They spent the better part of the day practicing their restraint on mana usage through various exercises that the specialist, who introduced himself as Gabriel Barrister. After they seemed to grasp the basic concept, he had them all try the spark experiment again. Freed, Mai, and Vesper seemed to have it down, Celine kept getting a small flame the size of a lighter, and Eva created small explosions every time.
"Well, keep practicing. Before you leave, I have a spell to teach you. It's for when you go out in public, so not really a permanent solution. A variation of the polymorph spell. You might be able to look somewhat like your old selves in public."
"But Headmaster Milton said they couldn't remove our changes," stated Mai.
"True, but I've been thinking while you were exercising, maybe a temporary solution can be allowed, or a transference. I could be able to transfer one change to another if you want to. But it's your choice of who has to take on the chan-"
"I'll take Freed's," blurted out Mai confidently, "he is like this because he chose to help me, I'll take on some of his."
"Mai," Freed started to protest until, she held up a hand to stop him.
"As what the hell, I've always wanted to fly, I'll help him out," said Celine as she stepped forward.
"No one would make fun of me if I had another set of horns," added Eva.
Vesper sat there on his coils looking down at himself. "I've wondered what it was like to fly with my own wings for awhile now, so this might be my chance, but truth be told, I'm frightened by the idea of changing further."
"Don't worry about it, I know how you feel. I would never force you into anything you didn't want to do," Freed put a hand on Vesper's shoulder reassuringly.
"Settled? Ok, stand here and I'll -,"
"I'll do it," Vesper called out, startling everyone.
"Why," asked Celine.
"I'm already shunned by everyone at the Aquarius dorm i thought were my friends, changing more is just me spiting them," he half smiled.
"Any other interruptions, or can I continue?"
They all nodded as Freed walked to the center of the room. Gabriel began his chanting and a pale blue light encircled Freed as a red one encircled each of his friends. He felt his wings slowly retract back into him as well as two pairs of his horns and surprisingly his tusks as well. He turned to look at his friends and saw some move their hands up to feel the horns grow or look over their shoulder to see the wings grow in. The whole process was completely painless, the only sensation being a slight tickling feeling, and in Celine's case, a tightness as her robe had a hole torn in it as her brown feathered wings grew in.
Once the light faded and Gabriel's chanting ceased, Freed felt the weight that had been lifted from his torso and head.
"I can never thank you enough for this you guys," Freed said as he thanked them each one of them.
"I'm sure you can try," replied Vesper in a joking voice as he folded his bat like wings around his torso like a cloak.
"You can thank me by not bothering me ever again," coughed Gabriel into his hand using the other to wave the smoke away that his pipe he had conjured up while the others were talking. He straightened up and spoke, "Now that spell I was talking about earlier."
"Wait," Freed interrupted as He felt his face, "where did my tusks go?" Everyone felt their faces, but found them lacking any orc tusks. Gabriel waved away his pipe, "this was an experimental spell, they probably dissipated, now about that spell." He walked them through the hand gestures and incantation necessary. Freed was first to attempt it. As he finished a billow of smoke surrounded Freed as the transformation began.
The first thing to change was his second set of arms retract into his body, followed by his finned ears reshaping into 4 inch long elven ears. Then his ribbed curved horns retracted back into small nubs poking out of his white hair. The greatest change was his long dragon half retract into him and he retook a bipedal stance with normal human feet. His tail had shrunk to 4 feet long but retained the spade tip. His testicles popped back out into a sack as the 2 dragon dicks disappeared and the demonic one shrunk down to 12 inches long. His 7 foot height shrunk slightly to 6 and a quarter, however his eyes remained the same. The tattoos remained through the entire process, covering him from head to toe. As the smoke cleared, Freed spun around taking in his more human body, not even caring he wasn't clothed. It wasn't until he noticed that everyone was either gawking, averting their gaze or covering their own eyes, that he finally remembered he was stark naked in front of everyone and covered up as best he could.
Gabriel waved his hand and some clothes materialized on Freed. He was given a loose fitting open blue vest, loose fitting white harem pants with a red cloth sash tied around the waist, brown slip on shoes and a 1 size too big blue novice robe. "That should do, I didn't know your size so I had to guess. Who's next?" The others each preformed the spell. Mai shrunk slightly to 7 feet tall but kept the wings and eastern dragon antler horns, which Freed didn't mind as it gave her a look like she was wearing a crown. Eva lost her udder and both sets of horns, much to her displeasure about the horns. Celine opted not to use the spell, explaining she liked the way she looked. When it came to Vesper, he hesitated. "What's wrong? You can go back to the Aquarius dorm if you wanted to," stated Freed.
