159 Chapter 159
While the crowd was still shaken, Aron and Evanora walked over to Lady Rose whose brief smile had faded and her usual strict looking demeanor returned.
"Shall we be on our way?" Aron asked casually and she nodded calmly before the three prepared to walk away from the venue.
This sight was beyond infuriating to some. The key to their organization or families rising was in the hands of a Harbinger ranked student who thus far proved he had no equal in his generation and a Grand Mage.
A pairing like this shattered all hopes of using force to gain information from them. Worse off he had clearly stated he had no family or friends they could take advantage of to perhaps threaten him which served to only make them feel even more bitter.
Unlike the other academy officials, Lady Uva could not have asked for a better outcome. She was already aware that Aron had some link to Limbo and that he held knowledge not yet attainted in Pesia.
If it was these two who held such knowledge then she was sure nothing catastrophic would occur as compared to letting greedy and ambitious families take it. However this was all based on the faith she had for both of them, their actual means if necessary had already proven to be catastrophic in their own right.
"Wait we cant end this here!" Yohan was unwilling to end the situation just like that but Lady Uva herself wasn\'t about to let an uproar breakout so she intervened. "This isn\'t a trail Yohan, neither you nor anyone else has the right to prevent them from leaving if they desire to do so. If you wish to speak to them then do so on private terms, otherwise let us hear the reports of an official faction that did use Galos academy resources." Lady Uva just reminded everyone of the other group that was present at the Komi Islands.
In that moment Juliet stood up and began walking over towards the pedestal but glanced at Aron walking away for a moment as she did so.
...
As the so called gathering continued, Aron, Lady Rose and Evanora took a carriage to Aaron\'s residence near the business district.
Lady Rose did have her own tower on the academy premises like Belle and Yohan but Aron wasn\'t confident in it\'s privacy. Anyone skilled enough could easily break in and set up a way to listen in on their conversations.
So for now the only secure place they could speak was his residence where the numerous runes he had set up guaranteed that there would be no leaks.
During the carriage ride Aron and Lady Rose once again shared no words just to be safe, it was only Evanora who seemed slightly fidgety. \'Evanora shouldn\'t have said secrets...\' She thought while casting side glances at Aron who was seated beside her and Lady Rose opposite her.
"Evanora is sorry for sharing secrets... it won\'t happen again." Evanora genuinely apologized while the lost look on her face remained.
Aron who had his head resting on his hand cast her a short glance and patted her head. "Don\'t concern yourself with the past."
Lady Rose nodded her head at this in agreement before crossing her legs and adjusting her sitting posture. "Indeed, furthermore I do not mind his perverse gazes towards my posterior." She added while giving Aron a cold glance with a small smile on her face.
"Spare me the accusations." Aron ignored her gaze and continued to look out the window instead.
It didn\'t take long for the trio to arrive at Aron\'s residence where quite a few individuals were gathered outside the gate.
These were commoners who simply wished to glance at the student who overturned most norms known to them.
"Followers of yours?" Lady Rose asked upon seeing the individuals gathered on the sides of the road leading to his residence.
Most of them looked quite young and were most likely first years but they were a few individuals who had a certain aura of nobility around them while others didn\'t come across as students at all... most likely spies.
"Who knows." Aron replied uncaringly before opening the door to the carriage and exiting.
After him followed Evanora and finally Lady Rose. The once cheery and excited atmosphere immediately grew silent in that moment.
For most this was their first time seeing not only Aron but also Lady Rose up close, two of the biggest enigmas in the academy at the moment.
Aron scanned the people present only for a moment before proceeding to enter his residence, despite his gate always being opened no one present dared set foot in.
Before leaving he had left many measures in place within. It was expected that when he left some individuals would try to break in which they did but all attempts failed.
The biggest measure he made was that upon entering his residence whose terrain and arrangement was now basically that of a large custom rune mechanism, one will feel their mana start to dwindle at an astonishing rate without recovery.
What the rune actually did was siphon mana from an individual\'s very body and store it into crystals placed in certain parts of the residence.
Aron first thought of this when he tried coming up with a way to filter out his Luna mana, the problem with this method however is that it didn\'t distinguish between Luna and Sol, it simply siphoned the mana of any foreign being or object cast into it.
If an individual stayed too long they would die from having all their mana taken. A brutal measure that didn\'t discriminate from friend or foe.
The only way to bypass this was by having a tiny piece of runed circular metal that negated the effects on ones figure which of course both Evanora and Lady Rose currently possessed.
The best part of using this method is that Aron could take note of the mana signature stored in the crystal so that if he were to encounter it again he would know which individual tried to break in when he was away.
"It\'s completely undetectable, impressive runing." Lady Rose complimented once they made their way past the gate. She tried to see any signs of runes but she found none, at first glance it looked like a completely ordinary equestrian manor.
"It falls under the category of geographic runing, using the terrain of an area to set up a near naturally existing rune mechanism. We can discuss it in further detail another time." Aron explained briefly but Lady Rose remained impressed although her facial expressions didn\'t show it in the least.
Anything to do with new knowledge peaked the interest of this studious woman. So she herself was eager to learn of this and apply it in the many ways she began to imagine.
In her eyes Aron was a genius without equal presently but in truth he himself was also just studious and had a slightly above average level of comprehension.
....
Meanwhile later that very day back on the Sovereign the crew had now began to awaken from the Mist Arts Jin had cast on them.
Once everyone was awake Jin had them gather in the dinning hall and explained what transpired as they were out.
Both he and Jagu didn\'t know what Aron was planning and were only asked to follow his instructions. Jagu to a certain extent did this out of both reverence towards him and trust in his abilities while Jin had a sort of blind faith in Aron\'s ways.
He explained that he only did as asked because even after all this he chose to trust in Aron.
After hearing how the entire gathering had gone and what exactly Aron had said, everyone held mixed emotions.
"So he did this so that we wouldn\'t be targeted right?" Riya muttered in a weak shaky tone as she still sought a reasonable answer to what transpired.
"He said he had no family or friends though." Another member added dejectedly and reminded just how easily he said those words.
Jin was about to do his best to make them understand his train of thought but surprisingly Jagu spoke first.
"He did it because you\'re all a burden, including myself. If we went to that gathering as a group your families and own lives would have been at risk so you have no right to blame him for what he did. Blame yourselves for being weak and having him shoulder the hate of countless aristocrats now..."
"As for friends... what qualifications do any of you have to call yourselves his friends when you don\'t even understand what he has sacrificed to keep you all alive!Tsk, humans." Jagu growled angrily and expressed his own idea of why Aron did what he did.
Was it really for them? Did he do so because he cared? Just what was his reason?
Many asked themselves this including Jin and Jagu but none could reach a logical and concise answer.
In reality the answer was simple.
By doing what Aron did today he gained support from countless commoners while many aristocrats now respected him.
Bringing them along brought no positives because if he indeed got threatened with their lives and those of their families he still wouldn\'t reveal anything.
This would only gain him the hate of both aristocrats and commoners alike while still having numerous forces and families target him.
He simply chose to go about it this way because it was more logical and perhaps beneficial but only time could tell for sure.