When Eliza and I headed outside, she flips open an amulet she pulled out of her pocket and a mini blue hologram screen popped up, which displayed--what looked like the time: 23:32. 24-hour format huh. That's good to know that it isn't some foreign number/letters. Eliza puts it away and says, "Farewell Kima, this is where we depart." She gave me a sassed look as she crossed her arms in disappointment.
A clock? Wait a minute… I reach into my pocket and feel my phone. "Here it is! I forgot all about my phone." I unlock my phone to check the time but it's all messed up. Even the date as well. I guess I'll fix it later. I notice Eliza and it seems that my phone has caught her interest, but I play along. "Yes?" I ask. She points at it; the look in her eyes was that of a curious five-year-old. "Oh, this? What about it?" I play it dumb, but I honestly just want to talk to her a bit longer.
"Stop being stupid, what sort of device is that?" Eliza said.
I give up and answer, "This is a smartphone, you could use this to communicate with someone who's far away and send messages. It can also tell the time, just like that." I point back at her foreign item, almost touching it. She backs up, "Very interesting. Your 'smartphone' works the same way as this 'Horologium'. 'Horo' for short; this little device carries the exact same functions." She holds it up to me as it shines in the moonlight, its color was silver, and the shape of it was circular.
"But can you take pictures?" I quickly go to my camera on the phone and snap a picture of Eliza. The moonlight was just enough lighting for me to catch this moment. "What did you just do? Let me see?" Eliza saw herself on my phone and instantly regretted it, "Erase this memory from your phone! I hate it!" She snatched the phone and started to tap aggressively, hoping to delete it. "Whoa whoa, don't do that! You'll damage the screen." I snatch it back, and I pretended to delete it by showing her a different photo in my gallery. "See? It's gone. I only have photos from my world." I said avoiding eye contact.
"Hmph, quite the device you have there. Earth is so intriguing and mysterious, but I guess that's how you feel as well towards our realm. Anyhow, we both need to get some rest for tomorrow. You have a big day coming." She looked at the school and sharply exhaled. I feel bad for her, I'm a burden to her now. I must prove myself to her and to the school.
She points to my right and says, "That's the student dorm building, that's where you're going to sleep. Meet me here at the gate at 07:30 before heading to the Headmaster, tomorrow morning. Any questions?" I shake my head no, and just like that, Eliza jumps high and leaps onto building after building heading deeper into the city. Damn… I wish I could do that. Well, I better go now and rest. I really don't want to wake up exhausted, since today has already taken a toll on me.
I head towards the dorm and open the door to the entrance. It's quite spacy in here and I see no one at all besides a guard at a desk on the right sleeping. I walk past him and see a directory of floors with dorm numbers. I find my floor and number, "Third floor, third floor, third floor." I say to myself like a mantra, so I don't forget. I head upstairs to my floor and reach near the end of the hallway and take a right leading me to my room. It's a wine-red door with 203 in gold, the handle was also gold.
I step inside and I turn on the lights. To my surprise I see three empty beds, do I have roommates? The room layout seemed to be obviously for more than one person, but, where are they? I shrug it off and walk into the middle of the room. I look around me and to my left, I see one bed and 2 on my right with a dresser near the farthest right bed. Also, a dresser and a closet near the left of the bed on my left. There's a huge window pane at the center wall. "Wow, I can see the city from here" I let out a small smile, then a yawn creeped out of me. "Alright, I think I should go to bed now…" I chose the bed on the left from the door. I take off my shoes and lay down without getting into the covers and passed out.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I wake up stretching my tired arms and legs. "Man, what a dream, it seemed so real again." I open my eyes to see no design on my ceiling. I gulp, hoping the inevitable wasn't true. I sit straight up immediately and find myself alone in the dorm room staring at the other two beds and then to the window. I sigh "So it was real…" I check my phone and it's dead. I get a flashback from last night and recalled the battery being at 5%. "It's not like they're going to have a charger and an outlet for my phone." I put my useless phone in the drawer beside my bed.
