"You know, Hikari, I just noticed you don't have a shadow. Speaking of which, you never had one since arriving here." Valentina speaks up as the four walk through the hallway to get to the prayer room.
"Why'd you bring it up?" Hikari mutters, walking by. She hated whenever Valentina would speak of her shadows, knowing that no matter what she did, if Valentina chose to go back on her word of helping her, she could very easily spy on her and gather allies behind her back. Both Hikari and the voices in the back of her mind knew this, and so chose to keep the members of the small square distant.
"Well, much like your uniform...we have the darker coloured robes while you have the orange one." Valentina answers, glancing a look at the orange clothing Hikari wore, causing her to breathe a sigh, although not fully relieved.
"It was because she impressed High Priestess Ashlen in class, despite not paying attention." Cassideyiana replies. "That and it's too stuffy for her fighting style unlike ours."
"Isn't her fighting style the same as ours? That showing off." Valentina groans. The voices agreed, causing Hikari to answer back.
"No, that's just how I was trained with people. It was when we did the mock exams."
"Oh those? I just hacked and slashed, I didn't watch any of the other exams though..." Valentina admits, glancing towards Hikari. "Truly was a boring way to pass the time, couldn't even properly fight to my heart's content." She sighs, looking back forward."Although, that's not why we were fighting anyways. I didn't even use the fighting style taught in class and still beat the instructor, then why is it that you got the orange uniform?"
"It's because she completed the monk training, instead of you who has a bloodlust known throughout the entire church!" Another person yells out, and the four of them glance over at another group of trainees, the one who yelled out having silver hair and blue eyes. They yelled out some more, "I don't even know if there is a difference between a rabid beast and you, Valentina Evercros!"
"Ryder," Hikari growls out, her voices chanting in her head as she continued to speak. "Why are you butting into everyone else's business?"
"It's not my fault this loud mouth for a brain is being way too loud for us to even concentrate on our training!" Ryder chuckles.
"If you are busy yapping, why don't you use that energy to fight instead?" Cassideyiana muttered, causing the voices to redirect their words of attention to her.
"Excuse me?"
"Well, if you needed me to repeat myself, when you could hear Valentina, maybe you should check your ears? As I recall, you failed that part of the exam when Priestess Gaia defeated you." Hikari and the voices knew Cassideyiana was picking a fight, and knew it was a serious one too.
Grabbing Cassideyiana by her shirt, Ryder hissed, "Do you really want to fight, you blind brat?"
"I mean, if you want one, I wouldn't give you that satisfaction," Cassideyiana muttered. "Someone else might, though."
"Trying to sick one of your friends on me? Don't think I'm alone." Ryder stated, snapping his fingers before two others walk away from the large group that was training, before going towards Valentina and Hikari. Valentina, seeing their shadows, threw the first punch as soon as one of the two trainees went for it. This caused the voices to chant as Hikari drew her training sword and attacked the other of the two with it.
Vincent, seeing the two fight and Ryder still not letting Cassideyiana go, decided to attack Ryder by punching him in the face, causing him to stagger.
"You're going to regret that, Evercros!" Ryder stood back up and punched Vincent in the face.
A fight brewed out after that, involving many of the trainees in the training hall, the main culprits fighting being Vincent, Hikari, Valentina, Ryder and Ryder's lackeys. The fight continued on for more minutes before a loud voice boomed throughout the hall.
"That's enough!" The loud voice revealing themselves to be Priestess Ashlen, with Cassideyiana, and two small children with purple hair and upon closer inspection, fins where their ears would've been, standing next to her as well.
The fighting ceased, Ryder and Vincent at each other's throats, Hikari and Valentina pointing their training blades at Ryder's lackeys.
"You seven follow me, as for everyone else, head to the prayer hall and pray for your mistakes here to be forgiven. We do not fight without cause in this church!" Priestess Ashlen ordered, motioning for the seven of the people involved to follow her.
All Hikari could think throughout that entire fight was that it was such a shame that she couldn't end the fight right then and there by eliminating those people who stood in her way and caused this disturbance. For once, her and the voices agreed on something, and began to slowly spite the Priestess for stopping the fight when it was getting good. These thoughts continued on even after Priestess Ashlen led them to the High Priestess Wislena's room.
"You seven, truly are the worst trainees I've had in this church," The High Priestess disappointedly stated. "What could I do to punish such insolence in this place, when you seven will continue?"
"But High Priestess, these, these freaks, started it!" Ryder shouted, before being interrupted.
"And you clearly haven't repented enough, boy! None of you have. I was going to give this job to the paladins, however, someone told me this would happen, and as such, I have an assignment for the seven, well, eight of you. An outsider will be joining into your assignment."
"Assignment?" Hikari questioned, along with the voices.
"Yes. One that I think would interest at least some of you, and prove to be a punishment of sorts." The High Priestess stated, setting down a paper with a report on it. "Have you heard of Calamatis?"