[center][h2][color=f7976a]Kishimoto Rikka's Tests[/color][/h2][/center]

[hider]Mycona told Rikka that there had been an announcement after seeing how she unnoticeable continued drinking her coffee even after everyone around her had stood up, this wasn't the first time this happened and not the last either. Rikka bowed a few times towards Mycona in thank of having warning her. She also made sure to write a thank you note on her paper before parting from the spore girl to take the exams.

They were suppose to gather up on the street just outside the cafeteria, the street she had met Alex in on the first day. Quickly they made their way over to one of the laboratory buildings with Rikka walking at the back just patiently following the group with both her hands clasped together, nerve clearly showing off of her face as their last exam approached. Probably the most difficult exam for her, she wasn't sure she would even make it. They went through the same hallway they went through yesterday but clearly changed in the smaller aspects. Clipboards hanging onto each blast door along the hallway. Rikka gazed from left to right examining most of the rooms as they strolled along. There were tables in all rooms with multiple items on it, they all seemed to be identical to every room. She stopped for a moment and tilted her upper body to the left making her hair fall down past her head as she looked closely over the room shortly before going on again.

The sudden stop of walking made her walk into someone by accident immediately pulling her attention to the front of the room. Making sure to apologies with a bow before taking her attention back to the front of the group where the teacher was talking. A bright board with names showed up above the teacher at the front so they could see in which exam group they were. Door two, easy. Rikka quickly made her way over to the second door, she was first to arrive and patiently waited for the rest to arrive with a gently smile on her face.

[hr]

When the six students assigned entered their assigned laboratory, Administrator Malkin was alone and lacking his usual translator. The rattling cage in the corner was almost distracting, but Rikka would feel something strange from the lower shelf on the table full of miscellaneous objects. Malkin surveyed his group of students for a moment and jotted down a few notes on a clipboard awkwardly held in his one claw, then "spoke". Or rather, did something similar to speaking. The feeling of magical energy struck the more aware very lightly at the base of their souls, and though Malkin was straining some, they could all understand him -- including Rikka.

[color=00a99d]"Again, welcome to the Institute. This isn't just a test, in case you were wondering. It's also unofficially your first lesson. You will demonstrate your abilities for me to evaluate, and even if you don't quite know how to harness them, I will be able to determine roughly what you're capable of. Ms. Kishimoto, please step towards the table and begin your demonstration. You're free to use anything on the table if need be."[/color]

The students and professor had all entered the same laboratory, Rikka uncomfortably shifted her hands before her lap while trying to concentrate on what the teacher was about to say. Rikka was even more so exam shy then before knowing she had to perform soon before the professor. It was going to be fine, it was only going to be displaying her powers. She had done this often enough to make it look like something she did normally. Remembering correctly this teacher wasn't able to speak on his own let stand her being able to read his lips. With the thought of that she felt a odd feeling, like someone had entered her head and put some subtitles under this lobster. 

Everything what professor Malkin had transferred into their head was very clear, the other 5 students seemed to be chatting about the brain thingy the professor did and appeared to be just as surprised as Rikka that he was able to do such things with magic. He was an amazing professor, she was looking forward to learning from him. Rikka paid little attention to the other students at the time knowing she had to go first by professor Malkin his request. Rikka gave a shy nod at the professor before walking over to the table seeing the many array of different items. Rikka turned to the professor and gave a gracious bow indicating that she was starting with her exam. Turning her eyes back to the table gazed slowly over all the item to think up something she was gonna do her demonstration with. Something like super slow catching out of the air was a consideration thinking on how much she had done that already but maybe a bit too bland. 

Jars, stones, simple household items. Rikka took a step back and looked further down beneath the tabletop suddenly seeming rather surprised there were things down there as well. A book? What was that doing here? Rikka unknowingly stared at the book for a while and deeply thinking about its purpose in this exam. Would anyone be able to use a thing like that in displaying their ability? Well, apparently. Rikka carefully reached out to the book while catching a gimps at Malkin to see if he was watching. She didn't want to let it take too long but she just felt curious to what was written in the book. The cover turned open.

Malkin had been silently and motionlessly watching Rikka during her examination of the table. Only when she stepped back did he start scribbling down notes on the clipboard again, and when she looked back towards him, he nodded encouragingly. The book had a simple brown leather cover and was fairly heavy, though it had no visible title or author. In fact, it didn't have anything written on it at all -- in any of its several hundreds of pages. And that it was totally blank felt wrong. Like there was something written there just beyond what was immediately visible. The pages were worn, and clearly had been written upon at some point in the past. The first page felt the most immediate and the most important.

