Gymnasium

"Alex, Help me distribute this to all your classmates," Miss Jane said as she directed her hand which was holding a large bundle of sheets towards Alex.

"Yes ma'am," Alex stood up from his seat and went towards Miss Jane to collect the bundle of sheets from her and turned towards his classmates. After doing a mental count he passed down a specific number of sheets to the first student of each row.

Sounds of the movement and shuffling of sheets resonated all around the room and finally stopped when everyone had a sheet of paper in their hands.

A few excited ones immediately tried to read the paper the moment they got their hands on it but lost their drive to do it after noticing the large number of words that filled the sheet of paper. They instead decided to wait for Miss Jane to summarise it to them in brief.

Miss Jane didn't keep the students waiting for long as she soon began her explanation, "The sheet of paper in your hand is an indemnity agreement contract. It states that any injury or health condition that you may suffer from taking part in the aptitude test shall become the responsibility of the Confederation and the Confederation shall bear the expenses for your treatment...I believe you all are already aware of the risks that the previous aptitude tests contained from the email that had been sent to everyone yesterday by the school,"

Quite a few heads nodded after hearing Miss Jane's words indicating that they all had read the mail yesterday. The contents of that email were about the risks that were involved in the previous aptitude tests with several examples of several past participants which made the students aware of the high risk that was involved in participating in the aptitude test.

This made the students who were only taking the test for the sake of giving have second thoughts which led them to think much more carefully about their decision. As a result, only the ones who had completely made up their mind came to the school today to take the test.

"If anyone has any doubts they can ask me about it before filling the paper if not then you can proceed to fill it," Miss Jane's words echoed in everyone's ears as they took out their pens and started scribbling the required information on the paper.

After five minutes Miss Jane collected all of the sheets and arranged them into a bundle as she said, "Very well, I'll go to the office and arrange our section's slot," 

There were ten sections in total for final-grade students in the school going from Section A to Section J. Andrey and the rest belonged to Section E. 

Since Andrey's section was quite quick in filling up the contract they were lucky enough to get alloted the the first slot. Miss Jane soon guided the 30+ students to the Gymnasium. 

Upon arriving they all saw that three individuals were waiting for them at the gymnasium. Two of them were unfamiliar while the third one was their vice-principal.

"Good morning everyone, you may go and take your seats. You all would be called one by one based on your roll numbers in a while," The vice-principal reciprocated the students' greeting and instructed them to take their seats as she went back to discussing what she had been discussing earlier with the two sharp-looking men.

The older one among the two men was wearing a grey suit and sported a well-groomed beard. He looked to be in his late thirties and was discussing some things with the Vice-principal.

The younger man was wearing a white lab coat over a light blue shirt. He had a thinner frame compared to the older man and was busy going through a greenish-transparent screen on his hand. His serious expression while he was going through whatever he was seeing made the heartbeat of the few girls rise the moment their eyes fell upon him.

"Who is that guy?!" A girl whispered and soon was huddled together with other girls who wanted to let out their emotions.

"He's so hott...gosh I'm melting just from his sight" One of them mentioned

"Look how slender and exquisite his fingers are..." Another one said as her eyes focused on the man's fingers as they slid over his screen.

...

As for boys, their area of focus was entirely different.

"Who is that muscular man?!" a boy said and was soon huddled together with other boys who too let themselves out.

"He looks so strong and sharp...is he a warrior?" One of them said

"I bet he is a warrior, how else can he possess such an aura," Another one said as he pressed the bridge of his glasses with his finger.

"I agree with the class nerd, Just look at that guy he's so coool..." A classmate concurred.

...

"Zack, are the preparations complete?" The man with the beard asked his companion.

"Yes sir, the subjects...*cough* I mean the students can be tested anytime," Zack changed his words with a cough when he saw a glare from his superior.

"I'm sorry for that Mrs. Smith, he's just too young and insensitive. You have my word that nothing wrong would happen to the kids so you can relax and let us handle the procedures," Zack's superior said to placate the Vice-principal as her eyebrows developed a furrow because of Zack's earlier action.

"It's because of my husband that I'm still trusting you, Ron. Don't make me regret it," The Vice-principal replied in a stern manner.

"I understand Mrs. Smith," Ron, the man with a beard replied as he gestured something to his companion.

Understanding what his superior meant Zack grabbed the handle of the large silver suitcase that was placed on the ground and lifted it before walking towards a six feet long table that was placed at the centre of the gymnasium.

The suitcase looked quite sturdy and was around 30 x 20 x 40 inches in dimensions and could be considered quite large for a normal person. From the way the suitcase looked it would be normal to assume that it was quite heavy but seeing that Zack didn't even flinch while lifting the suitcase a lot of the young girls gasped.

"It must be because the bag is quite light..." A boy said in a bitter manner.

"That must be the case," Another one chimed in when he noticed his crush looking towards Zack in a dazed manner.

Seeing his classmates like this Andrey just shook his head while Jacob chuckled as the two of them looked towards the heavy suitcase intently, wondering what could be placed inside such a sturdy-looking suitcase.

Zack soon reached the table and placed the suitcase on the table with ease making almost all the boys certain that the suitcase only looked heavy and was quite light in reality.

Zack didn't care about why these students were looking at him in the least as after placing the suitcase on the table he took a few steps back and the greenish-transparent screen once again appeared on his hand. Upon closure look one would realize that the screen projected thanks to the two black bracelets which Zack had worn on his hands.

"I also want those holographic bracelets one day..." One of the boys muttered.

"You're not alone, they look so cool...a pity they cost a leg. That guy must be filthy rich," The class nerd said dejectedly.

Zack didn't hear the two brats and instead was focused on his task, 

*Proceed to open the container? Yes/No*

Zack pressed the yes button and a screen asking for the password popped up.

"The password is..." Zack muttered to himself as his fingers flew in a flurry towards different parts of his screen as he entered a password comprising 32 characters. 

*Password accepted*

The message appeared on the screen and Zack switched off the screen as his gaze was now directed towards the silver suitcase which automatically started opening while making a hissing sound. Loads of white clouds of very low temperature emitted from the gaps of the suitcase as the suitcase got engulfed within the clouds for a few seconds.

When the clouds settled down what appeared in front of everyone was a meter-long cylindrical mechanism with vials of glass of five centimetres in length wound around its circumference.

The whole structure was divided into more than 15 sections with each section having vials of glass wound around it. At the top, there was a cube-like container made of some unknown metal which was approximately 10x10 centimetres in size.

Even though the students had no idea what was the use of this machinery they all couldn't help but be amazed after seeing such a thing right in front of their eyes. 

"Woah..are these red stones? Oh my god, they are mid-grade ones at that!" One of the students noticed a small pile of red stones just beside the machinery. 

The intensity of the red hue the stones were emitting made everyone realize that they were of a much higher grade than the red stone sample which Mr Thomson showed them a week ago in his class.

The stones were placed inside a sealed glass container in batches of three just like how a cosco ball is placed in a plastic container. There were a total of three glass containers meaning there were a total of nine red stones.

Seeing that the equipment was ready to use Zack walked towards the table and carefully removed a red stone from the glass container. When the red stone came out of the glass container the students realized that the stone was affecting the air around it and was turning it into a shade of red aswell.

"So intense..." The class nerd muttered as he saw Zack lifting his other hand to open the lid of the metallic container on top of the cylindrical structure. He inserted the red stone that he was holding into the container and pressed a switch on the cylindrical machinery as an expression of anticipation formed on his face.