Dismayed, Yet Impressed

The Beautiful Queen was what Pomefiore's dorm was emulated from out of great respect for her beauty and efforts to achieve her goals. However, what Lotus was seeing was something entirely different from descriptions of her! She was a queen of doubt and haunted by ugly jealousy. Just because a slave girl was more beautiful than her, she whole-heartedly hated her for it. What irony was it for a woman remembered for her beauty and efforts to actually be such a person.

Once the scene closed and Yuu was magically put back to sleep, she closed her eyes and sighed as he tilted her head back against the window sill. After a few moments of silence, she grumbled, "Hmph... That guy... He better not disappoint me before I finish with my judgement of him too."

Sensing the terrible mood from her, they decided not to interfere as she returned to her work. They had only managed to make her feel better, but now she was upset once more. However, not long after and to their relief, her anger quickly disappeared once she touched the beast taming books in her hands. As they had thought...

She really is a workaholic once she finds something of great interests...

.....

That morning, Lotus called them down for breakfast and decided to walk their way to the cafeteria after wrapping Grim up with a scarf and handing the supervisor one too.

"Morin', Prefect, Grim." Ace called out to them and rushed over dragging Deuce with him again.

"Good morning, it's really cold today." Deuce responded after appearing on the other side.

However, Yuu's eyes followed what was behind Deuce and his eyes lit up in shock. Out of surprise, he suddenly stopped walking making Grim, who had trailed behind him, crash into his leg, "Owow! Don't just stop right in front of someone."

Rubbing his face with a paw, he continued to complain, "I rammed my nose right into your leg."

Despite this, Yuu's eyes was glued to the statues. Lotus looked up and instantly understood why Yuu had stopped out of the blue. It was the statue of the beautiful queen whom they had last scene the night before. Recalling that night, she remembered the flames of jealousy burning ever moreso when those eyes rested on the slave girl approached by a handsome looking man by the well she was singing into.

"'Sup? Why're you staring at the Great Seven?" Ace called out in confusion.

However, Yuu was busy gazing at all of the statues in the street as it finally dawned on him. For Lotus, it was both a relief and confusion. Finally, this idiot realized what was going on now, but why is he this conflicted?

"Hey, Prefect. You're just spacing out, are you feeling all right?" Deuce called out hesitantly when he realized that Yuu's expression was only getting more and more off.

Though she knew what was going through his mind, Lotus was also starting to get more and more worried seeing him so silent for unknown reasons to her.

"Hey, Supervisor. You're just spacing out, are you feeling all right?" Deuce called out before she could.

"Yuu..." Lotus touched his arm hesitantly bringing his senses back to them.

"Lotus?" Yuu looked to her in surprise to see her worried expression as it was rare for him to see her so worried.

"They've been weird all morning, y'know." Grim reported to them nervously and relieved to see him back to the present.

"Ehh? Did something happen over the holidays?" Ace questioned in surprise.

"Well, sort of..." Yuu confessed hesitantly before noticing Lotus's pale face, "I'll tell you in the class instead."

Finally in the class, Yuu dumped out all of the stories of times when the mirror showed him some really weird stuff that bothered him a lot.

"You're having dreams of the Great Seven in the mirror in Ramshackle Dorm?" Ace said in suprise.

"I don't think it's weird since we see their statues every day. I usually recite the names of important figures in my sleep before history tests." Deuce suggested this when he heard this.

"But the dreams are different from the legends. It's like walking into a movie…" Yuu said with a shudder.

However, seeing Yuu's growing nervous looks, he continued nervously trying to reassure him, "But that doesn't sound like what you're talking about."

Yuu shook his head sadly, "There was some round eared guy called, 'Mickey,' too. There's also been a shadow called, 'Mickey,' lately, too."

"Mickey..." Lotus muttered quietly as she recalled that name.

"Whoa, scary! Who's Mickey?" Ace shuddered rather horrified when he heard this.

"I've never heard of anyone like that at school." Deuce said hesitantly.

"Oh, was that that one time you stomped on my tail in the middle of the night?" Grim brought up in surprise.

