Qiqi's usual opening door bang woke Serena up quite roughly.
"Good morning!" she greeted cheefully as always. „Are you excited to attend Ashin?"
"No," replied Serena.
"Oh c'mon, a bit more enthusiasm please!" said Qiqi and gave Serena an encouraging bump against the shoulder.
"I don't even know how schools work," retorted Serena, turning to the other side.
Qiqi let out a sigh of defeat and flew over to Serena's lying figure. Then she grabbed the blanket with both of her tiny hands and ripped it off. Coldness made Serena's skin shiver and she sat up quickly.
"What are you doing?" she asked, unfazed.
"Well, I don't want you to get punished. One of the rules here is to not come late to class. It's some sort of preparation to not come late in dangerous situations," replied Qiqi with a shrug.
"Alright, alright, I will get up," said Serena after closing her eyes for a brief moment.
Ashin didn't only teach their disciples fighting and the use of their power, but lots of other things that featured a well educated person. In fact, schools that trained disciples to exorcists weren't much different from ordinary schools. The main difference is that in ordinary schools was that they only taught the basic use of katara. People that wanted to become exorcist to earn more money or to have a better status un society can transfer from an ordinary school to academies that taught exorcism or search for a master who was willing to train them.
Serena had never attended any kind of school, so Ashin was her first one. However, despite she had never been educated by teachers, she still had great knowledge on a variety of things. Most of them were taught by who knew who, Serena couldn't remember, but everything she learned became useful in the future. People she had come across have often asked her where she was educated and often assumed that she was from a school like Ashin. In the end, Serena never told them that she was trained by a person she has forgotten.
"You're late, c'mon, I can only make up for ya once!" called Qiqi, her voice echoing through the hall.
Serena rushed foward to catch up with QiQi and eventually the two raced to a certain double winged door. It was slideable but QiQi seemed to have forgotten since she tried to kick down the door with her foot. She almost succeeded when the door slid aside and revealed a tall man behind it. He wore robes in different shades of grey, had his dark hair tied to a low ponytail, and wore a bright smile as well. He looked like a very kind man who was presumably just as old as Xuan Jixiang.
"Serena, that is Zhang Yin, your martial arts teacher," Qiqi introduced him. "He's a former disciple of mine."
"Shifu, please stop," laughed Zhang Yin in embarrassment.
"Anyway, Serena, your first class for today is Martial Arts. Have fun!"
As always, Qiqi disappeared with a quick salute.
"Serena - Young Misstress Serena, usually people would be called like that by their surname. However, you're an orphan so I don't know your last name so...Do you want me to call you by your first name only?" asked Zhang Yin.
"Do as you like," replied Serena.
"Alright, Serena, please step in."
Zhang Yin stepped aside to make room for Serena, who immediately saw that the martial arts hall was not ordinary.
The hall was like as huge as wide with a smooth wooden floor where it seemed easy to slip. The ceiling was wooden as well but underneath were two rows of windows that were seperated by another beam of wood. Near the windows, wooden pillars were set and at some spots Serena noticed the faint glimmering of force fields that ought to strengthen the walls and other objects if someone would ever have the power to destroy this place. The hall would easily make enough room for a army of hundrets of soldiers.
When Serena entered, she wanted to blend in with the crowd of disciples but Zhang Yin's grip on her shoulder tightened as she made a movement in their direction.
"Quit your smalltalks everyone, thank you," he said as he pushed Serena in front of the crowd.
"A new disciple has arrived, and you know how much I love introducing new people to you. That is Serena, a new disciple from the Land of Quanbu," he said.
The disciples nodded but the greeting was fell rather flatly. Not that Serena would complain about it.
"Now today we'll practice the Hook Kick also called Ushiro Mawashi Geri. I need you guys to improve your foot work because it sucks...," the last part of the sentence was muttered but some disciples were still able to hear it.
"What does it serves us for, Master Zhang?" asked one of the disciples.
"Increased leg strength and speed, also increased flexibility, improves your foot work and foot speed, and it improves your coordination," replied Zhang Yin. "Now get to work!"
He ordered his disciples to stand in line, and if one side was full they had to stand on the opposite until every single space on the sides of the hall was filled.
