“Ryan Payne was the only applicant to return from the Tower with one of every crystal within the radius he set for himself—three miles, three floors. He did this to support an argument that he could offer our school ‘anything.’”

Mrs. Denner’s voice echoed throughout the gymnasium. More people fit inside than they had during the exam. Tight rows of seats filled the space instead of single desks spaced far apart. Every single one of them was taken and yet, people stood in the back or against the walls.

“This argument was one many of you attempted to make in various forms, and many of you succeeded to varying degrees—I commend you for that. But this young man returned with one of every crystal.”

She brought something out of her coat pocket and held it up between two fingers. A perfect, blue sphere.

“Even a Candletail crystal, or as they are more commonly known, a mana crystal. His achievement in its entirety is what earned him third place during the exam. However, when he returned to his judges, he was not only reluctant to hand it in, he even tried to hide the fact that he had found it in the first place.”

Micah’s eyes were glued to the stage. This was the first he was hearing of this. Ryan had refused to tell him what Ms. Denner wanted to talk about, and talk to them about, until the end. Others in the crowd were equally drawn to the stage.

She turned to him.

Ryan looked like the model student in the school uniform. He wore it as the perfect representation of Beth’s demands. White shirt. Red tie. A red blazer. He’d chosen the tan pants instead of the dark ones. It fit with his hair. The school emblem was sewn on its chest, the edges of sleeves and elbows accented with different colors.

It looked classy.

Even from his seat six rows back, Micah could see he was a little nervous. Understandable, considering he stood on stage in front of two-thousand who were equally dressed for the occasion and watching his every movement.

“Why was that, Ryan?” Ms. Denner asked him. “Answer us truthfully.”

His gulp was visible, as was the way he set his jaw. When he spoke, it was just as magically augmented as her voice, but wavered a little—Even after the welcome speech, he still wasn’t used to the effect.

“Because I put a lot of effort into achieving the results I did, Ms. Denner, and I didn’t want it to be ruined by a blue pebble I found just because I got lucky.”

Some people chuckled at that. Micah smiled, irrationally nervous himself.

Ms. Denner nodded with quirked lips and said, “Thank you for your candor, Mr. Payne.”

She turned back to the crowd. “Hard Work. Luck. Opportunity. The three ruling forces of climbing. Ryan Payne was worried that his good fortune would overshadow— undermine, even, his hard work. I’m here today to tell you that it won’t. At this school, you will be given the opportunity to have your work rewarded. And with that in mind,”—she put the mana crystal into a small jewelry box and handed it to him—”here. You can have it back. I return to you the results of your labor.”

A small portion of the crowd shifted at that and Ms. Denner addressed them all, “You will, all of you who made it into this school, be given back the loot you brought us during your third exam, as a reminder that your hard work will be rewarded.”

The applause already erupted though she wasn’t done speaking, “This loot was placed in your rooms along with our welcome packages this morning. You will be happy to find it there when you return, later today. You will also be able to find your rankings in the foyer of—”

She struggled to get a word in edgewise and gave up, dismissing Ryan first, pointing one arm at him as he took his leave. Micah redoubled his applause to send him off, as did others. “Thank you, Mr. Payne.”

He breathed out a trembling breath, nodded at her, and headed down the stairs at the side of the stage.

Micah was grinning. So that was what he had found. To the end, his friend had refused to say. But it had just been a mana crystal.

He watched Ryan head down the large aisle between seats and pause at the edge of one, three rows in front of theirs. That guy with intentionally shaggy hair sat at the end. Micah recognized him from the last few days. He’d seen him around. Not a friend of Lisa’s then, but Ryan?

He watched in horror as Ryan tossed him the tiny jewelry box. The guy caught it, thankfully. But he fumbled with both hands. And Ryan strode off with a grin, telling him, “Now you owe me two, [Enchanter].”

Everyone who had witnessed it gawked, including Micah. When his friend sat back down, he looked straight ahead at where Ms. Denner was inviting someone else on the stage and said, “I hate you.”

Ryan replied, with affection, “I hate you, too, Micah.”

“Why’d you give it to that guy?”

“He’s an [Enchanter]. One of three at our school, apparently.”

The guy kept on craning his head around to glance back at Ryan, clearly suprised, and Micah gave him the stink eye. When it was clear he didn’t notice, Micah settled for doubt. An [Enchanter]? Really? He didn’t look like it.

“So you gave him the mana crystal?”

“Yeah. He’s an [Enchanter], Micah. He needs it to make things. It’s almost civic duty to give them mana crystals to help them level, you know? Plus, you don’t have a good alchemy recipe for them, Lisa hates hunting Candletails, and he owed me a favor. It seemed like the best solution.”

Finally, Micah glanced at him. He still looked a little rattled from his time on stage and was sweating, but was otherwise grinning. It didn’t look voluntary. “Shake your head a little. The breeze is wearing off.”

Ryan did, subtly. Micah could feel it spread and was glad he’d added a slight deodorant effect for the occasion. He didn’t mind, but he’d doubted Ryan wanted others to think he smelled like sweat and rain all the time.

“So you think he’ll make you magic items?”

