Chapter 7: Chapter 7: The first step into knighthood

POV-Leo

I'm sitting next to dad as we ride on the cart. I look around for the thousandth time to see if I can maybe see the city but as usual,  all I see is the fields of green with the occasional plains walker grazing on the grass, they are huge armored cow-like beasts that dad said is a harmless creature that will only attack you if you get too close to them when I asked him if they would attack us. Even though I believe dad, I still can't help but hold the hilt of the sword mom gave me. Right now the sword is wrapped in a cloth so that nobody can see it, dad said that nobody can see it because it's a super valuable thing and to only use it if it's VERY important. Back then I asked why I had it if it was so valuable, mom only said that it was fate for me to get it but I think she is lying. It looks like the rock dad found when I was little so I think dad turned that into a sword for me.

Two days later I'm watching the fields again, I look up to the sky after a while and see a couple of Blue Maw flying around.

"Dad, what's it like to fly?" I ask in curiosity, if anyone could fly it would be dad because he can do anything with his magic.

"I don't know," dad says with a sigh.

"Almost nobody can fly Leo, only the strongest people in the world can fly unless their race gives them wings." he continues.

"Maybe one day you will tell me what it's like to fly, you seem to have the talent for it," he said with a smile

"I will!" I shout because this will be my second life goal.

"Oh look Leo" dad says as he is pointing at the walls in the distance.

"Is that the city that I will be training? It's so big!" I say in amazement.

"Yeah, the city of war, famous for its class schools." dad says with a smile.

"Hey dad, didn't you go to a school here?" I ask as I remember him saying he trained here when he was younger.

"Yes I did, I went to the mage tower here" he responds.

I and dad talk for a while before we reach the gates of the city. They are massive to me and they hold the banners of our kingdom on them.  We get in the line to enter the city and I see other people coming in and out, some look like merchants, others like soldiers, and others look like other people who are going to one of the academies. Once we get to the front a guard starts talking.

"Please put your hand on the stone," he says in a monotone voice.

Dad then puts his hand on the stone and a screen pops up.

---

Name: John Brownpaw

Race: Human

Age 24/128

Level: Flame-Mage 28

---

After the guard sees the screen he nods to dad.

"Ok you can go in but don't go burning things," the guard says.

"Of course" dad nods back and we go into the city.

Once we pass the gates I can fully see the city, it's a maze of buildings, some big some small, most are made of bricks but some are made from wood or plain stone. I can see blacksmith shops way bigger than Uncle Sam's, I also see different clothing shops filled with too many different outfits, like who needs that many?

As we continue into the city we leave the cart at a stable and they walk on foot pasted areas with shops we travel to a giant building, bigger than any I have ever seen before 'Is this the academy?' I think when I see the huge flat stone walls of it, it has a gate that we walk through and into a dirt area void of plant life. I follow dad as he walks into the building while staring at everything from the other people we pass to the painting hung on the walls. It seems super fancy yet minimalist at the same time which is confusing to me.

We eventually reach a big room filled with kids and parents, dad walks up to a counter with a woman in a plain jacket sitting at it. 

"I would like to register my son at the school," dad says while gesturing to me.

the woman looks at me and raises an eyebrow.

"Only kids that are 4 or 5 can register," she says in a voice that is not amused.

"I can assure you that he is only 4, he might look older but he is not," dad says in a respectful tone.

The woman signs and bends down to pick up a crystal off the ground, she puts it on the table. She then gestures to me.

"Please put your hand on the crystal" She calmly says.

I do and a status screen shows up above the crystal.

---

Name: Leo Brownpaw

Race: Human

Gender: Male

Age: 4

Levels: Aura Knight 1

---

The woman has a mildly surprised expression as she reads the screen.

"So he is," she says and pulls out a paper and hands it to dad.

"Please sign this, once the sign-in time is over you will be given further instructions," she tells dad.

Dad then thanks her and tells me to go into the room while he walks over to the side of the room with the other parents.

