The first day of the academy was usually very eventful. Every student, new and old, would have a change in their classmates and roommates according to their previous performance and review given by professors and other students.
The first years were also arranged into different classes based on the individual assessments of the students during the testing. The students are arranged into classes such that the average strengths and weakness are similar. A number of points given to the students for their performance are shared by the class and this makes it easy to keep the students under control and also cultivate team spirit among the classes.
Alex's room was filled by five others by even the previous day and he had spent the rest of the day talking with them. These five boys were named Rick Gordon, Gray Raines, Hugh Stone, Bruce Waller and James Maudler. Rick was a noble and was a returnee who left the academy two years ago, but he rest were commoners and completely new to the academy. Rick was friendly and having been in the academy before, he told them a lot of things about the academy and even gave them some suggestions.
Alex found himself awake by five in the morning by a loud knocking on the door. "Get your asses up you sloths," came the voice of a person from outside the door waking up the others too. All except Rick were surprised by this. Rick was the only one who was already awake, cleaned up and was meditating on his bed.
"I told you guys to wake up early, remember," said Rick as he went up to open the door. "Get up, you lazy lumps," yelled a boy who was dressed in the students uniform as he walked in large strides. "Why aren't you out in the physical training uniforms and lazing on your beds," he continued as he looked at the others before his eyes fell on Rick who was in a white shirt and shorts.
"Returnee?" asked the boy who was about 6 feet tall, red haired with blue eyes and a crew cut as he looked at Rick who was already dressed for the morning exercise. "Yes," said Rick nodding to the boy.
"You didn't tell them about their schedule?" asked the boy.
"I did tell them. I also suggested that they go look at the notice board at night," said Rick.
"You lazy bums, you had someone inform you and you were still not willing to wake up for your early morning exercise!" yelled the boy again. "Ten points off class 3 for being a lazy class. Every ten minute late you are you will lose ten more points. Get dressed quickly and assemble outside the room now."
After that the boy went to the other rooms belonging to class 3 and repeated the same. Frightened by his warning, everyone assembled in the corridor in front of their rooms within ten minutes where the boy was waiting along with a girl. The girls of the class 3 were also assembled there beside the boys.
"I am Arven and this is Helen. We are fifth years who are about to go into specialization in our next year and are the prefects put in charge of the class 3 which is rooms 19 to 27. You guys have been awful tardy for your first day," said Arven loudly. "There are notice boards in the corridors, one for every class. Any changes in schedules, your timetables and general exercises would all be mentioned here," he continued pointing to a notice board on the wall.
"We will have to reduce any tardiness with a reduction in points for the class. The class points will play an important part in your evaluation. So, please try to check the notice board regularly. How many of the new joinees have checked it?" asked Helen.
As Arven and Helen had expected there had been no one responding to her question. "I guessed as much," said Arven looking at both the boys and girls. "Disappointing," said Arven shaking his head. "Get in line and make sure you go through each and everything on the board. Your timetables are there. Sometimes there would be change in classes suddenly. Such incidents would also be notified on the board. All of you have physical training and exercise at five every morning including Sunday. Now form a line and follow us."
"Today is your first day and you are new to the academy. So, we won't deduct any points for your tardiness. But from tomorrow you need to be punctual or you will be disciplined," said Helen as they led them to the grounds while giving a meaningful look to Arven.
"Fine, the points will not be deducted for today morning. But don't expect the same from tomorrow. If you are not punctual, the teachers will deduct our privileges. So, we will try our best to make you follow orders by any means necessary," said Arven glaring at the class.
The pair of them quickly led all the first years towards the grounds on the east side of the academy. They also found other classes being led by their prefects out to the grounds.
The prefects were all similarly dressed and wore silver cuffs with a P engraved on them. The first year were all looking a bit sleepy like they had just gotten out of bed. Some hadn't managed to dress properly with a couple of open buttons or disheveled hair. Some of them were setting their hair and dress properly as they walked.
They were all made to assemble outside the building in lines with about 20 members in a line. The sun just risen on the east giving the sky a red color. There was only a valley separating the grounds from the port town and ocean. It was beautiful sight as the red sun came up on the valley side, but most of the first years were grumbling about the early hours and complaining about their prefects to notice it.
As they were busy, a tall blue haired man with well-built muscles came running and stood behind the prefects. "Attention, first year," yelled the man in a loud voice that made the birds from the trees behind the grounds fly up in fear. Such a loud voice pulled all the first years awake and even prefects who were closer to him were reminiscing of their first time. It was the same every year. The teacher always shouted in a deafening loud voice that every prefect had a habit of using spells to cover their ears.
