Gunther had searched the grounds up and down. He had combed through the forest, but there was no luck, and no sign of Raze anywhere. In the end, he had to give up. Pincer, as well as the other students, didn’t seem to be so concerned, but regardless, he had decided to tell the other two who were somewhat stuck to the white-haired boy like glue.
Because of it, it was quite a tough night for Safa and Simyon to sleep. They had been shown to their rooms, which were just one large public building with several floors, each with doors leading to individual rooms.
The rooms themselves were even more basic than what they had at the temple, with only a single mattress on the floor, a pillow, and a bedsheet. It was a place designed so they would have no distractions.
Just before going to sleep, Simyon called out to Safa by her door.
“Hey, don’t worry too much about Raze. I know that teacher said he couldn’t find him, but in my eyes, that’s a good thing. It means that they couldn’t find Raze’s body, which doesn’t mean he’s dead.”
Although this was true, the edge of the forest was a complete cliffside. No one knew how far down it went, and the area was covered with fog. The examiners nor those of the Dark faction even explored the place.
In many ways, if a death did happen, it was the perfect place to hide one as well. Still, Safa was thankful for this and nodded as the two went to get some rest.
The next day arrived, and the sound of a loud gong vibrated through the halls, immediately alerting everyone. Students quickly rushed out of their rooms, opening the doors, wondering where the loud sound was coming from.
“ALL NEW STUDENTS ARE TO APPEAR IN THE COURTYARD!” a voice shouted. “Those who aren’t there in the next five minutes will be kicked out.”
Immediately, there was a rush from the students as they quickly got fully dressed and started to rush out of the rooms. The hallways weren’t the largest, and the students were squashed up against the walls, pushing against each other.
“Safa!” Simyon called out as he tried to look for her among the chaos. “Safa!”
Other students had bumped into Simyon, but as they did, one of them fell back down to the floor.
“What the… did I hit a rock or something?” The student saw that it was the no-name from before. Kissing his teeth, he got up and hurried outside.
That’s when Simyon could see Safa was struggling. She was being pushed up against the wall with no regard whatsoever.
“Safa!” Simyon shouted as he rushed forward. His shoulders hit several of the other students but knocked them away as he did. Then, when he met with Safa, he grabbed her hand. “Just stay behind me!”
Pushing through, Simyon managed to bulldoze his way through the crowd of people with his strong body, and Safa stayed behind him. Although her brother wasn’t here at the moment, it looked like there was still someone that she could rely on.
The students were now out in the courtyard, some of them tardy with their clothing. A couple hadn’t even worn anything on the top half of their bodies at all; they had come out in such a rush.
That’s when they could see Pincer out in front, and along with him, several other older males dressed in dark purple uniforms and a headband above their heads. There were three of them in total.
However, the headbands that they wore were completely different colors compared to the rest. From the right side, there was a dark blue; in the center, a yellow headband; and at the very end, a red headband.
In front of them, there was a table laid out, and multiple headbands were laid out on the table.
“In front of you all are the teachers of this academy!” Pincer shouted. “They will be the ones that will pay special attention as they focus on you first years. As you may know, the academy is a two-year course!
“After today, you will join up with your second-year students. If you look off into the distance, you will notice that on the plaque of buildings, there is a stripe of paint with the same colors you see in front of you.”
The students looked off into the distance, and they could see it was true. A large building to the left only had a red stripe of paint next to its sign just above the door. Another yellow, and the last blue.
On top of that, there was the main building that contained the cafeteria, the library, among other things, and this had all three colors on the signs.
“This is important. Based on what headband you are assigned today, you will have access to these different buildings. A student that is caught in the building that does not correspond to the same color without permission will be severely punished. Now please wait for your number to be called by the following teacher.”
Gunther had explained to Raze before that those who got through the second stage were already in the academy, and the third stage was to determine just their ranking, and this is what he meant by that.
It was clear that they were planning to split the groups according to strength. It was a common thing to do in regular schools as well. It allowed the talented to learn quicker as they could progress with advanced teaching, while the lower students that needed help could have more time to be guided and not feel lost.
Although some might have thought it was a way to create a divide and caste, it was for the benefit of the entire academy as a whole. Otherwise, they wouldn’t have just kicked out the other students in the first place.
The first numbers to be called were the five main disciples, and they had been called by the teacher with the red headband. They had collected the most power stones, so it was quite clear that those with the red headbands would be considered the best students.
A few names were called out, and in total, there were only fifteen students with a red headband on their heads. All of the students were from the top clans in the Dark faction. There were a couple of outliers that people hadn’t seen before, but with the rough look on their faces and eyes, they looked just as menacing as others.
Next, the teacher with the yellow headband started to call out names. Based on what they had seen so far, Simyon was waiting for their numbers to be called. After all, many students had given 0 power stones, but due to Ricktor, the two of them had handed in one power stone each.
However, as the names went on and on, and a total of around a hundred more numbers were called, theirs wasn’t one of them.
‘Sh*t!’ Simyon clenched his fist hard. ‘Why did I get my hopes up? Did I really think that we would get treated fairly in this place? Kron already warned us about something like this happening.’
Just as expected, the blue teacher called out around a hundred more names, and Safa and Simyon were on that list.
“If you feel self-conscious about the color on your headband, then train and work hard on improving yourself!” Pincer shouted. “There will be assessments that regularly occur; at the time, any color headband can challenge another, and if you win or lose, the two of you are to exchange headbands.
“Do not become complacent with your position, because there will always be someone after it!”
After Pincer’s announcements, the students followed their teachers into their respective buildings, where they would go on to learn more about what they would be doing at the academy and how things would work.
When all of the students eventually disappeared, Gunther appeared by Pincer’s side.
“What is going on?” Gunther asked. 𝗈𝓋𝑙xt.𝗇𝓔t
“What do you mean, you have eyeballs, don’t you? The students are going to start their first day,” Pincer replied.
“Not that,” Gunther replied. “I’m talking about the two no-name students. They handed in one power stone each, so shouldn’t they at least be in the yellow group?”
“Oh, that… yes, I did find that a bit strange, but it’s not our call,” Pincer explained. “The results were passed onto the administrator, and someone insisted they were in the blue group.”
Gunther didn’t push Pincer anymore on the matter because it genuinely felt like he didn’t know the reason for it. The academy had no-names before. Although it was rare, there had been the odd occasion, but the academy didn’t discriminate.
If they did well on the assessment, they would be placed in the appropriate group. Which was why even those that had survived during the second assessment, against the overwhelming power of the main disciples, were placed in the yellow group regardless if they got a power stone or not.
‘If anything, because they are no-names, they should be caring about them even less. So why would someone have paid so much attention to the two of them that they placed them in the blue group? More so than that, who has that much power in the academy to do that?’