During the early hours of the morning when most people were sleeping. There was a group of teachers preparing to have a a meeting. There was about 14 days left til the school opened but the teachers have started preparing weeks before that. These teachers were the 12 teachers with the most prestige at the school. they gathered main office. six teachers sat on the right while the other sat on the left side. They kept their professional demeanor but there was a clear animosity amongst them. There was one more seat that was unoccupied in the office.
One of the young teachers looked around and started in speaking a respectful manner he voiced his question" isn't the principal unusually late?". Couple of the teachers showed their agreement with him by nodding. the vice principal on the other hand knew the reason for the unusual delay." He has received some late intel on the new batch of students starting this year." she calmly delivered the news and kept sipping her coffee.
"seems like we are about to get a new batch of trouble makers." a teacher with fiery red hair commented. He was one of the older teachers but you wouldn't be able to tell that with how young he looked. He looked very exhausted at the moment with his crossed arms substituting for a pillow. several teachers on the right side of the table looked at him with disdain but kept their opinions without commenting. the teacher on his right on the other hand had different plans. she raised her arm and struck down on his head in a swift motion.
*bang*
barely reacting on time Samuel the red haired teacher stopped his colleague from cracking his skull." That's very uncalled for Cici" he raged as he sat up clutching Cici hand nut before he could continue his legs were swept under him and his arm twisted behind his back. " This is not the time to slack off, have I not taught you enough?. Your vacation must have you forgotten proper work place behavior. You must call me Mrs. Cole you little runt" Mrs. Cole was Samuels teacher before he took it up as career.
Samuel didn't have the energy to refute her so he just gave in and the office returned to its somber mood. A few minutes later the door opened and a looming shadow seemed to swallow all the light coming in. A second later a giant burly man stepped through the door and following him was a big dog that was half the mans sizes. the mans presence seemed unfathomable compered to the rest of the teachers in the room.
The man was the Principal of Greyhound academy his dark blue and grey suit was studded with metals he has received through many exploits. Ashton Crow was possibly the strongest person on the planet but only a few truly knew what devastation he was capable of. Ashton was always accompanied by his trusted pet the night hound. The dog was a spirit beast that Ashton contracted before he was a principal.
Taking his seat at the head of the table he separated the stack of papers he had with him into two and passed them to the teachers. " Ladies and gentlemen this year we will be getting a few members of the royal family. This year it doesn't seem like they are just dumbing there problematic children but they've sent some major talents. The other group of new students will be trouble makers from the Star, Morgan, and blue blade clans. they are talented without doubt but they are also prone to causing trouble. most shouldn't be to much to handle except for Emily, Ron, and Zhou ming. they are probably the most talented students in this batch so we most nurture them carefully and change their problematic ways." He gave the short speech as the teachers looked through the paper work they have received.
" it's only. a handful of students this year" Stephon muttered as he rubbed his beard and flipped through the papers. " yes but we are also getting the biggest batch of regular students and several of them come from different planets so the information on their talent level is skewed." Ashton provided more information to the teachers. at greyhound there is two groups students could end up in. first group was the silver hounds or as most students called them the noble hounds because that's where most nobles and royals were assigned, rarely ever does someone of regular background make it, the other group was called the wild hounds. the wild hounds name used to be the blue hounds but a young wild natured student dominated the silver hounds students the 6 years he was enrolled and the generation of sliver hounds he dominated are major character across the cosmos. After his graduation the next generation of blue hounds took up the name wild hounds and got permission to make that the official name.
the noble hound teachers on the right side excitedly looked through the names seeing what student might end up in their classes while the wild hound teachers surveyed the file report to know who to warn their students of. the meeting came to a quick end just as planned and the teachers went to go handle their affairs.
...
7 days later
Julius had broken into the 5th level of bronze. He had spent most of the past days exploring the city and studying up on different runes through several books he bought. Kiri other hand was fully dedicated on his sword skills and aura so he had long broken through to bronze rank and close to reaching the second level of bronze rank. Julius held both his blade in defensive stance while Kiri was moving around finding the right moment to strike. Julius had delayed his training in this aspect to let Kiri catch up and have a more meaningful sparing matches. his still spared time for Kiri to develop his sword skill mastery. The odds were still in Julius favor but Kiri was putting up a good fight. KirI innate talent let him fight somewhat on par with Julius who himself was stronger than many people at his rank.
