Royal Academy

"You don't look too happy, Colt."

"Nah, I didn't realise. Thanks for reminding me."

"Really? Your welcome!"

"...You don't hear my sarcasm, do you?"

At the present time, both Colt and Nathan could currently be seen walking through the front courtyard pathway leading towards what looked to be a massive building with pure-white walls, reinforced blue tinted windows and much more.

This place was Royal Academy, one of the five schools in the Western continent, and the school that both Colt and Nathan were going to be spending their next three years training in. Out of the five schools, Royal Academy was certainly one of the more popular of the choices.

Speaking of the school, the building that they were now walking towards was merely one of many buildings that made up the entire school. In fact, they had already entered school quite some time ago. The school itself was a large complex comprised of multiple high-rise buildings and more.

As for the building in front of them, it was the main building where everything to do with academic classes and similar were conducted. Basically, this building in front of them had the purpose of serving as your typical school while the other facilities were more physical activity, relaxation, etc.

Naturally, since they were in school, they were now wearing their assigned uniforms.

They were both now wearing rather fancy uniforms consisting of dark-blue sleek trousers with a matching suit jacket over a white short-sleeved dress shirt, the trousers and jacket also having lighter blue vibrant patterns lining them along with a matching vibrant blue tie neatly tucked under their jackets. To finish off, they had on black leather shoes with blue soles.

"Right, no one got to see what your transformation looked like!" Nathan suddenly exclaimed as he crossed both arms behind his head. "It's only been a few days, but the news of you getting an SSS-Rank Class spread like wildfire. I even saw some people drawing what they think you might've looked like transformed!"

"Did they draw me as a skeleton?" Colt deadpanned slightly as he sarcastically asked this. Unlike Nathan, Colt did not have any desire for people to gawk at him when transformed. That's why by the time the pillar of black light had faded away, he had already undone his transformation back at the ceremony. "I'm just glad such news isn't released to the public."

"Why's that?"

"Do you not see everyone who's looking at us?"

After hearing Colt's response, which was in a very blank and dull tone by the way, Nathan blinked a few times before looking around as they stopped walking. True to Colt's words, practically every student that noticed them was now staring and whispering.

"That's him, huh..."

"Did he really get an SSS-Rank Class?"

"In Examination Site 2, it was crazy!"

Naturally, everyone who wasn't doing their awakening in the same examination site as Colt and Nathan had extreme doubts of the authenticity of Colt's Class. To them, it just sounded like a bunch of fake and ridiculous news, not that they could be blamed.

Naturally, the school doesn't publicize this information even within the school, let alone outside, so any students who aren't physically at said site when the examination was conducted wouldn't know of other student's Classes unless told later.

As they were walking, the sudden whispers and commotion happening behind them suddenly caught their attention. Curiously, both Colt and Nathan turned around to see just what it was that was happening.

They all saw a number of other students looking at another student who was now walking down the same pathway they were, and they appeared to be female, evident not only by their figure but also obviously due to the female variation of the school uniform.

The female student walked in a rather refined and elegant manner, no doubt possibly due to some higher class life style. As she walked, her neatly straightened long white swayed side to side while her sharp icy-blue eyes remained trained on the path ahead of her.

Ignoring all of the looks she was getting, from both male and females that is, though mostly from the males, she continued walking.

"Who's she?" Colt couldn't help but ask. He was glad that all of the previous attention was taken away, but he couldn't help but become curious after seeing all of the exaggerated reactions after she appeared. "She seems rather popular."

"You don't know her?! That's Ariana Fromese." Nathan exclaimed once again as he stared at Colt in disbelief. "She's famous for being the most beautiful girl at Serene Queen Middle School, especially famous on social media too! How have you NOT heard of her?"

"I don't look at social media, though I have heard of Serene Queen Middle School. If I'm not mistaken, it's an all-girls school for the rich." Colt held his chin as he said this. "She does seem to have that typical high-class air to her, but I don't know. Must be pretty great being so rich."

"Uh... aren't you from an insanely rich family?"

