Two baptisms

Few days after Kiira and Ruzu made their first appearence, I, Father, Mother and Mina went to church in our town named Roseburg.

The reason was that today was Mina’s fifth birthday and she was about to get her apprisal ceremony. The entire thing was happening behind closed doors, but we were allowed to stay in main part of the church to offer our prayers.

With Kiira beside me, I knelt and put my hands together in gesture of prayer. And in that moment, white light enveloped me.

„So he made it huh?“ male voice ringed quite loudly through this place.

„They both did,“ female voice answered warmly.

I opened my eyes to meet white room with light blue table. Kiira was staring on people before us.

„G-gods? Did we died again?“

„N-no, we just took your souls to Divine realm for a quick chat,“ woman said again while waiving her hands in denial.

As I scanned faces before me I recognised them from statues in the temple. There was Creator goddess Ibris, Magic goddess Kuudia, War god Baldum, Alchemy god Humos, Merchant god Romjir, Agriculture goddess Deelia and lastly Artisan goddess Ova.

„First things first, it’s an honor to meet you in person. But please enlighten me, why did you wanted to talk.“

„He doesn‘t remember?“

„He doesn‘t remember.“

„He doesn‘t remember!“

„Wh-what should I remember?“

„Your skill … well…“ the alchemy god scratched his bald head.

„The [King] skill we gave you is kinda broken,“ said Merchant god and stroke his brown beard lightly looking totally uninteresed.

„Wh-what do you mean broken?“

„The King of greed is one of Demon king skills. So in order to not turn you into a demon we need to give you an opposite skill.“

„Wait, Demon king skill? What does that mean?“

„Skills that bears the [King] stigma are divided into Angelic and Demonic. That is not something humans would know. So in order to keep your soul from becoming demonic, we will grant you angelic skill. And the Demon king skills are extra worrysome,“ creation goddess said, looking uninterested and sipping her tea.

„Ah, I see. I understood now.“

„Well, the saintess got three angelic skills already so only thing we can give you right now is [King of wisdom] skill.“

„Whoa, what does it do?“

„The main part is it's ability to give you apprisal, Analyze material, Analyze goods and analyze item. It also have subskill, but that one can be used only with blessing of Skill god and he never gave his blessing before,“ said the creator goddess.

If I remember correctly, Creator goddess Ibris after creating the world created twin goddesses of Life and Death and then Created skill god. Thanks to the skill god other gods were born.

„If that will help me stay with my familiy, then please,“ I bowed.

„Oh, no need for that. There is actually one thing we will want from you in return.“

„Of course, whatever you need,“ I said still bowing.

„We want you to use your skills to take down any demon, angel or dragon that cames your way.“

„Wait angels? Aren’t those guys on your side?“

„They deffinetely used to be!“ Artisan god said laughing.

„When demons were banished into demon realm. They started acting all mighty, some of them even calling themselves new gods… back then we had to summon a hero in order to seal them away in their own realm… seriously that was a pain in the ass… now, let’s get to giving you those skills!“ the creator goddess explained and thrust one of her fingers into my chest.

„Ah! That hurts!“ Before I knew it her hand was back out.

„Great it went smoothly. Congrats, you gained King of wisdom skill,“ creator goddess said with warm smile.

„Okay, now is my turn,“ Goddess of magic said with gentle smile, „Your hands please… great. Now I grant you conceal skill and Icreased mana recovery skill. Now is time for you to return. Bye~“

The white light enveloped us again. When I opened my eye we were back in the church.

Mina just left the room looking quite happy.

„Everything finished?“

„Yes Father. I have recieved my status board.“

„Let’s take a look when we return home, shall we?“

„Yes.“

Back home everyone went to do what they wanted until time of diner came. And after dined, when servants took all dishes from the table and left the room, Mina opened her status for us to see.

Name: Mina Netrose
Level: 1
Titles: Third daughter

Skills: Magic manipulation (2), Light magic (1) Lightning magic (1), Estimation (5), Item box (4)

Blessings: Magic goddess (4), Mechant god (5)

„Oh, Merchant gods blessing, that’s new in family, quite high too, and Magic goddess blessing is also quite high. The item box is good to have I would say,“ father said with happy smile.

„Magic power of one thousand at your age is remarkable, you could probably pass as royal mage in the future,“ mother said.

Mina simply nodded and looked at me.

„You’re really lucky sis!“ I smiled at her and she smiled back with „Thank you brother.“

„I will ask my friend from labyrinth army to help you with light magic training.“

„Thank you Father.“

„In that case I will look for someone for training in merchant part of her blessings,“ mother said proudly. Soon after that I went to sleep.

The time flew by and time for my baptism came. I became five years old and Kiira was allowed to have baptism together with me. Normally slaves already had gone through baptism and most commoners had one at 10 years of age. So it was special privilage.

