•••

Cynthia watched on as the last of the students crossed the Lochxen Forest border to begin the Tests. She folded her arms beneath her breasts and the professional poise she had maintained thus far slipped a bit and she looked more… vulnerable.

"Alright," Lea said then from behind Cynthia, "Let's get eyes on them."

Lea snapped her fingers at a few spinning discs above and they came closer. They all began to give off clicking sounds as each disc was revealed to possess two components working together. The two components—one placed atop the other—spun in opposite directions and then light was shone out from the crystals on all the discs. The light from all the crystals shot in the same direction, coming together to create a gigantic screen.

On the screen was visual feedback of the students in their various teams moving all about the Lochxen Forest.

"How many teams are there again?" Raoul Raoul asked as he stepped closer to Lea.

"Twenty-three," Lea answered.

"That's a lot of them to observe," Raoul said, already looking overwhelmed as the large screen began to separate into sections so all teams were shown all at once.

"The surveillance crystals are enchanted with threat assessment capabilities," Lea said, "They'll alert us to whichever screen most demands our attention. Until then, we just enjoy the show, I guess."

"Hold on," Raoul said then and pointed at one of the screens at a team that looked around, confused, and then picked a path to follow,

"Why didn't they just follow the team that went ahead of them?"

"Because they can't see the team that went ahead of them," Lea said,

"We tinkered with the enchantment of the veil that demarcates the border of the Forest. On every third student that walks through it, the view is reset so the next three to enter can't see the ones that entered ahead of them. It's why we had them go in by Teams one after the other."

"That's… extra," Raoul said.

Lea looked to the side at him, an annoyance clear in her feline blue eyes.

"What?" She asked.

Raoul shrugged.

"I just thought it'd be a lot more fun to have them clash right from the start. Resetting their vision just pushes back the exciting parts of all this."

Lea narrowed her eyes and then she looked back at the screens as she said,

"The whole point of the Test, my part of the test anyway, is to assess my students' pathfinding skills. Having them be able to follow after each other dulls that.

They have enough help by being in teams of three anyway. If I had my way, every one of them would be on their own…"

"Oh, that would have been great…!" Raoul said.

Lea pressed on like she hadn't heard him,

"… but Cynthia wanted to give them an opportunity to try out group Combat Magic techniques she taught them such as Synergy. So I had to compromise."

Lea turned her eyes to look at Raoul again, frowning deeply,

"I wouldn't have to explain all of this to you if you had actually taken part in the preparations as you should have," she said.

"I did my part," Raoul retorted.

"Swinging a sword in your office and yelling out 'I'm busy' whenever I knock on your door is NOT doing your part," Lea said.

"I got the protective vests ready, didn't I?" Raoul said to insist on having proven his worth.

"All you had to do was pick them up and bring them here," Lea said, "I don't think that compares to actually setting the Forest up for all this."

Lea gestured at the screen as she said that. The very fact that they had visual feedback of the test—while standard for Lochxen tests like this—had involved her and Cynthia taking deliberate actions.

Raoul opened his mouth but wasn't sure how to respond. He glanced at the screen then and his eyes caught something.

"Oh, it's getting good already," he said.

Lea, despite knowing that it was an attempt to avoid accountability, looked over at the screen and things had indeed begun to get interesting.

One team had ventured into a field that was home to Burrow-moles who were fairly vicious and territorial beasts that were attuned to the vibrations of the earth and ever eager and ready to pop out and attack.

"Huh," Raoul said, "They're not my students."

He sounded like he had lost a bit of interest then but Lea watched on. She recognized the three. They were all girls and had made quite an impression in her Study of Magical Beasts classes. As she watched on, she had no idea when a smile spread across her lips as she whispered to herself,

"Interesting."

•••

-Somewhere in the Lochxen Forest-

"Burrow-Moles," Kaya said as she and the others stood before a netted dome that was around the first Beastly habitat they had seen thus far,

"Are you sure?"

"I spent hours poring through Professor Gilligan's Notes," Eloise said, "So yeah, I'm sure."

"Threat level?" Aylin asked.

"Three-Star," Eloise answered.

"Oh, then piece of cake then," she said and stepped into the Dome.

"Wait," Eloise called out but it was too late.

The ground was covered with holes and before Aylin even took another step forward, a large piece of earth was suddenly flying at her face. Taken by surprise, her brain was so sluggish that she basically could do nothing but stand there and get hit.

*Bang!*

The earth shattered against her face and Aylin went flying at the netted dome. She slammed against it and didn't go through as she had been able to do to enter the field. She struck the wall and practically just bounced back to hit the ground again.

"Ugh," she groaned, "They weren't kidding about feeling the attacks."

The protection of the vest she had on had defended her against the worst of the attack but somehow, it still hurt like a bitch.

Eloise walked into the dome then and reached out to grab Aylin's hand to help her up.

"I told you to wait," she hissed.

"Eh, I didn't hear you," Aylin said, "Speak up next time."

Kaya walked into the dome while rolling her eyes at Aylin but she also reached back to touch the dome wall she just walked through to find that it was solid.

"No getting out, idiot," Aylin said with a scoff at Kaya, "Probably not until we're done pacifying these things."

Kaya frowned as she looked over at Aylin,

"Wish that rock messed up your face at least a little," she said, "The Vests are doing their work far too well."

As she was talking, Kaya's eyes fell to the vest Aylin had on and she was amazed by how it fit over her large breasts without riding up her front. Enchantments likely make that possible. It would also explain why they all got vests seemingly at random and they fit them perfectly.

"Why Kaya," Aylin said with a ravishing smile that lit up her perfect face as she brushed her grey-white hair back, "Is that you finally acknowledging my superior beauty?"

"Ha, you wish," Kaya said and laughed.

"Ladies," Eloise said, "They're coming."

Eloise spoke with a bit of strain. The ground rumbled and she could feel it better than her teammates since Vibrations are a major part of Sound which was her best Magical Affinity.

The strain in her voice though wasn't because the moment was too difficult for her. It was because she was trying to ignore environmental vibrations to properly detect where the Burrow-moles were and that was more an analytical struggle than magical.

"Aylin, four to your right," she called out then.

"Got it!" Aylin said and thrust her hand to the side. Flecks of ice appeared and formed a spell circle that conjured a barrage of small rods.

A lot of the rods missed because Aylin hadn't had exact targets to aim at. Still, the goal hadn't been precision and she struck the four Moles and sent them slamming into the Dome wall, unconscious.

"Kaya…" Eloise called as more Moles flew out from holes all over.

"On it!" Kaya answered as she went down and slammed her hand against the ground, creating a massive green circle that conjured vines, all controlled to swing, whip, and grab the Moles all over.

She didn't get them all because there were so many and those that she missed sent chunks of earth flying at them.

Eloise was ready and slammed her palms together to create a crisp sound that materialized into a musical note that then burst into many others to create shimmering shields of magical musical notes to protect all three of them from earthen attacks.

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.