Joaquin and the other students were great with golden lion sculptures glaring down at them. When Ains first laid her eyes on them she immediately asked if she could take one back to school. Joaquin called her a bafoon and told her they were guardians who will crush them in an instant if they didn't follow the instructions given.
Ains pouted and persisted and Joaquin answered with a light knock on her forehead. In between the giant Golden lion sculptures was a set of stairs, Joaquin alongside Ains and the Idol Prince Wang, followed closely by Beipan and Luo. Behind them, with enough space in between to fit a sedan were the normal students.
The sound of water rushing downward started to become audible as they came nearer and nearer to the top. Joaquin looked to his left and then to his right, on the back of the golden lion on the left there was a mini waterfall. On the golden lion on his right there was a lava fall.
Ains ran forward and reached into the lava to pat the lion sculpture, Luo subconciouncly followed her and tried to stop her from hurting herself. It was too late when he got to her, her arm had already being swallowed by the lava.
Joaquin ignored this and continued to walk forward, the Idol Prince though a bit hesitant at first joined him. Ains didn't seem to be in any kind of pain and she was even smiling, talking to the lion statue as though she were talking to a child. Luo and Beipan stood right behind her frozen in fear, Beipan tossed a handkerchief into the lion's back and it started to burn before even reaching Ains.
The smell of the burning cloth and the ashes intruded Ains's nose and so and she backed off and ran back to Joaquin. "MASTER, MASTER!"
"What," Joaquin groaned.
"The kitty said he wants to go home with Ains." She said with a bright glow in her eyes.
Joaquin turned to glare at the statue, it showed no sign of life nor telepathic capabilities, if it had some it would've been created by runes and as far Joaquin had seen there weren't any on its body. Ains probably forcefully activated it and that scared it into complying with her demands. Thinking about it, Joaquin giggled.
"Stone doesn't talk, it was all in your head." He answered her and continued to walk forward, but something kept on bothering him. "What are you looking at?"
"I am just surprised you didn't scold her for being reckless," the Idol Prince Wang said as he slowly evaded Joaquin's glare.
"It's only reckless if she stands a chance of getting hurt and losing her life."
"Are you implying that she, a girl who can't use the right pronouns to even address herself, is more powerful than us?" Beipan said as he slithered forward.
They had already reached the end of the platform, there, on the corners were two tablets held up by stone hands of no exciting color. Beipan gave them a look and couldn't understand what they were saying. 'He can probably read them so there is no reason for me to screw up my mind.' he thought as he looked over to Joaquin.
"Whether she is stronger or weaker than you is all up to how you use your power… isn't it?" Joaquin said softly as he placed his hand on the tablet on the right and started to read it internally. It was another amazing trait of his, being able to separate his tongue from his brain. He was able to hold a conversation with an intellectual and still let his mind wander and think about what really interested him.
When asked about it, Joaquin would just say that he assess a person and then makes random guesses throughout their conversation. Yes, no one wanted to believe this, everyone who knew of it was convinced that Joaquin was an esper and was ashamed that his ability wasn't as destructive or flexible as his brother's.
He had now finished reading and deciphering the first tablet and had also been in a conversation of the value of power on all its five forms. According to Joaquin, the formulas of relvence, which were placing branches of binary against each other, for example saying positive bleach over negative bleach., are all made as a blueprint to developing one's binary ability effectively and ephitiently.
"Someone who follows the first formula of relevance which states that the constructive binary nature of count 13 is stronger than constructive binary nature of count 8 and so forth, will end up victim to a person of count 8 who believes in the sixth formula of relevance which states that the constructive binary nature closest to the destructive binary nature has more understanding of unity and chaos than his so called senior." Joaquin info dumped as he moved on to the next tablet.
" Are you saying that an 8 healer is better than a 13 healer?" Beipan asked with a cocky chuckle.
"In the talent of healing no, in the talent of combat yes. Also these factors will change depending on the environment of the healer. A famous serial killer by the name Heavy Atom was an 8 healer, his ability however did more than just heal, it resulted in curses and poisons responsible for taking the lives of many powerful and important figures. One most notably being your former emperor Wang III, Heavy Atom's ability aslo caused cells to mutate, which lead… "
" To the creation of a race of humans that live in the oceans and the seas, we know. But he is just one abnormality in a sea of many ordinary folk." Beipan interrupted.
Joaquin took a deep breath and turned away from the tablet to face the other students," there are two ways to cross over to the other side, one is to put your right hand in the lava for half an hour and two is to carry buckets full of water across a log suspended over a lava pit."
The students searched among themselves for the right answer., all of them knew that there was no way Joaquin was doing the sticking of hands in lava thing and so were confused by why he gave them the right to choose.
"HEY BASTARD!" Out of nowhere a girl from the crowd shouted and pointed furiously at Joaquin.
The Idol Prince, Luo, Beipan, and Joaquin all exchanged bewildered looks.
"Where are you looking? I'm talking to you." She protested as she bolted forward, another much quieter girl followed behind hurriedly trying to stop her.
Once they finally reached the vicinity of the top students the friend hid behind her loud friend.
"For some reason I wasn't able to approach you until now. But since I'm her I'm going to give you a piece of my mind. Why are you so selfish don't you realize that all of these lives are on your hands. Are you trying to kill us…"
"If I was I wouldn't have told what to do, but you know what, that doesn't sound like a bad idea." Joaquin said he faced away and reached into the tablet on the left and brought out a bucket.
"Do you think I'm afraid of you? If I wanted I could…"
"Get to working and start by filling thia bucket." Joaquin interrupted her by throwing the bucket at her face.
She caught it and snarled at him. "My name is Kristen Stanley, remember that." She turned around and her brown hair took flight and she stormed back.
She was a fairly attractive young lad, with freckles on her face, and a bit of make up showed that it was there but removed by the struggle at the swamp. Her lips were pinkish as a result, and her ears had small diamond earrings. Just like all the other students she was wearing her tracksuit.
Her friend was also pleasing to look at at, with a ball of black hair tied up at the back of her head. She wore glasses and had thick lips, her chest was huge and she would occasionally push it up as if she was trying to hide her face in it. What made her stand out more was her pointy ears, they weren't as showy as elf ears but they showed that she wasn't completely human.
Kristen took her friend's hand and dragged her away.
"Well that was weird l, you won't kill them will you? " the Idol Prince asked as he looked up to face Joaquin.
"Why would I?"
"Didn't you say you sacrificed virgins for power?"
Joaquin blinked rapidly and turned around to grab more buckets from the tablet.
"You are supposed to laugh, that was a joke."
Joaquin took one of the buckets and leaned in on the Idol Prince while pressing it against his chest. He looked down and their eyes met.
"Well it fell flat," he said and backed away from him.
The Idol Prince was still stunned stood there for a second before his face reddened as he caught on to Joaquin's insult.