"A telethist, huh?" a girl standing next to Ollys asked. "Isn't that like portals or something?"
Ollys shook his head, leaning back on his forearms. "Not really, more like channeling the flow of magic and matter. Includes some planar shifts though, almost portals." The stiff green grass of the field prick his arms, though he ignored it.
Ollys looked at the others in the group of 6 students huddled together. Four girls, including Opal, and another guy. The girl who was introducing herself and asking questions was Kyra. A little too friendly, Ollys thought to himself.
"I'm an arsokist," Opal said when the high-energy girl asked. "Change in energy manipulation. Fires and the like."
The boy, who had been sidling up to Opal, grinned. "Dang girl, so you play with fire?"
Opal gave him a wide but sarcastic smile, tilting her head for effect. "Burned many heads to a crisp, my friend."
The boy didn't take the hint nor get the innuendo and just laughed, grazing her arm awkwardly. Opal looked irritated, brushing her hair behind her ear.
"So, the activity," another girl said - a more serious and straightforward girl, whose name Ollys forgot, with a more slight frame and chocolate hair. "Should probably do that."
Kyra laughed. "I guess we should, shouldn't we?" Ollys could see Opal inwardly groan, and he grinned at her. She just traced her index finger over her throat.
"Enter into your trance," Madam Liall had said. "And try to touch the minds of each other. Get a feel for your group mates, and what their minds are like."
Not waiting for anyone else to bother, Ollys decided to enter his trance. He kneeled down, interlocking his fingers, and closed his eyes. Ignoring the many sounds around him, he fell into the near-habitual state of the trance he had learned many years ago. He had done this exercise - both the trance and the transient communicating - many times, so it was rather easy.
As he entered his trance, he began to loose touch with his sense - the yells of the fields became distant, the prickly grass a long gone memory. Instead, he focused on the magic flowing around him. The magic coursing through the grass, his nervous system, and his heart, where much magical energy was pooled.
He reached outwards further, prodding those around him. He could vaguely feel each of the presences of the 5 other students around him, though only a couple seemed to be present in the astral realm like he was. He couldn't tell who was who - spatial distance was irrelevant in magic systems - so he prodded one present mind.
As he nudged the presence with his own, the presence softly bumped back after a moment, a signal of admission. Surely not Opal or Kira, he thought. Far too timid.
He pressed his consciousness against the others presence again, beginning to explore their astra, looking at the way they interacted with magic - noting that they were doing the same to him. He ignored the invasive feeling and instead focused on them.
They seemed to be a hydrophist, dealing with water manipulation. Their pathways were well routed, suggesting a lot of experience in magic. Their presence prodding at his mind was gentle but forward, yet still a bit insecure. He wondered if it was that serious brunette girl.
He interacted with a few others as they entered their trances, including Opal with her bold yet preoccupied presence, and Kyra with her overwhelmingly friendly one. A few minutes later, he decided to return from his trance, once again regaining feel of his body. Including a bit of a hardness, to which he rolled his eyes internally. Trances had that effect, sadly.
"So, what are you guys studying?" Kyra asked, as if the brief silence was too much for her. "At the academy here?"
Nobody answered for a moment, so Opal piped up, "battle magiks, I think!"
The cringy boy - Elit? - laughed. "Dang, same! Twinsies." Ollys nearly died internally.
Kyra smiled broadly. "Dang, thats crazy! Couldn't do anything like that. Going into clerical magiks, myself." She swept her hair over her shoulder, glancing at Ollys as she did.
That her trying to flirt? If it was a sign, Ollys ignored it - he was terrible at reading social cues - instead responding himself. "Studying arcane masseuship."
The fourth girl - a tall black-haired girl - whistled. "Isn't that like giving massages to people all the time?"
"More or less," Ollys replied, grinning. "With some complicated magic theory involved."
"And plenty of naked girls," Opal added, grinningly wickedly.
Ollys rolled his eyes, trying not to blush as he chuckled. Elit was laughing hard on his back, while Kyra had the opposite reaction, blushing and looking away awkwardly. Way to make things comfy, Opal, Ollys thought to himself, though he didn't mind at all.
