very weak foe -- but wishful thinking wouldn't get him anywhere.

He was about to speak, but Yves spoke first -- stopping him. While Yves was still busy trying her best to defend him from Guiche's wrath by pointing out that duels were illegal, he immediately retorted with the fact that nobles could fight peasants if they so pleased in a duel, so the rules didn't apply. On top of that, Guiche insulted her by implying that she was a bit too 'close' to a mere peasant, to which Hayato grit his teeth. "As if sleeping with any girl who expresses interest in you would be so 'noble' of you." He spoke up. While this was definitely out of character of him, he wasn't going to just be beat by some random pretty boy. Besides -- this wasn't real anyway. His fear was just a product of his nervousness to be 'ejected' from the dream. Who knows, he might take this lesson to heart -- if he ever remembers this dream ever occurring.

After Guiche did the 'typical Japanese-anime transformation sequence' with blinding lights bringing discomfort to his eyes, he used his arm, folding it to obscure his view of the brightness, his eyes then adjusted to his form after that nonsense, seeing him not wearing the suit of armor in front of him, but merely controlling it from afar, as he grunted heavily. "How the hell am I supposed to beat this asshole..." He muttered under his breath, his hands typically shaking as he trembled lightly, but he bit his lower lip down hard, steeling himself as he stood his ground. There was no way he was going to dodge the punch, so he immediately raised his pistol, pulling the trigger repeatedly, backing up as fast as he could while trying to shoot at the suit of armor, the bullets merely grazing and scratching the metal, and even if it pierced the armor, it didn't have any effect.

Realizing that this had no effect, he stopped shooting after the fifth shot as he tried to run to the side -- but his legs were locked in place, presumably in fear, as the suit of armor closed the distance, as he closed his eyes and prepared himself to be knocked over.

A large clunk, and a massive push that left him unharmed -- but moved a few meters from his position, as the singular golem was in front of him, it's heavy gauntlet still formed into a fist, as the crowd gasped in surprise. "What... the fuck?" He was surprised as well, but just sitting there and gawking wouldn't land him any victories. Taking advantage of the 'shock', he finally started to lift his feet off the ground, dashing over behind the golem, and with the hole in his defensive line, fired three rounds to where Guiche was standing, hoping that at least one would connect, preparing to dodge if he counter-attacks with his other golems.
 
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Guiche was smiling proudly as he watched the peasant pull out the odd, red and black thing from earlier. "What could you possibly hope to do with a puny thing like th-" but he was interrupted by the first explosion from the weapon and immediately dropped to the ground in shock, along with another few people in the crowd. Five more explosions erupted from the weapon after this, during which time, Guiche slapped himself in the face to regain his composure and hastily shot back up. No longer did he wear the guise of a proud man - now, he had anger and hesitation in his eyes. "That...thing...isn't just for show, is it?" he mumbled, waving his rose wand around again as the plebeian rose up and started running to the side.

"What's Guiche doing?"

"Didn't he hit the plebeian? What's going on?"

"What kind of weapon is that? How is it making such sounds?"

The crowd around the two of them was rapidly growing louder, mostly in panic. A few of the bullets which bounced off of the suits of armor flew off into the air, and one in particular slammed into the ground right in front of one of the students, who then proceeded to faint. Seeing the weapon in use once again once the plebeian rose from the ground, many of the students started fleeing rapidly so as to not get hit by it. Only a few continued staring in awe as the plebeian resisted his seemingly inevitable defeat.

However, right as the plebeian evaded the brass golem which Guiche set out, he noticed the plebeian's weapon trained on him. Whether out of fear or quick thinking, Guiche dove to the ground as the plebeian fired off a few more rounds at him, then sent two more of the golems out after him. The first of the three golems was easily able to outpace the plebeian, and flanked him in conjunction with the other three. At the same time, the plebeian had just managed to fire off his third round at the brass golems surrounding Guiche, hoping to get a round through. But despite his skill, the brass golems faultlessly obeyed their master, causing a slight error in accuracy on the part of the plebeian to result in yet another [PLINK] noise.

As this happened, the three golems attacked at the plebeian, stabbing at him with their spears seemingly at random as he faultlessly moved out of their way. They attacked and moved around to compensate for the plebeian's movement so that, no matter how he jumped about, the second he landed they had another attack moving toward him. After a few seconds, their master's plan became apparent, as a fourth golem shot out from behind one of the others, right into the path of the plebeian's mid-air movement. At the same exact time, two of the other golems swung their spears at him, one targeting the hand which held his weapon, and the other targeting his neck. This coordinated attack left the crowd, especially Yves, in total suspense and awe.

Guiche was still cowering behind a bronze golem of his defensive line as he saw this happen. His eyes abounded in calculations as he watched the plebeian dart around, commanding the movement of each golem with subtle twists of his wrist and movements of his fingers. He didn't speak a single word the entire time, too intensely focused on the movement of his Valkyries to bother with the simple incantations. As the moment for the coordinated attack finally arrived, his eyes widened in anticipation, but simultaneously filled with malice. "Let's see how you deal with that, plebeian!" he declared, evoking a loud gasp of fright from Yves and a few cheers of excitement from various other nobles in the crowd.
 
Hayato grunted, knowing that his bullets wouldn't work against the golems. It was no problem, as he tried to break the defensive line that was formed around Guiche to safeguard him. Discontent to actually waste more ammo than he needed, as from the amount of times he fired his pistol, he only had two magazines on his person, in the inner pockets of his coat. It just goes to show that even if someone were to give a medieval soldier a pistol, he probably still can't take on more soldiers before being cut down. It did scare off a few students, and inspired fear within Guiche. He could see it in his eyes -- at least just before he ducked down and hid behind his bronze golem, still ordering them around from behind the scenes.

