The first classes

After a nice breakfast with the White family, Rachel went back to sleep, while Maria, Isabelle and Yuna hurried towards the Academy.

The central square was already filled with many students, some of them coming out of the teleporter. Those were the lucky ones who resided in other big cities scattered across Aether.

The colorful touches of the uniforms indicated what element was each student. Powder blue, red, gold, ocean blue, forest green, chocolate brown and indigo filtered through the streets all heading in one direction: through the gilded gates of the school grounds.

Maria entered the school grounds as well and a bell started ringing from atop the Academy.

Ring!

Isabelle and Yuna took off, their green and golden skirts fluttering behind them.

Ring!

Maria took off as well, heading towards the biggest building the school grounds had to offer.

Ring!

The people were starting to crowd in front of the door. The crowd made it impossible to see the inside.

Ring!

Maria moved slowly with the crowd until... She hit the student in front of her, who had suddenly stopped moving.

And as he turned around, Maria couldn't help but say:

"You again!" It was the same boy she had bumped into yesterday.

"I could say the same thing." He replied, then, without another word, he turned towards the door and started walking again. Intrigued, she followed him.

"You know, you should be more careful." He continued to say, as if he knew that she was still behind him, his deep voice covering all the other voices around me. It was as if his very voice demanded the world to go quiet.

Entranced, she continued to listen. "Could really hurt someone's back." He glanced at her again, and smiled crookedly. "So, where's your class at, backstabber?"

Maria snorted inadvertently. "Pfft, backstabber?"

"Cause you decided to stab with your pretty little head right between my shoulder blades." He feigned an expression of hurt, rubbing at his back.

"R-right... Sorry."

He waved her off, accepting her apology. Still, there were a few voices inside her mind, calling her "clumsy" and "stupid". Taking a page from the boy's book, she waved them off.

"So, you still haven't my question, backstabber. Where to? I could help you get there." That woke Maria back up.

She looked at her crumpled schedule, trying to hide the heat that was spreading through her cheeks. "Um...It says here I need to reach the Conch Auditorium?" She said, finally answering his question.

"You got lucky. You're standing right in front of it." He pointed at the set of massive wooden doors, framed by conch shells covered in nacre, one of the doors slightly open, because of the students pouring in. All of them wore the ocean blue that decorated her own uniform. The boy smiled crookedly again. "You really should watch where you're going, water."

"I'll get around to knowing the-" Maria started to say, but he was just gone again. Vanished in the crowd like a shadow.

"-school."

A little too late, the question she had wanted to ask him left her lips:

"..But what's your name?"

-------

The Auditorium was quickly filling up and luckily for her, she spotted Mya in the crowd. She quickly went to catch a seat by her. She threw Maria a beaming smile.

"I am so glad you're here! There are sooo many people! It's crazy, I've never seen so many people in my life! I am so so excited about starting to learn new things! Like, what do you think they're gonna talk to us about? And- Oooh, what class are you in?"

She snatched Maria's schedule to look at it, and before Maria even got to say "Hey!", Mya threw it back to her with excitement.

"Yay, we're in class Stardew together! Oh, it's so nice that I already know someone in my class!"

"You could have just asked, you know! I would have told you! You don't just take-"

Mya shushed her, because the lights in the Auditorium were dimming. And atop the stage came a figure surrounded in pearly fairy lights. All the irritation was forgotten as she came to the middle of the stage, her white blonde hair flowing down on her white jacket, even reaching the top of her turquoise crayon skirt.

"Welcome to Aether Academy!" she said and opened her arms, which made snowflakes start falling from above. Amazed, just like the other first years, Maria touched one of the falling snowflakes, while Mya caught one on her tongue.

"My name is Ms. Summers. I am here to tell you what to expect from our wonderful Academy. Here you will learn to master your element, water, and you'll also learn a lot of other things useful for traveling, surviving and thriving in Aetheria. Earthen students also have an extra mandatory class: Lay of the land. It should help those of you who are still new to our world adapt to its environment better."

Maria scoffed, unhappy with that decision, but at least that one made sense. Aether was confusing to her too at the start, after all. Still was sometimes. Mya looked worriedly at her, but she gave Mya a thumbs up. She'd be fine.

The monologue continued, as Ms. Summers went over the rules and explained the courses to them, as well as how the elemental training would work.

"So, while you'll attend classes with your respective groups, written on your schedule, during elemental training, you'll be split into groups of only water elements. You'll find that while socializing with other elements is interesting, learning with your peers is quite refreshing!"

A few laughs rung in the auditorium at the pun and a small smile appeared on Maria's face. Mya snorted.

The presentation was soon over and after Ms. Summers was off the stage, the other students started looking for each other's classmates.

And somehow, despite the fuss created in the auditorium, Maria heard someone shout "Stardew! Stardew!". She looked around and spotted a lanky boy, waving around a sheet of paper that had a hastily scribbled star on it. The girls went towards him and the people that were already gathering around him.