"Hey, you" I hear a voice behind me.

I turn and see a girl about 5 years old with long light green hair.

"Hmm?" I respond.

"Your too old to be here!" She shoots back.

"I look older than I am, I'm only 4" I calmly respond as I am used to this at this point.

The girl stares at me for a couple of minutes which makes me a little uncomfortable but I bare with it.

"Fine what's your name?" She asks.

"Leo, and you? I respond.

"Nellie Booth" she proudly says.

"Cool," I say and fall silent.

"What's with the cloth on your back?" Nellie puts an end to the silence.

"It's a sword," I say.

"Why is it covered? Is it super ugly?" she curiously asks.

"No, it's just that I am supposed to keep it covered" I answer.

"But why?" she asks.

"I don't know" I answer.

This goes on for a while before everyone around us falls silent and so do we. At the end of the room, there is a giant of a man with a sword that matches. He walks into the room letting the door he entered through shut with a slam. He slowly walks farther into the room and stands in front of the room of kids, his eyes scan through the crowd and lands on me for a second before continuing to the rest of the group and when he is done he opens his mouth.

"Welcome to the Greymarsh academy, if you get in you will be trained into fine knights worthy of serving our kingdom," He says with a booming voice.

"Now that we are done with the pleasantries let's get to the meat of the discussion, how you get into the academy." he continues.

"To get in you will need to pass a series of tests to weed out the weak ones in this group, leaving only the ones that can become knights," he says and some kids start to whisper.

"Now follow me, parents please stay here and wait for the results. He says before walking back to the door he entered from and walking through it, he walked through it as if it was not there. I see some kids walk up to the door and touch it, some go through and others are stuck and can't go through. I get nervous and walk up to the door with Nellie following behind, we walk up to the door and walk through it with no issue. I notice as I am walking through it that I lose some of my aura stores similar to when I hold my sword.

'So the first part of the test is to have aura already?' I guess and see the big guy walking down the hall, I run to catch up with Nellie following close behind.

"What was up with that door?" she asks, it seems that she did not figure it out.

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"Only those with aura can pass through the door, it was probably the first test," I say as we are jogging, some of the kids that are near me seem to hear me. 

"That's mean" one boy states.

"Only the people who work hard outside of the schedule with succeed" I respond to the kid.

"And why are you so smart?" I hear Nellie from behind me 'Why is she always behind me?' I think a little spooked.

"My dad is a mage so it just runs in the blood" I answer.

"That's cheating!" she exclaims while panting.

"You should talk less so you can breath more." I calmly say.

"Why don't you stop talking then?" she shoots back.

"Because I have enough stamina to keep this up for a while," I say with a smirch.

"Jerk" She responds.

This keeps up for a while before we reach a stone hall filled with armor stands on the sides, each armor set has a weapon to match it. Most of the kids who got here first are not doing anything to go forward.

"The armor will probably start to attack us when we pass it so watch out," a girl with fiery red hair states as she takes the first step into the room, once she takes that step the armor to her sides flares with aura and the armor on her right swing its swords. She sees the attack and steps back to dodge the attacks, the right armor misses but the left armor then swings and the girl seems to think she can't dodge this one so she draws the sword on her hip and it also flares with aura, once the two swords meet the girl's sword shines bright red and she doesn't even budge from the attack and the armor steps back to the resting position it was in when we entered the room.

'Is she just really strong or does her sword have a good enchantment like mine?' I wonder for a second before deciding that it's probably both considering she is here at all.

"WOW," some kids exclaim when they see what she did.

"She just blocked a living armor attack like it was nothing!" other kids say.

"Was that an enchanted sword?!" A kid exclaims causing others to whisper more.

"She must be a noble to have an enchanted sword right? Some kids ask.

'Are enchanted weapons rare?' I wonder.

"Red hair and an enchanted sword? She is probably from the Flameblood family" I hear Nellie say behind me.