"Did he looked someone from this school?" Lotus asked him with a frown trying to make him remember the details.

"I-I don't know." Yuu shook his head hesitantly.

Lotus nodded her head and reassured him, "This is a new world for you and it's probably full of many contradicting things that you've never heard or seen before. I bet not even Ace nor Deuce can confirm it either. After all, nobody would've expected Grim to be a student here with one look either. He needs you to be around as proof and so do you. That's why the headmaster made the three of us into a single status. To avoid worse discrimination from other students than you have bore now. So, if it wasn't someone from this school, then who could it be?"

"Hmmm." Deuce thought aloud, "If it wasn't a dream, did the ghosts do something?"

Grim sighed as he said blatantly, "I can totally see that, those guys like pulling pranks."

"Sure, they love to play pranks..." Lotus began with a frown, "But, that shouldn't be within their capabilities as ghosts."

"Huh? Then, you know how capable these ghosts are?" Grim asked her in disbelief.

Lotus nodded, "I've came across worse ghosts with my sisters in the past when we traveled. Even vengeful ones that had to be exorcised instead of reincarnated, sadly. My sister is rather powerful with her ability to exorcise ghosts. However, she doesn't do it on ghosts that doesn't cause harm or has taken the lives of someone after death."

She sighed and continued, "She's not the type to recklessly judge ghosts base on their types. So, even if she were here, she'd find it a waste of energy to have to exorcise all of the ghosts here. There's just no need to."

"Seriously?" Grim looked to her in disbelief.

"Anyway..." Ace tried to stop her conversation thinking that she was probably exaggerating again, "Oh, how's this sound? Next time Mickey appears in the mirror, why don't you use the Ghost Camera the headmaster gave you to take a pic?"

"It's a magic tool that shows the shape of ones' soul, right? Even a ghost should show up with no issue." Ace suggested.

Deuce nodded in agreement, "Good idea. If we've got a photo we can figure out who this Mickey character is."

Grim growled, "I'm gonna make them give me some tuna cans as a co-conspirator in squishing my tail."

"But if nothing shows up then we know Prefect was just half asleep." Ace reminded him with an exasperated sigh.

Suddenly, the bell chimed and the door was opened right on time as Crewel entered the classroom as he announced, "Take your seat, puppies."

Everyone jumped to their seats immediately as Crewel continued to the pedestal, "In homeroom, it's time take your leashes and pull the slack you enjoyed over the holidays tight. I'm sure you're all aware of the National Magic School Joint Culture Festival happening in the middle of February. Night Raven College has been selected as this year's host."

As per usual, Grim unintentionally opened his mouth, "Ffna? We're having a festival?"

"Grim..." Lotus shook her head and sighed nervously having seen that the cat had gotten careless and unprepared.

"All you confused puppies sitting here didn't look at the school calendar you got in September. Fools!" Crewel scolded grim and smacked his whip on the pedestal once before continuing solemnly, "Then I'll do you bad boys a favor a explain it again, disciplining puppies is my job after all. National Magic School Joint Culture Festival gathers students from wizarding schools all across the nation. Over two days they will perform, give research presentations, participate in a speech contest, amongst other activities. This is the cultural interhigh. Normally, fourth years are dispatched to various magic related workplaces for internships and research but… they come back to campus for this to share the fruits of their labors."

"Oh now that you mention it…" Ace looked up in surprise, "I haven't met a single fourth year since we started school."

Lotus frowned, "Once you reach your fourth year, you will set out to gain experience, so it'll be easier for us to get a job and internships in the future. Rather than wait for people to take chances on us. It's actually better than most other highschools the majority of the time. Other times, you wait for about the same amount of time as other people or longer. It all just depends on the number of available spots and the events that goes on in the world. That and luck."

Hearing this, Crewel looked to her in dismay that she had spoken out of turn but also impressed that she had gone through the entire handbook given to her and still did well through out all of her classes. She even rivals the top five students in school, but she just has to keep getting third place in her exams! Why was that?!