White flames enveloped their surroundings and everything slowly faded to black. As he lost consciousness, Soma heard a voice that called out his name. It was a female voice, but not like his sister Saiph. The scene cut to white and Soma woke up.
He was at a desk in a silver tinted lecture hall with maple colored desks that went in rows that elevated in height proportional to the holographic whiteboard. He realized that what he saw was a dream of past events. His eyes then met with a girl dressed in a uniform; the blazer was dark green with a white undershirt, with a red necktie. She also wore a skirt, slightly above knee length, the same shade of dark green in appearance, with a white trim. She had heterochromia, her left eye donned a shade of black, while her right was white. Her hair was an elegant shade of black, tied into a ponytail, which faded to white. Her appearance was seemingly flawless.
"..Lyra?" Soma said, tiredly.
"Soma, you shouldn't fall asleep in class." Lyra softly spoke. He was seemingly pleased in a way that contradicted her disappointed, slightly angry tone.
"Mister Rigel, joining back in our class I see. Only a week had passed and you're already in a coma?" The Professor who was in front of the classroom said, in a rather sarcastic tone. There was also a name imprinted on a plaque on his desk in front of a holographic whiteboard. The plaque read: Prof. Revenant Gall - Magical History Specialist.
"My apologies, Professor Reven." Soma replied, as he scratched his head.
A male student right of Soma, with a similar build to him, glanced at him with concern. He wore clothes similar to Lyra, except that he wore slacks instead of a skirt. Hyas had light blue eyes, with a noticeable white tint that outlined his iris, where his spiky hair was a shade of dark blue with a light blue tint.
"Yikes, even I don't fall asleep in this one." he said, trying to justify his usual self.
"Hyas Tempesto, as you are busy chatting with your comatose friend, would you like to explain to the class the difference between Blue and White Lightning?" the Professor said, rather aggressively.
The boy scoffed, thought to himself that the question was easy, and said: "Well, Blue Lightning is energy created by two opposite charges in the atmosphere, while White Lightning is energy found inside the crystals known as Ether."
"Thank goodness there is still a spark in that brain of yours, now sit down." Professor Reven said, with clear hostility.
Hyas sat down calmly, on the outside unperturbed, where inside those words cut deep by the scary professor.
"Now as you can see from this metallic device with a white crystalline core," Professor Reven said, before pulling out the compact device. It was the size of a badge, about as big as Reven's palm, with a bright white colored crystal embedded in the middle radiating a form of magical energy.
"This is the Ether Matrix in its basic form. Now, you all know that each of your clans have their own specific Matrix, with their own modifications to fit the element they specialize in. As you also know, the Matrix is your key to creating spells, which is why it is a very important device to carry during missions. This one in particular was created as a baseline and standard for the clan modified or even the clan specific versions. Therefore, it is natural to say that this Matrix is considered to be what is known as the Basic Matrix. " He continued.
"Now, if you could tell me," Professor Reven said, before using the device to fabricate an elegant rapier, where he immediately levitated swiftly and pointed the weapon a row behind Soma. The rapier was pointed at a boy who seemed unphased from it despite the weapon was shying away from slitting his neck, much to the shock of everyone in class.
"What kind of magic does this qualify as, Mister Apollyon?"
This particular boy, aside from the uniform, had olive skin, dark gray hair, and purple eyes. He also wore a silver chain necklace and two orb piercings above the far side of his right eyebrow. This boy seemed to resemble some shadowy figure, but despite his appearance he had a very calm demeanor.
"Projection magic. the device uses projection magic to create spells based on our focused thoughts by channeling energy in our body to create elements."
"And what is that energy, Mister Sluggish?" Reven pointed at Soma, with an icy glare as it floated back in front of the board.
"White Lightning, the energy that flows through all life but originally came from the White Crystals known as Ether. An Ether Matrix also stores WL energy inside it, being a form of a battery in the process." Soma replied, calmly to feign any fear or anger.
"And it goes in full circle, we will go over the applications of such outside of the matrix next time, Class Theta dismissed!" Professor Reven said before the rapier shattered and disappeared.
As Soma packed his things, Lyra and Hyas were waiting for him by the door. As he left, he glanced towards Apollyon, who spoke to two other individuals.
Both were female, where one girl had a face befitting of a rich upbringing, she had beige hair the length of and eyes. She also wore a pink and white headband. Her demeanor was more friendly and outgoing, who waved at Soma with a grin on her face. Soma waved back at her, with a grin. The other girl next to them had black hair and eyes dark as the night. She wore an oddly shaped, black conical hat, tall and indented at the sides and back. Strapped to her head by a baby blue strap, the strap also attached itself to a black headband with a star pattern, trimmed gold with gold charms that dangled from the sides. She appeared to have this aura of meticulousness yet emotionless, as if she were an automaton.
"Yo, Hana, Lopa, and Apollyon! Good luck in combat training later!" Hyas said with a big smirk on his face.
"We know you just want to ogle at the female students wearing tracksuits again." Lyra said in frustration and grabbed him by the collar.
