Kohra Mey - Kikka Colosseum
Kohra watched silently as the captains of each squad were introduced, listening to the murmurings of the crowd around her. She smiled and flushed slightly as Captain Lavaretz began working the crowd, but her expression changed to one of curiosity as Captain Walder gained the crowd’s attention.
Kohra considered her relationship with the priests of the Clover Kingdom to be…complicated…to say the least. She had known the Church to be generous in terms of helping people in her situation, but it had always rubbed Teylas the wrong way for some reason. Her older brother had always advocated for trying to make it in this world without handouts from others. Kohra had generally stuck by her brother’s side growing up, and so ended up making her way through the world without much help from the church, even after Teylas was arrested. More than once Kohra had questioned her brother’s wisdom, but a sense of loyalty to her older sibling kept her from seeking charity.
Once the captains had finished being introduced, the arena came to life around Kohra. Tiles rose from the floor, hovering in the air on one side of the colosseum, while pillars glowing with energy rose from the other side. Above, the air began to shimmer as a forcefield was put in place between the applicants and the spectators.
“Good luck, little one. I’ll see ya’ when we become magic knights.”Kohra gave a small start as Hikari addressed her, but she looked up and smiled at the ox-boy.
“You too, Hikari”, she said, giving a small wave as the large young man walked off.
Three Weeks Earlier
“Kohra, this is insane. You know this is insane, right?”“Stay out of my way Seamus. I’m practicing.”Blasts of concentrated air were launched down the alleyway, bowling over stacks of crates and boards.
“You just got your grimoire. Don’t you think you should give it a year before you apply?”“What’s the point? If they don’t let me in, I just reapply in another year. This way, I have a chance to get in as soon as possible.” A mini cyclone tore through the alley, whipping up the debris left by the shockwaves.
“Look, just because you lost your brother doesn’t mean you have to leave. You’ll be fine here. We can get by without getting into too much trouble.”“It’s not just that, Seamus”, Kohra said, dropping control of the cyclone. The airborne debris fell, scattering over the cobblestone alley.
“I need to become a Magic Knight so that no one else ends up like me.”The last few wooden boards fell to the ground with dull clunks. Kohra kept her eyes focused down the narrow alley as she clenched her fists.
“I need to become a Magic Knight so I can kill devils.”Present Day
“Number 198! Kohra Mey!”Kohra snapped out of her reverie and stepped up to the first testing station. She passed the attendant, focusing her thoughts on her mana, and forcing herself not to glance towards the Captain’s box.
Okay. Small targets at a distance. Gonna need to keep it tight. I can do this.She took a deep breath, raised her right hand, palm pointing at one of the targets, and spoke.
“Shockwave!”There was a rush of air from behind Kohra, air flowing towards the space in front of her outstretched hand, before a tight ripple of air was released towards the target. It smashed into the corner of the stone tile, fracturing it into several pieces and causing it to fall to the ground. Kohra repeated the exercise several times until, at the end of the minute, the remains of six tiles littered the floor of the colosseum in front of her.
Not great, but not terrible either. She thought. The more distant targets had been difficult, several shockwaves had gone wide, and it had taken more than one shockwave to down some tiles, but she felt she had performed well enough to be noticed.
“Hey, little girl! Where are your parents? Are they going to be picking you up after you fail today?”It seemed that Kohra had been noticed, but it wasn’t the kind of attention she wanted. Kohra’s head snapped towards the source of the voice to see an older man in the stands, cheeks flushed, with a flagon held in one hand and a large pretzel in the other.
She willed herself to not react, though her fists balled in anger at her sides. She turned away silently and marched away from the first station.
As she stepped up to the second station though, she felt something fall into the pit of her stomach. This column was much thicker and much sturdier than the tiles had been. Worse, it looked like it had been magically reinforced.
Okay, one spell to do as much damage as possible. I can do this. I have to do this.This was the first time Kohra had used her spells on something as sturdy as stone. It was going to be tough, and possibly tax her mana more than she had hoped to this early in the testing, but she hadn’t come this far to just give up. She raised both palms at the column, willing even more energy to gather in front of her hands. As she felt the winds whipping around her, the laughing face of the man swam into the forefront of her mind. The image ignited a spark of rage inside Kohra, and she tried to channel that feeling into her spell.
“Shockwave!”, she screamed into the arena air, as a blast of concentrated air shot from her hands towards the column. Air met stone, and the base of the column splintered into a spiderweb of cracks. Shards of stone fell away from the bottom of the column, until all that was left supporting the rest of the column was a chunk of stone a few inches wide. Then, after a few seconds, even that gave way, the top of the column tumbling to one side like a tree felled by a lumberjack.
Kohra smiled as the column hit the floor with a satisfying crunch. She smiled but was slightly concerned at how winded she felt. She might have used more mana than necessary, but at least she felt she had performed well enough.
Still smiling, she turned to see the heckler in the crowd staring at her slack-jawed, frozen with his half-eaten pretzel in one hand. Grinning even more broadly at the look on the man’s face, Kohra wordlessly raised her middle finger in his direction and walked away from the second station.