I'm supposed to be meeting up with the Headmaster and Eliza. Eliza first though, I hope I'm not late, I need one of those 'Horo' thingies Eliza was talking about. I go into a bathroom to wash my face and clean myself up. I quickly head out and I lock the door with the key handed to me from the Headmaster. I start heading downstairs and observe closely at the lobby and vending machines they had there. My stomach starts to rumble, and I just put my hand over my belly as if I were attempting to silence it. "Where can I get some food around here?" I realize that I need to be with Eliza, so I disregard hunger for now.
I walk past the guard still asleep. "Who's paying this guy?" I shake my head in disappointment.
On my way to school, I see a huge number of students coming in groups or alone. What's amazing is that they're all different races too. I see a dragon-humanoid with horns with scales. They were walking or flying, landing near the entrance. Another race that caught my eye were these tall fairy-humanoid creatures with different colors and designs for wings. They were beautiful; just like the dragon-humanoid people they were walking or flying and landed onto the grass. They contracted as soon as they touched the ground, giving them the appearance of a cape.
In the corner of my eye, I recognized something right away by one feature. It was an Elf--or should I say Elves. I correct myself as I see a bunch of them walking in groups. They all look very sophisticated and you could feel their brilliant aura. The variety of hair color is mind-blowing. Green, purple, blue and even yellow hair the Elves had. The Dragon looking people are red, purple, or black. The fairies are just full of colors, especially in their wings.
Those weren't the only races that were there. There was one that seemed very intimidating, yet cute in some aspects. I see animalistic-humanoid people. Some had tails, fluffy ears, some were overly muscular, had fangs, or just fur. They were human but had animal features. I get closer to the school and what a relief to see some of my kind here...humans. Lastly, I notice other similar humans in a group, but they weren't exactly like me. They were almost identical, except they had elongated pupils, brightly colored eyes, small horns sprouting from their foreheads, and different colored jewels embedded around their neck.
It was exciting yet frightening in a way. Anyhow, I need to find Eliza. I dive into the crowd, bumping into various bodies--as I struggle. I finally see Eliza carrying a satchel bag over her shoulder. I wondered if the bag was heavy for her size. I see she's tapping her tiny foot impatiently, "Hey Eliza!" I wave at her with a smile. She waves at the other people who are bowing to her and saying good morning. She's popular, huh? Must be that nobility kicking in. I guess she didn't hear me when I called her. I try again and stand in front of her.
"Good Morning Eliza," I say with a smile again.
"You're late. You don't keep a lady waiting, you know." She sarcastically said. She couldn't help but smile and let me off the hook.
"I'm sorry, my phone died, and I couldn't tell the time from there. I didn't even have an alarm to wake me up." She smirks as she disregards my dilemma.
"I figured this would happen. Here you are. Your very own Horo. I decided to pick one up this morning for you. Don't think this will happen again, though." She tries to put on a tough act and hands me a Horo, but it was smaller, and gold plated. I stare at it in awe and smile in excitement to try it out. I open it up and a mini screen popped out of it, showing me the time on the top. On the bottom of the screen which looked like apps on a smartphone--was a mini picture of a closed Horo with some 3 bars on top; that must be the phone. Right next to it was a square with scribbles on it--that looks like messages and the third icon was a gear, and this looks like options.
I get really into the Horo, but Eliza snaps me out of it and says, "So Kima, school is going to start soon and before you go to the Headmaster's office, I'd like to wish you good luck!" She gives me such a warm smile that I can almost feel it. "Thanks, I'll need it..." I start to get nervous because I forgot about the enrollment process and the goal I have to try and complete.
She starts to head towards the school and I put the Horo into my pocket. "Let's go. I'm pretty sure you remember where her office is, correct? I wouldn't be surprised if you got lost" she assumed.
"Yeah, of course, I'm not that useless!" I say defensively. She giggles, "Good, I'll be waiting for the results. I expect not so great things, but I do have faith that you will be fine." She goes ahead of me and walks inside waving bye.
I take a deep breath and follow the rest of the students inside. I go straight to the rising platform where Bria from last night stood. There were other students in my way, so I couldn't get a good view of her for a greeting. I shoved myself on the platform and we all went up. Each student stopped at their own floors and it took forever for me to reach the top floor. Eventually, it was just me and Bria. "Hey Bria, I'm the one from las-" She cuts me off saying, "I know who you are. You're going to Headmaster Mair's office, correct?" I guess she's not up for small talk. I nod yes, and we head up towards the Headmaster's office.
