Solace in failure
Ace was ecstatic at the thought, his worries were all for naught, no one except him could read his mind.
'But…that's quite lame.' He felt contradicted.
Reading your own mind, what kind of useless power was that.
Ace sulked as he used his sixth sense to read the book he dropped on the table earlier.
Reading in his sixth sense was strange, too strange, strange enough that it was hard to comprehend let alone put in words.
It was like the perception of his all of his five senses, but spliced together. Each sense was like a parallel line on different planes, intersecting but never touching.
Ace read the short note that the author had put at the end.
'Hope you enjoyed my brief story describing the path of perception. If you're up for more stories like this, read my second book 'How to kill a mouse''
By the time Ace finished reading it, he felt disoriented.
The input of information from the sixth sense was a lot more complicated than what his brain was used to.
The perceptions of his five senses started to erode the illusory world his sixth sense had constructed
Like blotches of darkness on white, They enroached upon his sixth sense, blinding his eyes with the unreliable information of the five senses.
With his five senses blinding him, All that remained of the truth was a vague sensation.
Ace couldn't hear the relentless patter of the rain through the sound proofing feature of his desk, His ears had been rendered useless, The only way he still knew it was raining was because of his eyes.
Ace sighed, his voice wistful.
"Six million years of evolution, rendered useless by a party trick. As expected the supernatural always triumph over the natural order of things."
Ace got rid of his fleeting thoughts, It was time for the lesson to start; The teacher had already walked in.
Ace turned off the sound proofing function of his desk, just in time for him to hear the bell ring. The sound of the bell as piercing as ever.
As soon as the bell stopped ringing, the teacher waited no longer to start the lesson.
"My name is Augustus and I will be your teacher in spirit and manipulation for the next year." He said while adjusting the frame of his rimless glasses.
"In respect of that, I would like to set the standards expected from you as esteemed students of Culmen Academy."
He judging eyes moved from student to student as he spoke, He was silently evaluating their talents and capabilities.
"The rules of the class are going to be as follows;
Number one – NO ONE! in my class is allowed to slack off, no matter your talent or social standing. If you fail to meet the standards given to you in my class, an appeal of expulsion shall be sent to the principal's office."
After he said that, the students broke into a heated discussion.
"Expulsion! Is he crazy, how can he expell us?!"
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"Does he even have the right to do that?"
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"Expell me! See if I care, I come from a very rich family of Bestowed, I can just learn this stuff at home."
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"You fool! if you get expelled how are you going to get your professional bestowed licence."
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Ace watched the heated chatter of his fellow students with calm eyes, what Augustus had said had no effect on him.
He was always going to do his best at anything he took interest in, just like a wise man said 'all or nothing' And if he fails even after he gave it his all, then he would have no hatred or indignance towards anyone.
The thought that he put his best into something he loved put his heart at ease, as it would be better to fail knowing you tried your best, rather than failing knowing you could do better.
"Alright students, calm down." He said with a flawless smile on his face, unbothered by the interruption.
"Now for the second rule, I will be making a class leaderboard in which I will use to track your scores and progress. The first ten people on the leaderboard will get prizes depending on where they place, and the last three people on the leaderboard will get a demerit on their students profile for every week they remain last. If you get twenty demerits, you get an automatic fail in my subject."