Watching a full classroom exist without a teacher was a lot like seeing the jungle on television. Cliques formed, rules were forgotten, and nobody tried to find the teacher. Amanda and I sat in our seats chatting, our shared secret about the nature of the class put a smile on our faces.

“I didn’t know a single symbol could do that much.” Amanda scanned the classroom. “I can’t see a thing.”

She was looking for the teacher, but there were no magical traces of his existence.

“This isn’t the result of a single symbol. This would take a lot of time and effort.” I’d examined the blackboard closely before class. “He’s probably done this for all of his classes and the room is set up to help him.”

“It’s a regent?” Amanda stared at the room with wide eyes.

“I think so.” I crossed my arms. “I was kind of hoping to learn something today.”

None of the students around me had noticed anything wrong. A couple of them were sitting attentively waiting for the teacher, but their eyes didn’t wander towards the blackboard.

“I’m not surprised.” Amanda whispered to me. “If I didn’t know I wouldn’t think there was anything wrong.”

Zodiac and my dad had been teaching me for over two years. In that time, I had seen hundreds of symbols, and each of them I have seen individually thousands of times.

It wasn’t an option for me to skip the foundations of symbol learning.

“You know, I think something’s wrong here.” One of the students spoke out. “Why isn’t the teacher here? This feels off.”

Our classmates slowly turned towards the voice. It belonged to a lanky girl sitting at her seat. She looked back at her classmates and shrugged.

“Ah, crap.” Another called out. “Is this some kind of test?”

My heart fluttered with joy.

Finally.

The class went quickly from there, each of the students agreeing that it was better to look for a test than it was to muck around. Eventually one of them brushed against the blackboard by accident and suddenly the teacher's chair wasn’t empty anymore.

Pernacles had his feet on the desk in front of him and was smiling at the class.

“Thirty minutes. Not the worst, not the best. Unfortunately, none of you realised anything in the room was out of place.”

He took his feet off the desk and jumped out of his chair. His cane smacked against the blackboard and the student that had rubbed against it jolted.

The class stared at the teacher, gobsmacked. Half an hour and none of them had even the slightest indication that someone was invisible among them.

“My name is Professor Pernacles. Your symbols teacher for this semester.” He stomped his cane on the floor. “Get into your seats. We’ve got a lot to talk about.”

The class passed a lot faster after that. Unfortunately, Pernacles was going through the bare basics that I had already learnt. I still listened intently.

It was always good to review.

Amanda was scribbling almost as many notes as she had for science. The question she had asked Pernacles was stuck in my mind.

Could a symbol be used to create a fake bloodline?

My hopes of finding an answer lowered as the class progressed. My dad’s lessons swam through my head as time passed.

Inherently, a bloodline was a symbol, but the method of creating it unknown. It could be gifted, but how that gift was transferred was anyone’s guess.

Bloodline inheritors only knew which creature gave them the gift, and how to contact them again. It was their most guarded secret.

They couldn’t gift it to themselves.

However, there was always physical proof of a bloodline inside the body of the inheritor. Somewhere inside me, there was a symbol. One would be in Amanda too, and Gerial.

I don’t think I was approached physically by the Crijik, but the symbol had still appeared.

Theoretically a physical symbol could be used to fake a bloodline, at least the effects of one, but there were a few reasons why it couldn’t be done in reality.

For one, a bloodline symbol wasn’t an ordinary symbol. It acted more like a complex regent. That raised more problems. A regent could mimic spells, but they had restrictions too.

Complexity. Mana cost. Time. Materials.

These were the reasons I had thought over, but the lingering doubt remained in my mind.

Amanda had asked the question, but I supported it.

Professor Pernacles was better than I was at symbols. there was no doubt about that. Maybe he knew something I didn’t. Unfortunately, if Pernacles knew, then the rest of the faculty would too and would have tried it already with Alexis.

It was a long shot, but I still wanted to take it. The possible answer was enough for me to risk some embarrassment.

I just needed more information.

“Your brother passed all the tests, didn’t he?” I whispered to Amanda.

I was curious about why she had asked Pernacles the question.

She nodded. “I was just- I had time to think while I was in class before. Agni isn’t convinced.” She scratched Agni’s neck. “And I still haven’t seen a Phoenix.”

I looked at the bird on Amanda’s head. Agni had run away from Alexis the first time he had unlocked his bloodline. The bird was smart, possibly as smart as humans were, and she was intrinsically linked to Amanda’s bloodline.

“What are the tests?”

I was interrupted by a cough from Pernacles. Then something hit my head. A piece of chalk.

I looked up but the professor had already gone back to his lesson. Amanda snickered beside me, and I flicked her pen away from her.

A minute later she slid a note in front of me.

Main tests:

Tested bloodline characteristics. Pass.

Tested lack of magic activation. Pass.

Tested bloodline existence in body. Pass.

Tested bloodline is ours. Pass.

More tests done too.

I read over the note twice and frowned. The main tests all focused on central parts of a bloodline. The first was the easiest to cheat. Alexis only had to mimic the bloodline abilities physically. Fire hair, heat emission, and other characteristics that he had intimate knowledge of.

The other tests were harder to fake. Bloodlines used magic, but they weren’t magic. When they activated, magic didn’t play a part in it.

It only occurred to me now that Alexis needed an onze regent to fake the second test.

His spells used his natural mana, but his bloodline didn’t. Otherwise, it would use up more mana than he could afford to give it because it was permanently activated.

If faking a bloodline using a onze regent was that easy then everyone would do it.

Many materials were magical. Onze regents couldn’t use them. A regent like that would take years to create. It would have to be highly specialised, and it wouldn’t mimic their bloodline abilities exactly.

