On the far left of the other three houses was the Gray Dragon classroom. Rhajat looked up and saw a flag, it was a black dragon with its lizard-like tongue protruding, on a white background. Rhajat took a deep breath. She was nervous, but she knew what she had to do. Today would be the day the rest of the class would arrive. She wondered if she'd know any of them. Lethe was such a large place after all. Rhajat felt a familiar shiver down her spine, though she wasn't sure if it was due to nerves or not. She walked inside and scanned the room. There were a myriad of desks and seats, and a desk at the front most likely for the teacher. Rhajat wasn't sure if she'd meet that person, so she walked up to the desk and sat on it. She hated waiting, but it was all she could do. She figured bringing a book of spells may be intimidating.
Rhajat felt another shiver down her spine. She still wasn't sure why. She looked upward at the ceiling. She was glad that the building wasn't too big, unlike the monastery. The monastery was so big she found herself getting lost. She looked back down, and saw a familiar bowl cut. She jumped in surprise, nearly falling off the back of the table.
She quickly regained her balance before glaring at the familiar ninja. "One of these days, I'm gonna hex you, and you're gonna be so confused about why!"
"No you won't." Asugi replied coolly, with his hands behind his head.
"Would you like to bet on th-" Rhajat cut herself off as realization dawned on her. "If you're here... you got in!"
"Sure did." Asugi confirmed. "Looks like we'll be spending the year together after all." He turned around and grabbed a chair out. He placed the back of it facing Rhajat, and sat down in it backwards. "Say, where's the house leader? You'd think they'd be here by now..."
Rhajat smirked. "You're looking at her."
For the first time, she felt a bit comfortable saying it. She figured talking to an old friend about it helped. She still wasn't sure if she was good enough to lead. However, the sight and company of Asugi did make her feel better, she had to admit.
Asugi's eyes widened in shock. "Wait, really!? Are you messing with me?"
Rhajat nodded. "Yeah, I was surprised too."
"Well congrats Rhajat!" Asugi exclaimed. "I heard that if anyone from Lethe would get to lead, it'd be someone from the wind tribe, but even still..."
"Thank you." Rhajat said. Apparently when Lethe helped Fodlan during the war of heroes, the one leading the charge was of the wind tribe. Which was why they got priority for house leaders. "I wonder who else we're gonna see."
Asugi got up and turned his chair around. He sat back down, and leaned back before placing his feet on the table. Rhajat thought he might be getting a bit too comfortable. Asugi shrugged in response to Rhajat's question. "No idea who else could've applied."
They then heard a girl's voice scream in irritation. "Rhajat!" They looked to see a girl with long flowing pink hair.
Asugi looked behind him. "Oh, it's Caeldori. I guess I should've expected her, she's always been pretty diligent."
The girl stomped forward with a somewhat annoyed expression. She put her hands on her hips and glared while leaning forward. Rhajat figured that Caeldori was trying to be intimidating, but all she did was amuse her. She thought it was cute if anything. She couldn't help but be amused by how hard she was trying. It was hard to suppress her smile.
"I can't believe you got in." Caeldori admitted. "They must not know you well."
Rhajat couldn't contain her amusement, and started giggling. "You're still mad huh...? I haven't seen you since⦠then."
"Of course I'm still mad!" Caeldori yelled.
Asugi looked between them, and grunted in confusion. "What are you two talking about?"
"You see, Rhajat once embarrassed me with a shame hex!" Caeldori explained.
"You're the one who asked for help, then chose to not accept it once it was done. I wasn't gonna let it go to waste." She explained back. Rhajat took things like that very seriously. While she didn't want to bring any harm to Caeldori, nor did she even have anything against her, she had to get her back for wasting her time.
Caeldori rolled her eyes. While she could sort of see where Rhajat was coming from, she felt like she was overreacting to do something like that. "You must be the leader." She said to Asugi.
Asugi shook his head and pointed his thumb at Rhajat. He, just like on the issue with the Lethian war, was rather neutral on the affair. He was on good terms with both of them. While he was closer to Rhajat, he wasn't going to pick between friends.
Caeldori blushed and started stuttering in frustration. "...Well, I'll give you respect as a leader. But don't think I've forgotten our past."