Malkin had been monitoring her the whole time, she felt a little forced upon to do this thing. When she looked back he was nodding at her. Was she taking too long or doing it right? Rikka swiftly turned her head back to the table in embarrassment and had to calm down for a minute before continuing with the book. It was empty. It was dusty, old and there was nothing written in it. Rikka stared at it in annoyance. It was irritating to expect so much of it and receive so little. Patiently she examined the book, she turned a few pages raised it into the air to see if anything was dropping out but it was just a book. It did seem worn however, it had been used and was there for a reason other then whamming someone on the head with. Rikka tried staring at it for a while longer, squinting her eyes and finally turned to viciously glaring at the book. People outside looking through the window must have thought she was some sort of crazy bunch. Rikka placed it on the table and quickly hurried over to her own bag she put near the door now fixated on the book instead of the exam itself. She was suppose to display her magic to the professor but she couldn't just hold the urge to rip this book to pieces. She jankend a pen out of her bag and wrote a few words in the book with what appearing no outcome whatsoever.

[center][color=f7976a]'Rikka, fish, school, show yourself devil.'[/color][/center]

Nothing, Rikka took one of the jars and quickly screwed the lid off almost snapping the jar by the force she took to do the lid. She poured everything over this thing. 

The words and the water soaking into the book's pages dried up and faded away as though they had been sitting on its pages for centuries. The book didn't seem amused.

Rikka already wanted to try and smash a rock into the book but suddenly noticed the passing away of her letters and the liquid she poured on. Flabbergast she stared at the book not knowing what had just happened. The book ate the things she did to it. Rikka pointed at the book while slowly turning her head back to the professor in scariness of the book. The realization came that this might be a magical book of some sort. She knew items filled with magic excised but she hadn't really seen them in her village. There were quite a lot at the school like her alarm clock but it still felt new and unreal. Rikka gulped and deeply gazed a the book thinking on what to do with it. 

Magic would work probably but what out of many. She couldn't do a lot with her magic yet but she was decently good at her own magic. Slowing down time was going to do nothing probably, maybe just see the history of it would work? Rikka placed both hands on each side of the cover of the book and rose it up more towards her face. Her eyes went over each bit of tattered piece of paper, each carve in the cover, each paper stain. Feeling as if none of that was there yet. Slowly removing them in her head one by one. Her hands glowed a bright green as it was passed onto the book as well. The book illuminated in a green hue as she went to see how many years she could go back with it.

Immediately, she found the age of the book. It was impossible not to - it was a loud detail, screaming into her mind like nothing she had ever felt before. The book itself was only perhaps thirty years old, but the contents of the book were the unusual part. Though the words didn't reveal themselves to her, she felt like she was looking at a scribbled jumble of information instead of a normal straight line like any non magical object. Its words were all over the past, and all over the future, like someone had intentionally scrambled them. Her own words, "Rikka, fish, school, show yourself devil.", were somewhere in the neighborhood of three hundred years in the future yet still locked on its pages as though they had already happened.

Administrator Malkin tapped his clipboard. [color=00a99d]"Congratulations, Ms. Kishimoto. You've passed the demonstration portion of the exam. Please keep the book - you'll want to examine that later. It'll help with your time magic and your innate Vision talents."[/color]

She felt a gust of air pass her head as she had figured out how old the book was and when and where it was made. Still missing a large portion of why it was here though but that was to be expected of a magical object like this. Her hair fluttered behind her as the gust of wind passed, she had to blink her eyes a few times at the sudden happening. Rikka gave a weird look at the book as to what it was doing, there were words in there but weirdly written, her own words were still there. She glanced through the book for a bit more, it was a weird thing but intresting. She had not experienced the use of her magic on a magical item yet. Suddenly feeling the tap of the clipboard resonate through her whole body she immediately turned around towards the professor to see what he was gonna say to her. Oh right, the exam, she had to get started. Rikka gave a panicked look for a moment and quickly bowed, she put the book between her upper arm and body as she quickly grabbed a bottle of pebbles and a stone bowl. The words of the professor were still going on as she threw up the jar of pebbles in the air. She was about to catch all of them in one go as she realized to what he just had said. A surprised look was shown on her face while staring at the professor completely forgetting about what she had just started. The sudden pebbles raining down on her head snapped her out of her confused state and made her crouch down as she was cowering in pain of the hurting pebbles releasing an ow with each pebble.

