The Hydra shifted back, folding back to sit against the floor like an obedient dog.
Its three heads each had a pair of bright yellow eyes, with pupils like two black scratches.
Julius stood in front of it, his eyes like two quiet suns at dusk.
The skies fading grey still felt far brighter than the boy standing calmly in front of the hulking black mass.
Adrian's face tensed with a complicated look, confusion swelling beneath the surface of his eyes, as vitality was restored in his Tiffany-blue eyes.
"What are you doing?" Adrian growled like chains pulling apart until they tighten, his expression darkening as he spoke.
He watched Julius, an eighteen-year-old boy, handle a hydra like a pet.
A sudden sense of disbelief assaulted him, on top of a lingering anger and slowly recovering adrenaline.
Julius didn't even twitch at the sudden intensity of his tone.
Instead, like a villain in complete control, he continued to gently smooth his hand along the scales on the neck of one of the heads in front of him.
He soothed the creature whilst internally documenting the creature in his mind.
As a hydra, being such a ferocious magic beast, one of the only ways for it to be contained for so long was that it must have had some level of training by someone.
When Julius stepped onto the scene, with this in mind, he noticed a red pile of mush in the grass next to some burning remnants of a building.
An entire adamantine cage still stood fully intact within the scene of the dead inferno.
The cage, a holding ground, with another now deceased figure lying beside it on the grass…
Julius presumed the dead person to be responsible for the Hydra, which he was right in doing so.
Hence he started testing the Hydra, using pieces of the tainted golden biscuit to expertly probe the Hydra for any sign of possible training.
Julius, an eighteen-year-old boy, had managed to make a Hydra sit like a pet, with the familiarity of an animal whisperer.
This seemed like an act of defying heaven, but really it was due to Julius's mastery of alchemy.
There's a certain recipe Julius uses, called killfaux.
It's a very simple recipe, an aphrodisiac made from cinnamon, honey and so on.
With wolfbane, a poisonous herb, added in…
Julius made this 'killfaux' in the chemistry labs of the academy, submerging the golden biscuit he obtained in the cafeteria so it would absorb the liquid.
Normally this killfaux would kill most that consumed it, the taste sweet enough to trick most into thinking it was harmless.
However Hydras were capable of eating lightning, they were formidable beasts endowed with absolute strength, this poison could not work on them.
If anything the sweetness of the aphrodisiac side of the recipe, combined with their unique absorption of poison, made the golden biscuit a treat to them.
As soon as the creature submitted to Julius, he internally documented it with concealed pleasure.
The Hydra sitting wasn't a miracle, part of how Julius could do it so easily, even with such impossibly apparent skill, was due to the Hydra being trained from a young age by some type of caretaker.
This meant the Hydra was capable of being taught further, if nurtured correctly.
Though this, paired with the creature's previous eye colour, raised another question for Julius.
He turned his chin forty-five degrees toward the red mush in the grass at the end of the opening.
"Was that the stable hand ?" Julius asked with the deadpan tone of a consultation session.
Calling such a tone professionalism was absolute overkill, it disregarded the loss of life in less than a fraction of a second, and it couldn't be recognised as anything less than absolute efficiency.
Though this lack of regard for such life, for such a kind life, made Adrian's eyelids fly open as he had just taken a shotgun pellet to the heart.
The question itself wasn't inherently wrong, although it didn't help that Adrian already disliked Julius, it was rather a mix of things.
There was no apology for seemingly watching Adrian struggling against the Hydra.
He didn't ask if Adrian was alright, or anything regarding his well-being.
Instead
He spoke in a tone like mist, detached and unweighted by anything, even kinship.
"He was-" Adrian's breath hitched, gritting his teeth suddenly as his jaw tensed.
He wanted to retort, say the guy had a name…But he didn't even know it himself.
"Yes." Adrian forced his mouth to sharply grumble the word, his eyes drifting away to avoid looking at Julius.
The two were like thunder, sharing the same intensity.
One was like the rain.
One was like the wind.
Both wore a cream uniform yet one was completely clean, whilst the other was dark with dirt and splinters of wood.
Julius's eyes narrowed with thought after the confirmation from Adrian.