His thoughts were interrupted as he felt a soft rumbling in the ground. The others in the group also perked up, looking around. Earthquake? Earthquakes were hardly uncommon, but this felt more quick.
The next moment, Ollys found himself falling through the air high over the fields. Not registering what happened, he blinked and looked around, noticing the world spinning around him. What the hell?? Confusion and fear coursed through him. He was flying through the air, and his ears were ringing painfully.
He saw the ground approaching from beneath him, and a combination of instinct and adrenaline kicked in. He entered a brief trance, becoming hyper aware of the magic around him. He tapped into the magic coursing through his bloodstream, and spread it through his body, warping his body's perception of the world as he plummeted. He felt the kinetic forces he was under pulling him down at dizzying rates toward the ground, so he changed them, slinging himself to the side instead.
And with that, he felt himself falling sideways instead. He cracked against the cold grassy dirt, releasing his command. He rolled to a stop, grunting as his bones gashed against the ground. He moaned and shifted onto his side, his mind incredibly dizzy and lightheaded from the quick spin. The adrenaline pumping through his veins cleared it quickly, and he managed to look around at the chaos around him.
Where he had been moments before, there was an enormous crater, nearly half the size of the field. Turf and dirt had been ripped up and tossed across the stadium, leaving only craggy rock and scorched earth in its wake. Sharp screams pierced his ears, presumably coming from the dozens of students running in the distance, sprinting from the crater. Many left for the exit doors, though nearly everyone simply sought to distance themselves from the last sight. Those who didn't lay unmoving on the ground.
Storming from out of the pit in the ground were dozens of soldiers of sorts, equipped with swords, crossbows and a few arcane channeling tools - most held wands or rods, though Ollys saw a couple with orbs floating before them, usually reserved for high level magiks. Fighting back were a meager few from the academy, including Miss Liall and a few other of the academy's magicians, all wearing the cloak of the school. A few students joined in too, either from the class or leaping from a platform above, though they were brutally disposed of.
As the situation sunk in, horror and anticipation rose from Ollys's throat. "What the hell???" He yelled.
"Ollys!" A voice croaked from somewhere nearby. He whipped his head toward the sound, pulling on his Telethic gloves habitually.
It was Opal. She was battered, some of her clothes scorched and torn, and lay a few yards from him, but she was alive. Ollys exhaled in relief. "Opal," he greeted, relieved to see a friendly face. "What the hell is going on?!" He shouted, though he could barely hear his own voice from the ringing in his ears.
Opal got on her feet and ran towards him, kneeling down. "Ollys! You ok??"
Ollys nodded, pushing himself into a sitting position. "I guess. What the hell kind of drill is this?"
"Pit if I know," she said, though her face was pale and her voice cracked, as Ollys imagined his own did.
He looked around the field again, slowly taking in the magnitude of what had just occurred. Debris was cast everywhere, with huge rocks and turfed dirt sprayed across the stadium. Dozens of bodies lay strewn across the field, some slowly sitting up, some unmoving. Ollys choked as he saw a pair of legs sticking out from underneath a boulder, bent at irregular angles. He forced himself to look back to the pit in the center.
"Who are they??" He asked hoarsely, though the question was rhetorical. How would Opal know?
Opal didn't respond, just looking with wide eyes as the terror set into her too. "I think we need to get out of here..." she said weakly.
"Yeah," Ollys agreed, managing to get his mind focused enough to rise into a crouched position. "Yeah we do."
Opal followed Ollys as he made his way across the stadium towards the door, passing rubble, unconscious students and disturbing gore Ollys forced himself to not look at. He focused just on the door, planted into the close wall, just a few dozen feet ahead. Somehow he kept himself moving, though the more he did, the more reality pulled him from his trance.
The doors burst open, slamming against the concrete walls, as a dozen more faculty from the academy burst in, pushing past Ollys and Opal. Ollys sighed in relief and nearly booked it for the door, but someone grabbed his arm.
