She begins to list out the groups and their members. It doesn’t take long for me to begin to notice a pattern. First, each group consists of six members and second, the leader of almost every group seems to be someone who had made it to the top sixteen in the Rankings. We are not much so I soon hear my name.

“...Ian Walker, Tobi Pierce, Han Ford, Isabella Adare, Noah Stoll, and Adelia Krause, you are in group four. Your leader is Ian Walker.” She motions for us to move to a corner and continues with the list.

I move where she pointed and a few seconds later spot Tobi, Han, and Bella. I smile at them, and also at Noah who is not too far behind them. Almost at the same time I see someone else moving toward us, a curly-haired girl with tanned skin. Tobi and the rest also notice her at around the same time I do.

“Hi,” she says as she comes to a stop in front of us. “My name’s Adelia.”

“Hey, I’m Ian.” The rest quickly follow as we all introduce ourselves. When they are done, I ask Amelia. “What Trump are you?”

“Avatar. What about you guys?”

“I’m True Body,” I say before turning to the rest who begin to speak. Tobi chose Space, Han, Super, Noah is obviously Illusions, and Bella surprisingly chose Yin. I know that Yin and Yang are two of the major Trumps, but I still don’t know exactly what they do, so I ask Bella.

“Well, we… I have to choose a partner from the Yang Trump. We cultivate a sort of energy that enables us to sort of connect to those from the Yang court. It boosts my and the Uua of whoever I connect to. It also allows us to share knowledge of basically everything.”

“Share knowledge how?” Adelia asks, looking very interested.

“Well, if we… if I learn a spell my partner can also use it without having to learn it and vice versa. Also, if maybe my partner learns a combat skill, I’ll be able to use it with her level of expertise even if I’ve never used it before. You know… stuff like that.” Bella looks a bit uncomfortable by the amount of attention we are paying to her.

I grasp what she means though. Basically, Yin and Yang allow their practitioners to automatically learn whatever their respective partner knows. With this, their learning power is practically doubled. I don’t know if there is more to the Trump, but just that is almost overpowered. If two people - one who is good at combat and another who is good with noers - join with Yin and Yang, then you get two people who are both good at combat and manipulating noers. If the right people become partners, they could potentially become overpowered.

“So, who’s your partner?” Tobi asks.

Bella shrugs. “I haven’t gotten one yet. They said it’s not something to choose willy nilly.”

“What if your partner’s useless?” Adelia asks.

“She’ll probably learn how to be useless too.” Noah theorizes, causing Tobi and Han to chuckle.

Bella glares at them all. “I’m not going to choose a useless partner. That’s why they told us to wait in the first place, so we can be careful who we choose.”

I speak. “It’s actually a bit busted, if used correctly. I mean, you guys realize that whatever we have to learn next, they each only have to do half the work to gain the entire thing.”

“That’s true,” a look of realization crosses Tobi’s face. “Do you think I can still change my Trump?”

“Why would you do that? There’s no guarantee that your partner will fit you perfectly.” Amelia points out.

“Maybe,” Noah speaks, “but it will still increase his Uua. Who knows maybe he can become like Ian and start beating up people with mainly his Uua.”

Han snorts. “Unless it can increase his Uua about tenfold, there’s no way he’s reaching the level of Ian.”

At this point the Teacher on the stage finishes announcing the teams and leaves. I frown. She didn’t mention what was to come next, just left. So, are we to wait here or not? The answer to my question comes quickly as the Protectors I had seen earlier begin to move to the various groups. Looking around, I quickly spot one such group coming toward me.

The group comes to a stop in front of me. It is led by a boy who looks a few years older than me, behind him are four girls and one other guy. “Group four?”

Since I am currently the leader of the group I step forward. “Yes.”

The boy nods. “I’m Kane. My team will be acting as your Monitors for the next year, unless you all somehow manage to become Protectors within that time. Okay, you’re pretty much done here so follow me, and keep all your questions to yourself for now, I’ll answer them all when we get to someplace quieter.”

Without saying another word, he turns around and begins walking, hit team following. I follow and so does the rest of my team - after they share quick looks with each other. We leave the field and begin walking towards some of structures still standing. All of a sudden Kane slows down until he is walking side by side with me.

“Drew has told me a lot about you,” he says suddenly.

“Oh.” I can’t think of anything better to say. At this point I realize that something about his name seems familiar.

“Can I ask you a question? How long exactly did you fight the Majin.”

I think deeply for a few seconds before tentatively replying. “I’m not exactly sure, but I think it was for almost a minute.”

“Damn!” Someone exclaims. One of the girls from his team, a blonde. She had been eavesdropping on our conversation. At the same time an impressed look appears on Kane’s face. Some part of me begins to suspect that they might be overestimating my abilities.

I try to quickly clarify things. “But I didn’t fight it on my own. There was a Fasuru… a Watcher helping me out. To be honest it did most of the work.”

“We know,” the girl who had exclaimed earlier says. “Doesn’t make it any less impressive.” She turns to look at Kane. “Do you think he’s one of them.”

“Probably,” Kane replies to her before turning back to me. “I heard it mutilated the body of the person it was possessing during the fight. How did you feel?”