The Magician of Sound

Kai and Tasha finally arrived at their home. They opened the door and came inside while saying, "Mom, Dad, we're back."

"Welcome home." Their mom came to the front to meet them. As she looked at her son, Kai, she noticed the bracelets on his hands. Those white bracelets seemed to have a good artistic level, and so did the ring on Tasha's hand.

Her eyes brightened when she saw them. She couldn't help but tease them. "So, where's my daughter-in-law?"

"There is no daughter-in-law." Tasha was the first to react to that question.

"But you two already got presents from her. How can I not meet her?"

"They're not presents. They're our hard-earned rewards. They're not the same."

"Fine fine... Have you guys eaten yet?"

Kai shook his head.

"All right, let's eat first. This mom's instinct of mine told me that you two would come home without having eaten, so I've also prepared your portions." She said smugly.

"Mom is the best... as long as you don't talk about this daughter-in-law thing." Tasha hugged her while smiling.

The atmosphere was heartwarming.

...

On the other hand, in another place, the atmosphere was the opposite. It was a chilling atmosphere.

There were two guys in a hotel room. The first one was a middle-aged man with silver hair. He wore a white suit that complemented his silver hair. His silver eyes looked at the other guys strictly.

"Son... He... That Yoshihiro just told me that he wanted to cancel the engagement." He said.

His son had silver hair and silver eyes just like him, and his handsome face could definitely charm numerous girls.

"What do you mean, Dad?" He was confused when his dad told him that. After all, he just got the news of the engagement earlier.

"I also don't know what happened. He told me that he got in a fight with his daughter and wanted his daughter to choose her other half by herself. He told me that if she really chooses you, then he won't do anything to stop you."

They were the Katsuragi's son and dad pair.

The son, Katsuragi Takaki, asked in a worried tone, "Dad, why?"

"I don't know, son. But, since he doesn't appreciate our gesture, then we should just go back to the north."

"No, Dad. I'll still enroll in Genesis Magic Academy. Since he allowed his daughter to choose, then I'll capture her heart."

"Son, what did you say? Why are you being so obsessed with her? You are the next head of our Katsuragi family. Numerous women prettier than her will appear in your life. You can marry all of them and forget about her."

"No, Dad. I don't want anyone except her." Katsuragi Takaki shook his head as he said with a firm heart.

Back when he was only a kid, everyone, especially girls, only looked at him with hidden motives. Kudo Ayaka was the only one that didn't have such eyes.

In his house, he was trained to be a leader. Being trained in that cold place, meeting Ayaka brought him warmth. He didn't know why, but at that time, his heart was captured by Ayaka.

Ayaka also turned out to be a big beauty after she grew up. His obsession became more and more apparent until around this time, his dad, Katsuragi Akagi, couldn't stop him any longer.

He used a business trip as an excuse to introduce him to Kudo Yoshihiro and let them have an engagement. In the day, the process went smoothly. But at night, he was called by Yoshihiro, who wanted to end the engagement.

He was angered when he heard that. Yoshihiro tried his best to explain to him, but anger was still in his heart even though they were comrades.

"Takaki, after we achieve our ambition, you'll be able to get any woman you want. Why? This is not what I taught you."

"I'm sorry, Father. My heart is only for her." Takaki said.

After the atmosphere became heavier, they stopped talking intimately. Katsuragi Akagi didn't call him 'Son' again. Instead, he called him with his name, Takaki. Katsuragi was the same, he didn't call him 'Dad' anymore and called him formally.

"We are going to take over the whole nation. Don't you know our pride as the Katsuragi family? A few centuries ago, this was not called United Asia. This was our home, Japan. Because all of those magic beasts were appearing in every corner of the world…

"We accepted all of them as refugees. AS REFUGEES. They are only refugees. Because of our country's strategic position since we consisted of islands and advancements in technology. We could exterminate the magical beasts in our nation.

