10: Orientation VI

I found Nigel sitting at the table I left him at. He was watching Jane and Iris who were no longer in their meditative states. Instead they were huddled close together and whispering amongst themselves. I rushed over to their table and threw my sigil card down on the table.

"Learned my spell!" I exclaimed proudly, standing with my chest puffed up and my hands resting on my hips. Iris and Jane looked at me with disbelief.

"WHAT?!" Iris screamed. Which earned her a round of people shushing her.

"How?" Jane asked in a more hushed tone. "I thought you didn't know anything about mana and magic."

"I'll tell you later." I said eyeing Nigel out of the corner of my eye. He might have been the reason I finally was able to activate that sigil card but technically speaking I didn't learn a new spell as much as had it imprinted on me. I didn't want to get disqualified for that.

"What about you guys? Learn your spells?" I asked. Iris huffed and flicked her hair over her shoulder.

"Who do you think we are?" She asked.

"A generally good person and a annoying Tri-clops." I said pointing to Jane and Iris respectively. Jane turned away and snickered trying to cover it up as a cough.

"Lady Jane!" Iris griped.

"Shouldn't you three head back to Jovia's desk and tell her you succeeded?" Nigel asked. The three of us shared a look then rushed over time the front desk. As we ran over I noticed that three of the groups that had been sitting in the study area were gone. Iris reached the desk first and threw her sigil card down.

"We learned our spell sigils." She said. Jane stood beside Iris and placed her card down as well.

Jovia stopped her sorting for a second to looked down at Iris and Jane's sigil cards then up at the three of us.

"All of you learned your sigils?" Jovia asked eyeing me specifically.

I held my left hand up and started flowing mana into it. Imagining lighting sparking from my skin and condensing into a ball. My mana responded a lot quicker than earlier in the bathroom and soon lighting was sparking off my hands. Everyone's eyes grew wide and Iris jaw dropped.

"How the hell are you doing that?! Iris demanded. Jane reached out almost touched my hand but I quickly pulled it away.

"Hey that's lighting!" I exclaimed and stopped flowing mana into hand. Jovia quickly gained her composure.

"I recognize that one of your group has learned their spell sigil." Jovia said. Jane held her hand up and a yellow sigil appeared in front of it. It buzzed slightly as a beam shot out of it and struck Jovia. Jovja reached over and picked up a stack of books as tall as her with one hand. She smiled and set it back down. "I recognize two have learned their sigils."

Iris snapped her fingers and a blue sigil appeared at her feet. Iris' skin took on a metallic look to it. I reached put and poked Iris' skin and my eyes grew wide when it felt like actual skin instead of metal.

"Excuse you!" Iris yelled and slapped my hand away. "Do not touch me with your filthy hands! I don't know what peasant hands you have!"

"What? I was expecting your skin to cold and hard like your heart." I said drolly and rubbed my hand.

"I recognize that all three of you have learned your sigil." Jovia said then reached under her desk, pulled out a key and placed it on the desk next to Jane and Iris' sigil cards.. "This is key will get you to the final test but unlike the last one you'll gave to get to the testing zone on your own."

"Okay, where is it?" I asked.

"You'll have to figure out that too."

"And how are we supposed to do that?" Iris asked.

"You already have everything you need." Jovia replied. Iris narrowed her eyes at Jovia and crossed her arms.

"What do you mean we have everything we need already? We don't have anything!"

"Of course you do." Jovia smiled and went back to sorting the books on her desk.

"However you should know it took the three teams before you thirty minutes at most to figure it out. If you don't figure it put soon one of the other teams will and this is just what a little bird told me. You don't want to be the fifth team to make it there."

"So basically only the top four teams make it to the next challenge?" I asked. Jovia shrugged then carried a small stack of books over to a cart.

"I would spend less time talking to me and more time figuring it out."

"We already have everything we need…" Jane muttered to herself. She folded her arms and started pacing in front of the desk.

'We already have everything we need?' I thought. I held up my sigil card and studied it carefully. It's rough and metallic surface had no indentations or carvings on it. Taking a quick look at Jane and Iris cards I saw theirs were the same.

