Unexpected Return

Since then it's been 2 weeks and at this moment Erik was in the garden of the mansion with Nina, both were facing the same direction looking at a giant tree that was a bit further down the garden. There wasn't much around this part so apart from a few trees and the grass at their feet there wasn't much else. The garden was so big that they couldn't see the wall from where they were which considering the fact it was one of area's closest to the wall is impressive.

" Alright, what I'm going to show you is something called Magic." Nina explained while looking over at her son to make sure he was listening, seeing him paying attention she continued "Magic is primarily used as a type of powerful attack however it has almost endless uses such as to strengthen your body and helping in your day to day life but coming up with new types of magic or spells is very difficult."

"you may not understand what I mean so I'll just show you" Nina then put out her stretched right hand in front of her and suddenly crimson flames started coming out of her hand and quickly spread to cover her whole arm.

The flame was unlike anything Erik had ever seen before, he couldn't help but be fascinated by it.

With her right arm now completely engulfed in crimson flames, Nina then tilted her hand forward almost as she was throwing something using no strength whatsoever. What happened however completely shook Erik to the core, never had he felt so weak until today.

A bright red fire lance 4 times the size of one Nina's arms was shot out from her, along with the departure of the fire lance, disappeared the flames around Nina. When the fire lance hit the tree it looked like half the tree simply disappeared there was no explosion nor any leftover fire just the bottom half of a tree, no leaf was spared. It had all simply turned to smoke.

Erik couldn't tear his eyes away from where the once had been giant treetop once was. He could feel his heart racing, he too wanted to learn just a powerful skill.

"Mother are you going to teach me that?" he couldn't help but ask in excitement if possible he wanted to start learning at this moment.

"Eh? Erm no actually that type of magic is something only members of Rufina family can sorry" she had totally forgotten that her son couldn't use the flames, she had wanted to show off a bit to her son but it seemed to have backfired.

"Am I not your son so why can't you teach me?" Erik was disappointed but how could he give up a chance to learn such deadly move, he was prepared to try anything.

"Nono you don't understand sweetie, only women who are born from Rufina blood are allowed to officially join the family since only women can wield the crimson flames." Nina was worried Erik would misunderstand and be mad at her thinking she was not willing to teach him.

"So are there any men in the family?" Erik's dream of wielding the fire lance was crushed, but he was also curious about his mothers family so he got over not being able to learn it since it was impossible.

"No there has never been a single man in the Rufina family, all boys born from Rufina women either take their father's name or in special cases they are given the name of a branch family since they can't wield the flames, either way, it doesn't matter too much." After Nina had explained anything she couldn't help but sigh.

Erik understanding the reason made him want to know what kind of magic he could use, hoping it was just as destructive.

"So what kind of magic can I do mother? Erik couldn't hide the excitement and nervousness in his voice if he couldn't learn any good magic he wouldn't be able to become truly powerful.

Looking at her son's golden expectant eyes looking at her and seeing how excited he was towards magic made her nervous, she didn't want to break her son's heart. As she too didn't know if he could actually wield any magic.

At the ago, 10 of it is customary to start introducing children to magic and have them take a test to see if they could wield magic. This is especially for high ranking magic families since bloodline inherited magic was far more powerful than normal magic. It's not only High ranking families that have bloodline magic it's just that their bloodline was far more powerful than normal peoples and also helped decide who the next head would be.

This, however, had nothing to do with Erik since he wasn't in a high ranking magic family.

"We'll have to take a test and see, how about we go tomorrow?" Nina hid her worries as not to worry him before even taking the test.

"Sure" Erik couldn't sit still for the rest of the day so he once again visited the library hoping to find something about what kind of bloodline magic he could inherit.

Since his father was a Grimes there was bound to be a few books about the family around, it didn't take long before Erik found one. He kept searching however he could only find one book about the Grimes family and there was no mention of any Rufina family whatsoever.

