Al woke up at the 6 am in the morning on the day of the exam.

He had a head ache.

And he couldn't at all remember what had happened.

He was underneath a bridge.

Near the cities water duct system.

The sky was still dark out, but the light from the moon and the rising sun reflected off of the rings orbiting around the planet. 

Shimmering in the sky. 

Illuminating the path, it was believed, the Zodiacs would take during their yearly journey.

"Ah, your finally awake! 

Here you go. 

You told me to give this to yourself when you wake up. 

Weird, but not the weirdest thing this Old Man has ever been asked to do." An old man Al had never met before told him, handing him his magic tome.

Shit.

'Voice? Voice! Where are you?' Al's voice echoed in the Inside Out. But Voice didn't respond.

Either he was asleep, or he was ignoring him. For the love of cake Al couldn't remember how he got there. The last thing he remembered was going to the bathroom. And he had a horrible headache. He hadn't felt like this since a certain night oh so many years ago.

First. 

Who was this guy?

Why does he know Voice?

But did it even matter. Voice has always been extremely scared of people. So if even Voice was able to trust him, Al could too.

Clutching at his good luck charm, a small necklace the Old Lady gave to him as a birthday gift, Al calmed down his paranoia. Soothed his aching head and cracked open the tome, curious to it's contents. 

A bunch of gibberish.

Ughh.

Voice had defaulted to writing in Japanese again, hadn't he? 

Al was glad he took the time to learn how to read the language. It definitely made things easier when Voice accidentally wrote things in the accursed chicken scratch by mistake.

Now let's see.

Name.

Weird.

What did a name have anything to do with this?

Continuing on, Al slowly began to realize what Voice had meant.

By name he meant Al's name. As in his true name. 

Voice wanted Al to put his name on the line, by making it apart of the signature. 

This would be the insurance that Magic would need in order to allow him to make contracts.

And it was absolutely idiotic. 

If Al put his name there, then what would stop Magic from just blackmailing him or something. 

It would have a work around against the divine protection afforded to all living beings by the gods. 

With his name, it would be able to make spell that could zero in on him past the barrier. 

It because of this very reason that he referred to himself as Al instead of using his real name.

Well, it was one of the reasons.

But anyway. 

What was Voice thinking? 

Angrily, Al continued to read on.

Voice apparently had a theory. 

The divine protection of the gods was to prevent the mortals from being taken advantage of by shielding them against the magic of the unknown. 

But what if that was what had been stopping him from contracting Magic to begin with. 

An interesting theory. A very plausible one as well. 

Reading on, he understood Voice's weird gibberish. It was a modified contract. 

One with a witness.

And that witness... was the Old Man.

Hmm. With a witness, he could use his name without having to worry about anything. 

But what about the old man?

"Did you read what you signed before giving it to me?" Al asked in a slight panic. He didn't want to involve some poor elderly man in whatever messed up idea Voice had.

"I did not." The dark skinned old man replied in a chipper tone.

"I can't read whatever you wrote. Way, way too much chicken scratch." He continued.

Al cursed at the back of his mind. What had Voice just done? Did he, an aspiring hero, really just sell the name of an innocent homeless man? Worse yet, without him even understanding what he got himself into?

"Though he did explain it to me. Something about needing a witness to some super important contract. I offered to help him by being the witness. Then he started going off on a tangent about how this could work. About how there would be no penalty because I had no name and-", wait. What did he just say?

"You, you don't have a name. In what sense do you not have a name?" Al asked the man suddenly.

The man just shrugged his shoulders. Al stared at empty space. Thinking.

A witness with no name couldn't be penaltied. 

No name, no penalty.

No penalty. He realized with shining eyes. 

Al could offer up his real name and fear no blackmail because he had a witness, and he wouldn't have to fear for the witness because the witness had no name.

Haha.

Hahaha.

Mwahahahahahaha.

Al laughed hysterically into the night.

The old man questioned if he had just made a deal with a devil. 

Then he just casually shrugged. It is what it is.

Al immediately started writing.

He modified the previous contract and made a new one in it's stead.

Then he left a space and signed using his real name.

Then he asked the old man to sign. He signed using Old Man.

And ironically, as if magically, a signature appeared right next to Al's and the Old Man's before the contract rolled itself up and disappeared.

Lightning flashed across the sky and a clap of thunder was heard. 

The trees began shaking and the wind seemed to come to life.

The stars in the sky seemed to shine brightly. 

As though responding to a great change. 

One star in particular, that hang in the North. It shined brightest, it's light shining upon Al and the Old Man, as if putting them on the spotlight.

And Al laughed.

And laughed.

And laughed some more.

And the Old Man along with him.

Al did take note of the mystical occurrences. 

Was this a good omen, a bad one, a sign?

Only time would tell.

Only time would tell indeed. 

And.... 

Barely half an hour later, Al and the Old Man were being carted away by the city police. 

Their crimes. 

Vandalism, aiding and abetting, breaking curfew and suspicious behavior at a time of heightened national security.

They were taken to the dungeon in the Royal Palace for interrogation and to await judgement from the King.