Wren had re-joined the rest of his class. They were stood in a tidy line outside the front of the cafeteria. There were six other lines from different classes stood next to Wren’s class. At the front of the class Lops was stood taking a register, he noticed Wren coming over and waved him over to the back of the line.
At the front of the line stood Xiao, her stoic confidence shown readily on her face. She nodded to Wren as he walked to the back of the line. He passed Liam on the way, he stood out as the tallest of the class, he was towards the middle but he refused to even meet Wren’s eyes as he walked past him.
“In a moment we will be travelling to the other side of the island where you will be tested on your latent elemental ability.” Lops called out. “These tests will be very different to the previous tests, none of you will have ever used elemental abilities before, even the Legacies among us, so please follow every instruction you are given.”
Wren was excited. He would finally have the opportunity to use the ability he’d unlocked. He’d thought about sneaking off the night before and trying it out, but he didn’t know what he was doing, he could hurt himself or someone else, and there was no guarantee that his activities would go unnoticed. The sensible thing was to wait until he could use his abilities with guidance.
Wren looked to his left and right, the other classes were receiving similar messages from their own instructors. They all looked as excited as Wren felt, fidgeting in their lines, whispering to each other in hushed gleeful tones. It was then that Wren noticed a set of eyes looking back at him. It was Chadwick.
Wren could feel the boys gaze digging into him, pressing down on him as if he had ten tonnes of weight on his back. Chadwick had a dark look in his eyes and an even more sinister smile across his face. He was stood at the back of his own line, similarly to Liam he was the tallest in his class and seemed to dominate the space around him. He lifted a hand and pointed it towards Wren.
“I’m coming for you.” The boy mouthed at him.
Wren turned away from Chadwick, trying to ignore the other boy. He wouldn’t let it get to him. He would just continue on with his day, try to complete the elemental tests and then return to his dorm.
“Everything will be fine.” He muttered to himself.
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His class had started moving off at the direction of Lops. They were heading into the forest in the direction of the wind room. He steeled himself and left with the rest of the class.
He felt Chadwick’s eyes on his back with every step he took.
~
The group had journeyed through the forest, taking the same path that Wren had taken when he’d gone to explore the island the previous day. They’d travelled past the structures Wren had assumed were offices and had reached the wind room where Wren had thought their journey would end. However they continued along a path past the wind room, making sure not to get too close to the edge of the island. He remembered the force field and the effects it had had on the Dusk Vulture. Would it have the same effect on the recruits if one fell from the island, Wren didn’t want to find out.
Finally the class had reached a meadow where they stopped and regrouped. There were no signs of any other groups having followed them, so he only assumed that they had been taken to other locations to carry out the testing. If all of the recruits weren’t in the same place, then the island must have had plenty of useful little outcroppings for testing and teaching to take place.
The meadow was filled with three separates stations, each having different sets of equipment. Wren could only assume that the elemental test would take the same form as the physical test and be split into three different parts, examining different aspects of their elemental abilities.
“Gather round everyone.” Lops said. He waited for all of the recruits to form a semi-circle around him before continuing to speak. “I will not be the instructor conducting your tests this afternoon, that honour has been given to an instructor much more specialised than me.”
In the distance a figure appeared, sporting a familiar shock of long white hair that came down to her waist. She appeared from a break in the trees and made her way over to the gathered group.
“I would like to introduce you all to Instructor Penn, who will be facilitating your tests this afternoon.” Lops said, gesturing to Anastasia. “Instructor Penn here graduated last year with record breaking scores and was invited to become an instructor this year. Now she may not be much older than you, but I would recommend listening to her, lest you want to keep all your limbs attached.” Lops said chuckling. Anastasia only blushed. “I hand things over to you.”
Anastasia stepped forward, the blush removed from her face, replaced with a steady confidence that told the group she knew what she would be doing.
“The test this afternoon, will be split into three parts. The first activity will test the strength of your ability, the second your range, and the third your stamina.”
The class whispered amongst themselves; the test sounded exactly the same as the one they had done in the morning.
“Now I’m fully aware that none of you have ever used elemental abilities before, many of you will not yet be able to summon your abilities. It is for this reason that some of you will not be able to partake of this test. And so, in this first test we will not only be testing the strength of your abilities, but whether you have a natural affinity as a wind elemental.”