The first day of school finally came to an end, the halls were crowded with students either leaving the main building or checking the integral leaderboard. Shiraki and her classmates left the building and regrouped near the entrance to not be in the way of the students that were leaving.
"So... we have 30 minutes of free time, what should we do?"
Shiraki asked while looking at her classmates.
"Well exploring the school is out of question, we have too little time for it at the moment, why don't we wait in the garden on front of the school? I heard the grass smell nice during the morning."
Mark was the one answering Shiraki's question, poiting at the garden in front of the main building. The classmates discussed for a moment if to sit on the grass or not, in the end everyone agreed to it and went to sit on the grass.
"Oi, is this some kind of joke?"
Shiraki asked to her classmates looking at the way they sat. When Shiraki sat on the grass everyone else sat in front of her in the same way they sit in the classroom.
"Well you are the strongest student among us first years, we need to show you some sort of respect somehow, after all almost half of the class turned out to be white students, we are not worthy of sitting beside you."
Sophy answered Shiraki's question raising her arm.
"Cut that crap, there is no need to be so formal between classmates, I may be the strongest first year but it's just on the paper, I have yet to make that title mine."
"If you don't want us to address you formally at least become our Honorary Student, I think we are all on the same page about it no?"
Everyone agreed to Sophy, upon hearing that sort of title Shiraki's ears twitched, she didn't know what kind of title that was, but it piqued her interest since they wanted to give her that title.
"Honorary Student? What is that?"
"The Honorary Student is the strongest student of the class, every class has their own Honorary Student and it's the class that decides with an election poll who should be the Honorary Student. A student that is both strong and smart is always the best candidate for the role, students can candidate themselves for the charge but anyone can be voted. If a student that didn't candidate for the charge of Honorary Students wins the poll, it'll be recognized as the winner of the election since the election is the will of the class. There can be only one Honorary Student per class, if the other candidates aren't happy with the result they'll duel in the arena for the title, the winner will be the Honorary Student of the class."
The one to answer Shiraki's question was Akavran, he was in the front row and Shiraki looked at him.
"You know a lot, was it written somewhere?"
"No, I know a lot of things already because my big sister attended here as well, she graduated this year."
"I see, is there something else you can tell me about being an Honorary Student?"
"Yes, allow me the explain then. The Honorary student is a figure that carries responsibilities and duties, they answer to the student's council and they have to attend all the official activities announced by them. Honorary Students have also the duty to be a bridge between students and teachers, if a student has a problem he'll first report to the Honorary Student of their class, should the problem be too much for them they'll ask for the assistance of the class' coordinator. Technically the problems that should be reported are problems that concern the whole class, if the problem is something personal then the student will need to take care of it themselves, that's why there is the Coliseum."
"I see, it's a title with a lot of responsibilities behind it."
"Not only that, but Honorary Students are also the face of their classes, if they act shamefully the entire class will be seen as shameful, if the Honorary Student and their classmates have good grades it'll raise the reputation of the class around the whole school. It's not an easy title to hold that's for sure, but it's a title that gives a lot of privileges as well."
Shiraki sighed while crossing her arms, at first she thought it was a title like the class rep she had at school, but it turned out to be a more serious title than that instead.
"That looks like a heavy title to carry, also it looks like you guys already made up your mind about it, even if I won't candidate for it you'll vote for me anyway, guess I have to accept the title anyway."
Upon hearing that Shiraki agreed to become the Honorary Student of their class, her classmates began to celebrate and thank her for taking up the role.
"Looks like we still have some time left before going to Hidit's office, what else can you tell us about the school Akavran?"
In hearing Shiraki's question, the celebrations stopped, everyone focuses their gaze on Akavran that began to answer Shiraki's question with the knowledge he had about the school due to her sister.
Time flew and it was almost time to go to Hidit's office, Akavran shared everything he knew about school's architecture, rules, spaces and much more. The school had a total of 6 floors, the first year students are located on the ground floor together with the canteen and the school's store, second year students are located on the first floor while third year students are on the second floor.
The third floor is the teacher's floor, each teacher has their own office and they are all on the third floor, some teachers have their quarters there as well while other teachers either live in the city or in the teacher's dorms. Akavran couldn't talk much about the fourth floor since his sister knew nothing about, she told him that the fourth floor was a floor used for meetings, while others believe that it's just an empty floor to separate the last floor from the others.
