The light was bright for a few moments, before it dimmed a little. It was still enough to illuminate the interior of the tower, and the two figures.
"If you're here for the exam, step inside. If you're here to just look at the spectacle, don't even bother." A voice rang out in the streets.
It managed to reach everyone's ears. And even though it was quiet, a normal voice shouldn't have been able to achieve that.
After hearing those words, the crowd practically surged towards the tower, leaving only a few people standing outside.
Theo was almost at the back of the crowd, so he was amongst the last to enter inside the tower. But, thanks to that, he was positioned near the two figures.
One of them was male. He had long, pitch black hair with a large, sickly green flower on one side of it. It would have looked quite girly, were it nor for the menacing facial features the man had. The piercing eyes reflected the color of the flower, creating a strong impression on anyone who saw them.
The other figure was female. Her hair was short, barely covering her ears, and it had an ocean blue hue. That alone wouldn't have been strange, were it not for the pair of blue furred bunny ears that adorned the top of her head.
'Someone from a noble lineage?' Theo wondered to himself.
The bunny-eared female was wearing a set of deep blue robes, complimenting her hair and delicate features.
The male wore an identical set, but it looked far worse on him. The blues of the robes contrasted strongly with the green flower, creating a unique sight. But not in a good way.
Neither of the two paid much attention to them as they entered the tower. They took one look at them, and then back towards the streets, towards the few stranglers still standing outside.
Not a single word was uttered amongst the prospective students or the two figures. Some of the students that Theo had already labelled as the more arrogant and pompous ones, mostly from noble families looked as if though they were preparing for something.
The male with the flower turned to the bunny-eared female and nodded once.
They both crouched down and laid their hands down onto the stone floor of the tower. Theo was only barely able to see the wisps of green aether emanating from their hands before the tower started rumbling again.
The light brightened again, making it almost impossible to see. Then a sudden flip of gravity, followed by an intense feeling of vertigo.
/-/
The few people still standing outside the tower noticed the bright light once again flaring up, and then the tower starting to quickly patch itself up. As if the crack had never existed in the first place.
It was done by in a flash. The patching took far less time than the creation of the crack had taken.
"It's always amusing to see the faces of people seeing how the gates operate for the first time." An old man cackled to himself. He turned to look towards the others still looking at the tower.
"Shall we go, sir?" A muscular man appeared out of nowhere next to him. "The guards are already looking for you."
"Tch." The old man clicked his tongue. "They won't even let me have this much fun? I might make a few mistakes if I don't get a few breaks here and there."
"Please don't."
"Don't be so serious." The old man waved his hand and turned to look skywards. "Though, even if I did make a few intentional mistakes here and there, you wouldn't notice them until it was too late."
With another cackle, the old man disappeared. Leaving the muscular man standing there, alone and drenched in a cold sweat.
/-/
"Follow me." A cold voice rang out in their ears once again. It was masculine, so Theo attributed it to the flower wearing man.
Still, it was hard to follow the words of the man. The suddenness of the entire situation had taken far more people than just Theo by surprise. Many were still trying to recover from the vertigo that seemed to plague most of them.
Though, there were a few people, acting all high and mighty who seemed to have been unaffected by whatever it was that had happened.
They leisurely walked out of the crowd and began following behind the male figure, not even bothering to spare a glance towards the people still struggling with their bearings.
Theo was amongst the first few to discard the feeling of vertigo and quickly followed after the group towards the exit.
Now that the world had stopped spinning, he could actually take a look at his surroundings. There was a similar bight white light inside of this place, too. It was also dimming in quite the same manner as the one in the tower.
In fact, Theo wasn't sure if they still were inside of that tower. The entire place looked eerily similar. Even the exit looked like the same crack they had entered through.
'Was this some kind of test?' Theo wondered to himself as he exited through the crack. That thought was proven false the instant he saw the world outside.
The sun hung brightly in the sky. In a different position from where it had been just a moment ago when they had entered the tower.
It illuminated the huge plaza they were in. The rays of sunlight were reflected back into the sky by the towers that stood in the plaza. There at least a dozen of them, each having people pouring out of them and gathering outside.
The man with the flower had stopped a few steps away from the tower and was now looking at Theo and the other people emerging from the tower with a slightly impatient gaze.
Theo could hear the murmuring from the other people behind him as he joined the crowd waiting for the others.
Though, the conversation between the ones already waiting for them caught his attention.
"They've never been through a gate?" A young boy with the most pompous tone Theo had heard in a while said towards one of the girls standing in front of him. He shook his head "How sad."
The boy was wearing expensive clothes. Obviously, he was from a rich family.
The girl looked back at the boy with an annoyed glance. "I have a fiancé, stop talking to me."
The girl quickly walked away from them and went to a different section of the crowd. Theo snickered to himself as the pompous boy looked as if he had been struck by a hammer.
"Huh? I wasn't even trying anything… What the hell…" The boy mumbled to himself with a distraught face. "I was just making conversation… Is everyone here this rude?"
'There's a chance.' Theo thought to himself. Now would be the perfect opportunity to start setting up the foundations for future connections. It would also provide a nice distraction from the thoughts in his head.
"You're not from around here, are you?" Theo asked.
"Huh?" The boy seemed confused as he raised his gaze away from his hands to look at Theo. "No. How did you guess?"
"Just a hunch." Theo said and then nodded towards the direction where the girl had walked to. "Some people are just like that, don't worry about it."
"Ah…" The boy looked embarrassed. "That's…"
Whatever words the boy was trying to say were cut off as the woman with the rabbit ears from earlier walked up to them with the last few of their group.
"Everyone is here, let's go~." She said towards the man with the flower.
He nodded and started leading them towards the center of the plaza where a large building was erected. It looked like it had been built from the same type of stone as the towers, but its luster was nowhere near as bright. It was more like the buildings he had seen it Zeah, but with a slightly brighter image. It also wasn't as uniform as the towers. There were parts made from the same type of dark wood as in the capital.
Every other group that had been standing in front of their respective towers were also heading towards this same building.
It took them maybe five to ten minutes to walk to the building, where they were then told to wait as more and more people joined them and the individual groups that had come out of the towers formed one large group.
The two people who had been leading Theo's group were now chatting with a bunch of other figures, who Theo assumed to have the same position as the flower man and bunny girl.
He didn't actually know their names, so it was easy to just identify them with their most prominent features. Though, the bunny girl might as well have been referred to as the breasts girl. They were that prominent, even underneath the robes.
A lot of the figures were crowding around the bunny girl. It almost looked like a fan club. The flower man, curiously enough, also seemed to have a similar, if smaller fan club. Though it was made up mostly of dudes.
Theo was broken out of his musings by the sound of the big stone doors of the building creaking and starting to open.
The slow opening of the doors and the constant creaking silenced the murmuring group and brought back the attention of everyone to the building.
When the doors were fully open, it seemed that the bunny girl and flower man had been given the leader roles as they were directing everyone to enter.