Celia sat beside Yuki, who was eagerly eating up American-style cheeseburger. To be frank in Celia's mind, the cheeseburger was absolutely gigantic, and with a large side of fries to back it up, but the young man was downing it like he was part of the culture it was made of. Her meal, on the other hand, was fried fish, a side of onion rings, soy sauce, and a choice between potatoes (Mashed, roasted, fried, or boiled), rice, and bread.
However, what hung in her mind was what the Grandmaster said. That not all of them will live past graduation. She wondered if she'll live to see graduation, if she'll live past the first year. Another thing that bothered her is that the Grandmaster seems very familiar in a way that she could not understand. She knows in herself that she has seen him before, many, many times before, but her logical mind is saying that that's impossible. She has never been anywhere in the Mirror World before, and the Grandmaster seems to be in this side of the world most of the time. It confused her stomach as well, which made her appetite less than what it should be.
It took nearly two hours for the hall to settle into a state of food coma before a round of bells woke their spirits. The instructors went down from the high table and each took a separate table as their own. Sheridan taking the first table, the Grandmaster taking the second, Alice takes the third, a gray old man in armor taking the fourth, and a black haired young man in red royal robes taking the fifth. Celia and Yuki were both at the third table, placing them under the blind young lady's care.
"Everyone rise." The Grandmaster announced. All sitting were now standing in line. "The instructors, including myself, will now be escorting you to your rooms. Before that, however, you must choose your pair. One pair will share a room. Do so now." Male and female pairs looked at each other, at this Alice sighed.
"We do not care whether you are of opposite sexes and genders." She spoke in a crisp tone unmatching her stature. "The fact that you have survived the Mirror World's dangers, however short, means that you can make logical decisions even under mental, emotional, and physical distress."
The awkward glances stopped, and pairs were formed within minutes. Yuki and Celia decided to pair up with no hesitation.
"Might as well stick together, huh?" Yuki said to her, to which Celia nodded.
"We will be passing through halls. Pairs will take the unoccupied room closest to them as we pass. Understood?"
A collective murmur of acknowledgement was heard.
Sheridan stole a look at Alice, who seemed to fixate herself on her own line.
*'Madam Alice, is everything all right?'* He fired a mental message towards.
*'No problem. Not yet.'*
'Calculating as always.' He thought.
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The five groups split off into five separate hallways. Each hallway had door on either side, and the pairs at the front of the pack entered as they passed empty rooms. After about an hour, all the pairs have secured their own rooms and were soon unpacking everything.
Yuki was very strangely hiding his belongings from Celia's view, but she thought it was just shyness. After all, she was a girl, and there were boy things that girls shouldn't know about, and vice versa. The room was very spacious. It contained two full sized beds on either side, cabinets, and a bedside table and lamp, making the room almost mirrored.
Now that Celia looked at him, Yuki is covered in layers. He wore a white scarf, white jacket over a black shirt, and thick looking pants, his whole attire stained with splotches of red.. Considering his signature magic form, she wondered if it affected his physiology in some way. She made a mental note to ask him later.
"Should we put a curtain between us?" Yuki asked.
"I don't think there's a need. The bathroom's over there." She pointed to a door in one of the corners.
"Nice. I'll go change. I don't like my clothes stained." He grabbed his bag and entered the bathroom.
"Huh, that's weird." She said to herself. "I'm the girl here. I should be the one who changes in the bathroom." She opened her bag. "Oh, well."
A knock came from the door. Celia opened it to be greeted by Alice.
"Good day." Alice smiled.
"Oh, um, Good day." She greeted back.
"I hope you're all comfortable."
"Yes, we are, thank you."
Alice was holding a large stack of folded paper. She drew one off the top and handed it to Celia. "Classes start tomorrow. Your schedule, and the map of the academy, is on that paper. Your whole block, that is this hallway, have the same schedule."
Celia took the paper from Alice, and for a split second, she felt a spark pass between their fingers. The blind girl, who was simply looking forward, turned her face to meet Celia's eyes. "Then I hope to see you tomorrow. Also, I would like to tell you time works differently here, so any Quartz-based watch is inaccurate. The clock on your wall is Tachyon-based."
'Tachyon?' She wondered.
"The theoretical form of matter faster than light, yes. We're are moving faster than light here, after all." Alice smiled. It was one of the things she was most interested in in the Mirror World. On Earth, nothing is faster than light, but in the Mirror World, everything adjusts so that nothing is slower than light. Well, not everything... Alice remembers her experiment where she brought cat from the normal world to the Mirror World, and it was immediately shredded to microscopic bits the moment it touched the portal. Humans are especially adapting, more so if they possessed magical affinity. Temporal sense when they return to Earth would be an issue, but that was her responsibility as Auxillary Magic to teach.
"I guess not so theoretical after all... Thank you very much. Uh..."
"Alice. Just Alice. We mean to introduce ourselves tomorrow in class."
"Thank you, Miss Alice." Celia bowed in courtesy. Alice turned around and moved to the next door. The door between them closed.
