My eyes snapped open, due to my sharp instincts, as I heard noises around me. I saw the blueish sky as my eyes rapidly processed the incoming light, which means I must have fallen asleep meditating yesterday. Sitting up I saw my schoolmates gathered around me, wondering what the hell I was doing.

As I saw them, I realized that today I needed to go to the lessons, which were to start in good 10 minutes. So I jumped up, gathered myself and ran forward to my dormitory. The others around me had made place for me, and looked after me wondering.

Meanwhile I had already reached my room, whereas I quickly showered and thereafter changed my clothes. Then I picked up my backpack from the corner, whilst going trough the door into the long corridor. As before I ran as fast as possible to my goal, this time my classroom. Outside the sun was shining beautiful, the grass twinkled, the trees sparkled and all students outside smiled widely. But I ran dead serious over the campus, until finally reaching my goal. I stood before the classroom, so I opened it.

I looked trough it, there was the ancient desk of our teacher, made of sturdy oak wood. Looking trough the room I saw, it was like always. But all was quit, the room was empty no one was there. Flabbergasted I checked again whether it was the right room, and it was. Until I finally realized I had read the clock falsely and had nearly an hour more to wait, some moments of panicking passed. I was really embarrassed, and wanted to sink into a hole. So I hoped no one saw me.

As I went awkwardly outside, I felt some strange looks falling on me. I looked around, until spotting some guys I liked. I went over to them and was nicely greeted. They spoke about many different things, and luckily didn’t ask me what I was doing. The school bell rang, and now was the real time to go inside. This time I wasn’t the solely person, so I seated myself and waited until the lesson began.

The class felt really long, even though it was only an hour. I was many time on the verge of sleeping. The worst was I didn’t learn anything new, even though it was one of the few lessons one had to attend. Needless to say, afterwards I went over to the training grounds. Here I trained, until the next interesting lesson was to start.

This day nothing much more exiting happened. Everything was as usual, I attended my lessons, trained a lot, mediated and went hunting later on.

So the weeks passed, until finally the school breaks were beginning. My plan was the same as many others had, to go home. I already stood before the carriage, going to Aldorem, with my luggage. I had said goodbye to my friends, who were either going home or staying here.

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The journey to Aldorem had been rough. The wagon was shaking around, as it drove over the uneven paths to reach the main street. Then we went for some hours eastward, on the way we drove trough a few villages and past some huge cites, until reaching the awaited entrance to Aldorem. Shortly before submerging into the lantern-lit darkness, of the underground road to Aldorem, the sun shone straight onto us. The traffic was on an all time high, as we made our way downwards, many merchants drove past us.

Reaching the market we all were allowed to go outside with our tiny luggage, as most of our goods were left behind. We were told before finally being allowed to go, to come here again in exactly 12 days, at 7 o’clock. Then we all left in different directions.

I went straight home, on my way I encountered the few dudes that nowadays were good friends of mine. They were those I had exposed for stealing, later on I was sorry for them. So over the last years I met them ever week or two, and gave them fruits and bread. But after a few years of doing so, they began rejecting my goods, as they got some jobs and had began getting a nice income. But still we met up, every now and then and had had our fun together.

After a nice little conversation with them, I said that we would met for sure in the 12 days I was here, I took my leave and went straight home.

My parents, already waiting in the door frame, were smiling brightly and seemingly happy to see me again. I ran into their arms, and gave them a hug. Then I gave my little brothers and my sister also a hug. My brothers were all grown up, they didn’t seem like the little guys as back then.

Inside a the house was a huge welcoming party arranged for me, combined with my birthday party. All my family was there and many good friends of me. It was a gorgeous sight. They all sang for me, then we all ate cake whilst chatting. All wanted to know how my life at the academy was.

But then the biggest surprise came. The door rang and as I opened it there were my five friends I had seen earlier on and midst of them was Nian. I was flabbergasted, bewildered and overwhelmed at the same time, I didn’t know what to say any more. After gathering myself I gave him a hand shake and let them all in. They congratulated me and then gave me their presents. I put them all by the other gifts I received, I would open them all together later on. Nian’s present was light and little, but I felt like it was really good.

I excitedly chatted with Nian as I never imagined seeing him so soon, he told me he was doing grate and was the class best in practical fighting but still was lazy as normally in classes. Other than that he trained every day hard, with the goal to surpass me. So we both decided we would fight after the party.