The journey to the Capital Zafaris was relatively quick by carriage, Malice mostly focused on trying to meditate and sense his essence, lately he was getting closer and closer to seeing within himself, to feel his magical essence.

After a single days worth of travel they arrived at Zafaris, it was huge with walls towering over head, beasts of different kinds flew above the walls, some travelling and others defending. Even above the walls grand towers with glittering lights stood lofty and untouched, Malice guessed these were Magus watch towers capable of using destructive magic. Zafaris was the capital of the Azalea continent so it was heavily populated, with people ranging from mortals, blacksmiths, shop keepers, soldiers, Magus', Martial Strength Cultivators and many more different and varied people by this one could tell it was an advanced and beautiful city.

Getting in was very simple, one of the guards had a quick look at Elder Klaud realising he was a Powerful Magus allowing Malice and everyone else through the massive overbearing gates. Once through buildings of all shapes and sizes could be seen scattered across the city, from where they were it was simply impossible to see past these waves of buildings.

"Zafaris is made up of three districts, each district with a set purpose." Elder Klaud spoke to everyone present giving them a brief explanation of the city.

"The district that is on the outskirts of the city in between the outer wall and inner wall is the commercial district comprised of shops, bars, inns and several other leisure real estate. The second district is the residential district which is located past the inner wall and ends at the Core Wall. As the name implies this is where most permanent accommodation is located, obviously those with smaller fortunes choose to live in the commercial district. Finally the third district surrounded by the core wall is the Political District, the place where those with power within Zafaris live, it also houses the greatest seat of power within the Azalea Continent, The Azalea Emperor, who lives in the Divine Infernal Palace. The Zafaris Magus Institution and Martial Power Hall can also be found within the political district." Elder Klaud explained slowly as to drill the information into everyone's minds.

"The political district will also be the place you will live whilst you are students of the Magus Institute. More specifically as you are from a town a days journey away and have no means as to travel here faster you have to take up residence within the Magus Institute. We will be heading there now, where you will get your Magus robes, class assignment and room keys." Elder Klaud finally finished his long explanation about Zafaris' situation.

As they continued the journey the three other students and their family members asked several questions about places to sight see and visit, Malice was dismissive of this conversation and continued to observe the city. From his observations the three outer, inner and core walls were the main defence of this city excluding the Magus' and Martial Power cultivators within the city itself. Each wall seemed stronger and more powerful than the last, the outer wall was greatest in height and was excessively thick, made out of some extremely solid form of stone. The inner wall was small in comparison but shone with a black lustre as it seemed to be reinforced by obsidian and other strong metals. However when the group began to approach the core wall everyone present gasped in shock because it was truly the definition of impregnable defence. The wall towered up like a gigantic beast, it was completely white in colour said to be made from one of the strongest stones on the planet the 'Everlasting Pale Stone'. Moreover the wall was covered in formation circles, glyphs and many different kinds of runes making it magically enforced. When Malice saw this he finally realised the overwhelming power of the capital of a continent.

Finally After extensive travelling the carriage had arrived at the Magic Institute, it looked like a large school with hundreds of classrooms, there was stages for fights and rooms for experiments, rune creation, alchemy, enchanting, weapon forging and studying. There was many grand plazas capable holding hundreds of people at a time and even a famed Spell Pavilions. Moreover there were separate buildings that held many rooms capable of holding almost every student present. Malice couldn't see all of it but knew that this Magus Institute was enormous and had at least thousands of students.

"Alright we have arrived at the institute after a long journey, I will now guide you to the reception where you will obtain all you need for your time at the institute. Follow me." Elder Klaud spoke loudly as he hopped off the carriage instructing everyone to follow him.

Malice listened to Elder Klaud and followed behind him. "Elder Klaud how many students currently go to this institute?" a small child from Malices Town asked that question.

"Currently there are 12,500 Magus trainees within the institute, obviously this number shifts as those aged 18 will either leave the institute or become management Magus who help out around the institute. Also many young 12 year olds join every year which boosts the number up increasingly as time goes by." Elder Klaud kindly answered that child’s question then decided to explain further some details relating to the institute "There are 5 academic levels within the institute each varying in difficulty, these academic levels are beginner, advanced, adept, expert and master. You will all start in the beginner class where you will learn the basics of being a Magus, you are required to be in the beginner class for a year at which point you will join the advanced class, to advance to levels after that you must pass an advancement test, classes depend on ability alone it doesn’t matter if your 13 or 17 you could be in the same class. Any way that's all in the future, right now you need to go and collect your Magus robes, Class assignment and key to your living quarters from over there, I hope to see you in the future." Elder Klaud finished speaking pointed at a table where a young man sat and then departed.