“Well … yeah. Sure. That.”

“Huh. Okay, then.”

“That easy?”

Micah shrugged and applauded as someone else stepped up to the podium. It wasn’t like he had a right to complain. The crystal was Ryan’s, he was free to do with it whatever he wished.

Micah doubted he could have compensated him, had Ryan sold it to him, even though he had money now.

Four gold coins. The auction had taken place yesterday and they had attended, the three of them in their school uniforms. Those were a great solution for things like that. Whenever they needed to dress up for a fancy event, they could just wear them and look classy.

But in the end, a middle-aged woman had only bought the painting for seven gold coins, not twenty like Mr. Zayer had said. So after paying back his debts, Micah owned four; three and a half of which he kept at Ryan’s place to save up so he didn’t spend it. He was going to need it for next year.

In passing on campus, Ameryth had told him she attributed the low value to a lack of perceived value. It would increase in time, not that it would help him. She had also complimented him on the flowers and told him to "Keep up the good work," which left him in a better mood.

Still, seven gold coins for one item of a first floor chest was a ridiculous sum. He was deeply grateful for having found it.

Next to him, Ryan seemed a little distracted while clapping. He searched the crowd and asked, “Where’s Lisa?”

Micah followed his look. Her seat was empty. He craned back to look at the aisles, but they were the same. He did see his sister and Ryan’s parents trying to catch their attention and tapped Ryan on the shoulder to make him look, but none of the exits showed movement. Lisa wasn’t standing, either.

His parents, meanwhile, were. They had shown up uninvited and without reservations and stood next to the wall. Micah was ignoring them. He had made the mistake of mentioning that he might have been the one to speak on stage instead of Ryan.

Well, why aren’t you? they’d demanded, like he had no reason not to and should just steal Ryan’s spot now.

They tried to catch his eye. Micah turned away and told Ryan, “She was just here. Where did she go?”

A frown. “Did you notice her leave?”

He shook his head.

“We should go look for her later.” Ryan glanced at him. “How are you doing, by the way?”

“Shh,” the guy sitting next to them said, eyes on the stage.

“Shush yourself,” Micah countered. “I’m fine. I’m not the one who had to speak up there. Great job, by the way.”

“Yeah?”

“It was perfect.”

The guy next to them spoke up, “Your voice wavered a little during your welcoming speech.”

“No, it didn’t,” Micah said.

He smiled. “And it was kind of obvious that you were reading off of a piece of paper half of the time.”

“How about you shut up yourself?”

“Thanks for the feedback,” Ryan placated them.

He glanced over and nodded. “You’re welcome. Felix.”

“Ryan.”

He rolled his eyes. “Obviously. You?”

“Micah.”

“Nice to meet you. Can we all shut up now, please?”

“Sure,” Ryan said.

Micah grumbled in assent.

People ran back to their rooms to get their loot, met up with friends, ate at the cafeteria, spoke with the teachers, tried and failed to speak with Ms. Denner, explored the campus, volunteered to help pack up the chairs, checked the rankings, said goodbye to their parents, checked their schedules, packed for the one or two classes they would have today—

It was chaos.

Micah tried to do everything at once and had to multi-task, so he said goodbye to his parents—who then tried and failed to speak with Ms. Denner—and “explored” his way back to his dorms with the others to see his loot and get his things for his classes.

They passed through the packed, two-storey foyer filled with tables to study or hang out at and someone said, in an angry tone, “Who the hell is Micah Stranya?”

He said it “Stran-jah,” like the beginning of the word “jargon.”

“Language!” someone reprimanded him.

Micah kept his head down and practically pushed the others out of there before anyone recognized him. But in the doorway leading out, he called back, “It’s pronounced Stran-ia!”

They headed for his room first, since Ryan only had a bag full of crystals waiting for him, and fell on the red salamander chest sitting on his bed along with a small staff and gift bag.

“What is all this stuff?” David asked him.

“Loot,” Micah said with a smile and counted as he picked them out. “One fire resistant shirt.”

“Wear it at all times,” the man told him.

“I plan to. One low-quality mage staff that is slightly better for fire spells and has a spell cradle, missing its affinity stone—”

“Are you going to sell that?”

“—I don’t know. One obsidian knife—”

“Careful there.”

“—It’s fine. One pouch full of crystals, and one pouch of marbles that have a teeny-tiny fire affinity.”

“Marbles?”

“Marbles.” Micah poured a few of them into his palm. “They have a fire essence sash inside of them, but I have no idea what to do with them. I can use them as light essence collectors in alchemy, I think. Or … maybe give them to Lisa?”

He looked at them.

Ryan shrugged, avoiding the looks Micah’s roommates were giving him every now and then. It turned out, they didn’t like waking up at six-thirty every morning. Especially on the weekends.

Micah was trying to learn how to wake up earlier so he could sneak out without waking them. He was failing. He checked with Noelle. “You wouldn’t happen to want marbles for five years in the future?”

She quirked an eyebrow. “Do I want trinkets to clutter my house for five years so that my child can maybe someday play with strange marbles filled with a teeny-tiny bit of fire magic from the Tower?”

