"Alright, for now we'll keep it in the core room until a guard arrives." Chronos said as he began guiding Old Tobias and the fairy deeper inside.
Old Tobias was already too distracted showing different runes to it and watching its responses to walk on his own.
"Oh ho, so you know this one. Then what about this one..."
As he kept switching between different runes the fairy would show happy expressions for new ones but bored expressions for ones it had already seen. Then Old Tobias took it a step further and showed it an arrangement of basic runes for a flamethrowing spell.
Its eyes went wide as it realized that runes could be linked together, it looked like it had a wonderful idea.
Chronos got a bad feeling.
A moment later runes appeared in front of it and Chronos was forced to cast [Isolate] as a wind blade was shot at him.
The blade burst into a gust of wind when it struck his barrier and child-like laughter echoed down the hallway.
"Hyahahaha."
The fairy was happily laughing at being able to use magic.
"Well, that's new. How many different spells do you think it can use?" Old Tobias asked.
"Probably anything related to nature, vitality, or thought. And would it kill you to be a little more worried about your apprentice? I just had a wind blade shot at me." Chronos scolded.
"Such a weak wind blade won't hurt you even without a barrier and suffering when discovering something new is normal, besides you blocked it." Old Tobias said.
"Hah you are insufferable; you know that old man. There are such things as safety protocols." Chronos continued.
"Safety, what now? Can you eat those?" Pretending to be ignorant he kept showing runes to the fairy.
Chronos gave up talking to him. He'd say the old man would learn once he got hurt, but with a missing leg and eye, it was clear that lesson wasn't sinking in.
As they entered the core room all of the enchanters stopped working and stared at the fairy. It was something none of them had seen before and seeing it using runes meant that every enchanter was interested in it.
"Oh, that's an interesting creature. What is it?"
"Is it safe for it to be using runes?"
"Can we play with it?"
They chattered as they gathered around them.
Raising his hands Chronos said, "All of you calm down I'll answer your questions one at a time. For those of you who know about the legends and stories you might recognize this creature. It's a fairy, specifically a castle fairy. No, it's not safe for it to be using runes without knowledge but it seems to have an instinctive understanding of runes related to the layers connected to the castle.
And no, you can't play with it right now. Old Tobias will be teaching it about runes and testing it to find out where its limits are. Please set up various protections as stray attacks may come at you."
"Way ahead of you there." Said one of the enchanters as he held up a small shield. "We always expect something to go wrong when old Tobias starts experimenting."
Glancing around Chronos saw small balls, scrolls, or pieces of armor start floating around every enchanter. There were so many different protective methods that he would be surprised if any of them were injured by accidental magic.
No wonder they were considered the elites amongst enchanters.
As the enchanters got back to work Magnus rushed into the room.
"Where is it? I must confirm that it really exists."
"Over here." Chronos waved him over.
Seeing old Tobias teaching the fairy the runes for lightning magic he interrupted them.
"Don't teach it such dangerous magic. We don't want it to accidentally kill someone." Magnus said as he rushed forward to stop them.
"Lightning magic isn't that dangerous." Old Tobias muttered.
Magnus glared at him.
"Alright, I won't teach it lightning magic." He raised his hands in surrender, then he cast the lightning rune he had already made.
"Tobias!"
"I said I wouldn't teach it! If it learns how to use it on its own, then that's not my problem." He was staring at the wall pointedly ignoring Magnus's glare.
The fairy was staring at the lightning with sparkling eyes. It really seemed to like the lightning magic and immediately started trying to cast it.
"Hold on little one, that magic is very dangerous and shouldn't be used lightly. If you want to use that magic, then you'll need to go to the training rooms on the east side." Magnus said.
"It can't reach the rooms on the east side yet. It can only travel in the area where the towers have been activated and the towers over there aren't operational." Old Tobias explained.
"Then Chronos I want you to synchronize all of the towers next to the keep as fast as possible. For now, I'll take over a room on the lowest floor of the keep and have the fairy stay with me. Chris and I will take care of it for now." Magnus said as he passed a written order to Chronos.
"Aw can't it just stay with me for now?" Old Tobias tried to give him puppy eyes and failed miserably.
"No, we don't know what crazy knowledge you'll teach it." Magnus rubbed his forehead.
Trying to keep Old Tobias from teaching it bad habits was going to give him more of a headache than the fairy itself.
"Come on little one. I'll show you the rest of the castle.. and give you a name. We can't keep calling you little one forever." He decided.
"Yeah!" The fairy cheered as it followed Magnus towards the surface.
Chronos shook his head while sighing, that fairy was going to cause all sorts of problems. Maybe it had already. Once word of this got back to the king, he might be asked to try to help the fairies of other castles manifest.
The king would definitely bother his clan to help out too. Hm, hmm, yep, he was going to ignore it. He had a job to do right now.
He grabbed one of the foremen on his way to the towers, "Come with me. I need someone to wipe a rune surface so I can rewrite it. Here's the order from Magnus."
The foreman read the order then nodded. "Alright I'll reset the runes for you. Which runes need to be reset?"
"Just the syncing rune. The current setup won't work but we've found a replacement rune already." Chronos replied.
Entering the first tower the foreman drove everyone out. Since this involved the secrets of the castle he would cover it up with fake runes to throw off anyone trying to steal their secrets.
Wiping the old runes away Chronos rewrote then connected them with the core room and the foreman covered them with a fake.
They had to repeat this four more times and cover the original that he and the foreman had forgotten about during the appearance of the fairy. By the time they were finished it was already late in the afternoon.
BOOM! "Yaaay! Ahahaha!"
A lightning bolt split the sky in the center of the castle before a child's cheer echoed around the plateau.
"What was that?" Yelled the foreman as he ran out of the last tower.
"Welp, there's no hiding it now." Chronos muttered while shaking his head.
Entering the keep, he ducked as a smaller bolt of lightning flashed over his head.
"It figured out how to use lightning already? What do we do now?" He asked as Chris tried herding it back into the office.
"IT is a him and his name is Kyle Von Envald Enlight Leighla the First. And I'm planning to teach him more about lightning, once he knows more about how it works and how dangerous it is he shouldn't misuse it." Chris glared at him for a moment before walking back into the office with him.
"You sure it's okay to teach him more?" Chronos asked Magnus who was sitting at a desk going over the daily documents.
"I'm letting Chris decide that. I trust her." He said without looking up.
Looking at them Chronos realized that their children would be nightmares. If Magnus wasn't indulging in their whims, then Chris would be teaching them how to use their skills better.
And a skilled willful child would always be a handful.
"Well, there's no way to hide the fairy.."
"Kyle Von Envald Enlight Leighla the First." Chris growled at him.
Glancing at her he continued, "There's no way to hide Kyle anymore. Everyone in the plateau saw that lightning bolt and I wouldn't be surprised if those outside the plateau saw it too, people are going to start asking questions. It was pretty powerful after all."
"His power increased as you synchronized the towers with the core room. I'm pretty sure that as Kyle's intelligence develops, he'll be able to change everything within the walls to some extent, but I have no way to prove it." Magnus replied.