"The Flamebloods are a big noble family right?" I ask Nellie because I never paid any attention to nobles or anything similar.

"Yeah they are, the head of their house is the Legendary knight, Gulros the Dragon Slayer he is called" She whispers back to me.

"Wait, someone able to kill a dragon and live?" I feel like even I would have heard of him if this was true.

"Yeah, most nobles keep it hidden for some reason" she responds.

"Then how do you know?" I ask.

"My dad is a baron who has a fief south of here" She responds as if it were natural.

"So do you have an enchanted sword then?" I ask trying to get how many people have them.

"Yeah, but mine only has a lightweight enchantment so it weighs less," she says.

"Do all nobles here have them?" I continue.

"I think most will at least have an increased durability weapon" she responds after thinking for a little.

"Why the questions though?" She asks.

"Umm well, I am just trying to guess the competition." I nervously respond while looking away.

"Well with your size I don't think you will have any problems," she says trying to comfort me I think?

"Oh look! She is going forward again!" a boy to my left says which draws me back to reality.

"We need to get going, I can't even see the knight anymore" I quickly say to Nellie.

"I agree," she says and follows behind me as I walk to the front.

"You are a good windbreaker you know, everyone just parts for you," Nellie says with a smile.

'Is that why she is always behind me? 

Once we reach the front of the room we see the red hair girl taking the third of 15 steps to get out of the hall. I see her parry one of the armor and dodge the other as she walks, it seems the armor will only attack someone once. I see this and am the next person to go in, I take my first step and dodge both attacks. I take my second step and get attacked again, this time I dodge one and block the other with my still-wrapped sword, stealing some aura from the armor but less than normal because of the cloth in the way.

'Dad said to use this when it's important and this is, right?' I convince myself that swinging it is fine.

I take another step and block both of the attacks, they are strong! Like why are they using this as a test for kids?? I take another step and reach the red-haired girl.

"What kind of enchant is that?" I ask with small pants because of the strain of blocking.

"It's a force absorption enchant, why?" she asks.

"I don't know, I was just curious" I respond.

"Anyway, What's your name?" I ask.

"Lezzun, you? she says.

"Leo," I say as I take another step and block another set of attacks, Nellie comes up behind me, she seems to have dodged most of the attacks.

"Hi, my name is Nellie! Are you from the Flameblood family?" Nellie asks excitedly.

"Why?" Lezzun asks suspiciously.

"Well, my dad said that there would be people from bigger families here and you have red hair and a cool sword so I wanted to see if that was true" Nellie says with a childish gleam in her eye.

"I am from the Flamebloods," Lezzun says with a matter-of-fact tone.

"That's so COOL" Nellie exclaims.

"What's it like being in such a huge family? Have you ever met Gulros? Have you seen a dragon?" Nellie fires off question after question.

"Nothing strange, yes, and no" Lezzun states.

We all take another step and get attacked, we either dodge or block them, behind us we can hear people shouting and it seems like people tried and failed to dodge the armor attacks. After a while and a couple of close calls, we reach the end of the hall which seemed to take forever but was really not that long.

"My feeeet" Nellie complains as she rubs her soar feet, it seems her dodging everything took a number on her feet, causing me to chuckle.

"Leo can you carry me to the next area?" she pleads.

"If you can't get to the next area then you won't be able to get into the school," I say.

"Hey you can't leave me here you jerk!" she scolds in turn.

"And I'm not failing in the actual parts of the test, just in between them AND nothing says you can't help people" she states.

"Fine but only till the next part" I concede after a minute of thinking.

I then pick Nellie up from the ground where she is sitting and put her on my back, she is surprisingly light which shouldn't be surprising at all considering the fact she can dodge so much. I continue to the next part of this test.

“Why is this test so hard when most of us have never trained before!” Nellie complains.

“Yeah, this is suspicious” Lezzun comments.

“Only like 10 people will get in if they keep this up” She continues.

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