68 Good News

With Lorvan and Yuil's help, Savyrran finally made it out of the forest. Thankfully, they did not run into anymore bullies. In fact, they did not even run into anyone. However, Lorvan was sure that if they had been attacked, Savyrran would have saved the day.

Once outside the forest, the ring on their fingers dissipated as did the time monitors on their wrists. Savyrran's mouth twitched in confusion as she stared at her empty finger. But it looked like the other two girls were as confused as she was. Before any of them could say anything, they heard a voice.

"Welcome." A middle-aged man with his eyes closed said to the three girls the moment they emerged out of the forest. He was lazily sitting on a wooden chair in a way that suggested that he was bored by the whole thing.

"You have cleared the first phase. Write your names and pick one of the cards in the basket." The man nodded towards the book and basket lying on the large table in front of him without even opening his eyes. "In two hours, take your cards with you to the Combat School."

When the girls saw that the man was no longer talking and had gone back to sleep, or whatever mysterious thing he was doing, Savyrran and her companions did as they were told. As Savyrran wrote her name, she saw that eighty-three people had already written their names in the book. Did this mean that only eighty-six people had cleared the trials? Only two days were left until the trial ended and yet just eighty-six of them had passed. Wasn't it thousands of them who had began the trial? So where were the rest of them? Or were they having a hard time finding soul beasts like her?

After Savyrran wrote her name as the eighty-fourth applicant, Lorvan and Yuil followed suit. After everything, Lorvan and Yuil profusely thanked Savyrran for everything while the latter smiled in uncertainty. Savyrran really had no idea why the two girls were thanking her when it was thanks to them she had found so many cores and also found her way out of the forest. She felt she was the one who was supposed to thank them, and so she did, to a very confused pair of sister. But having come to know that it was useless arguing with Savyrran, the sisters just let it go.

When they left the Combat School and were about to part ways, Lorvan reminded Savyrran to bring her card when coming to the school in the next two hours. She explained that the card was proof that they had passed the trial. If she lost the card, she might not be allowed to partake in the next phase of the trials.

Savyrran thanked her and promised to take care of her card. Then she waved them goodbye.

Now, she had to find her brother. It had been five days and he should have been up by now.

...

"What do you mean he is not yet awake. It's been five days." Savyrran felt her palms becoming clammy as she fixed an intense gaze on Captain Jarjaha. It had been explained to her that the longest her brother might be unconscious would be two or three days. So why was her brother still not awake after five whole days?

For a moment, Captain Jarjaha felt quite uneasy as he saw how slowly the expression on Savyrran's face morphed from calm to fury. This was the first time she had seen the girl without a smile and he found it rather disturbing. He knew he had to quickly intervene before she misunderstood everything. Clearly, her existence in Naa Vah had warped her sense of time.

"It's not been five days. It's only been five hours since you began your trial." The captain quickly explained.

"What?" She asked, staring at the captain like he had lost his mind.

"The forest you were in during the trial was an illusion and so was time in general. Your trial was supposed to end in seven days, however in real life, it was only seven hours."

"Oh." She muttered to herself.

"You really don't have to worry. Ovandarrak is recovering very quickly. I promise you, he will be fine."

Slowly, the lively smiled returned into Savyrran's shiny black eyes when she heard the captain's assurance.

….…..

Two hours later, Savyrran was back at the Combat School. But she was not the only one. There were hundreds of applicants already waiting in the large Combat Hall. Once Savyrran displayed her card to a senior standing guard at the gate, she was allowed to enter.

Savyrran was not sure what this meeting was about. However, she knew it had something to do with the next phase of their trial tomorrow. Honestly, she really did not care. All she thought about was her brother. So within the next hour, she tuned out every single thing that the petite young woman said to them. The only thing she heard was when the young woman introduced herself as Kakami Rendo, Captain of the Combat School.

By the time the whole meeting was over, she wondered why she even went there since she did not pay attention to anything. Once outside the Combat Hall, the first thing she noticed was the darkness slowly falling over the academy. The second thing, or more appropriately, person, she noticed was a certain red-head with a large grin on her face. Instinctively, Savyrran smiled when she saw her friend.

"Minyet. What are you doing here? How did you know I was here? Wait… How long have you been waiting?"

"One at a time, please." Minyet chuckled as she hugged Savyrran tightly. "I came to talk to you. I knew you you'd pass so that meant that you were here at the Combat Hall. And for your last question, I've only been here for about five minutes."

"You look happy." Savyrran said.

"I am. Pan came to see me."