The pebble rain had stopped. While still covering her head with both hands she looked back at the professor to see if he was serious. A somewhat smile appeared on her face when she saw he wasn't joking with her at all. A blush of happiness appeared on her face making her turn her head to the ground in embarrassment while still crouched down at the ground. She took the book from under her arm once more. It was special, it was her own special book for now that she could study in her room in her free time. It was probably not of much use to her but it made her pass this exam at least. She turned it to about the third page where she saw a large written piece of text on the paper.

[center][color=f7976a]'Good luck from now on ;)'[/color][/center]

[hr]

After all of the students had completed their demonstrations, Malkin announced the beginning of the combat tests by ripping the black cloth off of the top of the cage in the back of the room. The huge insectoid Monster was thrashing about blindly, trying to get at the rack of gas masks on the wall next to it. It didn't seem like it was able to see the thin wire mesh of the cage it was being held in, and it seemed to have too short of a memory to realize it couldn't escape.

Administrator Malkin quickly explained what this creature -- an Ash-hopper -- was, and why they were dangerous, just as every other professor was doing in their own respective rooms. He added one last bit that the others didn't, though: [color=00a99d]"Not everyone will be visiting the Dead lands, but every field of magical study involves some level of risk and unknown factors. Even if you don't think this combat test will help you at all, trust me when I say that it will."[/color]

He called upon several other students to take the combat test before Rikka, and most stayed in the second, completely sealed room for between three and ten minutes. One of the four who went in before her had to be dragged out, his gas mask filter cartridge cracked wide open and the cotton pads that had held the filtration agent torn to shreds. Eventually, Malkin called on Rikka to take the combat test, and held out a large, standard issue Unoctocan military knife. [color=00a99d]"Ms. Kishimoto, please put on one of the hoods on the rack there, and enter the room. Here, take this too: your magical talent may not be enough on its own."[/color]

And so Malkin pressed the button, sliding open the blast door and revealing the Deadlands-esque chamber once more.

They moved onto the next part of the exam, the so called combat side to the magic exam. This was Rikka her weak part of the whole exam thing. Rikka wasn't sure if she was ready. The cloth being undone from the cage made Rikka drop her hands past her side as a complete blank expression was showed on her face. It moved, it was big, it looked like a giant cockroach, IT WAS AN INSECT. Rikka let out a terrified scream as she dashed to the opposite corner of the room, crouched down, turned as far away while still being able to see it and shivered tremendously. A terrified look was shown in her eyes, she was covering her mouth in fear and trying not to gag and scream as the terrible creature shifted about. She was shaking her head as much as possible when the teacher looked to show him she didn't want too go in with that thing. 

Malkin was explaining further on about what these creatures did, what they were gonna be wearing and what they were suppose to look out for. Rikka had been paranoid sitting in the corner of the room the whole time while occasionally paying attention when she wasn't looking at that thing again. They stayed in the same preparation room before the experimentation chamber. Most people of their group went in and came out in one piece again. They didn't look hurt and seemed fine and all but she didn't imagine them having a great time in there. The last person didn't come out so unharmed, he was dragged out by medic staff, he was dying slowly. It added up to the horror of the scene but not as much as the insects. Her name was called, she was the last one. She scarily walked up to Malkin, her head was tilted over to the ground as her hands were pressed against her lap. There was some hair hanging before her eyes as she peered through it up to Malkin clearly shivering in fear the whole time. 

Unlike the others a knive was held out to her, surprised to see that she got a knive she grabbed hold of it with trembling hands before pressing them against her lap again. This was out of remorse. She shook her head one more time at Malkin as he told her to put on the hood. Her head turned shortly towards the hoods and back at Malkin, her mouth agape with puppy eyes. He didn't falter. She violently shook her head as she went over to the rack of hoods and put one of them on slowly. She stepped back at towards Malkin but not further. She stayed next to him for the whole time shaking her head as tears enveloped in her eyes. With Rikka not moving at all two other students softly pushed her into the open doorway at the end of the room untill the door could be closed behind her. The door shut closed as she was standing in the room only trembling and her eyes well shut. The knive she held against her skirt she moved up towards her belly holding it tightly in front of it. She softly sobbed as she waited for the worst.

The room was dark, and only dimly lit by the pink and purple glows of small pods hanging off of the mushroom trees' vines. A sponge like flower coughed up a cloud of spores once, and moments after being shoved into the room, a thin white fog swept in, indicating that the gas mask now had to be protected. A moment later, she was struck with one of the same feelings of magical energy she had when Malkin had first started 'speaking' to her, and the room stirred to life. Nothing was visible, but she could hear loud clicking and rustling in the blade like crystal grass beyond the mushroom tree in the center of the room. Something was going on back there, but it wasn't coming closer to her at all.

