"Have you heard about the Sword Mage in Sword City?"

In a well-lit room, an old man with a stern face asked a middle-aged man who was kneeling in front of him.

"Yes, the rumors reached Imperial City a week ago, I doubt that anyone who practices swordsmanship didn't know about him. It seems that some months ago that Sword Mage being just a 3-star Apprentice won against a 9-star Practitioner in a battle of pure swordsmanship. However, I also heard that he advanced consecutively until the 6-star Apprentice in the same battle."

The middle-aged man had obtained a lot of information about the Sword Mage since the rumors about him reached Imperial City.

"Do you think that making three consecutive breakthroughs is normal? Even if he had been at the 6-star apprentice from the start, beating someone with more than a whole rank of difference is still something that even our younger generation is unable to do. Moreover, that girl is a member of the Sword Five, the strongest of her rank in Sword City, and not any random girl."

The middle-aged man nodded his head; he understood that very well, but he hadn't chosen his words very well due to his nervousness in front of the old man.

"We must try to recruit such a great talent to our Larken Clan; his talent seems even higher than that Yale who Durgan told us about. In fact, we can't discard that both of them were related or they were even the same person. The descriptions and real names are different, but there are a lot of ways to modifying one's appearance, and the Sword Mage also trains the Magus Path like that Yale. After all, that guy has disappeared for too long, and it is difficult for such a talented kid to remain unnoticed forever."

That old man was someone who had reached the Grandmaster Rank and was one of the higher-ups in the Larken Clan, given his experience he didn't want to discard any possibility. Of course, he didn't believe that Yale and the Sword mage were the same; he just thought that as Yale was disappeared for such a long time, there was still a chance.

That old man had never meet Yale personally, but he knew that although Durgan was young, he had an extremely good eye for talents, and Yale should be top class since he dared to offer his little sister to him. The world wasn't a place for weaklings and someone with talent wouldn't be low-key enough to be bullied, so it was difficult for talented people to remain in the shadows for too long.

"Probably they are two different individuals, but we should still bring Durgan with us in the travel to Sword City just to confirm it. In any case, it may be good for Durgan to battle to some talented individuals outside the clan and Sword City have some of them."

The elder had lived a long life and saw a lot of things, so he didn't dare to be negligent with anything. Yale wouldn't be the first faking his identity to avoid the Larken Clan finding him; even Swordmad had faked his identity and disguised for a lot of time to avoid the members of the Larken Clan pestering him.

Although the Larken Clan never forces anyone to join them, they were always extremely persistent, and a lot of their targets got annoyed and tried to disappear. Of course, the Larken Clan didn't hold a grudge for that; they would just try to find those who were hiding hoping in convince them to join.

"What should we do with Lar? I hear that a talented girl called Lar was also a member of the Sword Five and her description matches to our Lar. There is no doubt she is in Sword City, and she seems to be in good terms with that Sword Mage."

The middle-aged man discovered that while investigating the Sword Mage; usually if a rumor like the one of the Sword Mage didn't appear, the Larken Clan wouldn't bother with Sword City. Only someone capable of spreading his name as far as the Sword Mage was someone worthy of making the Larken Clan move.

"I have always known where that lass was, I just wanted her to have some freedom as her temper is difficult to control, but she is the biggest talent of our clan and my granddaughter, there is no way I would let her go out without knowing about her whereabouts. However, we should try to tell her to come back as we are already going to Sword City."

The middle-aged man nodded and smiled, but he was internally cursing the old man because he knew that regardless how that old man spoke, he wouldn't go personally. Thus, the almost impossible job to convince Lar to come back would fall in those who went to Sword City, and the middle-aged man knew that he would be one of them.

"Oh, remember to pick some members of the younger generation to go with you besides Durgan. Although we have our own methods to train them, it may be good letting them test other opponents from outside the clan."

The middle-aged man nodded while cursing again internally because he even turned into a babysitter for those members of the younger generation. Just Durgan or a few more was alright, but the old man wanted him to bring a lot of them when he said some; that wasn't the first time that the middle-aged man followed the old man's orders and he understood how that old man acted.

That old man had too many grandchildren, he didn't even know a lot of them personally, but he cared a lot of those talented and his favorite one was without doubt Lar, but due to her temper he didn't interact too much with her.

After Lar, the one who obtained the best impression from the old man was Durgan; although his talent was inferior to Lar, he had a good personality and was a good leader, so a lot of elders of the Larken Clan liked him. Of course, that old man as his grandfather was extremely proud of him.

That old man's position in the Larken Clan had turned better thanks to having a lot of talented grandchildren; Lar and Durgan played an important role in that, but they weren't the only ones.

There were some other talented individuals that could compare with Durgan in the Larken Clan's younger generation, but they paled with him in personality, and they were all descendants from different elders, so the glory obtained by their ancestors couldn't be compared with the one obtained by that old man.

That travel of the younger generation to Sword City would have mainly descendants of that old man, but he would include some geniuses who weren't to also give them a chance.

Even in the righteous Larken Clan, it was unavoidable that one cared more for his own descendants than those from others, but for those with enough talent that wasn't important either because those with talent would be treated well no matter their ascendance.

"Go and start organizing the travel. Although Sword City isn't too far, it can't be considered to be close if you need to travel with those kids."

The middle-aged man was at the Veteran Rank, so his travel speed was higher than the members of the younger generation; he would be able to carry three or four without lowering his speed, but with the number of kids following him, the speed would be too slow for his tastes.

The fact that the Larken Clan was sending someone of the Veteran Rank to recruit a kid was already a big show of respect, members of higher rank wouldn't accept doing such tasks.

After the middle-aged man left the room, that old man sighed.

"In the end, that city made by that son of mine long ago have been useful, the kind of talent displayed by that Sword Mage is even higher than any talent seen in our Larken Clan since our internal war."

That old man wasn't old enough to had seen the period before the internal war of the Larken Clan when their current leader saved the clan, but he had heard of incredible geniuses of that period although they were legends that no one confirmed their existence.

***

Some months had passed since Yale started to try recreating the Sword Bloodline by himself and he had progressed quite a bit with it. However, he still didn't see the day he would finish because the difficulty was too high to let him made some predictions.

That day, Yale received a notification from Ralen, the governor.

"All the members of the Sword Five shall come to the main plaza as soon as possible."