"I don't know what you're talking about." Colt shrugged as adjusted his bag over his shoulder before turning and began walking once again towards the main building. "We should go, don't want to get in trouble for being late to the opening assembly. You're free to continue gawking if you want."

"W-Wait for me...!"

Nathan quickly flailed around in a panic before rushing after Colt, this all being seen by Ariana as she seemed to cast a curious look towards the walking pair.

[O]-----------------------[O]

Although Royal Academy was overall a school designed specifically to train the next generation of Awakened to fight against the interdimensional invaders, it was still a school overall, thus general education on top of classes related to Awakened are available.

After the opening ceremony for the new students, all of the freshmen who were now attending Royal Academy were all split up into four different classes, such as Class 1-A, Class 1-B, etc. Nothing complicated, standard stuff.

Anyway, since this was only the first day, the freshmen students didn't have any official classes and were instead given a proper and in-depth tour of all the facilities around the school. Each of the classes were given a tour by their teacher.

Unlike most normal school, the teacher assigned to each class stays the same until the end of the year when you move up to your second and third year. The teacher, referred to as instructor here in this school, teaches all the subjects for the class they're assigned.

Aside from that, with the first half of the day over, the four freshmen classes were all taken to the cafeteria to have their lunch. The schedule style here in this school was very simple, you had three classes in the first session, then lunch, and then three classes again before you either go home or have club activities.

Considering this was a school for Awakened, a majority, if not all, the clubs were combat based or in one way or another related to the career of an Awakened.

The cafeteria was massive to say the least, with a whole wide range of items to choose from everyday, which naturally brought great joy to the new students. The quality of the food was no less than that of 5-Star restaurants, the advantages of taking on a career that puts your life in danger.

After launch, the classes were all brought together into what looked to be one of the large gymnasiums. The four classes were all sitting on the many seats surrounding the large field below, where what looked to be a complex obstacle course had been set up.

As for the instructors, there were two males and two female instructors. All of them were currently wearing fancy suits, and the way they all stood tall without shifting at all already showed their natural discipline. They were instructors, so they naturally had already gone through a lot of training.

"Alright, you all must be curious as to why we've all brought you together here!" The loud voice of Class 1-A's, that was Colt and Nathan's class, instructor sounded as the other three instructors were all lined up together on the field and looking up at the students. "As you all know, every Awakened starts at the same benchmark. All of you should have twenty in all of your main parameters. No matter your size, muscles, height, or anything. You are all the same."

This was one of the oddities when it came to Awakened, their benchmark upon first getting their powers was indeed the same. All of their stats of Strength, Agility, and Vitality were all at twenty. Even if you were the smallest kid in the class, you'd be as strong as the bulkiest and tallest student.

Of course, one could increase their stats as an Awakened through physical training in the gym and such, but doing so is rather exceedingly difficult. Thus, most of the time, Awakened always prefer to try and level up instead of physical exercise.

"Taking advantage of this, we have decided to test you." One of the female instructors, who from the looks of it appeared to be the instructor for Class 1-C, spoke up after the first. "Before any changes occur in your parameters, we'd like to see how well you can move in the field."

Another one of the instructors took over at this point. "Power is important, there is no denying that. However, you also need to possess certain skills if you are to be sent into battle in the future. The ability to properly move in complicated terrain is but one, and we wish to see where you currently stand in that."

"Please turn your eyes to the obstacle course." Class 1-A's instructor spoke as he gestured behind himself. "We've set up this course with various different sections that will test your balance, coordination of body movements, and more. Four students will run the course at the same time, one from each class. Once your name gets all, quickly make your way to starting line!"

"Yes, sir!"

With that, the instructors all quickly called their first participants as all the others watched on from the seats. The course itself wasn't long, and with all of their enhanced physiques, everyone should be more than capable of finishing it in under five minutes at the very most.

"You should be really good at this, Colt!" Nathan smiled as he rested both of his arms on his knees with his back hunched forwards, looking to Colt as he said this. Colt was seated like normal with his arms crossed over his chest. "You're really good at... gymnastics, right? You're really light on your feet."