Even then, an onze regent could hide, but it couldn’t survive intense scrutiny like Alexis would have been placed under.

The third and fourth tests were the most convincing.

Did he have a bloodline? Yes

Was it the right bloodline? Yes.

These tests alone would be foolproof. I nodded my head at Amanda. It was strange. I knew the faculty was looking into this, but I had still been holding into some doubts.

Alexis couldn’t be faking the bloodline.

When the class finished Pernacles confirmed our suspicions.

“It is simply not possible to artificially create a bloodline.” Pernacles shook his cane. “More manpower and money have been put towards researching this than into the creation of the frontier cities. Every country wants an army of bloodline warriors defending their border.”

Pernacles didn’t know the secret behind bloodlines, but his reasoning was simple. Humanity was missing the information about how bloodlines were created.

Sometimes an inheritor would appear at random, without displaying any prior attributes, and other times the bloodline would be inherited from birth.

The divine’s Marked ones were always randomly chosen, and not even related to each other. They didn’t have to be young, though they often were.

Amanda tugged at my sleeve, and I realised we were already in front of the science classroom. We had rushed over here to get seats.

The students had calmed down as the day went on. Amanda’s stance was clear. She didn’t want to be bothered.

Before I knew it lunch had arrived.

Most of our class had calmed down, but Amanda still received looks from the others in our year level. Gold squawked at some of the onlookers and Amanda and Agni ignored them.

This time we didn’t walk to the gardens. I led the way up a familiar tower. It was empty and there were a few rooms open as well.

It was where my metal magic studies class was held.

“I’m so happy a place like this exists. Nobody to swarm us.” Amanda spun as she looked at our surroundings. “You get to have your fancy classes here?”

I showed her the room and peeked inside it in case Tago of metal was there. It looked empty.

“I don’t want my teacher sneaking up on us like Pernacles did.” I closed the door.

“Yeah, that was scary.” Amanda stepped away from the room. “I didn’t know symbols could do that. I thought they always had signs of magic.”

I shrugged. “Onze don’t.”

Amanda turned to me with her eyebrow raised. “What’s an onze?”

“Nothing, what’s an onze with you?” I replied instantly.

She didn’t laugh, but the corners of her lips were tilting upwards.

“It’s a type of regent that doesn’t use mana.” I spoke. “And I can see you holding back a smile. Admit my joke was magnificent.”

“You need to learn that life is hard for people who make bad jokes.” Amanda refused. “I am the friend that will teach you that lesson.”

We walked further into the tower, until we found an empty room that looked appealing. It was smaller, with only five chairs and two tables inside.

Amanda said that the faculty didn’t care if students occupied the rooms. I had my doubts, but the worst that could happen was that we were kicked out.

Amanda sat back on the furthest table.

She raised her finger and Agni jumped onto it. Gold chirped at the movement, and the birds flew to have their own conversation in the corner.

“I wanted to make an awesome school debut, but not like this.” She sighed.

“They’re just excited that someone unlocked a bloodline.” I leaned back on the wall. “There are plenty of other bloodline inheritors here that aren’t being bothered, right?”

She nodded. “That’s because they’ve already established their friends. Or their lack of friends. After experiencing power politics your whole life, you get used to maneuvering in it. My brother is the latest trend and fresh meat all rolled into one package.”

I was going to respond when a ray of light glistened into my eye. I’d caught the glare of the sun from the window behind her.

Amanda saw me wincing and turned her head.

“Hey, I can probably see the whole garden from here.” She craned her neck to see the view.

She failed.

Amanda pushed her hands against the surface of the table and slid across it towards the wall. Her back bumped against the window and she turned around to look outside.

“Hey, I can see my brother. He’s not surrounded by a crowd this time.” Amanda spoke. “He’s with someone. I know her. She’s the Destin girl.” Amanda gestured at me. “Come look.”

“I don’t support your peeking habits.” I spoke.

Then I stepped forward and joined her in looking out the window. She gave me a scandalous look and I shrugged.

“Good sir, you are a traitor to your values.” Amanda pointed. “They’re there.”

Alexis was talking with a girl, her stout figure recognisable even from afar.

It was Unice, from my earth magic studies class.

“Her surname is Destin? Is she related to Ouros?” I pulled back from the window.

“His cousin from the main branch. You know them?” She stared at me. “Oh, right, you’d be in the same earth magic studies class and metal for Ouros.”

How did she know that?

She saw my expression. “Don’t give me that look. It was the hottest gossip of last year. The Destin branch family successor outpaced the main family successor.”

Amanda shrugged and pushed herself away from the window. I stayed for a second longer and saw Alexis putting his hand on Unice’s shoulder in a familiar motion.

“-It’s good that he got himself a new friend. I was worried all this would go to his head.” Amanda’s words cut into my thoughts.

Alexis and Unice had already stepped away from each other. A felt a pang of worry bubble up inside my heart and committed his actions to memory.

Gerial would relay it all to his dad.

I turned back to Amanda, and she was pulling out notes from thin air.

“I saw you in our symbols class, bored as anything.” She tapped the notes.

They were all intricately crafted, some weren’t even from our class.

I could see some of the words on the pages. They were all related to bloodlines, and potential ways to fake them.

“You’re trying to figure out something that has been examined from every possible angle.” I crossed my arms. “Didn’t the tests convince you?”

“I trust my brother, and I trust our tests.” Amanda frowned. “But Agni is still worried, and I feel like something is off. Call me silly, but I want to investigate, and you’re just the person to help me.”

She leaned towards me, her cheeks in her hands and a mischievous smile on her lips.

“Can you teach me about symbols?”