This time he didn't sit in the library and instead took the book with him as he quickly ran to his room. Once inside he jumped on his bed and started reading.

The book included everything from the history of the family to their magic but there was actually very little on the topic magic only saying that those who inherit the eyes are allowed to learn the family arts.

`Family arts? Would it be some kind of fighting technique? .`

seeing as the book was practically useless on the topic of magic he decided to read about the families history. That too ended up being a waste of time it only kept mentioning `the eyes this, the eyes that` Erik assumed the `eyes` mentioned constantly, was the pupiless golden eyes he got from his father.No matter how you look at them they are pretty weird, first they have no pupil which would think looks weird but actually isn't that bad.

Erik, however, could find nothing special about the `Grimes family eyes` sure he could see extremely well probably better than most people but `that's not really something to brag about.` shaking his head he closed the book and lay down on his bed. Closing his eyes to think, before he knew it he fell asleep as it was already quite late.

Erik was up by 6 am which is considered quite early in his family since they usually start to wake up around 8 am. He watched some cartoons while waiting for his family to wake up so they could have breakfast. Erik found cartoons interesting since most of them were about fighting but he strongly disliked how stupid main characters usually were so he would mostly watch it for the fights since they were usually quite different from those in real life were, even if you added magic, which he just learnt about, in there.

At 6.40am Erik saw that Arch had already woken up and was currently sitting on a sofa not too far away from him. Erik felt there was some sort of distance between himself and Arch. Truthfully Erik didn't really care much about Arch they had hardly spoken even before he went on his 17-year journey, putting a bit of wall between them. At times it even seemed like he alienated himself from the family but Erik wasn't really in a position to say anything since he hardly knew his brother.

Then at 8.21am Arthur arrived along with Nina who was walking while guiding a sleepy Emi by the hand.

Finally, breakfast started, during it, no-one spoke about anything important so Erik just focused on eating his food. When he was done he looked towards Nina as if to say `let's go already`.

Nina seeing her son so enthusiastic about getting the test done couldn't help but chuckle and although she was still slightly worried he would be too disappointed, she hid it and instead smiled.

Seeing this Arthur didn't say or show anything on his face but he was actually a nervous wreck, he didn't care if his children didn't have any strong magic as he too didn't have any. What he was worried about was their happiness. People who have no magic potential can't wield any magic, this leads to people looking down on them for their for most if not their whole lives even if you just wanted to work at an office it would be difficult to get a high-end position.

"Goodluck" He couldn't help but say towards his eldest son.

Nina wanted to say something but didn't want to get his hopes up just for him to then be disappointed so in the end, she didn't say anything.

"no worries, even if I inherited no magic or even worse if I am unable not to wield magic I'll just have to find another way to become strong." Erik had already thought it through last night that even he was magic-less he would find another way to become strong since being weak in such a society was paramount to having a short life.

Seeing his determination Arthur could do nothing but nod even if he spent all his life trying to be strong and in the end failed at least it was his own decision. Of course, Arthur and Nina would try to make the dreams of their children happen at all costs no matter how impossible.

Erik couldn't help but see the disdain on Arch's face `What are you even disdaining you're just a kid` he didn't take it to heart but couldn't help but feel annoyed acting anything but his (mental) age.

Finally, at 10 am it was time to go get tested, it was only Erik and Nina going.

Erik was confused why it had to be his mother that had to take him, not that he minded.

They both got into the back of a black car that looked like Rolls Royce but of this worlds brand. The car made no sound except a small humming, It was Erik's first time in a car since returning and he was quite amazed.

The trip didn't take long, they arrived in 23 minutes. When Erik got out he was greeted by a massive white dome made of what looked like metal with a few windows spread around the surface. Nina took his left hand with her right and took him to the entrance.

The entrance was filled with uniformed men and women. They all carried big guns that Erik could identify because he had seen them in cartoons though he hadn't expected such a powerful ranged weapon to actually exist.

