"Good morning, how can I help you?" Nagisa was greeted by a soothing voice as soon as he stepped in front of the reception. There was an elderly woman with a sweet smile sitting behind the wall of glass.

"Good morning, ehmm, I was told to come and apply here." Nagisa said slightly uncertain. While highly unlikely, it was still possible that Kagero simply didn't consider that the semester had already started a while ago.

"Ah, yes, I was told that we'd have a transfer student coming today." The woman answered to Nagisa's relieve, "Shiota Nagisa correct?"

"Ehh yes, this is my ID." Nagisa nodded and quickly slit his card through the gap to let her check it out.

"Mhmm… yupe that's right, please wait here for a second, I will call for someone to come pick you up." She nodded while returning his ID card. "He will take you to the principal to test your abilities and register, show you the dorm and your room and finally bring you to your class.

"Alright, thank you very much." Nagisa nodded and said politely before walking back to the gate and waiting.

"Such a sweet young boy… I hope he doesn't get bullied too badly." The woman sighed as she watched Nagisa disappear from her sight.

It didn't take long until a tall man dressed in a uniform walked towards the gate to pick Nagisa up. The uniform consisted of a dull silver colored blazer with black linings, a black shirt and some black pants. The logo of the academy, which was a golden rising sun rested proudly on his right chest. "Shiota Nagisa?" The man asked while eyeing Nagisa.

Nagisa simply nodded as he walked closer to the man, "Follow me." The man told him and turned around.

"Ehm, where are we going sir?" Nagisa asked while quickly chasing after him.

"No need to call me sir, I'm just a student like you." The man said.

"Huh? A student?!" Nagisa's eyes widened, the man looked at least 30 years old! How on earth was he still a student?

"Heh, after you graduate you have the choice of leaving and exploring the world or staying and working here while continuing your studies. Of course, you won't be taking the regular classes anymore. There will be teachers specifically chosen for you to guide you into higher grounds… Ah, what am I doing, it's still way too early for you." The man interrupted himself and shook his head.

The inside of the academy was even bigger than it looked! While Nagisa was silently following the man, he noticed that there were way too many buildings around this place. Some of them just looked like huge containers!

"Excuse me ehh, senpai," Nagisa asked and continued after the man turned his head towards him, "I've noticed that there are some strange buildings around here and all of them are labeled as training fields, why are there so many?" Nagisa wondered.

"Hmm, quite observant, aren't you?" The man raised an eyebrow in amusement, "These fields are the pride of our academy. We have mages to create and maintain different environments for these fields on a daily basis from forests to deserts, snowfields and even underwater."

"I see…" Nagisa nodded in amazement, "Are they open to all the students?"

"Of course not! Students can only enter under a teacher's supervision!" The man chuckled at Nagisa's question.

"Hmm." Nagisa nodded but was slightly disappointed, these training fields could have provided with him perfect training environments.

"We're here." The man nodded while holding the door for Nagisa, "I'm not permitted to enter, someone inside will take you to the principal's office." The man explained.

"Thank you." Nagisa nodded back and walked into the building. The building had a rather odd structure. The hallway behind the entrance was unnecessarily long and it led into a huge hall.

The secretary of the principal was already waiting for Nagisa when he reached the hall. She quickly explained to him what he would have to do in the entrance test while also explaining some key rules of the academy.

The principal's office was the only room on the top floor. To Nagisa's surprise, the principal looked rather young, maybe about Kagero's age. He had slightly dark red hair and an insanely bulky figure. The suit he had on him looked like it would explode with just a tiny movement of his. "Welcome to the dawn academy, Shiota Nagisa right?" The principal asked, he had a surprisingly gentle voice. "I am Akabane Shin, Principle of this academy."

"Thank you, sir." Nagisa bowed slightly, "it's an honor to be here."

"Heh, let's just get to it shall we?" Shin snickered silently, "Are you applying as a combatant or a mage?" he asked.

"As a mage sir." Nagisa replied.

"Is that right?" Shin seemed rather surprised, "Huh, I really assumed that you would be a combatant."

- Eh? Oh right… probably because of Shisho… -

Nagisa concluded, it was Kagero who got him into this place at the first place. "No sir, just a mage." Nagisa shook his head and replied. Since Nagisa came here to strengthen his ability as a mage Nagisa planned to keep his aura hidden.