Rhajat started giggling again. "I did. It wasn't that important to me in all honesty."
Caeldori facepalmed. Rhajat was making it so hard to be nice to her. She wasn't sure how anyone was particularly fond of her. "Give me a break..."
Next to enter was a girl with dark flowing hair. For reasons unbeknownst to the trio, she was wearing the men's uniform. Her hair was in curls, and she looked uncomfortable. She looked up and saw Caeldori looking frustrated. "Um... am I interrupting something?"
Asugi was the first to acknowledge her, admittedly kind of glad to break the tension. "Nah, not really. Why are you wearing the male uniform though?"
He sighed. "It's because I'm not a woman..." He started blushing. He was hoping that it wouldn't cause any problems. He had enough to worry about without his classmates hating him for silly reasons.
Asugi didn't really react. He had seen a lot in his life, and a feminine looking man was far from the worst. "Ah, my bad."
Caeldori picked up on the boy's discomfort rather quickly. "Are you okay?"
The boy looked up at the other three. He slowly nodded. "Yeah I'm just... not used to this kind of clothing..." If it was up to him, he'd have sewn his own clothes, but the officer's academy was rather insistent that he had to wear at least a variant of the uniform.
Asugi looked a bit sympathetic. "Yeah, it is a bit stuffy." He looked down at himself. Normally he wouldn't wear something like his uniform either. He vastly preferred looser, more casual clothing.
"That's... not really what I meant. Oh, I haven't introduced myself have I? I'm Forrest Marwood." Forrest bowed out of respect.
Caeldori looked thoughtful. "Are you the Nohrian prince?" Caeldori knew that Nohr was technically their enemy, but she still at least knew enough to know the names of the royalty. Forrest confirmed her suspicions with a nod. Caeldori looked flustered, and bowed herself. "I'm sorry if I did anything to offend you!" While in theory she knew that if Forrest wasn't a good person, she could potentially start another war, but she was more flustered over the idea of making herself and her family look bad by being rude to royalty.
Forrest smiled for the first time since he entered the room. "Not at all. You don't need to treat me differently from anyone here." Caeldori was a bit surprised, but accepted it. She harbored no resentment for Nohr, but didn't expect one of their princes to be so down to earth.
The conversation was interrupted by a bang. They looked to the source to see a young woman who grabbed something. "Treasure..." She had dived onto the floor to get it.
"Oh, Velouria!" Forrest exclaimed. "It's nice to see you made it in too. What did you find?" Forrest already knew of Velouria oddities, at this point he had accepted that that was just how she was.
She walked over to him and opened up her hands to reveal a dust bunny. "Isn't it beautiful? No matter how many times I see these I'm always amazed..." Velouria looked up to see the other students staring at her confused. She looked at them, then looked back to Forrest. "I can't wait to put this with the rest of my treasures!"
"Velouria... you should introduce yourself. You're being rude." Forrest reprimanded. He knew she could get caught up in her treasure hunting, so sometimes he'd need to be the one to remind her of human customs. Despite being half human herself, she identified more with her father's side.
"Fine..." Velouria said with a grumble. "I'm Velouria. So anyway-"
"She's a piece of work..." Asugi said a bit confused by her nature.
"Sorry about that." Forrest was used to having to cover for her. "She's just only really interested in... well her interests. We're old friends. Our parents fought together in the war so..."
A large man walked in next. He had a weird smirk on his face. He looked cocky. Asugi waved at him. "Hey man, long time to see."
"Asugi!" The large man screamed as he lifted his arms. He looked through the room and recognized some faces, but not others. "Huh, looks like we've got some interesting people here... Well I'm Shiro Mitsuda! Prince of Hoshido! Gonna rule it someday too! Nice to see you two made it in." He pointed at Rhajat and Caeldori.
Caeldori smiled at him, and Rhajat waved slightly. "At this point, we may as well wait for the rest of the students before introducing ourselves."
"How many are left?" Asugi asked.
Rhajat only shrugged in response. She was never told how many people would be in the house. They could only wait and see.
Next, a monster charged into the room. Everyone exclaimed as the monster sat under the table.
"Don't do that!" Caeldori scolded. "That was horrifying." She sighed, feeling that she'd be sprouting some gray hairs this year.
