Luna sighed softly. She gazed at Emmia's sleeping figure. Emmia had lost consciousness once more, just a single day after the last time.
'I swear she's trying for a record or something,' Luna thought to herself, thinking back to all the times that Emmia had fallen unconscious and had been taken to the nurse's office or the hospital.
Luna's vigil was broken by the entry of the head nurse, Sophia.
"Oh, hi Luna," Sophia greeted the student. She obviously knew the black-haired girl's name. In fact, it was the director himself who had told her to keep an eye on her in case she found any abnormalities.
"Mmm....hi," Luna managed to get a greeting out before returning to her default silence.
Sophia turned her attention to Emmia. She had come to check up on her when she had heard the news from an interesting source.
'It's the regular!' a nurse had shouted to another nurse.
'HOW?! It hasn't even been a day!' Another nurse exclaimed in disbelief.
'HAHA! Pay up!' the first nurse laughed in joy,
'ARGGHh.'
Sophia had decided to visit Emmia after hearing about the 'regular' from the duo.
Activating her gift, Sophia examined Emmia's body.
'Her body is fine...'
'Her nerve count is roughly the same...?'
Sophia circulated Emmia's blood once more and checked once more.
'Huh...it is the same...'
Whenever Sophia had checked Emmia's body, the nerve count, as she liked to put it, had always increased from the last time. But this time was an anomaly clearly shown by her examination.
'I did check quite recently...' Sophia recounted back to when Emmia had visited her office a few days prior. It was the day after she had been discharged from the Spectrum Hospital.
'The last time did have an abnormal increase,' Sophia thought carefully.
'I need to observe this for a longer time for any proper results.' Sophia concluded and deactivated her gift.
"When will this girl stop coming here so often," Sophia muttered softly. All Sophia wished to see was the wards empty and no one injured. Although Sophia knew very well that it was a pipe dream, she continued to believe. Sophia didn't have any other reprieve other than to believe.
"Do you know what happened to her?" Sophia asked while deep in thought.
"...It may be due to her..eyes," Luna answered after a thought.
"Her eyes?" Sophia muttered as she activated her gift again.
Checking Emmia's eyes, Seril found no major abnormalities, except for an unusual gathering of universal energy inside them.
'Interesting. Has she awakened the ability to see universal energy? But that shouldn't lead to such a major change in her eyes. I should get it checked in depth.' Sophia thought to herself.
"Just let me know when she wakes up ok? I'll need to do some more comprehensive tests," Sophia informed Luna and then proceeded back to her office without waiting for an answer.
"..." Luna closed her mouth without being able to respond to the hurried doctor.
'Haah, I need to respond faster next time...' Luna thought to herself with determination.
If she wanted to communicate properly with people, she needed to work on speaking faster and with fewer pauses in between her words.
Luna scratched her side absentmindedly as she immersed herself in mental mock conversations with different people she knew.
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Shui hummed to herself what she thought was a weird tune as she walked along with Icarth along the hallways.
'Where have I listened to this before?' Shui thought to herself, trying to remember where she had heard that certain tune as she trailed behind Icarth.
The duo which wasn't seen together for a couple of years was finally together again. Many of the older students of the same grade recognized the pair in shock.
"Their back together?" One student uttered in shock.
"Hmm, interesting."
"Oh wow, you guys are right," Another answered back.
"When did those two get back on speaking terms?"
Whispers like so flew around the corridors and followed the pair until they exited the building.
Shui just rolled her eyes upon hearing some of them while Icarth ignored them entirely. Nothing that they could do about it. After all, people love to gossip especially if it's about a boy-girl pair.
"Are you going to keep following me?" Icarth finally asked.
"Finally! Geez, I thought you wouldn't ask and would just go on your way." Shui skipped ahead.
"And?" Icarth asked again.
"Oh, I don't have any particular reason. I was just bored," Shui shrugged her shoulder elegantly. Her red hair caught the sunlight, turning it a brighter shade, more akin to orange in the midday sun.
Icarth closed his eyes and shrugged his eyebrows. He continued to walk, not minding that Shui was following him.
"Where are we going?" Shui asked finally.
"The beast containment facility," Icarth answered curtly.
"Ahh, someone is finally going to visit his partner?" Shui teased Icarth.
"I need him for something," Icarth mentioned refusing to elaborate further.
