Chapter 173 - Fight It Out

Despite the speed of the two girls that had rushed ahead of them the group of eight others soon caught up at the stairs where a crowd of others were beginning to climb in an orderly fashion. Apparently, they weren't the only ones with disagreements in their team. Of course, Jien knew that the academy wouldn't have such a policy if the number of conflicting teams was small. Still, to see the vast wave of students climbing the stairs with determined and in some cases murderous looks in their eyes was surprising.Despite the heavy atmosphere and the feeling that one spark would set off a storm, the students seemed to keep control of themselves. Perhaps it was the knowledge that they were being watched and punishment would be swift and unrelenting if they acted out, that kept them in order. The group of ten walked in an orderly fashion up the stairs with the spear wielding brunette at the front of the procession. Nobody tried to fight her for that position, knowing that all conflicts would be resolved in the near future.Soon they surfaced with the others from the stairwell to see the exact spectacle that they had seen when entering but flowing in reverse. The lines moved from the stairs at the corners of the building to the same organized desks with tired looking staff, now looking much more like zombies than earlier but still moving through requests in a timely order. The saving grace in the situation was that rather than registering individual members they were now working with groups, mostly ten members but in some cases twenty large, reducing their workload significantly.Jien's group was soon before a young lady who didn't seem much older than themselves, likely a new graduate or maybe only a year out of academy herself. The woman looked at the Brunette for a moment, opened a book just like the one the faculty member had used to identify Jien and his unit. She flipped through it in the same manner as if not even caring where she landed. Soon a page with what looked like a schedule for multiple locations opened up before their eyes.If one looked carefully, they would see text appearing in several boxes even as the book was sitting there before them. "Name, unit number, number of matches" the woman asked the girl before her. "Julie Summers, B114." At the last question she paused, scanning the others with her eyes before turning back to the woman behind the desk. "20." she answered simply, not explaining the logic behind the choice, or even looking back at them after the last glance.The faculty member as if not particularly caring looked over the quickly filling schedule and quickly struck out with a pen into a empty space before it could be filled. She wrote out Julie's name and unit in an elegant script at a speed that surprised everyone before sighing in relief as if she had been holding her breath. "Training Field Y778, exit through the back entrance and walk nine blocks before taking a right, five blocks then a left. Look for the designated area. You should hurry. Your time slot starts in twenty minutes and will last two hours, refereed by an instructor."The zombielike woman pointed roughly in the direction of the entrance that was at the exact opposite of where they had come in originally. The girl that they now knew to be named Julie nodded firmly and then started heading in the direction of the exit without so much as a backward glance, to which the short girl nearly snarled before chasing after. Jien shook his head helplessly before starting a light jog to keep up. The others were quick to follow, all of Jien's former cohort wondering how they had ended up with this group of troublemakers.They had yet to even properly greet each other yet they were already at everyone's throats. On top of it all they would need to work out the kinks within one weeks' time to a workable degree. This was truly an unexpected twist to them, but apparently very common given the number of groups rushing in all directions. They wondered how the academy had so many training grounds but it hit them that this was a military academy through and through, why wouldn't they have enough training grounds to handle their student population. Not to mention that their student population was four years' worth of the entire Empires' children.It was all a bit overwhelming and seemed to finally catch up to them all now that they were knee deep in it. This was not going to be like their private lessons, for those that had had such an opportunity in their youth. This was an institution meant to firm them into soldiers, into weapons to point at the Empire's enemies.It was only when they arrived at the training field and saw the many sandy fields from the base of more warehouse like buildings to the academy walls, or in the case one side on the far right they thought they saw hints of water through a gate. Each of the training fields was vast enough for several units and they appeared to be separated into quarters for this event. Many were already filled with varying students fighting with all their might, watched by different adults in uniform, most with several medals hanging on their chests.In the distances, close to the wall they spotted a simple wooden sign with the text "Y778" painted on it. It was time to find it out to learn the pecking order going forward.