Once inside the dome actually looked a lot bigger Erik wasn't sure if it was actually bigger or just perspective. Looking around he saw plenty of different kinds of people, some had uniforms similar but clearly different to the guards at the entrance, they also looked like they were ready to fight at any time.

There are also people in suits, people in lab coats and kids like him who have come here to take the Magic aptitude test. The most eye-catching person, however, was a blonde woman who was currently walking into the inner parts of the dome. She had white pauldrons on her shoulders and white gauntlets that looked like claws, on her c.h.e.s.t was armour made of the same white material as other two pieces but it only covered the area around her b.r.e.a.s.ts. Underneath she wore something that looked to be a tight-fitting light blue battle robe with a white ribbon loosely tied to her waist, the back of the robe followed her body closely so you could make out her curves, the robe reached down to her knees with a split in the middle.

The woman had a mask made of the same white material as her armour that covered her nose down but you could tell she was probably beautiful just by looking at the top part of her face and her violet eyes.

Noticing her son suddenly Nina turned around to look at him only to realise he was looking at something, following his gaze she too then looked at the armoured blonde woman however compared to Erik who was staring at her with admiration, Nina stared at as if they had a grudge that only death could sort.

"Why are you stopping? she's not even that beautiful." Nina told her son.

"Eh, I don't think it's that bad?" Erik was confused, he was just admiring the woman's armour dreaming about one day also wearing some cool looking armour, he was spacing out so he only heard `not even that beautiful` when he had finally come back to the real world only to see his mother look annoyed at his answer.

"Looks aren't everything for example if a sword looks good but doesn't cut even paper what good is it? It's the same with people, so you should choose wisely and not just settle for something or someone based on its looks." Nina looking proud of her speech couldn't help but nod a few times to herself

"I see that makes sense it seems I was in the wrong mother, I had hoped to have a cool looking armour but now I realise its more important for it to have practicality" Erik also couldn't help but nod to himself in enlightenment he now had a goal an extra goal, he still wanted to look cool but now he also wanted to make it the best gear he could.

`Eh? Armour?` Nina suddenly realised there was a misunderstanding but she was stubborn and didn't want to admit it so she just changed the topic.

"Using big words now are we you sure have grown up." she didn't really think about what she was saying, she just wanted to move on. Taking Erik's hand in hers again she started walking again.

Ahead of them was a line with a lot of people. Erik couldn't even see what they were lining up for, he thought that even if he was tall enough to see over the people he wouldn't see anything. The Line of people was truly long and looked like it had no end.

Nina, however, didn't line up and following the line from the side instead. Erik who was being pulled by his hand couldn't understand why they didn't line up, he could see there were kids with their parents in the line along with people without children meaning there should be no way to avoid lining up but here was his mother was trying, which got them a lot of dirty looks from those in line.

"Mother is it not better if we.." before he could finish Nina interrupted him with a simple "It's fine"

He could not understand where she got her confidence from but he could do nothing but follow her while ignoring the looks he was being given. After what seemed to take forever they finally arrived at a line of big wooden desks, all the desks look simple and only had a monitor and keyboard on them. Behind every single desk, there was a single person in a suit man or woman, all wore the same fully white suit and black tie.

Nina didn't even look at them and simply went to one of the doors that were behind every desk. Every door had a guard in front of it. The guard was surprised he had never seen anyone so brazen, she had clearly had skipped the line altogether and even ignored the white suit workers.

"I'm sorry miss but you can't just skip the line nor enter without the permission of the white suits" Even though he saw how she ignored everyone he wasn't rude.

Nina said nothing simply looked at the guard for a second before going into her purse and took out a card. She then showed the card to the guard who even while trying to keep a calm exterior couldn't fully hide his shock.

