Awakening Ceremony

Along with many kids and guardians across the court Jordan moves to the front where he sees a stage has been set up for the new students. On the stage there is a dozen teachers sitting on wooden chairs surrounding a podium, by the podium stood an old women almost as famous as Lucius. She is the vice-headmistress of Chaos academy, while Lucius is almost always busy and despises public appearances, vice-headmistress Diane usually takes his place.

Next to the podium lies an alter with a clear orb that looks like a glass football stood, shining in the morning light. On the other side a complicated circle has been drawn on the ground with what looks like chalk, but Jordan is certain this is not.

As Jordan admirers the complexity of the drawing, Diane clears her throat.

"Good morning 15th class of Chaos academy, to the entrance ceremony that i'm sure you have all been waiting for. I, vice-headmistress Diane, welcome all eager students to our academy in hopes that you will form everlasting bonds with your classmates that will last more than a lifetime. I wish you to study and learn during the time and come out a confident mage or warrior that can be a core piece of Chaos city. Without further ado, We shall start the ceremony."

"Mildred Barns!..."

After a sweet encouragement from her mother a small orc who is larger than me nervously wonders onto the stage she stands in-front of the altar staring at the orb as if its going to eat her.

"Place your hand on the orb and it will tell us your magical aptitude. come on, no need to be shy." A calming voice comes from a young pretty teacher sitting close to the alter.

With encouragement Mildred lifts her green hand and places it on the orb, for three seconds nothing happens until a blue spark fills the once clear orb.

"Water attribute: mediocre talent."

Jordan wasn't too surprised. There are only so many potential attributes that can appear:

Blue is water attribute, red is fire, orange is earth, green is wind these are the common elements that most of the students will awaken.

Brown is metal, silver is lightning, white is light, black is darkness these are the rare elements that maybe 100 of the 1000 students present will awaken.

Purple is space, dark blue is time, light grey is order, dark grey is chaos these are the primordial elements that around 10 students will awaken.

The different category of elements does not mean one is stronger or weaker than others they all have pros and weaknesses. The thunder element is known to be fast and destructive however it is weak and easy to block, while the water element is a jack of all trades, its good to turn from offence to defence in a blink of an eye.

However despite awakening a certain attribute, doesn't mean you cannot use the other attributes; the orb just shows the attribute you are most talented at.

Other a moment of disappointment of being called mediocre, Mildred turned to look at the next item, a magic array. Magic arrays are common, in the city almost all houses to have at least one item that contains magic arrays except Jordans, for obvious reasons.

However this magic array is far more complex than most of the new students have seen. This magic array gathers mana and pushes it down on ones body allowing one to see how resistant one is. by how long a child stands, ones warrior talent can be predicted.

As mildred stepped in the circle the pressure on her body slowly started to appear. Her body became heavier and heavier until she no longer could stand up, as soon as her knee touches the stage, the pressure disappears and she sighs in relief.

"Above average talent! Work hard Mildred, you could become a fine knight one day."

With a pleased expression Mildred left the stage back to her mother, at the same time a Leon boy was pulled onto the stage.

As hours go by much of the day goes as Jordan predicted, until a wave of whispers and displeasure goes around the parents and a handful students, this is due to Lion-kin getting on the stage. She had huddled her shoulders together and bent her head down flopping her ears in a depressing manner.

Despite Chaos city being known as a city with many races that was officially accepting of many races, Jordan knows this is a pretence as the racism between the races isn't as united as it seems.

The Leons view most of the other races as low class minorities, a lot of Leons despise Orcs for their barbaric nature and Lion-kins for their dirty blood.

Humans see the other races as uncultured animals and brutes, while Orcs see the others as weaklings parading around the city.

The difference between the three kingdoms cultures is difficult for the city to wash away leaving many racists in every walk of life. There are shops that refuse Leon customers due to fur 'contamination', there are restaurants that refuse Orcs because of bad smells and mercenary groups that refuse humans due to flimsy bodies.

The truth is that the city puts up a front of unity while the three big races fight for dominance and the others don't get a say. Lion-kin are often seen as the weakness of the human and Leon races, so they are in the worst position in the city.

But today someone broke this norm, a little girl named Friday Williams.

Under the murmurs of the parents, nana gave a loud snort that lasted too long and drew the crowd a offended stare at her instead.

The little girl noticing nana's action, calmed down a bit and placed her hand on the orb, after a few seconds the orb started to shine a bright brown.

"Metal attribute: strong talent. Work hard and you may become an archmage one day. Show those people what you're made of."

The vice-headmistress whispered the last bit bringing a smile and look of determination to Fridays previous dejected look.

A look of disdain flooded the parents faces and many even looked down at their mediocre kids.

With that Friday moved onto the next test but only had average combat talent, still she was pleased with her magical talent.

A handful of names passed till Jordan heard his own.

"Jordan Adams"

With an excited skip Jordan jumped up onto the stage. the crowd didn't murmur much due to him being a different race like they did for Friday. This is due to a unique race not being too uncommon in Chaos city, although 9 in 10 people are either Human, Orc or Leon, that's still over 100,000 people who are of different races.

Even the child before him was a Treant, a humanoid creature that takes the features of a tree, even able to survive of carbon dioxide and light alone. So another strange race is nothing new.

when Jordan reached the orb, he hurriedly placed his hand on the orb, almost passing through. He felt a small prick that his uncle had told him about, it kind of hurt but felt more uncomfortable like a vampire is sucking his blood with a straw. He knew this would happen as the orb work by stealing a small amount of the persons spiritual energy and testing it to find which attribute the user is more attuned too.

For a being made of spiritual energy instead of flesh and blood like Jordan, this is like puncturing a small hole in a balloon, then quickly placing a bandaid over the wound. It was unpleasant but he'll live. It kind of reminds Jordan of when he took shots in school.

The wait was only 3 seconds long but for Jordan it felt like hours, quickly a gray star began to shine brightly under his hands.

"Order attribute: very strong talent. Your journey may be tough but you have a chance of becoming an archmage if you continue to work hard."

The crowd gasped upon seeing the bright star. Someone with a very strong talent was rare but not new, the record for chaos academy was two very strong talents in one year. However there has only been one other very strong talented mage with a primordial attribute, since its founding and that is the headmaster, Lucius.

However, they know that although the primordial elements may be slightly stronger than other elements, what the students lack is a guide. only 1 out of 100 people have a primordial element and of these most don't have a talent stronger than mediocre. only 7 students this year have strong talents with most of them having common elements.

As such there is little studied about the primordial elements and subsequently the potential of the mage is reduced due to lack of spells. The most powerful mage with the order attribute was prince Bryn of the Leon kingdom, he used his order magic to create a spell that controls the movement of objects around them.

The order attribute is the least understood attribute of all due to its complexity and rarity. all that is known is that its the power to manipulate the world around it. Even this is kind of predicted from the attributes of the chaos element. The chaos element is the power to distort the world around them, its commonly referred as anti-magic as chaos spells de-spell all other attributes. The people know that the order element is the opposite of chaos, so the prediction is that Order has something to do with control, but it was theorised and never proven.

With that, to the surprise of everyone, the vice-headmistress announced, "Martial talent: unknown." She wrapped up the final test of the last child and called it a day, despite all the students had just spent the day testing their attributes. A thousand students going through each test one at a time has taken over 12 hours, as a consequence many of the students were exhausted.

Jordan was not, he had slept this morning and Spíritãz don't need to sleep much compared to other races. Spíritãz don't have a physical body that gets tired, of course they still get mental strain but this can be days later, as such Spíritãz only need to sleep once or twice a week. Its just one of the perks that comes with not being human.