In the end, they were a small group, of about 5 students: the blond lanky boy, a short brunette, a white haired boy, Maria and Mya. Awkwardly, they all shuffled towards our new class, which was in a different building. As they walked together trough the morning dew, Mya had started chatting with the white haired boy and Maria talked to the other girl. They probably would have missed the building, which was at the edge of Misty Forest, if it weren't for the gathered students in front of it.

The charming little building was mostly built of wood, with small terrace out front and a bigger stone furnace at the side, fire crackling inside. Ivy crawled up its walls and three small pots were left on the railing outside, the vibrant paint on them still wet. This had to be where the Manual skills class took place.

They met up with the rest of the students in the Stardew class and started getting to know each other. In total, they were about 25: them five, five earths, some fires, six natures, three air, two light, one dark.

The shadow boy looked a little bit left out, so Maria decided to go talk to him. In her mind came forth the memory of her dad, angrily saying that people believed darks to be "shadowy" and "untrustworthy". But if her mom was such a sweetheart, the people must be mistaken, right? The boy lifted his eyes, irises solid black, his wrinkled shirt forgotten.

"They are very loud." He whispered, a sheepish smile on his lips.

"Yeah" Maria smiled as well. "Are you alright?"

"I can hear their thoughts..." he whispered, his voice barely louder than the breeze. "They are very... distracting."

Maria suddenly felt very exposed, her thoughts laid bare for him to just peek at. An amalgam of thoughts and feelings floated through as she tried to lock up anything weird or embarrassing. He clasped his hands on his ears, pulling a grimace. "Now you're loud too... Shouldn't have told you..."

"No, no it's fine! It's fine! I just-"

"Panicked.."

"Yeah... sorry... I just saw you hanging by the edge of the group and didn't want you to be-"

"-lonely." He dropped his gaze to his wrinkled shirt once again. "Thank you..."

The conversation was cut short when the teacher emerged to welcome them inside. He had a bushy beard and wore a leather apron. On his head, covered in a mess of long curly hair, rested a pair of protective glasses. On his leg was a big drop leg leather bag and his broad arms were also covered with similar smaller leather bags. His apron was filled with a multitude of pockets and they were filled to the brim in different utensils and trinkets.

"Come on in, there is no time to waste!" He hurried back inside, and they followed as quickly as they could. In the cozy, but slightly cramped building, were two tables, each filled with pieces of brown leather, gathered in neat little piles in front of each chair.

"Come, sit!" The teacher urged them. They each took a seat and he started explaining that today they were going to learn how to stitch leather to later on learn how to make a traveler’s bag.

He started explaining what each of the tools in front of them were used for and then explained the steps for sewing through leather.

"We'll start with scraps of leather so you can get a feel for it."

Stitching leather was a lot harder than it looked. With it being thicker than normal fabric, it needed all these extra steps before you could even get to the thread and needle.

The teacher hovered around the students, giving a helping hand where it was needed. Strict when it came to dozing off or goofing around, but gentle with those who needed help or made mistakes, it was clear the teacher cared a lot about his craft and his class as well.

They exited the class, each holding two small pieces of leather sewn together with white thread.

The rest flew by like a breeze: they went to study history in the big building, which wasn’t as interesting as Maria had hoped, and had introductions in literature, which took place in an adorable pagoda with a large round table in the middle. Many other pagodas were around the place, some filled with some other classes.

They also had two hours of beast study, which was quite fun, as they got to study in what was apparently the Fairy Garden: a small clearing of Misty Wood that was surrounded in colorful flowers from which the fairies gathered nectar. They were told not to disturb them, because as a defense mechanism, they could become incredibly hot and burn you. That didn't stop some of the more rambunctious classmates from trying, but they each now boasted a red mark from the angered fairies. Still, some fairies sat around on tree branches and listened to their lecture, their hair floating straight up, and for some, it was filled with pollen. Sometimes you could hear them talk, soft jingles spreading through the clearing.

Then came time for the lunch break. Hungrily, they all were guided out of Misty Forest and they headed towards the cafeteria, which was part of the big building, but with an outside section, filled with picnic tables, which were already filling up. One big queue was stretching from inside and Maria groaned at the prospect of waiting so much to get to the food. Obediently, she took her place in the queue, Mya right behind her.

Maria looked around the tables, trying to spot someone familiar, when from one of the tables, someone waved at her. After they got food, her and Mya sat at the table Nin had waved at them from.

“How’s your day been?” she asked, looking at both of them with a playful crinkle in her eyes.

-

Edit: Hello, elements! Apparently, I have been a bit too ambitious with my publishing schedule. So, unfortunately, from now on, the chapter will be published once a week, on Friday. I hope you have a great weekend, wherever you are!