Chapter 7: The Admission Agency 

A boy of 14 to 15 year age stood in front of a massive structure. This building only consisted of 7 floors but each floor was at least thrice as tall as one normal floor. But the ground floor was at least the same height as five floors combined. The gate to this building was huge as to be expected. One would ultimately feel tiny when encountering such a large gate that one needed to pass through. The boy wandered why the heck such a huge gate was built and he suspected the major reason for this was obviously to scare off the students to death. And it did its job perfectly because he certainly was scared shitless. 

This massive building was the student admission agency. And this boy with gray hair was Nevan. 

After roaming around the city, he had finally come to get admitted. 

The admission process of Arcmania was quite simple but unlike normal academies. Usually, each academy would give a selected date when the admission would be held and all candidates who want to get admitted would have to come and give an exam and wait for their qualification. 

But this type of exams had certain problems. As the humanity expanded its territory more and more, the distance between places to travel would increase more and more. At the same time people would face many difficulties. So it was reasonable for many to miss the exam date.

Not only that since each academy held separate exams and each academy had different student requirements, it was difficult for students to get into their desired academies. 

So Arcmania had a representative from all the academies who would do the work for them. Each academy would give their requirements to the admission agency. The agency would think of exams and other tests to understand a student's capabilities and then assign him the academy that his capabilities can get into. 

Like this a student can get a fair and easy process. The time duration for application was much stretched in this process. 

Each academic session would start at the first spring of the year which was the month of April. The application date starts from May and ends in March of next year. From May to March, students could apply and if they got selected they could enroll from April, starting a new session. 

This was how the admission process went in Arcmania. 

Nevan took a deep breath. With a nervous yet firm breath he crossed the gate and went inside. The inside wasn't empty, neither was it bustling. It was March 29th. Almost the deadline for application. And since the application process went all year round, naturally people wouldn't crowd themselves at the last moment. 

There were 3 different information desks right in front. Above each of them were written respectively from right to left, "For humans", "For semi-humans", "For pseudo-humans". 

The right desk is for human applicants while the middle one is for semi-humans or can be understood as a cross between a human and another race which resulted in human like appearance. And the left one is for pseudo-human which basically meant races that did not have human genes but were of humanoid shape. 

The right desk wasn't crowded. The middle one and specially the left one was rather full of people. 

'it seems Arcmania being human city, the humans have all filled the application ahead of time while the demi-humans are rushing  for application now.' Nevan thought. 

Demi-humans are basically every other race that looks similar to humans. Basically semi-humans with human blood or pseudo-humans with no human blood are classified as demi-humans. 

He walked to the right desk, there were only 2 people before him. He heard the receptionist at the front say, "OK, go to 7th floor, and your files and certificates, though they won't be of any use, you can get a good impression on the examiners." 

The girl who was in front of the receptionist thanked and headed for 7th floor. Her hand was full of bags with files and stuffs inside. 

Nevan wondered if that girl had the typical story of a poor village student coming to the big city's academy in the hope of getting a better life. How did Nevan know she was poor? 

No one carries their stuff in hand nowadays. Space compression and space folding technology had basically made normal means of carrying things on hand meaningless. Unless one was too poor, they wouldn't use their hand to carry their belongings. 

'As for those certificates and what not they are mostly useless since academies don't see your prior achievements. Academies want what you can do. Not what you have done already. As for what you will do? Academies have more than enough confidence.' 

Nevan's thought showed the attitude of academies. Academies don't see what you have achieved in the past. Academies want to see your capabilities. What you can do in the future. If you have the skill to shoulder what they will impart you with. Academy will teach you things, you don't need to know anything prior, you just need the ability to completely understand what they will teach you. That's all. 

The person at front who was a boy of similar age to Nevan came in front and the receptionist asked, "What sort of profession do you want in the future?" Her voice wasn't endearing or smooth rather it was a little rough. 

'What sort of receptionist is this? Her voice isn't nice. 1 point deducted.' a sound rang inside Nevan's head. It was Black Nevan. 

'Nevan you shouldn't say such things. Every voice is beautiful in their own ways.' a second voice sounded. It was White Nevan. 

'Beautiful my ass!" Black Nevan disdainfully replied.  

White Nevan wanted to argue but Nevan hurriedly said, 'You two don't fight. We have important stuff to do.'

The two then became silent.

Nevan heard the boy say, "I want to admit into St. Garo Academy."

"So you want to be a wanderer. Go to the 1st floor." the receptionist replied in an unhurried tone. 

"I said I want to be a student of St. Garo academy, not just any wanderer. What do I need to do?" the boy asked again, this time his voice had a more pressuring attitude. From his forceful tone it could be seen, he should have considerable authority wherever he was from and was used to using such a domineering attitude. 

The receptionist did not even flinch, again replied with a stony voice, "To be a wanderer, Go to the 1st floor." 

"5 points deducted, very bad attitude for a receptionist." Black Nevan added. He was dissatisfied with the attitude of receptionist. Yes, the boy's attitude was crude, but as a receptionist, you must be respectful and handle people differently without causing a conflict. From her tone and her behavior, it was clear she was asking for a fight. 

The guy looked like he was about to fight but suddenly-

*Cough*

A small deliberate cough sounded beside him. The sound could only be heard by the boy, the receptionist and Nevan. And they could understand the source of this. It was a young man who looked in his early twenties. What was astonishing was the fact that he was at least thirty to forty meters away from them and that only 3 people had heard his cough. 

'Strong!' is what the receptionist thought. 

'Show off!' is what the young boy thought. 

'Wow!' is what Nevan thought. 

The young man did not say anything just looked at the boy with a smile which also did not seem to be a smile. The smile seemed to translate into- don't cause trouble here. 

The boy reluctantly left but not without leaving a glare at the receptionist. 

Now it was Nevan's turns. He came to the front and finally clearly saw the receptionist lady. Because there was glass in front, the receptionist could not be seen from behind. 

Now that he saw the receptionist, he had to admit that-

'Plus 3 point for a good looking receptionist' Black Nevan's voice sounded again. And Nevan had to agree that it was indeed true. Contrary to what he thought after listening to that rough voice he had assumed the receptionist would not be beautiful but turns out she was indeed beautiful, just how it should be. 

After all, all receptionist must be beautiful without exception. Of course this was a very personal preference of a certain black themed guy. 

And when Nevan looked at the beautiful receptionist directly and was going to open his mouth, the receptionist said in an impatient tone, "Didn't you hear me? To be a wanderer, go to the 1st floor." 

'10 thousand points deducted!' Black Nevan screamed. 

Even the ever good White Nevan was stunned. What sort of attitude is this? Does she have a family or workplace problem that made her become irritated so easily? 

Nevan was speechless. What the hell? This is a very bad customer service. Who speaks like this? Can we file a complaint? 

And besides, 

"How do you know that I want to be a wanderer?" 

"Do you not want to?" 

"Yes I do, but how do you-" 

"Then scram to first floor!" 

Nevan hurriedly scrambled to the stairs in fright. 

'There's no doubt.' All Nevan thought together, 'She is on her period.' 

Certainly she could have other reasons for becoming so irritated. But as far as three Nevans were concerned, s he was definitely on her period even if she wasn't. 

And so with a foul mood Nevan went to the first floor.