"No, he is a friend," John said.
He stepped forward and touched the edge of Lanmar's glaive as if it were a mere wooden stick. "Withdraw that little weapon. Store it away. We don't need to scare my teacher to death."
"…"
Nikolas was so startled, so utterly terrified, that he couldn't even find the air to speak. His eyes darted frantically between the giant, the swirling blue portal, and the slowly approaching John.
Seeing John, the one he had truly believed was just a talented little cub, playing such a high-level hand drove an instant, genuine fear into his very soul.
"Stay away from me!" Nikolas summed up the last of his courage and roared, his hands shaking as he unsheathed his long spear. "Take one more step, and I will treat you as an enemy!"
"I'm that Paragon we kept speaking about back there," John calmly said, dropping another bomb on Nikolas's head that nearly caused the man's heart to stop.
