1 I am not a honours student...
The war between Demons and Nephealians has been waged for thousands of years until Nephealis was destroyed forcing the Nephealians to take shelter in the Chain of Floating Islands called Udan. The Nephealians settle themselves in this supposedly holy land that was believed to be protected by gods something that turned out to be true.
Without any life-threatening demons around the Islands of Udan, the population grew exponentially.
Nephealians now had more time in their hands to do trivial things like exploring a better way to develop their civilization and create a class-based society giving people of higher classes unfair advantages and the power to decide for everyone. Peace was all around the Nephealis.
However, this peace did not come without a price. Soon the Nephealians discovered that they were giving birth to children that were either magically dumb or had Maya reserve comparable to a Poltan Bat. The people in the higher classes who discovered it first managed to uphold their magical supremacy by selective marriages.
Everything wasn't worse but it did force the civilization into the development of a new kind of magical technology that allowed even the magically dumb to cast spells.
Even with the fast developments of magical technology, Nephealis was far away from being called suffice. Magical technology requires a lot of money to produce and even if you have the money you will still have to find someone who is a master in the craft of making Magical Items that you require.
Magical technology requires a lot of studies not only on the science of magic but also require archeological studies. Especially on a specific period in history that Archeologists decided called "Void Maya Era". As the name suggests it was an era without any Magic particles or Maya left in the world.
Every zealous archeologist that exists in Nephealis has a common goal in mind and that is to discover the technologies of the Void Maya era. That sure is a noble goal with lots of benefits. Just finding one can give you a vast amount of wealth that you can retire right then and there.
...
My name is Andrew Will or you can call me Will Andrew, I am also an archeologist with the goal of uncovering secrets of our past, well I still don't have the identification of a true archeologist but today is the day that will change. I am more than ready to prove myself to the Headmasters of archeological and ancient magic departments that I am worthy of my Blue Vest with Stonehenge sewed on its chest, the sign of Academy graduates.
"Good Morning Andrew." I am greeted by Mr. Jonathan.
"Good morning indeed, Mr. Jonathan." I greeted him back.
Mr. Jonathan Rose is an air carriage pilot and a good friend of mine. We first met when I first joined the academy and ever since then he has been the one flying me into Orion the Capital Island of Udan.
"I see you are ready for your promotion." Mr. Jonathan said after looking at that huge binder of pages that I am holding in my hand.
"I have a good feeling about this one," I assured Mr. Jonathan.
It has been three years since I first gave my final examinations, which I failed miserably and did not manage to promote ever since.
"You better promote this year, I still have my hopes up for a new carriage." Mr. Jonathan has a weird way to encourage others but believe me when I say he is a nice man.
I am thankful for him, if it weren't for him then I would have never managed to repeat the academy for the third time especially after my second miserable failure.
"Don't worry I will, I have a good feeling that this time the headmasters will have no other choice but to promote me into a real archeologist. And after I am allowed to explore into the underground ruins of Ancient Durran, I will start raking up so much money that I will buy you two carriages instead of the one I promised."
"You better." Mr. Jonathan warned me.
Two years ago after my second failure, I was ready to give up. That was when I had the chance to truly befriend Mr. Jonathan. I was about to jump off the edges of Island Hermes when Mr. Jonathan saw me and caught me before I could jump. He scolded me for hours and kept me in his home refusing to let me leave until I assured him that I wasn't going to repeat my actions.
Since then every morning he would pick me up from my home and drop me at the academy. When I was struggling financially he wouldn't take any money from me instead he told me that when I make it big I should just buy him a new carriage. I am still indebted to him for that.
I climbed inside the carriage while Jonathan mounted the monstrous 2 meters tall Hawk that sat above the Carriage.
"Are you ready?" He asked while adjusting his gloves and face cover.
"Let's go." I tapped the carriage's roof while sticking my body out from its window.
"Here we go." Mr. Jonathan cheered while I securely sat inside the Carriage.
The hawk flapped its wings and with giant gushes of wind lifted the carriage from the ground. The carriage went up until it reached a safe height and then with a sharp whistle it surfed forward, cutting through the air heading straight towards the Floating Island called Orion.
It took 2 hours for the carriage to reached landing ports of Orion and it safely landed.
"Thank you." I thanked Mr. Jonathan after leaving the carriage.
"It's alright and you better get promoted this time, I don't care what your dreams are but I want that carriage. I have already reserved one at the store." He called from the top of the hawk.
"Thank you." I thank him one last time before heading towards the large gate with a sign carved out of the stone.
The stone sign had three main pictures carved into it but the most important was the profile of the founder Grandmaster Henry Edenwood, he is not only the founder of the academy but he is also the first archeologist to discover an ancient artifact. An artifact that allowed people to cast a level 12 fire spell called Gran'nvukhan.
The Nephealians magi-crafters reverse-engineered the artifact and developed the first Magical Lighter that can light any burnable material within the range of 2 meters.
