Morning’s sky breaks through the living room of Zahn’s apartment. The light shines throughout, reflecting off the floor and walls. In the bedroom Zahn’s new phone rings out with an alarm that breaks the silence of the room and awakens him to a fresh start to a new day–his first day. His eyes gleam with excitement as he stands up and begins stretching. He reaches down for his phone, still sounding with the flashing screen that reads “6:01am”, and shuts off the alarm.
“Well, today is the day.”, He exclaims to himself as he opens the door of his bedroom.
He walks into the kitchen to see what he can find to eat, but his eagerness has left him without much of an appetite. He grabs a couple pieces of bread and places them inside of the oven. After a few seconds he takes them out and begins to crunch down on two beautiful, golden, and crispy pieces of toast. The silence in the room interrupted ever so often by the sounds of munching reminded Zahn so much of his house in Grith. The last bite of toast was taken and with an exhale and one last stretch he walked into the bathroom to finish getting ready for his first day at Draken.
The time on the clock in the lobby of the building strikes 7:25am as Zahn exits the elevator into the lobby. He felt slightly uncomfortable wearing the new outfit that he had gotten. It was nothing like his old clothes from home. The long black pants felt heavy on his legs. He had on a long sleeve dark gray shirt with two rips going in long patterns down the sides of the torso. He did not think this shirt was much different from his old ripped up ones from home, but he liked the way the fabric felt. The clothes all fit perfectly to his body and the fabrics were much higher quality than anything he had ever owned. He thought to himself about how long it would take him to get used to wearing clothes like this.
Zahn made his way out to the front of the building and pulled his phone from his pants pocket and dialed Yuu’s number. Shortly after the call ended Yuu pulled up to the curb outside and Zahn entered the car.
“Hello sir! Hope you are doing well this morning, Mr. Novix!”, Yuu exclaimed.
Zahn smiled and responded. “Yes I am. I’m excited. I don’t know what to expect, but hopefully I will enjoy it.”
“I believe you will, sir. We should be arriving very soon; the academy is actually really close to your building. They purposefully did that because not everyone likes riding in cars or driving. They made sure to at least have a dorm building close enough for walking.”, Yuu said.
“That’s good to know. I may want to walk from time to time. How did you get to the building so fast? It was only like 5 minutes until you got there.”, Zahn replied.
Yuu smiled and told Zahn, “I live in a building nearby with other drivers. The company pays for all employees to live there so that way we can have the fastest response time to the building for the new Immortals.”
Zahn was confused as to why they were being treated so special for being Immortal when the drivers are also Immortal. He asked Yuu the same question to see if he even knew the reason.
“I applied for this position. Most of the drivers are regular humans. I chose to become a driver even as an Immortal because I didn’t think the bureau life fit me and I didn’t have any other ideas. When you live forever, it's very easy to get bored after a while, so I chose a job that would at least allow me to meet new people and make new friends.”, answered Yuu.
Zahn understood what Yuu was talking about even if he could not relate to it right away. The thought entered into his mind about what he would do for hundreds of years. He needed to make certain he would enjoy whatever it was.
“We are here, Mr. Novix.”, Yuu said.
Zahn thanked him for the ride and stepped out of the car and looked up at the great building in front of him. The tower stood tall and dominant compared to the rest of the building in the area. The tower was profound and unique in its design. The outside of it had large panes of glass that went all the way up the tower. Lights were along the ground facing the building, but were not on. The parts that were not made of glass had a distinctive metal in its place. Unlike the other towers and skyscrapers in the city this one’s metal was filled with energy. Zahn’s first thought was maybe it was used for better defense in case an attack on the academy were to happen.
Upon entering the building Zahn was prompted to come to the front desk off to the left side of the lobby.
“Hello, sir, may I please get your name?”, the lady behind the desk asked.
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“Zahn Novix”, he answered.
“Thank you! Welcome to the Draken Academy, Mr. Novix! Here is your temporary ID and a map of the Academy. This building is just one of many on the campus, but the others are much smaller. This main building is mostly where the staff offices are located and the others are where you will have your classes. Please feel free to explore when you get the chance, but do remember you are not authorized to go everywhere. Your badge will act as an access card into all the buildings. Any area you are not authorized to go in will deny your ID. Thank you again for attending our esteemed academy!”, the lady explained.
Zahn thanked her for her help and opened the schedule paper she gave him. The paper read off that all first year students were to meet in the training building at 8:30am. Zahn started out of the back door into the courtyard of the campus. The map that he had been given called this area “The Center”. The center was full of lush green grass with shady trees all around. There were many walkways, benches, tables, and a fountain. The building Zahn needed to head to was on the left side of the center after a bit of a walk. When he arrived at the building he noticed a lot of people standing inside the door waiting.
