Azura couldn’t help but be grateful that Reign was at least quiet while sleeping. He found himself a little envious of Lily, since her familiar could come and go whenever she wanted. Still Reign was still young, and he had hope that the dragon may mature out of his current attitude. Despite the friction between him and his familiar, he couldn’t help but be a little giddy. Tomorrow was the welcoming ceremony. He and Katy had finally done it. They had finished all the trials.
It was everything he had been working towards for so long. The giddy feeling faded slightly as his recent perspective change clashed with his original goals. He shook his head. The recovered memories didn’t change anything. It may be his fault they had died, but his father was the reason they hadn’t been able to understand each other. He wouldn’t shirk his part, but he wouldn’t take any undue blame either.
He sighed. Never before had such a major victory felt so hollow. He had done what he had set out to do, but did it even matter. Escaping his father wouldn’t save him from the hate he was drowning in. Not really. He resolved to set his bitter feelings aside. He had made mistakes in the past, but that didn’t make him a monster. He still had the right to follow the path he had started.
He supposed in the end it didn’t really matter. He didn’t exactly have much of a choice. He was set on the path, and it was too late to stop now. He hardened his resolve, but he knew sleep wasn’t going to come easy tonight. He eventually decided if he wasn’t going to sleep anyway he might as well be productive. He quietly left the room. He debated on what kind of training to do, before making 2 copies. One was sent to the library as normal. Now that he was an official student he no longer had a time restriction to worry about. The other was sent to the forge, while the copy wouldn’t be able to withstand more of the magically taxing stuff, it would still be able to make some basic stuff with the less valuable materials he had acquired.
His real body would have the least fun job… physical training. Well his body wouldn’t stay in shape on its own. Well technically it would with a little magic, but higher baseline meant better results. So he decided to start with a jog around the school grounds, since he wouldn’t be allowed to exit them this late at night. At least the quiet night would help him clear his mind.
***
Azura regretted his decision to replace sleep with intense physical training. Even after cleaning himself off with the soothing hot water, his muscles burned terribly. Worse, all the students who had been accepted had been called into the auditorium, and he desperately needed some sleep. The others were chatting amicably, but luckily all seemed to be tuned in enough to realize he wasn’t in the mood for conversation at the moment.
“Welcome officially to the Grand Forge Academy, where you will all be spending the next 4 years, assuming you don’t die or drop out at least. You all represent the worst of the best. You have come this far with talent and hard work, but here you will discover what it is that truly turns a good mage into a great mage. Here you will be given direction, and guided down the path that best suits your own unique abilities.” The headmistress once again greeted them from the stage.
He was a little curious about that. There couldn’t be as many teachers as there were students, so the classes couldn’t be entirely unique to each person, but he wondered what kind of classes would be available. He doubted there would be any in enchanting, but there would probably be one for spirit magic.
“As official students of the academy, all of you will be visited today, to talk about your classes, and given official markings signifying you as a student of this academy. You will be given 1 week to fully adjust to the environment and memorize the layout of the academy proper, and then classes will begin in earnest.”
Hopefully whoever came to check on him knocked loudly, because he was passing out the second he got to his bed. Once he found his new room that was. They had each been given a card with their new dorm number upon entry. Roran, him, Luna, and Cynthia were pretty close together, but the rest were pretty scattered.
“I am sure each of you are eager to return to celebrations, so I’ll leave it here for now. I look forward to witnessing how all of you grow into fine mages.” With that the headmistress turned and walked away from the stage. He would be lying if he said he wasn’t excited to find out what kind of classes would be available to him, but unfortunately some actual sleep was going to have to come first.
He yawned, and turned towards his friends. “I had trouble sleeping last night, so I’m going to head straight to bed, but don’t let me hold you guys from any celebrations you might want to have for being admitted.” He yawned again, and turned to walk away.
“We have a whole week before classes start dummy, we can just celebrate tomorrow.” He rolled his eyes, but a small smile came to his lips despite his best efforts. His friends were definitely more than he deserved, but that was fine. He was grateful for their support, and he knew they wouldn’t blame him if he told them what happened, but he knew it was his fault. Regardless of what anyone else would say, he could have done better, if he had just been a better brother, maybe it never would have happened.
“Suit yourselves, but don’t waste today on my account. At least do something fun.” He says as he walks away, stifling another yawn. He was definitely ready to get some sleep.
***
“I wonder what happened in the selection ground that has him so riled up.” Lily was the first to speak after Azura left earshot. Not that losing sleep for some reason or other seemed to be out of character for him, but he had seemed to be the type that would be more excited about being admitted into the academy. Heck Katy was so giddy she almost hadn’t noticed how weird Azura was acting.
“I’m not sure, but knowing him, asking about it is just going to make him try harder to hide the fact something is bothering him.” almost. She idly wondered what kind of history they had that made them so in tune. Katy had said that Azura was something of a brother, a father, and a friend all rolled into 1. What exactly that meant she had no idea, but she imagined their history was anything but simple.
“So what? We just leave it be? That doesn’t seem very helpful.” She wasn’t used to having actual friends. Everyone from her country of origin would sell her out to the guards if even a hint of her magic seeped out. Spell casting was called witchcraft over there, and typically led to very gruesome public executions, but here it was actually glorified. Becoming a mage was an impressive feat, and actually getting formal training was enough to open a whole lot of doors.
“Of course not. We give our support, believe me just having us here will be good for him. He’s not very good at asking for help yet, well at least not for important things. His father always said that nobles couldn’t trust anyone to help them. Of course servants aren’t people, and telling them to do something doesn’t count.” She didn’t blame Katy for her bitterness. No society was perfect, and just because there aren’t witch hunts doesn’t mean that everything is great.
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She noticed Luna put her hand on Katy’s shoulder in support. “Well that explains a lot actually. He’s doing a pretty good job of acting like he wasn’t raised by someone like that.” That definitely explained his secretive nature. She probably went too far the other way. Since she had to hide every second of every day back in her hometown Springriver, being here where her magic was actually something to be proud of lifted a huge weight off her shoulders, and as such she was probably a bit more free with information than was probably advisable. Still she could definitely empathize with his need to hide things from those around him.
“On the surface maybe. He doesn’t like to admit it, but there are still a lot of things he takes for granted, He could probably survive on his own more or less, but he can’t cook, he doesn’t really know how to clean, and basically relies on magic to do a lot of things most people can do on their own. Granted he knows enough about magic to accomplish most things, but he once took 4 days figuring out how to make an enchantment to clean his clothes, because he didn’t know how to do laundry, and I bet him if the maids didn’t clean his clothes for him he’d accept them being dirty.” She laughed. She wondered if it was hard for Katy to accept that her best friend kept so many secrets from her.
Still it was kind of hard to picture Azura being so bad at such simple things, but at the same time she couldn’t remember him making anything while they journeyed to Fire Ward. Granted, he had handled a big chunk of the base set up, but that was pretty much entirely magical. “As great as it is to learn more about everyone's past, I feel a little uncomfortable talking about this kind of thing without him here.” She rolled her eyes. Seeing Luna fight and train, you’d never guess the kind of person she was normally. If she had been asked before meeting Luna if there was such thing as a pure hearted person she’d have definitely said no, but if anyone was it would be Luna.
“That’s fair, Azura would probably throw a fit if he found out I was telling you guys any of this. He works really hard to give off a certain image. It’s not necessarily untrue to his nature, but it definitely leaves things out.” And Katy wondered why Azura kept secrets from her. She doubted it really even occurred to Katy that she was telling them something that Azura may have a reason for not wanting them to know.
***
Azura awoke at the feeling of another presence in his new dorm room. He startled awake, as it occurred to him he hadn’t set up his normal defensive enchantments before going to bed, and Reign was currently with all the other intelligent familiars that would grow beyond a certain size getting the rules explained to him. He quickly prepared in case it turned into a fight, but relaxed some at the familiar face.
Coal let out a loud laugh at the most likely ridiculous sight of him jumping out of bed in his simple gray night clothes as if expecting an attacker. “Pretty good instincts kid, but maybe don’t immediately jump out, if I was actually here to hurt you feigning sleep until I’m real close would be your best option.”
“Unless you chose to hit me from over there with a ranged spell.” Either way, it was already a failure on his part the second he forgot to set up the proper defensive spells. Coal seemed to be thinking about his rebuttal, but he had more important questions to ask at the moment so he spoke again before Coal could respond. “Still that’s not really important right now, I’m assuming you’re here to run me through the different courses I have to choose from?”
Coal chuckled. “The headmistress did say you could be quite impatient. Yes that’s right, I’m here to talk about the classes with you. Of course I’m usually sent to the people that need the least help. Since my answer to everything tends to be if you can’t beat it down, then you’re not hitting it hard enough.” The giant of a man laughed again.
He sighed. It was probably true that he didn’t need a lot of help, but he’d still have liked to be able to pick the brain of an expert for their opinions. “I know what you're thinking. You have a good poker face, but everyone I’ve been sent to so far has always had the same thought. “Can this guy really help me any?” Well I’ll have you know they don’t let just anyone teach here. I’m not great at figuring out the best path for people to take, but if you have any questions I should be able to answer them.”
He didn’t visibly react, but he did give the man an apology in his head. He’d take that as a go ahead to ask his questions. “What kind of classes are available, and what kind of schedule will we be expected to adhere to?” Someone looking at him probably wouldn’t be able to tell, but he was struggling to maintain his composure through the excitement. Even his recent gloom couldn’t put a shadow over his love for learning everything he could about magic.
“Well this isn’t a traditional school really. Courses are from 8 in the morning to 8 at night, but they are repeated 6 times in that time frame. Each course is 2 hours, and 10 different courses are run each day. Sometimes events will be run instead, or the typical classes may change. There are hundreds of different courses, and which 10 are set each day varies. I imagine your little cloning trick is going to make a lot of people jealous with this system.”
The big man definitely wasn’t wrong. This was literally about as good as a system could be for him. It was probably designed that way to make people make difficult decisions, and rely on other people for notes on classes they may miss, but he wouldn’t have any trouble attending everything if he wanted. Which was good, because he hadn’t missed the fact that there were no scheduled breaks, and the classes were all back to back. As in unless you leave one early you will be late to the next.
“As I’m sure you guessed, the system is all about time management and prioritization. Along with of course encouraging students to work together and share what they’ve learned in their off time. The courses available for each day will be boosted for the week on Sundays, which will be the only day no courses are held. That isn’t to say it’s an off day though, typically events and or games will be held on Sunday’s. Which I highly recommend attending.”
“Yeah, I think I get the gist. So I’m guessing not even the teachers know what courses are going to be held until Sunday is that right.” The smirk he received for his comment told him he hit the nail on the head. He sighed, so much for trying to prepare ahead of time. Looks like sound judgment under a time constraint was also a part of the teaching here. “Is there anything else I should know, or do I just get my apprentice mark?”
Coal chuckled. “Well, aren't you eager? I don’t have anything you haven’t already figured out I’d bet, so if you're ready for your mark, then sit down and be still.” He did as instructed sitting on his bed. Coal pulled out a device he hadn’t seen before. It was an odd metal cylinder, with a flat circular piece on one side, and a funnel looking thing on the other.
He felt the cold metal of the flat piece rest against his cheek, as coal began funneling magic into the other side. Azura couldn’t feel whatever was happening in the device, but he knew the second the mana started pouring into the part against his cheek that the device had completely adapted Coal's mana into a new form. He had never felt anything to compare it to, it wasn’t hot or cold, it wasn’t any nature, but it wasn’t normal mana either. It left odd tingles against his skin as he felt the mana take the shape of some arcane symbols he recognized.
“The basic set? Haven’t seen these in a while.” The basic set was essentially enchantment for beginners. They were the only symbols in the spirit world that never changed. Supposedly a powerful spirit long ago carved the symbols of that moment of time into the very fabric of the spirit world causing them to forever hold value. However their unchanging nature makes them much less useful than an actual connection to the spirit language.
“No idea what you're talking about I’m afraid. I know how to use this thingamajig, but don’t expect me to know anything about it.” Fair enough, but that sure brought him back to when he first started learning the art of enchantment. He knew what the symbols meant, but the unnatural mana still left him on edge. It wasn’t long before the mark was completed and the object was moved away from his face. The symbols shimmered briefly with a gold color before fading away into seeming nonexistence.
“Alright, you are all set.” He felt something shift around him as his room shifted to around until it suddenly no longer was exactly the same as his last one. Now his room was a deep blue, the bed having white blankets, and arcane symbols moving across the walls shaped as various animals, with the most common one being a wolf. He stared around in wonder. “Welcome to your first glimpse of the Grand Forge academy!”