*Iah*

All of us ran out of the red room and headed to the end of the hall. Yeung opened another black oak door. "What's wrong?" Yeung asked, searching for her crying son.

"Come on!" Vermillion yelled as she reached under a tiny bed. "Come on, I won't hurt you!" She flashed the kid a smile. "You can trust me."

He finally reached his hand out. I could see that Vermillion wanted to yank him out of there as her hand was twitching. Yet somehow she managed to keep herself from doing so, allowing Keanu to trust her.

"There you go," she said.

Keanu smiled a little. He pushed himself from under the bed. One could finally get a good look at him now that he wasn't partially hidden. The kid was 3' 8 foot tall with caramel brown hair and light brown skin. His red eyes seemed to hold the power of the core of a small planet.

Those eyes, do they reflect the depth of his power?

"I'm sorry for fleeing," he said.

Vermillion hugged him. "Ah he's so cute. Can we take him home with us?"

"No," I said. "Now let go of the poor boy he looks claustrophobic."

She noticed the color of Keanu's face had become pale. She let's go of him. "Sorry."

"I'll save you big brother!" A blond haired girl ran into the room wielding a stick. "It may have taken me a while but I found the perfect weapon! Now, who dares mess with Keanu?"

"Calm down," Hei said. "And slow down!" She slammed Hei into the wall with her stick. "Oww."

"Sorry," she said. "I lost control over my swing there." She smiled at him. "It's nice to meet you I'm Solean."

"Yeah it's very nice. Now would you mind getting that stick off me? You're pressing it against my lungs," he said.

Keanu and Vermillion helped their siblings get up.

"Those are some children you have," I said, snickering.

"Yeah, they can be quite a handful," Yeung said, sighing. She embraced her kids. "Should've thought twice before having two kids one year apart."

"Keanu!" a boy yelled.

"Another one," Azure said, spinning around.

"Who are you?" the new boy asked. He had short red hair, and blue eyes. He wore a red cape and held a golden toy wand. He stepped back. "Are you here to kidnap us?"

Azure narrowed his eyes at him much like his father would do whenever one would ask something he deemed stupid. "Would a kid your age really seek to kidnap you? Sure one may suspect of Iah but to ask me that? You've been having too many role plays."

The boy's face turned red. "So who are you then?"

"I'm Tiānlán sè Wudi, but everyone calls me Azure. The two oldest kids here are my siblings Zhuhong or Vermillion as she likes to go by, and Hei. The teenager and the twins my age are my cousins Iah, Akatsuki, and Aoitsuki."

The red-haired kid's eyes glowed as soon as he heard the word 'twins'. "Twins? So I'm not the only one?"

"You have a twin too?" Aoitsuki said.

"Nekua!" the boy yelled.

A blue haired girl in a cute blue and white dress poked her head into the room. "What is it Koal, can't you see we have visitors? Hello guests, sorry for my siblings' misbehavior. I'm Nekua Huo. I hope you can forgive my siblings for their childish behavior."

"You're a kid too you know," Solean said, crossing her arms over her chest. "Act your age."

"You're older, so act more mature than me then we'll talk," she said.

"Better yet I shouldn't have had six so close together."

"Six?" I said.

"The other two are asleep." Loud cries filled the house. "Or at least they were. You four shouldn't have made such a ruckus."

"We're sorry," Keanu, Solean, and Koal said.

"I did nothing," Nekua said, crossing her arms.

"Well I'm going to go quite them down. You four behave while I'm gone."

"Wait," Nekua said. "When will my tutor arrive?"

"She'll arrive shortly."

"You also have a tutor?" I said. "What element are you learning?"

"Water!" she said.

"Water?" everyone in my family and me said.

"You have fire though," Vermillion said. "While Earth may be strong against Fire they aren't as polarizing as Water and Fire are. Fire is an element that drains the user's prana rapidly while water is one which flows more gently and smoothly."

"They're like North and South," Hei said. "Poles. Trust us we should know about this."

"And wood's opposite is metal," Aoitsuki said.

"That was random," Akatsuki said.

She gazes at her hands. "Sorry but you were talking about North and South...I felt West and East were being left out."

I patted my sister's head. "Well that was a nice little lesson. Now the Center also feels that way. Earth is the point in which the others move around. However all five elements; Wood, Metal, Fire, Water, and Earth are affected by, and affect each other. Without one the other wouldn't exist so a balance must be maintained between the five. However this is all just philosophy of our clan, you clan probably has something else."

"The elemental balance," Keanu said. He smiled. "It sounds nice. Our philosophy is also nice. We can teach it to you during your stay if you want."

The doorbell rang across the house.

"Who could that be?" Solean said, glancing out of the room.

"It's probably Nekua's tutor," Keanu said.

"Since Yeung is taking care of your siblings I'll go check who it is," I said.

