"Everyone please gather around. It is time for me to take all of you new students over to our academy. If we delay any further, I am afraid that I will be scolded by my superiors." the teacher looking figure announced as the other groups began to stand up and leave including those who originally brought Timothy over.

Once the students and Timothy gathered, the teacher properly introduced himself as Fred. He was actually a teacher's assistant which was why there was such a long delay on his arrival. The teacher originally responsible for the task of escorting the new students every week to the academy had fallen ill the night before and after pondering over it, it was decided that his assistant would be given the temporary role.

Finally after roughly twenty minutes of traveling, the group had arrived at the gates of the Grey Imperial Academy. The escort began describing some of the rules when it came to the academy and its students and this included the dress code. "Since you are all first year students, you will be given a white robe to wear and as you advance year by year, you will be able to wear a different color to signify your prowess. Do not feel strange, it is just our academy's way of showcasing our students both on campus and off campus. Each robe includes an insignia of our academy's crest so it is wise to wear even off campus since no one in our area looks down on our students."

"Keep in mind that the only way to advance in our academy is to grow stronger. There are some students that have been attending this school for many years and choose to remain even if their strength as a mage does not improve. We count years by how high your ranks are as mages. If you do not surpass the fifth rank as a mage, you should not even think about graduating. There are seniors who do not graduate but due to being a high enough rank, they are not technically kicked out. Remember this well, and remember that all of the top powers in the city know what each color signifies."

"And one more thing, there is a curfew in place during the week but this curfew is only concerning off campus activities and is rather lenient. Your studies are most important to each of us staff members here and our Dean has chosen to implement a curfew because last year a group of students unfortunately went missing when it was three in the morning. Since then, we at Grey Imperial Academy have allowed students to remain up all night if they wished to, but they would not be allowed to leave campus without proper permission!"

There was a heavy blow to the young students, but Timothy understood and was not the type to want to head into the city for late nights since he was currently extremely weak. He did not mind making connections and networking with others off the campus in the future, but the Grey Imperial Academy offered a wide range of students regardless and many who he would attend classes with. With so many top tier classmates when it came to commoners and smaller but well established organizations, even just meeting one new fellow student each day would bring in endless benefits.

Upon arriving, the teacher assistant spoke to the gatekeepers before gesturing for Timothy and the other students to follow him onto the campus. It was not unusual for even academies such as the Grey Imperial Academy to have gatekeepers and security guards stationed around their grounds. For the most part, it was actually fairly affordable to hire the city's guards for such roles since they received a small salary from the city and would accept a lower salary from said organization. There were those who would choose otherwise depending on how large the organization was and if they had members who could only contribute to them by being in such a role.

Once entering and coming across the second building on the campus, Fred escorted them in what seemed to be a building dedicated to handling matters such as giving students basic resources such as new robes, information brochures, and even some technique books and common tools and equipment. There was a big difference between what a first year and a second year student could request and be given on the academy's funds, but since Timothy had very little already, everything given to him in the next hour would feel like a great accomplishment.

Timothy received two sets of white robes, one to wear immediately and one to keep stored, he received basic mage type armor which was light armor since mages were not prone to being very physically fit, and even a fire element technique book. The book was a collection of information one would find in scrolls but since these techniques were meant to be given to those just starting out to build a proper foundation, it was better to place them all into a book rather than Timothy receiving upwards of twenty different scrolls.

"It would be wise to study all of the techniques in that book, but with my help you will begin to see what type of specific techniques you would be better at utilizing and using as your main ones. When you go through those initial trial and errors, I will be able to help you build a proper path once I understand more about your strengths and weaknesses when it comes to using your mana.`` The artifact told Timothy in order to encourage him that the Grey Imperial Academy's lesson plans were indeed helpful and beneficial to him.

These techniques were very basic, so much so that Timothy realized compared to the Iron Will Sect and their earth element technique scrolls, the only thing the Grey Imperial Academy beat his old sect in was the quantity of techniques. The Iron Will Sect only had about six techniques which were all considered basic including one technique which was average which was most likely taken without permission from the Iron Will Clan the organization they are an unofficial branch of. In the academy's case, they had twenty different basic techniques but the biggest difference was that chances were there would be just as many average level techniques once he advanced into the second year student phase of his education.

It was known that even the military gave such techniques to their soldiers who served within, but only officer ranked experts were allowed to be given stronger techniques to learn and every soldier had to make a heavenly oath that they could not pass down the techniques they learned to their families or organizations. It was slightly different for those who were considered military families, those who each member were automatically forced to serve. Such families were treated like the backbone of the military and of course since every member would eventually join, it was not expected that the family would not share the techniques openly given to regular soldiers.

"Alright everyone before we head out, I need to give you all of your schedules for your classes, a map of the academy grounds, and of course your room key and information. You will not all be living in the same building because as you will find out if any of you reach rank three as a mage, by that time we encourage our students to head back into the outside world for some time if it makes sense for them to gain that type of experience. Therefore, the rooms we have are mainly for students of the first and second year while those in the third year and above have their own building which fits everyone in it given the circumstances."

Looking at his schedule, Timothy was actually very pleased because it looked like every class of his was during the day. He was not thrilled that this might have meant moving forward that he would have to train as a warrior in the late afternoon and night. Training as a mage was more mentally draining while training as a warrior was physical strength draining. In a way, he could not have asked for anything better because at least after his warrior training he could most likely sleep much better until it was time to wake up in the morning to start his day all over again.

The Grey Imperial Academy had a rather large campus because they allowed students to focus on different trades such as alchemy, blacksmithing, and of course inscriptions and seals. This was not just limited to trades, this included potential career paths where students could learn about how different businesses operated. This would allow students once finished with their schooling, to transition much easier into what their goals were. And teaching such classes were retired individuals but were consultants for several local organizations that focused in such areas!