That night when grey went to sleep after finally cleaning his poison mist mess he passed out almost immediately and awoke in his lucid labs he found lily training with some weird glowing runes but they were in the air instead of on her body.
Grey quietly approached to watch her closely and for a while watching in amazement when she used her raw flow to inscribe runes in the air or make circles full of weird symbols.
'Hmm? I guess I can only translate noises others make and not writings.' Grey thought to himself.
When she finished a few portals appeared before her that were linked.
"WHOA! That's pretty cool." Grey said surprised.
Lily whole body fliched as her portals collapsed immediately.
Her green eyes glowed with a hint of purple as her lime hair was covering most of face in a huge mess as if she just woke up from a cave.
"When did you get here!" She screamed in panic.
"Not too long ago, but why do you look like… like that?" He asked being pretty blunt as he pointed to all of her.
"Ugh! Don't remind me. Me veil has me working on glyphs for the past for days nonstop after I got my third summon."
Grey looked at her with obvious confusion "I can assume the glyphs are the runes in the air you made. But who is Mr veil and when did you got a third summon?"
Lily immediately pressed her hands on her mouth in shock. "Dammit I was gonna surprise you, well anyways me and Adam have trying out new techniques and syncing up and after a while we were close to evolving but we couldn't for some reason until a few days ago."
Grey was opening his mouth to speak but lily quickly interrupted him.
"And before you ask i studied a book on my rune and it turns out I can't enhance myself until all my summons reach my rank however you guys can evolve independently of me."
Grey thought about that for a moment. "Meaning you can focus on one or two and have them evolve way past you or have try to speard out your power to have more summons… interesting."
Lily let out a deep sigh "Yeah but Mr veil has been has been very strict on me as I'm going to the academy some after traveling for a bit."
A look of realization appeared on her face "Oh that right you don't know them."
"THEM?" Greys confusion just grew.
"Mr veil is what we call a irregular specifically a Soul twin. They are people born with two souls but have only one body meaning they never sleep as someone is always awake and they can swap to change rune or fighting styles."
Grey looked shocked at this information causing his normally droopy ears to fully erect giving her his full attention.
"Yeah Brian veil took his mothers name and Steve orgins took his fathers. Steve is the one the actually invented the raw flow technique that my dad taught you while Mr veil invented glyphs as they both are runeless."
"Wait. Wait. Wait." Grey had to stop for a moment.
"They are runeless but still use rune energy? How is that possible."
"Well according to the runes channel your soul essence into itself to power your elements. So Steve trained to manually force it enhance his body while Mr veil used it to create runes and symbols to replicate rune users saying something like names and words have power so written word should also have powers."
Greys jaw dropped "so one forced his flow or soul essence as you call it to boost himself and the other used it to draw on the air to mimic the actual runes of others… wow… just wow."
Grey smiled at his flabbergasted face "Yeah Adam and crystal were pretty shocked too. Steve likes teaching his so called raw flow to anyone like my dad while I'll be learning from Mr veil as his first student."
"Can I learn pleeeeeeeeeeeese." Grey cuddled up to her leg and gave her the puppy dog eyes.
Lily felt a strong tug on her heart strings 'soooo cute!' she thought to herself.
She gently picked up grey and hugged him tightly. "I'm so sorry but you have to ask him as he is very scary and strict."
Grey paused and looked like a distraught child when a image appeared in his head "Wait a dang minute!" Which got him a raised eyebrow.
"Moqui can teach me! She is a goblin who has no rune but she somehow managed to control the dead like puppets."
Now it was lilys turn to be shock "woah she sound interesting. Hmmm I wonder if she would accept a temporary contract?"
Grey gave her another strange look.
"Oh that's something I learned recently I pass on a stone to someone and after forming a contract I can summon them once in exchange or open a random portal and unleash a something I can't control."
Grey had a devious smile "sounds like we both got stronger wanna spar when I return?"
"Yeah! I'll show what I got. Luckily for you dreams aren't the best place for summoning runes otherwise I'd kick your butt here."
"So how has everything with you been so far and what happened with your family?" She looked a little concerned.
Grey looked up at her face with a warm smile before he told her all his adventures since he went back home.
"Wow you've been through a lot… wait so does this mean your married to a snake?"
Grey looked at her weirdly. "I understand what your saying but for some reason I don't know what this marriage thing is?"
"Oh, it's like a umm mate for life I guess?"
"I don't know but I do like her and want to mate with her again."
"Sooo? can I summon you again or do you still have things to do at home." She asked nervously.
"Hmm I basically finished I got my family and kin to safety, helped golos revenge, reap aid scarlet and Maria… I don't thinks so but I could be wrong plus I wanna stay with my family a little longer."
Lily slumped in dread I thought so "Adam can't understand anyone other than me unless I'm borrowing your rune… oops?" She looked grey with a sheepish grin.
"Wow your really bad at keeping secrets, hmm just be careful because my second rune is poison gas so if you borrow that it could be dangerous for everyone else."
Lily just nodded. "Oh my dad doesn't know but before we go I plan on visiting another kingdom before heading to another base near the academy."
Grey loved secrets and it showed on his exited face "what we doing."
"Well I'm supposed to with my meet up with a orc that lives in the mountains near the academy but there is this cool new kingdom not to far from me owned by a demonic rat queen. It's built upon ruins and is very advanced full of games and other cool things."
Grey and Lily spent the next while just chatting and plotting have a good time for the first time in a while.
