Beast Awakening. Ethan's Luck.

"Those are your presents. Trevor, you go first. The skull is what you will use." Miss Carmen said.

"Skull? A Beast Awakening? Won't I die? Or ... or ...." Trevor shivered with a scared and horror-struck face. Even the others had frightened faces.

"No, you won't die. Everything will be okay and with the energy you've taken from the Awakening Stones, you should be able to go through a Beast Awakening. That is a Death Skull, a Smoke affinity beast at the Silver Rank. That's the only tangible part of its body. The rest are just smoke. You can do it and there are also measures put in place in case it backfires. So, there's no need to worry." Miss Carmen assured Trevor. 

"O ... okay."

Trevor moved towards the podium with the skull on it and stood there, looking at it. He sucked in a deep breath and placed his hands on the skull. It was similar to using an Awakening Stone. You calm yourself and open your whole being to accept the new energy.

White smoke instantly flowed out of the openings in the skull and entered Trevor through his ears, eyes, nose and mouth. His white hair glowed brighter to the extent that it became as white and bright as the smoke. His eyes glowed with a dangerous red color. His feet left the ground as he slowly floated up into the mist that had formed because of the smoke. The rest had to back away leaving only Miss Carmen who didn't let her eyes off Trevor. The skull also floated with Trevor as more smoke leaked out of it into Trevor. 

After 5 minutes, Trevor slowly floated back down and fell on the floor. The skull hovered over him then burst into tiny pieces and entered him. A blue crystal fell on Trevor. It was no longer glowing as the power in it had been drained by Trevor. 

Miss Carmen took a bottle from her storage ring and poured its contents into Trevor's open mouth. It was a Stabilizing Juice. Miss Carmen recorded what happened on a tablet. 

"Hmm... that went better than expected. He even absorbed the beast's essence and left nothing. A perfect fusion." She said as she recorded her findings. 

Trevor woke up with a start and started asking questions. He looked like he had experienced a nightmare. He was sweating all over. His hair had grown a few inches, and his eyes had a certain glow and coldness hidden in it but only Miss Carmen noticed it. An effect of him absorbing the whole being of the Death Skull: its energy and essence. 

"What happened?! Did I die?! The... the beast..."

"It's okay. You are fine. The Awakening was successful, no more than successful. You had a perfect, a 100% Awakening rate, the first ever." Miss Carmen said with excitement clearly in her voice.

"Huh? Successful?"

...

"Yes. But I will tell you the details later. It's now Ethan's turn. Ethan..." Miss Carmen's expression changed as she couldn't find Ethan near them. She unconsciously turned towards a box in the corner of the room. There she saw Ethan standing there petrified, with his hand on the box as it shattered. It was made of glass with mist in it.

When they were focused on Trevor, Ethan moved to where he was. He felt something calling out to him. He tried resisting but his body moved on its own accord towards the box which was the source of the feeling. The force of attraction was too strong for him to resist. As he got closer, he discovered that it was a glass box. The glass seemed to be made from a special material. The interior of the cage was foggy, but the fog quickly dissipated to reveal a big, coiled beast. Looking closely, he discovered that it was a serpent. In all his life on Earth, he had never seen a live beast before and this one turned out to be a rare one or so he thought. The beast also sensed the boy approaching and raised its head. All this while, no one was concentrating on Ethan as awakening with an Awakening Stone wasn't epic as Beast Awakening. They all knew that with an Awakening Stone, everything will be alright and the awakening will go on smoothly.

The serpent had three eyes, one on top of the other pair. They were black in color, but the third eye was bright blue in color. The scales on the serpent were red with black dots. On its head were three golden horns. The serpent in fact, was beautiful especially with how its scales emitted a glow once in a while. Ethan instinctively placed his right hand on the glass. The serpent moved closer to the hand and hissed. That was when a streak of red light shot out of Ethan's palm and hit the serpent. It was so fast that no one saw it.

  CRASH!

The shattering of glass drew the group's attention to Ethan who was standing there, petrified as the serpent pounced on him. It swiftly coiled itself around him and looked in the direction of Miss Carmen who had reacted faster than the rest. It was a very intelligent creature as it could sense that Miss Carmen was stronger than it. It tilted its body so that Ethan's agonizing face could be seen by the rest. Miss Carmen seriously wanted to attack but she was afraid she might hurt Ethan in the process. As she was contemplating on what to do, she heard coughs behind her. She turned and was horror-struck as she saw Trevor and the others coughing blood. The space around them was being squeezed by an unseen force but she instantly knew it was the power of the serpent, Telekinesis. She hurriedly released her aura and enshrouded the kids in it. All the while, she had been planning her next move. A black curtain flowed towards Ethan and the serpent. It started shimmering and turned into a serpent just like the first one except this was shadowy and black. That was an ability related to Miss Carmen's affinity, Darkness but in the early stages, Shadow.