by Weiqi Wang
‘I don’t think Mr Principal will accept my application.’ Soarame sighed. ‘He wouldn’t even allow me to go to Cylone City.’
‘That’s sad.’ Ericson frowned. ‘The old man should know that he can’t protect you for ever.’
‘But we should still try it, right?’ Dileys urged, biting her lips. ‘Ericson is right. We need real battles and we need soulcores!’
‘Sure. Let’s do it right now.’ Seeing Dileys’ begging face, Soarame hurriedly nodded. The friends thus filed a joint application through their Libral Emblems. According to Dileys, the results should come back in a week or so.
‘Okay. Let’s say we won the championship and got lucky in the rehearsal, we can only get two or three Expert soulcores at most.’ Jemario asked. ‘What about the rest?’
‘I think we all forgot the most common way.’ Ericson hesitated a bit before continuing. ‘We buy them.’
‘Buy?’ Kardiac stared. ‘Do you know how much an Expert soulcore cost?’
‘Good question.’ Ericson asked back. ‘Do you?’
‘… No.’ Kardiac had to scratch his head and look around for help.
‘At least 400 ruby coins. That is 40k in gold coins.’ Kriagon spoke up. ‘It might be even higher.’
‘Great. Every weekend I make 20 gold coins, and I thought that was a lot.’ Soarame quickly did the maths. ‘Now I know it will only take me 40 years to get one Expert soulcore, unless I never eat.’
‘Well, I have 11 ruby coins and I can contribute all of them without waiting that long.’ Kriagon said. ‘What about you guys?’
‘Wow, man! I didn’t know you were a rich guy.’ Kardiac was startled. ‘I only have 3 ruby coins, but feel free to take them all.’
‘I only have 120 gold coins, sorry…’
‘I have…’
The friends quickly counted. Sadly, although they were all wizards and possessed a good fortune for their age, altogether they couldn’t even make a quarter of one Expert soulcore.
‘You guys forgot another important thing.’ Ericson suggested again. ‘Where shall we buy it, if we can afford one?’
‘The auction hall, of course. Where else has that kind of rare thing?’ With that, the friends were suddenly reminded of something —
‘Eric, did you say you got news about Soarame’s auction?’
~~~~
Earlier in the day, Ericson had stood in front of the Cylone Auction Hall, with a slight smile on his face. He stood there for a little while, seemingly emotional for some reason.
‘Greetings!’ The reception lady hurriedly came to salute to this young wizard. ‘What can I do for you, Your Honour?’
‘Your Honour…’ Ericson muttered to himself in a low voice. ‘I’d like to sell something in the auction.’ With that, he handed over a painting of Soarame’s. It was a cluster of fancy-styled buildings with glass-like lustre under the sunshine — the Wind Department of Libral.
‘Hmm…’ The reception lady bowed and took the painting for a look, but seemed embarrassed after a little while. ‘Your Honour, this may not satisfy our quality standard…’
‘Really? I think quite otherwise.’ Ericson was not surprised to hear this. ‘Check it carefully. It was painted by a wizard, in a special way. So you’d better summon your expert assessor before you regret it.’
‘Oh dear… yes, yes, I’m sorry.’ The lady looked frightened. ‘Please follow me inside, and forgive us for taking time to assess it!’
Soon enough, the expert assessor arrived. He didn’t take long to finish his quick check. ‘Your Honour was so right. It’s painted in a special way that differs from all our known methods. You mentioned the artist was a wizard too?’
‘Positive.’ Ericson was sitting on the couch, legs crossed. ‘And he’s going to be famous, for what it’s worth.’
‘Seriously!’ The assessor looked solemn at once. He performed another round of checking with a lot more care, and finally drew his conclusion. ‘I need to take this painting for a most detailed assessment. Here’s the receipt, so that Your Honour doesn’t have to wait here…’
‘I’ll wait.’ Ericson was enjoying his coffee at his leisure. ‘Do it as quickly as possible.’
‘Yes… yes, Your Honour.’ The assessor bowed and hurried away, leaving the reception lady standing by Ericson’s side, reverent and respectful.
