The Burning Fiend

Reynolds made his way back on the same fashion as he arrived. He traveled by night with extreme care leaving the areas around the Mountain Range of Magical Beasts by the time the morning light catch up to him.

He made a stop to clean himself and change into a new set of grey warrior robes, this time without a hood or mask. He then made his way back leisurely and stopped to bought breakfast at an inn, he had only eaten roasted meat for two months and was delighted by the food of a professional cook.

Reynolds now had a sharp aura around him and he moved calmly exuding a confident feeling to the people around him. He was happy to arrive at the Ernst Institute feeling tired of two month of constant guard, he felt like sleeping for two whole days.

He arrived to the dorm a week before Linley and the four of them went to celebrate their reunion and talked about their adventures. Apparently Linley had suffered more attacks of either beasts or humans and found himself a little lost for the betrayal and crude reality that he encounter.

Reynold understood how lucky he had been, but thought that his almost paranoid measures had kept him safe. Linley also found that he was recognized by the Proulx Gallery and offered a hall for his sculptures which make the four brothers proud and happy.

During the following years Reynold kept training with Linley, but he noticed that Linley was a little distracted and his improvement was affected a little. He did not say anything as he could see that his brother was happy and he kept working hard.

Yale did not disappoint and it only took a month to provide with a rune-array method that could hide auras and slight magic fluctuation. It took another month for Reynolds to master the construction method and deployed on an artificial cave that he had made hidden behind a waterfall that would be difficult to access to warriors below the third ranks.

After a year of hard work Reynolds managed to reach the fifth rank as a warrior and the sixth rank as a mage, finally gaining on Linley even if it was only for a short time. It was only at this time that he had reached the first rank as a magus on life magic and finally was able to start practicing necromancy magic.

His life continued on his happy routine of training with Linley, training his magic alone, enjoying meals and time with this three brothers and joining the adventures to the Jade Water Paradise under the guidance of Yale. Reynolds understood why old man Frey why so insistent on him finding a girlfriend and enjoying life. He had failed on the first part, but under Yale's guidance he learned how to enjoy life as he would with a girlfriend and he was happy to ignore George and Linley's admonitions. They also found out that Linley had a girlfriend and that she was the reason that Linley had reduced a little his maniac training spree.

Reynold made another trip to the Mountain Range of Magical Beasts, Linley was still under the charm of the first love and decided not to go out to experience in order to spent more time with his girlfriend. Reynolds smiled at that and was a little jealous, perhaps he should follow old man Frey advice and get himself a girlfriend instead of enjoying the favor of the girls at the Water Jade Paradise. Then he thought that even if he got himself a girlfriend he could still enjoy his visits with his elder brother Yale to the Water Jade Paradise, could he not? He then thought that perhaps Yale was not the best role model, but he could not abandon his brother.

During this time Reynolds had no luck regarding treasures, but the trip proved profitable as he killed three assassins gaining a small fortune. This time he fought against magical beasts of the fifth rank having no problem while using his spear dance that now had a trace of fire elemental magic on it. He was still no match for a sixth rank magical beast and he did his best to avoid them but was forced to flee from such magical beasts a couple of times.

At his return he found that Linley was having trouble with his girlfriend and was in a depressed mood, still he joined them to celebrate Reynolds return and listened to his adventure.

While life continued as usual, Linley was even more depressed and the three brothers have no way to improve his mood and could only worry for him. Three months passed on that fashion and Reynolds kept with his training and spending time with the three brothers. Until one night as Yale was leading the way towards the Water Jade Palace he found that in the distance Linley's girlfriend was holding hands with a boy that was not Linley.

Yale and Reynolds were frozen in place and started to get angry. "Eldest brother, that Alice is playing with third brother and started dating another guy without even making things clear with him. To think that third brother wanted to marry this vixen!". Reynolds could not believe what he was seeing and was very worried for Linley.

"We should go back, we need to talk to third brother when he goes back to the dorm. He was trutly besotted by this woman and I'm afraid he would take things too hard". Yale said. On their way back they found George who decided to join them after listening to them. He was also angry as he thought on how Linley would be hurt by this. Linley came back a little drunk early in the morning and found his three brothers waiting for hime. "What's the matter" he asked.

Yale was serious and concerned as he said. "Third brother when fouth brother and I were on our way last night we saw Alice holding hand with another man". Linley grew angry and said. "Lies".

Reynolds put his hand on his shoulder and said. "Third brother, when have we ever lie to you? We are not trying to make you angry, it is true that we might be wrong but we want you to be prepared. After all she had been avoiding you for two months now and we are sure of what we saw, we don't want you to get hurt".

Linley took a deep breath and said calmly. "I'm sure that you saw a similar looking person. Do not worry about it". The three brothers released a sigh and could not help but keep worrying.