He had no time to be observing what his rival in this battle, he had to avoid these spears. Almost as if he commanded his body to move in that direction, with blinding speed -- he managed to move out of the way, going forward -- past the three golems that tried to skewer him with their spears. At the last moment, he was almost hit by a spear, so to compensate, he took a leap, landing behind the golem as it's weapon was jabbed towards him, managing to dodge a potentially lethal attack. Without even letting up, he saw the two immediately prepare themselves to dash forth, and at the right time as the two golems were commanded to rush towards him, he jumped upwards at the exact time, moving past the suits of armor. With Hayato's blinding speed, he could barely make out Guiche who was flanked and covered by a few golems, as he fired a round off -- trying to take him on. His personal guard detail quickly and swiftly blocked off the bullet.

The adamant Hayato had no time to gawk on his impressive skill in controlling these 'men of bronze', but then he was again surrounded -- with another very quick dash attack. Easily, he jumped up again and barely managed to miss those two spears, but then he was met with the wrath of another of Guiche's bronze Valkyries who broke away from the defensive formation. Then, the third golem quickly closed the distance between the 'plebeian' and Hayato, his neck being targeted with his spear. What surprised him was the well coordinated attack, that would leave him either weaponless, or him having no life to speak of at all.

Guiche was a smart man, but he wasn't about to risk life and limb in this duel. While in mid-air, he felt his senses slow, as well as his perception of time. He wasn't sure if this was a good or bad thing, but he felt his adrenaline pumping, his blood surging as he spun horizontally -- using his newfound increase in his physical abilities a great help. While he did avoid the third golem's spear which barely grazed the skin of his neck, but Hayato was forcefully disarmed, his right wrist nearly stabbed by the fourth golem. Reflexively, he tried to avoid it, but while he managed to avoid any harm on him, he managed to loosen his grip from his pistol, as it was released from his hand.

His best hope for defeating Guiche was slipping out of his hand. Try as he might to will himself to pick his gun back up, he only merely managed to regain his footing on the ground. While he survived the attack, his gun was quite far from him, near to the Valkyries than he was to him. He saw that his gun was far, and he tried to run back into the fray. With his speed and agility, he was sure he could get his gun again. But something felt off, quite off -- as if he was getting slower and slower as he tried to fish his gun from the Valkyries, dodging a few of the spears -- before suddenly met with the increasingly blinding speed of Guiche's golems. He was forced to back off, but it wasn't good. While he did back off quite a bit far from the Valkyries, it seemed like his powers were waning quite quickly.

As he stood there, thinking of his next 'stupid idea', a massive thump of pain from his chest, almost as if a car hit him head on, the pain forcing him to grunt loudly. The runes stopped glowing, and he dropped to the ground in pain. It wasn't like he was punched by a literal iron fist a while ago, but for some reason he only felt the pain now. Already on his hands and knees, he was more or less vulnerable. What the hell was going on? He couldn't understand how his 'power' was being taken from him. As soon as he held his pistol and aimed at Guiche, the runes glowed, but now they didn't. He'd have to get his weapon back. But how was he going to do that, with all of Guiche's iron goons blocking him from recollecting his firearm. As he was clutching at his chest, he tried to stand back up -- regaining his footing as he took deep breaths. "T-Took you that long... t-t-to take me out?" Hayato pointed to Guiche, stuttering in a mixture of fear and in pain, as he tried taunting Guiche.
 
Guiche's expression brightened considerably as he saw his coordinated strike work flawlessly against the Plebeian - not only was he able to take away from him that which he feared most - he also injured the Plebeian a little. At least he can be injured, he thought, quickly sending another one of his golems over to collect the gun. Over the next few seconds, Guiche forced the golems to attack so that the plebeian couldn't reach his weapon, and soon enough, his golems were able to form another wall, preventing him from reaching his gun. As the fifth Valkyrie reached the gun, it picked it up and hastily hovered back over to Guiche as the nobleman watched his foe drop to his knees.

At this point, Guiche couldn't help but gloat. Yves sprinted over to the injured peasant as the Valkyries rested the dull side of their spears on the ground, as if they no longer saw the plebeian as a threat. Yves dropped to her knees and gently but firmly grasped his shoulder from right beside him and with a tone of desperation, she groaned, "There. Do you get it now? Peasants can never win against mages!" She then stood up and turned over to Guiche, declaring, "Guiche, stop this duel at once! It's clear that he can no longer fight!"

Guiche, however, was too busy looking over the odd device which the plebeian held previously. He grasped it in the same way the plebeian did, then tried jumping from side to side out of curiosity, checking the back of his hand to see if any light appeared on the back of his hand. "If you want to stop me, go ahead Yves. But last time I checked, this situation didn't involve you." As was expected, nothing unusual happened, and he ended up shrugging and placing the weapon in his pocket with a sly grin. "That was rather unexpected, I must say. But it looks like whatever good this thing was doing for you is gone now." With this, he shrugged and, grinning, desummoned four of the six golems around him, causing them to form back into rose petals and shoot back onto his rose wand. He then called back three of the four golems around the plebeian back over to his defensive line, leaving only one to stare the poor soul down. After hearing the plebeian's comment, he confidently declared, "you seem to think that this is over, plebeian."

He then looked over at Yves, who was now glaring at him. Upon seeing her attempt at composure, his confidence and ego grew ever bigger. "Look, I would feel bad about breaking something that Yves owns, so I'll forgive you if you apologize now. Just drop back to your hands and knees like you did before. It's not that hard." After Guiche finished speaking, Yves clicked her tongue at him and focused on the plebeian once again. "You couldn't ask for a better deal than that! Stop being stubborn already and apologize!"
 
The plebeian, Hayato, wasn't ready to throw in the towel just because he was disarmed by this pretentious master. He simply looked over to him, gazing at Guiche with a smile playing on his face. He was a broken man, and he finally snapped. He wasn't going to bend over and kneel to another master, another boundary -- no, he was going to put him in his place. He wasn't doing this for Yves, nor was he doing this for anyone else. He was going to do this for himself.