"I've got a confession to make. The night we changed, I was with a student from the warriors school. It was pretty serious. We were on a sorta date when I changed and she fled without a second glance. It hurt alot, but as I returned to my dorm, my dormmates saw me and called me a freak. You guys saw me and saw a person in need regardless of how I looked. I don't think I want to cover up who I am."
"If you still need a place to stay," Freed approached Vesper offering his hand, "my offer is still open."
Vesper took Freed's hand and they shook on it, "thanks it's the least you can do for getting me into this mess yo begin with," smiled Vesper as his eyes moved down, "did you have to make the offer like that though?"
Freed looked down to see his harem pants tenting very visibly and quickly turned to cover it up. His face beet red, "I'm so sorry, that's not what I meant. Forget I said anything."
Gabriel was surprised with himself that he started to smile, but quickly resumed his apathetic expression. "With balls that big, I'm surprised you weren't always hard," he added. "Now if that's all. Please go, I've got drinking to get back to. Keep practicing those exercises and you'll regain your control."
The 5 turned to leave with Eva bringing up the rear. As the rest left, she looked over her shoulder and mouthed, 'thank you', as she left, stunning Gabriel. 'Did she notice?'
"Well, I must say I'm surprised at you Gabe," said a voice above him jusy as the door closed and the headmaster Theodore Milton decended from above, "you are a natural teacher. A little gruff, but you did well. But why did you do it?"
"Tch, because you asked me to. You practically dumped them on my doorstep," Gabriel waved his hand and a fresh full bottle of rum flew to his open hand.
"Young Gornhilde would possibly be in a far worse state if we hadn't acted sooner. And that is not what i meant and you know it," said the headmaster as he conjured a glass for himself.
Gabriel pulled out the stopper and poured some into the floating glass. "As a big green guy once said, 'kissing becomes a challenge with tusks', and besides what is a pair of tusks to me anyways? I've got a file somewhere around here."
The floating man took a sip of the spirit and quickly spat it out in disgust. "Egad! This is what you drink all the time? Do you have no taste?"
Gabriel took a swig from the bottle. "Its cheap and it gets me drunk, that's enough for me."
"You keep that spell on all the time now?"
"I can keep it going asleep and blackout drunk, and I do regularly," he took another swig.
Milton sighed, "you can't keep doing this to yourself. Gorg forgave you, why can't you?"
"Because I see her every time I close my eyes. If I had been faster, things would be different. This is the only way I can sleep soundly."
"What did you think of them?"
"They're young, but quick learners, I think that Eva girl saw through my bluff about the tusks. They kinda remind me of us when we were training. You have news?"
The headmaster nodded. "Ms.Char told me everything that occurred at the library, and how far it went. It was an emotional amplification spell, it affected her kinda like that lust draft did at castle-"
"WE AGREED NEVER TO SPEAK OF IT AGAIN! I still can look at a cheese wheel and get flashbacks."
Milton chuckled, "agreed. It does concern me who did it though, keep an eye on that Freed boy."
"I've done my part, and I don't plan on seeing them ever again." He lifted the bottle up.
"Hmm, that could be interesting. A teacher never seeing his students."
Gabriel stopped just before he took another gulp, "What. You can't possibly mean...."
"I've assigned you to personally teach those 5. You would be perfect. You yourself said they remind you of your younger days."
"I will not. I never agreed to that."
"Oh yes you did, 3 weeks ago. I slipped it into your contract renewal for the year. You just didn't read it. 'If you are unable to keep an air of disinterest through an entire lesson, you shall be assigned that class as its private teacher' is what it said, and I caught a small ticket of a smile at the end didn't I?"
"Grrr, yes. But there are better teachers here. They have training to prepare them for the future. Not like we did."
The headmaster began to circle Gabriel as he spoke."What if they don't prepare them properly? What if you could? If they were to graduate and perished because you chose not to teach them?" His circling stopped.
Gabriel paused. 'Maybe I could prevent what happened from repeating.' "But what if I fail?"
"Do your best, and you won't. I'll give you 7 days to prepare your lessons. It'll be easier if you ditch the bottle." The headmaster teleported away with a flash, leaving Gabriel to look at a mirror that the headmaster had maneuvered in front of. Gabriel spent a few moments looking at his disheveled appearance for what felt like the first time. He looked down at the bottle in his hand and sighed. 'Ok, I'll try for her.'