"But look at what we are now. We changed our name to United Asia. We might control the north, but how about the south? In the south, there are lots of big families from the surrounding nations. They control more than a third of our country and changed our proud name from Japan to United Asia.

"We are going to make them lose power and change their statuses back to refugees. We are going to change this United Asia back into Japan with our Katsuragi family as the leader.

"You are the next leader of the Katsuragi family, why are you so obsessed with a single woman? You need to take lots of women so our Katsuragi family won't lack a successor in the future.

"We have manipulated one of the S-ranks in this country to do our bidding. Our Katsuragi family is famous for our medicine, and he, who is in need of our medicine, can only follow our orders.

"As long as we can get another S-rank in this country, we can get rid of the other one and rule this country. My original purpose of letting you enroll in the Genesis Academy is for you to get that Tasha Carter.

"Although her bloodline is not suited to be your wife, it's fine for her to be your concubine. Did you forget about that?" Katsuragi Akagi was so mad that he scolded Takaki with all his mind.

"Father, you don't understand. I have fallen in love, and my heart will always be for her. I haven't forgotten our initial goal. But polygamy is legal in this country. As long as I can make Tasha Carter head over heels with me, that would count as me having finished my purpose." Takaki said with a bit of a hateful tone.

Katsuragi Akagi observed Takaki's expression. He contemplated a bit before he sighed. He said, "Fine. As long as you accomplish your mission, you can do whatever you like. Go back to your room."

Katsuragi bowed to him then left the room.

...

The next day, Kai and Tasha went to school again.

Kai sat on his previous desk and saw Ayaka, who was beside him, glaring at him. Although he didn't want to be bothered by her, he thought that he at least needed to apologize for yesterday.

"I'm sorry about my sister's actions. It was very rude of us to disappear just like that after receiving something from your family."

"Hmph."

Kai sighed. He was a quiet guy, but this situation forced him to say something because his conscience didn't let him stay quiet when he was wrong. "All right. I'm truly sorry I didn't stop my sister."

"Friday. We should be getting a practical test where we need to hunt monsters in the training field. The test will require us to make a group of two. So you're going to partner up with me." Ayaka said.

She told him this because she wanted to prove something to him. She regretted that she couldn't do any better when they fought. She gritted her teeth as she recalled the scene over and over again.

She kept telling herself, 'I should be able to do better than that. I can make this move to dodge him, and I can do this, I can do that, and so on.'

So, she wanted to pair up with him so she could show him she was better than that, no other purpose, especially not because of that curse. She just wanted to show her actual strength. After all, losing to a D-rank magician was a bit embarrassing for her, especially when she fought that bad.

Kai looked at her, surprised. He was dumbfounded when he heard the condition. He thought about pairing up with George since he was the only one he knew excluding Ayaka.

He looked at her eyes and knew that he couldn't convince her.

"All right." Kai gave up while sighing to his sister.

Achieving her objective, she smiled smugly. She became a bit fired up inside, thinking, 'Just you wait, I'll show you.'

Kai didn't care anymore as he tried to ignore everything around him while waiting for the class to start.

Not long after, the teacher came to the classroom. But today was different as the first sentences she said was, "All right, students, I don't know if you should rejoice for this or not, but I have gotten another student that I need to take care of. In other words, you all have gotten another classmate. He's another brat- I mean a transfer student. Come in." The teacher said.

The door opened, and a silver-haired guy came to the classroom. He wore the school uniform that seemed to complement his silver hair as well as his silver eyes.

"Who is he?"

"Is he the new student?"

"So handsome."

"Tch!"

The girls were charmed by his appearance, while, as everyone might have already guessed, the guys were the ones who clicked their tongues.

Ayaka frowned when she saw this guy. She thought she might have met him, but she didn't remember him.

The guy then wrote his name on the board.

'Katsuragi Takaki.'

He smiled and said, "Hello, I'm Katsuragi Takaki. Pleased to meet you all."