" I think 7 days of rigged training is going to solidify us for a good position and even get to have a personal teacher." Kiri was impressed with the visible improvement they were both making."personal teachers? what do you mean? ugh!!" Julius blurted out as he was unaware of what Kiri was talking about but the moment of distraction Kiri struck Julius in the ribs counting this one for his win. Kiri hadn't been able to out right beat Julius but when he took great advantage of Julius' mistakes he could squeeze out a win here and there.
" Some teachers select students to give personal training to for different competitions throughout the year. Different teachers have different criteria for selecting students so who knows we might just be selected. of course the competitions aren't just for selective students but in actuality students are required to compete, it's just that the students with personal teachers usually are the most impressive." Kiri answered Julius' question as he sat down to relax after the tough sparing match.
Kiri continued explaining the ins and outs of the school. he introduced him to the two teams of greyhounds and Julius thought ' I'd technically be a noble hound huh' he wasn't entirely wrong but his current status he was a regular civilian so he could easily tell he'll end up in wild hound. He wasn't disappointed as he was already getting sick of snobby nobles the past week they've spent at this hotel. he wasn't sure how much more genuine the common folk were but he was always skeptical of others so he wasn't worried about running with the wrong group.
5 more days of training and Julius finally broke through to silver rank tier 1. The power that flowed through Julius was now more violent and more refined. his Aura felt heavy and it was a deeper purple. the first few ranks Julius broke through his Aura wasn't as vibrant as it was now. once you broke through the silver rank your auras trait starts manifesting but the change is close to none existent. while family bloodlines have a major effect on the trait and some even use special means to pass on traits but Julius family did not partake in such practices and focused more on individual development. some general guess could be made depending on the color and how the aura feels but with the color purple it could be a wide range of things. Julius best guess was poison since both his mother and sister possessed a similar trait.
poison was as lethal application of aura so Julius was excited to unearth it's true potential. for a while he kept testing his new limits and did his best to not cause to much damages, with the help of the defensive runes through the building he didn't cause any trouble. This was their last day at the hotel and they would be checking into their dormitories by the end of the day. they enjoyed they last couple of hours they had at the expensive hotel by watching tv and getting delicious food. they didn't know how good the academy would truly treat them so they indulged in all kinds of foods.
12:00pm Saturday
Julius and Kiri had made it to the entrance of the academy. Greyhound wasn't just an academy but a whole city in itself. the biggest building was the colosseum it could seat over 150,000 people and had 4 arenas. the second feature of greyhound was that it was two building made up the school. the two mountain sized building each had close to 300 classrooms that were seat up for different kinds of class from weapon training to regular school work. the school wasn't only meant to sharpen the blade but also the mind.
at the entrance of the school there was a line forming and student giving there registration papers and getting their number. while most of the regular students lined up the Nobels had their own spot to register if they already hadn't been. these nobles were the ones who weren't super talented so they had to register themselves. Julius and Kiri took their spots in the line and waited idly. Julius was focused on seeing if he could see anyone with notable abilities but nobody was catching his eye. the line inched closer and closer ever so slowly getting shorter and shorter. it was finally Kiri's turn to hadn't his papers and get his number. Kiri got the number 967, majority of the students had already registered but they could also be consider somewhat of the early patch. moving on Kiri waited at the side for Julius.
" papers and ID please." The mature young lady at the decked asked Julius. he took them out of his ring and handed both documents to her. " rank and weapon specialization?" she asked next. Kiri had his Sword next to him already she didn't need to ask other than his rank but Julius kept his swords in his ring so she had to add that part for him. Julius calmly getting out two swords he answered" silver rank and dual swords"
*gasp*
*mutter mutter*
*whispers*
the whole crowd near by reacted to what Julius had said. this was enough proof to know the influence had even this far away in the galaxy. the past days Julius spent time researching why dual swords was looked down upon so much. the only thing he found out was that it was mainly hated by his family due to the accident their ancestor. their influence alone brought a degrading of the sword style. Julius shook of the gossip around him and got his number. the round badge said '968' Julius stuffed it into his pocket and went to where Kiri had been waiting.
their next destination wasn't to far of. the colosseum was used to test the new students and determine who their main teacher will be. there was three test the students would take. the first test was a test of pure natural talent. the second test was a test of pure strength and the final test was a duel against a teacher to determine level of skill.
when they made it to the colosseum they were directed to where their seating would be. There was almost a thousand people already there but the colosseum looked empty. at the very front seats were the nobles and young masters of major clans. the testing was gonna begin in 15 minutes so other than the long wait due to everyone that showed up before him it wasn't looking to bad.