"Alright, just put your hand on this crystal and infuse your mana into it." The principal shoved a transparent crystal towards Nagisa and said. It was an elementless mana crystal, these were quite rare and could contain all elements.

Nagisa did as he was told and with his mana entering the crystal, it started to give a faint blue color of itself, "Stage 2 Level 9, so you'll be entering the second grade, of course, once you've broken through you'll enter the third grade." The principal nodded and told Nagisa.

"Thank you, sir." Nagisa nodded as he pulled his arm back, "Ehh, I will need to stay in a dorm sir."

"Huh… so you need a room… that's a little troublesome." Shin frowned as he thought about it. Since Nagisa was entering in the middle of the semester, it was rather hard to find him a room in the dorm. The rooms here were shared by 2.

"I think I have an idea." Shin said as he started to explain. He had told him that there was still a place where he could stay. But when he mentioned it, he looked rather hesitant for some reason but Nagisa just brushed it off, he was probably imagining it anyway.

"Ehm senpai… are you sure this is a dorm?" Nagisa blinked a few times at stared at the building in front of him. After he got out, the man who led him towards the principal's office took him to his "dorm". But unlike the other dorms they had walked past, this one looked more like a tiny villa.

"Yes… the student living in here… is a, ehh, special case." He stuttered as if he was a little scared and nervous.

"The student? There's only one student living in this building?!" Nagisa deadpanned. Who the hell was he going to share a room, no villa with?!

"Well… he's the nephew of the principal, but he has some… bad habits. In the 3 months in this school, he had been moved from 6 rooms already. This is actually the principal's private building, and since we couldn't find another way to fix his problem, the principal decided to just lend his house to his nephew to live in.

"Huh… the principal's nephew huh…" Nagisa chuckled nervously… how bad must his habits be that even the principal was forced to move him out of a regular dorm?!

"Well, just introduce yourself and try to get along… I'll be off then." The man chuckled and instantly walked away as if he was escaping.

"… Oooookay?" Nagisa was completely overwhelmed by everything that was happening right now. All he knew was that he was standing in front of his supposedly "dorm", shared with the principal's nephew who was known for his rather nasty habits. "Here goes nothing…" Nagisa took a deep breath and knocked on the door.

"Yo! Not now uncle!" Nagisa heard a voice yell in response, it had a rather nonchalant and lax touch to it. But what in the hell was he supposed to do now? Yell back?

"Ehm… excuse me! I was told to come here! I'm supposed to move in!" Nagisa finally yelled after he knocked again without getting an answer.

"New roommate?" The voice sounded amused but not impressed and Nagisa had no idea how that was even possible! "Just a second!" Nagisa could hear a loud thud and then footsteps coming towards the door.

- Did he just jump down from the second floor?! –

"Yo!" The door finally opened and Nagisa was greeted by a tall boy with bright red hair and hazel eyes. From the first look, the boy looked rather friendly as he was wearing a grin on his face. "Akabane Karma, nice to meet you."

"Hello, I'm Shiota Nagisa." Nagisa greeted as he held out a hand, "Nice to meet you."

"What did you do to get send here?" Karma took a step to the side and signed Nagisa to come in, "Threw your roommate out of the window? Accidentally set the dorm on fire?"

- WHAT?! –

Despite what he was thinking, Nagisa managed to keep a straight face and answered: "Ehh, no I just enrolled here today and there weren't any rooms left.", Nagisa answered with a chuckle.

"Huh…" for some reason Karma's enthusiasm instantly died down with Nagisa's answer, "Well, there are 4 bedrooms in this house, 2 on the base floor and 2 on the second floor, each room has its own bathroom, just go check them out yourself. The kitchen is over there," Karma pointed to the right side of the stairs, "you can use it whenever you want. The room right across the stairs on the second floor is mine, so just chose any other one you like." And with that Karma simple left Nagisa standing there and went back up the stairs, "Oh yeah! And if you hear some strange sounds coming from my room, just ignore them!"

"… Alright." Nagisa only came back to his senses after he heard the door to Karma's room close, that was a rather sudden change in attitude, "Chose any other room huh…" Nagisa repeated Karma's words and let out a sigh, well guess he'll have to check out the house first.