The guard said nothing else, he let them through and he even held the door open for the duo as they entered. When the guard closed the door he wiped the sweat on his forehead with his hand and went back to work. The people in the line also saw what happened since the doors weren't exactly hidden, those who were angry about the mother, child pushing in line could no longer complain since anyone who could pass in such a simple manner was in no way normal.

Back with Nina and Erik, they were now in what looked like a waiting room with various people in it. But once again Nina simply ignored everything and went over to one of the doors on the wall then putting in the pin on the lock, The locks screen then turned green and the door slid into the wall.

Nina went in as if it was normal but Erik felt something was weird he didn't know what the dome was apart from the place where he was meant to take the test but it seemed like his mother had some sort of status in the dome which surprised him but it didn't seem like she was going to say anything so he could only follow once again.

Within the door was what seemed like a mix between an office and a lab and sat at a desk at the end of the room was a woman with black hair and eyes with black framed glasses. She was currently writing something on paper which is rare these days but it seemed like she had a habit of doing so since her desk was covered in paper. The woman was so focused on her work she didn't notice that there were two extra people in the room.

As the door closed behind them Erik looked towards Nina to see what she was going to do but only saw her looking at the woman at the desk. Erik realised they were probably going to wait for her to finish her work. `sigh~ thank god we managed to skip most of the waiting otherwise we might not have been able to go home today` what Erik didn't know was that the lines actually move very quickly for such size but filled up just as fast so it looked like it never ended.

After around 10 minutes the woman finally put her pen down and started stretching her arms and legs, only then had she noticed the two intruders. While slight surprised she didn't seem to be bothered too much.

"What are you doing here Nina?" The woman spoke as she got up and walked towards the duo who were side-by-side.

"My son is here for his aptitude test and since we couldn't be bothered to wait I came to get you to it instead," Nina said it as if it was completely natural and she wasn't interrupting someone's work.

Only now did the woman notice a cute pale little boy with crimson hair and gold eyes with no pupil next to her friend. She then stretched out her hand " My name is Raylee Massey but you can call me auntie Ray" she said with a warm smile.

"My name is Erik Grimes, nice to meet you auntie Ray," he said while shaking her hand. Erik felt a bit weird calling a woman who probably has the same mental age as him auntie but he still did it anyway.

Raylee seeing how he was so cute and polite and even called her Auntie she couldn't help but hug him as if he was a plush toy.

Erik wasn't sure what to do `should I hug her back?` in the end, he decided against it since he felt it was weird, so he just let her hug him while awkwardly stood there. He looked over towards his mother for help but all he got was a victorious smile, who was she victorious against he had no idea.

It took 2 minutes for Raylee to stop hugging Erik. With her now off him, he could breathe. Erik thought it was weird that someone would hug a stranger they had just met for an awkward 2-minute long hug. He clearly wasn't taking into account he was a child.

"Hehehe isn't he adorable?" Nina asked Raylee with a smile.

Raylee could only nod since she didn't understand what she was going to say.

Seeing her nod Nina couldn't help but widen her smile " So when are you going to have children? Well before that, you'll have to find a husband first."

Raylee's face instantly fell, Nina had hit her weak spot. Raylee was in no way ugly, in fact, she was very good looking. She just focused more on her job then anything else, hence her being single and having only a few relationsh.i.p.s in her younger days. Nina constantly reminds her when they see each other no one knows if she's trying to help or rub salt on the wound, not even Nina herself knows any more since it has long become a habit.

Raylee, of course, wouldn't take that jab lying down so before long the two had gotten into a heated argument.

Erik not interested in their childlike fight, so he started looking around the lab there are quite a few machines following the walls of the room, none of them are very big at most being the size of an oven. Since Erik didn't know what any of machines were for he quickly lost interest. Looking over at where the pair of women were, he wasn't shocked at all to find them still going at it.

Looking around the lab he couldn't find anything interesting so he just picked up a random glass beaker with some blue liquid in it and sniffed it which resulted in almost instant regret, he somehow managed to quickly put the beaker back before he passed out.

