Far Far From Home
The ship had docked close to the center ring giving an impressive overview of the surroundings. The dock, if you could call it that, looked like a scene out of Kaden's favorite RPG space shooter. It was massive in size and gave plenty of floor space that all the staff and students that have been dropped off could fit comfortably. A space colony was what popped into Kaden's head as he gazed out to the horizon.
Kaden could not help but gape at the size of everything. As he looked out he found that they were all in a huge cylinder that was divided into five gigantic segments. A rod of bright light ran from one end of the station to the other. It was at the center of the cylinder and was the main source of light for all five sections.
Kaden could feel the heat the light radiated. It felt like an artificial sun. Starlight from space could be seen between the gaps in the sections. He could feel the starlight seeping into his body tens of times faster than at home. "I'm already liking this place" Kaden whispered to himself.
The Citadel as Kaden wished to call it was a huge space structure that housed the top four of the five best summoners schools in the primary universe. Kaden had no idea it would be such a big deal. He figured the school would have been on some island in the middle of the ocean, not this.
It was mind-blowing how advanced everything was. Shaking his head he and his group rejoined the other students of Edensburg. The chatter of excitement from the students intensified as the vessel carrying Kaden's group was not the only one that had arrived. As old friends reunited the crowd slowly grew noisy. Kaden like most of the freshmen was all too shocked and amazed to make a peep.
A loud voice boomed to gather everybody's attention. "All students from Soul Trap Institute should head to gate 1 to be accounted for." It was a gruff hoarse voice of an aged man. He was hovering by the Gate 1 Exit.
"Students from Voidstar High School should gather at gate 2 and have their grimoires at the ready." A sweet honey-like voice that was a hundred times better to listen to than the old man rang out next. The lady that it belongs to looked like a fairy from heaven. Literally, she had wings and seemed to shimmer as she flew in circles by the Gate 2 exit.
"Rockhurst Academia, Same drill Gate 3." A lazy-sounding voice followed. The man at gate three was too lazy to use any kind of flight magic to make himself more visible. He just stood by the doorway with a book in his hand that he did not want to stop reading.
"Edensburg Elites gather the freshmen for processing the rest you know the drill." A stern but controlled male voice said. Nobody could find where the voice came from as no one was standing or floating by gate 4 or 5.
Quickly the teens sorted themselves out and headed to their respective gates; only the freshmen from Edensburg were left standing to wonder what was next. It took about five minutes of confusion before a group of older teens made their way to the lost flock.
"I'm Anton Higgens, Leader of the school's elite senior team. My partners are Tibbs, Terra, Hunter, and Glen" Said a tall dark-skinned boy. "We each represent the best of the school's talents." He continued with a hint of pride in his voice.
"Ok, then all the girls line up behind Terra as she will take you to the female dorms and get you to settle in. Glen will do the same for the boys. The time is just past lunchtime. You have a couple of hours to get used to the dorms. 3:30 pm all students will be required to go to the Center Summoning Chamber to be introduced to the school. I recommend that you do not miss that chance." Anton finished saying before throwing two crystal objects down on the ground in front of him.
"Meh, Leader, I think you forgot to do the checks," Tibbs stated under his breath as he covered his mouth with his hand. He tried hard not to draw attention to himself as he did not want to embarrass Anton. Tibbs did not want to point out any fault his leader had. His biggest problem was Tibbs did not know how to control how loud he spoke. Everybody heard his thunderous reminder which of course caused Anton to turn slightly red in the face.
"Haha, Yeah Elite Leader, Tibbs said was right, YOU NEED TO DO THAT FIRST." Terra, the only girl in the group, said trying not to hide her sarcasm.
"Anton's doing a good job, I think. It's not that big of a deal if we forgot that dumb task. I say if they made it this far then why must we test them? All over an archaic practice. Plus think of all the chaos it would cause the teachers." The boy named Hunter said in a reasonable and calculated way as he adjusted his glasses.
Glen second him with a simple "Hm" as he nodded his head in agreement.
Anton just sighed as wish he had normal members in his group. Terra seemed to be contemplating the matter as if Hunter had made a valid point.
"Teachers, Chaos, Teachers, trouble for Anton then I can take his spot as the team leader. But I have to make sure he keeps on the team. He has the strongest summoned creatures. Hmm, hard choice." Terra was muttering to herself forgetting her assigned task.
Anton could see the fear in some of the kid's eyes at the prospect of failing whatever test they had to take. "Before you all panic it's not what Hunter made it sound like," He said as he waved to him and a bag appeared.
Taking a stone out of the bag he explained "These stones are summoning stones. It will allow you to summon a creature from your grimoire world. A gift, I guess you can call it. The schools use these stones to judge your potential. If your summon creature is strong enough you can make it into the elite class for your grade. There you will be trained for the Five Star Intergalactic Academic School Competi..."
"Yeah what Elite Leader said, and if you are good you can become a school representative. Which is fun. For those who can't summon anything yet. All I can say is that you will probably be getting supplemental classes." Terra cut in before Anton could finish. Glen just "hm" and nodded his head agreeing this time with Terra.
Anton quickly gave out four more bags to his teammates then the order "All the girls get your gem from Terra, boys divided yourself into four lines in front of me, Hunter, Tibbs, and Glen. And I repeat do not use the stone until I instruct you to."
It did not take long for the boys and girls to get in their lines to get their stones. For some, this would become the first bond creature that they had with their grimoire. The few like Kaden had already received a summons. While even fewer had even more experience and had contracted more than one creature. Regardless, everybody was excited to get the chance to use the stone to summon a creature.
There were far more boys than girls, almost a twenty-to-one ratio. It was not that females were less in population than the male summoners. It was because the second top school in the main universe was an all-girls school and it was located in a different galaxy than Edensburg.
Thousand Rose produced the most diverse and will train medical talents ever. If you were a female and just awoken then you would receive an invite to go to their school. It was a full scholarship for all who attended.
Soul Trap, Viodstar, Rockhurst, and Edensburg were focused on creating soldiers to fight in the upcoming planner war. They were the best schools when it came to combat.
Edensburg focused on physical combat. Teaching summoners to fight alongside their summons, unlike the other school. This made it so that Edensburg always had the lowest number of girls joining. One thing that stood out was that Edensburg always had devastatingly strong warriors regardless of gender graduating. The dropouts were also higher. No matter the school dropouts would be trained in the basics of survival.
The shortage of girls in the school was not lost on Kaden, He quickly found out that the school he would be attending was primarily an all-boys school. Shaking his head at all the problems that might entail. He had read enough light novels to know that in a year or two his life was going to be interesting.
Puberty was not something Kaden wanted to go through even though he already was starting to show signs. Now he was stuck with a bunch of boys that would go through the same experience. Horney boys with a pitiful amount of girls. Kaden imagined that all the girls, even the female staff in the school, were worshipped by the male student body as goddesses.