Julius and Kiri sat in their seats and were in the middle of when a gigantic student sat next to them. The young man sat down but still looked bigger than a fully grown man. his presence brought many eyes toward the three while people paid no attention to the other two those with keen eyes still took note of the two. Julius paid more attention to the axe he was carrying than the man himself. the Axe looked very impressive, the head its was the size of a torso and the blade was sharp. the axe body was slightly taller than Kiri and the full thing was Julius height.
the Gigantic guy visibly turned red with all the eyes on him and his face sunk down starting a staring contest with the ground. " come on you big bear don't start getting scare you" A girls voice rung out. Julius was pulled by the voice it was soothing and friendly so he slimly leaned back on his chair to look at where the voice was coming from. On the right side of the young man sat a young lady. She Had curly blue hair, slightly tan brown skin, her lips were plump and pink. this girl was the pretties girl he had seen so far. it left him a little speech less. " what are you looking at" she sneered at him. it looked like she was having a bad day already and the stress of the coming up test weren't helping. " sorry I was just looking around that's all" Julius said as he straightened his seat. his face was feeling hot but he kept a calm act.
The time for test was about to begin when the principal got on stage and began to give a speech" Welcome, welcome to greyhound. you are the new generation the new blood of the school. I have high expectations for every single one of you and I am hear to tell you that there is a forth test. As many of you know Greyhound specialize in spirit animals, so this test will see if you are compatible to sigh a contract with a spirit animal. although it isn't necessary for you to do it right now and can do it easier at a stronger rank. starting early will undoubtably make you contract stronger spirits later. this test will be held by me once you finish your three other test." the principal didn't give the students a moment to catch their breath. it wasn't easy to get a contracted spirit no matter the rank and the early you start training your spiritually the stronger creatures you'll be able to attract due to your deep spirituality. " The test shall begin now!" the principal announced and walked oof the stage and into a small waiting area where he will perform the fourth test.
the first couple of students went up and got their results but on the fourth test they all came back looking disappointed. the first group going were nobles. so far they all performed at an expected level nothing impressive. 20 or so people have went up so far and nothing outstanding really happened.
for the first test they would go up and inject there Aura into a crystal ball. inside the crystal ball were 9 distinct levels. the higher you could activate the more talent you were. most people were getting 5s from the nobles but the for regular people it was more expected get a 2 or 4. currently the student with number 23 was going up. He felt completely different from the other students. his long black hair looked wild but was still maintained. his dark green attire was clearly made of expensive material and decorated with gems. the he got the the crystal ball he placed his hand on it and noticeable green Aura spewed out and went into the the ball. he as clearly in the silver rank. slowly the crystal ball glowed green, it went up level by level, easily blowing through the first 5 levels. When it got to 6 he was clearly the most talented student to go up. The crystal ball didn't stop glowing as the levels went up, the colosseum was silent at the moment. it was rare to reach the 7th level the young man currently did so without any visible excitement. not far away a couple of examiners were talking to each other" Zhou ming, 13 years old, no wonder the whole school has been talking about him." the first examiner said" shhh, he isn't done yet" the other examiner replied excitedly . Zhou ming was truly done the crystal ball was still going at the final stopped it reached the terrifying 9th level. there hadn't been a talent of this level in decades.
The crowd was left speechless. they've been so used to seeing the same result just for Zhou ming to have an outstanding showing. The crowd felt like they were splashed with a bucket of cold water. Zhou ming on the other hand had a satisfied smile on his face and removed his hand from the crystal ball and moved on to the next test.
the strength test was also a simple test all you have to do is punch a thick piece of metal that would project a number after force was exerted on it. most regular nobles were at different level of rookie ranks so they had gotten between 10-100. different people specialized in different combat forms so it wasn't always purely rank based. Zhou ming was currently the second supposed silver rank going up. the first silver rank got 178 even tho he was their 1 of the silver rank. Zhou ming was vastly more impressive than the other student to go up but he didn't look like he specialized in strength.
Zhou ming positioned himself in a calm manner and channels his energy and took a deep breath to concert and the strike. The whole colosseum held its breath waiting for the moment of his strike. Julius was extremely focused compared to the earlier students. Kiri was blown away by the performance so far, he had felt like he was experiencing a piece of history. the moment Zhou ming moved he seemed like a blur and a defying sound rang out through out the whole place.
*BANG*