It was disappointing compared to the ancient artifact but it paved the way for future generations to develop on his discovery.
"Good Morning Mr. Andrew." I heard a familiar voice calling me so I turned.
Are my ears ringing? There is no one behind me.
"WAAH!" I screamed when I turned back and saw a large fanged monster standing right in front of my face. In my attempt to run away from it I stumbled back and fell on my butt.
"Hahahaha," I saw the monster laughing with his hands wrapped around its stomach. Surprisingly this monster has the body of a young female student.
"I can't hahaha… I ca… hahaha… I can't believe you fell for that." I watched as the monster tore its face revealing a girl laughing at the top of her lungs. She wiped her tears and approached me offering her hands for help.
I took her hand and lifted myself off the ground before I started dusting the back of my pants.
"That wasn't funny." I frowned at the girl who was still laughing uncontrollably.
"How can you say that?" She paused to laugh, "That was one of my best pranks."
"I guess the audience must have enjoyed it." I pointed at the people who were giving us weird looks.
"Well, they don't know what good comedy is." She said and slapped my back.
"Oww." I cried and started rubbing my back.
"Don't be such a weakling." She criticized me.
"Well you should know about the difference is our strength gap." I scolded her which was naturally ignored.
"By the way are you ready for your presentation." She asked while matching my pace.
"Yes," I answered.
"You should pass this year, I overheard the teachers yesterday, I think they are planning to regulate the number of attempts each person has before the academy decides to rusticate them." She said with a concerned tone.
"So they had had enough of me."
"I hope not." Her face sunk and she kept her head down.
Emil and I have been friends for more than a year now which is surprising seeing she is a second-year student while I am attending my fourth year in my final year of the academy.
Unlike me, Emil is a student of Academy's Martial Arts and Magically enhanced combat department. She is someone you will call a prodigy and she always ranks top in her class. She can even outmatch most of the final years but due to a biased ranking system, her name never managed to appear on the top rankers list.
"What about you? Are you ready for your examination?" I asked her.
"Yes, and you bet I will be the topper this year too." She patted her biceps as she said that.
"I feel bad for your opponents." I joked.
"I hope your lying, they are total nom-noms." I giggled at her, calling nom-noms to a martial arts student is something only she can do.
(Author's note: Nom-noms means light snacks or snacks you serve while having tea. It is a word? Phrase? I don't know how those works. It is usually used towards toddlers who are still learning to crawl.)
As we walked towards the Main Hall of the academy, where the headmasters will give a speech to the examiners, we started to see many other students. Most of them gave me a look of disgust, something I have gotten used to a long time ago.
"Hey princess you should stay away from him or else you will catch his curse." A student yelled. I have always been an outcast and ever since my failure people have been mocking me constantly and making dumb superstitions like how people who are close to me will never clear any examinations.
Some of those idiots even went as far as to sabotage answer sheets of people who were friendly to me. This was why I chose to distance myself from others but for some unknown reason, Emil just doesn't care about that rumor and hangs around me. I am secretly grateful for that.
"I will punch your teeth into your mouth and then you can keep looking for them every time you take a dump." She threatened the student.
She then looked at me and said, "Don't listen to them Andrew, they are the peoples with goblin Ancestors." I find it cute that she tries to comfort me every time something like this happens.
"Don't worry, their insults can't get under my skin." I just ignore those toxic people.
"Good good, good good." She nodded to herself, "If you ever want them to just disappear, just tell me." She said with a menacing grin on her face.
"I don't think that will be necessary," I confirmed with a disturbing smile.
…
It took the headmasters two hours to complete their speech and with each word they spoke it would give birth to new words creating a miserable cycle of torture that can continue forever.
I can't explain how happy I was when Grandmaster came on the stage. He didn't rant like the headmasters and after a short speech, we were allowed to go to our classes.
"Mr. Andrew?" Someone asked when they saw me enter the class.
"Yes," I answered confusingly.
"Please come with me." he requested.
"I am sorry but I have an examination that will start soon," I explained to the rude person.
"Please follow me, I insist." He handed me a letter that had the seal of the grandmaster stamped on it.
I took it from his hand and started reading it.
It wrote,
"To,
Andrew Will,
A student of Archeological and ancient magic department,
Dear student,
You have been invited by the grandmaster of the academy to join him in his chambers. Please visit the Grandmaster's office as soon as you receive this letter.
From,
The Grandmaster of National Academy of Nephealis,
Grandmaster Henry Edenwood"
My eyes widened when I saw the signature of Grandmaster Henry Edenwood on the corner of the page right below the seal of grandmaster. I tried to remember what I did to receive this letter. Even after thinking about it, using my every brain cell I could not come up with an answer.
"Does the grandmaster wants to personally rusticate me?" I asked the person who came with the letter.
"Please follow me for now, all will be answered when you enter his chambers." He said while keeping a straight face which only made me more curious.
"Please lead the way," I said with an aching heart something that could not be cure until I get inside the Grandmaster's chamber.
