(Saturday, 9th of Dawnstar Moon, 2021)
Jack woke up the next morning with Alice kicking his head in her sleep. Jack noticed the light of day peering through the dark ballroom, signaling the day has begun. Jack woke up his friends and reached into his bag to pull out an energy bar, since Sanctuary didn't provide meals for the first day. Why did they do this? Your guess is as good as Jack's. Luckily, Jack and his friends just packed their own breakfasts. After waking them up, Jack and his allies quickly ate their breakfasts before getting ready for the day. They all put on their combat outfits and dawned their respective weapons, well the twins had each other so they just wrapped their arms around one another, while Othelia went to the garage to grab her mech. An announcement played as all of the potential students were getting ready for the test.
"Hello students, this is Geppetto speaking." Geppetto's voice could be heard on the speakers. "All of you are to report to the arena, you will be assigned matches with a single person. The rules will be explained once you all reach the arena. Don't forget to bring your A-game. Also Alice, don't forget to eat the bento I packed for you and your friends!"
"Your grandfather really seems to care about you, Miss Alice." Mifu pointed out as she cleaned her sword gracefully as Jack began rolling up the sleeping bags to return them to their spots. "Say, where do we place the rolls?"
"I think we will deliver to the laundry chute over there." Othelia pointed at a laundry chute that was on the wall opposite of the ballroom.
"Actually guys, that's a trash chute." A new guy walked towards us looking tired as hell as he cracked his neck. His hair was spiky and orange, with golden irises that reminded you of the sun. He wore a red flower, collared shirt paired with khaki shorts and sandals. This guy also had a double sided Great sword on his back."I heard that there would be some marionette servants coming by to pick up the sleeping bags now that Master Geppetto is back here, so we can just leave them on the ground here."
"AM I THE ONLY PERSON WHO DIDN'T KNOW GEPPETTO WAS A BIG DEAL?!" Alice shouted in annoyance like she was throwing a fit.
"Yeesh, you good man?" Nico asked the new guy with the tired expression, who let out a hefty yawn.
"Yeah I'm okay, I just didn't get much sleep last night." The orange haired boy sleepily replied. "I was stuck next to some guy who snores like a sawmill."
"New friend?" Alice suddenly popped out from behind Jack after her little fit and grabbed onto the orange headed man's wrist. "You're our friend now."
"It's too late for this poor soul." Zane suddenly started chanting some kind of sutra. "Wait, what's your name?"
"Oh, my name's Galahad." The newly dubbed Galahad introduced himself.
The group introduced one another in a friendly manner because evidently Alice is either a shonen or a bisexual harem protagonist with the amount of friends she's acquiring. After introducing themselves to one another, they noticed a mannequin-like marionette pushing a cart through the doors, and it began picking up all the empty sleeping bags. They passed by the marionette in question and tossed in their used sleeping bags before continuing down the hall. As they walked, Jack noticed a lot of people, but he couldn't tell if they were students of Sanctuary, refugees, or actual Guardians. Sanctuary doesn't have much of a dress code, the only real rule on dressing up is that it has to be an outfit that one can wear in a fight and it covers enough of one's skin to actually be considered clothes. All of them suddenly reached a flight of stairs to their right, and they went up those stairs. For the record, Jack had no idea where he was going, he was just following Zane, who actually had a map of the building. They continued walking until they found themselves in a large waiting room. On the right wall were two doors separated by gender, and they looked to be locker rooms. On the left end of the room were a flight of stairs. The room had multiple screens hanging down from the ceiling, kind of like an airport. All of the screens were off, but Jack supposed they allowed those in this room to watch the fights from here. Towards the back of the room, Jack noticed a third door with the sign 'Garage Entrance' on it.
"Students, please have a seat." Herakles ordered as he stood in front of the room. Jack looked around the room, there were at least one hundred of students right now. "All of you will be handed a number by chance, the number indicates when you go up the stairs and into the arena. Like if you're number 1, you'll go up first along with the other person who got the number 1. Then you two will fight each other until the other one surrenders, passes out, or is incapable of fighting further. The loser will be sent home with money for the ride, and the winner will be able to attend Sanctuary Academy. Also, no killing, we aren't savages."
