The mage kept inspecting.
“And what’s this?” He lifted a lead garment whose dead weight made him suspect some hidden weapon.
Luo Wei nudged her sunglasses. “Thermal layer. Nights get cold in the forest. We need it.”
“Do they.” Skeptical.
“Of course.” She raised a hand solemnly. “I swear on my honor.”
“…All right.” He grudgingly set it down—then his gaze snagged on a green turtle shell. He held it up. “Explain this?”
Luo Wei removed her sunglasses, revealing wide, earnest eyes. “Sir, that’s my divination tool. My classmates and professors can vouch for me.”
“Divination tool?” His expression said: Are you serious? “Siria students divine with turtle shells?”
Unblinking, Luo Wei said, “I do use turtle shell divination. Ask my Astrology instructor—Lady Tobias—if you doubt me.”
At the name, respect snapped into his posture. “A student of Lady Jacqueline Tobias! Has she made a new breakthrough?”
“Refining traditional tarot-and-crystal meditation—shifting to natural media like shells to interpret stellar omens?”
Faced with the scholarly hunger in his eyes, Luo Wei offered an apologetic smile. “Sorry. It’s the professor’s research. I don’t know the details. Perhaps consult her directly.”
Spectator area. Professor Tobias herself: …
Side glances gathered. The lead instructor of the top-ranked St. Pulu Academy among the Ten Great Academies actually turned and called out loudly, “Lady Tobias, are you truly divining with turtle shells?”
Seeking drama, he flicked his wand; Luo Wei’s feed swelled in her magic mirror right under Tobias’s nose.
Professor Tobias’s gaze rested on the girl’s straight-faced bluff. Hearing the probing question, she answered coldly, “Siria Academy enjoys academic freedom.”
Translation: None of your business.
What else could she do? The student had just hung the pot squarely on her hook; she could only accept it.
In a full century, Lady Tobias had never carried blame for something she hadn’t done. The sensation was—novel.
At the Junior Division entrance, the gate mage, finished with Luo Wei’s pack, eyed her again. “Not hiding anything on your person?”
Luo Wei produced the wand from her sleeve and the dagger from her boot. “Only these.”
He nodded. “You’re clear. Next!”
Next was Hol.
From Hol’s pack the mage extracted… a pot.
“A pot?” He blinked, doubting his senses.
But the look and greasy heft insisted: a pot. A blackened iron pot, bottom crusted with suspicious sticky residue.
“Why bring a pot?” Shock sharpened his voice.
Hol’s smile was simple, guileless. “In case we’re injured—I can brew potions.”
The mage’s eyes bulged. “An iron pot—for potions? Has Siria Magic Academy fallen that low?”
Serious potion makers used rounded silver or tin cauldrons; failing that, at least copper. Iron was for commoners stewing meat.
With crude casting full of impurities, iron darkened anything boiled. No noble would cook in it—let alone refine medicine.
Hol chuckled. “Family heirloom. Sentimental. I didn’t use the academy’s.”
“No need to explain. I know. I understand.” Sympathy softened his gaze.
Poor child—this impoverished and still guarding the academy’s face.
Who didn’t already know Siria Magic Academy was broke? No need for pretense.
“Fine. You pass. Go.”
He waved Hol through and moved on.
Axina’s and Jack’s packs were by-the-book; aside from that “thermal layer” and sunglasses, nothing notable.
Then—Gladys.
He pulled out a longsword—and two massive marrow bones.
Bones?
“What are these?” His hands trembled with the existential question.
So thick. So long. Human?
Gladys snatched them back, hugging them. “They’re mine! I love eating beef bones!”
Beef bones. Visible relief eased his shoulders. “Those you—”
Crunch—
Gladys bit straight into one. Teeth grated audibly on bone, a sound that made his own ache.
“See? I eat them.” She displayed it anxiously, as if fearing confiscation.
Silence. A chill crept down his spine.
Absurd. A magic apprentice had actually spooked a Mage.
Just how poor was Siria that students gnawed raw bones?
In the spectator area, Siria’s professors also fell silent.
Had they treated students badly?
No?
Then why were these students blackening the academy’s reputation in front of so many outsiders?
In the magic mirror feed, all five Siria contestants cleared inspection and entered the field.
The event began at noon and ended at noon the next day. Each team had a separate entrance, so Luo Wei’s squad met no one else inside.
A breeze passed. Gladys’s ears twitched; her sword flashed free. “Magic beasts. Seven hundred meters.”
Hol crouched, palm to soil. “Two medium-small beasts. Closing on us.”
Jack looked from Gladys to Hol, nearly unhinging his jaw. “Wait—how do you even know?”
“Ears,” Gladys said coolly.
“Hands,” Hol replied, smiling.
Luo Wei shook her head. Those two—effortless show-offs.
She glanced at the light, drew her wand. “Time. Ready up.”
“Yes!”
They answered as one, drawing their favored weapons, eyes burning toward the distance.
Seconds ticked. Gladys spoke suddenly. “No—they stopped.”
Hol crouched again, sensing, then looked up. “Five more people joined them. We got beaten to it.”
“Being slower is on us,” Luo Wei said after two seconds’ thought. She drew out the turtle shell. “Don’t panic. Let me take a reading.”
She closed her eyes, slipping into her mental realm; a canopy of star charts blossomed.
No resolving doubts. No telling fate. Only the present.
“Magic beasts within ten kilometers—where?”
Stars glittered; from the dark sea below, a vast cracked carapace rose. Starlight lanced down in narrow beams onto its surface.
Gold points of varied size drifted over the fissured shell—some lively, some still.
Scattered across the shell-map, their positions, sizes, movement vectors—all at a glance.
From her current locus, one kilometer northeast: a cluster of small beasts, lounging inert—the behavior of nocturnal species disinclined to daytime movement.
She opened her eyes, a faint smile at her lips.
As expected—divining existing conditions surfaced swiftly, and interpretation was effortless.
“Northeast, one kilometer—a group of small magic beasts. We go there first.”
She’d fixed the map in memory. Some would roam, but most beasts stayed within territory unless driven out.
Those nocturnal creatures would let them pull far ahead in points.
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