The sun beaming through the sky roof, glorious quartz lined the walls as they entered the head office.
Zeth craned his neck, glancing around at the incomprehensible beauty of the tiling and architecture.
"Where are we?" He squeaked, fearing that the giant that had taken him was going to lecture him before removing him from the school.
Luka sighed as he felt Zeth quivering from fear. There was no way he could blame the student, after being mauled by a dire wolf and needing to be saved by a staff member, it didn't seem as if he was going to pass the test.
"Principles office, just shut up and wait here, I'm returning to the training halls, we'll talk later." he said, staring daggers at the poor teenager.
Zeth swallowed his saliva and didn't dare to offer the man a rebuttal. He assigned himself a seat near a column of pristine stonework and prepared for the school's overseer to shut down his future of battling creatures outside the city confines.
"Are you alright hon?"
A voice wafted over and softly entered Zeths ears. The smooth buttery voice quelled his anxiety, and he followed the voice to a sharp looking attendant. Her seductive voice not matching her uptight and collected aura.
"Y-yeah I'm okay." Zeth stuttered, trying to find words to describe his predicament.
"What's happened to you? Your uniforms all ripped." She pointed out.
Zeth glanced down, the torn arm of his shirt still showing. He shivered. He had completely forgotten that he nearly died because of the adrenaline and the professor completely shrugging off an injury that could've ended his hunting career before it even started.
"They're making us fight fucking dire wolfs!" He spat disdainfully hate and disgust infesting his voice.
The assistant sat mouth agape, struggling to form words. Her prismatic eyes searching for any sign of sarcasm or lying in his face.
"How are you still alive?" She questioned, staring at him like he was some kind of freakish anomaly.
"Huh? What do you mean?" Zeth responded.
Clans and schools limited information on monsters until high school so as to not scare little children and make them scared to fight. Many kids knew of monsters but nothing of what they could do.
"Aren't they just slightly stronger wolves?" He questioned back as sweat trickled down his forehead.
Zeth knew that a dire wolf was a level 10 monster, but with no prior battle experience he had no clue how large the gap was between his own strength and the wolves.
The assistant began to explain, displaying a deep understanding and pity for this poor student.
She explained that dire wolves can run roughly three times as fast as an average wolf while being twice as large and twice as intelligent. Monsters such as them would be able to eviscerate a classless teenager in a heartbeat.
Zeth's heart began to race even faster, imagining being ripped apart fueling his anxiety and hatred.
"THEN WHY WOULD THEY MAKE US FIGHT THEM?" He screamed, fighting back the urge to storm out and leave the school.
The lady shivered, making eye contact with Zeth. His outburst had shocked her, however the deep abyss in his eyes had completely mortified her. It felt like something was inside them, watching and studying.
She stumbled out of her chair and began to creep out of the office, something about this boy was unusual. She couldn't understand her own horror and didn't want to.
She sprinted away, her figure flowing as she slid around the corner.
Zeth sat dumbfounded, unsure of what had just happened, he started calming himself down. The situation had been resolved and his life was no longer in danger, there was no reason for him to be panicking.
He pulled out his phone and noticed the array of notifications from Andrew.
"Dude what happened?"
"Where are you Zeth??"
"HELLO?????"
"ARE YOU ALIVE?"
"HELLLOOOOOOO??"
Zeth snickered at the texts and responded after screenshotting the conversation.
"Yeah, I'm fine. Just in some office area after my fight with the dire wolf. Can't believe they made us fight those!"
Zeth closed the messenger and swiped his phone until he found the camera app, snapping a photo and following up his message with it.
Three dots appeared and faded countless times, as if Andrew couldn't even find a response to his statement.
"Huh?"
The single word answers dumbstruck Zeth, the Andrew he knew would have had hundreds of questions about his test, yet he only said 'Huh?'. Before he could question him, the dots showed up again and a new message appeared.
"Dude, everyone else fought a single gnome. What the fuck do you mean dire wolf?"
Silence. Absolute silence. Not a breath could be heard as Zeth's heart stopped.
His mind plowed through information at an unimaginable rate. It clicked, he finally realized after the message that despite not being the only person who couldn't defeat their monster, he was the only one escorted away by a staff member.
His body began to shake, as the rage built up in his body.
'I was the only one to fight that fucking thing? How does that even happen?'
Zeth angrily typed a response on his phone, resisting the urge to throw it across the room.
"You're telling me I was the only person who had to fight that fucking creature?" He sent as an attempt to confirm his suspicions.
"Yeah… Are you alright? Where is this office? Which teacher took you there? What does he look like?..." A bombardment of questions flooded his phone, deciding to switch it off and calm down Zeth placed the phone back in his pocket.
Just as he had collected his thoughts a familiar fiery woman barged her way through the doors. Seeing this, the rage inside of Zeth boiled over the limit, he screamed.
"WHAT THE FUCK IS YOUR PROBLEM?"