When Diana Cavendish had arrived to begin her education at the Academy, she had expected to meet intelligent, like-minded people, all working together to better themselves so they could serve their kingdom and fulfill their sacred duties as nobles to the best of their abilities. What she found were shallow, vapid masses more concerned about the rumors and stories that had appeared about the mysterious wandering lunatic who thought it was still the age of myth calling herself Lady Maria than they were with honing the gift of magic blessed unto them by the Dark Soul that usurped the Ancient Flame, the Deep Sea, the Raging Storm and the Eternal Earth. Probably some fool who took too literally the ancient myths that anyone could rise to greatness like the Chosen Lord.

So she had set her sights to loftier heights, and while she had not managed to attain the ranking of highest in her year, she was one among six who were elevated to the high office of the student council. Surely here she would find nobles who shared her ideals, who sought strength and empower their souls in the pursuit of their duties? A kindred soul?

They were, to her shock, only slightly less base than the rest of the nobility of the school. Why was everyone seemingly so focused on seducing Lady Claes? She already had a fiancé! Who seemed intent on seducing her at any given moment, despite the company around them. For that matter, so did Lady Hunt and Prince Alan, but that didn't seem to stop them. Lord Claes, she is your sister, this is most unseemly! Lady Sophia, 'Lady Chatterley's Maid' is clearly not a book suitable for a young lady, stop leaving it around the clearly innocent and ignorant Lady Claes, your intentions are very clear!

Diana almost despaired, had she not found her kindred soul in the most unlikely place.

President Maria Campbell had given a depressing and rather outrageous speech at the beginning, but as the days passed, Diana found to her horror that it was true. They had been chosen to do work so tedious, repetitive and never ending that only one whose academic output was already high could have dealt with it without significantly lowering their grades. And yet the President, true to her reputation, merely did the work as expected of her, forging on as good work was rewarded merely with more work. She never seemed to tire, always performing her duty as the President of the Council with impeccable dignity and grace. She offered her Light Magic freely to any in the council finding themselves pained, and she even treated Lady Claes like a child someone had brought to work, to pat on the head and given something to distract herself while the adults worked.

In her search for another soul she could relate to, one who performed their duty as expected of them, who saw their gifts of magic as a part of themselves to be trained rather that a symbol to raise high in opulent self-aggrandizement, Diana had never expected to find it in a commoner.

Her sweets were also the most delicious things Diana had ever tasted. Lady Claes was such a good girl to share…

The first breakthrough in the search for the eight kinds of blood happened when someone accidentally mixed two fresh blood samples and left them unattended. They thickened in a way that Maria had never seen before, and neither had anyone else. As they tried to find out what had caused it and any external factors that might have accidentally added, someone checked the labels and found that one of the blood samples in the mix had come from the fool who had experimented on himself.

The other had come from the person whose blood the fool had injected into himself.

"Is this what happens when incompatible bloods mix?" Lady Dahl said, poking the sample with a needle. "No wonder he nearly died if this was in his veins. The only time I've seen blood look like this is after a snake bite."

They'd finally managed to decipher the chart about blood in the ancient texts. Two factors, which could be present individually, together or completely absent in blood, as well as a third factor that was present in a majority of people's blood but could be absent as well. Eight possible combinations.

"Could the combinations have some correlation to the sort of magic a person possesses?" someone wondered.

"Unlikely," someone else said. "Unless you're saying there are three other kinds of magic wielders we have yet to discover– don't you dare bring lightning into this, lightning is a myth!"

As a small academic argument broke out, with some people placing bets and others clearing out the glassware, Maria diligently wrote down the findings, noting the blood as incompatible types. The fool's she marked with a sword. The incompatible sample, she marked with a shield.

Using the two as a base, as they knew they were incompatible types, they began experimenting. There was no reaction to blood long from the vein, so they had to use fresh blood, which was a bit limiting because their donors had to be present and quickly had to rest to recover. Still the results were gratifying.

Some blood that reacted to sword-type blood was tentatively marked as shield-type blood. Blood that didn't react was tentatively marked sword-type. Some objected to Maria getting to choose the nomenclature, but Lady Dahl overruled them, as they were too busy being silly to take notes, while Maria hadn't, so it was her nomenclature they were using.