"Maybe it's mine," Koal said, running past me. He tried to open the door but was too short to do so.

"Let me help you out," I said. I lifted him up high enough so he could open it.

"Sorry I'm late," a familiar voice rings. "We had some difficulty getting here."

"Lei?" I said.

"Iah?" Lei said as Adela and him stepped inside. "What are you doing here?"

"I asked first," I said. "Shouldn't you be doing some mission?"

Someone pulled the door until it was fully open. "We are," Eien said. "His mission is the same as yours."

Lei put his hands on the back of his head and flashed the kids a grin. "That's right, we have to help children learn magic. The future of magic and all that."

"I see. I take it it's the same with you?" I asked Adela.

"I'm actually here to help Eien observe. He plans to go back to Kyuu Seishin soon."

Eien nodded. "Yup, so glad that I can leave this guy with you two."

I let Koal down. "Hey Koal are you being taught wind or lightning magic?"

"Wind," he said cheerfully. "So is this my tutor?"

"I guess he is," I said, scratching my head. "Never expected this though. Wonder who Nekua's tutor is..." I smiled. "At this point I wouldn't be surprised if it were Nyima."

"Lei, Adela, Eien, Iah?" the expected person said. Nyima passed Eien and stared at us, her teammates.

"Right on cue, as always," I said, snickering.

She gave me a confused stare. "What are you four doing here?"

"I'll tell you later, first we should start these kids' training," I said, glancing over at Koal. "Go with Lei."

"Is our tutor here?" Solean said, poking her head out of the hallway.

"Yup," Lei said, nodding. "I'm guessing you're Solean Huo, right? I'm Lei Lan, I'll be tutoring both of you as promised. Though not at the same time."

Lei walked Koal over to Solean. He took out a bronze coin from his coat pocket.

"We'll be doing this by chance. Now pick, heads or tails?"

"Heads," Koal said, jumping up and down.

"Tails for me then," Solean said.

Lei flipped his coin, it landed on tails. "You're first Solean. Sorry Koal, you'll going to have to wait."

Koal puffed his cheeks. "Fine."

"Hey, kids," I said. "Do you know who from this country will be entering the upcoming magic games?"

Koal glanced at the floor before answering, "No one."

"What?" Adela asked.

"There are no magicians in this country around age 13 to 21. The games are every three years," Solean said. "So counting this upcoming one, our country hasn't been part of a tournament since the 2193 Winter Games at Kyuu Seishin. Back then father had managed to gain silver, a few golds, and even one platinum medal all on his own."

"Our country probably would've gotten more if the games hadn't been canceled following a certain incident," Keanu said. "In total our country hasn't participated in over eight years. Adding it all up, our country won't be represented until the 2208 Winter games, six years from now, when Solean will be thirteen and I'll be fourteen."

These kids seemed to know more about the games then when I was their age. "So a span of fifteen years in total. That's a long time."

"Keanu will likely struggle," Solean said.

"By the way, you mentioned platinum, didn't you?" I said. "Only the best of the best get that. I'm surprised a single person managed to get one." I smiled. "As for your big brother, leave it to me. I'll make sure he learns enough during this week that he'll be able to one-man-army several matches of the team games, and to snatch all the gold from the individual sections. Who knows, maybe he will even get a platinum. Six years from now, I'll be twenty one by then so we will see each other. So my last appearance at the games will be during my student's first."

"Actually, I won't participate," Keanu says. He stood in the middle of the hallway, hugging a flame shaped pillow. When did he sneak away from us? "I'm... I'm too weak. I'll simply end up embarrassing my parents and clan."

I squated down until my eyes met his. "Nonsense. The only way you can disappoint your parents is by not doing anything. How do you plan to revive your clan if you're too afraid to try?"

"Revive my clan? Will trying really be better?"

I stretch to my full height. "Sure beats hiding under your bed. How will you impress girls like that?"

He laughed. "I'm only eight you know."

"Well it's never too early to plan to get a girlfriend."

"What kind of advice is that?" Nyima said, glaring at me.

"Are you his girlfriend?" Keanu asked.

"No!" we both said.

"I barely know the guy," Nyima said. "I wouldn't ever date guys I barely know."

"That's a good rule when it comes to dating," Lei said. "Even we guys should make sure we know a girl before going out with her. She may turn out to be a man eating witch."

"Good point," I said.

"That'll be scary," Nyima said.

"Yeah," Adela said, nodding.

"Giving children dating advice? No wonder children these days are dating so young," Yeung said, returning from attending to her youngest children.

"Welcome back Lady Yeung," I said. "These are my friends Lei and Nyima. They're also tutors it seems. Oh and the pink haired girl is another friend of ours. Her name is Adela. She is sort of just tagging along. As is this guy here, he is-" I turned around and noticed Eien was gone. "Where did he go?"

"He never came indoors," Lei said, glancing back. "I guess he went outside."

