Chapter 10: The Magus Academy
The pile of teenagers each looked at the sky with a puzzled expression. They seemed more confused than scared.
"What's a little girl doing floating in the sky..."
"Did they accidentally let a child in the Academy?"
The person could hear everything they were saying about her from where she was, which made her irritated.
"Shut up you worthless scums, I am miles older than all of you, and don't forget I can kill you in a matter of seconds!!!!!"
As soon as she instructed the audience to calm down, they all became silent. The child-looking person sighed once the throng had quieted down.
"Now, let me introduce myself better..." Her body descended from the sky to the ground.
"My name is Lee Itoshi, deputy head teacher of the Magus Academy,"
When word spread that the Academy's deputy head was a young girl, everyone gasped. A deputy head of the Academy can only be one of the most powerful Magi. This would indicate that she is most likely among the strongest people around.
Deputy head Lee smirked when she saw their expressions,
"Behind this gate, is a whole other world completely different from the one you have been living in. Here, you will learn and train to become the ones who will protect society from the darkness of this world. Every single day here will be a further step for you all to become a Magus. I am here to welcome you all to the Magus Academy, but also to show you how things work here, but first, I would prefer to explain in a more appropriate place,"
When word spread that the Academy's deputy head was a young girl, everyone gasped. A deputy head of the Academy can only be one of the most powerful Magi. This would indicate that she is most likely among the strongest people around.
"Well then..." Her voice echoed along the large and spacious room.
"The Magus Academy as all of you may know is the place where we form the Magus. However, the Magus Academy is only a large school building in the city of Velris. Currently, we are at the Shade tower, the highest point of the city, which goes even beyond the gates."
As she began to explain, her tone of voice and demeanour changed.
The city's highest point, which is above the gates? The audience was perplexed by what she stated since, if the location where they were was the city's highest point, how could they not have been able to see it from where they had been earlier?
"The reason you weren't able to see it is that the city is surrounded by two Equinox barriers. Inside and outside the walls. Where we were previously was between those both Barriers, and this is why you could see the gates, but not the tower. This tower is used by the council of 10, the strongest students of the Academy for meetings and also trials.
You will be spending 4 years in the Academy, and each is aimed at a specific goal for you to achieve. We do not expect failure from any students, and if you cannot keep up with the pace, then you will be expelled without any consideration. The Magus Academy is hard, and you must all be aware that this won't be a time for you to become more independent, and live life as grown-ups without parents watching you. There will be sometimes you will regret choosing this path, but it will be at those moments that your mental strength will be tested, and if you survive till the end, you will become part of the saviours of this earth,"
After she finished, she anticipated that most of the kids would be terrified or perhaps even second-guess their choices, but most of them remained unfazed and several even appeared more motivated.
'I feel the students this year are going to be special...' deputy head Lee thought.
"Now, moving on to your houses," She then clapped her hands, and a smartwatch appeared on the wrist of each student, "The watches are Academy watches, and this will be the main way of receiving notifications from the school, checking your currency, paying for anything, and checking your student information.
If you press the screen of the watch, a holographic touch screen will appear in front of you. On the side of the screen, you will see each option, currency, notification, and school information.
If you click on school information, you will see the house option, and rank option too. First, let's go into houses. Your house will determine who will be your main teacher, and it will also determine in which sector your dorm will be. Furthermore, there are annual competitions every year and each top 5 for each houses will be competing in it. As for your rank, it will be updated monthly and will be a sort of power level tracker. It will compare your power level with the others in your house, and give you a position of how high your power level is compared to the others.
I think that's quite it for the smartwatch explanation, as for the rest of the content, most of you are all basically adults, so you should be able to figure it out yourself,"
When she was finished, the space began to take on new hues. There were now 8 distinct colours in the space, and the house names of each colour were inscribed on the wall.
"Using your smartwatch, I want each of you to direct yourself to your exact house. You will then each be teleported to your specific dorm rooms, and each of you will be left instructions on your beds,"
The screen instantly turned from dark blue to grey as Caleb selected the "home" option. Silver Hawking was the name that was bold-written.
"So there I am," He said looking at the grey-coloured part of the room.
'Oh look, I'm Green, it says here... Green Bannister," Maya said pointing at the bold name on her screen.
"Hmm... so it seems we won't be attending the same lessons then," Caleb said.
It's not that he liked Maya or wanted to stay with her at all costs, he would've just preferred to have someone he knew that was in his house. Unfortunately, the only person he knew was in a different house.
"Well, I guess we'll meet each other later," Caleb said raising his fist for a fist pump.
She smiled and joined her fist with his, "Don't get expelled before we see each other again!"
Following her remark, Caleb grinned and strode to his house. The deputy headteacher clapped her hands to draw everyone's attention after they all appeared to be in one area of the room.
"Now that you're all in your houses, you will each be transported to your dorm rooms. Remember, each of these dorm rooms will be your place to sleep for the next few years.
I hope that the next time we meet, there will still be as much of you as there are now, and you will all have the same determined expression on your faces,"
Without saying a word, the deputy head Lee flicked her fingers, and in an instant, Caleb was moved to a dorm room, exactly like before. The size of the room was about average.
It had the appearance of a typical university dorm room. There were two closets, two beds, and a tiny refrigerator in the room, which was attached to the wall between the two closets.
"It's not the luxury, but it's just how I imagined it..." Caleb whispered walking to the left side of the room.
"Hey, if you don't mind, I'd prefer to have that side," A manly voice said behind Caleb.
'Two beds must forcibly mean two people, that's quite obvious
A tall, strong teenager with tribal tattoos on his arms, and short, spiky red hair, shared the room with Caleb. Because of his height, Caleb, who was somewhat larger than typical, was slightly looking up to him.
"Yeah, I don't mind which side I have anyways..." Caleb said.
'That guy is huge as fuck, and he's probably twice my size, there is no way I could beat him in a brawl... I'd better stay on his good side for now...'
In order to test the springiness of his new bed, Caleb lifted a little portion of himself off the ground and sat down on it. When he raised the bed covers, he noticed that there were wooden planks below, which caused his buttocks to sometimes touch a rough surface.
"How the fuck do they expect us to have a good night's sleep with this type of bed?"
He adjusted his bedclothes and stood up to open his closet door. A huge cloud of dust billowed out when he opened it. Inside the closet, there were countless dusty dark blue uniforms, each with a logo of a lion standing with its jaw wide open, displaying his front paws and claws plainly, and ten swords constituting a circle around the lion, pointing directly at it. That was the Magus Academy logo.
"Umm, there was a paper left on my bed instructing us to wear a uniform and go to our house assembly halls,"
"Do they expect us to wear these dirty uniforms?" Caleb said taking one of the uniforms out of the closet.
"Dirty or not, I don't really care," Caleb's roommate said in a disinterested tone taking off his shirt.
The moment his roommate took his shirt off, Caleb looked at him and started to wonder how he could be cool with wearing such dirty clothes.
'Maybe it's a test, the Academy maybe wants to send us a message that in this career, we will have to get dirty sometimes and accept it...', Caleb thought removing his clothes and wearing the dirty uniform.
"I guess we should get going," his roommate said opening the door and waiting for Caleb to head out.
Caleb stared at his roommate as he removed his shirt and wondered how he could be okay with wearing such filthy clothes.
"Hey, are you coming?"
'This is the beginning of my true life, my path to becoming a Magus... I never thought I'd say this, but just the fact of wearing this uniform is giving me chills all through my body...'
Caleb then smiled determinedly and clinched his hand in resolve, 'Everything starts NOW!'