"I see," Shui nodded her head and didn't question Icarth further. After all, Icarth had a lot of secrets that he had gathered up in the few years that they had not talked to each other. And Shui knew that Icarth didn't like to reveal his secrets unless he wanted to by his own violation.
The pair walked through the semi-busy streets of Nova Academy, moderately filled with classes of students of all ages moving towards their respective destinations. Amongst them, were staff who worked at Nova Academy and the occasional guard who patrolled the streets to maintain order.
The pair walked in relative silence, with Icarth busy with his thoughts while Shui contemplated on the reason for Icarth's sudden visit.
'It's definitely not because he's suddenly feeling compassionate towards Jade.' Shui ruled out. While Icarth and Jade were indeed partners, Icarth had some....problems with Jade as his partner, which led to a bitter partnership between the two.
'It has to be related to training or something.' Shui nodded to herself. Before she knew it, the duo arrived in front of the beast containment facility which was situated right next to the stadium where students conduct their practical training.
Entering the building, Shui looked around in wonder. This was her first time visiting the beast containment facility, and she wanted to see for herself if the rumors did it any justice.
Icarth stopped in front of the receptionist's desk near the entrance and requested the receptionist, "I'm Icarth Struze, I'm here to get my pet."
"One moment," saying so, the receptionist checked some records and moved deeper into the building. "Follow me." The receptionist called out to the pair after seeing Shui fidget impatiently while trying to look deeper into the building.
Shui controlled her excitement and followed the receptionist while Icarth followed after a short sigh. Deeper into the building, there were large rooms of reinforced walls that contained different beasts, from bears, to birds, to certain rooms even containing insects. The rooms were as large as football fields at times to compensate for the size and quantity of the beasts contained inside. Each room had a different environment to accommodate the various beasts inside the building.
Shui took it all in with wonder, looking inside the rooms through the transparent glass window fitted at the entrances.
"Shui," Icarth called out.
"Yes?" Shui answered, not looking away from the wolves inside the room.
'These look familiar,' Shui squinted her eyes and tried to jog her memory.
"Shui, let's go," Icarth called out once more.
"The first test!" Shui exclaimed suddenly remembering where she had seen these wolves from.
"What?" Icarth asked confused at the sudden outburst.
"These wolves, they were the same wolves from the first test," Shui gestured to Icarth to come over and take a look.
Icarth stared at Shui for a moment before relenting and shuffling over.
Taking a look inside, Icarth found the same wolves that he had killed during the first practical test.
"Why are there so many?" Icarth thought out loud.
"I was thinking the same thing," Shui agreed.
"Hmm," Icarth scrunched his forehead as a certain feeling hit him.
'Something is off about these wolves.' Icarth thought to himself.
He watched as a couple of wolves tiredly trudged around, aimlessly and with a hollow look in their eyes. Although their bodies were fine, none of the wolves felt as if they had any life to them.
'Odd...' Icarth thought to himself.
"They look dead," Shui observed and Icarth couldn't agree more.
"Hey! Time's up!" The receptionist called out to the pair.
"Let's go," Shui said as she reluctantly pulled herself away from the window.
"Hm," Icarth murmured and turned away, his eyes still lingering on the room with the wolves.
Icarth and Shui made their way back to the entrance where the receptionist was waiting for them with a cage. Inside the cage, was, of course, Jade who was currently leaning against one side while lazily staring outside the cage.
"So how was inside the building?" The receptionist asked Shui as he handed the cage over.
"It was interesting," Shui answered truthfully.
"But what is up with those wolves?" Shui asked after a moment.
"The wolves? Ah! Do you mean the gluttonous wolves?" The receptionist asked while pointing to the same room where Shui and Icarth had been a few moments ago.
"Yes," Shui answered while Icarth nodded his head.
"You see, they look like that because we are suppressing their gift. We can't feed them anything or else their gift might activate and they might start evolving." The receptionist explained.
"Then how do they look physically alright?" Shui asked confused.
"They're being fed only universal energy which is used to maintain their bodies..." The receptionist continued to explain all of Shui's questions patiently.
'Is it just that they look dead because they haven't been eating?' Icarth thought to himself. Something was nagging at him that it wasn't the case.
'Argh, forget it, I have more important things to do,' Icarth shook his head free of unnecessary thoughts and lowered his gaze to find Jade staring back at him with his tiny eyes.
Icarth watched as Jade's nostrils flared and he turned away as Icarth looked on speechless.