They quickly found several blood samples that react to both shield- and sword-type when added in, but did not react as strongly when either was added to it, which corroborated with two of the blood types. This was marked as shield-sword blood. By elimination and consultation with the chart, the last variety was the one that did not cause a reaction when poured into any sample, yet reacted when the other samples were poured into it.

Maria was aware it couldn't possibly be that easy, and from the discussions of those around her so was everyone else. But it was a start.

Earl Dan Ascart, Prime Minister of the Kingdom of Sorcier, had an arrangement with his liege. He'd work diligently, loyally, and to the fullest extent of his great capabilities, and in return his Majesty would not ask him to work nights. This was the only thing he had asked for when he had wed his wife, that nights would be spent with his wife and children, and unless there was a direct threat to them, like a plague, a rebellion, a war or the 8th return of Seath the Scaleless or one of his inspired lunatics, his majesty could kindly stuff it. As they'd been friends since they were children, this condition had been accepted. Dan had only waived his condition three times: when their highnesses the princes had been born, as the king had been such a bundle of nerves that he had chosen to stay by his friend's side. His wife had understood, and the king had repaid the favor when Nicol and Sophia had been born, having needed to run the country for three whole days each without his trusty prime minister.

In the end, the capital hadn't actually caught fire, and that was the important thing. Neither child was ever to know their birthdays had each been dangerously close to being the date of a national tragedy.

Today was a perfectly ordinary day in the palace, and like many Prime Ministers before him, Dan surfed between the dangerous line of delegating so much he was ignorant of what was going on and doing so much his hand needed Light Magic. Nicol's letters of the amount of work they had to do in the Student Council had been greatly amusing in an 'oh, wait until you enter the real world, son' kind of way, considering they had a member who possessed Light Magic and was generous with it. Dan wistfully wondered how much his son would miss that once he was working as the Third Prince's Prime Minister.

He read through a report from said prince about the progress on the last few escapees from Rafael's Vengeance, which contained a few disturbing reports that hinted the reported Dark Magic wielder sighted in Noir was still in the country, and an addendum that noted his suspicion this was the person who had performed Dark Magic on the late former-Marchioness Dieke, though what memories beyond the circumstances of her betrayal to the Ministry had been altered, no one knew.

"Your sons are being capable, as usual," Dan said loudly enough for his voice to drift through the nearby door that connected his office to the King's.

"Which one? Damn it, Jeffery didn't do anything stupid again, did he?" King Artorias Stuart said (he'd been classically named, and had been mercilessly teased in childhood, until he'd met Milidiana Claes...), his voice that could easily be mistaken for that of a young maiden (among other parts of him, refer to aforementioned teasing) emanating from the next room, long used to this form of communication. When he'd been a prince they'd managed to get by sharing an office, but on his ascension, that hadn't been allowed. So they'd had neighboring offices set up with their desks against the same wall, a rotating Ashina-style secret door between them. It wasn't much of a secret form the office staff though, since they kept it open to talk, but it preserved the fiction they didn't share an office.

"No, I meant your son who's friends with my son," Dan said. "Apparently one of them got to Marquis Cavendish in that banana farm he runs. He's added his support on that proposal. I think we'll be able to push it through late summer, now. Not that it needs any more help, I have a report here that she was part of the team that finally made a breakthrough about that blood thing. They're naming it after her because she was the only one who remembered to take notes, and Palin Dahl's punishing them for arguing."

"Cavendish? They got to Cavendish?" Artorias said in surprise. "The man usually won't budge for anything but fruits and indulging his daughters."

"I think they got to a daughter. Isn't his eldest starting at the Academy this year?"

"The stuffy one who has a bigger propriety polearm up her ass than Mili? They are capable if they managed that. Hah! That's my boy! He's going to marry Mili's girl yet!"

"Please, you know it'll only be a pity victory since Nicol isn't fighting at all," Dan said.

"Those are fighting words, Ascart!"

In the desks across from their possess and therefore facing the open 'secret' door and incidentally each other, the Prime Minister's Private Secretary Humphrey and the King's Private Secretary Bernard exchanged their usual exasperated looks and sighed. People seriously overestimated the sorts of secrets they had to keep…

Blood Vial
Special container for blood used in ministration.

The vial contains a label denoting whether it is Sword, Shield, Armed or Bared type blood, and whether it is of ruby or sapphire tinge. This is known as Campbell-Typing.

Using the wrong type in ministration could be potentially fatal. Be sure to always check the label of your blood vial.