The Nina and Raylee only noticed when had already collapsed, worried Nina ran over quickly but since she wasn't a doctor nor did she know any type of first aid so there wasn't anything she could do apart from looking over at her friend who could.

Seeing Nina looking at her with nervous expression Raylee could only sigh "He's fine, the liquid just makes someone fall asleep for a few hours."

Only when Nina heard that did she let out a sigh of relief. Looking at her son she shook her head and couldn't help but wonder what drove him to do such a stupid thing, in terms intelligence he wasn't some amazing genius but he wasn't stupid enough to sniff a random thing in a lab without knowing what it was.

"Since I assume neither of us wants to spend the next few hours waiting for him to wake up so just pour a little bit of pure prana into him and he'll wake up soon." hearing what Raylee said Nina put her hand on Erik's forehead and poured a very little amount of prana into his body.

Erik finally woke up 7 minutes later only to be told off by Nina for another 10 minutes. He didn't really have any excuse other than "It was just there and I was bored so without thinking I just sniffed it" which if anything made things worse for himself. Erik himself was ashamed he did such a stupid thing, it was like his brain had stopped working for a split second but that's all it took.

" You guy's can continue this later, for now, let us get Erik tested." Raylee interrupted the ongoing scolding and brought everyone's attention back to what they were here for.

"Yes you're right" Nina agreed before turning to Erik "Don't think this is over, what you did was very dangerous I won't be able to live my life if I'm worried about you going around sniffing everything."

*sigh~* Erik had nothing to add so he just nodded, he still couldn't believe that he, a trained ninja and a feared ronin could've done something so stupid if any of his past enemies heard this they would probably lose all respect and fear they had for him.

While Nina was giving a short scold Raylee had gone over to one of the machines on the side and using some sort of technology placed underneath it she made it hover and pushed it into the middle of the room. Once it was in the middle the machine once again stopped hovering.

The machine had nothing that really stood out apart from the thing attached on top which no matter how you looked it, looked like some sort of long black cylinder handcuffs that could cover most if not a whole arm on each side.

Looking at the machine Erik was sceptical but seeing Nina's calm face he was confused, how was this meant to tell him if could use magic or not, rather how was it possible for it to show what magic he inherited. But what did he know? He didn't even understand how magic worked so maybe the way it worked very obvious to those with common magic knowledge.

"Put both your arms in here, one on each side." As Raylee instructed him Erik rolled up his shirt sleeves and did as he was told.

Normally he would wear his baggy T-shirt and shorts combo but since he was going outside he wanted to look well dressed since he could tell his family was very well off and he didn't want to make them look bad, so he was wearing grey shorts and a formal white shirt with some brown Oxford style dress shoes with short socks so they're hidden.

After he put his arms in the black cylinders which were stuck to the machine he looked over to Raylee to signal that he was ready.

Raylee seeing he was ready started typing on a little keyboard on the side of the machine which also included a short but long monitor.

The Black Cylinder's then started to shrink to fit his small arms better, when that was done the machine let out a lot of steam. `isn't this too outdated?` Erik couldn't help but think such a thing since everything in this day and age worked using a mixture of both magic and science making technology quite advanced so seeing something still let out steam seemed quite old fashioned.

When the steam was cleared he could no longer move his arms. Then steam shot out once again but this time it didn't come from the Cylinders but instead from below straight from the machine. What happened, however, wasn't expected by Erik at all, his arms started glowing with hundreds of bright red lines that almost looked veins, they were so shinning so bright almost like a powerful LED light you could probably see it from miles away.

It was then Erik realised he had been wrong it wasn't steam that came out it was something that would help him awaken or see these vein like things.

"What is it?" since he didn't know, it meant he had to learn. He was sure they were going to tell him but he still asked anyway. What he didn't notice though was Nina's and Raylee's shock.