A few weeks went by in a blur before grey sadly said goodbye to his friends and family.
"It's been fun guys but I'm still needed but don't worry I'll visit often."
"You BETTER!" His brother yelled as a portal suddenly opened behind grey and sucked him in.
Grey eased back and felt strange vibrations all around him as he fell through the summoning tunnel and appeared next to Lily in a wide forest.
Grey looked next to her only to see a massive feminine creature made up of pure dirt and grass standing next to Lily.
Lily was pretty smug as she tried to gloat "This is crystal she is basically a earth spirit from a race called Golems they are born on a planet where minerals come to life that grow stronger by eating other minerals, crazy huh."
Grey felt a shift in the air as the golems arm reformed into dirt board revealing a happy face.
"Great another one that can't talk, welp you wanna see what we learned… I bet I'm way stronger so if I win you owe blueberry snacks."
Lily giggled a bit "sure but if I win I get to hold and pet you for a day."
'Crap' grey thought. "Hmm fine three… two… GO!" Grey immediately dashed out at high speeds ready to kick lilys legs when a dirt spike appeared in front of almost impaling him.
Grey immediately jumped to the right to dodge only for a portal to open up there.
Grey fell through the portal and before he knew it he was falling from the sky.
Crystal created massive earth spike waiting for grey to land while Lily formed a portal near her as a makeshift shield.
Grey used his stepped on solid sound to hop away but all the two girls saw was a rabbit hopping on thin air. "Sound step!"
Grey started moving faster looking like he was running on air through the forest.
"Crap we lost sight of him! Crystal prepare for anything we must win!" Crystal ran to Lily.
But both girls turned around when they heard a whisper directly behind them.
"It's too late I got you!"
They both turned around and swung at the air. They looked confused at the empty air when grey emerged from the spikes they made earlier away from their sight.
Grey immediately released a dense cloud of white mist.
Lily felt her eyes tearing up as it became harder to breathe.
A black rune quickly formed on her hand as she dropped into the shadows.
Grey felt the moment she disappeared with his ears. 'Oh right she can borrow her summons runes, so that must have been Adam's shadow rune.' He thought.
Crystal quickly attacked greys back with arms transformed into stone clubs.
Grey immediately ran into the air dodging her repeated attacks.
'And it looks like she also doesn't need to see to find me, since she's a earth user I can't make any tunnels underground. And it looks like normal gas doesn't affect as she doesn't breath.' He wondered when he felt something faint coming near like leaves but not truly there.
Grey saw five glowing purple symbols flying at him. "Whaaa! Oh crap!" Grey immediately ran with all his might wondering why he barley felt these things called glyphs.
One exploded near him cracking space near it causing grey to be pulled back into it.
One glyph immediately sealed the space fracture while the other three formed a barrier around grey trapping him inside.
Most of the mist was pull into the space fracture so grey saw a exited dark elf girl jumping up and down in joy while crystal looked smug in her own silent way.
"~Awww man~! Grey grumbled as he was brought into lilys tight hug by the barrier.
"Hey why couldn't I feel your glyphs coming at me until they were near me?"
Lily thought for a moment when a serious but echoing voice answered causing Crystal and Lily to flinch for a moment.
"Allow me to explain."
A tall and powerful dark elf with skin a lighter shade of brown than lilies chocolate like skin.
His eyes glow a empty white but grey could swear he saw a few small dark white symbols shifting in the man's eyes.
"Hmmm… oh you must be Mr veil yeah Lily said you use a power similar to moqui!"
That earned a pause from "hmm a spirit beast with powers similar to me?"
Grey could feel the heavy gaze of the man on him as if his entire bloodline was being examined.
"It seems you are also a irregular and that you know other irregulars like us." He said in a serious manner.
"A anomaly and a irregular… what a interesting pair you two make. Anyways to answer your question the glyphs are pure energy so the same way you can feel past the mist your couldn't feel the runes as they were not solid. The only reason you felt them last second was because she moved them at high speeds at the last moment shifting the air faintly, that's what you felt."
His answer seemed to make grey think about a few things, for one he never thought about why he could feel past his gas mist.
For another how was he also a irregular?
"Hmm excuse me but how am I a irregular old man, I don't remember having something else in my body?"
Mr veils eyebrows twitched heavily as he also heard Steve in his head laughing like a maniac.
"Call me by my name at the least or ill trap you in a shadow nightmare for a week."
Hearing the mention of a shadow brought grey some very bad memories of the past.
They all noticed how his body fliched and sweat rapidly feel from his face.
"Good it seems like you have already experienced it, so to explain it to you I'll explain all three cases."
Crystal grey and Lily sat down near him quietly as he hovered above them with no emotions on his face.
"There are three cases Anomalies, irregulars, and exceptions."
"The exceptions are people blessed from birth by the world or a divine being they are extremely powerful and have the world backing them."
A certain green rabbit appeared in greys head.
"Next are anomalies, they are creatures that should not have been born naturally and exist. Like lily here was born because someone decided to change time which caused time to change permanently."
Lily was the most shocked out of the three of them at this info. "She knew she was a anomaly but she didn't know she was born because someone changed time."
"And finally us irregulars we are things that shouldn't exist naturally but evolved naturally like a very rare exotic herb. The world seems against us as we have the power to defy fate itself, like me and my brother being born in one body or the red energy in your body that's syncing with your chimera form. Which are both irregular powers."
Now greys was shocked.