Then he proceeded to show them the technique and how to execute that kick exactly.
Serena saw that Zhang Yin was a skilled martial artist that would be hard to beat but that meant that Qiqi, who had been his former master, might be even stronger. She'd have trouble if she tried to sneak out. The only thing she could do was to hope that the zacrals haven't found that tunnel that led to the outside world yet.
Without warning, Serena suddenly saw someone attempting to kick her in her sides and she reflexively blocked. The person was a girl about Serena's age and she seemed quite surprised that Serena could effortlessly hold her kick.
"Girls, who said kicking each other. I said, kick the air," said Zhang Yin as he passed by.
A few disciples giggled and the girl pulled back her leg with a scowl. She would have been a very beautiful girl if it weren't for that much makeup on her face. Her skin was too pale as if she tried to look like a doll but in the end she ended up looking absolutely ridiculous. In spite of that Serena hasn't seen anyone making fun of her appearance and she soon figured out why. The girl was of a high status, how high she didn't know but definetly high enough to have a whole crowd of disciples worshipping her.
"Serena!" Serena suddenly heard a voice calling.
Lorely had switched places with a few disciples to get next to Serena, who still held up her leg.
"Hello," she greeted when Lorely stationed herself next to her.
"Hey. Do you want to know who that bitch over there is?" she pointed with her chin into the direction of the girl's direction.
"Please elaborate."
Lorely scowled when she looked over to the girl but took a deep breath to calm down. "Saint Adroga, some spoiled brat from Praestantia Terra."
For once in a while, Serena was genuinely confused. She has maybe once or twice heard of that place but she has never done any research on that.
"Praestantia Terra is an island away from where our nations are located. It is the "Land of nobility"," Lorely rolled her eyes hard and continued with an annoyed sigh. "Everyone who comes from there is ought to be highly respected otherwise you will get in trouble with the government. Don't ask me why this sort of scum is protected, they are hated by lots of people but law is law."
"That means if I were to hit her, purely hypothetical, I might go to prison?" asked Serena.
"I don't think so but they would demand to detach a limb or two from you," replied Lorely. „Just ignore her."
The lesson passed by, the students started to lose their motivation when they were close to the end. Contiuously practicing kicks was too exhausting in their opinion and yet they musn't refuse unless they wanted to bear the consequences. When class was finally over for today, the newly created Voto Inferni gathered in Simon's room. Especially Simon and Noya were expecting results whereas Ora doubted if the drone had the ability to find that object very quickly. However, Lorely was indeed very skilled and the drone had located the amulet within twenty hours already.
„There aren't many cursed objects with a curse flow like that," said Lorely as she beamed a few screen sized holograms into the air.
"That's it, right?" she pointed at a photo that showed the amulet quite clearly. Even though the photo was made with a zoom to even recognize it, the amulet was good to see.
"And the one who is wearing this?" asked Serena.
Lorely scrolled through the gallery of photos the drone has taken, all of them had a particular man in it. In all of those pictures he was seen wearing a fine suit or in a high place.
Simon let out a groan as he saw the picture. "Not that guy!"
"Do you know him?" asked Ronan.
"Only briefly but he is a gambler. He was once a guest in our casino," answered Simon.
"And?"
"His name is Igor Volkov, he's especially good at card games," Lorely replied instead of Simon.
"How are we even suppose to meet him?" asked Ora.
Lorely rolled her eyes. They were so clueless that it was almost laughable. "Hacking into his calender?" she suggested while already proceeding to do it.
Serena glanced over her shoulder and observed how Lorely was hacking the system. That could might become useful to her in the future and Serena was fast at learning from observation.
"In two days he will go to the casino that your family owns, Senior Voronov," said Lorely after a while.
"What?!" exclaimed Simon in utter disbelief. "Why?" he then asked like a small child.
"Because your casino is very well known," said Nile.
For once or perhaps twice, Simon wished the casino his family owned was some unknown facility in the north.
"This man owns something we should take," began Noya, "that means we need to kill him."
"Absolutely not," said Ora, headshaking.
"Oh what's the matter? Are you afraid you'll taint your reputation only because you killed something that is not a katara devourer?" countered Xiao provocatively.