"Why would a hydra kill its trainer?" He thought to himself, a sharp sense of wit catching at faint threads in the air.
Julius moved, previously still like an image, now pacing across the opening in sharp but controlled steps.
Bang, bang, bang.
The thud of heavy steps followed behind him, as the Hydra gently pursued Julius, three heads sniffing the air for a golden, bittersweet scent.
He walked all the way while ignoring the Hydra, until he reached the dead inferno, not the part of the blackened dirt patch, but the wooden ruins surrounding the adamantine cage at the side of the clearing in the forest.
He walked around the ruins, passing through a path of grass between a pile of red mush on his left and the ruins on his right.
He walked all the way around, his eyelids vigilantly narrowing whilst his pupils analytically flicked over the scene.
He stopped and lowered to a crouch, watching a pile of ash in the corner of the ruin, opposite the cage.
He sat silently, unmoving, as if his soul had evaporated.
A set of two cold muddy eyes, like glasses of root beer, fixed themselves onto the pile of ash.
Adrian watched from afar, his jaw beginning to slack now, not with relief but with the sudden memory of the saytr's death.
His face wore an extra pinch as the thought surfaced in his mind.
Meanwhile, Julius abruptly stood back up, turning his head toward Adrian.
"Did he feed the Hydra?" Julius asked with a glance over his shoulder, his voice dull yet carrying a smoothness as natural as the wind.
Adrian's jaw clenched suddenly, eyes previously distant with thought, now wide with rage.
"Who does this guy think he is?"
His steps followed, heavy and sharp as he trudged toward Julius.
His arms swept either side of him hurriedly as his face darkened, finally growing sick of this incessant waste of space.
"Grrrr."
Adrian stopped a limousine's length away from Julius when suddenly the sound of a nightmare growled at him.
The Hydra hadn't forgotten its fight with the silver-haired boy, instantly assuming a slanted position as the boy approached its new master, defending its newfound source of delights.
Julius had already faced back toward the cage before Adrian had approached, standing unfazed before a demi-god's presence.
If Adrian had wanted to kill Julius, he would already be dead.
Though that would mean Adrian would suffer a disastrous consequence in the form of three heads and sharp teeth.
This Julius didn't even blink, instead secretly feeding one of the heads another piece of tampered golden biscuit.
Then he pursed his lips slightly, sensing an opportunity.
Fwoooot
Julius Sparrow Whistled.
Nothing happened.
He turned his head over his shoulder again, eyes watching the beast standing guard behind him.
Fwooooot
Then he clicked his tongue against his teeth, a sharp fuzzing sound.
Finally, he got the attention of the beast, three heads turning toward him, its razor-tipped ears perking up, as if learning the sound.
Fwooot
"It's almost as if…He's trying to train it?" Adrian watched from a small distance away, his expression sharpening as he slowly began to back away.
The Hydra's posture immediately rose, its chest puffing out to assert dominance.
Adrian didn't risk another second, lightning cackling around him before carrying him to the end of the clearing by the tree line.
The Hydra remained still as Julius clicked his tongue again, soothing his hand over its scales to reward the beast with affection.
"That's a good girl, Hydie." Julius soothed in a voice as cool as ice, coincidentally using a nickname it had once previously got from its former master.
The beast immediately melted, sensing the 'threat' was gone, thus it now lowered itself comfortably to the ground.
Once the beast settled, it lowered itself, which allowed Julius to see over it.
He could now see the silver-haired boy watching from a distance with a mild scowl.
"Battle is persuasion, not negotiation." Julius recited to himself like a mantra as he reflected on winning over the Hydra, using it to convince Adrian of a victory he couldn't attain in a million years.
"All that magic…How many mages would kill to learn even just rank four magic, yet this guy can only run and hide." Julius sighed internally, how much easier his life would be if he could use even an ounce of such power.
"A pity." Julius suddenly tutted into the darkening autumn air.
"If only you learnt to make what you do automatically, manually instead..." He sighed across the field, reaching a young man with silver hair.
Adrian wouldn't forget this.
Then choosing to leave, stepping back into the shadow of the tree line.
One of them had to report the saytr's death to Mr Ignis.
Something told him Julius didn't care for it.
As far as he thought Julius was concerned …
Detention was over.
End of chapter 32