"Oh." Savyrran said as though wondering how that could possibly make Minyet happy.

The golden freckles on Minyet's face became even brighter when she smiled. "It's not like that. I mean he came to see me to deliver some good news."

"Really? What good news?"

"Well, Ovandarrak woke up and I heard he's been asking for you. So I came to look for you."

A large stupid grin appeared on Savyrran's handsome face and for a whole minute, she did not speak. She could not speak.

"Savyrran… Say something, please."

But instead, Savyrran grabbed Minyet by the hand and then took off with her as fast as she could.

The red-haired girl had not anticipated that Savyrran would suddenly start running and then drag her along. However, she did not complain and instead just started laughing at how awkward the whole thing was.

Savyrran did not use her full speed, because she was not sure of the full extent of Minyet's power and therefore did not want to hurt the girl if she was actually weaker. In spite of that, she was still fast enough to reach Master Nien Dinra's residence within a short time.

When Savyrran and Minyet entered the master's laboratory after they had been led there by Captain Jarjaha, Pan was already waiting by a very bored looking Ovandarrak.

"Finally. You two show up." Pan said. "I thought you died in the trial or something. You know, we never saw you on screen."

Savyrran laughed. "Nice to see you too, Pan."

"Yeah well, I wish I could say the same."

"Hello, little brother." Savyrran walked up to Ovandarrak, totally ignoring Pan's derisive tone. For some reason, the boy's words never bothered her at all. It was almost like he was trying to get a rise out of her. If that was what he was doing, then Savyrran thought he was wasting his time. After all, it would take more than mere words to make her angry.

Right now, all she wanted to do was hug her little brother whom she had missed dearly. So she did. "I have been so worried about you."

Ovandarrak's calm expressionless face remained unchanged as his sister tightly hugged him with all her might. Yet, he felt a surge of warmth burst from his gut and then spread into every pore within his body. He had to admit, he had dearly missed his sister too. Slowly, he rubbed Savyrran's back as though to assure her that he was fine and not going anywhere.

"Aw… how touching. Now please excuse me while I go and vomit." Pan scoffed.

"There's the door." Ovandarrak said nonchalantly.

"No fair. I was the first to come and see you." Pan touched his chest lightly as if pained by Ovandarrak's words. But the smug smile on his face showed that he was not pained at all.

"And you can be the first to leave." Ovandarrak added.

Savyrran simply watched with surprised amusement at the exchange between Ovan and Pan. Since when did they become close enough to exchange such wonderful pleasantries with each other?

Minyet on the other hand was just laughing at everything she was witnessing. She had never seen Pan and Ovandarrak together and seeing their interaction was all too interesting. She had no idea that the very cold and silent Ovandarrak was capable of speaking more than three words. Who knew?

"So Ovan," Savyrran began, breaking the glaring competition between Pan and Ovandarrak. "Minyet is here. Do you remember her?" Savyrran pointed to the red-haired girl with the ponytail.

"Hi… Ovan…darrak." Minyet waved coyly.

Ovandarrak nodded in acknowledgement. Of course he did. This was the girl they had met in the train back in Valley Province. "Hi."

"How are you feeling?"

"Better."

Minyet nodded, not knowing what to say anymore. Perhaps, she had overestimated the number of words Ovandarrak could speak.

"Goodness… This is so painful to watch." Pan broke the silence. "Make it stop."

"When can you leave?" Savyrran asked, directing her attention back to her brother.

"Now. Master Dinra said I'm completely fine."

"Great. Then can we go back to the inn. I'm starving."

"About that." Ovandarrak started. "I got accepted into Yugaki Hall so it seems I don't need to go back to the inn anymore."

"Oh, okay. My trial is not over yet, so I haven't been accepted into any hall of residence. I guess I will have to go back to the inn then."

"Well," Minyet said, "you don't have to. I mean you have only two more days left before you can become a full student of the academy. So why don't you come stay with me in the next two days. I don't have a roommate anyway."

"Are you sure about that? Is that not going to be an inconvenience?" Savyrran asked. It wasn't that she was not intrigued by this offer. After all, she would rather not stay all alone without her brother or friends. But the thing was that she was not officially a student in the academy. Thus, she was worried that staying in one of the halls of residence might put Minyet in trouble.

"No. Don't worry about that." Minyet assured.

Savyrran grinned widely, running her fingers through her long dreadlocks. "Alright then. I��m so glad my brother can see my next trial."

"Yeah… About that. We did not even see your first one. Are you sure you passed?" Pan mocked.

"I guess we shall see about that tomorrow."