"My name is Patrick Sharks. I am going to be you training officer for the rest of this year," continued the blue-haired man in a slightly lower voice. "You are all to assemble here every day by five in the morning sharp. For every one person who is late in a class, the entire class will be kept here for five more minutes and points will also be deducted for the specific person. Apart from that, your prefects will have to be here as long as the class is. So, they would also probably try to punish you for your tardiness."
As he finished his sentence, a number of students started to complain and a few of them even yelled that they came here to study magic and not become muscly warriors. Some knew of the importance the academy puts on physical development and discipline for magicians as they had been in contact with older students or alumni of the academy and kept quiet. This trend wasn't usually maintained in other magic academies with the exception of military.
The prefects were calm and didn't care as they always knew that some of them would complain, but they noticed that it was relatively better as few of the first years were returnees who had already experience this, but there were some who almost decided to go back into the building.
Usually, the ones who left were kicked out as only students who completely lack respect and are unafraid would do that. These would usually be kids who were pampered or reckless kids. Either of them would be difficult to teach and the academy believed that such people wouldn't be much successful and didn't care about them. Some of the parents or guardians usually got them back and paid a hefty fine so that the academy would take them back.
This time though Patrick didn't let them go. He took out a wand and muttered a spell causing all the first years to be pulled back in their line and stand erect while forcing their mouths shut. This happened even during the last year, but the current prefects didn't know that. Due to the fall of the magicians, the teachers were specifically instructed to keep students in the academy and not kick them out of the academy. Though it was a change, Patrick still had a way to impress and realize them the need for physical development.
"Which idiot yelled that I was just a muscle-bound warrior and he had come here to learn magic not beef up?" he asked while moving among them coming to a specific student who fat and plump. "You are Jacob Crane, right? Sone the alchemist Jenson Crane. Do you know why your father sent you here?"
"To learn magic," mumble the student as he was allowed to open his mouth by Patrick.
"So, why here and not any other academy? Why Nature Palace?"
"It has the best records of graduating magicians and is known to be the best academy?" guessed Jacob timidly.
"Do you know why it is the best?"
"I. I. It has the best record?"
"I meant why does it have the best record?" asked Patrick as he released every student while rolling his eyes. "Anyone tell me why do you think we have the best record? Do you think we have better equipment and more books than the rest of the academies?"
"Isn't it?" asked a girl in a timid low voice.
"No. It is not. Anyone else? No? It is because we make sure that our students have a strong foundation and have a completed development of their body and mind."
"You think that a magician can be weak? No. A magician has to be stronger than any common mand and I don't mean stronger spells and magical skills. He needs a stronger physique. You can't channel powerful spells with a weak body. Doing so will take a lot more time to learn spells and there is a high chance of the spells to fail," said Patrick.
"You think that every magician could bind all of you up so easily at a quick as me. No. I can only do that because I trained by body along with my mind. Maybe if you want to just be an alchemist, you can learn preliminary spells and alchemy and go ahead, but that is not what the academy intends you to be. We train you here to be powerful magicians," yelled Patrick.
Even the prefects who had long learned about the necessity to have a disciplined life and had gotten use to regular exercise were inspired by his speech. In fact, they were all surprise by the way he bound all the first years. They always considered them to be among best of their class as they had become prefects, but they were sure that they couldn't repeat the same feat with even a fifth of the students.
They also thought that Patrick was just a Magic Knight who was just crazy about body building and exercise but were shocked to realize his talent in magic. They had a newfound respect towards him and also felt that it would be better if they put more effort into physical development.
The students also realized that their trainer is no mere man but a powerful magician. Some of them from smaller villages were much more afraid because, they realized that Patrick was powerful enough to be a strong major in the armed forces and could quickly take down a large squadron with the magic that he just performed. As a realization of his power came to the students, they also felt that the man might be actually speaking the truth. There was definitely no need for such a person to lie to them. Following his act, all of the students listened to him calmly and followed his instructions either out of fear or respect.
He quickly had them speed walk a few laps around the perimeter of the ground and some running followed by some exercises before he left. The effect of the magic followed by physical exercise had most of them panting in 40 minutes. Patrick left them ten minutes to rest before the next class as the meditation instructor always scolded him if they were too tired for her class.
"Take a small break and drink some water after five minutes. There are taps to the north side of the wall. Your meditation instructor will be coming, and you guys better be in good shape by that time. I don't need her on back for putting you through too much strain before her class," he yelled while he left.
A couple of minutes later, they began to start discussing about the things told by Patrick. Some were even discussing about the amount of magical power exhibited by him and even the prefects were not an exception. They even begun to wonder about the salary given to Patrick as such strength and power could easily make him a colonel in the military.