All twenty men who had accompanied the children to the Academy receiving their cue from the older wizards, turned and left.
The wizard who welcomed them smiled widely, whereas the other wizards with him tried to act present and welcoming. He had forced them all to personally welcome the new students into the academy.
"You have set foot into the prestigious academy, one out of two in this great empire." The wizard said dwindling the uproar from the students.
His statement did make them understand why this school was much bigger than the others they had seen. Seven kingdoms were branded under a single empire, though they mostly handled their affairs independent of the emperor. It made sense now why four flags were on each tower around the building. It also meant the other academy had to cater for three kingdoms alone.
Darkmoon itself belonged to Mulgard and the other belonged to a certain kingdom as well.
"You each passed the test to get here, so you must not abuse that privilege. As much as I would want to guide you through, that's not my job. I'll let Mr Chadwick do all that's needed. Welcome once again," he said and all five wizards left. In front of the children, two large doors opened and out of them came a man putting on a black overcoat.
He had black hair which fell at his back. He stared at them through his dark eyes, his lips almost curved into a frown, his brows almost touched as he furrowed them causing wrinkles to form on his forehead. The major thing the kids noticed was out of everyone they had seen on their journey here and afterwards, this man was the youngest.
His stark appearance and gaze, made them guess he was very strict. "Where do I start?" He mumbled to himself while looking at the hundreds he was supposed to guide. "He has already welcomed you all, the next thing you need is a tour and a knowledge of the rules around here." He spoke and turned to leave. "Come along and no more chattering from here on." He gestured with his hands and they all followed silently.
Meanwhile returning to their office in the higher floors of the building, the one who talked to the children had an unnerving smile on.
"I don't know why you had to drag us there for that." One of the women said. Her face was hardly visible through the hood she had on. Her lips were all that could be seen and she clearly was not happy about being disturbed.
"He's new at this and wants to interact with the kids, leave him be." Another wizard spoke in his defence as they walked up the stairs to the last floor and into a hall with five doors alone. The five doors led to the five chambers belonging to the same number of individuals.
Everyone entered their rooms and shut the door. Immediately after, one room was being opened surreptitiously. Out of the room, the said 'new' one snuck out and entered the room of another.
"You don't have to be sneaky, you know. No one would question you." A feminine voice said as soon as he shut the door behind him.
She opened the blinds for the windows and took off her hood, revealing her facial features. She fell back on the chair and pulled back her long, a bit shaggy, brown hair which had a couple of grey strands here and there. She tied it up and rested on the chair. Her sharp blue eyes stared at the man standing at her door in annoyance.
"I know but it's still better to be safe. I didn't want anyone to begin to pry," he replied moving away from the door.
"Then we shouldn't be talking about this here, Lucian." she rolled her eyes. "Straight to the matter, you saw it too, or should I say felt it?" She suddenly sat up with a serious expression.
"I did, a part of her was here," Lucian responded with a nod. "And you said it would be a waste of time going to see the new students." He teased her for being against his idea.
"But, that would only be possible if it was true that it saved the child." She said ignoring his last statement.
"Feeling it confirms it did save the child." He replied.
"This means that one of them, if not both are alive. For sure the child will not survive if they were both killed." She spoke again with an oxymoron of feelings on her face and in her voice. She was both happy and sad.
"I hope it is he who is alive and if we are right, Jadis, we need to find him." Lucian said and Jadis nodded slowly in agreement.
"For that, we need to find which child belongs to them."
Meanwhile, getting a tour of the school, the kids followed Chadwick silently. He mentioned a few rules when they began walking; no chattering, no interruptions when he's talking, ask only when given the room to and importantly, no stupid questions.
At the moment, they were in a large classroom in a circular arrangement. In the centre of the room was where the teachers would stand, while being surrounded by chairs with a space to walk to the door, and staircases to get to the different rows of seats. They had seen different room of this sort, but this was by far the largest and looked able to fit the all in.
"This room is where you will learn the basics is magic, spell casting. Every little thing you need to know about being a wizard or witch, will be taught here and I am your teacher." He said as they looked around. "Any questions?" He asked like did when they entered any room or went anywhere. Some of them gently rubbed the furniture with their fingers, there were several paintings on the walls of this room and the others they had seen. Even the halls had various paintings hung up. Most of them were people, beasts, nature and others, weird symbols they didn't understand.
The rooms they had seen before this one were introduced to be for different homeroom lessons, there were specific classes for certain categories of powers possessed, another for those who can't choose a specialty, and one which basically taught about weapon handling. They were told for the first year, they wouldn't use it much and while that room was inside the building, it felt like they were teleported outside the building, the sky was visible, the earth flourished around them and beneath their feet.
The interior though of every other place in the academy was a bit dark. Every new room they entered felt like a different place from the rest of the building except for the major classroom and almost everything moved about. The staircase didn't have a specific start and end, they just took you where you wanted or needed to go. Running in twirls, horizontal as well as vertical, the stairs seemed like a mess and they wondered how they would get used to such a thing.
Walking in the school, felt like taking a long walk up and down a hill repeatedly, it was getting tedious, considering they hadn't rested properly after the test. Before them, a large door opened revealing a room filled with books.
"This is the school's library." The wizard spoke. "As you can see a lot of knowledge is being kept here." He emphasized on two words 'a lot'. Looking around and certainly up, the room was very wide and tall. It had nothing but tall shelves each filled with books, then benches and tables for those who wished to feed their minds.
"For this first year, you are advised to not go above the second demarcation on each shelf, everything above that is for the next year." Chadwick pointed at the separation on a shelf.
After every two demarcation on the shelves, was a ceiling like platform which above it continued the tall shelves filled with books. It looked like a different room entirely when looking from the ceiling. Every door lead a different year level in to read and there was a total of four doors each on every corner of the library in all four demarcations signifying the four years of the academy.
"Any questions?" He asked again and someone raised their hand
"Is there a punishment for those who go over the demarcations?" A boy asked. He did wonder if they were not supposed to go over, whyw as there a ladder leading to it.
"From your teachers? Not at all. From the school? Yes. Whatever you read which is not for your level will completely distort your learning process. Believe me when I say it's not a good idea." He responded. "Everything you need is arranged in different sections, history, mystery, strange occurences, fantasy, even when right now our world be considered fantasy from those who lived before us. Most questions you need answers to will be found here." He said and they exited they left the library.
"Any other questions? I am about to end this tour." Chadwick said feeling tired.
"The paintings, the ones with symbols, what are they for? What do they represent?" A red haired boy asked.
"That you will find out in class." He answered. "Since there are no more questions, we move to the end of this tour." He said and walked off, they followed.
Stepping through the door they were now outside and walked through a concrete part of the open field leading to a tower. "Here, all your belongings are kept, you will go in and get them. Any help you need in this academy, message you would like to send to a family member or whomever, would be done here." He said. "This is where my tour ends whatever question you need to ask, do it in there, there are others to help. There you will as well be guided to your various rooms." He moved to the side as the doors to the tower opened.
"One more thing, your classes begin early tomorrow. You will be told more when you go in." He added and in a blink of an eye he was gone.
"Welcome, I am Mr Rasmus," A man appeared in front of the door. He gestured for them to follow him.
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Author here,
I apologize for the delay in updates. It will be consistent hereon out.
I have a new book out named "A foe for the devil." It is currently participating in this month's WPC. Kindly check it out. Your support is highly appreciated.
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