Hayato pointed menacingly at Guiche, standing tall and proud, defying a nobleman as the plebeian stood his ground, the crowd that was still left still listening rather intently. Hayato was determined to win this, no matter the cost. "Me, bend over to you? No. Not today, not tomorrow, not ever! For a duel, I expect a one-on-one battle, and since you're a mage and I'm a plebian, I'd rather face you down. Give me a weapon, and you can use my own. Let's see if you have the gall to face me." He swallowed his fear in exchange for a burst of confidence, as he was triumphantly taunting him -- something that would keep Guiche complacent as he hoped what he had planned would work out.

He just hoped he didn't just cut him down and beat him up, and instead would underestimate his power. While he only knew that his gun could do the trick, his pistol was low on ammo, plus he was sure that prissy little prince couldn't handle the recoil of a Glock 23, especially with his apparent lack of physical power.
 
Yves backed away from Hayto as he started pointing at Guiche. She retreated all the way to the edge of the crowd by the time the plebeian was done trying to convince Guiche. Guiche, however, proudly stood behind his golems as the plebeian continued to speak. Immediately after the plebeian was done speaking, he snapped his fingers. The brass golem in front of the plebeian then shot forward and punched him square in the chest. Guiche then motioned once more, causing the brass golem to swiftly move back a foot or two so that he could watch the plebeian writhe in agony. "Of course you'd rather fight me without my magic - you don't have any!" He chuckled after this, and various members of the crowd laughed along with him. He then crossed his arms and, grinning, declared, "here you are, lying in the dirt like the mutt you are, and you think you have the capacity to tell me what to do?"

After this, after observing that the plebeian was trying to stand up once agian, he made a quick, flashy gesture and the golem punched Hayato again in the same way as before. Once the plebeian was on the ground again, he motioned for the golem to move back so that he could gloat at the injured peasant. "I am a noble and you are a plebeian. As a noble, I pour out the generosity of my heart to keep disrespectful, ignorant mutts like you alive. As a peasant, you spend your life attempting to live up to the burden you set upon us nobles."

As he explained this, he pulled out the pistol and started examining it. Once he was done with his short explanation, he went off on a thought tangent, declaring, "you seem to think that you are allowing me to use this thing, whatever it is. In truth, you were allowed to keep it up until now out of the kindness of Yves' heart, just like how I'm allowing you to keep your life at this very moment." He then threw the device to the ground and motioned at one of the golems which was defending him. It then moved over to the device on the floor and started stomping on it with it's armored foot.

The nobles around the circle all nodded, as if agreeing with his words while he spoke. After seeing the golem start to pound the device with its armored boot, they all stared intensely, as if waiting for something interesting to happen. Guiche had the golem continue to stomp on the device as he continued speaking, the look of pride growing in his eyes at every word. "You have been nothing but disrespectful, ignorant and rude for as long as I have known of you, peasant. Therefore I decided to devote some of my time to teaching you about proper etiquette." After saying this, he then bowed mockingly toward the peasant and grinned maliciously at the peasant.

"First: bow to nobility - as such." After saying this, his golem rushed forward and punched the peasant just hard enough to force him to fall forwards. The crowd fell to hysteria after seeing the action, as the golem bowed to Guiche right next to the plebeian. After a few seconds, Guiche applauded sarcastically and commented, "excellent. Now, second: listen when a noble speaks to you." At this, the golem next to the plebeian grabbed him by his hair and lifted him into the air. The golem positioned the plebeian in such a way that he couldn't turn his head away from Guiche. After this, Guiche applauded sarcastically once again and commented, "very good, you seem to be able to understand. Now third: obey when a Noble gives you an order." He then frowned mercilessly at the plebeian and in a loud voice, he declared, "apologize for your behavior at once."

......

Guiche continued to demand that the plebeian apologize to him as the duel went on. Every time he refused, the golem punched him to the ground. The golem then waited for the plebeian to rise again as Guiche demanded that he apologize. The crowd continued to watch in surprise as the plebeian continued to endure the beating over and over again. Yves finally snapped after five minutes of the beating and rushed over to the plebeian, shouting, "why are you getting up again?!" The red-headed aristocrat, who was standing next to a blue-haired girl with a book, commented, "look! He's getting up again!" at the same time, as did a few other nobles in the crowd. The blue-haired girl sighed and closed the book in response, saying, "alright, I'm going." The red-haired aristocrat declared, "but...this is where it starts to get interesting!" The blue-haired girl left anyways, taking her rather large dragon-like familiar with her.

At the same time, Yves reached the plebeian and protectively crouched next to his torso, begging, "Guiche, please! Stop it already!" But Guiche, frustrated from not getting what he wanted out of the plebeian, declared, "Leave him, Yves. Step aside." But Yves remained at his side, ignoring Guiche as she spoke to her familiar. "Come on now, that's enough. You did really well, okay?! I've never seen a peasant like you before." After a moment of speaking, she got a closer look at his wounds and declared, "What are you thinking? Why are you doing this? What, did you think that it wasn't going to hurt? This makes no sense!"

As the plebeian stood up once again, Yves groaned and commanded, "I order you to apologize to him! If you keep this up you're definitely going to die!" But, once again, the plebeian seemed intent to accomplish his goal. Seeing this determination, Guiche sighed, his frustration finally reaching a peak. Clearly this isn't working. There's only one way to deal with peasants like that. Guiche looked back over at the device which his golem stomped on awhile ago. It looked to have been cracked and bent in a few places, but it was surprisingly resilient. He then looked back over at the plebeian and, with a sly grin, he said, "do you still want to go on with the duel, peasant? Even without that device of yours?" He then waved his rose wand and a single petal flew over to a spot right in front of the plebeian. From the ground, a large, brass sword then shot out in a bright flash of light, hilt-side up. "If you have the will to go on, just pick up that sword." He then grinned, his malicious expression returning, and he continued, "but if you don't, all you have to do is tell me that you are very sorry."