This time the assessment took much longer. Just when Ericson had almost lost his patience, the assessor rushed back with excitement. ‘Your Honour, great news!’
‘Just say it.’ Ericson frowned. ‘Don’t give me a number below 10 ruby coins. It’s not worth my time.’
‘Err…’ The assessor’s smile froze on his face; he actually started sweating. He had meant to quote 8 ruby coins as a base price for a bid, but had been shut down before he even opened his mouth. ‘It’s not up to me to decide the number… Your Honour.’
‘Then go get your boss.’ Ericson put down his coffee cup. ‘Quickly, please.’
‘Yes, Your Honour!’ The assessor had to rush away again, leaving a nervous reception lady to tread on eggshells. Fortunately, this time it didn’t take long for the manager to arrive. ‘Your Honour, I’ve heard of your demand and we respect it. Therefore, the bid price will start at 10 ruby coins.’
‘Good.’ Ericson stood up and took the receipt from the manager. The three auction hall staff watched him walk to the gate. They were about to heave a sigh of relief but had to hold it back — the young wizard stopped and turned around to face them again.
‘Yes, Your Honour?’ The manager hastened forward again. ‘How else could we be of service?’
‘Thanks.’ With that, Ericson walked out. It turned out that he’d turned around just to say this, as if he had forgotten it in the first place, so that he made efforts to make it up.
‘Shooo…’ The three could finally exhale. The manager shook his head. ‘Young wizards nowadays…’
‘I know, right?’ the assessor complained. ‘I wish you were here earlier to see more!’
‘Not every young one is like that.’ The reception lady cut in. ‘This brat is just a bad example.’
‘Silence!’ The manager hurriedly berated her. ‘He’s a wizard, after all! Watch it at all times!’
‘But 10 ruby coins… for an unknown artist, for the very first time?’ The assessor tried to cover for his colleague. ‘And we don’t even know if the artist was really a wizard!’
‘Actually, we do.’ The manager stroked his chin. ‘This artist was indeed a wizard, as long as the signature is genuine. He’s actually a famous one — remember the boy on the cover of Cylone Times years ago?’
‘Oh god, it’s him?’ The other two hastened forward to check the painting again. ‘Soarame… Soarame! No wonder the name sounds familiar!’
‘If it’s really that same Soarame, we’re in luck.’ The manager couldn’t help smiling widely. ‘Dig out the old newspaper from years ago! Let’s add as much colour as possible to the story, see if we can sell it at 20 ruby coins.’
‘20? Really?’ The other two were surprised. The auction hall took a percentage as the service fee, so they certainly wanted the price to go high; they just didn’t expect it to be this high for a first-time painter.
~~~~
‘That’s pretty good news, Soar.’ The friends said. ‘10 ruby coins actually make you the second richest one of us.’
‘It also made us a scrap of an Expert soulcore.’ Soarame cracked a bitter smile. ‘Should I be happy?’
‘It’s only a starting price, so don’t lose faith just yet.’ Ericson handed Soarame the receipt from the auction hall. ‘Let’s see if you can get the crystal ball back first.’
‘Mr Principal only just took it, so we’ll need to wait a bit before I go and ask for it.’ Soarame inhaled a long breath. ‘I’m going out to practise now.’
‘The sun is setting, Soar.’ Jemario couldn’t help pointing out. ‘Do you have to now?’
‘I must. I can’t get over what happe
ned to Rodka.’ Soarame gritted his teeth. ‘Also, I need to get ready for the rehearsal.’
‘And the Championship!’ Dileys supplemented. ‘It’s not going to be easy either. I’ll go and practise too.’
The friends looked at each other, and everyone nodded in silence. Soon enough, they left one after another to practise in their own ways.
Meanwhile, in the Principal’s meeting room, a group of professors were having an intensive discussion. A reassembled crystal ball was sitting on the table, with cracks all over it.
‘Rodka?! Are you sure?’ Everyone was mad to learn about the story, especially Dean Akex, because Rodka had been his favourite student. ‘How could this have happened? Have we started looking for Rodka?’
‘We have. But Rodka graduated long ago, so the Alliance just took over on that.’ Gazbell said seriously. ‘Speaking of which, I was just informed that he didn’t report to the Alliance after graduation. Dean Romboton and Akex, did you know about this?’