The last floor, the fifth floor, was the Principal's floor, the Principal's office and other important things were located there, such as the Principal's quarters. Students weren't allowed to go to the upper floors from the third to the fifth floor without summoning, in the whole school there were only 2 flight of stairs that led to the third floor and so on, and those flight of stairs were guarded 24/7 by powerful demons.
"Well guys time is up, I thank Akavran for all the information he was able to share with us but we should get going, let's clean ourselves and let Akavran guide us to the third floor."
Everyone stood up and started cleaning themselves from the grass of the garden, once everyone was ready Akavran began to guide his classmates towards Hidit's office. While they were heading to Hidit's office, Shiraki was thinking about the other things she learnt from Akavran, especially the student's council.
The student's council gets refreshed every 3 years, the current member of the student's council were second year students meaning the student's council was refresh the last year. The president of the student's council is a role given to the strongest first year student of the new year, while the honorary students of each class become the new members of the student's council.
While being absorbed in her thoughts, Shiraki didn't notice that her classmates stopped walking and accidentally bumped into one of them, after apologizing she raised her head to see what was the matter. They were arrived at the third floor but someone was blocking their way.
A 3 meters tall gargoyle dressed up with a black uniform was blocking their path, his arms were crossed, his tail was waving smoothly as he opened his wings before them as a kind of warning. The gargoyle looked at the students and flapped his wings towards them, seeing that the students were still there his eyes turned sharp keeping his wings spread.
"You students shouldn't be there, this is a restricted area. Identify yourself, to which class do you belong and what is reason of you coming up to this floor without a summoning? Only students being summoned by teachers can access this floor."
The gargoyle's voices echoed inside the students, he wasn't speaking to their ears, he was speaking to their souls. The students didn't know how he could do that, while they were busy trying to understand that and coming with some sort of answer, Shiraki made her way before the gargoyle and answered his question.
"I'm Shiraki Ryu and we are the class 1A, we got summoned by our coordinator Hidit Thyne in her quarters after the end of today's lessons, we were told to head to her quarters in 30 minutes since the ring of the bell."
The gargoyle lowered his head and looked at Shiraki in the eyes.
"Ah yes, the famous golden student herself, what a splendid encounter. I have to confirm your summoning with your coordinator."
The gargoyle closed his eyes and his ears for a moment, when he opened them again he untied his arms and looked at Shiraki again.
"Your coordinator confirmed your summoning, I'll escort you and your class to her quarters but you must follow those rules: first, you MUST stay where I'll leave you and not leave that area for no reason. Second, should a teacher or someone else ask you the reason of your presence in this floor, show them this card."
The gargoyle handed Shiraki a card with something written on it.
"It's a permit to stay on the floor, if you'll show them this card they'll understand and they'll leave you alone. If everything is clear I'll escort you all to your coordinator's quarters."
Shiraki took the card and placed inside her right pocket while thanking the gargoyle, seeing that his instructions were understood he began to escort the class to Hidit's quarters.
While being escorted to Hidit's quarters, the students were observing how the teacher's floor was different from the others. The walls were of a purple darker than the one of the ground floor, the floor was of a pitch-black color while the roof was of a light purple color. Golden candelabra were hanging from the ceiling and other lamps where mounted on the walls, filling the hallways with light as there were no windows. Both sides of the hallway were filled with doors leading to a teacher's quarters, the doors were black with golden tags hanged on the door with the teacher's name engraved on it, the handle and everything else was made of gold as well.
Finally arrived at the door of Hidit's quarters, the gargoyle reminded the students the rules he told them before entering the floor and left after saying goodbye. Shiraki and her classmates were standing in front of the door waiting for Hidit, they didn't know if Hidit was in her quarters or attending to some teacher duties, all they had to do was to wait for her.
Hidit had a slim figure with a smooth and light skin, she had short purple hair with light purple eyes, she was 160cm tall and for the first day of school she wore a purple suit with a red tie.
5 minutes has passed since the gargoyle left them in front of Hidit's quarters, the door was still closed as if there was nobody in there. The students were looking at each other wondering what to do, stay here or go back to their dorm, but when all hope was lost the door finally opened.
Hidit was the one that opened the door, but the way she showed herself left everyone speechless. Her hair was messy, she was wearing a green sweatshirt that was leaving her shoulders bare, a yellow t-shirt, a pair of black shorts with a pair white of flip flops on her feet. As Hidit was holding the door's handle with her left hand, with her right hand she was holding a mug filled with what looked like steamy coffee, with 'number #1 teacher' written on it. All the elegance she had in class in the morning was completely gone.