The crowd fell silent at this, but Yves loudly protested, "Stop this, Guiche!" with the inkling of rage starting to boil over in her tone. She stopped the plebeian from stepping toward it moments later, venomously exclaiming, "Do not touch that sword! Guiche will kill you the second you touch it! Listen to me! I am your master, and I order you to apologize to him this instant!" Meanwhile, Guiche waved his rose around and replenished his forces of golems back to ten, grinning over at the plebeian as he did so. Three of the golems were ten feet away from the sword with their spears resting on the ground, seemingly docile, but secretly waiting for their cue to attack. The other seven formed a two-layered wall between Guiche and the familiar with just enough of a gap between one another that Guiche could still watch them. The crowd was murmuring in excitement, as they all knew that, one way or another, this duel was about to end.
 
Without any of his abilities, and the only thing keeping him in this fight was his will to make him kneel to him. He took the comments, the snide remarks and tossed them aside -- not really listening at all to what Guiche was saying, and the laughter of the nobles as he clutches his side, feeling that if he did something rash, he would probably get more than broken bones. His knees buckle a bit, as he trembled, writhing in agony and in supremely massive hatred for Guiche. As he moves the forward golem to punch him square in the stomach, knocking the wind out of him as he drops to the ground, his eyeglasses finally falling from his face.

He stood, in rash defiance of this male gigolo with a power-trip. He struggles and tries to do so -- with both verbal and physical abuse flying towards him, but he finally gets up, standing up. He wanted to comment, but he didn't have the strength to even reply or say anything of the sort. Trying to catch his breath after the golem forcefully knocked him out, he merely only manages to get out grunting noises -- he managed to stand on his own two feet, before getting another fist on him from another golem, as he nearly landed face down, as he lands on his side, his vest getting torn at the area of impact.

He wasn't done. He wasn't ready to sit down and take this loser's attacks up the ass. While he was still trying to get up, he saw that he saw that he was saying something, yet the words were hard to comprehend, as he was struggling to stay conscious, as he spits out a tiny bit of blood -- the taste of iron filling his mouth as he felt it run up his throat. Wiping his mouth before the blood trickles down his lower lip, he continued to hold his side, as he saw Guiche smashing his gun. Despite it's resilience, it only meant that his plan wasn't going to work as intended. Besides, what are the chances of him being able to get a weapon? Still, it did hurt personally, he even had it painted -- but there wasn't much he could do now. Well, not until he could try to find a way to figure out how he gained those abilities.

While he was being toyed with -- being forced to bow with punches, and having golems nearly rip the hair off his scalp, he endured -- solely to figure out how to defeat Guiche. While the pain was unbearable, his hatred and the adrenaline rushing through his body kept him going. Even though it finally reached the point where every time he stood, he was being punched down to the ground, in rash defiance, he refused. He continued to be beaten, but he still stood up -- as if he was powerful enough to keep going. He felt as if he was holding back, as he only wanted to prove a point -- but that will be his undoing.

Yves somewhat oddly ran up and still continued to beg and plead for her familiar's life. As he stood, his knees nearly giving way as he reached the breaking point of his tenacity, but then, he heard Guiche offer something, as even he ignored Yves in favor of hearing what Guiche has to say. He knew that beating him down will only result in him standing up -- at least that's what Guiche thinks, but Hayato was convinced that if he could continue the fight, he might be able to get his gun after all. But then, he remembered that he had to use whatever weapon Guiche wanted to give him.

Luckily, he didn't decide to mess this entire thing up by giving him a wooden spoon. Rather, a large -- narrow bladed brass sword appeared in front of him, the hilt up. Without hesitation, Hayato grabbed the hilt, not even bothering to listen to Guiche ask him if he wants to give up. Like hell he's going to give up, after getting this far. No way. He wasn't going to let him have the satisfaction. Weirdly, he felt the pain and all his fatigue dissapear, the runes on his hand glowing rather brightly, as the light died down in intensity, but the runes were pulsing. In any case, he wanted to confirm with a simple trick he always saw in videogames. Spinning his weapon over his shoulder as he points it over to Guiche, he felt revitalized -- and the only thing on his mind was blinding rage. "Biggest mistake you ever made."

Instantly after he said that, the golems rushed and attempted to thrust forth, ignoring Yves, but they instantly started to rush towards Hayato, spearheads aimed as Guiche thought he had the upper hand. The pronged assault would result in something amazing occurring. Taking cues as to when they would arrive, he grabbed the hilt of the sword, swinging the blade sideways, hitting all their spears at once as he attempted to parry all three of their attacks. He grunts as he uses his enhanced strength to hold them off. He knew that a king was useless without his forces, and this shiny new brass blade would eventually defeat the spear wielding suits of armor. Their spears were made quick work of with the sword, as Hayato held his sword in two hands. Without their weapons, he had the reach and the damage advantage, and as Guiche panicked at his plan not working, Hayato quickly decided to deftly try to knock the golems flat on their feet, as he spotted gaps in their defense.

Swiftly, he moved in, quickly running as he swung at the precise time, letting go of all the force as he directed it to one of the golem's armored kneecaps. Swiftly, it fell to the ground, as the legs were sliced jaggedly -- but it was close enough. With this, he turned and directed his attention to the other golems, raising his weapon and then immediately curves his attack -- causing his blade to pierce the armor around the neck portion of the golem, chopping the suit's helmet off. Without any time to check if both golems were actually dead, as the yelling and hollering of the crowd overshadows his own thoughts for a moment. Bringing himself back to focus on the task at hand. He decided that the next golem, while it was trying to face him head on with a charge fit for a sumo wrestler, he met the attack head on, and with a single stroke of his hand, the force was strong enough to slice the golem in half, as it crumples to the ground.