One by one the people Malice travelled with went up to the young man and collected their robes, key and class assignment. Malice followed soon after telling the young man his name and size after that Malice was given an aqua blue robe by the man and a belt with a title plate on it with the words 'beginner' inscribed into it. "It is not compulsory to wear the Institution robes unless you venture outside of the city, however you must wear your title plate for identification purposes." The young man gave a simple explanation for clothing requirements. "Classes will start in two days so explore our Institutes territory until then." Next the man passed Malice a piece of cloth that had a map with 2 destinations marked down, the first destination was his living quarters which was beside a large lake in the middle of the Magus Institution territory and the other destination was where his assigned class was which seemed to be among the masses of rooms in the main building.

Malice fastened his title plate belt around his waist and then proceeded to walk toward his living quarters, on his way he saw many students walking around the Magus Institute Territory ranging between twelve and eighteen years old many had unnatural and powerful auras coming from their body's, being surrounded made Malice feel quite nauseated so he quickened his steps to escape all those auras, Malice felt sick but also felt envious he also wished for power that could surpass others like that. Malice had desired strength ever since the death of his parents as he never wanted to feel the weakness he did the day he found out, he simply would never accept being weak again. Seen as a genius in intelligence made him weak and ignorant to the worlds horrors thus instead of continually lazing around accepting his weakness he strove to become an insurmountable existence.

Malice had arrived at his living quarters, it seemed to be quite a luxurious building with at least 5 rooms, for Malice this could be considered small but he did not mind as long as he had a place to sleep and train.

In the Magus Institute there was a large overbearing building that held all the rooms with the purpose of teaching within. However despite this building there were hundreds of other buildings much smaller in size capable of holding up to 5 people, these were spread across the Institutes domain. These hundreds of buildings were for those more than a days travel from the city. Moreover a great majority of the Institutes students were residents of Zafaris so these hundreds of buildings was just enough for the families of each student from distant towns.

After Malice’s arrival he only unpacked clothes, cleaning products and other essentials from his interspatial ring, he then proceeded to rest after all he spent the entire way here trying to feel his essence.

Two days passed relatively quickly, Malice didn't really do much except meditate and look around the lake next to his quarters, on the day Malice had to go to class he managed to feel the essence within himself, see it flowing through his body However that was the extent of what he could do, he couldn't look deeper and only had a superficial understanding of his essence.

'I have spent three days simply trying to feel my essence let alone use it, does that mean even with this talent I have its going to be difficult, what does talent grade even measure? Now that I think about it no one has actually told me if it decides how fast I learn or how pure my essence can become, oh well I will probably learn my answer in my class today.' Malice was contemplating his talent whilst making his way to his class. Whilst walking hundreds of people brushed past also wanting to get to their destination and from the amount Malice saw he had a new respect for the reputation the Magus Institution had.

Malice eventually made it to his class, there was about twenty odd people within, already some had started to form cliques, then again it was probably just them being friendly and Malice being cold and pessimistic. Malice then decided to sit down, he wore seemingly royal attire of a abyssal black velvet and silk formal robe adorned by golden plated shoulder pads and obsidian ornaments which also had his family crest which was a sword or more of a snake that wrapped around a black rose which was the crest of his Darkblight family and although he was the only one remaining he would always don the crest as a sign of respect. Whether it was his outfit, his unnatural black and white hair or his aloof, cold demeanour to the others in the class he seemed like royalty completely thoughtless of these ants around him.

"Welcome, Welcome everybody you may call me Teacher Li, I will be your Magus teacher for your beginner year, now we will all introduce ourselves and tell everyone our talent grades so we can know each other just a little better, alright you start." A middle aged man walked into the class room he wore an old yellow robe tied up with a large piece of red rope, his hair was long and ruffled and looked to not care about his messy appearance. Teacher Li even seemed like an enthusiastic and spirited person trying to get everyone to join in.

"My name is Miya Greezhalt and I am a lower B grader" a young girl said.

"This one is called Vivek Ironite and I'm a middle C grader" a sturdy looking child spoke next.

"My name is such and such I'm a something grader" This was repeated several times till it came to Malice.

"My name is Malice Darkblight and I'm an upper A grader." Malice said his introduction cold and clearly he wasn't trying to show off his talent so he simply ignored any shocked expressions or attempts to befriend him.

'Surely this teacher Li must realise that saying their talent grade will allow arrogant bullies to easily pick their targets and see who to steer clear of, *sigh* Well at least I'm the latter so it won't affect me.' Malice simply couldn't understand this excitable teacher.

"Well now that we all know each other we can begin our first lesson, we will go over magical essence refinement and foundation spells, alrighty lets get started." Teacher Li was upbeat as before truly exhibiting his eccentric behaviour.