"Oh hello there guys, did I make you wait long? Sorry for the wait but I lost the track of time when I was chilling in my bed. Come inside, I have prepared the room to continue our lesson, leave your shoes at the entrance when you get inside."
This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
The students entered her office and left their shoes at the entrance, the office was filled with chairs to give everyone a sit, in front of the first line of chairs there was Hidit's desk. Behind Hidit's desk there was her chair, bookshelves, drawers, shelves filled with documents and much more. The office had red walls with white flowers drawn on it, the floor was made of green marble tiles and a golden candelabra was hanging from the ceiling.
Everyone sat down trying to sit in the same way they are seated in class, Hidit sat on her desk and kicked off her flip flops, after taking a sip from her mug she looked at her students.
"Looks like everyone is here and nobody is absent, this makes me really happy. First of all let's cut down the formalities, feel free to call me how do you prefer, call me with my name or with any way you are used to call your teachers. Understood?"
Everyone nodded positively to Hidit.
"Good, now let's continue our lesson. As I told you in class, the last student of this school that turned to be a golden student was 600 years ago, based on the records we have those who are ranked as golden color are destined to big things in their future. We don't know how this rank is linked to someone's future, but since we began to measure student's ranks those who were ranked as golden always became important people. In the past the only way to measure someone's power was by their mana, but when mana disappeared from this world and the others we had to reinvent almost everything."
"So demonic energy didn't exist before?"
A student asked while raising their hand.
"Exactly, demonic energy was discovered around 2000 years ago, in the past demons, angels and human were all living beings that depended on mana. Mana was the energy that allowed living beings to live, and it was also what was used to use magic."
"What is magic? I heard about it from my grandpa but he couldn't show me what it was."
Another student asked from the backrow seats.
"Magic was the power that was used back in the day, magic allowed to use different elements at once, to heal yourself from injuries and many more things. In order to use magic you needed to have mana, mana was the energy that allowed to use magic, the use of magic consumed mana meaning that doing too much magics could leave you without mana, on the contrary of demonic energy that can't run out. When someone was out of mana, they needed to wait an undefined amount of time to naturally restore it, once their mana was restored people were able to use their magics again."
While Hidit was sipping from her mug, Shiraki raised her hand and asked a question.
"Sensei I can't understand, you are talking about the world as if it was something completely different in the past, what happened in the past?"
Hidit refilled her mug and answered Shiraki's question.
"Well to properly answer that question I would need a couple of lessons to fully explain everything, also history is not my subject so you'll have to ask the details to your history teacher. I'll tell you what I can tell in class when we'll have lesson, and I'll tell you this before going back to the argument of golden ranked students."
Hidit took a sip from her mug and looked at her students.
"2000 years ago the world was on the verge of being erased from existence, not only the Demon World but the human world as well and The Heavens, everything was in the brink of being erased from existence. Luckily our worlds were saved from that fate, but the law of nature and many more things were changed in the process, the disappearance of mana and the discovering of demonic energy was one of them. Still today there are beings that use mana but they are beings that also adapted to the changes that occurred in the past, you'll never see a demon using magics nowadays."
Hidit overlaps her legs and took a sip from her mug, she licked the coffee off her lips and went back on the topic of the lesson.
"I know you guys have more questions than answers now, but let's go back to our main topic. The last golden student this school has seen was around 600 years ago, and I'm sure that those who live in the city knows his name in a way or another. Does the name Ky Akaname ring a bell for anyone?"
More than half of the students raised their hand in answer to Hidit's question.
"Let me explain for those who don't know him. Ky Akaname is the current head of the kitsune clan and leader of the region. Kitsunes, kamaitachi, tanuki and similar demons live in a region inside the capital. This region is ruled by the 4 big kitsune clans, each kitsune clan has a leader and the strongest one among those 4 is also recognized as the ruler of the entire region. Just like Shiraki, Ky was a golden student since his first year, he became the student's council president of his time and was the strongest student in the entire school till he graduated. After his graduation he began to climb the ranks of his clan, in 100 years he became the head of the Akaname clan, and after 50 more years he became the ruler of the entire region, to this day he is still the ruler of the region and his clan."
Listening to Hidit talking about Ky, Shiraki remembered what her grandpa told about her father the night he was kidnapped.
"Jīchan do you remember the name of this demon?"
"I don't know, I remember he was a tall man with red hair and yellow eyes, for his name... I think it was something like Koi... Ken... Kin perhaps? Something like that... but I remember his surname for sure since he loved to brag about it."
