02 WHAT THE HELL?

Orea and Alicia were currently walking towards the school cafeteria where they hoped to get something good considering the fact that it had been quite a while since they went on holiday, and also for the fact that the academy seemed to have made some improvements to the infrastructure, so hopefully the same logic would apply to the café and the food offered.

They were brutally proved wrong as the food was not only the same but the disher was still the same irritable old woman who seemed to have been created without an ounce of patience in her.

“Move it, you worthless creeps!” She kept howling whenever the line appeared to be moving too slow for her liking. Soon enough the both of them were at their table, while Alicia seemed to be enjoying her meal, Orea was thoroughly dissatisfied and could only toy with the food while she looked on.

“Could today get any worse...,” she mumbled when she noticed three boys enter the cafe and head towards their table. They were familiar faces though.

“Hey Rea!!!!.. when did you get back??” Said The tallest one among them. He was Kurt Dimeo, the son of the CEO of Dimeo estates. As a result of his family background and influence he was seen as some dummy who knew nothing and got into the academy by paying his way in and riding on his father's coattails rather than his competence.

Well, they were wrong because Kurt was really worth his salt.

“Few hours ago...you?” Orea asked in reply.

“Just now...,” Leon popped in. “Well all just got in just now”

“I see,” Alicia mumbled while focusing her gaze, as if searching for something among them.

“I mean we’re one year closer to being heroes so...it’s natural to want to be eager to restart school.” Jrad popped in.

Jrad and Leon were both from middle class families like Orea was and weren’t that well to do or popular either. While Kurt could be really cocky at times especially when they’re junior year girls around, Alice was like some wild beast that just escaped captivity.

The Alinari mansion could be said not to be far off, as Alice being the only child of the Alinari family, it’s walls were so high that they were almost touching the clouds. As such Alicia hardly ever got out of the house and spent the majority of her life reading books and learning spells. Although she wanted to become a sorcerer like Zakkus, it was still overwhelming most times.

“Guess so...,” Orea said as she looked keenly at the three boys who had taken their seats already.

“About that...,” Orea pondered before seemingly making up her mind to say whatever she wanted to say.

“You’d never believe what I found,”

“True love?” Kurt guessed.

“What...,” She stammered before conjuring a tongue of flame on her palm.

“I’ll burn the next person who says that,” she said with a serious face making the other people seated with her to shudder in fear.

“Eish...sorry Rea, just said something funny, that’s all. You don’t have to be a dick about it,” Kurt said with a frown while looking at the others as if to get their support, unfortunately for him none of the rest wanted to get roasted.

“Well...I’ve heard that once already today and it is not funny,” Orea replied her countenance getting stricter.

“OK,Ok, chill,” Kurt said resignedly.

“Better, this... is what I found,” she said dramatically as she brought out the two daggers from her backpack which she had dropped on the ground beside her.

“What the hell are those?” Leon asked looking thoroughly puzzled.

“No way you guys don’t know what that is...,” Alicia said looking bewildered at their ignorance. She wondered how they could spend three long years at Cyara’s incredibly boring hero academy and not know what Orea was holding up to them.

“I have no idea whatsoever,” Jrad said when he noticed Alicia’s searching eyes looking in his direction.

“Could you at least tell us what it is,” Kurt protested, looking like a baby that had its candy taken from it. He was obviously bothered by the fact that he couldn’t identify the weapon in Orea’s possession.

“Those are retrieved daggers from a two fanged werewolf,”

“Wait what?” Leon paused in disbelief.

“Did you...how did you...” Jrad stammered

“I didn’t go into the Portal, Zakkus gifted me the both of them after I tried to kill the werewolf,” Orea replied a look of satisfaction on her face. If anything she was happy to become the first person in their little circle to have come face to face with a monster.

“Did you fight it?” Kurt asked rather unhappily.

“Yes I did, without fire though,” Orea replied, her grin getting wider.

“No way!” Leon couldn’t believe his ears. He was dumbfounded as to how Orea had the guts to face a monster without using her powers. If it were to be him, he would’ve bolted right through the window before anyone even noticed he was a student from the most prestigious academy in Cyara.

Alicia however was eager to end the discussion as she was somehow jealous that she wasn’t the one who got to meet Zakkus face to face. She would have tugged his shirt and followed him wherever he went.

Stolen novel; please report.

“Guys I’ve got to go, we’ve got classes tomorrow,” She reminded them before leaving the table.

“Yeah, I better get going,” Kurt added and got up too.

Orea put her daggers back into her bag and got up while running after Alicia and asking her to wait up. Leon and Jrad had some research to do at the library so they got up too and left. The next day was the beginning of classes and Orea didn’t want to be left behind.

♣️♠️♣️

Orea woke up the next morning feeling light headed, her vision was foggy and everything was a blur. After staring at nothing for ten minutes she got out of her bedclothes and walked into her bathroom.

Her hair was a mess and she looked like she had just walked through a tornado.

“Mondays are hell,” she grumbled as she shoved her toothbrush into her mouth. After a quick shower she jumped into some clothes and walked out the bedroom.

The ache in her head wouldn’t go away and she felt like going back to her room to take a little nap as she was going to class twenty minutes early. Orea reasoned that to be a rather bad idea and trudged on to her class. It was too early to tell but she was beginning to have the feeling that this would be a bad day.

She got to the entrance of the class to meet a stern looking Alanic at the door.

Alanic Zosk was the class captain of the C-class, although he wasn’t the strongest, he was somehow chosen by the class director to be the supposed leader of the class.