Empowered by his abilities coming back to him at last, he takes this moment to taunt Guiche, pointing at him with his brass sword, the tip of the blade pointing at him. "What, are you going to sit there, or are you going to face me like a man? Or are you going to cower like a King when the lowly men and women scattered at his feet decide to unite and start a revolution?" He tries to reach out to the peasants who were in the crowd, people like Siesta and all the other waiters at this little gathering. "Come on! Fight me! What's a duel when the other guy's got an army?" He continues to taunt him, as he assumes a posture that assures him he can easily defend himself, his dominant foot forward and his left foot back, as he holds the hilt with two hands. "Unless... you're afraid of a peasant like me."
 
"but if you don't, all you have to do is-"

Guiche was surprised to find that the human picked up the sword without hesitation. He shrugged, sighing at the lost opportunity to make another condescending remark, but nonetheless motioned so that his golems stabbed at where the plebeian was. To his utter astonishment, not only did the plebeian not get stabbed three times, he strafed out of the way of the spears and sundered each one with multiple sweeping strikes thereafter. Biggest misteak...huh... he thought, remarking upon the plebeian's words. Earlier, all the plebeian was doing was dodging, but now that he had a sword, he appeared much more capable. Perhaps he's right...

Guiche and the crowd both fell silent at the sudden change of pace. "What's going on here?" Yves squealed out, her voice choked by surprise as she stared intensely at her familiar. He was casually slicing away at the other golems as the crowd slowly started to murmur and grow louder. Guiche frowned as he summoned a few more golems, only to watch in terror as the plebeian cleaved through them like butter. One golem fell to the ground as it's leg was halved, another's helmet was separated from it's body and fell as well. Next he simply cleaved through a bunch more golems, taking out 3, then 4, then 5 and 6. Pretty soon, all 15 of the golems which Guiche had summoned were gone.

With genuine fear in his eyes, Guiche summoned one more golem, seemingly with the last rose petal on his wand, and tried to make sense of the plebeian's banter. Some of the peasants responded to his statement with wide eyes, but none seemed as intent with his words as with his actions, waiting eagerly for the conclusion. Instead of responding, Guiche sent his golem charging toward the plebeian. Once the golem was split in half like all the others, Guiche found the plebeian much closer than he was comfortable with. In his surprise, he exclaimed, "Ahh!" and fell backwards onto his rump. A second later, a realization came to him and, with his head held low, he humbly mumbled, "I...I give up."

An instant later, the crowd erupted into a series of shouts, yells, and laughs so intense that it made both Yves and Guiche wince. In astonishment, Guiche looked up a few seconds later, with disbelief in his expression, and declared, "but...nobility can't lose to a peasant..." just soft enough that it was only barely audible above the banter of the crowd. As this happened, Yves quickly rushed over to her familiar and asked, "A-Are you alright?" He appeared to have only gotten a bit dirty to her and the rest of the crowd, but before drawing the sword, he had multiple deep injuries and could barely stand. Her confusion at this paradox was evident on her expression as she looked him over, searching for wounds.
 
Hayato cleaved through golems like they were butter, cleaned house and cut a swath through Guiche's army. With the ulterior goal of proving himself and to all the peasants in this institution that there exists a chance to actually gain respect. He rushed in deep, holding the hilt of the sword and plunged forward, thrusting the weapon and nearly cutting straight into Guiche's chest if not for Guiche, in fear, tried to move back, but tripped and fell backwards, landing on his posterior. To undergo such shame, such public humiliation -- it was Hayato's greatest victory by far, and it went to show his unwavering devotion to winning. Standing tall with a nobleman conceding defeat. Has this ever happened at all in the place he was in?

He tried to resist the cheesy one liners, and had his grip tighten while holding the handle of the blade. With Yves approaching him, Hayato smiled -- yet he still didn't understand why such a thing was even possible. In the realm of magic and mystery, such as in here -- but if he just holds any weapon, he could easily defeat anyone? How could this be? He's the anti-thesis of a 'master swordsman', and even holding his own gun, he was capable of performing feats he could only see in films such as Die Hard and Mission Impossible. Even Yves was astounded as to how he managed to defeat Guiche with such skill and grace, all without so much of a scratch.

"I would demand something from you, Guiche. Stop playing with other women, and don't treat peasants like dirt. If I catch you going against my wishes, I'll come back and humiliate you again." He said calmly, turning to face Yves. Amidst the fierce roar of the crowd, the cheers, whistles and hollering -- he focused his gaze on Yves. "I feel fine. I mean, I'm more than alright." He sounded fine, but little did he know about what was going to happen if he let go of the weapon. Now, without seeing the need to fight, he let go of his weapon. As the brass blade clattered to the ground, so did he, feeling the pain and anguish from his multiple wounds, as he knelt down, grunting heavily. A low growl emanated from him, as he clutched his stomach, feeling the pain overwhelm him.

It felt harder and harder to maintain his own consciousness, trying to stave it off, as he looked up to Yves, the pain varying -- due to the amount of damage he received from Guiche's golems beating the ever loving crap out of him. He could barely speak, the pain making it harder and harder to even breathe. It seemed like he suffered some rib cage fractures, and pulsating pain from his multiple bruises made it difficult to stay conscious. But he struggled to.

"H-Help..."
 
