With the merging of other realms, the planet had become less of a sphere and more of an irregular oval. Resembling an oval with wider 'hips'.
After much time, Asher's bus left Saint's City, the rain still pouring heavily.
Outside the walls were large farming grounds, with houses here and there.
The bus drove onto the road, past the farming area, passing a settlement area in the distance with multiple houses.
'She's probably tending to the garden.' Asher glenced at the place he grew up, remembering a certain nanny who raised him.
The bus drove out of the area, coming to an empty grassfield, with grasslands stretching out into the horizon, the rain still pouring.
Outside of civilization was mostly empty, due to dangers of magical beast roaming around, but most parts were clear.
"This dwarf staff was worth the effort." Sitting at the front, Chase was spewing his words, pissed-out drunk.
Apperantly, this was the 'acknowledgement' from Pumza academy, proving they deserved their spot. Obviously, four-eyes wanted to complain but was stopped.
The wheels on the bus suddenly retracted, and it levitated into the air, boosters exploded at the back, propelling the bus forward.
Inside, the students didn't feel anything, only the scenary passing faster.
An hour pasted, and they finally saw a large forest in the distance, the bus increased it's altitude and flew even faster, 1 hour, 2 hour, 3 hours later, the bus was already cruising over an ocean.
After crossing the ocean, the weather had changed, in the sky, two sun's were visible, the heat was unlike anything they've ever experienced.
"Goddamn it's hot out here!" Atlas complained, taking off his shirt and jacket, on his lap was a girl who was asleep.
The children in the bus went from feeling cold, to comfortable, and finally irritatingly tired of the heat. Most of them woke up, confused and covered in sweat.
Rolling down the window didn't help either as that only allowed more heat to enter.
"Apperantly, our bus has special Ac's for situations like these, it'd be preferable to have it on." Four-eyes stated while fanning himself.
"Wait, we got AC? Ayo driver turn that shit on!" Suprised, Atlas gently removed the girl from his lap and went to the front.
"Ayo, why you holding out?" Atlas quickly found the botton for the AC and turned it up.
As soon as he did, fresh cooling air started filled the bus, causing everyone to relax.
"I'm sorry sir, I'm new here." The driver, a young looking man, nervously replied.
"Aight don't sweat it, don't get us lost though."
The bus increased it's altitude and came to the clouds, in the distance, a large city built on the clouds was visible. Also visible were winged figures, flying back and forth.
"Your with Saint's academy? This isn't your place, try to be early next time, human!" A winged guard at the gate disdainful said, while quickly letting the bus pass.
The driver apologized and drove inside.
Suprisingly, the city was made of white marble walls, so too was the ground.
The streets were exclusively people with immense beauty with pointy ears, young and old alike. Occasionally some with white wings walked about.
The bus attracted a lot of attention on it's way to town, particularly because there weren't any other vehicles on the road. Asher noticed that they didn't have much technology, which was odd.
The bus finally stopped at a church like building.
The students quickly bore the heat and entered the church. They were brought to a large platform with intricate symbols, it was teleportation hub.
After waiting in groups, everyone appeared in front of a grassy mountain range, with various trees and plants.
The temperature had dropped, returning to a bearable level. The skies were still clear with two suns, oddly enough behind them in the distance, they saw clouds on the ground.
The air was refreshing, the whole area was filled with life.
"Look alive people, we have a long way to go, try to not embarrass our school, I'm looking at you four-eyes." having fixed himself and looking sober, Chase quickly scolded everybody else.
Chase led everyone on the trail, leading to the mountain range.
The distance was long, luckily some trees provided shelter in between the mountains, and the sun wasn't as hot.
5 hours later...
Everyone noticed, the suns hadn't moved an inch from their positions. Their trail finally stopped at one of the tallest mountains there, atop the mountains were gigantic trees, it seemed like vegetation trieved.
"Ayo, I'm tired of this walking shit, why can't these people just get cars man." Atlas voiced out his frustration, his words obviously shared by others, but there was nothing they could do.
