Chapter V

Arclight looked as if she just finished living in a troll den and eating the carcasses of the previous inhabitants for the last two months. With an eyepatch over her left eye, her right eye appeared to be attempting to make up for the defect as it darted about wildly, rarely blinking. Her hair was matted down to her scalp until it reached her shoulders where it was tied back loosely with a piece of twine.

She smiled widely at them all as they approached. She opened her arms as if inviting them in for a hug.

“First years! Worry not my dear new students, the dreary paperwork is at an end! Now we fight!”

A few students gave a couple nervous chuckles no other response. Arclight only continued smiling maniacally as they glanced between one another.

“Each of you, line up in order of height. Shortest up front!”

Kizu shuffled to the back. The tardy shirtless scaled boy was the next tallest out of the group. He grinned at Kizu.

He hissed at Kizu, assumingly speaking to him. Kizu made gestures trying to convey his lack of understanding. The boy nodded, pointed to himself, and said, “Harvey.” The name seemed unnatural out of the boy’s mouth.

Kizu pointed at himself in response. “Kizu.”

Then Harvey pointed at Kizu’s hair and gave a thumbs up alongside another hiss.

“Now, you in the very front.” Arclight pointed at a small nervous looking girl. The same girl who had reprimanded him earlier for not wanting to hand over his blood. “Attempt to kill me!”

The girl visibly paled at the demand. She sputtered and looked at the rest of the students as if for help.

“Worry not, I will not strike back. Or do you worry you may be too powerful and kill me? Oh girl! Even if that was the case, the RnR professor is right around the corner, ready to attend to me. Use any spell, any magic. Combat is an accumulation of knowledge placed in practice! Now, strike like a viper!”

The girl raised a trembling wand. She pointed it at a small boulder nearby and it slowly raised from the ground. Then positioned it directly over Arclight’s head. The professor didn’t move. She didn’t even look up as the girl released the spell. The rock tumbled down from the air. Arclight raised a hand, and as the rock touched her finger, it burst into dust.

“Slow and predictable.” Arclight laughed. “If I wanted to, I could have ripped out your spine with my hands before your spell finished lifting that stone. One more opportunity. Show me your arsenal!”

The majority of students ahead of Kizu relied on what looked like elemental transmutation or spells like the first girl that affected the exterior environment. One boy conjured a sword and completely failed in physical combat. And the quilled girl drew a circle in the dirt and attempted to summon a magical entity to do her bidding. Instead, it emerged half formed and attacked her instead of the professor. Arclight had to step in and banish it.

After failing to harm her, Arclight sent each student to a building on the other side of the courtyard. Soon, the only remaining students were Harvey and himself.

Harvey matched Arclight’s smile as he marched forward.

Arclight seemed rejuvenated by his confidence. She laughed as he stopped in front of her.

Then, instead of pulling out a wand or staff like all the other students, he drew out a flute from his belt. He sat down in the dirt, and began to play. The music sounded carefree, as if he played without any plan or structure. The notes lived freely after their creation. Harvey’s features smoothed as he played, becoming more alluring. Then Kizu began to question Harvey's gender. Because the closer Kizu looked, the more beautiful Harvey appeared.

Arclight knocked the flute into the dirt, abruptly ending the song. Kizu’s perception of Harvey returned to that of a scaly boy again.

Arclight threw her head back and laughed. “Oh, boy, you’re skilled, to be sure, but you lack control. Instead of focusing your magic on me, you spread it thin across all your music. If you learned to focus, you could deal some true destruction. Best display all day! Now follow the others and get your uniform.”

Only Kizu and Arclight were left in the courtyard. Emptied of all other students, Arclight turned to him, her eye dancing over him.

“Someone informed me of the irregular registration of a sixteen year old entering alongside the first years. Despite the fact you will only get three years of education instead of everyone else’s five, you still signed up. A little more questioning and I discovered your living situation these past few years. Exhilarating! Show me some witch magic!”