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Guiche practically ignored the peasant, his grumbling unintelligible and his eyes distant. The second the peasant looked away, over to Yves, Guiche squirmed away from him, rose, and ran off, tearing through the crowd with tears falling from his face. Faced with being the first noble in known history to be defeated by a peasant in an open duel, he cried of embarrassment and fled the courtyard. A few laughs and pointed statements rose from the crowd in response to Guiche's actions, but the crowd dispersed shortly thereafter, no longer interested in the situation since the action was over. Most of the people started making snide comments about what they just saw, or insulting Guiche. A few of the peasants stayed to watch what would happen to the peasant, but were quickly shooed away by nobles who wanted more tea and cakes.

As this was happenning, Yves continued searching Hayato with her eyes as he responded to her inquiry. Just as he said, he appeared to have no injuries, and was in top condition. If it weren't from the tears in his clothes and the dirt stains and fragments of brass all over his body, she wouldn't have issue believing him. But since she had seen him shaking and bruised before picking up the sword, she was hesitant to accept his words as truth. "If that's so, then we have a lot to talk about. Why is it that you ignored--" She started to speak and walk away, but before she realized it, she heard her familiar's brass blade fall the ground and shatter back into magic energy, which dispersed immediately thereafter with the sound of a gust of wind full of rustling leaves. She looked back at her familiar to see what was going on with confusion on her face.

As her eyes focused on her familiar, she immediately saw that his blisters were back, and that he had fallen to his knees. As if reflexively, she lunged back over to him and knelt down at his side. A few gasps from nearby maids and servants sounded around them, and even a few nobles turned their gaze to see what the soft commotion was about. "What happened?" Yves gasped, quickly reaching for her familiar's shoulder to support him, then realizing that his collarbone was shaped oddly, "you were fine just a second ago!" As her familiar clutched at his chest, Yves looked at it and noticed that his chest was shaped oddly too. She then pulled back her hand, stood with a stern expression as she looked around for something. Once she seemed to have found what she was looking for, she pointed over to two servants, one male and one female. "You two. Assist me in transporting my injured familiar at once!" she declared, pointing down at the peasant at her feet.

The two peasants nodded and hastily made their way over to him, placing their serving trays on an unoccupied table as they rushed toward him. Yves looked down at her familiar shortly thereafter and saw him staring up at her. Her stern gaze melted into pity, then fear as she continued to look him over, and as he begged for help, she felt something in her chest snap. She looked away from him, overwhelmed, and gritted her teeth as she watched the peasants line up next to him, aligning a table cloth in a rectangle next to him. Yves helped the peasants move her familiar onto the tablecloth, being careful not to touch his chest, then she pulled out her wand and froze the tablecloth below him with a few muttered words and a flash of bright light. "Follow me, and don't let him fall" Yves demanded, hastily moving in the same direction that guiche went, over to her living tower.

-------

Once the three arrived at Yves' room, she hastily unlocked the door and demanded that the servants place her familiar on her bed. Once this was done, she carefully moved him off of the table cloth, which the servants then took with them as they left, and Yves started to carefully take off the clothes on his feet and his upper body. Once she was done, she took out her wand once more and, with a few whispered words, "Nien, Vols, Ultha" she touched the tip of her wand onto sections of his body where she noticed that he was injured. Once she was done with all the sections she could see, she asked, "Are you hurt anywhere else?" and followed his instruction to touch the tip of her wand onto the areas he mentioned. Once she was done with this, she quickly swished her wand in a circle and the areas of his body which she touched started to cool down and numb. "That should quell the pain until I can get my family to deliver a healing potion for you."

With this said, she placed her wand back in its holster and quickly looked around the room, once again searching for something. She seemed entranced in her work, looking around for a few seconds as she stood next to the bed, then she started to move, walking over to the dresser upon which a mirror stood. She searched through this drawer for a minute or two, then finally found an ink pen and a few sheets of paper. She carefully placed the items on the dresser after clearing a space for writing, then opened an ink well and sat down upon a fancy chair which was placed in front of the dresser. She began to write a letter immediately thereafter, intensely focused on the task for the duration.

She wrote with exquisite ease and great haste, finishing a few hundred words in only a minute or two, then used her magic to freeze the tip of the pen, scratched the extra ink off into the ink well, closed it off, and put the two items away. She then left the letter to dry on her dresser and elegantly stood, pushing the fancy chair back into place after doing so, and walked back over to the bed to examine her familiar. Instead of asking him how he was doing, she intensely peered into his eyes for a few seconds, as if to ask his soul directly, then looked him over to see for herself.
 
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Hayato was in a state of shock. He didn't even know what was going on at the moment. All he knew that he was kneeling down, two men were picking him up and placing him on -- something. He couldn't tell. He was being carted away, and the bright light emanating from her wand made him blink, and squirm. He decided to let them carry him, as he still felt weak for some reason. The damage was too intense, and he could feel the pain trying to envelop him, every bit of his body feeling broken -- and he didn't doubt that at least several of his bones are actually broken.

He couldn't help but try to move his hand, his leg, even his finger, but he was nearly stunned as the pain centered on the joint he tried to move, as he grunted. "This... is not good..." He could speak with less pain now, but everything else felt like it was smashed by a giant hammer -- which is a lot better than him getting beaten on by several giant brass golems. The pain was too much to bear, but what Yves was doing was similar to an anesthetic of some sorts. He couldn't feel his hand, his leg, but the feeling came back -- yet with little or no pain at all. Magic is magic, it worked. Apparently, she's doing this with that wand, and he sighs. "The ribs... the leg... the--" He continues on, until he feels that most of his body now, yet he knows that most of the damage was still there, it was just the pain that disappeared. While waiting for that potion, Yves was scrambling for something, but he couldn't guess how this was going to help.

It was odd as to what Yves was doing. He knew phones didn't exist, so was she going to do something along the lines of sending a letter to her family? Was she going to summon a bird or throw it into some air chute? Whatever the case, she even had elegance in writing swiftly. It was odd to see someone from the past. To see the man from the 21st century -- belonging to a progressive, creative, and a 'lack' of major social classes -- meeting a woman of nobility, in whatever century who can cast magic, yet has this outdated belief of social classes and your family's birthright the basis if you were to be a noble or not.