"What was his surname?"
"Akaname."
When the dots finally connected, Shiraki felt as if something snapped. Her red eye twitched as she clenched her hands into fists.
"(So it's him the scumbag that is supposed to be my father eh? Now that I know and what he is I can look for him and make him pay!)"
Shiraki was trying to not show her anger on her face, she could hide her face but not her body. Her tail was all rizzed up and her ears were in alert.
As Hidit kept talking and explaining more things about golden ranked students, she noticed how Shiraki's tail was all rizzed up. Finally having some information on her fafher, Shiraki was lost in thoughts of pure anger.
"Oi Shiraki, are you alright? You have been staring at the void for a while, do you need a little of fresh air?"
Hidit's question broke Shiraki's deep thinking, resulting in her getting kind of startled from her question. Shiraki was quick to regain her senses and answered to Hidit's question.
"Eh? N-No thanks... it's that his name was familiar, I think I heard it somewhere but I couldn't bring myself to remember where, my apologies for not paying attention to the lesson."
"Don't worry about it, it's understandable that you may not be able to keep up with the lesson, after all it's just your first day and you guys are receiving so much information in so little time, it's a lot to process. On the other hand you weren't the only one to zone out, so I think we shall call it a day, but before that let me tell how the first month of school will proceed. For this first week you guys will have only lesson with me just like today, a couple of hours in the morning and nothing else, from the second week you'll start to have a more detailed calendar of the lessons."
Hidit emptied her mug and resumed what she was saying.
"During the first 2 week of school we'll try to work on your demonic energy, not everyone will be able to awaken it in those 2 week but don't worry, it's normal. At the end of those 2 week we'll attend a lesson where we'll analyze and discover your element, some of you may already know what your element is but you don't know how strong it is. I'll teach you what demonic energy is and how to use it, but I'll also teach you how to use your element, and during those lessons I'll be with another teacher more expert than me. After 2 more weeks, during the last day we'll go to the contract room and perform the summoning rite for your familiar. Once you'll acquire your familiar you'll be a complete student, but let's leave things like this for now."
Hidit got off from her desk and moved her hands behind her back, while looking at her students with a warm smile on her face.
"The extra lesson ends here my dear children, you are free to go now, go explore the school and do whatever you want following the rules, I'll see you all tomorrow in class, bye bye~"
Charmed by her beam, the students almost reluctantly gave their goodbyes to their teacher, her smile was so warm they began to feel such warmth inside themselves. That beam was so full of love, only a mother could smile that way for her children. Filled with such love, the students couldn't help themselves but to smile back to Hidit, with one full of love, like that of a child for their mother's eyes alone. Hidit's beam was engraved in their memory, so vivid in their mind they couldn't stop smiling, even after leaving Hidit's office and the main building, such smile was too difficult to forget.
The students regrouped at the fountain in front of the main building's entrance, it wasn't even midday yet meaning they had almost the whole day to explore the school or other activities.
"What you guys doing? I want to visit the school's store."
"I want to see where is the school's library."
"I wanna see the other buildings."
The students were discussing what to explore around the school, the students divided in groups based on what they wanted to see.
"What do you want to see Shiraki?"
"I'll go back to my room or just look at the surrounding, there is time to explore the school so I'll join you another time."
"As you wish, see you then."
"See you tomorrow."
After parting ways with her classmates Shiraki headed to her dorm, observing her surroundings now that she had the occasion.
The school's garden seemed limitless, except for the buildings and sidewalks the rest of the school's spaces were made by fields of grass and trees, with a fountain in front of every building. Walking around the school was like taking a stroll in a giant park.
Finally arrived at her dorm, Shiraki sat on the fountain in front of her dorm, looking at the sky and her surrounding, when a tree in particular caught her attention.
Upon coming closer to it, it looked like a cherry blossom tree from the human world, the flowers as well looked like cherry blossom but instead of being pink they were green. While looking at that tree Shiraki's mind was flooded with memories of her childhood.
In an angle of the garden in her grandpa's house there was a cherry blossom tree, after training with her grandpa she used to rest under the shadow of that tree. Resting, sleeping, reading, she used to do all those things under the shadow of that tree, sometimes alone sometimes with her grandpa.
Flooded with those memories she wanted to rest under the shadow of that tree once more, on top of that the shadow of the tree was being projected on the grass field. Shiraki left her bag at the base of the tree and laid down on the grass, she put her hands behind her head and closed her eyes, in less than a minute she was already sleeping.