"Parkour actually, but close enough I guess. We'll have to see though, I'll have to adapt and get a feel for the obstacle course first if I want to get a good score for this."

"Really? Don't we just need to complete it?"

"They said it was a test, meaning we're going to get a result." Colt answered simply as he rested his head against his palm, his eyes narrowing as he watched the current students doing the course. "It's not just about completing it. They'll probably grade us on various aspects, such as how long it takes us, how many times we mess up, and more so."

"Will the grade for this affect our final results?" Nathan frowned a bit in concern. "I haven't really done stuff like this like you have."

"I doubt they'll have it affect much on our final records, but who knows. Even if you haven't done anything like parkour, I'm sure they made it more than possible for you to complete it. I sincerely doubt they made the course so that only those with impressive manoeuvres can complete it."

"Oh, okay! That makes me feel better."

[O]-----------------------[O]

The instructors continued to call out students as any who have not yet taken their turn or have already gone watched from the seats, and it was during his time observing the others that Colt noticed a few things about the other students.

From what he could tell, a number of them had yet to properly adjust themselves to their new physical abilities. A number of them on the course weren't able to keep proper balance, and had accidents such as knocking into others, jumping too far, etc.

With how a normal humans could only ever reach up to ten points in their stats, an instant jump up to twenty for newly awakened certainly would be a bit difficulty to get used to. Keep in mind also that everyone here weren't professional athletes, so some may have jumped immediately up to twenty from like six or below.

In any case, it eventually got to Colt's turn as he was now standing at the starting line with the other three who were going to be running with him.

"Colt Azrael."

"Hm?" Colt blinked before turning his head to see who called out to him. When he did, he widened his eyes slightly in surprise when he saw a familiar person staring up at him with a pair of cold unblinking eyes. "You're... Ariana, right?"

"Mm. Ariana Fromese from Class 1-B, nice to meet you." Although she spoke in a cold and rather emotionless tone, though Colt could still tell she was being genuine with her greeting. "I look forward to competing with you in this race."

"I'm pretty sure it's not a competition, but same to you I guess." Slightly confused, Colt still replied with a nod of his head. 'Actually, now that I think about it, why are we doing this in our school uniforms? Meh, maybe the instructors want us to get used to doing physical activity even in more restrictive clothing...'

"Get ready!" The instructor's voice boomed as the four who were lined up all quickly got into position. "Begin!"

Right after that word left the instructor's mouth, Colt didn't waste any time before kicking off against the ground, giving him a rather large boost of speed as he shot forwards. He wanted to get ahead of the others immediately, that way he didn't need to worry about accidentally bumping into them.

The first part was very simple, it was just a 100m dash to the other side of the building, which he and the others easily cleared in under five seconds. The next part was a simple diagonal monkey bar, to which Colt didn't bother climbing properly, instead swinging himself up after grabbing onto the first bar.

He swung himself through the gap and landing lightly on top of the next bar, and when he landed, he didn't stay still for a second before quickly rushing himself up the monkey bar as if he was running up a flight of stairs. His footsteps were light and fast, barely causing any disturbance to the bar itself.

Seeing this, everyone couldn't help but watch in awe as he leapt off the last bar and onto the first swinging rope on the next section. Instead of using the other ropes to swing across, he used the momentum from his jump to launch himself with a swing on the first rope before breaking his fall with a graceful roll and immediately getting into a sprint.

The other three students were still at the bottom of the monkey bars, mainly because they got distracted by Colt's movements. Ariana was the first to snap out of it as she decided to copy what Colt did, it looked to be the fastest and most efficient method after all.

With her own great sense of balance, she was able to quickly swing and run up the monkey bars as well. The last two students were... hesitating, they obviously hadn't gotten used to using their newfound strength just yet. Thus, they had no choice but to go up the normal way.

There were many other sections that made up this rather long course, but nothing that they couldn't handle. In fact, only a few of the students took over five minutes to finish, which was the expected duration for a solid pass. Obviously, those who lacked basic technique were much slower than others.

"Colt Azrael, forty-two seconds!"

"..."

"Ariana Fromese, one minute twenty seconds!"