But then she was staring down on her. He assumed that she was still rather angry at his actions, disobeying her orders. Even though the outcome was positive, there could be a number of things that could have gone wrong. Example, if Guiche didn't want to humiliate him and be done with it, he could have damaged Hayato to such a point where he would still end up like this. Instead of giving him a weapon, he could have just beat him up. But he was still rather irritated at the way she treats him as less than a human. A sub-human. He decided to speak up. "Y-Yves. I'm fine... m-mostly. Are you okay?" He looked up to her, giving a slightly parted smile, as he simply laid in bed.
 
As she looked down at him, she frowned, biting the corner of her bottom lip. This is bad...seriously bad...he could actually die... She was still pent up in her downward spiral of dreary thoughts when he suddenly started to speak. His voice was labored, and his expression had a sort of dumb cheerfulness to it that nearly made her sick. She was taken aback by his words for the first few seconds, but her eyes narrowed thereafter and wormed over to his own. There, they locked into place, sparkling with malice. "Of course I'm alright," she growled softly, glaring at him, "I wasn't the idiot who let a seething wretch of vengeance pummel him into straw!"

Her voice was sharp, jabbing at him like a dagger as her gaze held him down, "what was that about? Why did you ignore me? I gave you an order!" She paused, momentarily looking away, then focusing right back in on him for round two. Her voice was softer, as if laced with venom "Do you even know what 'order' means?" After this, she was right back to her previous growling. "I told you to stop at least five times! Your pathetic exercise in futility nearly cost you your life, and all you can say in response is 'I'm fine'?!" She didn't bother trying to impersonate him as she quoted his response, instead she just emphasized the words by lowering her voice. She coughed a little after this, as if clearing her throat, then, frustrated, continued, "Just who do you think you are, peasant!?"

She paused momentarily after saying all this, as if deciding what to do next as she glared at him. Finally, with a soft huff, she turned around and walked over to the table in the middle of the room. She pulled out the chair, her face contorted as she attempted to maintain composure despite her anger. She grabbed a book from the pile at the center of the table, slammed it down right in front of her so that its spine hit the table, and ripped it open to the page marked by a cyan ribbon. She started to read the page's contents for a few seconds, until she was finally able to control her facial expression.

Then, still reading through the page, she commented, "I suppose it doesn't matter now. What's done is done." After this, she immediately shot over another gaze of intense malice and, enunciating each word with powerful intent, asked a very simple question: "Do you know what will happen the next time y-you..." she stammered slightly as she spoke the last word, her malice instantly gone as she started to cough again, more violently this time. "...oh for the love of-" She rose from her chair suddenly, then stormed out of the room in a thunder. Immediately outside she discovered a servant who was carrying a few glasses of water on a tray.

Yves immediately stopped the servant and asked who the water glasses were for. "Why, I was just about to bring you-" the servant managed to say, stopping mid-sentence as she swiped one of the glasses from his tray, interrupting him. He remained there, speechless, as she downed the entire glass in two gulps, then gently placed it back on his tray. "Thank you. Carry on." She declared, wiping the excess water from her face with a sleeve. She then immediately rushed back into her room. She slammed the door closed and locked it immediately after entering the room and then, attempting to look composed, walked back over to the table and sat back in the chair.

After taking a few seconds to smooth out her skirt and to adjust the ribbon down the center of the book, she shot a glare back over to her familiar. "As I was saying..." she started, attempting unsuccessfully to assert the same level of malice that she had before, "if you try disobeying me next time, I'll..." she paused once again, as if thinking of what to say next. She continued to think for a few more seconds, then sighed, defeated, and loosened her posture.

As she spoke, she was more relaxed, pulling up and reading the book on the table midway through her line, as if losing interest. "I'll stop you...if you try it again...you filthy peasant...so...sleep or something...Dinner's in a few hours." With her final word voiced, she scooted her chair back, away from the table, and rested her feet against a footstool under the opposite side of the table. Then, partially reclining, with surprisingly improper posture, she held up the book about a foot from her face and began scanning through the pages. After a few seconds of reading, the slightest hint of a smile started to worm its way onto her face.
 
Of course, he couldn't do anything. He looked over to her and saw her screaming -- about how she had to somewhat suffer -- or something like that, seeing her familiar get knocked down and beaten to near death by Guiche's armor-suit minions. It wasn't easy to have someone, even a pet, get beat up and how the owner either can't do anything, or the owner isn't allowed to, but it still paints the image that Yves still sees him as a mere object, not a person with thoughts, desires, feelings, emotions. It's as if only noblemen and noblewomen are the only people who can have their own dreams, ambitions, goals -- while peasants only have to serve the nobles.

He didn't want to fight back, he knew that fighting a healthy screaming girl isn't good for the broken state that he is in now. While he's still ecstatic at his victory against Guiche -- despite the fact that even if Guiche did lose, it might just prove that he's weak, weaker than a peasant, and that even if a noble lost, peasants would still be peasants in the eyes of the nobles. It reminded him of the plight his heroes in fantasy novels and related literature have been. Rich men falling in love with the young peasant girl, only to let the binding shackles of social class prevent their love, or a swashbuckling pirate looting ships because he couldn't fit into society.

He merely observed her actions. Her movements, the way she stammered -- her voice as sharp as a knife and her message loud and clear. She hated the fact that he disobeyed her orders. From what he can gather, it made her feel inadequate. But the result wasn't something she didn't disagree on, at least from what he can observe. She lost her cool when she started to cough really violently, and she rushed out to presumably get a glass of water to clear her throat. What surprised him is how fast she took to get the glass of water.