Micah put the pouch in his backpack.

"I’ll ask Lisa. And finally”—he caught himself and made sure neither of his fanatic [Mage] roommates were looking.

Fabian was missing. Lanh was too absorbed in his own loot and family to notice. Vladi had no reason to care, though the only thing he seemed to care about was silence.

Micah briefly wondered if he annoyed Ryan as much as the first of those two annoyed him. They never stopped talking and they never chose a topic Micah could join in on. If he was only half as bad as them, how did Ryan put up with him?

”—One tiered, educational spell scroll for the spell [Kobold Fire Seeker],” he said in quieter tone. “Probably going to offer it to Lisa. Or see if Ameryth wants to add it to the library. I doubt she would buy it, though. I could donate it, but …”

“Wait until the end of the year,” David advised him. “It’s a nice thought, but you might need it for your tuition.”

“Right. Thanks, David.”

Micah put the scroll in his foraging tube and put that in his backpack. He had math with Lisa later today, his last lesson on Monday afternoons. He would pick her overstuffed brain then.

Ryan put his hands in his pockets and pushed his shoulders up a little, giving Micah a look that wandered over to the treasure chest. He stood one step behind his parents, out of sight.

You remember our deal?

Micah couldn’t nod because he was in their line of sight so he nodded with his eyes instead, as if being demure.

Yeah, you can have it. He glanced at the door, a lot less demure. But wait until your parents are gone.

Ryan smiled. No translation needed.

He checked his welcome package next. It had the various pamphlets for school life, the dorms, the cleaner, the Guild. There was a map of the school and some assorted school supplies as well.

“Sweet.” Micah put those in his backpack. The pamphlets were clutter, but it seemed impolite to toss them out. They went into his desk, never to be looked at again.

“So what now?” David asked them.

“Homeroom, right?” Noelle offered.

Micah shook his head while tidying up. “We don’t have homeroom yet.” Where would he put his loot? Closet? He doubted Lisa would want the staff. She had that cool new one with the sheep horns from the exam. It could be used as a club, too.

“How so?”

“We have mandatory classes only,” Ryan told her. “Grammar, math, biology, that kind of stuff. Micah has … ?”

“Dangers of Healing and Alchemy 101,” he offered.

“—tacked on because he is an [Alchemist], as well as the overview courses in math, natural sciences, and social studies.”

“What are those?”

“They’re to get me on the same page as everyone else,” Micah said. “Lisa has them, too, because she’s repeating a year.”

“So you have five more courses than Ryan?”

He hesitated. “Basically? It’s only for the first month.”

“We get to choose our electives and main courses in two weeks,” Ryan went on. “We get our proper schedules after the Beer Fest, along with our homeroom assignments. I was thinking of taking biology as a main course." He looked at him. "Then you and me might get the same homeroom, Micah.”

“Hey, now,” David interrupted, “we’ve been over this. Don’t choose your studies just so you two can hang out more, Ryan. You live five feet apart.”

“I do sports and mimic beasts, dad,” Ryan said, sounding amused, “I’m taking biology as my main study.”

He hesitated, then shrugged. “Fair enough.”

“Why will you only get your proper schedules in a month?” Noelle asked them, frowning. “What are you doing until then?”

They shared a look. “Boot camp.”

They stood in a long line along one of the gymnasium walls, forty or so students clad in sportswear. Micah had checked his papers again before coming here, but he was unsure of what was to come.

Boot camp consisted of three and a half weeks of triple physical education, double mana manipulation, and extended Tower study lessons in place of the main courses and electives.

Today was a the first day of school, though. A half day. Micah had gym and an overview math class. It would probably just be a friendly hello, right? Maybe they would even be let go early. That would be awesome.

Their gym teacher was his judge from the third exam, the small blonde woman who had criticized his injuries so much. She wore almost the same loose jogging clothes as she had back then, with a whistle dangling at her chest. In one hand, she had a bundle of more, in the other, an attendance list she read out loud.

Some people leaned forward to peer at Micah when she read his name, curious about who had gotten first place. They always frowned before leaning back. But they did the same for people who had gotten high scores all in all. The guy who had gotten second place wasn't here. He had to be in a different gym class, then.

Micah wasn’t sure if he had ever caught her name or just forgotten, but their teacher introduced herself as Ms. Jo, and the contraption that filled the gym behind her as, “Basic obstacle course number one.”

Ah, he thought. So that was what it was supposed to be. There were two to four lanes based on the section. Hurdles, boxes, trampolines, ladders, mats; those he recognized.

The thick rings on the ground … they probably weren’t allowed to touch the edges? Or maybe they would have to hop from one to the other? Something else? He wasn’t sure. There were plain ropes and ropes with rings. And there were ropes spanned horizontally over the ground, like a suspended ladder. Were they going to have to crawl underneath?

Mats, bare stretches, and stretches that were segmented into thin spaces by tall fences, cones, high bar—

Okay, so it was an obstacle course. As Micah recognized more and more disciplines, he made up his mind. This seemed like fun.

“Familiarize yourselves with it,” their coach said in a grave voice, “because you are all going to be spending about seven to eight hours a week for the next three and a half weeks running it over and over again.”