Shiraki was happily sleeping under the shadow of the tree, she was sleeping with a smile on her face without a care for the world, until something woke her up. In the middle of her sleep Shiraki instantly woke up when she felt a weight got dropped on her stomach, as if someone dropped a bag full of books on her stomach. Mad from the way she woke up, Shiraki looked at what was on her stomach, only to find a girl sitting on it.
The girl was wearing the school's uniform with a skirt, she had long silky hair that were as white as the snow, bright azure eyes with a pale and smooth skin.
"Are you Ryu-san?"
Her voice was soft, but that wasn't enough to wash away that angry expression from Shiraki's face.
"I don't know, it depends on who wishes to know it."
"The girl sitting on your stomach wishes to know it, why I feel like I'm sitting on a rock..."
The girl said the other half of the sentence with a lower tone looking at Shiraki's stomach, she rubbed herself against Shiraki trying to find some comfort but she was unable to find any.
Shiraki was puzzled by the girl, since her name got called in the making of the first class she had no knowledge about the students of the other classes, she also never saw her before even in her dorm.
"You know, it's kind of rude to sit on someone's stomach while they are sleeping, to not talk about you asking questions out of the blue and rubbing yourself against someone you don't know with your butt, the least you could do is introducing yourself."
The girl looked at Shiraki in the eyes and placed her right hand on her chest.
"You are right, it was rude of me to not introduce myself, so allow me. My name is Yuki Shirayuki, current heir of the Shirayuki clan rulers of the Snow Peaks, second ranked first year student. It's your turn now."
"Shiraki Ryu, half-demon from the human world and first ranked first year student."
Upon hearing the word half-demon Yuki's expression turned into a mix of anger and disgust, the tone of her voice changed as she clutched her hands into fists and looked at Shiraki dead in the eyes.
"So it is you... you saved me the time of looking for you, I wanted to see what kind of high-ranking demon dethroned me from the leaderboard, but turns out it's just some kind of half-kitsune trash from the human world, a mere half-blood from nowhere. I can't understand how a stray half-blood like you turned out to be a golden student, this is a humiliation that I can't overlook."
Shiraki's rage was reaching her boiling point, she was itching to reach her katana and slash Yuki on the spot. Being insulted in that way with that expression without a reason from a stranger was something she never expected. Shiraki was a person with a cool head most of the times but rage was consuming her, her angry expression from before turned into a death stare toward Yuki.
"You have a really big mouth you know that? But can you back up what you say with your actions?"
Shiraki was starting to get up by leaning on her elbows, but she stopped when Yuki touched the tip of her nose with her right hand.
"That's the reason why I am here. Fight me Ryu-san, I won't bear such humiliation in silence, if the leaderboard says that you are the strongest among us first years then prove it, I'll prove in front of the entire school that a mere half-demon can't really be a golden coloured student."
Yuki stood up and stepped aside, she looked at Shiraki up and down with that expression of rage and disgust only to look at Shiraki in the eyes once more.
"I'll go ahead and book the arena for our duel, don't you dare to be late."
With her last piece said, Yuki left towards the Coliseum without looking back or adding another word, while walking she began to massage her butt and her back with both hands, as if she has been sitting for hours.
"What is wrong with her stomach? It was so hard that I feel like I sat there for hours... my back and butt are all sore now..."
Shiraki got up and watched Yuki's figure slowly disappear, she was grinding her teeth from the anger and reached out for her katana, but instead of letting rage consume her even further she closed her eyes and took a deep breath. Shiraki sat on the grass and took another deep breath, she assumed a meditation pose and began to meditate to calm herself.
Shiraki spent around 5 minutes meditating in pure silence, when she was done she got up and cleaned herself while taking another deep breath.
Shiraki took her bag from the base of the tree and began to walk toward the Coliseum while cracking her neck and knuckles. Now that her mind was calm she thought about what happened with Yuki, she couldn't help but laugh at what happened.
"Ah... so much happened in so little time, I was wondering when I could test the katana Jīchan made for me but I never thought I would test it so soon. That brat liked to run her mouth a lot and I'll give her what she's asking for, it's always nice to give a bully what they deserve~"
With a smile on her face Shiraki was going to the Coliseum for her duel with Yuki while resting her left arm on her katana, words of the duel quickly spread across the school with students rushing toward the Coliseum.
The first day of wasn't over yet so much happened already, so many unexpected events kept happening one after another in so little time, it was time for Shiraki to face her first challenge in the Demon World.
END CHAPTER 5