“You’re late,” The boy said and adjusted his glasses, then started scribbling something on the note pad he was holding. Orea felt like protesting that she was actually ten minutes late and that he was just being a total jerk for knowing that and still writing down whatever he wrote down, but that would just give the boy another thing to scribble about.

She walked past him and entered the class.

It wasn’t very different from the previous year as there were familiar faces all around, except for one particular girl who was seated at the far end of the class. She seemed...strange.

However Orea blasted the thought out of her mind and went to sit beside her. The girl was immediately put on guard and gave Orea a thorough look like she was searching for something within her, after some seconds she seemed to relax.

“Hey, I’m Orea, Orea Noveda,” Orea said, smiling and extended her hand for a handshake. She wasn’t one to make friends but there was something about this girl that seemed to draw her close.

After some moments of silence the other girl took her hand.

“I’m Touka, Touka Arajin,” she said.

A weird silence took over as Orea wasn’t sure what to do next.

“I’m kinda new here, so I was wondering if we could be friends,” She said.

“Are you sure, 'cause you kinda looked like you were going to swallow me whole minutes ago,” Orea replied half jokingly.

“Oh that, I was just checking you, I’m sorry if you felt scared.” Touka replied with a smile.

“Checking?? What do you mean?”

“Oh, I’m sorry, I’m a mind mage.”

Orea immediately withdrew in fear and cast a suspicious look on the blue eyed girl in front of her, however the girl seemed to understand her fear and immediately calmed her down.

“I know what you’re thinking, I’m not like that, I assure you you’re thoughts are safe,”

“You just said you knew what I was thinking,” Orea said still maintaining the suspicious look.

“No,” Touka said and facepalmed. “ that’s not what I meant. I’ve sworn an oath not to read anyone’s thoughts without their permission, so you’re safe to think what you like,”

“Creepy,” was all Orea could say.

“What then did you mean by ‘checking’ me,” Orea asked laying a little emphasis on the word the checking. What the hell was she checking if not her thoughts.

“I was checking if you had any hostile potential towards me,”

“You know, I’m not even gonna ask how that works,” Orea said and looked forward. The other girl was about to explain what she meant when Suiryu entered the class.

He was the director of the C-class.

Suiryu Shindo was the director of the C- class of the academy, he was a very experienced mage and was also strict as and had this potential to annoy students with his somewhat repetitive form of teaching.

He made Orea burn a perfect circle through a piece of cardboard paper throughout the previous year. He made Alicia conjure flames with definite shapes, and once he asked her to shroud a dummy in flames without burning it. This would have been easy for Orea since she could create the flames with her hand, but for Alicia it was hell, since unlike Orea she was doing this with her mind.

For the different powers other students possessed he took his time to make life as miserable for them as possible.

“Good morning class, this is a new year, hence we learn new things. Being a hero is job that requires utmost concentration and discipline. You have millions of lives in your possession when tackling monsters and the lot.... for this reason it is important...,”he trailed off with one of his usual speeches.

Orea’s headache was getting worse, she looked around the class for the others but she couldn’t find anybody. Alicia was a late comer but she had never been this late before. Kurt on the other hand was very punctual, Leon attended classes at random times and Jrad was usually the earliest bird but she wasn’t seeing any of them....strange.

“Your mind is in turmoil,” Touka’s voice came from behind.

Orea turned around to look at her, her eyes blank and...confused. She was skeptical about asking this new girl for help but then she wasn’t sure if her friends were in true danger...because it was too early to conclude? All four of them were absent...at the same time...it wasn’t normal.

“Something’s definitely wrong,” Orea said absent mindedly.

“What?”

“I don’t know..,”

“What?” Touka asked with a puzzled expression on her face.

“My friends... all four of them...they’re re not here,” Orea replied. Toucka whispered something back to her...whatever it was, it got Orea furiously whispering back, amidst gesticulating wildly, which caught the attention of Mr. Shindo.

“Miss Hartman! Miss Arajin!” He half screamed.

Both jolted in shock.

“What might you be arguing about that you would like to share with the class?” The man asked, trying as much as possible to look stern.

The two girls could only stare back at him, the reason for their disturbance unwilling to proceed from thier mouths.

“You might want to discuss it outside,” He said while making the sort of gesture chaffeurs made when ushering thier masters into a room.

Orea bolted out of the classroom as fast as lightning. Toucka was feeling disputed but followed her nonetheless. Getting out of the class, she had to use Orea’s mental signature to track her because the other girl seemed to have disappeared.

Orea was weaving past buildings and people with such inhuman speed, having to levitate at some point because of the large amounts of people at the bridge. She increased her speed more as she neared the dorms.

Dashing through the hallways, she half crashed into Alicia’s room.

What she met sent a jolt through her body. Speechless was an understatement for Orea stood rooted to the spot, her eyes unbelieving, her feet unmoving, and her heart unwilling.

“No...,” she gasped as if her lungs had failed her. Toucka came running into the room but stopped abruptly at the sight.

Alicia was laying in the middle of the room, drenched in her own blood. A thick black sort of blade without a handle was sticking out of her chest, and another right through the side of her neck, protruding from the other side of her head. Her eyes were still open staring directly at the ceiling. They were lifeless and her face held no expression.

“No...” Orea whispered again as she moved to lift her off the ground into her arms.

“No...” Toucka mouthed. “You don’t know what killed her,”

Orea’s head snapped in her direction, her eyes cold and bloodshot.

“Whatever or whoever killed her is still at large, and it seems to be heading towards the male dorm,” Toucka said with closed eyes, opening them only after a while. It was then Orea’s eyes widened in realization.

“No...,” she squealed and bolted out of the room