Oh. Was that still fun? Micah wasn’t sure, and neither did his neighbours seem to be. Their smiles slipped.

She tossed her bundle of whistles to the outermost guy in the row and spoke while slowly walking down in front of them.

“Pass those down. Here are the rules: Each of you takes a whistle and runs this course. Each time you make a small mistake, like stumbling or tripping up, you make a mental count of one. Once you make three small mistakes, you whistle once. But you don’t stop running.

If you make a big mistake; say, you trip and fall, or miss a jump, whistle twice and get back up again. Asap. I’ll be keeping an eye on you to make sure you do it right. And if you’re wondering why we’re doing this, it’s simple: One in three people who make it out of the Tower with grievous injuries report that they forgot to whistle under duress. Idiots, basically.”

Micah gulped.

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“And those are just the ones who make it out. We can only guess how many people die inside the Tower because they forgot. Of course, whistling is not a guarantee of help, nor should you treat it as one. There is a high chance nobody will hear you”—Micah was beginning to not want to be here—”but it is a resource you can use and we are going to drill the habit into you to make sure you remember.”

She paused and gestured behind herself. “The course itself? We are going to ensure you have the basic agility required to fight inside the Tower, no matter if you’re a [Fighter], [Mage], or [Scout]. Every day, I will make slight variations so you don’t form any bad habits. And every week, I will make it a little harder. By the end of the fourth week, there shouldn’t anyone among you who could not dodge an attack below the fifth floor.”

She turned to them. “Are there any questions?” It didn’t sound like she wanted an answer.

One guy raised his hand anyway. Hair darker than his, but skin slightly lighter, Micah recognized him as Raphael, from seeing him around campus the last few days. He was one door down from Ryan. Now, he stepped forward with a frown.

“Uh, I thought this school was supposed to be against drilling specific Skills into students, ma’am?”

“Yes, and?”

“And ... this obstacle course sounds like it’s bound to get anyone who levels up in the next four weeks [Lesser Agility] or a similar Skill,” he replied. “How is that not the same as what any other school does?”

“Good question. Here’s my counter offer, so listen up: You won’t get any Skills if you’re dead." She kept on walking. "This boot camp of ours is designed to show you the lowercase skills required to succeed inside the Tower, Mr. Stone, whether it be dodging enemies, learning correct behavior, manipulating mana, knowing what to do in emergency situations, or learning the unwritten rules of climbing.

In just two weeks, you can choose your main studies, extracurriculars, and electives and you can decide however it is you want to train your Class. You can also choose which courses you want to drop. If you want to drop my course, that’s fine. We won’t ever have to see each other again. But the school and myself will be able to sleep peacefully knowing that we imparted onto you an appreciation for the basic, lowercase skills involved beforehand.

If you do get [Lesser Agility] from this, in the meantime, so be it. It’s a price the school and Registry are willing to pay if it means you will survive to get other Skills. You’ll have the rest of the two to five years to ‘discover’ your own Paths. But for your information, I myself have zero Skills that promote tutoring. If you do get [Lesser Agility], it will be because you are agile, and that can only be a good thing.”

Someone else spoke up. Felix, from earlier. “You’re talking like we’re going to go to the seventh floor in four weeks, ma’am. We’re only allowed to the third under the week. That’s safe as f—udge.”

She gave him an unhappy look. “Tell that to the applicant how fell out of the portal screaming with a shattered leg during the entrance exam. Or to Mr. Payne over there who had to run away from an cluster of twenty-six Ink Golems on the second floor. Not to mention that Rathounds apparently appear in the single digits in the Sewers, nowadays.”

Ryan stood up a little straighter.

“But you’re wrong about one thing: At the end of this school year, you will be doing a repeat of your third exam, Felix, but in teams, as a miniature expedition, and with the fifth floor laid bare for you. And for that, you will want to prepare.”

Micah leaned forward to look at her, thinking he’d heard wrong. Others did, too, surprise clear on their faces. They were going to have do an expedition at the end of the school year? But Ryan had told him that was second-year stuff.

“And when spending days in the Tower, you won’t always have the option of avoiding direct combat or blocking attacks, so knowing how to dodge [Fireballs] and Archertoads is vital to your survival and your grades. Are we understood?”

“Yes, ma’am,” Raphael and Felix both said, looking unhappy. Raphael didn’t step back in line.

“All of you,” she said.

“Yes, ma’am,” they echoed.

“Uhm, can I ask you more about that exam—”

“You will be told about the exam when you need to know, not now in my class. Now get to warm-ups! I want to see you running laps, people!”

When Micah finally found the right classroom, Lisa already sat there. She had chosen a spot on the left side of the descending lecture hall, in a row of her own.

Only a third of the seats were taken. Most sat isolated or with a single friends or acquaintances, though he spotted two of his roommates sitting in separate groups. Shala was there, too. He sat in slightly off to the right side of center block, almost in the middle of the room. He gave Micah a nod walking past.

Micah slumped into the seat next to Lisa with a groan. His face was still hot, despite washing up with cold water just a few minutes ago.

