"Everyone, wear the pendants provided to you and come on the stage according to the sequence." said the winator who would conduct the ceremony.
All of us wore the pendants that were provided to us during the registration at the reception. Every one of them had a particular number written on it, mine had the number 217 as I had come fairly late compared to my counterparts. There were hundreds of children present for the ceremony.
"This sure is gonna be a hell of a day." I thought as the 1st child went up on the stage.
The winator then took the pendulum placed on the table and said, "Turn around, and I won't say it won't be painful but try to endure it."
As the man started oscillating the pendulum, it started emitting a plethora of colorful lights.
"Heh..what nonsense, I don't feel anything." said the child but the next moment he started screaming, "Ahhhhh.."
It could be seen that a pair of azure colored wings were tearing out from his back.
"It's an affinity of wind." the representative from the Anamui clan said emotionlessly. The process of finding out which element he had an elementality towards was done and so was the process of awakening his wings, the next task however was unlike the other two, not that painful, he just had to take a feather from both of his wings and place them on the elementality cube which was placed on the table near the winator.
"OW!" before the kid could even register what had happened, the winator took the azure feathers and placed them on the cube that would decide the kid's future.
The cube then started switching between colors in orders similar to those of the treasure rankings and it finally stopped on the color of azure just like his wings, his affinity for the wind was of the mythical grade, it was quite good considering the ceremony was happening in a country side town even if it was the largest country side town in the empire.
The second candidate surprisingly had an affinity towards lightning which was one of the rare elements after the even rarer ones like blood, space, and time.
The representative of the Indra clan had to be disappointed, however, as he only had an elementality of rare grade, nevertheless, he still decided to take him in in the end when they would announce which people they would house. As their clan had fewer members as compared to the common clans like Ahurani due to the rarity of the element he had to take this decision ."Even if he can't be useful in important things, he'll still be helpful as a bodyguard, cook, or in some other chore." the representative thought.
Nobody had a great affinity after that but surprisingly a boy with blue hair came up.
After the test took place the taker was very much surprised just double checked if he was wrong, to everyone's surprise, he had a demi-god rank fire affinity.'
"Quite a great day for you, huh Paul?" said the Chronos clan representative with envy.
Some of the clans had very few members due to the rarity of their elements, hence the rare affinity clans had to hire people to go as their representatives. This situation was faced by the Chronos, Astraios, Ichor and Hebe clans.
These hired members would receive their commission depending on the talent of the children they brought back, and this was the reason why the Chronos representative was filled with envy.
"Well, what can I say, I guess my presence is just so influential that the child has got a good fire affinity." to Paul's comment most of the representatives rolled their eyes as they knew very well that everything happening around this guy was always good for him, what's worse is that he always praises himself for it when it's nothing but his luck.
After another session of common elements and grades below mythical, finally, a boy came up, and to everyone's surprise, he had a time affinity!
The hired representative was eccentric and everyone waited with breaths held in, to find out what was his control over his element.
"Huf, ayee I guess I'm just too awesome for this town. Bow before me you lowly peasants for I am a future powerhouse, for I a-"
"Shut is trash, what a pity someone with the time affinity has only rare ranked control over it." as fast as the happiness came, it was taken away but no one was more disappointed than the Chronos representative.
"AYO PAUL! How dare you steal my luck, ima duke it out with you." a mental transmission was sent to Paul by him. Unlike him, Paul was actually a member of the clan he was representing hence it didn't matter to him if the talents he brought back were worth it or not, he got the same salary, unlike the Chronos representative.
After the chaos settled down a little the ceremony was continued and a girl came up on the stage.
The girl after going through a round of pain, suddenly gave a piercing scream.
"This is not supposed to happen, what is happening?!!" the thoughts of the person oscillating the pendulum were in turmoil, but he soon received a transmission from the higher ups that this was normal for people with more than one affinities, they had more pair of wings hence had to face more pain when they came out as compared to people with a single pair of wings.
The girl surprisingly had a blood and a fire affinity, having a dual affinity was good enough, but one of them being one of the rarest was another thing.
Everyone had their eyes on the elemental cube as they watched to see if she had any talent or was a failure with a good affinity like the boy who had come before her.
To everyone's surprise, the girl had an abyssal grabe blood affinity and a lawbreaker grade fire affinity.
As soon as the results were out the representatives hurried and contacted their respective clans to inform them of this once in a generation talent.
In some corner of the world, two slits opened and an ancient voice resounded, " So, that vermin was actually telling the truth..."
The surprises were not over as the next moment a girl awakened a lawbreaker life affinity.
The representatives from the Ra, Hebe, and Ichor clan were eccentric because they had found some diamonds in the rough."Hah, we have had gains so big this year that it can't even compare to the other times, if this continues then even if we remain one of the clans with the least manpower we will have only powerhouses among our ranks isn't that right Leah?" asked Boris the representative from the Ichor clan to Leah, the representative of the Hebe.
"That is indeed true, the oracle had indeed spoken the truth, but this generation I feel is going to bring the rise and downfall of many clans." replied Leah.
"Oof, if only that girl had a higher affinity for the fire element instead of the blood element we could have taken her to our side but since her blood elementality is higher she will only spend a third of her time with us and that also only to ensure that her affinity does not go to waste." thought Paul, the representative of the Ra clan.
Afterward after what felt like millennia, my, Quinn Salvator's turn finally arrived...
"Look closely you lowly peasants, the king is coming on the stage. MUAHAHAHA die of cringe you readers." I thought as I went up to finally get my key to becoming more powerful, it feels too vulnerable to stay the powerless, wimpy kid that I currently am.
I went on the stage, turned my back towards the awakener winator, and waited for the pain to hit me. As it did.."AAHHHHH..." a blood-curdling scream escaped my mouth, all the people turned their heads towards me and looked in horror at what could have happened wrong. I didn't know if what the other participants felt was similar to this but if it was I marvel them for holding back their pain.
A similar situation to mine had happened with the girl, Saya, who had awakened the duel elements of blood and fire. If I had any sanity at that point not taken away due to pain, I would have jumped out of joy that I had awakened 2 elements.
After the pain subsided, I got off the ground covered with my blood, and looked at my wings, this was the moment I realized why everyone was silent.
"Ayyy, at this point what can I do if not being enamored by my glamourousness?" I spoke in a hushed voice but as it was silent in the colosseum my words were heard by everyone.
After all, I had awakened two of the rarest elements out there, blood and space.
"Hahah, wait till my elementality grades are found out."I thought.