~~~~~~~~~~~~
I am faced with her huge door again. I inhale sharply and before I get the chance to knock, it opens on its own. She's sitting at her desk as usual but someone else was in the room and it was the guy that I bumped into last night. "Hey, you're!" We both say at the same time. "Oh, have you two met already?" She questions us.
Blake speaks first, "This runt bumped into me last night. Eliza needs to keep a leash on this kid."
"Hold on a minute, you were the one who bumped into me and called me a weakling! You don't even know me!" We both walk towards each other clenching our fists as if we're going to brawl it out.
The Headmaster hits the both of us on our heads, "Now stop it you two. Blake, I'm going to have to ask you to leave us alone. We have some business to take care of right now." He sucks his teeth and leaves. I didn't notice but he was wearing the same uniform as Eliza, but it was of course for males. He had a dark blue blazer with red seams and golden buttons on his sleeves near the wrists and gold button downs. There was also a Phoenix stitched on the right side of his chest and he wore dark blue pants and brown leather shoes.
"I apologize for the rudeness of Blake but he's always like that with the new students." She gestures me to sit down with her. I'm tempted to roll my eyes, but I don't want to get hit again.
"So Kima here is your uniform, shoes and training uniform. I believe in your world they're called P.E clothes." I nod and place the uniform next to me and I noticed I'm still wearing my own uniform. It's all dirty and I stink…
"Would you like to go use our lavatory to bathe or shower in? I can also create the same exact food from your home realm before further instructions" she offers, and I am so relieved.
"Please, that would really help me a lot" I smile, and she nods ok. With the wave of her hand, the door next to her desk opened and I could see what looks like a bathroom. "Take your time, Kima. You have a big day ahead of you."
"Thank you so much!" I grab my new things and go into the bathroom.
~~~~~~~~~~~
I finished using the bathroom and I already ate the breakfast Mair has served me. It wasn't exactly like home's, but she gave it a shot and I am grateful regardless. I look really good in this uniform, and it fits perfectly. My guess is that she used magic to figure out the correct sizes.
"Mr. Kima, before enrolling here at Siren, every student takes an exam to test and see what the students are capable of. Allowing us to develop their ideal weapon to use during missions and class. You can also change your weapon later, but you can only switch weapons once a year. So it isn't our fault if you can't decide. Any questions?"
"Hmm, about the test. What does it consist of? I hope it isn't a written exam." I say without hesitation since I really hate exams.
"No, there isn't a written exam, but you do have to sign some papers for your enrollment after the test, so we can have a record about you in our archives." I nod, and she continues, "Now about the test; this test will consist of trials to test your physical and mental capabilities. For example, Strength, intellect, survival skills, battle, and a magic capacity test."
"Magic Capacity test?" I repeated.
"It's a test to see how much Magic you have residing within your body. It can increase over time with training, but as you know this an individual's true form of energy." She gets up and starts heading towards the door. "Follow me, Mr. Kima, I will escort you to the testing room." I start to get nervous again, but I have to pull it together.
We enter another set of doors down the hall from the main office. "I don't remember this being here," I said. Mair replies, "Of course you don't, the door is only visible to those who have access to it. Since you're with me, you have temporary access."
"Ohhh."
We walked in and the area is huge. It's the size of a gymnasium. It's like a white void and the only thing that wasn't white were two window panes near the ceiling, on my left near the entrance. I could see people who looked like scientists, with lab coats, with yet again... the phoenix symbol.
They were all humans, but in the back, I could see one female elf with long purple hair and she wore glasses. She held a clipboard tight to her side. She looked a bit shy and wasn't really doing anything but watching us and the scientists. Mair stands at the door and says "Good luck and remember not to focus too much on passing. Just do your best and if you want to give up just yell it out. You don't want to die from a simulation. They will dismiss you through the speaker when the trials are over." She turns around slowly and I say, "Wait, I could die!? Mair stop!" The door shuts behind her and disappears into the wall. I have no exit.
"Welp..." I say with a straight face and no emotion.