“Gym?” she asked him, forgoing the greetings. They had split and met up again so often in the last few days, it became habit.

“Yep.”

The desks had to be folded down from the divider. Micah folded his and stretched over it, arms dangling over the seat in front of him. Thankfully, there was nobody there.

As more people joined, it seemed like a divide was forming—repeat students, the older ones, sat down closer to the left side of the room. Lisa and a few others had set the precedence. Grade skippers, the younger ones, sat closer to the right. They seemed more radical in their seclusion and clusters.

Micah smiled a little at the thought that he was sitting with the older kids, though a part of him wanted to sit with Shala. Maybe he could invite him over or drag Lisa over to him?

Mm … He sighed. Too much effort.

“That bad?” Lisa asked him.

"What?" Oh, because of the sigh? He put his smile back on. “No, gym was fun.”

“How so?”

“We had to run through an obstacle course over and over again and I did really well. I’m loving my [Lesser Agility] right now.”

“How did Ryan do?”

“He’s … getting the hang of it.”

She looked amused. “Oh?”

It was true. Some of the things, Ryan had done easily. The ones that required speed or strength. Jumping over hurdles and sprinting down the stretches. Other things …

On the positive side, he really was a quick learner. In a week, he was probably going to be more agile than Micah was, even without a Skill. He would cry unfair, but he was having a hard time feeling jealous of him. Either way, it was too fun to be jealous of anyone.

Micah rolled over to get his stuff from his backpack. Lisa had gotten out her notebook and pencil already, but he grabbed a pouch and tube instead and put them halfway on her desk.

He checked. The teacher’s desk was still empty.

“Hey, do you want any of this?” He got the scroll out from the tube and unrolled it for her.

She took one look and nodded. “Yeah. How much?”

“Nothing,” Micah said. “I mean, I actually wanted to keep the scroll, but I thought you could borrow it? To learn the spell?”

She nodded again and took it carefully, inspecting it for herself. Micah resisted the urge to snatch it back. He knew how Lisa treated paper by now, and it wasn't with love and care. Fortunately, she seemed to be making an exception for this.

“I would need a few days,” she said. “Maybe a few weeks, depending on how demanding my classes are. You could have it back after.”

“Wait, what?”

“Or did you want to keep it on you?”

“No, not that. But what about— I thought [Mages] needed months to learn new spells?" he protested. "This one is supposed to be complicated.”

He distinctly remembered Ameryth telling him that.

She gave him a look. “Please. I could do this right now if I did it slow enough. Here, watch.”

He held up both hands, placating her. “I’m good. I trust you.”

She shrugged. “Fair enough.” The scroll disappeared in the tube, which then disappeared in her bag.

Micah guessed he wouldn’t need it anytime soon. He had another and would rather the scroll was safe. He spilled out a few marbles next to show her. “And can you do anything with these? They have a sash made of fire essence in them, I think. I’m not sure because I can only see the red.”

She plucked one up and peered at it. “Interesting. Yeah, I think I could do something with these.”

“Really? Like what?”

“For example, spell anchoring,” she said. “The fire essence in there is dense. It’s about the same amount as a Teacup’s crystal.”

“Really?”

She nodded. “And can you see the tiny holes? Ah, probably not. You really should get yourself some glasses, sometime soon. But there’s holes in there, almost as if it were meant to be interacted with.”

Micah listened in fascination, but he really couldn't see anything. Meant to be interacted with? "Like, for caltrops, maybe?" he asked.

She nodded and said, "Or ..." As she spoke, her fingers shifted away from the marble as if it were expanded, though it wasn’t. The glass bead remained exactly where it was, frozen in the middle of the air.

A moment later, the space began to fill with a red light that grew denser, bulging and shifting into the form a tiny lizard. See-through and with a marble at its center, it latched onto her finger with four legs and a tail, then scuttled down her arm to jump off her elbow and land on the table.

It looked at Micah, then back at Lisa, and did nothing.

“Awesome,” he said. “What is that?”

“Just a basic summon,” Lisa told him, “anchored to the marble in place of a patterned crystal. It can’t handle much more than this, though. I could use them as scouts, bait … messengers?”

“Messengers?”

Lisa smiled and scribbled something down on the corner of her page, shielding it from view. She placed one finger on the paper and tore the corner off, then folded and held it toward the tiny lizard.

“Open up.”

The lizard opened its mouth. Lisa pushed the paper onto its tongue and it promptly went up in flames.

Micah shied back, others looked over, including a surprised Shala, and she simply said, “Oops? Forgot to insulate its insides. One second. I’ll try again.”

Shala shook his head and looked back, though other people’s gazes lingered.

“It’s alright—” Micah tried but she ignored him.

She placed two fingers on the lizard’s head and popped it like a bubble, snatching up the marble before it could bounce away.

Micah frowned. Was the pressure from two fingers all it would take to break them?

A moment later, the lizard was reformed and the note rewritten. Lisa gently guided it into the summoned monster's mouth and it closed it to keep it there. Now, there were both a note and a marble floating around inside of it.

“Now, bring it to Micah. But no touching him.”