‘What!’ The two deans looked at each other, surprised. ‘He never got in touch after his graduation, but we thought it’s because he’d been busy… so he didn’t even report to the Alliance?’
‘You really should have paid some attention to your previous student.’ Gazbell shook his head. ‘Anyway, that’s the past. For us, the attack and threat to our current students is a greater concern.’
‘Speaking of this, how did the delivery pass the safety check?’ Dean Romboton asked, looking irritated.
‘I wish we knew, but it did pass. So the crystal ball must be well covered by some tricks.’ Gazbell was knocking the table with his index finger. ‘And that gives us another reason to believe it’s from Max, because he’s good at these kind of tricks.’
‘Not only that. That clown is probably a schizoid; his mind is like this crystal ball.’ Dean O’Heven was checking the cracks on the crystal ball. ‘Whenever I think about his creepy wooden puppets, I get gooseflesh.’
‘I heard that Max even named them — Blamers.’ Dean Harries looked disgusted. ‘For a man in his 60s or even 70s, that’s really impressive.’
‘That’s enough. What exactly shall we do now?’ Dean Romboton asked. ‘We need to hunt him down this time!’
‘Someone from the Alliance is on his way to join us for this, but in the meantime…’ Gazbell pondered a bit as if he was making a hard decision. ‘I believe we should immediately summon back all the students who are currently outside, especially those who are in rehearsals. Then we suspend the rehearsal programme and close the campus.’
‘Pardon?’ Everyone was shocked to hear that. ‘Close the campus?’
‘No offence, Mr. Principal, but this is overreacting,’ Dean O’Heven cut in. ‘We can’t make this dramatic change just because of one student.’
‘It’s not for one student. It’s for all our students.’ Gazbell said. ‘Max is not only a threat to Rodka or Soarame, or his friends, but also to the entire school! We confiscated his entire MagiMax, have you forgotten that? What would you do if you were Max?’
‘I’d stay away from public and hide well.’ Dean O’Heven humphed. ‘I dare him to challenge our school!’
‘Agreed. He dares not, at least not from upfront.’ Gazbell said. ‘But what about our students in wild areas for rehearsals? Does that count as “away from public”?’
‘But… would he really?’ Dean O’Heven frowned hard. ‘He’d be nuts if he did that!’
‘Excuse me? Since when is he not nuts?’ Dean Romboton skewed at him. ‘Would anyone in this room ever try to kill kids for a magimal egg?’
‘Agreed. We can’t afford to risk our students’ safety.’ Dean Harries nodded. ‘Especially since plenty of Max’s properties have been gifted to our students over the last couple of years.’
‘But our students need to get trained in real battles against magimals! If they don’t experience rehearsals they will grow up weak!’ Dean O’Heven frowned. ‘Plus, how long are we going to suspend the rehearsal program? If, ten years from now, we still can’t find Max, are we going to keep it suspended?’
‘Yes, we are going to. Because we have to.’ Gazbell said deeply. ‘I’ll find other ways to compensate our students.’
‘But you are overprotecting them.’ O’Heven sounded upset. ‘Historically, our students always got hurt in rehearsals, and in rare circumstances they even got killed if they overestimated their power and went too aggressive.’
‘I know! But that’s an inevitable cost for them in training, so we have to bear with it.’ Gazbell was not in a good mood either. ‘But this time it’s different! We know there could be a fatal threat, and that threat is intentional! See the difference?’
‘Not entirely. An Expert magimal can occasionally roam out of deep jungle and get into a Novice or Adept area, and kill people there.’ Dean O’Heven was not convinced. ‘It happened several times in the past; can you say it wasn’t intentional when it started to kill?’
‘Mr. Principal, Mr. Alcanta from Sunrise Alliance has arrived.’ Right then, a teacher’s voice sounded from outside the meeting room.
‘Send him in, please!’ Gazbell stood up to welcome the envoy from the Alliance, as did everyone else. ‘Good to see you again, Professor Alcanta.’