"Listen, I-am-so-smart-san, you have no idea what my aniki and I have experienced. Outsiders have no right to judge!" spat Ronan.
A snort escaped Xiao's lips and he curled them into an unbothered smirk. "Even if I don't have any right to judge, I can still state my opinion, can't I? We have freedom of speech in Ashin Temple after all. How is it my fault if you take it personally?" he retorted.
"You-!"
"Fumetsu, calm down. It's pointless to fight someone like him," said Ora, grabbing his brother by his wrist.
Heavily breathing, Ronan backed away from Xiao, who was still smirking tauntingly.
"Qiang Xiao, please stop," Serena chimed in from the other side.
Xiao's head shot up, he glanced at Serena before he eventually lowered it. "My apologies, qianbei[1]," he said with a small smile.
"Lorely - was it? Who is that girl I sometimes see next to him?" Noya suddenly asked, thereby changing the topic.
"I assume that she is his daughter," said Serena.
She found the pictures that were all floating in the air fascinating since she had never seen something like that first hand.
"Should we kill her too?" asked Xiao, earning annoyed glares from Ora, Lorely and Ronan.
"We can use her to get the amulet," suggested Serena as a second option.
"I vote for the second option!" Ronan immediately called, raising from his seat.
"I vote second," Lorely agreed.
"I'll go with those two," nodded Ora.
Simon, Nile, Noya, and Xiao didn't state their opinion but it was clear that only Xiao would vote for his own idea.
"What a democratic folk," muttered Xiao, offended that no one chose his plan. "However, I know the perfect man to knock her out," said Xiao while everyone else just gave him an either questioning or doubting stare.
"Noya," proclaimed Xiao. He wasn't mocking Noya. If anything, it was a genuine compliment and Noya had no idea how to take it. Eventually, he stayed silent.
"I would also suggest that the rest of us should go in duos," said Lorely.
"We are seven," said Serena. „Unless one of us doesn't volunteer for being splitted into half, there will be no way we can go in duos."
"Do you have any better suggestion?" countered Lorely.
"Let the group form teams. They know amongst each other whom they can work with best," replied Serena calmly.
"Aniki and me!" shouted Ronan as if he was afraid that nobody could hear him.
Nile let out a long sigh, giving Simon a side glance. Even without any words, they both knew that they would team up as well, and that would be a pain since they couldn't get along.
Serena smiled softly but victoriously in Lorely's direction, and the latter let out a sound that sounded something between a sigh and a laugh. "Fine, you won. I guess that's why you deserve the position as a leader. Let's team up too."
"You left me," Xiao's voice echoed from the corner.
"You will come with us," said Serena, something menacing laid itself upon her face. "And we will keep an eye on you in case you might cause trouble."
"Why of course, qianbei," replied Xiao, to everybody's surprise, obediently.
When Serena was finally able to rest in her bedroom, she sat down into meditation position. Thoughts were running in her head, she was afraid that she might misinterpret something and came to wrong conclusions. That was why she tried to think of any possible solution or outcome of a situation, weighing her options and then making a final decision. That was how she has been doing it since she has been a child but it had never caused a headache that worse.
Most of her thoughts circeled about the little zacral Xiao. She wasn't certain if someone else has noticed it but Xiao was a very odd person. Although he said things that sounded stupid, they sounded more like a defense wall from his side, put simply: he was pretending to be stupid to fool others. However, Serena was the sort of person that would get fooled on purpose only to fool the one who attempted to fool her back. His attitude reminded Serena of someone she was sure she has never met. And yet it seemed so familiar.
Sighing, she leaned her head back and tried to think of something else. Her thoughts wandered to the Voto Inferni. On the surface, their group seemed nothing more than just a bunch of youths hanging out together and trying to be something useful to society, but Serena looked deeper. Deep in all of her comrades hearts was something sorrowful. Since she was a child, Serena could easily look through facades and those of her comrades were no exception. However, Serena didn't interfere into personal affairs, she only helped if someone specifically asked her to, otherwise she will ignore the matter and move on with life. After all, that was how reality worked.
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[1] "Qianbei" is a Chinese honorific to politely adress someone older like your senior.