"What are you doing?" Iris asked looking over my shoulder.

"Trying to figure where we're supposed to go obviously." I said. "She said that we already had everything we need but the only thing we've gotten were these sigil cards. I thought maybe they came together like a map but…"

"There's no way they'd use sigil cards to hide a map." Iris said dismissively. "The spell sigils encoded on them prevent any other markings being made on them."

Iris picked up the key from the desk and held it to the light. She examined it for a moment then her crystal started glowing dimly as she focused intently on the key. After a few minutes the glowing stopped and she sighed and lowered the key.

"Nothing on the key either?" I asked. She shook her head and frowned.

"What the hell else could it be?! We haven't gotten anything else?!" Iris snapped.

Another team ran up and threw their cards into the desk. Jovia stopped her work and started to deal with them. Iris and I shared and look and rushed over to Jane.

"We need to hurry up and figure this out!" Iris whispered.

"No! Really?!" I gasped sarcastically. Iris growled and slapped me on the shoulder.

"Being a sarcastic ass isn't helping!"

"And slapping me is?" I growled rubbing the spot where's she slapped me.

"Oh my gods! Nigel! He's our guide! We got him at the beginning of all of this!" Jane exclaimed suddenly. Iris and I shared a look then turned to Jane then back to the other team at the desk. All three of them were staring at us unblinking.

"Oops." Jane muttered and covered her mouth. The other team sudden ran back to the study area, where they probably left their guide. Iris and I ran after them, quickly finding Nigel sitting calmly at the table we left him he smiled when he saw the two of us.

"Finally figured it out?" He chuckled. I glanced back at the other team and they had already grabbed their guide and was making their way towards the exit.

"Yeah! So we gotta go!" I exclaimed. Nigel stood and stretched.

"Come on! We don't have time for this!" Iris yelled, earning yet another round of shushes but she waved them off and grabbed Nigel's hand and started pulling him toward the exit. I followed after them and the three of us meet up with Jane at the archives entrance.

"The other team already left!" Jane explained as we rushed outside. I could see the four of them riding off on the back of a steed. I turned to Nigel and grabbed him by his arms.

"Where are we supposed to go?" I asked.

"Hercules Coliseum. It's on the other side of the campus, even on a steed it would take a hour to get there on land." Nigel replied.

"Then we won't go by land." Jane said then pulled her hair to the side reveling the back of her neck and a square shaped crystal. "Jingles!"

Her crystal started to glow as a hexagonal structure formed then shot into the air landing in front of her. A ferocious roar reverberated through the air as a evo I had only read about stood proudly before us with its wings spread wide.

"A Lyon!" I screamed. Lyons were evos that every boy back home basically obsessed with. They were created by combining lion and eagle DNA. For the most part they looked like your average lion only one story tall with massive eagle wings sprouting from their shoulder blades and some eagle feathers mixed into their manes.

Jane's Lyon had darker brown and tan fur covering it's body, it's mane however was a bright pink and had four large braids intertwined in it down its chest. Despite that oddly feminine look it stood majestically over all of us.

"Jingles, I need you to get us somewhere fast! Can you do it?" Jane asked. Jingles roared softly and knelt down folding it's wings against its side. "Thank you! Let go you guys!"

Jane climbed onto Jingles back and held her hand put for Iris. She pulled her up behind her then the two of them looked at Nigel and me.

"Well come on!" Iris yelled.

"You want me to get on that?!" Nigel asked pointing to Jingles. "And did you call that Jingles?"

"Yes! Now hurry up! We're wasting time!" Iris growled. I placed my hand on Nigel's shoulder.

"Please." I said softly. Nigel sighed then turned and climbed onto Jingles back and held onto Iris. I climbed onto after him and smiled despite myself.

'Guys back home would never believe this!' I thought as Jingles stood up and took a running start before jumping into the air, snapping his wings open and flapping hard. Both Nigel and I screamed as Jingles rapidly ascended, quickly reaching the height where the team on the steed looked like ants. Jingles leveled out and started gliding on the winds.

"HOLY SHIT! THIS IS AMAZING!" I screamed.