Once again we were lined in carriage with me sitting next to Kiira and Mina. During the past few years Mina started sneaking into my bed and the first time was suprised by Kiira being already there.

We entered the church and I remembered the first time I was there.

Skills that I got here back there was King of wisdom, conceal and Increased magic recovery, both of them being level one. So in order to level it up I was using it to completly hide all my skills during these two years. Not like there was someone who could see it.

It was said that highest reachable level for skills is 5, but I found out that my conceal can go even more up, now being level 9. Somehow I also got apprisal skill during this time so I kept using it until it reached level 5. Although I have my King of Wisdom skill... No, I should be glad for it, I can't really show everyone my unique skill right?

From my skills I decided to only show my magic skills, magic manipulation, increased magic and stamina recovery and apprisal.

I went inside baptism room and knelt before the altar. The head priest said some prayers and droped some cold water on my head. When the water fell on white floor it turned from clear to yellowish green.

„Seems like you aquired quite a handful of blessings my son. Now go to sir Eisbuch next door to finish your apprisal ceremony.“

„Yes, sir,“ said with light bow.

On my way I used Status and saw that I recieved blessings of Magic, War, Alchemy, Merchant and skill gods.
Wait skill god? didn't creator goddess said that he never gives his blessing? Wait it's level 10?! What the hell is going on? Wait, what skill did I also got? None...
What about subskill of King of wisdom? Oh, there are now two of them! Great! So the first one is World dictionary. It allows it's user to search for informations of this world.
The other skill is Complete comprehension. this skill allows me to comprehend anything in less then a second. So I just need to think about problem and the answer will appear, great!

All other blessings were level 5. As the Head priest said, I have quite a lot of blessings I decided that I will keep all of them except skill god’s blessing, but I will lower their levels to similar of my sister. So Magic, Merchant and War gods blessing I made look level 4, Alchemy god’s level 3.

I also recieved item box and transmute skills of level five, but I made them look like level 3.

„So you are the Duke’s youngest boy?“ said man of aproximately sixty years of age.

„Yes, my name is Leo Netrose. It’s a pleasure.“

„My, so polite with old man like me. You surely take a lot after your mother,“ the man smiled warmly.

„People do say that,“ I smiled back.

„Well, take the seat and we will begun… Now, [Apprisal] go… Oh, that is nice collection of blessings and skills. Your Apprisal is same level as mine, I see magical patern of your siblings with Lightning magic, but getting Space magic is really rare. It’s said that only one in a million can get this atribute. After all it is an Advanced atribute.“

„So, I got lucky?“

„Yes, you really did. A piece of advice, Magic should be your main topic of study in the future, but given that you have War god’s blessing you shouldn’t forgot about your swordsmanship training. In the future, if you do good in school, you could become court magician, Royal appriser, or even Royal magic knight.“

Sorry, I already decided to be greedy, so I will be putting my hands on all those rare skills, I thought.

„I will keep that in mind. Thank you,“ I said and with slight bow I left. Within few minutes Kiira was out and all smiles. We headed home and I crushed on bed.

„Leo, you have a minute?“ Kiira asked.

„Yeah, sure,“ I said without opening my eyes.

In that moment Kiira jumped on top of me.

„What are you doing?“

„Hehe~ Well, I have to tell you what blessing I got and new unique skill as well.“

„And you have to sit on me like this?“

„Of course~ The blessing after all is from goddess of love. And that unique skill is called [United hearts].“

„And what it do?“

„Well~ as name implies, it unites hearts of those in love, silly~“ she said while stroking my hairs, now laying on me.

„So stats increase?“

„Uuu, Leo you dummy,“ Kiira pouted and hit me with her fist.

I sit up patted her head and kissed her cheek.

„Let’s test it when we are allowed to go train outside of the city.“

„Y-yesh!“ Kiira blushed so much she forgot to say anything else.

After that I changed my clothes to something more casual and left for dinerhall.

When the diner was finnished, father cleared his throat and said importantly: „Now, Leo, show us your status.“

„Yes father. [Status open].“

The board I displayed was same as the one in ceremony earlier that day.

Name: Leo Netrose
Level: 1
Titles: Third son, Father’s boy

Skill: Magic manipulation (3), Increased mana recovery (2), Increased stamina recovery (3), Fire magic (1), Water magic (1), Wind magic (1), Earth magic (1), Ice magic (1), Lightning magic (1), Space magic (1), Item box (3), Transmute (3), Apprisal (5)

Blessings: Magic goddess (4), War god (4), Merchant god (4), Alchemy god (3)

„Wha– Four blessings?! Three of them level 4?! And Space magic alongside Apprisal and Item box? This never happened before in our kingdom! No, in the world!“

„That is really true, dear. You will have to put extra work in your skills, Leo.“

„Yes mother. That also reminds me, father, could I go to the forest for training? I think it would be fine, if I had Ruzu with me. She is after all, former explorer.“

