The class ended an hour and a half later. Everyone was exhausted as they walked out of the hall in the second building. Mistress Sersie was a Berserker and sometimes forgot that her students were different, pushing them to the extreme.
Hazel, Richard, and James tried their best to stifle their mocking chuckles as Lucas and his cohorts lumbered tiredly across the plain.
James was a Berserker. He could naturally endure the training, making him Mistress Sersie's best student. Hazel, though an elf, had trained with James to boost her strength and endurance. She was quite tired with a few sore bones, but she could move freely. Richard could only thank Hunter for always forcing his former self to train, or he would have been in a worse shape than Lucas.
"Do you think Mistress Sersie knows about Master Hendrik?" James whispered to Richard, when he noticed that they were the only ones left close to the entrance.
"Yeah. Probably. There's no other reason for her to ask us to wait," Hazel said with a tinge of excitement.
James wanted to be surprised that she heard him, but then he realized that she was a Chorister. It sometimes skipped his mind.
He raised a brow at Richard, who simply shrugged.
"She knows?" he asked.
"I had no choice," Richard shrugged again. "She's very persuasive."
Mistress Sersie was the last person to leave the hall, carrying a small duffle bag in hand. Her deep brown hair was tied into a bun, exposing her oval face, brown eyes and pointed nose. She was very beautiful for someone stronger than most men.
She had just taken a shower and was clad in a black sports bra with yellow fringes. Her shorts were also of the same design. As though her slim muscular body wasn't dazzling enough, the latent wetness on her body made them glisten as though they had been rubbed with baby oil.
Staring at her amazing abdominal pecs, Richard couldn't help but feel his torso. He could barely feel his abs.
'Maybe I should ask her to train me instead?' he began to have second thoughts in his head.
Mistress Sersie tossed her duffle bag forward and walked past them, "Come on. Let's go."
James caught it in quick reflex and walked after her. Richard and Hazel followed in tow.
"Uh... Mistress Sersie, did we do something wrong?" Hazel asked after a few minutes of walking. They had entered the lecture building and were heading towards the Chancellor's office.
No one goes into the Chancellor's office unless they're summoned. Most Masters included.
And ninety percent of the students who are called into the office, enter and come out expelled from the Academy.
Hazel was a tad worried.
Mistress Sersie had a sly smile on her face as she decided to tease the students, "Maybe. Who knows?"
The three of them shared disturbed glances and prayed internally. They were certain they hadn't violated any rules, but the fear of the Chancellor made them go back to their very first day at the Academy, and tracing their every step till the present date.
Mistress Sersie simply laughed a few seconds later, "It's good to know that the Chancellor is still feared, since anyone has hardly ever seen her."
"It's a she?" Richard muttered in puzzlement. James and Hazel would have also said the same thing.
"Oh, she's more than a she," Mistress Sersie smiled as they reached the gold plated door of the Chancellor's office.
She reached for the round door knob and twisted it open. The door opened without a sound and she walked in casually. The students followed her like ducklings to a mother duck.
The office was wide, too wide in fact. It looked more like a living room than an office. The leather furniture was plated in gold, likewise the centre table. The floor was made of marble. If it wasn't for the desk and swivelling chair at one side of the room, the three students would have thought Mistress Sersie was toying with them and had taken them to the wrong place.
The presence of Master Kincaid at a corner of the office also cleared that suspicion. He was standing by a wall close to the desk, waving at them with a curt smile.
"The Chancellor sure is living the good life," Richard blurted as he looked around the room. The desk was almost empty, with only a few stationary and some files on it.
"She's the Chancellor. She overseas the welfare of the school. What else do you expect her to do?" Hazel posed the question to Richard and also to herself. She, too, was surprised by the interior of the office.
At that moment, Master Kincaid and Mistress Sersie adjusted their posture, their faces solemn. Richard and his classmates creased their brows.
"Ah, they're here already," said a 4 foot tall, lady elf that appeared out of nowhere
She had a petite frame and a mischievous twinkle in her eye. Her hair was a vibrant blue, falling in loose, curly locks down her back. She wore a tiny, leaf-green tunic. The tunic still looked quite big for her, falling down her left side, exposing her shoulder. A delicate, sparkling silver circlet adorned her forehead, and a fluffy white bow tied up her hair in a playful ponytail. Her pointed ears peeked out from beneath her curls, and her bright green eyes sparkled with a constant hint of mischief. She had a smudge of dirt on her left cheek and a few leaves tangled in her hair. On her feet, she wore soft, supple leather boots, that were probably soundproof.
After staring at the little creature for seconds, Richard's eyelids dropped, "Who's the lost child?"
The two Masters tensed up with dilated eyes. James and Hazel soon acted the same way as they realized who the elf was.
They stepped back as Hazel muttered, "Richard..."
"Hm?" Richard half-turned and scrunched his brows, puzzled by their somewhat fearful expressions.
After a few seconds of looking back and forth, he didn't need to look into his memories to get the gist.
"Oh..." he faced the little elf, sizing her up in a new light.
He smiled wryly, "Well, shit."