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As she polished off her lunch, a voice addressed her. She slowly turned her head to see a.. Sheep man. She remembered him, he was the guy that made that really weird comment in the cafeteria. How unpleasant.
"Hmm.. I do? I feel perfectly fine right now. And I know I did poorly, but I'll soon learn from my mistakes." She replied blankly. She didn't know how else to answer him, and she was pretty distracted by how comfortable his wool looked. It seemed similar to the wool on her jacket.
It wasn't long before everyone was called to the Magic Exams, and after hearing her name being called, she stood up.
"I'll be going now. Good luck on your exam." She said, giving him a nod before walking away.
The instant the group of six students entered the first chamber of Laboratory Six, Brovak started speaking, cutting off any possibility of mingling between them. Even with his face covered, he seemed anxious to get the testing overwith.
"I don't want to be here any longer than I have to, so let's make this quick and relatively painless. You are to demonstrate your magical abilities for me, and I'm supposed to evaluate your skills and potential, after which we will begin the combat exams with one of the more unpleasant things from the Deadlands. You there, Ms. Voll, please step forwards and show me what you're made of, or try to."
Brovak indicated a space right in front of the table full of various artifacts and materials.
Upon entering the room, Magnhild's gaze swept the tables, looking at the various...things that had been placed on display. She didn't even know how to begin, so she started to randomly pick things up and put them down after looking at them for a couple of minutes.
A few minutes passed before the chimera looked at the professor, shrugging. "I don't actually know how to use magic at all." She said bluntly. "So I guess we'll move on?"
The ball of Brovak's right foot bounced on the concrete tile floor impatiently. "I'm afraid that's not possible. I have to get a test result, so... Bah, I'll have to deal with Volkova for this later. Ms. Voll, please close your eyes, ignore the rest of the world, and focus on everything you feel. Airflows, any bodily aches and pains, bad memories, whatever. Think of them as energy. That should be enough for me to get a result, and we can go from there afterwards."
Mag nodded before following Brovak's instructions. Meditation had always been pretty easy for her, so this should be pretty much the same. Her breathing slowed as she began to empty her mind of everything. She didn't really know what 'energy' looked like, but she just went along with what her foster father had told her about Chi. That's the same, right?
Brovak's voice interrupted the meditation in a matter of seconds. "That should be sufficient. Please step back so that the next student can take their position. Mr. Coridell, I'm looking forward to your display..."
His pen flew across the clipboard quickly. So quickly that he couldn't have possibly written anything of substance. And then he looked up at the group expectantly.
Immediately after the last student in the group finished their demonstration, Brovak half-jogged to the other side of the room, where he ripped the black cloth off of the rattling cube to reveal a huge insectoid creature thrashing about, trying desperately to get at the rack of gas masks along the back wall. Without a pause, he explained what it was, why it was dangerous, and what the students would be doing. "This is an Ashhopper. It's one of the most deadly creatures in the Deadlands not because it directly kills (usually), but rather because it feeds on equipment other people need to survive there. The combat exam requires that you kill every Ashhopper in the test chamber before they 'kill' you. Try not to worry too much - the gas in the chamber is not deadly (unfortunately), so even if you fail, you will still survive and be placed in a class (against my recommendations). L'ilisht, you're up first."
Eventually, after all of the other students had gone through the room (with some being dragged out unconscious by medical staff), Brovak turned to Magnhild and pressed the button to reopen the test chamber's door. "You're next. Please put on your mask, take this knife, and enter the chamber."
Since Magnhild had been completely distracted by the appearance of the creature, most, if not all, of Brovak's explanations had flown through one ear and out the other. All she retained was it's name and 'Try not to worry too much'. Both things that are easy to remember. She'd never seen anything like that before, and her first thought was actually, 'What does it taste like?' The cafeteria may or may not serve this in their dinner.
After a few moments of struggling with her mask, she took the knife and examined it for a moment before lazily holding it in her fingers as she entered the chamber.
Before Brovak pressed the button to close the chamber blast doors, he loudly stomped up behind Magnhild, grasped two of the leather straps on the mask hood, and jerked them tightly closed with very little regard for her comfort. He then stepped back and pressed the button, prompting the door to slide shut and flood the room with darkness, save for the faint glows of the fruitlike pods hanging from the parasitic vines. They looked almost like some of the ground-crawling plants from the Airelosian border.
