Chapter 45: Kain's Mastery
Lucius wanted to take a quick look at the library about the particular rune beasts but was interrupted by Kiana.
"And where are you going? It's time for dinner." Kiana chided.
Knowing that there was no getting out of it, Lucius just decided to get to dinner for now and eat. He had more time to read later on anyway.
'Or I could just ask others about them, I guess.' Lucius thought.
Soon Lucius and Kiana were in the dining hall where the servants were setting up the dinnerware.
"Mother and father are not back yet?" Lucius questioned.
"Count Gabriel is in his study and will be here in a bit while your mother is just finishing up some final tasks for the day." Kiana answered.
"Ah, I see. So should we sit down for the time being?" Lucius said and thought it would be a good opportunity to ask questions.
"Yes, let's." Kiana replied before pulling the chair back for Lucius and then sitting down herself.
"Kiana, I had a question," Lucius spoke.
"Oh? What kind?" Kiana asked.
"I wanted to know more about rune beasts." Lucius replied.
"Rune beasts? I don't know much about them, but can answer some basic questions I guess." Kiana stated.
"Do you know what Stampeding Bulls are?" Lucius questioned.
"Hmm… I think I've heard of them. They are one of the E rank rune beasts found south of our territory." Kiana answered.
"E Rank? Rune beasts have ranks too?" Lucius asked, though he had already guessed something like that.
Since humans had gifts and beasts did too, there was of course a ranking system for them.
"Yes they do, they go from F rank to A rank." Kiana replied.
"Ah… do they correspond to their ranks as gifts?" Lucius questioned.
"I… don't know exactly. It would be better if you ask Master Kain, he is after all a master in Rune Beasts." Kiana replied.
This was new information to Lucius as he had been wondering what Kain was the master of and now he finally had the information. But now this posed another question, if Kain was a master in Rune Beasts why was he teaching him knowledge.
"I didn't know that. I thought Master Kain was a master in languages or something like that." Lucius spoke.
"Hahaha! Most masters that are from an academic field can do that. To be honest, he is way too overqualified to be teaching you." Kiana replied.
"Why is he teaching me, then? Won't it be a waste of his skills?" Lucius asked.
"He is simply paying off his debts and favors to Count Gabriel." Kiana replied.
"What kind of debt?" Lucius questioned further.
"Well, when he was just a new scholar, he wanted to specialize in rune beasts. But to do research in that, one needed quite a lot of money and opportunities. Back then, even though Master Kain was able to get into the artificers guild, he was not able to secure funds for his research, thus he needed to look for it elsewhere.
That was when Count Gabriel saw potential in him and chose to sponsor his studies and research." Kiana explained.
Lucius was rather surprised by this, as he had not expected Gabriel to be a man who appreciated academics like this.
'Seems like I may have a much better advantage than I thought.' Lucius thought.
Lucius wanted to ask more, but he heard the sounds of footsteps approaching.
"Good evening, Count Gabriel," All the servants greeted in unison.
"Mmm," Gabriel hummed in response and looked at Lucius, who was already present at the table.
"Seems like your first lesson on swordsmanship went good," Gabriel spoke.
"It did, I learned a lot and feel like it is suited to me." Lucius replied.
"Good, Lieutenant John is a competent swordsman, and I've seen his skills on the battlefield too. Learn well from him." Gabriel agreed.
"My, my, you've really gotten obedient now Asher." Lita suddenly spoke from the archway before approaching them.
Lucius simply nodded his head in response and the two parents took a seat.
"So what were you talking about?" Gabriel asked while the servants got to serving them dishes.
"Rune beasts father. I was reading some names of them and it sparked my curiosity." Lucius replied.
"Ah, I see. That is good, it is always good to learn more. If you want to learn more about them, you can ask Master Kain." Gabriel spoke.
"Oh, Kiana already told me about him." Lucius replied.
Gabriel nodded in response and after that, the family had some mundane conversation about their day. Lucius asked what they did and learned quite a few things about the workings of the city and the administrative matters.
One of the important matters he learned was that of robbers that had recently popped up in the region. While from Lita he learned that there was a reduction in edible oil supply to the region.
He noted these matters in his mind and finished up his dinner.
"I'll take my leave for now, father, mother." Lucius spoke.
"Alright, go and rest for now. You've had a long day." Lita spoke, and Gabriel chimed in.
Lucius hummed in response before heading straight to the library. He knew he would not be able to spend much time here before Kiana would interrupt him and tell him to rest, and thus, he just chose to grab the books about the rune beasts.
He had learned quite a lot of new words and felt like he would be able to read most of the things now. He still had some assertive dictionaries, so for the words that he did not understand he would not have much of a problem.
Back in his room, Lucius opened the book called Compendium Of Rune Beasts, which spanned across 9 volumes. He had taken all of them and each of the books was four fingers in thickness.
The rune beasts were arranged in an alphabetical order, thus he did not have a hard time finding about the two beasts.
"Here we go, Stampeding Bull and plow worms…"
Gifts
-- Gift
received Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone