The inside of the giant acceptance hall was also breathtaking. Its ceilings were higher than any that I had seen before. Giant windows bigger than any person let light flood into the huge open floor. The floor was made of dark marble and had a golden sun carved into it. There were several high wooden podiums with a formal-looking man or women in dark clothing on top of them. Several families were standing in front of their podiums with their kids. Everyone looked so….rich.

The grown men wore high-quality leather vests that were colored differently based on the person. Silk sleeves ordained their arms and formal pants made of the finest fabric covered their legs. The men all looked fit and muscular and the women all looked very beautiful. Were they muscular? I don’t know, they’re all muscular compared to me…

The adult women wore dresses that were beautifully colored and ordained with gold filigree. The children dressed like their parents, and I got the impression that–much like me–these kids were waiting to get their plans for their school year. But apparently, this was a very important occasion and I hadn’t dressed the part. There were food concessions with fruit and drinks, and it looked like the people got to have a small party after they got their schedules.

In my town school was a random affair. Sometimes we would work in the fields, herd the animals, chop our firewood, and then on some odd occasion read a children’s book and practice simple math by counting and adding rocks. It was a completely home-taught system that had no order.

I went up to the podium and got my schedule. I got some very odd looks from people—since I was so informally dressed. But the lady seemed to know who I was, and gave me my information without asking much at all.

My system of school and this new one couldn’t have been more different. Firstly, I had classes almost everyday and at a set time every day too. It was also weird since my class times were always the same, but I had different classes on some days than others. It was even more confusing when I learned that I would have to move from building to building for different classes. What’s a protractor and why do I need it for some class called, geo…meteor? Geo…geo—met—tree?

How did anyone expect anybody to do this? I practically melted into a bench outside of the acceptance hall—near the front entrance. I had very unexpectedly gotten to my goal of getting into an academy. It worked out due to some massive accident or some cosmic luck. It’s about time I had some luck.

What was my situation all about? How did I get this special blueprint? Did I have it before? How do I tell people that I’ve never had liquor? Am I compatible with liquor if I have a blueprint? What am I?

Even though I was where I wanted to be—I still felt so…lost.

I looked up and saw a girl, my age, pass by me with her friends.

She had slightly curly hair that came down to her waist. It was mostly auburn-colored, but it had some streaks of gold in it as well. She had tan, olive colored skin, and her large, observant eyes seemed to constantly scan her surroundings. She was much taller than I was, and she was slender—with a good amount of lean muscle. She wore an electric blue shirt and nice comfortable running pants—as well as black shoes which also looked specialized for running and sprinting.

As I looked at her in her entirety I felt my face go a little red. My heart began to beat a little faster and I stood up—a little faster and more aggressive than I wanted it to.

I don’t know what it was. I felt….flustered? I panicked and couldn’t think? I never felt this way when looking at anybody. I’ve felt afraid but this was different—I felt like my imperfections, my words, my hair, my face were all being shown in the worst light possible. I felt like I was embarrassed to even be….me. I felt so…..clunky?

I didn’t know how to feel and along with this my entire life had just been turned upside down. I had it much worse than all these kids, I had so much more to think about than them and yet I didn’t want this girl to leave…I wanted her to stay.

She walked away from me and I just sat on the bench—too scared to have even made a single move. I put my head in my hands and sighed a little bit. I guess it’s the first day but am I that pathetic that one random girl gets me going like this?

So this is how it’s gonna be…..

I heard a large bell crash and several people turned their heads. I looked towards a large festival with several stalls selling food and offering games with prizes. While the adults stayed in the hall to have a more formal gathering I saw the students—new and already enrolled—go down to the festival to celebrate.

I guess everyone else had a pretty tough time getting into this school. It makes sense why they would celebrate like this.

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I remembered the words that Officer Yen had told me. “Make some friends”, echoed in the back of my head. I groaned and stood up to go to the festival. Making friends is hard. I really hope school isn’t harder than this.

The first thing that I noticed when I arrived at the festival was that everything was really, really, bright. People that had dressed formally pretty much all got back into their casual attire for the festival. Kids yelled and ran around like mad men while others went and bought strange snacks and played small games at different stalls. It had grown slightly darker and so there were lamps covered in a thin bubble of red and yellow paper that gave the light a colored glow. I looked around as the mass of students seemed to be congregating into small groups. Oh, everyone is with their friends.

I assumed that a lot of these kids were friends since childhood—since gifted children in our empire usually moved up school rankings together. Gifted children were friends with other gifted children from the start and so even in a new year everyone had friends except me.

As I walked around a corner a really tall kid appeared in front of my eyes. He was balancing an apple on his forehead and seemed to be carrying some type of paper bag—which had fireworks poking out of the top of it. For a split second I got the same feeling...The same feeling I got when I stared at Noble Wyren. The feeling of absolute power towered over me as I instinctively tensed my entire body.

The boy then turned to look at me and gave me a smile, “What’s up man? You look weird, are you hungry? Here, have this apple, I stole it from the horse stables.” I felt comforted by those words. He had gray hair that came down his forehead slightly and flattened out at the back of his head. He looked like a trouble maker and had a strong, lean, muscular frame.

He tossed me the apple and looked at me with a friendly smile, “My name’s Geon, I’m from house, um, nevermind. Sorry, family issues. What’s your name?”, he said the last part in a voice that clearly wanted me to ignore his little pause. I chose to respect his privacy.

“Yes, my name is Evay, uh…nice to meet you”, he and I shook hands and started walking around the festival.

“Yeah, nice to meet you too”, he was being quite secretive but I thought that it would be weird if he revealed everything to a stranger so I let it be. He started to talk a little bit more when we came upon a large crowd in the square of the festival. I wondered why me and him got along so easily. I guess we just mesh? It feels a lot easier to be around him than the others. The area was brightly lit and extremely packed as people gathered here to say high to their friends.

“I wanted to come to Eden Academy since it’s the best of the best. I mean I don’t really know what I want to do, but I know I want to do something. I hope I can have a little fun—I don’t just want to work my tail off”, he started to fumble around with a green ball he had gotten from his pocket. “So what’s your story—if you want to share it”, he was focused on tossing and catching his ball but I could tell he was listening.

“Well I don’t really have much”, I kept my voice as even and truthful as possible. “Apparently I’m a special case and I need to learn how to tap into my potential in order to become a warrior.”

“Huh well I guess good luck to you. I feel like you have great ambition and will-power, and that will probably carry you far”, he looked at me and handed me a piece of ripped paper. “Here’s my room number on campus, let’s go party sometime”, he waved at me and started to walk away. I saw him round a corner and ran towards what I assumed was his dorm room. So…..did I make a friend? I gave him a wave and started to walk back. Looks like school won’t be too bad—

There was an ear splitting explosion that hurled an entire stall at my face. Before I could even react I felt a hand push me out of the way and blow past me in a flash. Geon flew into the sky and surveyed the surroundings.

Children were screaming and buildings were on fire but two people stood in the center of it all. Encased in a ring of flame, two older students faced off and dueled each other. “My house name will not be tarnished by some snail like you”, the student carried a gigantic steel black sword that had a huge blade and handle—which was shaped like a box cutter. He had a black vest and a brutish build—along with a military style haircut.

While his opponent had a small necklace with a turquoise gem on it that glowed almost every second. “You're quite stuck up aren’t you,” the boy with the necklace stared at his opponent with his crystal gray eyes—his voice calm and deadly. He had fluffy red hair and wore a white jacket that had a chain flowing out of his pockets. “You need to know your place if you want to work your way up, or did your peasant family not get that across to you,” the other boy's face contorted into rage and he prepared to attack.

Geon picked me up and we began to run towards safety. They're first years and we’ll have to compete with them? I looked back when the boy suddenly threw his sword at his opponent as the giant weapon twirled in the air. His opponent easily dodged the weapon which crashed into the ground and split it open—creating cracks in the dirt pathway. Black fire started to ooze out of the crevices and there was debris falling off of buildings in every direction.

I looked behind me and my eyes were as wide as saucers. The boy without the weapon had already closed in and held his opponent by the neck—high off the ground. I had no time to look at that now. I had to run—I had to get out.

Suddenly a wooden beam fell off of a nearby building and crashed into the ground before my feet. I stumbled back and couldn’t catch myself as I fell on my back and hit my head on the tough ground.

I saw the world flash before my eyes in a blur—there were several Geons looking at me as I couldn’t tell the difference between the real one and the hallucinated Geon.

Another piece of roof tile fell between me and Geon as the two students behind us continued to put up a fight.

“Hey, Evay! Can you hear me? Come on, let's go,” the voices were getting quieter and quieter as I began to lose consciousness,

“Haha, Geon, there’s four of you.” Geon laughed,

“You’re absolutely gone, aren’t you. But seriously, you should get out of here. I’ll deal with them after.”

How did I manage to die before my first day here?

Then I felt a hand on my shoulder. There was a pleasant smell that radiated the air as I felt the perfumes of rosemary and flowers hit my senses. I felt myself being dragged and tossed over the pile of debris, and then I was being carried by Geon as we ran back to the acceptance hall and towards a neighborhood of buildings—which all looked identical. Some lamps were lit as we walked into the homey town and we finally began to slow down.

The adrenaline slowly began to leave my body and I began to drift off into unconsciousness. I felt Geon and one other person walk through the door, and I felt myself being lowered onto an extremely soft surface. Is this like that bed I had in my very temporary house?

I slowly succumbed to darkness as my mind began to dull, and my will to stay awake slowly drifted away as I fell into a deep slumber.