"Eien is here to talk to my husband. He's at the capitol building," Lady Yeung said. "Now are you three ready to train my eldest children?"

"We are," we said in unison.

"Koal, Solean go with your tutor Lei, Nekua come over your tutor Nyima is here, and Keanu go with Iah. I divided the training hall into three rooms. I made sure that Lei had the largest. I also made sure your rooms are all large enough for the elements being used."

Nekua ran on ahead to the training room. "Come on," Nekua said.

"I'm coming," Nyima said. "Are all kids this energetic?"

"It may just be my kids," Lady Yeung said. "Now children behave yourselves."

"We will," the four said together.

"Hey you don't have need for a fourth tutor, do you?" I asked.

"No. Ame is barely learning fire magic and Kyustarusuisho is too young. Nekua and Koal are gifted in that they've managed to learn a second element at such a young age. It took Keanu and Solean three and two more years respectably. Yet all four of them are more talented than I. I didn't learn light magic until I was thirteen."

"You know light magic too?" Nyima said.

She nodded. "I learned it by reading books on the magic."

"Do you still have them?"

"Yes. I always try to reread them and try out spells I haven't had a chance to learn about. There's seven volumes in total." She tried to smile but sadness seemed to prevent her. "Father gave them to me. I'm not sure if he was telling the truth or simply joking, but he said he got them at a garage sell."

Nyima looked at her weirdly. "So do they work?"

"I'll be happy to show you. Ah, after you teach the kids first of course, I don't wish to distract their learning now. I will tell you this, the seven volumes according to my research are actually from a small clan made up of fourteen mages. They are said to be a clan of purifying light. Those words sadly appear to be false as they are in actuality believed to have attacked the Sui clan to the north recently, twenty-four years prior to the present day to be exact. A great war of Seven years happened between thirteen of the so called 'Shards of Light' and the Sui clan."

"Wait a moment," Lei said as he wrote down everything he was being told in his green notebook which he always kept on his person. "Seven years against a clan of fourteen? Were the Sui at the time that fragile?"

"On the contrary, they were at their prime. The thirteen nonetheless proved to be far too much for even a great clan to take on. The thirteen wielded not just Light magic but various kinds as well, ranging from Lightning to Fire."

"What happened to the lights?" I said.

"They vanished after the end of the seventh year. They faded from the world in a great explosion of light, taking a great deal of knowledge with them. Recently there have been accounts of them reappearing, such rumors say they still look as young as they did during their attack, some of them fourteen and some in their twenties."

"Fourteen to twenties?" Lei said. "Some were our age, while others were older or even younger...how could they have defeated a clan..."

"I have a theory, would you like to hear a quick summary of it before you go?"

"Yes please," Nyima said.

"I believe those fourteen have yet to regroup. The rumors talk only of a small group of seven, five of them teens, and two kids no older than eight. They are dressed in white robes with golden trim, holding wands made out of silver wood. Each time only those same seven are said to be spotted, roaming, as if looking for some people. I believe they are searching for the remaining seven members. Why would they be searching for them? The answer I came up with is that the Clan's final spell wasn't a normal teleportation spell, nor a suicidal attack. The spell was a reincarnation spell, in other words thirteen of the fourteen who vanished have been reborn into this world. As to why they would go ahead and go to the trouble of being reborn? I really don't know."

That description... Kun and the others... could they be...

"Where were they last spotted?" I asked.

"They were heading on route to Kyuu Seishin. My friends said they heard from some merchants that they were spotted heading towards your school. It appears they were attracted by the hole that mysteriously appeared there."

"The portal to the Abyss," Lei said, his face contorting with concern. He too must have thought the same as I. "What could be their connection to it be?"

"Who knows," Mrs. Huo said. She gulped. "Maybe the last seven are in your school. If so the seven will search for them. They may even pretend they're students."

Like Kun and Nahimana...

"So, how did these books end up in the hands of the man who sold them to your father?" Nyima asked.

"As I said I'm don't even know if father did get them that way. I still haven't been able to figure that out. Nor do I know the homeland of the fourteen."

"Come on," Nekua yelled. "We've been waiting for a long time now."

"We're coming," Nyima said.

I glanced over at Lei who was sweating.

"You also think that Kun is connected, don't you?" I asked.

Lei glanced up from the wood floor. "I... I don't know what to think. On the way here, Kun said that he'll be heading to Kyuu Seishin to check up on the condition of the hole as well as to hold a meeting with Nahimana, Ry, and some others."

"Lei," Adela said, placing a hand on his shoulder.

"Hmm, so despite all these months, we still don't know what Kun is up to... nor who he truly is..."

**Solar Note: Happy 2018, everyone :D! Hope that you'll look forward to reading more of Immortal Sun Mist Emperor in the upcoming year :3. 

What do you think Kun and the other white-cloak wearers are hiding, if anything?**