Yuri Gakuyami

Yuri continued looking around and shopping in another store as there was a plethora of them to choose where to buy clothes from.

As he glanced through the gallery of jackets and trousers for one that he liked, he couldn't help but take a look at the money that was in his hand and inwardly sighed.

He did so for a while, just standing there and people that passed kept a lingering glance on him, partly because he was really attractive and because he just stood there frozen. 

He had no idea that they were doing this and eventually picked out a pair of trousers and a jacket and moved to a changing room which he walked into and switched the sign on.

For some reason, he began to reminisce.

He was an orphan whose status of his parents were unknown and had left him in an Orphanage for unknown reasons. The Orphanage, although in a more Caster dominated region also housed Human children as well.

  Yuri was in the orphanage, sleeping in his room with the rest of the children. At that time, he had not known he was a Caster at the time because the Orphanage had no details of which Race his parents belonged to so they were unable to tell as his magic had not manifested.

So really, a Caster could be considered a human until they unlocked their magical abilities. As for the children that were recognized as Casters despite not reaching the age of awakening, the Orphanage had been able to get details of their parents in order to determine their Race.

Yuri felt something tug onto his face while he slept. At first, he choose to ignore it and the same could be said for the second time around but the third time, he couldn't handle it any more and decided to open his eyes.

He let out a horrified scream as he could see a kind of person shaped shadow figure coming out of his very hand and seemingly smiling at him with no eyes. He was also equally terrified at how tentacles were coming from said figure's back and grabbing onto the other kids in the room.

Very rarely and unlike average Casters, Yuri had not awakened when he hit his teen years which would also be considered incredibly rare but at the age of ten.

Some screamed as well while others, the ones that were merely newly awakened Casters tried to stop the situation by acting on their tender powers but the shadow figure threw them towards the wall and with how weak they were, easily knocked them out of commission.

"Stop it! STOP IT!!!" Soon, the nuns came rushing in with an adult Caster ready to stop this rogue awakening when, as if the shadow had listened to him, instantly stopped, much to everyone's bewilderment.

Yuri breathed a sigh of relief before he fainted due to the shock of it all.

Later, the next day, Yuri woke up to all the kids either looking at him in jealousy or in anger because of the event that had transpired the day before while the nuns were praising him, encouraging him to become a successful Caster so he could come back and make the Orphanage better.

Another unique case Yuri had had been the acquisition of his Charm which took another three years instead of in a matter of weeks or months at most for an average Caster. But he wasn't.

Yuri was already a very closed off, reclusive person because he always found it difficult to connect with others but with his identity of being a Caster having been discovered, there was no chance for him to make friends with them as everyone envied him. This was even worsened by the fact that he was blessed heavily by the gods with good looks and physique.

He grew up to be an isolated person and an untrusting one as well, becoming more and more introverted as the days went by. He was always on his own and with no other choice, he had grown to like it.

Two months or so after he had turned fifteen, he had taken a bus to the Academy, his fees having been paid by the Orphanage as well as being giving money on a regular basis to take care of his personal needs while in the school. A treatment the others did not have the privilege of receiving.

'Ah, why did I remember that just now?' Yuri thought as he was on the verge of trying on the new trousers when he heard the slight creaking of the entrance door to the dressing room.

He turned around and saw two heads popping through the booth. One with snow white hair and the other with red. Oh, he was gonna kill them now.

"There you are." Ayato squeezed his way through the dressing room door and afterwards Kuro, much to the Shadow Caster's utter horror.

"You flameball." The nickname for Ayato had just come flying out of his mouth because of how infuriated his was because of the invasion of his privacy as he was still wearing trunks at that moment and trunks alone as he wanted to try out the jacket and trousers at the same time to see if they matched right.

This left the two teenage boys stunned as they had never seen him express emotions quite this much and this was one was pure anger.

  "Are you guys stupid? Didn't you see it said 'occupied'?" He spat out and Kuro seemed visibly scared for a moment which he took note of.