Kizu, despite watching dozens of other students perform, still remained completely clueless as of what to do. He waved his hand to the side, creating the illusion of a stone wall between him and her. But she walked right through it.

Not knowing what else to do, he ran at her. Blue flames burned on his fist as he went to punch her face. But she grabbed his fist before it made contact.

She looked disappointed as she pushed him back into the dirt. The smile almost seemed to slip from her lips.

“Only illusions? They’re complex, I suppose. But illusions are only useful for three things in combat. Retreat, intimidation, and confusion. You used the first two, both of which are useless in this form of combat test. Where will you retreat to? And what good does intimidation do for you? A lackluster performance. You never even utilized that familiar on your head.”

He felt almost ashamed as she gave him a hollow laugh and pointed him on. Grateful to be last, he stepped inside the building and was greeted by James.

James handed him a folded pile of clothes.

“Congratulations, your testing is complete! Please change into your uniform. Your test results will appear briefly.”

Kizu stepped into a box set up as a changing room. As he slipped on each article of the uniform, it tightened to fit him perfectly. When he got to the tie, it came alive and flipped itself around into a knot and tied itself around his neck. He had to loosen it slightly, the pressure on his neck disturbing him.

He shoved his old clothes into his satchel and looked at himself in the mirror. Mort hummed sleepily from his perch on top of his head.

“Yeah, it looks too…uniform. Maybe it will grow on us.”

As he exited, an exhausted looking woman approached him. She introduced herself as the Rejuvenation and Restoration professor. Then she grabbed his ear, and stabbed a tiny shard of metal through it.

The action was done before he could protest or question. He just yelped and clutched at the piercing as he backed away after the deed was done.

“This piercing is enchanted to translate any foreign languages. All students are required to wear it as part of the academy’s dress code. You may have noticed that while everyone uses the universal script here, the spoken languages vary wildly. This enchanted piece of your uniform places all students on equal footing with their peers.”

“You could have warned me first!” he protested.

She sighed. “I’ve been informed that you’re an argumentative student. I went with the path of least resistance. Make certain to not touch it. I don’t want to see you in the medicine wing for an infected ear.” Then she excused herself and left the room.

He looked around at the room of first years. Harvey noticed him standing in the back and waved for him to join him on a couch.

Nobody else sat near the scaly boy. He grinned as Kizu sat down next to him.

“How do you feel about the tests?” he asked, his voice now completely understandable, with a hiss of an accent. “I’m pretty sure I aced the alchemy test. But I definitely bombed the history one.”

“I probably failed them all,” Kizu said.

Harvey gave a throaty chuckle. “Better to keep expectations low, right? Secret to a happy life, my ma always said.”

“Yeah,” he agreed half heartedly.

“But she usually said it in reference to Da.” Harvey laughed.

Then the glass case in front of the room glowed for a moment. When it faded, words were left behind on the paper behind it. Everyone crowded around it instantly. Kizu had to fight his way close enough to see the result. They ranked everyone’s test results from F to S followed by a rank within the academy itself. He found his name.

Written Tests- Politics- F (799). History- F (799). Brewing- S (002). Astronomy- E (693). Music- F (799).

Blood Tests- Enchanting- C (382). Rejuvenation and Restoration- F (799). Conjuring- F (800). Divination- B (213). Illusion- A (98). Elemental (799).

Combat Test- F (784).

Not the greatest results. But he noted with a smidge of pride that he had the only S on the board. Though, if the test was anything to gage by, he really wondered about the lackluster standards of the brewing class.

At a glance, he noticed most of the other students ranked between E and D in almost every class, with the exception of a fair number of F’s and C’s. But he easily had the most F’s on the board.

“Woah, you weren’t kidding about failing everything,” Harvey said beside him. “You’re actually the worst at almost everything on the board. But already claiming the second place in Brewing? Absolutely mad. I don’t envy all the trouble you’ll have in that class. We’ll be in the same History and Astronomy classes though.”

