“What is all the ruckus? All you brats sit down! Today you have a new classmate.” Immediately after the teacher walked in, he found the little critters arguing and making noise. Apart from Mwana and Maji 1 who were arguing, the rest of the class was just as lively with many of the kids chatting away and moving around making the class seem like an evening market.

After everyone scrambled to their seats, they got more curious about the new student.

“Do you think it’s a boy or a girl?”

“I hope it’s a girl, a beautiful one.”

“Ew, you pervert!”

“Pervert! What? No!”

The little boys and girls had already started chattering away again about the new student making the teacher feel helpless. However, a cough from him was enough to shut them up again. “Come in.”

As everyone looked to the doorway, what appeared before their eyes was a sight they would never forget. Although it might be exaggerated, it was indeed a moment out of a million. Time seemed to have slowed as the new student walked in step by step. ‘Tap, tap, tap.’ The children’s mouths were agape seeing this character that seemed to belong in legendary fairy tales.

The most noticeable thing about this person was their eyes. They were a deep black but as soon as the sun shone on them, they appeared a turquoise blue as if an optical illusion. On seeing those eyes, Mwana was lost in them and he couldn’t help but blurt out, “Kia.”

The entire class was silent as their new classmate’s beauty was simply indescribable. Kia, as Mwana called her, was wearing a golden concave shape crown with golden threads and pins hanging over her forehead. Her long thick black hair was held together by a golden pin. In terms of clothing, she was dressed in a black dress with a pattern of crisscrossing golden threads. Additionally, she wore necklaces with gold, blue, red, and white beads as well as large white earrings. Her skin color was even darker than Mwana seeming extremely regal surrounded by the gold adornments. Glittering light seemed to ripple over her skin whenever the sun shone past her giving her a fairy-like look.

None of the students could look away. Some of the students felt like they were meeting their favorite celebrity musician while the others were lost in dreams of marriage. Apart from Mwana, everyone else was lost in their own fantasy world regarding Kia. Mwana was still intensely observing this girl he had not seen in about 2 or 3 years. His heart was racing like a train engine as he observed her from her head to her feet.

Although Kia’s feet were bare without any shoes, there seemed to be a thin invisible layer between her feet and the ground. ‘Tap, tap, tap.’ As she walked, not even a single speck of dust touched the bottom of her feet. Even the teacher was impressed. He could tell that as the girl walked, her every step seemed to utilize each and every one of the 650 skeletal muscles of the human body creating a minute rippling effect on her body that was imperceptible to the common folk. Only those who had a keen and trained vision could perceive this marvel. Apart from the teacher, none of the students even had a clue that this girl whose beauty they were lost in, possessed an incredible martial spirit.

“It really is her, Kia, Jua Malkia!” The new classmate was her; a girl Mwana had dreamt of constantly. He still could not forget how he met her and his antics whenever he was around her. It had already been 2 or 3 years but those memories brought him both joy and embarrassment.

As Mwana looked at Malkia, her eyes seemed to meet his causing his memories from when he was 6 years old to come rushing back. He had just been enrolled into the academy when he met Malkia. At that time, the Maji cousins had started bullying him for no reason with their dogs. ‘We didn't even know each other, ye t they had their dogs chase after me every time I went to and from school.’ Mwana’s memories of this time were not pleasant as he could not walk to the academy in peace. Even after telling his mother and her speaking to both the Maji cousins and their parents multiple times, the bullying did not stop.

Mwana already expected his mornings to be filled with running from dogs until one fateful day. It had been the memorial of one of his distant aunts, Jua Sahau, a cousin of his father. On that day, his distant similar-aged cousin, Jua Fury Jin, came to the Jua village to celebrate her mother with the family. Apart from her father, a new girl came along who Fury Jua called cousin. Mwana did not know her or recognize her as part of their family so he guessed she was related to Fury Jin’s father instead of her mother who was the one from the Jua clan.

It was on the same day of meeting Kia for the first time that the bullying stopped. As Mwana had been taking her on a village tour, the Maji cousins thought it was the best opportunity to bully and embarrass him. However, they were not prepared for what they experienced that day. At first when the dogs chased after them, Malkia ran away alongside Mwana. However, she ended up falling at which point she got extremely angry and tragedy ensued on the Maji cousins.

Unlike Mwana who was still a bit weak at that age, Kia had the power to fight back. Both the dogs and the Maji cousins received a beat-down they would never forget. Even watching from the side, Mwana had never forgotten the savagery the Maji cousins experienced as they ran away bleeding like fountains. It was from watching that scene of pure violence, pure justice, and pure karma that Mwana first felt the early tingling of love in this life. He developed his first crush. From that day on, Mwana was never bullied by the Maji brothers again even after Malkia left the village and for that alone he was eternally grateful. While a tiger cannot change its stripes in Maji 1s case, the rest of the Maji cousins seemed to have mellowed out in general.

Although Kia stayed in the village for a few weeks, the day still came when she had to leave Jua village and go back home to Eastern Jin Nation. Mwana’s memories of those few weeks spent with her were filled with happiness and some embarrassment. He still remembered how he sheepishly tried to seem taller by standing almost on his toes to boost his height as Kia was taller than him. However, the memories that stuck with him the most were the playful moments, the evening talks, and the time he almost confessed to her during an eclipse.

‘Kia’, seeing her again, Mwana could not help but sigh with a hint of hope. ‘I won’t miss my chance this time.’

As Kia was joining the Academy, she could not help but think back to the home she had left behind. It was a huge change to make, moving from one country to another. For most of her life, she had been living in Eastern Jin Nation with her uncle and cousin. The Jua clan had other branches and villages outside the main Jua village. Out of the bigger villages, there was the Jua Tanga village also called the Wandering Sun village, the Jua Moto village also called Scorching Sun village and the Vunja Jua village also called the Breaking Sun village.

New Words 

Malkia - Angel

Sahau – Forget

Tanga – Wander

Moto – Hot

Vunja - Break