Zahn mentally prepared himself as he stepped inside the building and was overwhelmed with talking and laughter. It appeared the door to go inside the next room was closed and everyone was gathering in the lobby of the building waiting. Students were all around talking, laughing, and discussing their abilities. Zahn could hear some of them speaking and talking about how much they are looking forward to discovering their true power.
The noise of the room was interrupted by the sound of the doors opening to the training room. Everyone started to flood into the room little by little. Once everyone was in the room the doors behind them were closed and Trux stood in front of them. The room was not much different than a normal gym–wide open layout with padding on the walls.
“Welcome everyone. This is the training area of the academy. This is where most of your training will take place for the majority of your first year. Today is going to be a very straightforward day. Today will be all focused on everyone receiving their level or rank. The reason we do this is to try and place students in groups according to their ranks so we don't have growth problems from students not being able to benefit from the training of others. An example would be like taking a kid who has high attack power and a student with low attack power and telling them both to punch a brick wall repeatedly. The low attack power student will see gradual change and improvement over time, whereas the high attack power student will most likely destroy it with every punch and not benefit from the lack of challenge. Now before we begin this I do want to emphasize a couple things. First, your rank is statistically impossible to be really high. That’s just how it is. Two–your improvement will be slow. It takes years upon years of training to improve your level beyond a noticeable amount, but honing your skills will fill a little of the gap. Alright now let us begin!”, Trux shouted as he turned and walked into the center of the room.
The students walked forward and stood in a line across from Trux. There were around 70 students total. Trux looked at them all to get an estimate of the number and mumbled under his breath.
“So, only about 40 didn’t show.”, he said to himself. He smiled and addressed the students in a stern voice. “Alright, so does anyone know how your level is determined?”
A student standing along the far right side of the line raised their hand up. Trux pointed to them with a slight nod.
The student answered out,”Yes sir, an Immortal’s rank or level is determined by the average of their stat scores. There are seven stats that are graded for a rank: Physical Attack, Energy Attack, Defense, Energy, Speed, Stamina, and Recovery. Normal humans’ stats are used as a baseline of 0 and the maximum is 10.”
“That’s right.”, Trux responded. He continued, “Now the first stat we will be testing is your speed. This room is exactly 150 feet across. Some of the fastest humans in the world take anywhere between three to five seconds to clear 120 feet. If you can’t clear 150 in a shorter time then you should be questioning why you are here instead of working retail with the other humans.”
He motioned the students to line up along the side of the box marked on the floor and had each student go one by one as he timed them and recorded their scores on a holopad. Zahn watched each and every one of them astonished by how fast some of them were. Trux never gave out anyone’s time and he never made a comment. He just recorded the numbers and promptly responded with a stern order.
“Next!”, he called out.
Zahn stepped up to the line and watched as the light turned from red to green. He bolted as quickly as he could and put all of his effort into his legs and pushed even further. He was determined to get a good score.
Trux’s eyebrow raised slightly as he looked back down at the timer on his holopad. Zahn reached the finish line and slid across part of the floor coming to a halt. He felt fine–not out of breath and still felt as thought he could go much longer. He walked over to the stands where everyone else was sitting and he took a seat near the end.
One of the students with dark blue hair called over to him and congratulated him on his run. A short time passed and soon everyone had finished their run. Trux walked away from the middle of the floor and went to the sideline.
“Ok, next we will be testing your physical attack. I will be the one that will personally grade you on this one.”, he says with a rather evil laugh.
He stands in the center of the floor as everyone re-aligns in their previous positions and looks towards him as he continues.
“Each of you will strike me and I will gauge how much power you have myself. Let’s get started.”, he finished as he took a strange stance and began groaning.
Zahn felt a spike in energy when suddenly he noticed Trux’s skin started turning into stone. He was completely shocked by what he had seen. He never knew Immortals had powers like this. Trux stared intently at the approaching student. His eyes were stone, but they continued to show movement and life. The student walked up and pulled back his fist and slung it forward with everything he had. Upon impact his fist shattered against the stone skin. Bone fragments exited his hand and landed on the floor. The student grabbed his hand and fell to the floor crying out in pain.
“Get up.”, Trux told the crying student.
The student laid on the floor still after hearing the command. The pain was so intense that they were unable to speak, and they continued to cry. Trux began to get annoyed with both the crying and the lack of obedience.
“I said… Get up!”, He shouted as he kicked the student’s back. The force of the kick shattered their spine and launched them into the wall. All of the other students looked in shock at the crater left in the wall and the student laying on the ground completely lifeless. Fear set in like a plague in each and every one of their minds. Zahn could not believe what he just saw. Is this really an instructor of the academy? Are they allowed to do this to the students? All of the questions flooding his mind were all halted by the chilling words of Trux that rang in his ears.
“Who’s next?”, Trux asked with a sinister grin.