Crunch
Crunch
Crunch
Aren held his bag tightly to his chest as the carriage swayed left and right. The path was uneven and that was not even the worst of it, it was the stares he was receiving.
There were three other ladies inside the carriage, two before him and one beside him. He knew what they were, cheap whores from the bawdy house.
"Oh my god!, he stinks"
"How does he even have the money to travel by carriage
"I can't be bothered by him, I heard mages are coming in from the academy for recruitment today, we need to put in our best performance."
What annoyed Aren was that they didn't even bother lowering their voice, it was like he doesn't exist to them. Not that he cared about them but the fact that they keep disrespecting him when he did nothing didn't sit well with him.
"Hey kid!"
The one beside him finally spoke and when Aren thought she was about to say something sensible she proceeded with dumb talks, "Be a man of dignity and abandon the carriage for us"
"Eh" Aren was beyond stunned as he looked at her, Dignity? "You speak of dignity yet you sell your body to old men" *spat* "I would sleep with a beast over any of you bastards"
Of course he wouldn't sleep with a beast, he just hated the three women to the core. Before they could even retaliate he jumped out of the carriage and sprang into the bush as he laughed at the top of his voice.
"You foul mouthed orphan bastard!!!!!!! Come back here!!!"
He smirked as he disappeared completely, he had already reached where he was going, Just a turn and they were there already. As he exited on the other side he could see it already, a stage had been erected in the middle of the town centre.
It was made of earth, no doubt a mage at work.
"Impressive" Aren murmured as he stepped closer, his small body went through all the people gathered together until his head finally popped outside of the stage area. Three men were sitting in the middle and behind them each were three younger men standing in ques.
Aren looked at the 12 men on the stage and he couldn't help but be wowed, they all looked feminine to him. Not that they looked like a woman but the quality of their skin and cloth.
It was as if they had never been through any suffering before, compared to the men here these ones were heavens apart.
He didn't have to wait long until the place was completely crowded out, everybody looked his age and luckily he wasn't the only one looking rough so he didn't gather that much attention.
Movement!
The man in the middle stood up from his chair as the whole place was silenced, everybody looked as he walked forward. In one motion he thrust the staff in his hand into the ground.
Afterwards he looked at the kids around the stage as he spoke in a clear and loud voice, "Each of you will step on this stage one after the other. You must only touch the staff with one hand and it will tell whether you're eligible for practising magic"
Everybody nodded, well everybody except Aren who stared at the man dumbly. What the hell does this man mean eligible for magic?!!! He never knew about this part, being eligible to practice magic and actually successfully awakening your magic were two different things.
Things were looking bad.
The man returned to his seat as a random boy jumped into the stage, he was very eager to touch the staff. Taking large strides he reached the staff and placed a hand on it.
".."
Everybody watched in silence as they expected a reaction in the crystal embedded at the top of the staff but after five seconds their patience busted.
"Fuck, he's ineligible???"
"You are not eligible to practice magic" The man sitting on the left announced emotionlessly, to him this was just routine. He didn't give a fuck about these kids future.
The boy's hand slowly detached from the staff as he walked down with hollow eyes, his soul had already left his body before the man spoke.
This was it, it was over, he would die human, there was no hope of becoming something great. Sixteen years of dreaming for this moment and everything came down in five seconds.
"Next".