"Whoa, sorry, man. We just wanted to sure you around and maybe stalked you a bit but only because I want the three of us to be friends." Ayato's reply was nothing short of ludicrous to the Shadow Caster but seeing the Fire Caster weaponizing something in his arsenal, Kuro's face which was pretty cute right now because he was embarrassed.

"We're sorry. We... just wanted to make friends with someone here and um... um..."

"It's okay." Yuri gestured as he simultaneously sighed at the whole situation. "Would you just leave first?" Yuri then gestured to how he was almost completely naked and the duo rushed out but not before pulling him into a big bro hug.

"Thanks, Yuri." The prodigy blushed as they rushed out.

"Hey, did you just forget that I'm not wearing..." He stopped talking as he soon realized they were no longer in the vicinity. Staying in the changing room, he just leaned against the wall and casually slided against it. "I don't know why but it feels nice, nice to have people who care." He thought about the foreign emotion he was feeling.

* * * * *

The man shouted and all the cars zoomed off. The use of Casting and special technology was allowed in this particular race so people began to take advantage of the situation. Arina's race car was right behind another boy's car. One who had blonde hair and just reeked of superficial ideologies and wealthiness as well as being a Caster.

Said boy could see that she was going to surpass him and his ego wasn't going to let him allow her to so he resorted to using his Casting and not with enough restraint which showed that he didn't care if she was hurt.

'He's going to hit me. That little...' And she didn't have enough space to move out of the way.

So eventually, when the boy had chanted, "Wind Casting: Air Tunnel!" And sent just that in her direction, she reacted equally by shooting out a Spell of her own. However, it was a Basic Spell.

"Oh, no you don't!" Arina designed a ball of light, a larger one and the two forces collided, cancelling each other out before her race car switched gears into overdrive and zoomed off, easily taking the lead, much to the boy's aggrievance.

"I'll get back at you, red-head."

* *

  Humans that passed by the Color Caster, Luz Umibe on their wheels envied her vehicle and how well it had been made.

Taking a precaution for the future, one of them threw flat metal discs off onto the track which turned into robotic crawling bugs that began tearing apart other racers wheels, leading to their crashing and elimination.

But Luz was smarter than that. Seeing the technobugs coming at her direction, she reversed before pulling out an embarrassing picture frame of her when she was in a school play and had completely forgotten her lines at the age of 9.

"I always hated that picture. Fortunately, its useful at the moment." Stretching her arm out, she forced the vision that she wanted upon the frame which she threw on the race track and it began to form a kind of multicolored solid neon ramp out of the hue which she could control to some degree.

She threw out two more as her siblings had made copies to mock her and she was doing so rapidly as the technobugs were closing in fast.

"Welp, here goes nothing." Luz pressed down on her feet and the wheels left hot screech marks on the ground before she rode up the ramp, over the technobugs and over the competitor that had released them, "Ohh, yeah!"

However, her trails for this race were not over yet as a fellow Caster launched his Spell on her.

"Thunder Casting: Blast Wave!" A green wave of magic was released from the assailant's arms. At that pivotal moment in time, the Picture Caster's Charm, more specifically one of its gems had opened up, giving her access to a whole new second spell.

"Picture Casting: Color Sphere!" Once a Caster's gem opened up, all the information regarding that Spell would just come rushing in and it was all the same for her.

A transparent solid sphere of rainbow magic swirled around her in almost an instant, protecting her from the attack that had been used against her.

* *

Arina and Luz arrived at the finish line and they were surprised, with one eyebrow raised higher than the other at how Serena had been the first one to pass through and was therefore the winner.

"How did you get first place?" Luz asked, referring to the race that had taken place just seconds ago as the Mech Caster kept the medal on her neck with pride. They had not seen her go across the finish line.

Serena replied while snapping her fingers to literally snap the vehicles out of reality, "I have my ways." She smiled and the Color Caster pouted.

"Mysterious much."

"Come on, guys. Let's head back to the dorm." Arina had one hand of Luz' shoulder and the other on Serena's as they merrily skipped back to the Academy.