„Well that is true, but before that there are two things that we have to do.“

„And are those Father?“

„You will have a party presenting you to nobles and people of power in our teritory, in two months. And more imortantly, we have to transfer ownership of those two to you. Not like we could separate that little one from you anyway.“

„Yes Father, that is correct. Should I and Kiira start training with swords in the meantime then?“

„Yes. I would leave it to Ruzu, but she isn’t really someone with experience in cobat against humans. But she still can teach you about monsters in these parts.“

„Understood Father. I will do as you say.“

„We should also start thinking about your spouse…“

„Isn’t it too soon, Father?“

„What do you mean soon? It’s normal for us nobles to be betrothed at this age. Look at your brothers, they all already have their fiancées. Gavin is even glad for it.“

„Your sisters are also betrothed, except for Mina that is,“ mother added.

„Well, could we wait at least until I enter school?“ I tried to put on a cute face, which always worked on father.

„W-what about a compromise? I will let it slide for now, BUT! When you reach ten years a yearly banquet to introduce young nobles will be held in royal capital. If some girl there pique your interest, then we will enter marriage talk with their family. I don’t belive that they would be very interested in third son, but families with lot of children will be happy if they got to tie some bonds with our familiy. You will need to be extra careful to around those kind of people.“

„I guess I will have to accept that. Thank you for your listening to my selfish request Father, Mother,“ I smiled and left the room.

Behind the door I met with Kiira who must have heard something, becouse she started clinging to me right away.

„You are not going somewhere where I can’t follow are you Leo?“

„Of course not. Whenever I go, you go with me. Forever, just as we promised,“ I whispered into her ear the last part, making her blush.

The next day after breakfast I met my swordsmanship and magic instructors. Kiira was there with me as always, but today she had big warm smile. She had it all evening, and even in her sleep.

„So you two are the kids sir Flik asked us to train?“

„Yes, I’m Flik Netrose’s third son. Leo Netrose is my name. This is my attendant, Kiira.“

„What a fine intodiction, are you sure you are your father’s son?“

„Oh, are you doubting my loyalty to my dear husband, sir Helbert?“ mother asked with cold gaze.

„N-not at all Madam Sareen!“ the man saluted, while sweating bullets.

„You should at least introduce yourself to sir Leo first you big oaf! …Anyway, I’m Liteena Butell, hononary baroness. I’m one of the Thirteen wands of royal capital, I can use all basic elements and Ice magic. As you are space magic user as well, I would like to see you use some space magic for future refference, if that's okay with you.“

Hononary titles are not hereditary, so it’s rarer to see any higher then Hononary knight or more commonly called chevalier. This is acctually my first time seeing one.

„Are space magic users that rare?“

„There is only one more in the entire kingdom I'm aware off. Weirdly she is also your age, so you may meet one day. By the way, I’m Helbert Hen, viscount who governs town on border between this territory and Royal territotry. Sorry for the late introduction.“

For next two months we trained daily. I gained swordsmanship skill and leveled it up to level 4, my basic magic skills got to level 3, with lightning and ice being level 4. Lastly my space magic got to level 2. Magic manipulation became level 6 and mana recovery and stamina recovery level 5. It was one hell of a training! From morning to evening I was getting beaten up again and again. I even learnt Self-healing skill and leveled it up to level 5!

From what I learned Fire, Water, Wind and Earth are called basic magics. Lighting, Ice, Light, darkness and Metal are Intermediate magics.

Advanced magics are Space, Void, Nature, Holy, Psychic and Ghost magics. There is also something called Dragon, Crimson, Demonic and Angelic magics, which can’t be possesed by humans as they don’t have sufficient mana pools. My overall mana broke through five digits a few days ago so I guess I could use them anyway.

Our last test was a tag battle between me with Kiira against our teachers.

„Kiira, could you obscure vision with your fire magic?“

„Sure, will you take care of Helbert-sensei?“

„I will try get you few minutes to get your chant ready, but please be quick.“

„Let’s do it!“

The battle started. I blocked sword of Helbert and Kiira used [Smokescreen] to obscure our vision, but Liteena used wind magic spell to blow it away. In that moment I used my magic to coat my sword with pure mana and added lightning atribute to it, in order to paralyze Helbert.

Liteena tried to move in in order to lift the paralysis, but was stopped by fire wall made by Kiira.

Liteena used wind shield to breake through the wall, but was welcomed by my Stone cannon. The spell hit her hard and she was sent back through the fire wall, where Kiira already was prepared with her [Fire binding] spell.

„W-we did it!“ Kiira laugh and hugged me, when mother called it our victory.

True, they both were holding back quite a lot, but it was our win never-the-less.

„Heh, and they used to call us unstoppable duo… seems like that title now goes to these two youngsters, Madam.“ Helbert-sensei said to my mother looking proud.