“How do you know the schedules?”

“They’re based on your scores now. You get placed with all the other people of your letter. The actual schedule will be in the dorms, and half of these classes won’t even be relevant until next semester. It depends on your class grade.”

“What’s to stop them from occurring at the same time?” Kizu asked.

“They have it all down to a system. Nothing will interfere with anything else. I don’t know how it works beyond the fact that we have three classes every day on weekdays.”

Kizu looked at Harvey’s scores. He alone had the only other A on the board, scoring it in Music.

“Congratulations about the music score.”

“Thanks, but it’s not actually set in stone yet,” he said glumly. “The evaluation for that one happens in class. I just marked professional on my flute. I could get knocked all the way back down to F with you by next week if the Music professor deems me bad enough.”

“I heard your playing, I doubt you’ll be moved anywhere but up.”

“I better not! That would be as bad as being moved down! S classes are supposed to be cut-throat. I’m not ready for that.”

James clapped his hands, calling all their attention. The students tore their eyes away from the posted scores and over to the world-weary puppet man. And behind him, stood another James. An exact clone of him.

“We will now escort you to your dorms. Boys with me, girls with my companion.”

“What is he?” Kizu whispered to Harvey as they followed the first James out of the room.

“I think it’s a wooden golem. Read about them once. It takes a complex set of enchantments to create a golem.”

James rattled on to them about the rules of the dormitory. “No one is to have any females in their dorm at any time. No one is allowed to perform dangerous magical experiments. No one is to make loud noises after nine in the evening. No one is to interfere with the safety of others, including dueling, at any time. No one is allowed to perform any arrangement of harassment of others.” And on and on.

They went down staircases, looped around in hallways, went up then back down again. Suits of armor saluted them as they passed and lanterns lit up as they approached. Kizu noted a strange lack of doors into rooms in the hallways. Though there were plenty of paintings of lavish sitting rooms and classrooms. In fact, that seemed to be the only type of painting he noticed the entire walk.

Other boys chittered nervously and Kizu caught pieces of conversations about the test results.

“Now, all first year boys please enter through this painting.” James gestured at a painting hanging on a wall. It showed a cozy looking room with a fire lit in the hearth. “This will be your common room for the next five years, assuming you choose to remain on campus. Treat it well and obey the rules listed. From here, you will find access into your personal quarters. Your name, as well as your roommate’s name, will be listed on the door.”

Harvey stepped forward eagerly and slapped his hand on the painting. A few other students gasped as he appeared to get sucked into it. Nothing outwardly changed in the painting, but Harvey was gone.

Slowly they all lined up and touched the painting. Kizu watched from the back of the line as each student disappeared into the painting. He felt his heart beating faster with each step he took closer to it. Finally, with everyone else gone, he reached for the hearth. It seemed to exude warmth.

“Mr. Kaga, please follow me to the third-year students’ common room,” James said. He began walking further down the corridor.

Kizu trailed after him, looking back at the first-year common room with a pang of jealousy. They passed by more paintings until they arrived at one of a similar common room. This one, however, had open massive windows circling the room showcasing open sky above a layer of clouds. Where the first year one looked a bit homely but cozy, this one looked exposed and drafty.

“Mr. Kaga, you must also be informed that uncommon familiar animals are rare for students. The facility has been informed of your bond and as such, made allowances. However, if your familiar causes trouble in the dormitory, the facility will rehouse it down at the stables.”

“Okay,” Kizu said. He doubted Mort would cause any issues. “And when will my blood be disposed of?”

“Blood disposal occurs at six in the morning on the first day of every week. Your appeal to be present is still pending with the headmaster. However, it should be determined by disposal time tomorrow.”

“How will I know where to go?”

“Your guide should be adequate.”

Kizu waited for any further instruction or information, but James continued staring past him blankly. With a sigh, he reached out, and touched the room.