With her eyes squinted close as strongly as she could she could only feel the chilly temperature in this room, she was waiting to just get killed or something but there was nothing happening. One of her eyes slowly opened as the other one followed after reckoning it was safe. It was shallowly lit in the room only adding more to the horror vibe Rikka was getting from it, there were creepy trees and weird flowers that moved. This was not her favorite place. Her eyes started moving faster as she knew it was suppose to be here somewhere. Her knees bend a little as a soft sobbing let out of her mouth again. She felt like something had happened in her head with magical energies again. She felt the soft pulsating in her body from the ash hopper in the room. She knew it was behind that tree. Rikka stepped back as far as she could to get away from it bumping her back against the door. She kept her eyes on the things, it didn't seemed to move at all. It was just there. Being annoying. She kept her position for about 5 minutes straight without being able to do anything at all except knock on the door a few times.

The noises stopped for a while. Eventually, the noises came back, and louder, and the Ash hoppers revealed themselves. Both of them. They tumbled along the ground out of the dark grass behind the mushroom tree, locked together in combat, and one of them had the shredded remains of a cotton pad stuck to its leg: remnants of the previous failed student's filter cartridge. The smaller one of the two didn't quite look like the other, as it had a large, shovel like horn protruding from its head, and it was desperately trying to flip the slightly larger one upside down. They were obviously preoccupied with the carbon on the cotton pad.

The throbbing stopped, it came back even harder. This was the worst. Rikka let out a small shriek as she saw the two ash hoppers move over the grass. They weren't coming for her yet but it was better if they stayed away for as long as possible. She raised the knive a little to her chest but it was of no use. She turned her head somewhat away only looking with one of her eyes as another 5 minutes went on without any fight.

Eventually, the larger Hopper gained an advantage. It broke away from the smaller, horned one and charged, the cotton pad falling off of its leg. The smaller Ash hopper lowered its head, preparing to flip its opponent once more, but the larger one dashed to the side, spun about, and kicked its foe with its rear legs, sending the huge bug flying, one of its wing casings split open by the impact. The larger Hopper was maybe twelve pounds and a foot and a half long, and it greedily swallowed the charcoal coated cotton pad on the ground before turning to Rikka, realizing that it had another free meal in front of it. And so it jumped straight at her filter cartridge.

The sudden vision of seeing the bug eat the filter made her breathless, it turned its head and almost instantly jumped over to Rikka like it knew she was there all along but had waited. Wide eyed Rikka jumped at the bug and activated her magic as time stopped with the bug right in front of her, she was viciously swinging the knife around without any aim just the general direction of in front of her hoping she would hit something with her eyes still closed. Her magic kept going untill she started feeling tired and slowly dropped down to her knees at the door heavily panting from the overuse of her magic. Tears were streaming down her face as she brokenly shook her head from side to side, her magic had deactivate as her concentration was gone. With the knive in front of her chest again she waited.

As she waited, she felt the slow trickle of fluid falling down the knife and onto her hand. Her flailing had worked, though it was by no means a 'clean kill', and when her magic halted, the larger Ash hopper flopped uselessly onto the ground, covered in gashes in its hard carapace ranging from perfect to horribly aimed. Rikka had completely accidentally killed the creature in her panic, but the blast doors didn't open just yet. Eventually, the smaller, horned Ash hopper came into view. It was limping towards her across the mossy dirt covered floor with its upper shell cracked wide open and one of its rear legs badly mangled from taking a bad landing, but still it hungered for charcoal. It tried to leap towards her, failed, and tried to take flight towards her, failing that too, and it skittered across the ground with its broken wing buzzing alongside its intact wing. Eventually it stopped and just lay there on the ground, frustrated by having not one, but two meals denied. If it had had a human face, it seemed like it would be pouting.

Rikka kept her eyes shut close for a bit longer untill the sudden feeling of some goo landing on her hand opened her eyes back up to look what it was. Yet another scream as she almost accidentally stabbed her other hand with the knive as she was trying to get the goo away from her hand. She brushed the knive over the sleeve of her arm leaving a good trail of insect goo on her clothes. She started panic crying as she tossed the knive away to free both her hands and get all the goo off of her. It was hopeless. Seeing the insect body in front of her definitly made it worse. Her head turned away as she frantically started crying more and more. From all the panic and terror the girl had experiences last few minutes the girl had done something what hadn't happened in a long while. Out of embarrassment she placed her face in both her hands and sobbed and cried as the other insect still tried to get to her. It miserably failed leaving him and Rikka both in the dust.