"Well, we could have taken the easy way but none of you asked, don't worry though, your baptism is just up that mountain, don't worry you almost there." Chase was a saint himself so he didn't get tired that easily.
His words obviously caused some resentment among the students, but they could hold it in, they really needed that baptism.
So the walking continues, luckily there were steps in to walk on, the only problem was that, they coiled around the mountain.
Just like that, 3 more hours passed, with sweat-soaked clothes, they finally reached the top.
Whoever designed these stairs has a special place in hell, right next to the inventer of pop-up ads. The students thought.
"You guys must be here for the baptizing, right this way please." A female guard, wearing silver-white armor with a white pair of wings was waiting for them.
The place was teaming with guards, left right and center, all of them armed to the teeth.
'Are they expecting an attack or something?' Asher wonder looking at the scene.
The skyscraper tall buildings were turned into well buildings. Houses could be seen carved into the trees, with people flying back and forth.
Asher's class was brought to single tree, slightly out of 'town'.
"These will be your living arrangements for today, the ceremony will be held tomorrow. Don't cause trouble or you'll be punished." The guard explained, without spending a second she left.
The inside of the tree was very spacious, with stairs leading to rooms, scattered across the inside.
Not far away, everyone noticed other students from saints Academy. It was the other class that arrived first.
Oddly enough, all of them had ugly looks on their faces.
"Akari, what happened, why do they look uglier them normal." Chase came forward and asked the teacher.
The teacher, a female, with shoulder-length black hair, with a small face, was wearing a business suite, with a long tight skirt, that hugged her curves.
"They were challenged by some angel kids and lost badly, luckily I was able to heal all their injuries." The female teacher, Akari explained with a bad expression.
Asher noticed a few familiar faces in the crowd, besides his neighbor Abel, he saw the other sponsored kids, including Aiden, the son of his sponsor.
"So ya'll got your asses clapped huh? That's tough but, where the food at?." Atlas laughed.
He hadn't eaten all day, they left early and had to fight on an empty stomach. He had prepared some meat earlier but some bastard had slapped it out of his hands. Thinking about this, Atlas vowed to proparly pay that person back.
"There's food in the lobby over there." Akira pointed towards the other end of them room, where multiple glass display counters were arranged.
Asher's class needn't be told twice, they quickly ran there.
"What I say about embarrassing our school, if you don't stop, none of you will attend the ceremony and I'll expel you here and now, I wonder how you'll return home." Chase got irritated and immediately threatened.
His methods were devious but quite effective. Everyone stopped rushing and formed a line, before moving forward. No one wanted to disarm a Dyscalculia time bomb.
"Haha looks like even dogs can be trained." Suddenly, a deep voice sounded in the room, the tone filled with contempt.
Standing by the entrance, were 3 figures wearing white appeared.
"So a second batch of humans arrived, I truely want to see if your all that weak!" In the middle, a muscular youth with blond hair, cut in a fade, spoke. He had spoken earlier with a deep voice.
Seeing him, the first class lowered their head in disappointment, others wore angry expressions.
Asher's class on other hand, ignored him after the initial reaction. Clearly eating was more important then entertaining some clowns.
Being ignored, the mascular youths expression darkened with shame and anger.
"You inferior humans dare to ignore me!? None of you have the honour of an angel. I'll give you the chance to reclaim your friends honour, yet you reject my good will! Truely inferior!" The youth spat on the ground. His serious expression, showing a hint of contempt.
"Calm down my friend, give them a chance, I'm sure they aren't that dumb, but I say we shouldn't expect to much from them." On the side, a youth with long blond hair said, while fanning himself.
Wearing a long robe, his physic was skinnier, and slightly shorter then the bulky youth.
Hearing their words, the first class looked at the second class expectedly, but the second class were focused on getting food and finally sitting down and eating hungrily. Totally ignoring the provocation.
After grabbing their food, they sat down on lunch tables scattered across the room.
