Chapter 25: Chapter 25: The Maw of the Dragon
Yohan continued testing his affinities, the following series of events just felt so surreal. The lights brightly shone with equally exaggerated intensity.
"Perfect affinities to all 5 basic elements." The Wizard solemnly watched as Yohan approached the center of the formation. A bright white light flooded the room this time blinding all the spectators. Afterwards, light drained from the walls, the room became pitch black. Yohan retracted his hands and the room returned to it's original appearance. Silence had filled the room. "P-Perfect affinities to light and dark...." The unthinkable had just happened right before their very eyes.
Every person in the room, Klara especially, wore incredulous expressions. After a couple of breaths, the wizard coughed and they returned to their Wizardry class on the second floor of the building.
"I will have to update your profiles and notify the principal. You will both progress very quickly, if you are able to catch up with the material, both of you can smoothly skip 2 years as said previously in your letters." Mr. Crawford stated. 'If anyone were to find out the talents of either of these two, Yohan especially, they would wish to covet these gems.'
"Right, let's get started." The class then officially began it was a small lecture at the end.
"The most difficult part in becoming a wizard is making up for the inability to conjure different elements. Your affinity is an indication of the attribute that your mana can 'naturally' possess and manipulate, your body, sort of infuses the mana and since you have the affinity for those elements, you can more easily conjure those elements. Those who have poor or no affinities for that element will need to find ways to attribute mana to conjure said element. Those with moderate affinities would have an easier time but, eventually like those with lower affinities might have to find other avenues of manually or artificially attributing the mana they use...." He gave them a brief explanation on the difficulties in becoming a wizard, though it would likely never appear on these two people's paths to becoming one. The lesson ended and everyone dismissed.
'Next is practical combat.' Yohan leisurely made his way to his next subject but, he heard some clangs and slamming on metallic lockers. He ran towards the corridor where he heard it from. It was a scene of some seniors giving their peer a beating.
"Hmph, you're just lowly Chaff. Don't even dream of being Cream like us." One taunted while a couple of lackeys stepped all over the weak student. Yohan became enraged, he detested the scene before him. He marched up towards the seniors and stood between them.
"Hey! There's no need to go so far!" Yohan defended.
"Beat it kid, otherwise I'll take it as you asking for a beating too." The bully said. Yohan was a couple of heads shorter than these seniors, so they might be from the same year as Amber. They drew closer while mana began to gather in their hands sparks and currents of wind and water began to manifest.
Yohan still stood there defiantly this time his fingers began crackling, before a couple of students came running along. They had silver shield badges on their uniform. They were part of the disciplinary committee. The school had a uniform which was white dress shirts and gray blazers which went down past their knees (sort of like the ones from irregular at magic high school) and corresponding gray trousers for boys and, girls wore white dress shirts with any blue or dark pleated skirts. The dress shirts and blazers had a logo of a crown with a scepter and a saber crossed with each other on their breast pocket.
"Each and everyone of you come with us, we'll take in what you have to say. Rule breakers will be dealt with justly and will have to report to correctional classes after school." The two said. The seniors tried to walk away but they were subdued by the two and followed with annoyance painted in the expressions. They heard out each testimony and decided to send the feeble student on his way to the infirmary. "You four will be attending a correctional class for today, since you all used magic. Furthermore you three seniors will be given duties around the campus to fulfill for the next couple of days."
"But I didn't do anything!" Yohan defended himself. This was his first day and he already he is going to be labelled a troublemaker.
"We all witnessed lightning magic gathering in your hands, though you had yet to harm other students you still attempted to perform magic in a place which isn't meant for combat. You only have to attend one class since it wasn't severe."
Yohan tried to protest a bit more, but it was useless. He arrived over 10 minutes later to the practical combat class in the combat center where the combat simulator was in full effect. The teacher himself was a bit annoyed but he let it off since there was no use in taking up the time in scolding a student.
The combat center was a huge infrastructure which was shaped like an elliptical sports arena but, it was enclosed like a basketball stadium except with much rows of seats. The walls and ceiling were metal and the field was synthetic flooring.
The practical combat class had everyone same in the same course taken in the same period, all in all there would be a little over 30 students in each class. There was two streams for both elite and standard courses. The practical combat class took about 10 minutes to warm up, which Yohan had missed, before they were instructed to perform basic swings with their weapons and practice shots at some targets. He saw Stella slashing the air with her twin daggers and Ayne who used a spear. After that, they would split off into groups to fight team battles. Yohan got paired with a slightly chubby kid with green hair.
"Nice to meet ya! I'm Henry Ward!" The kid greeted. "You're Yohan the wood mage right?"
"Ah.. yeah nice to meet you." Yohan returned. Who wouldn't know Yohan? His performance in the combat exam was simply indelible. All the students who had participated in last year's combat exam, and some teachers started referred to him 'Yohan the wood mage.'
"Hehe, looks like we're gonna win the combat matches, glad I'm on your team." Henry triumphantly smiled, however his smiling complexion did contain a tinge of pity towards the others.