A split second later, the room flooded with white mist, and a surge of strange energy not unlike what Magnhild thought of as Chi struck her. And the room sprung to life, with exactly one crunching sound from a dark corner near the ceiling, just beneath the cap of the twisted mushroom tree.
At first, the darkness surprised Mag, but she soon became accustomed to it. The fruitlike pods that hung around the place seemed... interesting to say the least. It reminded her of the plants back home. Nobody liked them except her.
The gentle breeze that went passed her seemed quite familiar. It was hard to describe outside of just calling it energy or chi. It was odd to feel in such a place, but also not that surprising. Her gaze immediately moved to the source of the crunching noise, her grip on the large knife tightening.
The faint purplish-pink glow of the fruit pods bounced dully off of a large, waxy shell. She'd caught a glimpse of the first Ashhopper in the room, and it didn't quite look like the one in the cage. It was perhaps three times larger, more bloated, and the rear legs seemed to be digging into the underside of the mushroom tree's cap, spewing wood dust and spores everywhere. Whatever it was doing, it was almost finished, and it backed into the hole it had dug for a few moments, keeping all four eyestalks trained on Magnhild lest she make a move for it. It seemed to make some sort of threatening chattering, grinding noise towards her.
Upon seeing the ridiculously large Ashhopper, she immediately readied a guard stance, or rather a basic one. However, it seemed to be less aggressive than she thought. Big monsters were usually aggressive, weren't they? Or maybe not. She slowly stepped toward it as it backed into a burrow, the noises making her fidget with the knife grip.
With each step, the hostile grinding noise grew louder, more frantic, and the Ashhopper squirmed angrily within its burrow. Some white foam of some sort dropped out of the hole, and one of its eyestalks jerked down towards the ground, where perhaps a quarter cup of the thick stuff hit the ground. It dropped down immediately, taking up a protective stance over the foam and revealing a huge volume of the stuff in the cap of the mushroom. A quick kick at the ground threw up some dirt, and it awkwardly shoved the foam into the tiny hole it had made before raising its shell and revealing its wings.
Magnhild immediately stopped moving as the creature began the spew weird bubbles around itself. She had no idea what it was, but she definitely didn't want to try eat it anymore.. Well, for now. Perhaps a solid couple of hours in an oven would work wonders.
She had always been instructed to find an opening before striking an opponent, but this bug's.. stance looked very impenetrable, for her anyway. She wasn't much of a hunter, but she did like the idea of sitting and waiting until it did something else. The chimera stayed in her defensive stance, not moving an inch closer, even when the wings came out.
Whatever it was doing, it seemed to be finished with it, and three of its eyestalks glared at Magnhild blankly, with the fourth aimed upwards towards its burrow under the shroom cap. Satisfied with its work, it turned all of its focus onto the Pangolin Chimera and took to the air. It was sluggish, heavy, and having some trouble maintaining a steady altitude, but even its underside seemed to be covered in the same brittle, waxy brown shell that protected the top of its head. At least, everywhere save for the mouth, which it opened to reveal several circular rows of grinding teeth. The creature flung itself towards Magnhild, no longer interested in holding its ground, aiming its mouth not towards the mask's filter canister, but rather towards her face.
In the back of her mind, she hoped the stalemate would last for a moment longer so she could.. maybe take a nap. However, this was just a pipe-dream and she suddenly had a fat, angry bug flying at her face. She immediately shielded her face with her arm, the bug slamming into her like a pile of bricks. Even though she didn't really know how much a pile of bricks would weigh. This is probably about it. Needless to say, the insect's maw had a nice firm grasp on her arm.
What may as well have been a squirming, flying, thrashing pile of bricks was more agitated by the moment and tried to clamp down its teeth on Magnhild's arm. Its mouthparts weren't designed to bite, but the circular ridge of grinding teeth vibrated back and forth as it tried to tear through its foe like it tore through steel filter cartridges and charred logs. Its wings weren't strong enough to push her over by a long shot as they could barely keep it aloft without the added strain, but it certainly was trying.
The pangolin feared the worst as she felt the insect's teeth move. It wanted to tear her arm off, however it felt more like someone trying to massage her arm. She stood there for a moment as the insect fruitlessly grinded at her, tearing through her jacket sleeve.
After a few boring minutes of staring, she brought up her knife and stabbed it's fat abdomen, hoping it would do something.
The huge Ashhopper immediately clamped its shell closed over its wings when the knife penetrated its underside with a pop. The shell didn't seem very thick - at least not there, at any rate. It crashed to the ground and thrashed about on its side for a split second before turning upright once more, aiming its back end at Mag, and throwing its enormous spurred rear legs at her right shin.