Nagisa made a quick tour around the house checking out the kitchen and all bathrooms. He then went ahead to look at the rooms that were available. The rooms were fairly spacy and already had beds, wardrobes and tables in there. To be fair Nagisa really didn't mind which room he would stay in, but that quickly changed after he noticed that each room had its own balcony.

When Nagisa entered the other room on the second floor, he went straight towards the balcony to take a look. And it was just as he expected! The villa he was in was at the edge of the academy, so Nagisa was able to see the capital from this balcony. On top of that, the wall surrounding the academy was only a few meters away!

- This is the one. –

Nagisa thought with a satisfied grin on his face. When he was doing his registration, he had been told that students weren't allowed to leave the academy without permission after bedtime and it had been bothering him ever since. But now with his balcony so close to the wall, he was fairly confident that he was capable of sneaking out without anyone noticing with the night as his cover.

"Guess I'll go check out what's going on tonight." Nagisa decided while mumbling to himself, "I will need some cash anyway.".

Having made his choice, Nagisa lazily walked towards his new bed and threw his small back onto it while he followed right after, "Haha… how long has it been?" Nagisa wondered, "Almost 4 years huh… I almost forgot how nice it is to sleep on a surface that isn't rock."

After laying there and doing nothing for a short while, Nagisa thought that it would be appropriate to let Karma know which room he had picked. So Nagisa got back on his feet and walked towards Karma's room.

"Hey, Akabane!" Nagisa knocked a few times while yelling.

"What? I'm kinda busy here!" Nagisa heard a slightly frustrated voice yelling back.

"Nothing, just thought I'd tell you that I picked the other room on the second floor!" Nagisa yelled back.

"Good for you! Sorry but now is a really bad time!" Karma continued to yell back but was interrupted by a sudden sound of an explosion, "Ah fuck!".

"What was that?!" Nagisa yanked Karma's door open and was greeted by a huge smokescreen that made him cough.

"What the heck! Close the door!" before Nagisa could make sense out of the situation, he was shoved out of the room with Karma following right after him and shutting the door, "Damn…".

"What did you do!?" Nagisa asked in terror, the smokescreen was extremely thick!

"Ah, nothing special, I was just trying to merge two spells together." Karma answered nonchalantly, "Didn't work out as I wanted is all."

"You were trying out spells in your room?!" Nagisa thought he misunderstood him.

"Yeah, what about it?" Karma turned around and grinned.

"Why not outside?" Nagisa questioned.

"Didn't feel like it."

"…"

"Hey, mind your own business alright?"

"…sure, but what were you trying to do?"

"I was trying to merge Flame Bullet and Smokescreen." Karma explained, "I wanted to create a sort of smoke bullet that would explode when detonated."

"Huh… but what's the point of that?" Nagisa wondered. If you'll have the bullet explode anyway, why not just use the Smokescreen spell.

"Hehe, imagine shooting that into someone's mouth and all the smoke suddenly expanding inside him." Karma snickered evilly as he was imagining it.

- He has some bad habits… -

Nagisa recalled what he was told when he got here. "I guess that would be fun to watch." Nagisa shrugged and admitted.

"You do?" Karma wondered out of surprise, "Huh… well, just to warn you, I'm experimenting quite a lot with spells so don't freak out every time something goes boom."

"… I guess I can do that, well have fun." Nagisa deadpanned as he left for his own room. "Yeah, no wonder he's been moved from 6 rooms, he's a prankster… and on top of that, a genius." Merging spells was not as easy as Karma made it sound like. It required the user to have a great understanding of his spells and perfect control! Not only that, to come up with the idea to shoot an exploding smokescreen down someone throat, in some way that guy was like a mad scientist!

Nagisa quickly made his way back to his room and threw himself onto his bed, "Hmm… maybe I will take a group mission today." Nagisa gave it a little thought, "They've been bothering me for a while now to find a partner…".

"Well, I guess that's that." Nagisa decided to just shrug it off and closed his eyes. The sun was already starting to set, and since he was planning to have a long night, he decided to get some sleep while he still could.

When Nagisa woke up again, the sun was already gone from the sky. But when he got up, he couldn't help but to frown slightly. "I'll need to get some spare clothes… and pajamas" Nagisa muttered when he saw all the wrinkles on his blazer and shirt, "We do get uniforms… so maybe just pajamas?".