"Don't count on it!" A voice rang out. It was none other than Klara. "Hope you didn't slack off Yohan! I'm going to set things straight." She said with extreme confidence. She had been diligently training, her grandfather tried to console her on her defeat, but she was all the more determined to be the top mage of her grade. It seemed she was paired up with the calm, expressionless Snow, their bearings greatly contrasted but, it allowed for a much smoother team dynamic.
"Hey Henry, what elemental magic do you use?" Yohan asked.
"I use earth, though I don't know any spells, I have a lot of mana in my mana pool compared to others." Henry explained.
"I don't think we need to use spells for our first day." Yohan said pondering.
"Listen up students! Though you have just entered, your school years will probably be more demanding than the previous students." This time the combat instructor began to explain. "By the second grade you would have need to have learned an intermediate tier spell while also having to integrate your low tier spells into your combat style. It shouldn't be too difficult since this year had a very strong turnout. By the fourth year you would need to have learned an advanced tier spell." The combat instructor, didn't know the reason why Advent magic academy's criterion was being changed so dramatically. Little did anyone in the combat center know that this was all of the result of the prophecy and Archus.
For the incoming calamity, they needed to prepare their mages well and why not start doing so at the beginning stages. While they made epic tier and heroic tier more accessible for affiliated guild members to acquire, they would have to raise the bar with the student's criterion to bridge the gap. Some academies which already had advanced tier magic as part of their syllabus would see a much smoother transition than others. Though it would be better if students were to learn grand tier magic, they were afraid that students couldn't keep up since the teachers are unfamiliar with the course material that was needed to be taught. The magic theory classes and respective elemental magic classes would see an increase in volume of materials needed to be covered.
"Well, it's time to start the matches. Daren and Veronica you are in the first field....." The instructor directed everyone to their battle fields. The large rectangular field was divided into quarters and those pairs who weren't fighting would be on the side lines. "Now it's 10 minutes each match or if a pair is defeated, if there are equal number of students for each pair still standing, then it will continue till one is defeated for a tiebreaker. The combat simulator is on, so you may fight to your heart's content, however don't overdo it since you can still get extremely lethargic."
Yohan and Henry were on the third field, waiting for their match which came after. There would be a total of at least 6 matches each pair fought. It was a simple system, where each pair fought 3 times on that field and those with the same number of wins and losses would be then grouped together on another field to fight their remaining 3 matches. Therefore it would take around 2 hours for this part of the class, since in a 'pool' of four pairs there would be six matches and there were two pools.
"Yohan it's our turn." Henry said.
"Ok, let's do this!" Yohan was still a little moody from the earlier disciplining, but hoped to wash away that feeling with a match.
"Oh man we're against the wood mage." A boy with a short sword sighed.
"Our luck is just too bad." A girl wielding a wand said. They were both a pair, but seeing the other team, they basically had lost the will to fight.
They stood across each other, their match was going to begin. Henry didn't wield any weapons, he wasn't attracted to any particular weapon either. "Start!" The abrupt signal spurred each field into action.
Henry began forming some shards of rock and threw them at their opponents. Yohan blitzed towards his opponents without any use of mana. He was just as fast as a wind mage using agility enhancing wind magic when he lifted the [Earth Release: Weighted Boulder jutsu]. His physical capabilities were incredible, he would be around Rock Lee's when he joined his own genin team. His mana capacity.... it would be one foot into superkage levels (Hashirama or Madara levels of chakra reserve). He decided to take on his match without mana for now.
The instructor would look around and reveal an expression of extreme satisfaction. This new class was indeed quite strong and should have no problem combat wise. There were a few classmates in his class, 2 of the original 5 who had faced off against him was in this class. They were the human boy and bunny girl. Their names were Clyde and Bonny, they were fairly chummy. They each showed exceptional skill in the instructors eyes even if they were to be in the 2nd year according to his previous experiences.
The instructor finally came to Yohan's quarter and he was astonished. It was a one sided match. Yohan's opposition were on the defensive having to defend against volleys of rock shards while having to mind the close quarter battle maniac running circles around them. Yohan's methods complimented Henry's. They could easily set up pincer attacks after pincer attacks, Yohan lead them into the trajectory of Henry's projectiles, while giving no time for them to address Henry leisurely shooting out wave after wave. Yohan didn't even break a sweat. The instructor was extremely impressed with this relentless synergistic combo. He would've mistaken them for 3rd year students despite them not using any spells.
"The difference is quite apparent." The instructor mumbled. He had heard of Yohan's reputation and seeing him effortlessly dance around his opponents, he couldn't deny their validity. The match ended with Henry and Yohan's victory with 4 minutes to spare.
"This is too much! He didn't even use any offensive magic." The other two were utterly dejected. Yohan just went at it with fists and kicks, their weapons didn't help them since they had to fend off Henry's rock shards.
"Hehe we make a good team bro." Henry said as he rubbed his nose.
"Let's keep it up then." Yohan said smiling. The next match was going to begin and they stayed in for the next round. The next victims.... I mean opponents, despairingly entered the maw of the dragon... I mean valiantly entered the field of battle.
CREATORS' THOUGHTS 
SengokuBangloi
SengokuBangloi I am sorry that it's been more than three weeks since the last chapter, but I hope you all understand this is my final year. So I am sorry for not doing this.
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