Genius Seventh Prince 48 Home Again

Greyson knew that time was of the essence with his travels to the Idris Kingdom since he needed to visit the church again for a couple days. After he finished Genesis, he had started preparing for all the goodbyes. Although this goodbye was not going to be forever or permanent, Greyson knew that it would be awhile before he could see them again unless they had some reason to go to the Idris Kingdom. Slowly but surely, the day of his departure arrived. On this day, Greyson grabbed his packed bag and threw it over his shoulder and placed his parting gift to Lyle outside his roommate's door. He had not let his friend know that he was leaving today because out of everyone he felt saying goodbye to Lyle was the hardest. Lyle was his first real same-age friend and he was really sad to see that his rapid growth had left behind this friend. Similar to Claude, Greyson was starting to realize that these friends of his were not on the same path as him as their potential and talent differed too greatly. A feeling of desolation and loneliness crept its way into his heart, but it only renewed his hopes to go to the Idris Kingdom, because the higher and more powerful he climbed he knew he would be able to meet friends who could follow him along all of his journey. Thinking about his next destination and new rivals got him excited as he firmly stepped out of the dorm.

Greyson's next stop was Castiel's painting workshop. Without walking in, he placed a canvas pulled out of his spatial bag on the doorstep before swiftly flying off. He did not notice that right after he walked away, his quiet teacher came out and picked up the canvas. Castiel knew that his disciple was leaving today and had a feeling he would just leave like this. That child always looked cold, but on the inside he had a warm and caring heart which enabled him to create such wonderful paintings. Looking down, Castiel finally focused on the scene painted on the canvas. His eyes widened in surprise as he saw a painting of himself. It was a common everyday scene of Castiel sitting in the open room painting. The tranquil and warm atmosphere was all caught within the scene and the onlooker could tell the appreciation held for the painter in the picture. If Greyson had stayed behind, he would be shocked to see his always stoic teacher break into a warm and happy smile. Castiel then proceeded to hang the painting in the most obvious space in the workshop so he could look at it every now and then.

Greyson spent all day running around to his different teachers leaving them similar gifts. A song for Carlyle, a homemade chair for Old Man Thraec who always complained of the metal chairs in the workshop being too uncomfortable for his old back, and either a painting or useful magic tool for the Head Teachers. He had been planning this for a while so he had time to finish everything and put a lot of thought into each gift.

Summoning Zephyr and hopping onto his dragon's back, Greyson took one last look at Academy City while the memories of the past three years flashed past his eyes. Three years could be seen as a short time by some, but for the young Greyson it was more than a third of his life spent here. From an ignorant village boy knowing nothing, he took his first steps into the world of magicians and his occupations here. Everything had started here. Finally, he turned away and began to fly off while saying silent goodbyes to all his friends and teachers.

...

"Grey Grey is so bad! How could he just leave without saying anything..." Leilena cried.

"Hmph, what's the point of soppy goodbyes. It's better this way!" The gruff voice of Keenan remarked, but if one looked closely they could see the sadness and attachment in his eyes.

"Wow, our little disciple has really grown up... How sad... Comfort me, Vivienne!" Edwin feigned sadness before shamelessly looking towards Vivienne.

"Begone! You vile man! Stop pretending you are not sad when I know you're probably the saddest of us all. You just like to hide behind your disgusting exterior." Vivienne coldly looked at the man. She has know the twins for the longest, so she knew that although Edwin acted playful that he was the one with softest heart out of all of them.

"This is not goodbye forever. We should be proud that our disciple is moving on to greater things." Elendil quipped. His usual frozen exterior had cracked a little and one could see the hint of sadness mixed with pride in his expression. All the rest of the teachers then grew silent and prayed that things would go well.

...

"Hmph! Who wants your terrible music! I could write one a thousand times better... I... I..." One could hear the indignant shouts sounding from inside Carlyle's room which at some point switched to him blubbering and crying. All the people around couldn't help but roll their eyes at this musician's peculiar way of grieving, but they, too, would miss the cute little flute player.

...