Coming back from the shock Raylee hearing the question answered him " Those are your Prana circuits which allow you to wield magic and the brighter they are the better their quality, powerful magic families tend to have more circuits then normal people and they also tend to be brighter. Not to say there aren't exceptions. It's rare even among high ranking magic families for them to have someone born with both a lot of prana circuits and such amazing circuit quality. What I am trying to say is your prana circuits are nothing short of amazing."

Hearing that Erik couldn't help but be a little proud of himself even though he got lucky for being born with strong prana circuits luck is also a skill, at least from today onwards it is.

"Don't be too happy you might not the only one among those your age who has have excellent prana circuits although rare its not uncommon for there to be 1 or 2 children that have them every year, but there have also been times when no one had gotten a perfect pair of circuits for several years. This is also the reason why Magic families now marry into each other's families, with 2 bloodlines even the weakest will be above average, usually." Nina paused for a bit before continuing "There is always a possibility that you can be born without any prana circuits meaning you wouldn't be able to use magic. And no matter how many bloodlines you have it wouldn't make a difference, It just means you were born unlucky." Nina was tired from so much talking so she went to get some water but on the way still was still speaking "I was actually worried you would be born without prana circuits since that's always a possibility, now I just have to worry about Arch." *sigh~* Then Nina spoke no more, she quickly returned with a cup of water.

"Are you not worried for Emi?" Although it quite a lot to taken in all of a sudden Erik still managed to find something off about Nina's speech.

"There is no need to worry about Emi since I already know she will defiantly have quite a lot of prana and she will also probably inherit most if not all of my families bloodline magic," Nina said while shaking her head.

Erik wasn't sure how Nina was so certain when she had just said there was always a possibility of being born without any just minutes ago, he however just nodded his head to say that he understood.

"Ok now that's over with are you ready for the 2nd part?" Raylee asked Erik.

"Sure" Erik answered casually.

Hearing him confirm he was ready Raylee started typing on the little keyboard once again. Erik was watching Raylee typing so he didn't notice that Nina looked away and had closed her eyes.

Erik wasn't sure of what he was waiting for when suddenly 4 of what felt like needles stabbed into each arm he couldn't help but shout in surprised.

"MOTHERF.UCKER" Even he was surprised by what came out of his mouth, the needles were no longer his biggest problems realising this he sighed, it seemed he was bound to get told off a lot today.

Hearing his shout Raylee couldn't help but giggle while Nina looked like she wanted to spend another 10 minutes lecturing him.

Not even 20 seconds later the needles were taken out and the black cylinders went back to their original size allowing Erik to take out his arms. As soon as he took his arms out Raylee spread some sort of cream over where the needs had pierced him and it quickly healed.

"You know children almost always cry after that part either from pain or shock so I'm surprised you didn't complain or cry even once after the initial shock" Raylee really was impressed that Erik took the needles so well since it was rare to see a child so young hardly grimace from the sudden pain.

"So let's see the results." Nina looked indifferent almost as she hadn't just heard her son swear which filled Erik's back wet with cold sweat.

Raylee nodded her head and quickly typed on the little keyboard before picking up a T.V remote and using it to turn on a TV that looked it was a hologram, she then made the screen as big as a 50 inch TV using the remote.

There on the screen, was only four words. `Armament, physical curse magic.`

Erik didn't really know what they did but he was happy that not only did he get a bloodline type magic spell he even got two, even if they were weak it was better than nothing. He looked towards Nina to see her reaction and he was completely taken back.

Her face was bright red from excitement and she a huge smile on her face that didn't look like it would disappear any time soon.

"Hahahahaha my son inherited two types of Rufina bloodline magic and he also got a perfect set of prana circuits! I must be blessed!"Nina then threw her arms in the air and starting spinning in place.

It was very weird seeing his mother like this so suddenly, but he saw that Raylee wasn't surprised and instead had a small smile meaning this wasn't the first time she had acted like this. Today Erik had seen two new sides to his mother and both were complete opposites.