‘Likewise, Master Reymond. And good to see you all, ladies and gents.’ A curly haired, neatly dressed man walked into the room and shook hands with Gazbell. ‘This must be the crystal ball that you mentioned. The Alliance has already gone into action to search for Rodka, for your information.’
After the greetings, Gazbell quickly updated him on the discussion that they were having. ‘So what do you think, Professor Alcanta? Shall we close the campus and suspend the rehearsals?’
‘Well, I think I’m right on time.’ Professor Alcanta nodded in thought. ‘Coincidentally, the Alliance offered another potential solution, so let’s talk about it now!’
****
Since the poison attack, the friends had exhausted themselves in hard practice. Rodka’s crisis had brought out the best in them; each and every one of them became more positive and proactive in everything than ever. Soarame was particularly impressed by Kardiac — this boy almost became another person. Soarame used to personally call him by a nickname other than the mad bear — lazy bear, for his tendency to eat and sleep a lot more than the others. But since that day, this was no longer the case. Soarame was very proud of him, until just a few days later…
‘WHAT THE HECK?’ A deafening voice came from the living room this morning and shook Soarame out of his dream. ‘Guys, wake up! You need to read this!’
‘For the mercy of god, Kardy.’ Soarame sat up from the bed, frightened to see Kardiac barge into his room. ‘How amazing to see you up so early on a Sunday morning!’
‘The rehearsals have been cancelled!’ Kardiac barked urgently, waving his emblem up and down. ‘Check your emblem messages!’
‘What?’ Soarame spent a few seconds clearing his mind. ‘Our rehearsal plan is cancelled?’
‘Kardy, you should at least finish reading the entire message before you scare people.’ Omifo came over, rubbing his sleepy eyes. ‘There’s more, so keep reading!’
‘A Jankide Quest is issued to replace rehearsals. Only Adept and above can apply.’ Shortly later, the friends all gathered in Soarame’s dorm, reading the notifications from their emblems. ‘Jankide Quest? What is that?’
The friends kept reading and soon found the answer. Although the reason for closing the campus and suspending the rehearsal programme was not explained, in order to make up for these sudden changes, the school was offering a unique chance for the students to accept an assignment issued by the Sunrise Alliance. They were trying to collect a type of rare ores called Jankide, from a large area of wilderness. Due to the broadness of the area and the rareness of jankide ores, the Alliance didn’t have enough labour resources to search for it, and thus they needed help from the students. They would send the students to potential jankide areas, and the stude
nts were supposed to go and seek the jankide ores in exchange for valuable rewards.
Jankide was known to be an extremely valuable material due to its hardness — actually, it’s the hardest material known in the world. The ores were very rare, and were known to exist only in very special geographical environments. Interestingly, for some reason they were attractive to some magimals as well, so sometimes people found them in the nests of magimal clans. In this case, the students would have to battle the magimals during their searching but, fortunately, the Alliance hadn’t detected any Expert magimals in the area, which made it a perfect chance for the students to rehearse there.
‘Once we find the ores, we can exchange them for Adept or Expert magigears or soulcores, depending on the value of the ores… Really?’ Dileys screamed in joy. She stared at the picture of jankide ores, carving its appearance into her heart. ‘The only shame is that the school only allows us a maximum of two weeks in the quest. Is that gonna be enough time?’
‘Hold on. It’s not easy even to stay that long. It says the quest is more dangerous than most rehearsals, and survival is not an easy task.’ Jemario read aloud for the friends. ‘Note: As a rehearsal, the quest is completely unsupervised. And the quest is more dangerous than ordinary rehearsals, because there are supposed to be more Adept magimals. Ambition can thus result in fatal incidents — all participants be strongly alerted.’
‘Wait… so the Alliance wants us to do something for them, but they don’t care about our safety?’ Kardiac complained. ‘They just throw us there and we’ll be on our own after that?’
‘It’s a rehearsal, come on!’ Catheray squinted at him. ‘Are you a wizard or not?’
‘It says we will be teleported to a random spot in the outer zone of the jankide area to start with, but after that it’s all up to us.’ Alicey cast a photo from her emblem into the air. ‘Look! Here’s a photo of the jankide area. It’s beautiful!’ In the photo there was a valley, with trees and flowers here and there.