Chapter 4

A black car with round shapes and blackened windows was moving through empty fields. It seemed like it does not rush anywhere, it was going slow, maybe slower than what one could expect. Inside, there were three... men? One was on the front left side, driving the vehicle. The second one was right behind him, talking to the third one that just a minute ago looked more like a girl. But sh-, ehm, he looked different now.

Gabriel looked away from Clar to the rearview. "Don't forget to open her doors, bow down, and wait until she is behind the gate." His look was met with a gaze full of unbelief, "Boss, I know she is the best, but we are also not dumb, ok?" The driver shook his head and focused back on the road. A short muted laugh was echoing from the right side of the car. "Jack, you kno-" Instead of her normal voice, she sounded like a male. She stopped and opened her eyes wide, "WOW, it seems that adding purple basil WORKED!!!" Still yelling out of excitement, she fumbled through her leather backpack, taking out a small notebook. She flipped to the page with a flask and a herb doodled on them, and under the words "Test 17, adding two leaves of purple basil" she drew a smiley face. The two men looked at her in silence, her master gave her a side eye, and the driver gave her an up eye in the mirror, with a hint of fear.

While still scribbling she continued, "GUYS! I finally did IT! You would not recognize me with this voice, rig-" When she looked up and was met with indifference and fear, she carried on with now an optimal loudness. "Oh, ups, hehe. Got carried away, again, heh. But yeah, to what I said before, Jack, I am not the best. He already examined me exactly 11 times about my whole identity so he does not check me anymore."

Gabriel rested his head on his left hand and raised his right eyebrow. "Repeat it to me. Who are you?" The friendly smile on Clar's face was replaced with a poker face. When there was no answer, Gabriel turned to her, "What are you waiting for?" She looked forward and calmly, with her newly acquired male voice, replied, "I thought that maybe if I show you that I understand my role you will leave me alone. Truth be told, why would I, Edgar Holyswift, need to reply to someone lower than my rank?" The stillness was cut by a Jack whistling. "Oh no, you are the best!" At that, she relaxed her face again into a smile. Still, the master looked at her expectedly, so she took a deep breath, and in a slightly frustrated monotone started again.

"I, Edgar Holy-Swift, am a-"

But Gabriel stopped her. "It is Holyswift, not Holy-Swift." Poor man, Clar thought, he cannot even laugh at a joke like this.

"Yes, I am Holyswift and I am a first-year student at the Wallort Academy." She tried to make her speech boring. Thus, she imagined that she is a librarian that is dealing with a loud kid that asks her for the 5th time, why there are no cakes that she could eat. She saw the scene once, and the librarian replied to the child as if his soul has left him. "I am 16 years old, and I have a birthday on the 3rd of March, I control the earth magic but I cannot use it now because my jewel broke in an accident on auction, I play pranks on people lower than me, I kiss up to the ones that are higher rank than me, I think that his majesty is cool, I don't like the pink color, I don't like rain, I like cats more than do-"

"What about sweets?"

"Well, I don't eat them," ah, he had to check this. "Just occasionally," she whispered while looking away.

Gabriel slightly raised his voice. "No, you don't eat sweets, ever. And if someone of higher rank offers them, you take a small bite out of courtesy but no more." Clar smirked at the fact that her boss would care about such detail just to make her life a bit more despondent. What is this one for? she asked in her mind.

"Ahhh," she sighed heavily at the personality she was going to become for this mission. "This lad is simply miserable."

|~|

"Gentlemen!" an energetic man in his mid-fifties stood on the podium and with his arms wide open continued in his speech, "I am so glad to see so many of you here. I think that I don't need to remind you, that YOU are the future of our empire!" he paused to wave at one man from the row of professors standing behind him. He swiftly moved to his place and handed him a scroll. "Thank you, Mr. Tworidge. NOW, I am honored to read the message the emperor wrote to all of you!" while he was opening the scroll he cleared his throat. "Good day to all of you, as an emperor, I am glad to hear that the nobility in our empire cares about education. I believe that this fact alone gives us an advantage over the other kingdoms..."

Clar was listening to the emperor's message only partially because she was secretly admiring the hall she was placed in. Unfortunately, she could not admire it as much because the lights in the audience were down. She was sitting in a very comfortable seat as if she was sitting on a cloud. To her right there were her classmates, some of them were listening intently while others, similarly to her, did not show much interest. When she turned her head slightly to the side, she saw the students from higher years. Most of them stared forward with a bored look, while others seemed to be catching up with their sleeping hours.

When Clar heard that she is going to the academy, she did not expect that it would be the Wallort Academy for males instead of Bellic Academy which was for females. However, she found to like it more this way, because she is more well versed in subjects such as economy and athletics than tea time etiquette and 30 signals one can do with their handkerchief. Currently, she tried to notice, in the dark room, her target, the reason she was there: Bernard Valiant, a spoiled brat with an unfortunate family with illegal business - human trafficking.

On the other side of the room, Dorian rolled his green eyes. You could try being original here and there, uncle, he thought after listening to the first paragraph of this speech. Almost word for word it was the same as in the past three years. He heard a sight next to him. "Dorian, you should have written the letter yourself and just exchanged them, this is stupidly boring, eh?" A guy with long brown hair, tied in a loose braid, smirked at Dorian. "Hmmm, that's too much work, isn't it?" Dorian said lazily and looked away. He did not like this guy, but he needed to keep him close to get the information he wanted, and besides, it did not require much effort from his side.

After the emperor's letter was read, the enthusiastic professor continued speaking about the school. He mentioned the core values, the success of the alumni, the rules, about visitors, when they had joined events with Bellic Academy... and more of the unimportant things that might be interesting for the boys in the first two rows that were new, but others just had to sit through it. At last, the man started to talk about the dormitory, and the class representatives were asked to come front and take a list with arranged room matches. Students were then ordered to go outside of the hall and ask their representatives for their room numbers and keys. As always, first came a loud clap, and then even louder chaos as everybody wanted to go to their room as soon as possible.

Dorian slipped away from the crowd and without talking to anyone or asking questions headed through the small gardens to the dormitory. When he reached the last room on the first floor, he took out the keys from his pocket and opened the doors. He arrived yesterday so he was already unpacked. There is just an hour left before lunchtime so I cannot really go out, he thought to himself while walking up the stairs of the bunk bed. He liked it up there, it was different than the bed in the palace. He decided to read the documents that he received this morning.

He must have fallen asleep because he did not notice the sound of the opening or closing of the door. What he heard, however, was a loud thump right underneath him. "AUCH! Ahh, I hate bunk beds, I always hit my head!" someone said angrily.

Dorian sat up, leaned over the bars, looked down, and asked, "Did you get lost on your," he took notice of the pink shirt of the intruder. "Oh, pink uniform, so a first year, I see. I will let it slide this time, but be careful about these things, you might get on someone's bad site if you kee-"

Still covering the left part of the head, that was hit by the platform of the second bed, the boy with green hair replied, "What are you going to let slide? This is room 115," he looked up while also lifting his right hand that was holding a key. "and it is my room too, you st-" When he finally looked up, he saw the blond looks and was met with a playful green stare. "Your Highness?!"

Dorian swang back to a sitting position and left a tired sight out. This is the punishment, seriously? he thought while he imagined the face of his uncle.

What is this guy doing here out of all people? The green-headed boy was white as the walls.