'That was her.' Alice thought to herself. She had been using a form of triangulation to find the Spiritron signature from before. She zeroed in on this single student, however her magnitude was not as strong as before. She wondered whether it only appeared when the Grandmaster was near her, but that was an investigation for another time. She handed out the rest of the schedules.
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Celia and Yuki's first class was, unsurprisingly, Auxilliary Magic under Alice. The class room was devoid of most things. It was more akin to a cave than a classroom, but it was what Alice called home within the walls of the academy. It was made of stone from bottom to top, with no other instruments. The door that led to this room had a massive sign that said "Be barefoot". It was easier than putting "Take off shoes" because not everyone wears shoes, and they might bring socks in. Alice didn't want that.
The stone floor was cold for the students barefoot. Yuki was the only one who did not feel anything.
"It's just like back at home." He remarked.
Alice cleared her throat once everyone was inside. "Welcome."
"Where's the instructor?" A male voice asked from the crowd. A round of collective sharp breaths were heard across the room. It did not help that the walls echoed.
"I am." Alice pointed to herself. She was smaller in stature than almost everyone, so she stood at a stone podium.
The male student walked to the front and eyed her. "You? You're just a kid." Again, a collective intake of sharp air. Some turned their face.
Alice hopped off the podium and stood on the ground, facing the student. "What's your name?"
"The name's Cale, the next Grandmaster."
'There's always at least one.' were Alice's thoughts. "Then Cale, how about we have a little demonstration." The male raised his eyebrow. He was unnecessarily large, towering over the blind girl, but the only emotion she could muster for him was pity.
The room felt it too.
"If you can force me to move from this spot, you win, and I will immediately consider you for an acceleration program." The other students were sitting now, giving the two of them a large space. Cale huffed. "If you lose, I will personally see to it that you spend 5 hours in detention outside academy walls."
Cale nodded in agreement and took his place opposite hers. "Keep in mind." She smiled, and her smile sent chills across the room, "you were only outside for two minutes last time."
'Two minutes?!' Celia looked at Yuki, who was as shocked as she was.
"Hell of a two minutes." Some of the students whispered under their breaths.
Cale suddenly felt the pressure. He had only survived because he left a lot of people to be devoured by the beasts. He was lucky, and he knew it, and Alice knew it as well.
"I'll give you five minutes." She brushed her hair backwards. "Go."
Cale immediately went on the offensive. If he was going to move her, then he should use his entire stock of energy in one powerful burst. He raised both his hands in front of him, and focused. The spell he was going to cast has the power to level a city to dust, but will cost him all his energy. Alice assessed him calmly.
His voice was rough, and shaking. "God of Destruction, hear my prayer! Let mine enemies be obliterated! Roar your ultimate desire!"
The spell was Extinction Ray. A class A spell that grants massive destructive force. In the face of Alice, however, it was no more than a parlor trick.
Beams of what seemed to be light flew from Cale's shoulders, hands, knees and eyes towards the blind instructor, to which she raised single finger to meet it.
Her voice was sharp. "Cancel."
Immediately, the beams were gone, and the male student collapses on the floor out of exhaustion. With a snap of her fingers, he was teleported to the infirmary a good city block's distance away from the classroom. Alice returned to the podium.
"Welcome. I am Alice. Formality's sake you are to call me Miss Alice, even as I find it annoying..." She continued to talk as if nothing ever happened.
'This is the magnitude of power our instructors hold?' Celia wondered that if she was as strong as she was, to be able to immediately and effortlessly nullify a class A spell, how strong would the Grandmaster be.
"Auxilliary Magic is using magic through the senses." Alice stepped down once again from the podium. "Everyone please stand up." Alice was wearing a casual outfit. A form fitting T-shirt and pants reaching her ankles. Everyone stood up. "The world is a living organism, and like a human, by following it beat, we can create a map. This is extremely useful when you're blind." She chuckled to herself. "The heart of the Ley Lines, a convergence as we call it, is at the heart of the Grand Hall. This is how they look like."
After she spoke, lines on the stone floor began to appear. The lines glowed white, and appeared to emanate small globes of white light. The students looked on in amazement and wonder. "This is this world's blood vessels, where its lifeline flows through."
Yuki raised his hand. Alice acknowledged him. "Miss Alice, if ley lines are the blood vessels, what is its blood?"
Alice smiled, and her smile, in conjunction with the beauty of the ley lines, captivated the entire class. "It's technical term is Spiritrons. The very core element of it. But the lifeline of this world is..." The ley lines glowed brighter, until the cave was consumed with light. Alice stalked back to the podium, like a fairy. "Magic."
Celia could not believe her eyes. The beauty of the ley lines, of the Spiritrons, Magic in its purest form.
"This is what Magic looks like. It's the foundation of life." The lines faded away. "All of us draw magic from the ley lines, processed by our bodies, so we can manipulate them. You cannot actually see ley lines. I simply shared what I see through Auxillary Magic."
The entire class was back to sitting, and more interested than ever. Never mind her power, she was amazing at getting attention from students.
Alice distributed books from behind her. The books floated towards their new owners. Celia read the cover, "Magic Through Sense volume one."
The blind instructor stood tall now. "Let us begin then."
The start of a new year of learning was about to begin.