The monster started giggling. "Sorry!" Her voice echoed through the room. There was a flash of light, and she turned into a humanoid girl before giving a salute. "I'm Selkie! A Kitsune!" She transformed again and rolled around the room. She sat down on her stomach under a desk, wagging her tail as if she were a dog.
Shiro looked confused, but shrugged. "At least she's happy..."
Last up, a familiar face to all walked in. Everyone looked rather surprised. It was none other than Corrin. She looked around the room, saying it's rather spacious.
Caeldori's finger slowly rose as she pointed at her. "You're the... daughter of the Nohrian who led the army during the war!"
Corrin looked a bit concerned. She frowned. She was hoping that it wouldn't be a problem. "I'm just here to learn... don't mind me!"
Rhajat rose an eyebrow. "Your mother won a war. What could the people here possibly teach you?" While everyone in the room knew of her, they didn't know her personally, aside from Forrest.
"Well... there's no better teacher than experience you know?" She said with a blush. "I still have a lot to learn. Not just about fighting, but about life. Not to mention... my mother isn't around anymore."
"Huh...that's understandable. Sorry." Rhajat apologized. She wasn't trying to offend her, she just put her foot in her mouth.
"No, you're fine! Are you the house leader by any chance?" she asked her.
"Yeah." Rhajat confirmed.
"I'm looking forward to following your lead then!" She then looked Rhajat up and down. "You're... Hayato's daughter right? You look like him."
Rhajat nodded in confirmation again. She was reminded a bit of how much she was missing him. But she shrugged it off. "I think we've met a few times before, but we were pretty young huh?"
"Yeah, it's nice to see you again!"
A few more students came in, all hailing from Lethe. Rhajat looked around, and felt a bit nervous, but began to speak regardless. "Okay... I'm Rhajat Hoshino of the wind tribe. I'll be the house leader. That's really all there is too it."
Asugi smirked, before clapping somewhat sarcastically. "That's one hell of a speech."
Rhajat rolled her eyes. "What do you want from me...?"
The class went around, introducing themselves one by one. Rhajat committed all their names to memory. She had to admit, 8 of them stood out compared to the other students. What with their colorful hair and features. Everyone else looked rather "normal" in comparison.
"Well, now that we all know each other, I hope we get along!" Corrin said a bit nervously. She looked worried for reasons that some of the other students were unaware of.
"...whatever." Shiro said, oddly grimly. He wasn't fond of Corrin already. In fact, he'd been rather quiet since she came in. "If that's everything, I'm gone." Shiro walked away rather quickly with an angry expression.
"...What's his problem?" Velouria asked. "That was rude."
"Look who's talking." Asugi replied teasingly. "But uh... I'm not sure how much I can say..."
"I..." Corrin began. "If he's the crown prince... he's Ryoma's son... which means he probably blames my mother for his death. I can't blame him. I'm sure she stands by her decision but... he has every right to hate me."
Rhajat looked at her with sympathy. "Look, I wouldn't be happy either if it was my family. But... it's war. War isn't pretty. I'm sure both sides have suffered tremendous losses. It's not fair to blame you for what your mother did."
"Hm... right..." Corrin still looked sad, staring at the door that Shiro left out of.
"I understand why he's upset, but I hope we can at least cooperate if we're going to get through the year." Caeldori noted. "In fact, the first thing we're gonna do once classes start is a mock battle against the other 3 houses. And the other 3 have the heirs to the 3 major parts of Fodlan. If we're fighting like this, we won't get anywhere."
"You're right. We don't have to be friends, but we do need to coexist at the very least." Rhajat admitted. "Maybe let's give Shiro some time to himself though. It's still a shock to him. You guys can go."
Despite the awkward ending to the meeting, Rhajat did feel a bit of pride. She managed to get through the introductions. She just hoped that Shiro would be okay. While her Mom did side with Nohr, Rhajat still found herself closer to the Hoshidans. The wind tribe was there after all, and Rhajat had limited interactions with Nohr. There was no way to avoid it now however. Rhajat didn't particularly care if they hated her. She did what she had to do. And what she needed to do now was get through the year. She had a feeling though, that it'd be a long one.