"You're jealous that I look at other girls, aren't you?" Hyas said who gestured a shrug as he was dragged out of the room.
"Huh? W-Wait up guys!!" Soma said, as he blitzed out of the room.
Soma went to follow them shortly after, but he got lost and realized after he checked his clock that he was running late.
"Oh crap, I have to get to class" Soma said to himself.
"Ah, Mister Rigel, good morning." A gray haired man spoke to him as Soma ran past.
He wore a white suit trimmed with silver, and a cane that appeared have four slits with compass points engraved on it. He appeared to be young, but he radiated an aura full of knowledge and experience.
"Good morning Headmaster Canopus, can't talk gotta get to class." Soma said, with a nervous chuckle.
"Well you best get going then, young man"
As he walked past the Headmaster, Soma arrived in his next destination.
In his thoughts, Soma said: "I swear I felt as if I made it earlier than usual.."
This class in particular was a massive indoor area with bleachers and glass windows. It was a rectangular arena tinted with dark green walls just like every part of the school.
Soma saw Lyra and Hyas, both in dark green tracksuits with a white trim. Hana, Apollyon and Lopa all gathered together along with the rest of the class.
"Professor Reven was extremely furious at us today, wasn't he?" Hana said as she approached the other three, with an intimidated chuckle.
"Yeah, it felt like he was going to send me to the Underworld when class ended." Hyas said, with a stressed expression.
"He pointed a rapier at me! Can you believe him!?" Apollyon said, breaking his calm facade.
"Apocalypse, you deserved to be scared." Lopa said monotonously.
"Ohoho, now you've done it Miss I'm only rich enough to wear gold." Apollyon looking irritated at her mispronunciation.
"Like you're one to talk, Mister I'm late to a death metal concert." Lopa said as she poked at his piercing.
"Ehehe..These two are getting along lately eh?.." Lyra said, chuckled hesitantly
"These two are always like this, can't blame 'em" Hana said to Lyra, laughing, where Lyra followed suit, followed by a glare directed at Hyas.
Several other classmates gathered around the group of six. Among them was a boy with dark blue hair and had an ambiguous look with delicate facial features befitting of a woman, a girl whose hair is dark blue but wavy like water, and a boy who lugged around a black violin case and had neatly brushed silver hair.
"Soma! What's up?" The wavy haired girl said.
"Oh hey Isla, Calder" Soma said in reply where he also looked at the boy next to her.
"Those guys really aren't getting along, huh?" Calder said, with a hesitant chuckle.
"Nah they're fine, Lopa and Apollyon banter regularly." Hana said.
"Wait till you see me and my cousins." Hyas said, with a fearful look in his face.
"Oh right, you're one of the members of the Weather Corps" Isla said, interested.
"Weather Corps?" Calder said in curiosity.
"Yeah, the Celestial Weather Corps. It's the special exception to the Factions' Magic Styles being the same. Those marked by the Celestial are divided into five sectors, each symbolizing a certain weather: Droughts, Blizzards, Sandstorms, Tornadoes and me, the Tempest. Each generation, a child chosen from each Weather will enroll in Polaris to represent the Celestial Faction."
"They're pretty notorious for packing quite a punch!" Soma said with anticipation.
"There's Cleia, who lives in Oasis, where her family works as glass makers, also representing the Sandstorm branch. Aesyle, my bro represents the Tornado branch, he's quite sucked into writing novels. Corona is the Drought rep, she's quite hotheaded all the time. Lastly, Ambrosia, she's the Blizzard representative and popular among the male students for some reason."
"Isn't Ambrosia the air head?" Lyra questioned.
"Pfft yeah, it gets annoying though." Hyas said in response.
"I see, you guys are a strong group indeed." Calder said, nodding.
"I don't recall meeting the others aside from Aesyle." Soma said
"Well that's mostly because-" Hyas said before he was interrupted by:
"ALRIGHT!! CLASS HAS BEGUN!!" A yell of a woman whose voice reached every inch of the arena said.
This woman had golden horn ornaments attached to her head accompanied by her dark golden hair, and black soldier beret. She wore a black trench coat laced with gold and gold platings and had a long sword on her back along with two shorter swords, one on each end of her waist. The blades emitted a golden tint despite being pure crystal, where they gleamed like pure gold. Her face appeared to be young for her position and she was no taller than Apollyon who was considered tall in the class, but her voice proved otherwise. She was the full representation of absolute authority.
"Yes Professor Argo!!" The whole class said in unison.
"As of last week, you have enrolled in Polaris, and all you've done is schoolwork and then come here expecting some easy exercise such as using the basic forms of a matrix. All that dancing around the gym expecting to get stronger is highly inefficient."
The students nodded in agreement.
"So next week, we the staff are preparing an event to commemorate the beginning of our school year. This event will not only show your strength, but to also know your classmates better aside from being chewed out by Professor Revenant."
Some students in the fifteen started chuckling, but Soma could not discern who it was.
"We will hold…"
"An in class tournament!!!"