The insect eventually seemed to realize that it was hurt, and that it wasn't just being held back by some unseen force. It shivered and steeled itself for the coming battle that had claimed the life of its rival, stood back up on its five intact legs, and quickly limped towards Rikka. The human wasn't looking at it. The human wasn't even trying to defend itself. What was this human doing? Whatever. Snack time.

Rikka felt a gentle tug at the hose on the filtration hood covering her head. Then another. And a third tug. And following the third tug, the hose went limp and the insect skittered away, leaving Rikka to breathe in the room's fumes, which burned her throat on the way down. It took maybe ten seconds for her to grow dizzy, and another twenty seconds for the dizziness to fade to faintness, and finally her vision began to blur. The last thing she saw before she lost consciousness was the bright white of the blast door rolling open and bathing the room in light.

Rikka quivered in fear at the door untill the last bug came up to her and pulled the filters off gently. She was done, she didn't even want to see what it was doing, all what she wanted is get out of this room. Not a moment longer, Rikka was at the point of pulling the mask off herself but the insect had already taken everything off, the gas leaked through. It was definitly burning in her throat, she couldn't breath. She was grasping for air but nothing. She let out a few last hopeless sobs and whines before falling over to the side. Her time in the horror room: 20 minutes.

When she finally woke up, her head hurt. It wasn't too bad, but it wasn't pleasant by any measure, and she was lying in a bed in a small, sterile white room with some medical equipment lying around. The book from the magic exam was tucked under her right arm, and none of the insecticide blood was on her clothing, as though it had never been there in the first place.

Softly she opened her eyes, she immediately sat upright and frantically looked around her with a shocked expression on her face, her hair was undone. When she came to the realization she wasn't in that room anymore she let out a troubled sigh before tearing up a little again. She softly watched her sleeves and everything to see it completely clear of bug blood. Her wet clothes had been changed already with her freshly washed clothes at the side of her bed. Rikka tried brushing the tears away but they kept coming. Eventually it died down a little as she was shifting her fingers a little around each other waiting for something to happen.

After a few minutes, the door on the other side of the room creaked open, and an old woman with a hair net and deep wrinkles peeked in at Rikka. Seeing Rikka awake, she opened the door and stepped in with a clipboard. Institute staff seemed to love their clipboards.  She was wearing the standard green Institute uniform, though she had the symbol of a steaming mortar and pestle embroidered on one side of her chest.

[color=f6989d]"Are you feeling alright now?"[/color], the woman asked, with a look of concern written across her face. She'd seen the aftereffects of the combat exam's fumes a lot, and not everyone reacted to them the same way, even when they always wore off in the end. [color=f6989d]"I have a note for you from your assigned examiner if you're ready for it."[/color]

[color=f6989d]"Oh! Sorry, uh..."[/color]

A look of embarrassment crossed the nurse's face when she glanced down at the clipboard and realized that Rikka couldn't hear her. She was totally unaware that Rikka could read lips, and didn't know what to do.

From the corner of her eyes she could see the nurse entering the room at which her head immediately snapped towards the door. With a somewhat gentle smile and still red eyes she waited for the nurse to come closer. She felt a little embarrassed knowing the nurse could see that she had just been crying right now but tried to ignore it as much as possible. Rikka gave a nod at the nurse that she feeling alright right now and held out both hands to get the card off of the nurse, softly bowing her head as a thank you to the nurse. The nurse suddenly seemed quite embarrassed but Rikka didn't understand why or what. She tilted her head in confusion while watching the nurse as she left. Giving a short shrug she looked back at the note in her hands and promptly opened it.

The note was a small one, and read, [color=00a99d]"Congratulations on performing well during the demonstration. Unfortunately, you will have to be placed in remedial combat training courses following your performance in the combat exam, but I'm glad you at least tried to defend yourself once. You have the rest of the day off to do with whatever you'd like, and we'll give you your test results in the morning. Signed, the giant walking insect."[/color]

Rikka had performed well during the demonstration so she was quite happy and for the combat training... Well, she didn't mind honestly, to be put in remedial classes was the least of her worries if she made it to go to this school at least. Rikka seemed quite happy with the note untill she read the last line and froze as she dropped the note in shock onto her lap. This was gonna give her nightmares wasn't it...[/hider]