"Ayo, this meat ain't have bad, it's a shame the chef isn't experienced, what a waste." Atlas commented through bites of food. He was the first to get his food.
"Hmm." Asher and Four-eyes nodded. They knew when it came to food, Atlas was particularly serious, and rarily did he boast about anything.
His comment was particularly loud in the quite room, drawing everyone's attention.
"Oh, our meat isn't up to your standard huh? Are insinuating that you can do better?" Seeing the opportunity, the youth with long blond hair stated.
"I ain't insinuating shit, I can prepare it better." Atlas stated between eating.
"Then why do you keep stuffing your face, if the foods no good?" the bulky youth interrupted.
"It ain't the foods fault that it wasn't taken care off proparly."
"You sure are-"
"My friend, let me take care of it." The smaller youth stopped the bulky youth.
"Excuse me, your their teacher right, can you tell me who's the strongest of them all is." the youth politely walked to Chase.
Although a bit reluctant, chase pointed towards Asher and Atlas, "It should be between those two."
After spending a month with them, and seeing the performance, Chase had already narrowed down the candidates.
Everyone's gaze landed on them.
"I see, Pardon my late introduction, but my names Jerahmeel, I'm one of the twelve holy disciples of the church." The youth, Jerahmeel, walked up to Asher's table and introduced.
After getting no response, he continued smiling, "My friends, I see you enjoy eating food, why is that?"
Atlas stopped his moved, he thought and responded, "Food and women are the finner things in life, without them, life is meaningless."
Chase couldn't help nodding on the side.
"Truely admirable, then I propose we have a food eating contest."
"Oh?"
"If you win, we'll give you as much delicacy as you want, and if we win, you have to spar with my friend here." Jerahmeel hid his smile behind his fan.
"Hmmh, tempting offer but not interested" Atlas continued focusing on his food.
"ehh... Then what are you interested in?" Jerahmeel asked in annoyance.
"Not you that's for sure."
The bulky youth got irritated, walking up to Atlas, he slammed the table, causing the plates to jump up.
"Fight with me, if you lose, I'll allow you the honour of joining my pact, and if by some miracle you win, I'll join your pact." the bulky youth stated.
His words undoubtedly shocked the others, even Asher momentarily froze.
Angels were inheritly stronger then humans, as a byproduct most of them were arrogant. The fact that Atlas would get the chance to either join a pact full of them or have one in his pact, was cause for great envy.
"Hey stupid, don't slam the table." Atlas's expression suddenly turned cold, he looked at the youth with deadpan yet deadly eyes.
The others who saw this, subconsciously gulped down some Saliva. It seemed like the teachers words weren't full of hot air.
"Fight me!" undeterred the bulky youths voice got even deeper.
Atlas glanced at Chase and saw the later shaking his head, he looked back at the youth, "1 I like women, I'm not interested in you. 2 back up off me, and gimme 3 steps."
The bulky youth was undoubtedly close, after staring at Atlas, he back up, "Che, cowards." he said.
"Fine if you win you can have me." just then, an alluring female voice gripped everyone's hearts.
Everyone looked. The third person, a female, finally spoke, as she walked toward, Asher's table.
Every step she took carried elegance, her sharp silver eyes, a tapestry of stories untold, sparkle with the vivacity of a starlit sky. Her small lips, threatened to curve and clense the world of all evil. Her face alone could start and end wars.
Fully clad in silver light-armor, her armor couldn't hide the possibility of exquisite curves. Nothing could be added or removed to improve her looks. Her vague figure was so good that if the devil saw it he might just switch sides, her figure looked so good that she looked like she hasn't committed any sins.
(Author: sorry I'm getting sidetracked but, There is a place boyond descriptive words, her beauty exists there, a place of perfection. The only word I could think of besides peak, was perfect, she looks perfect.)
She instantly drew everyone's attention. The boys felt their chests tighten, their breadth rapid, and their...blood pressure rise. Even the girls felt a bit pressured and conflicted.
Asher shook his head and looked at the bulky youth, "I'll fight you."