He smiled as he saw her struggling to try and look like she's still the noble, still ever the most elegant, and whatnot -- it didn't matter. He saw right through her facade though. He spend years perfecting that sort of thing, and he could see how she was trying to stay composed. It didn't really matter to him, though. He always assumed that this sort of thing meant someone cared for him, even though they may just be legitimately pissed off at him for what he did. Well, he couldn't blame her -- a pet that doesn't follow instructions is always bad.

"Do you think of me as an actual person? Does a peasant have no worth?" He seems to have lowered his voice a significant degree, speaking softly. Why would Yves care about what some peasant would say, even if they beat another noble in battle? Well, she would at least try to listen what he has to say. Why would she still care though? She knows that he's just some savage, some brute. He parts his hair a little bit, still laying in bed -- squirming lightly in the occasional jolt of pain suddenly returning and disappearing again, as he still locked eyes with her face.

"Well... were you at least satisfied that I kicked Guiche's ass?" He tried to lighten the mood a bit, as he gave a wide smile. He actually felt satisfied about something he did in his life. He actually stood up for what he believed in. It felt -- good.
 
As Yves continued flipping through a few of the pages of her book, she realized that the peasant was starting to talk to her. She quickly put the book down with her thumb in the gap, and as she watched and listened to the peasant, she wrapped the bookmark ribbon around her wrist, tying it with an elegant bow using her left, free hand. Once she had heard the peasant's question, she slouched a bit more and sighed. "Of course you're a person...unless you're trying to tell me something," she shot him a glare at this, looking him over for a second, then relaxed a little and looked into his eyes a bit more calmly, returning to her former, more elegant posture.

"Peasants are people who can't use magic. Without magic, they are practically useless to society, aside from labor and other menial tasks." She pauses for a moment, thinking, then continues, "Here in Tristain, there are about as many peasants as there are nobles, maybe less." here she offers him a slight grin, "I suppose they make the lives of us nobles slightly easier, sometimes. Most of the time they're just hindrances, gobbling up all our food and resources despite doing close to nothing in return except lie, cheat, steal, and run away all the time. Those who we keep as servants regularly disobey us unless we train them properly. That's why, in noble court, they teach us to treat them like livestock so that they do not have the opportunities to spite us."

At this, she frowns, looking over to a book at the table, and comments, "There are a few peasants who work like nobles, to some extent. We have a few of those kinds of peasants working here at the university. They are about as close to nobility as you can get in the peasantry, so I respect them to some extent..." here she trailed off, then twitched, as if coming to a sudden realization. Then, she looked back over at the peasant with a stern expression, "...I hope you understood at least some of that." After saying this, she blushed a little from embarrassment and picked up her book again, quickly slipping back into her poor posture as she continued to read. "Tricking me into lecturing...how clever..." she mumbled, her eyes already scanning through the words again.

Once the peasant asked his second question she practically ignored it, responding, "No...I told you to stop...many times...so stop bragging...idiot..." After a few more seconds of reading, however, she sighed, marked her place with her thumb, and looked over at him. After seeing his smile, she recoiled slightly, appearing uncomfortable, but recovered an instant later. She still had an uncertain expression as she inhaled, but spoke smoothly as she commented, "if you want me to be satisfied with your actions, just do what you're told...like every other familiar." After saying this, she continued looking over at him for a few seconds, as if thinking about something, then continued to read her book in silence.
 
There wasn't much the bedridden Hayato could do, aside from sleeping -- sleeping again, waiting for the designated time to eat, and sleeping until she gets this magical potion that would supposedly make all his wounds go away and be healed, but without the ability to stand up from his bed, he was stuck here. He was sprawled a bit on the bed, trying to find a comfortable sleeping position. If not for the sheets, he would look rather broken. Without the ability to feel pain, he knew there were some joints he couldn't even move despite the lack of pain at that area. Either way, it didn't stop him from trying -- albeit this was mostly useless, since his bones were still broken.

But then, he noticed that Yves was reacting to what he said about the peasantry. Noticing that she didn't really get the hint, he wanted to correct her on the context, but decided against it. Arguing with Yves would probably not bode well, but he noticed something different in the way she reacted. She seemed to glare at first, but softened her gaze to a mere calm look on her eyes, regaining that sense of politeness. Was she respecting him? Probably not, but she really didn't have a reason to act all polite in front of her familiar. Sometimes, he couldn't tell if her trying to look elegant was a hint at her having some sort of respect for Hayato, or it was just force of habit. He could only observe, after all.

Hayato listened in rapt attention -- mostly because he was bored. He was the type of guy who relaxes when listening to audio books back in the realm where magic is the stuff of fantasy. While this probably might be a dream, he might as well get immersed in the environment. She was talking about how peasants are labeled peasants, and how peasants at the university are generally better than those who aren't. Negatively though, she lists as to how they're mostly terrible for taking up supply as what he can gather, and how some run away and steal. Oh, how he could just try and bring up the point, that if they treated their peasants better they wouldn't try to rebel. But still, this isn't going to stop that until some sort of cultural revolution occurs, like the French Revolution in 'real life'. At least he was getting his mind jogging, instead of being bogged down filing all these acquisition reports six days a week, twelve hours a day.

"Thank you, Yves. I... I guess you're pretty nice for a noble. I mean, I would have expected you to treat me like trash after nearly getting you in trouble but... you're here, taking care of me. That's heartwarming, to say the least." Instead of going the route of trying to change her mind, he should try to prove that he isn't like the other peasants. Understandably, nothing can change the mind of an entire culture that lives on this sort of 'slavery'. He should at least try to keep a level head, and try to ease Yves up to him. Noticing her blush, most likely from embarrassment, he understandably changes things up a little bit, and smiles softly. "I'll follow your instructions then, since you've been... nice to me." He tries to instill that he would be responsive to orders if she was nice to him, which was a simple give-take demand from him if she wanted co-operation.
 
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