The lizard looked around, spotted Micah, and scuttled over to his desk, right up to the edge. A trail of heat essence in the shape of bloating foot-prints clung to the wood where it walked. It opened its mouth and lifted its tongue a little to tip the paper toward him.

Like snatching something away from the hot stove, Micah snatched the note—slow at first and then as quick. He unfolded it and read, How much? He chuckled. “Nothing. It’s a gift.”

“Oh. Awesome.” She shifted the entire pouch over to her desk and peered inside, counting the marbles. A smile. “Thanks, Apples.”

“You’re welcome. Now can you kill it before it sets my desk on fire?”

“Sure. I’ll have to work on its spellscript a little, of course. Second attempt and everything. You understand, right?”

He nodded, leaning far back in his chair. It was like a mini-Sam, except it looked like a pure lizard and could set paper on fire by touch alone. Could Sam do that if it wanted to?

Just as the lizard began to run back to her desk, someone walked past their row and pointed a single finger at it. The lizard froze. The woman did as well, one step later. She glanced at it, up at Lisa, scowled, and said, “No summons in the classroom, Ms. Chandler.”

Lisa frowned. “Did you just try to banish my creation?”

“Dispel it yourself,” she deflected. “Or I’ll have you write two copies of the school rules to hand in by tomorrow.”

Lisa scowled and killed the lizard with two fingers again. She dropped its marble in the pouch and the pouch in the her bag, staring at, presumably, their math teacher the entire time.

Micah was a little confused. Could [Mages] mess with other people’s summoned monsters? And had the teacher failed?

“Good.” She smiled and headed for the teacher’s desk. “And don’t forget it.” She addressed the class. “That goes for all of you. There is a time and place for summoned monsters and it’s in your private rooms with your roommates’ permission—”

“Not granted,” a girl behind them said.

Micah glanced back. He assumed it was Lisa’s roommate because she was her age, had dark skin, and was glaring at them. But two rows down from her, Anne sat and was getting out her things. She didn’t notice him.

“—Don’t interrupt me,” their teacher warned. “It’s impolite. Raise your hand before you speak.”

“Sorry.”

“In your private rooms, in magic classes, or in the Tower,” she repeated. “Nowhere else.”

Lisa raised her hand and said, “That rule sucks.”

She shrugged dismissively and got out a book from her bag, tossing it on the desk. “Bring it up with Principal Denner. Now, on to our lesson. Welcome to Math Orientation. I’m Mrs. Mart, one of the few actual [Teachers] employed at this school, and I will spend the next few weeks bringing you up to speed with your peers to make sure you’re all on the same page. You.”

She meant Micah. He practically jumped.

“Ms. Chandler’s friend. Why is your desk empty? Aren’t you going to participate?”

“Sorry, ma’am.” He scrambled to get out his things, but her sight lingered on him for a moment before she went on.

Shoulders hunched in personal embarrassment and solidary discontent—Lisa didn’t look happy next to him—Micah glanced around the classroom. Vladi was in the back right, now. He must have slipped in when he wasn't looking. Everyone else looked weirdly focussed, like they didn’t want Mrs. Mart to notice anything wrong with them.

When she looked down to get out the attendance list, Micah risked looking back.

Anne noticed him this time and gave him a glancing smile before focussing on the front.

Micah copied her. The teacher was strict and he disliked math as a whole, even if he was surprisingly good at it, but at least his classmates weren’t so bad.

Math class ended a torturous forty-five minutes later and the students packed up and headed out with their teacher’s permission. It really had only been an overview of what they would learn this year and making sure they knew the methods from previous one. Mrs. Mart explained some things, but she expected them to catch up on their own, outside of class and in the library.

Micah got a nod from Shala before he headed off and hurried to pack up so he could catch Anne before she was gone, too. He had seen her during the ceremony earlier, but today was the first day she was on campus. His chest trembled when he stepped up and leaned against the desk opposite hers in the row. “Hey.”

“Oh, hey, Micah.” She was putting the last of her things away and looked up. “Congratulations on first place, by the way. I had suspected you would be high up there since you found a new monster, but I hadn't been expecting that. It's awesome that there are three of us in the top ten.”

“Of us?”

“Grade skippers,” she clarified.

“Oh, right. So you’re in the top ten?”

She smiled, but seemed confused. “Yes. Haven’t you checked the rankings yet?”

“I wasn’t really all that interested," he said lamely, kicking himself for it. "Sorry. How did you place?"

Lisa joined them and gave Micah a look that either said, Respect, or You’re making a fool of yourself. He tended toward the latter.

“Fourth,” she said and slipped her bag on, hiding a grimace. “But, you know, the other people just brought back better things than me, I guess. I’ll have to try better next time. Have you heard there’s going to be a repeat at the end of the year?”

“Yeah.”

“Repeat?” Lisa asked.

“Of the third exam, but in teams and as a mini-expedition,” Micah explained, doubly nervous now because Lisa was there to see him talking with Anne. Why had he ever let her know, again? Hopefully, Ryan would be cooler about this.

“Huh," Lisa just said.

He pointed an elbow at the door, hand in his backpack strap. “We were about to go hang out in the Hub, or the Commons, or the Guild Foyer; whatever you want to call it. Do you want to come?” Please say yes, please say yes, please say yes.