While thinking about that, Nagisa grabbed his back that was still on his bed and headed towards the bathroom after locking the door of his room. When he came back out, Nagisa was dressed in a different attire.

He was still wearing black pants, but the material looked a lot tougher, a tight, black and high collared sweater topped with a dark gray hoodie. His knife was still tightly strapped to his waist and his hands were still covered by the same fingerless gloves Kagero had given him.

After checking again that his door was indeed locked a grey aura started to surround Nagisa. The glow of his scale from using Illusion Shroud was perfectly covered by the glove that he was wearing. When the aura settled down again, Nagisa's hair and irises had once again turned into a grey color. His features also turned slightly sharper.

Taking a deep breath, Nagisa quietly opened the door to his balcony, grabbed a chair that was standing there and placed it between the door so that it wouldn't close completely. Nagisa then took another good look at his surroundings. There was a lantern far on his left side that slightly illuminated the place, but for the most part, everything was covered in shadows.

"Heh… that's better than I imagined." Nagisa smirked slightly before pulling the collar from his sweater up to cover his mouth and nose, the sweater also came with a mask. In a swift movement, Nagisa jumped over the fence of his balcony and jumped straight into the wall. But instead of crashing into it, Nagisa's body simply dove into it!

That was the second Unique Skill Nagisa's shadow scale had provided him, Shadow Walk. It gave Nagisa the ability to merge into shadows and move in them! But while he was in a shadow, he could only move at a walking speed and he wasn't able to jump into another shadow without fully revealing himself first. But that wasn't all, while the ability slowed him down greatly when he was in a shadow, it also boosted his speed by around 50% when he was simply moving on shadows!

Trailing the shadow spread across the wall of the academy, Nagisa slowly moved towards the other side until he was a fair distance away from it before he resurfaced out of a shadow.

With a cheeky grin, that wasn't visible due to his mask, on his face, Nagisa silently sprinted down the road and towards his destination.

While avoiding all the busier streets, Nagisa quickly made his way towards the less wealthy area of Valm. They say less wealthy, but it was still a fairly decent place. The streets were still clean, and the buildings looked sturdy. It was just a section for commoners and not any aristocrats.

Nagisa started to slow down after he reached an empty place rather dim lightning and only a few houses nearby. In the corner, there was an abandoned well standing. After making sure that no one was nearby, Nagisa jumped over the edge and straight into it!

Since the well was abandoned, there wasn't any water left in it, but it was still rather moist around. While you couldn't see from above, the bottom of the well was fairly vast. It looked more like a hallway than the bottom of a well. And at the end of the hallway, there was a sturdy looking door.

Nagisa slowly walked towards it and started to knock in a certain pattern. "Who goes there?" a voice came from behind the door while a small door opened and an eye started to peak out.

"The Liberator." Nagisa answered in a deeper voice than his usual one.

"Liberate us of what?"

"Of the dawn."

"What do you bring?"

"The dusk is what I shall bring."

"Come in." the voice said while the eye disappeared from the tiny door. Nagisa heard how several locks were opened before the door slowly opened itself, "Oh, it's you, it's been a while."

And that's the chapter! Nagisa has finally enrolled in the academy and is sharing a dorm with Karma! A lot of you will probably start telling me that the characters seem rather OOC by now, but let me explain. It is only natural that the characters will be OOC, unlike in "Last Assassination" or "4 years later", all the characters in this story have a completely different background story! And I already hinted that Nagisa will have a bit of a split personality.

Nagisa was never abused by his mother so he won't have the same personality issues he had in the original story. That also makes it harder for Karma to warm up to Nagisa, in the original story, Karma warmed up to Nagisa because he seemed "harmless" and instantly distanced himself when he found out otherwise. In this story, Nagisa was never "harmless" to begin with, he doesn't have the same confidence issues (anymore after Kagero told him the truth behind his compatibility) as he had in the original story, so Karma won't be as careless around him in here.

At the end of the chapter, Nagisa entered quite a suspicious place, didn't he? Tell me how you liked this chapter! Your reviews are my biggest motivation to write this story!

And as always, thank you so much for your support and I'll see you in the next chapter! ;)