"Ugh, I'm not so old that I need this chair. I still have a lot of youth left, just look at how spry I am. But... Hmmm... It is pretty comfortable... Well, I guess you have to look at who taught the boy. Of course he would be able to create such a comfortable chair. I guess I'll forgive him for just leaving me behind. Who's going to help this old bag of bones with all the hard labor now, though, how inconvenient..." A long monologue could be heard from inside Thraec's workshop as he tested out his disciple's going away present. One of the assistant's bringing the metal that the blacksmith asked for felt his lip twitching. Are you old or are you young?! What was with this old man?

...

Quickly flying through the air, it took Greyson around two days to finally see traces of Willow town again. He could only summon Zephyr out for around two hours of flying before his mana ran out, but luckily dragons were extremely fast flyers so even with the breaks in between it still only took him a couple days. Knowing how flashy and disconcerting arriving on a dragon would be, Greyson landed inside the woods a little ways away from the church and walked the rest of the way. When he was walking through an opening in the woods, he suddenly felt it looked familiar. Eyes lighting up, he glanced over at the sleeping Lucius on his shoulder and smiled.

"Hey, Lu, do you remember us first meeting here?"

"How could I forget? I approached curiously wondering what you were flailing and screaming about in the middle of the woods." Lucius's eyes flickered open as he giggled thinking back to that initial scene.

"That's just because I never learned anything about magic at that point! Obviously it's not like that anymore..." Greyson fiercely blushed thinking back to his ridiculous antics while trying to first learn how to control magic.

"Oh, yes~ yes~ you are no the all amazing genius magician Greyson. Who would else but me would know your dark past?" Lucius mocked with sarcasm and laughter literally dripping from his voice.

"Whatever... Let's just quickly go back." Rolling his eyes, Greyson stopped listening to Lucius and continued running through the woods.

In little to no time at all, Greyson was approaching the ever familiar church. Grinning widely, he started pushing his magic even more as he quickly approached his home. However, the closer he got, the more he could hear sounds of argument. His happy smile soon changed to a frown that became even deeper when the church's front scene became completely visible to him. He saw a group of men grabbing onto Sister Lily while a couple of the other children in the church were being held by their friends looking beat up. One of the men gave a hard slap to Lily's face after something she said that Greyson could not completely catch. Seeing Lily being hit, Greyson was furious and he burst in action. His eyes switched to a dark black as the shadows of the trees rapidly moved to the three men before binding them all into place. Sister Lily and the children were all shocked by the change in events before turning to look at the approaching small figure.

At first, they could only feel confusion at who the approaching young boy was until Sister Lily's eyes quickly flashed with recognition.

"Grey!" She yelled happily. The rest of the children hearing the name looked shocked as they glanced again at the boy. Grey? As in Greyson? The one who had disappeared for three years. Greyson smiled when he saw that Sister Lily had still recognized him so quickly. After he had awakened a part of his elf bloodline, his hair had changed to a platinum silver and his eyes were not the same color at the moment. Plus his body had changed after three years of growth, so he was worried that nobody would recognize him at first. Hearing her shout out after only a moment's hesitation warmed his heart as he really felt that he had returned home. However, before he could really happily return, he needed to take care of the trash that had abused his family while he was gone.

His black eyes turned and glared at the men. The men saw his glare and began to shiver in fear. They obviously knew that it was just a young boy in front of them, but they could not help but feel fear deep within their hearts. His eyes quickly switched to a bright green. Strong winds followed that sent the group of men flying back. A loud crunch sounded that made all the listeners flinch even Greyson, but he stayed firm in his stance. One of the men cried out in pain as the others scrambled to pick him up and run off after taking one last fearful glance at the young silver-haired boy. Greyson nodded after seeing that the men were gone before turning around and letting loose a happy grin in Sister Lily's direction.

"I'm home!" He declared.

"Mm... Welcome home, Greyson!" Sister Lily lovingly nodded while opening her arms wide.

The tears that Greyson has held back for so long suddenly felt as if they were springing forward at once. Drops slowly dripped down his face and he buried his head into Sister Lily's warm embrace. It was as if all his struggles and pressures just disappeared in that moment. No matter if it was real or not, he felt safe and relaxed.

Chapter end