She gave him an awkward smile.

Oh.

“Sorry, but I already promised Myra I would hang out with her after classes.”

Myra. Lisa’s friend? Micah nodded. “Oh. Right. But we should hang out there sometime. We're probably going to do homework there, too.”

She took a step up, body half-tilted toward the door, and said, “Definitely. Or in the library, or cafeteria. Bye?”

"Bye."

"See you in the common room later, Lisa?"

"Sure. Later."

Lisa waved and let the hand drop on Micah's head when she was gone. He stood still and went over the conversation a few times. That hadn’t been so bad, right? Maybe? No. But it could have been much better. He sagged a little.

They headed for the second-floor of the foyer, which had already been given five different names by the students over the weekend, and their moods improved a little. Ryan had secured a table for them, having had the time for it, and sat on the far left side near the windows.

At a glance, the window tables and balcony were more popular than the wall-side ones because of the view. And the right-side tables were more popular still because they were closer to the cafeteria and library. It had been the same over the weekend, too. Just three days and there was a natural order to things.

Below, people were clustered around the rankings and discussing, but they didn’t have much to go on other than a name and three placement numbers. Micah slumped into a padded bench with a thanks for Ryan and greeting, and remembered to tell Lisa, “Show him the thing.”

“The thing?” he asked.

“The thing.”

“Alright,” Lisa said, but gave him a look. “If we get caught, you’re writing one of the pages.”

“Deal.”

Part of the group, part of the punishment.

“Keep watch?”

He nodded and trained his eyes on the entrances in case any teachers or staff came by, but kept glancing back to see Ryan’s reaction.

Lisa got out a handful of marbles from her bag, cradled them for a moment, and scattered them over the table.

Ryan lurched with wide eyes to stop them from bouncing off the edge, but they froze a few centimeters away from the surface and stuck there, frozen mid-air. Tractive lizard feet formed from red light. As soon as they had heads, the four lizards looked around, spotted Lisa, and ran up to stare at her expectantly, like she was a tamer and it was feeding time.

It was awesome.

Ryan’s surprised face seemed to agree with that assessment. Micah couldn’t stop himself from grinning at the reaction.

“How? New Skill?”

She shook her head. “I just mimicked the barebones structure from Sam, shaved off a few unnecessaries, and anchored them to the marbles, like using a safety-pin. The most complicated part was keeping them from burning things, really.”

“She did it in a few seconds,” Micah said with one eye on the doors and stairs. “But they die like soap-bubbles, I think.”

“True,” she admitted. “I can make them a little more durable, if I need to, but even then, you could squash them like a bug. The caltrops you mentioned probably have some kind of enhancement trick, I'd need to figure out. But I only need them to scout or send messages. Here, watch.”

She sent a note to Ryan and he slowly pulled it from the lizard’s mouth, looking fascinated. Then he turned the scroll over with a blank face.

“Who is Mrs. Math?”

Micah glanced back. The note read, Mrs. Math sucks.

“Mart,” Lisa corrected him. “That’s an ‘r’ and you got the order wrong. But she’s our math teacher, so I suppose it fits.”

“She’s super strict,” Micah hissed.

“Excuse me?” a voice said.

The lizards disappeared under the table in a flash.

A girl at the next table over had turned around to talk to them. Or rather, to Lisa. She stood with her knees on her bench and was leaning on the divider, as if this were a restaurant.

Since it wasn’t Mrs. Mart come to haunt them, Micah took the chance to duck under the table. The three lizards clung there, upside-down, awaiting orders. Summoned monsters were awesome.

“Hey, I’m Cathy. And I was wondering, but ... Are summoned monsters are even allowed on campus?”

“Lisa, and no. But it’s a stupid rule so I’m ignoring it,” Lisa said with a smile. “Don’t tell anyone.”

“Oh. I won’t. But, uhm— So you would want to be able to have summoned monsters on campus?”

“I’m a [Summoner]. Obviously.”

Cathy nodded. “So you would want somebody to do something about that? Fight for your rights as a specialized Class?”

Lisa looked a little lost. “I … guess?”

Micah frowned. “Could you even do something about it? I thought monstrous summons in public were illegal?"

The girl glanced at him, her light brown hair looked almost blond in the right light. “I think so. It’s private property, remember? All we would need is permission from the Guild. And since Ms. Denner is a mage herself, I think she would be sympathetic.”

“Oh. Right.”

“Think on it,” Cathy told them and turned back around.

They shared a look. That was … weird, right?

Think on what? Lisa mouthed.

They didn’t know. They didn't bother asking, either.

“On the topic of thinking,” Ryan said—

“Because you don’t normally do it?” Lisa threw in, smiling as if she were scoring herself a point.

He rolled his eyes. “Electives. Main studies. What’re you planning on picking?”

Micah answered straight away. “Biology, Alchemy, and …”

“And?”

“Tower Studies? Or do I take Gym? No idea,” Micah admitted. He searched his backpack for the school papers. There was a list. “I know I want to pick Overseas Studies as an elective, and Alchemy is locked down. Biology is obvious, I think. So I'm not sure which of the two mandatory subjects I should pick. ”

“You’re picking Overseas?” Lisa asked. "Really?"

