NOVEL WEB Chapter 39: The Worm
The teachers were watching Alan Duo and her group be chased by the Ice Birds while in pursuit of Feng Wu. They looked at each other shaking their respective heads.
“What is wrong with the minds of these candidates? They’re in the middle of the assessment yet they’re willing to spend time on personal vendettas. Do they think the assessment is too easy?” James scowled.
The other two silently agreed. These student candidates had poor mental and emotional intelligence. It didn’t bode well for their achievements in the future.
“The girl in white strikes me as the most interesting, to actually be able to communicate with wild magical beasts… With that kind of ability, I wonder why she tested as a sword wielder. Wouldn’t beast master be more fitting?” wondered the teacher of the Magic division.
“Hey hey. Lou Shali, we at the Sword division are no worse than those guys at the Beast division.” The smiling sword master smirked in protest.
“Aier Rogge, that’s not what I meant. I wasn’t saying the Sword Division is inferior, I just thought the girl would be more suited to be in the Beast division because of her abilities.” Lou Shali responded with a side glance at him.
He was about so say something more when a streak of light caught everyone’s attention. No one expected it to crash into the mirror so forcefully; it was like a meteor blazing its way to its destination. Even though they wanted to stop it, by the time the thought crossed their minds it was already too late, and they they were thrown back by the concussive air pressure that was released.
The three had to stabilize themselves and get their bearings again before they could even think about what to do. By the time they did so the silvery light was gone.
“What should we do?” Lou Shali looked anxiously at the viewing mirror which was now blurred and distorted.
The powerful impact of the energy made the virtual world unstable. They wouldn’t be able to ascertain the children’s condition. The odds of the children being harmed was minimal; should something happen they would get yanked out of the virtual world and wake up in their beds.
However it was not 100% guaranteed now that an unknown variable entered the picture. None of them knew how the disturbance would impact the children’s state of mind.
“Let’s ask the headmaster if we need to suspend the assessment.” James had a grim look on his face as he spoke.
“You do not need to stop. The mirror should stabilize after a moment. Continue with the assessment as planned,” came a lovingly gentle voice. It appeared in the mind’s of all three teachers and soothed their worries away.
The three immediately turned toward the sky, their complexions smoothed and relaxed. “headmaster,” spoke the three in unison.
This was the legendary head of Xingguang Holy Academy, the headmaster few could set eyes on, but whose presence everyone was aware of. Their headmaster was even more amazing and powerful than they’d imagine. He was indeed fit to stand shoulder to shoulder with the Master of the Sacred Temple.
Regardless if the legends surrounding him were true or exaggerated, in the eyes of the teachers and students of Xingguang Holy Academy, he was a mysterious, powerful, devoted and formidable person worthy of their reverence.
“But Headmaster, just now something rushed into the mirror…” Lou Shali nervously bit her lip as she spoke aloud her reservations.
“Worry not. What entered the mirror was a heavenly artifact with the ability to cross boundaries. It seems to have taken a liking to one of the candidates.” The soothing voice reappeared at Lou Shali’s comment, calming their anxiety and chasing the darkness away from their hearts.
The three were relieved knowing the children would be safe. All bowed their heads in the direction of the sky, knowing in their hearts the headmaster had left.
“It seems like one of our candidates is very lucky.” Aier Rogge chuckled, happy for the child, certain he or she would have an interesting future. He was looking forward to the new batch of students with great anticipation.
While the world outside returned to normal, the virtual world inside the mirror was suffering an upheaval. When the artifact crossed over into the virtual space a strong shock wave reverberated everywhere.
“Heavens! What’s going on?! Earthquake?” Some candidates were frightened by the sudden shock and looked around uneasily.
Everyone in the city and the surrounding forest were upset. The indigenous people fell to the ground their mouths moving as though in prayer.
Those examinees without weapons could only try their best to stay vigilant and be on guard. None knew if it was part of the assessment or not.
“Look there in the sky! What is that?” A silvery light streaked by cutting through the clouds.
“Don’t tell me that’s part of the assessment. Are we supposed to track it or something?”
“What the hell was that? Are we supposed to go after it?”
“Yeah it has to be the case. It must be something important. Maybe extra credit! Let’s look for it!” Someone excitedly shared the news. The air filled with excitement as the children thought of the potential.
“I have to find it before everyone else. Doesn’t matter what it is.” A candidate not part of a group thought to herself.
As the children shared guesses about the silvery streaking object, the object in question had already disappeared into the mountains rushing towards its goal.
The quaking made the magical beasts in the area restless and those that fed on carrion wiggled about and made their way up out of the earth. These kinds of beasts normally lived underground and only came out at night, but the quaking had alarmed them so much that they crawled their way up despite the daylight. They were most active around this time of the year so there was a lot of them. In fact the depressions in the ground were made from their digestion acids. Carrion eating beasts were generally lower life forms that lacked intelligence, so unlike other magical beasts they were not affected by Feng Wu’s aura.
Feng Wu looked down at the huge bugs crawling around, her face sour. She took out a small sword from her storage bag. Her love for animals did not extend to the ugly crawly magical worm kind.