MAZE - The Endless Quest

"What are ye waiting for? Let's go."

Before the students could realize what was going on, Mr. Greyson had already opened the door and left the room. A girl in the front seat looked back at the class.

"Do we follow him?"

The students stared at each other, trying to figure out what to do when they heard yelling coming from outside.

"If ah have to wait for more than ten minutes, ye all are running the drill instead of training."

"What is the drill?" One of the boys asked.

One of the older ones got up and started walking to the door.

"I have no idea, but I really don't want to find out."

As if agreeing with him, all the students got up and rushed through the door. The first student to leave the room saw the teacher looking back and going down the stairs.

"We need to go down!" he said before following Mr.Greyson.

Hera got up and followed the group, but she stayed at the back, afraid of stopping and hurting someone. At her side, a girl was running at the same pace.

"Hey, it was a nice thing you did to help that guy. Even if it was an accident," the girl said. She had her long blue hair set in a ponytail and bangs that resembled a bit how the Hero Undine did her hair, albeit shorter.

"Oh.. thank you... I... he... The teacher just reminded me of a customer I had and making him talk about something else made him cool off."

Hera avoided eye contact, worried Mr. Greyson would be angry if he knew what she did. The girl started laughing at the same time they went down the stairs.

"You treated Mr. Greyson as a rude customer? Oh my god, that is amazing."

Hera's eyes widen, "Please don't tell him."

The girl shook her head, "Don't worry, that was incredible. I need to think about how my work can help me here, the previous work I mean. What's your name?"

The group was going down the second flight of stairs. Hera noticed that even though they were almost running, she wasn't feeling tired at all. Yesterday this light jog would have exhausted her.

"I'm Hera."

"Hey Hera, I'm Pamella, but you can call me Blue."

Hera tilted her head. Nicknames usually are part of the name, right? That was an odd one.

"Why Blue?"

Pamella pointed to her hair.

"Oh, right," Hera felt embarrassed. The reason for the nickname was literally in the girl's face.

"I'm just kidding, my last name is Blunt, and since in my class, there were two other girls called Pamella. People started calling me Blue since Blunt seemed a bit too formal."

Hera smiled at her. She knew it was just a joke, but that still made her feel uncomfortable, even if Pamella was just trying to be friendly. At the same time, she wondered if she wasn't being made fun of.

Following the group one more flight of stairs, Hera realized that they were going towards the basement since they had just passed the ground floor. She stopped before going down and looked around. Hera took the guild tour so many times that she still remembered the layout. This hallway leads to the training room. Why would they be going down?

"What's wrong?" Pamella stopped in the middle of the stairway, looking worried at her new classmate.

"This seems wrong. The training room is that way. Why would Mr. Greyson take us to the basement?"

Pamella looked down at the rest of the group, "Maybe he has a different place in mind."

"I don't know... I think he would take us to where they train. I'm going to take a look." Hera started dashing through the hallway towards the cloth while she heard Pamella yelling.

"If you are late, we are all running the Drill!"

Hera wasn't sure of what the Drill was, but she was sure there was nothing underground. The basement was a storage and research area, nothing more.  Why would a teacher take his students there on the first day?

Reaching the fork in the hallway, Hera looked around, trying to remember how to get to the training room. To her right, there was something in the back that seemed to glow. She started sprinting toward the light, but halfway through it, she saw the solid stone wall changing to a glass one.

Through the glass wall, Hera saw a big room filled with equipment and a running field. Some people were training there. Hera assumed they were explorers since the training seemed to be almost impossible for an average human. Scanning the room, she finally saw an area with a few training dummies and one big sun-tanned man standing in front of them looking towards her.

#############################

Mr. Greyson smiled at his student. She was the first to get there, but he had seen her in the back of the group. That fresh batch of recruits seemed to be too green even for the standard of a beginner course. He was glad at least one of them seemed to have some brains. He waved at her, but that caused her to run back the way she came.

That surprised Greyson. Sure, he was harsh, and his personality wasn't very welcoming, but running away after seeing him hurt a bit. He scratched his chin, wondering if the beard was contributing to the bad look.

If it came to people running from him, maybe he should consider changing his style, even if he was very fond of it.

Still pondering what he could do to be more friendly towards other people, he saw the girl running through the hallway toward the training ground.

She was halfway through the door when another girl showed up, the one with the blue hair that seemed to be a bit too into the Heroes. The first girl, the one that arrived late, stopped in front of him at the same time he saw the rest of the class running through the hall.

#############################

"Would ye look at that," Mr. Greyson said.

The teacher was staring at Hera, who now was catching her breath. The jogging through the stairway was fine. But the sprint towards the training room and back, and to it again, was enough to tire her. Still, she had a wide grin on her face. She was fast. She was faster than ever before, and she could go at her full speed for more than just a few seconds, and she still had some energy.

Part of her wanted the class to fail, and run through the Drill, whatever that was. She wanted to test her strength, test what her body could do now.

Pamella joined her after a few seconds, nowhere near as tired at Hera, but she also was taking deep breaths. The rest of the class soon got behind them. Most were breathing heavily, but a few seemed to be okay with the marathon.

"Very well, ye all made it in time, so none of ye will run the Drill today." Mr. Greyson walked toward one of the training dummies.

"Now, ye all need to show me what ye can do. We made this dummy for this. It can take a beating, and it won't break," the teacher said as he walked towards one of the silver dummies.

"Ye will use the wooden ones if you get a higher level you need to swap for a more resistant one like this,"

With a swift movement, he slammed his fist in the dummy's head, making a 'clang' noise that startled even the other explorers in the room. Above the dummy, a screen showed a score of 183 points.

"Each one of them is linked to a computer. So they can give you an idea of how powerful yer attack was. Even if ye are a mage, ye need some strength to fight, and Ah need to know what ye can do so Ah can teach ye."

The students mumbled a bit until the man who left the class first stepped forward.

"Can I go first?" he said confidently.

It surprised Hera that he could ask something like that without any hesitation.

"Very good laddie, ah like who takes the initiative. Take one of the weapons in the wall and give it a good whack, also what's yer name?"

The man walked towards the wall and put his hand on a wooden spear, letting out a long sigh before answering, "It's Leonidas."

Mr. Greyson gave a resounding laugh after hearing the name, "And ye know how to use a spear, my boy? Yer parents never gave ye a chance."

"No, they didn't."

Leonidas walked in front of a dummy and took a deep breath. His entire presence shifted from someone confident and joyful to a cold and centered person. Hera was taken aback. It was the first time she ever saw someone with a bit of combat experience get ready to attack.

A few seconds passed before he pulled the spear to the side with one hand while aiming it with the hand in the back. With a thrust, he hit the center of the dummy, making a loud noise as if a shelf had just fallen into the ground.

Leonidas took a step back, staring at the spear and then at the dummy with a surprised face.

"Ah told ye laddie, that dummy is a tough nut to crack," Mr. Greyson said with a smile before pointing towards the monitor.

In big blue letters, Leonidas' score appeared.

23 Points.

"That is the strength of yer attack. It is the same as if yer strength score was a 23. When ye strike, the skill behind it also makes it stronger than yer own score. Very good for a recruit boy, Ye may make yer name justice one day."

Leonidas smiled and put the spear back in the wall before walking towards the group. The teacher clapped his hands once and asked.

"So, who is next?"