Just when she thought that she'd won already, the bug had begun it's counter attack, it's leg smacking into her leg with all it's might... Which felt like she walked into a coffee table at night. She definitely felt it, but.. Well.. It was very anti-climactic.
The Ashhopper's eyestalks were all aimed at different points on Magnhild, twitching and shaking slightly. Its motions felt almost like a creature trying to protect its young, and it hopelessly slammed its legs into Mag's shin over and over again, hoping that its single best weapon would drive her away. But the kicks were getting weaker each time.
There was a point at which Mag almost felt sorry for the bug, but she didn't really know if it was smart enough to be scared or feel hopeless. Thus she decided to do when she did with every other bug she's ever caught in her life. Kill it. Taking up her knife again, she stabbed the Ashhopper in the abdomen, hoping it would die a little faster. She was getting hungry again and she was pretty close to taking her mask off to take a bite out of it.
The knife caught it on the top of its outer carapace after it had kicked her perhaps twelve or thirteen times, prompting a dull ache. Even armor wouldn't get rid of the bruising that sort of pummeling might cause. The section of shell Magnhild's knife struck was significantly thicker, and the knife merely dented it: she may as well have struck it with a stick or something. But it worked, and the Ashhopper stopped its attack and scrambled towards the hole it had made in the ground, where it had buried the foam. A trail of thick brown fluid showed that it was severely injured by her first strike, and was presumably slowly bleeding out. The creature angled its rear end downwards towards the ground and turned to face Magnhild again, folding its rear legs like a powerful spring. And then it waited.
Magnhild clicked her tongue in irritation as her knife merely made a dent in the shell, and this irritation drove her to chase after the Ashhopper. Her stomach growled as she jumped on top of the bug, attempting to pin it down.
The bug jumped at the same time with a loud 'CRACK', almost like cannonfire. Its mouth was headed straight for her face again, and a stringy stream of brown goop was flying along underneath it, almost unable to keep up. It stopped making any further attempts at moving after it had sprung towards her, mouth wide open. Perhaps it was dead already, and this was its final act?
Again, being akin to a pile of bricks, the bug slammed into her face as she tried to jump on it. The force knocked her over, but she was far from hurt. The worst injury she's had thus far was a dull ache in her shin, which was a little more annoying than she previously thought as the ache settled in. She soon felt an itch in her eyes as she noticed there was a crack in her goggles. She looked at the bug blankly as she attempted to ignore the itch in her eyes. It looked dead. Then again, she remembered that some of the animals she's see only pretended to be dead. How sneaky.
She strolled up to the bug, but stood far enough to avoid any surprise attacks it might have up it's..'sleeve'. Maybe it'll explode or something, it looked quite close to doing that. She looked around for a moment before sighing.
"I think it's dead, am I done now?" She called out. Obviously someone should be watching this, right?
The patch of dirt covering the foamy hole shifted slightly, and a swarm of tiny translucent Ashhoppers under a centimeter long crawled out. More fell from the mushroom cap burrow, and hit the ground, where they desperately tried to get back up. A couple seconds later, every single one of them stopped moving, as their mother had been unable to focus on providing them with a stockpile of slime mold to feed upon. The room's ventilation fan spun to life, sucking the white mist out of the room, and once the air had cleared, the blast door slid open to reveal Professor Brovak standing at the entrance. A moment later, every single insect disappeared, and the rip in Magnhild's jacket disappeared, along with the crack in the mask.
"I suppose I should congratulate you, as much as I hate to. You'll receive your test results in the morning, and we'll be seeing eachother again when classes officially start some days from now. You're dismissed and you have the rest of the day off - just hang the hood on the rack again before you go."
The chimera watched in silence as the insect.. babies. Died unceremoniously. She didn't feel hungry anyone after seeing that.. Or was she just tired? Probably tired. She didn't even notice the damage disappearing from sight. Even before Brovak had started speaking, she'd just about ripped the mask off her face. It was horrendously stuffy in there and she just didn't like having things covering her face, unless it was a nice warm blanket.
"Alright." She replied briefly before hanging up the mask. She'd seen a lot of new things today, none of which she liked other than that bright looking egg from this morning. She wondered what her result would look like.. they probably looked really horrid. It was to be expected from someone that never went to school.
Now what should she do for the rest of the day? Probably nap. Maybe she should check up on Rikka?