“What’s wrong with it?” Ryan threw in. “Do you know how those weird light bulbs work?”

“Yes. I do. But you’re climbers, right? Pick Dwarfish.”

Ryan scoffed. “If we need to translate loot, we can just use a dictionary. Why, are you picking it?”

“Probably." She lured the lizards back out from hiding and played around with them, having them follow her finger. "It seems easiest of the three. I might not pick a foreign study at all, though.”

“Three?” Micah perked up as he finally found the right page and laid it out.

“There’s Linnian Studies,” she told him.

Lin. It was the name of a continent, religious figure, and religion all in one. Five or so nations followed it, far to the West of here. Weeks to months on boat. Even longer on foot. Micah doubted he would ever travel that far. Why study it?

“I’m taking Overseas Studies," he decided. "At least they have a base near Lighthouse and they trade with us.”

But what else would he take? There were the mandatory basic courses: Math, Grammer, History, Geographie, Social Studies, Biology, Gym, and Tower Studies.

Then there were the elective subjects, like Spellcraft, Alchemy, Linnian Studies, Dwarfish, Overseas Studies, Music, Art, Chemistry … and many more. Each of these subjects had sub-courses. Some of those, Micah could pick as a free courses, like Meditation Theory, Mana Manipulation, Armed Combat. Those were technically courses of higher subjects, but he could still pick them.

Of course, since this was a climbing school, he had to pick either Tower Studies or Physical Education as a main study. And Alchemy was locked down for him because he was an [Alchemist]. That left one free choice and he thought he wanted to go with Biology, but Micah could also take both P.E. and Tower Studies to get more of a combat focus and then take Biology courses as free courses or extra electives to learn more for alchemy.

There were so many options. What could he pin down?

“I think I want to take Mana Manipulation,” he said. “That and Overseas studies. Definitely. I want to understand new technology and I need a course to help me further my Path.”

Ryan nodded. “That seems reasonable.”

“It does?”

“Yeah, sure. Go for it. Are you taking Ecology, Lisa?" He looked at her. "It'll lead to more advanced Zoology courses later and you're a [Summoner]."

"I might take Ecology, but I'm not taking Zoology," Lisa said and pointed at her lizards. "I won't need it."

"Fair enough. There’s still the extracurriculars.”

Right. Extracurriculars. Micah almost groaned, but settled for ruffling his hair as he searched for the example list of those. He knew there were fliers downstairs with even more options. So many choices of different courses to take. This was daunting.

“Dueling,” Lisa said. “You’re both signing up.”

Micah looked up. “We are?”

They had their own papers out, now. Ryan was even taking notes to sort out his thoughts and looked just as confused by that statement.

“Yeah. A bunch of people I know are going. I’m definitely going, so I want you both there. You need to learn how to fight. When was the last time you two even sparred?”

They shared a look. They wrestled sometimes, but actual sparring? They both knew when the last time that had been.

“But I already have so many courses,” Micah deflected. “I'm pretty sure I'm going to take extra ones. And workshop. There might be other extracurriculars I want to take. And I still have to put in time for my alchemy. And I have to go into the Tower often to pay for my tuition …”

Along with homework, how was he supposed to wrestle all of this? Counting it all, he would have fourteen or fifteen courses. He wouldn't have time for anything else.

“What extracurriculars are there even?” Lisa asked. She leaned forward and put her hands out, revving up for an argument. “You’ve got sports clubs that students need to found. The only sport you two play is alleyball, and you’ve never done it on a proper team.”

“Yeah, but—”

“Then there’s music. Instruments. Choir," she cut him off. "Do you any of you know how to play an instrument? Or even own one? I've never heard either of you sing.”

“We might want to learn,” Ryan protested.

“Instead of learning how to fight?” she countered. “Is that worth it? We’re going to have to go on an expedition at the end of the year. We’ll be allowed into the fifth floor. That means we could fight against humanoids. Proper Kobolds and Golems. Then there's Salamanders and you know we'll have to fight those for Ryan's Path."

Oh. Right. Salamanders. Micah knew he had dragged Ryan to the Salamander's Den for his Path, but fighting against an aligator-sized Salamander that could climb on ceilings and breathe fire? Some were supposed to be coated in fire. His heart raced just thinking about it.

“Shit," Lisa said.

Micah looked up. What? Oh. Him. They were staring at him.

“Of course I’ll come with for Ryan’s Path,” Micah quickly said. “You've always wanted to fight proper Salamanders, right? And I have my shirt now—”

“Your shirt won’t be enough,” Ryan said. “If it even fits you by then. But it’s alright, Micah. That's ages away. And choosing courses is two weeks away. We still have time to think about stuff. Right, Lisa?”

“Yeah, yeah,” she said, giving up the battle but not the war.

Micah relaxed again and glanced at his paper. Dueling class didn't sound all that bad, if he had the time for it. But—

“I still need to pick a third main study.”

The others looked at their papers as well and they all sighed. If only they could take everything.