"Well, it was nice knowing you guys." Zane was a hacker, so he had no way of fighting unless there was machinery around him.
"Before you support classes start losing hope, adjustments will be made in the arena in order to allow you to properly fight against the combat focused classes." Herakles shouted, from Jack's point of view, he sounds like a fair guy. "Support types that heal will be given a knight to fight for them, and the healers will have to heal this knight in order to win. Nerfers and buffer classes will have this same bonus. Support types that rely on the environment, like Elementalists, will receive an alternated environment to allow you to fight on equal footing."
"And here I was hoping to get out of this." Zane whined with a sigh as another mannequin marionette walked in front of the group and handed each of them numbers. "Looks like I'm the 3rd one."
"Hey Mannequin the man, my bro and I are each other's weapons, so give us the same number." Rico demanded, and the mannequin handed a single number to Rico. "Oh sweet, number 7."
"Hmm, it appears I was graced with being second." Mifu looked at her number with an amused smile on her face.
"Lucky me, I got fourth." Galahad held up his number triumphantly while yawning. "I wonder if I could fit a nap in here somewhere."
"Nuts, I got sixth." Alice pouted adorably while crossing her arms. "I wanted to be the star of the show."
"Looks like I'm eighth." Othelia suddenly appeared beside us wearing a pair of leather pants, a leather jacket, and a white tank top. "What about you Jack?"
"I got..." Jack unraveled his piece of paper to read what was on it, and all that was on it was a single vertical line. "...One..."
"Well let's hope the first guy is super weak." Nico looked around the room and his eyes suddenly landed on a boy with some kind of machete-like sword. "Hey, was that guy at the ceremony yesterday?"
"There's so many people here, how can you expect us all to keep track?" Galahad asked as he put his hands in his pocket.
"I'm a mirror, it's kind of my job to know my surroundings." Nico stated as he examined the boy from a distance. "He's giving me a strange vibe, like he's the main character of an anime or something."
"Would the people with 1 on their cards come up to begin the match?" Herakles demanded, and Jack walked over to the stairway where Herakles was waiting. "To prevent instant deaths, Geppetto will be overseeing the match as an official referee, so respect him."
The hero boy and Jack made their way past Herakles, and Jack felt as though the headmaster was giving him a slight look of pity for some reason.
The hero kid and Jack reached the currently empty arena, where Geppetto was waiting in the middle of. Geppetto signaled for the hero and Jack to go to opposite ends of the arena. Jack unsheathed Fire Maiden and the hero didn't even move.
"Remember, no murder!" Geppetto ordered the two before pointing at the two of combatants. "The battle will be between Hero and Jack, I expect a clean fight, since neither of you are rogue classes! Now...begin!"
Geppetto suddenly vanished to a nearby stand right after telling them to start, and Jack reeled his short sword back before using it's whip function to attack Hero, and Jack didn't want to sound rude, but that is the weirdest name he's heard. Jack knew it was either Hero or himself, but Jack still felt slightly bad about it. Just before the tip of Fire Maiden could cut him, Hero suddenly vanished.
"Sorry friend, but I'm not gonna lose, I'm too powerful."
Jack turned around and saw that Hero was behind him, so Jack jumped back only to be punched with Hero's fist making contact with his stomach. The force alone sent Jack crashing into one of the arena's walls, which caused an explosion of dust to fill his vision. Hero had a massive amount of strength, so there's a good chance he is a warrior class. So Jack would just have to avoid his physical attacks? Now Jack have something to work with! Unfortunately, his hopes and dreams were shattered when the dust cleared, when he saw that Hero was coming at him with golden lightning coating his hands like giant claws, wait, Jack thought warrior classes can only use magic through their weapons like a conduit or something! Hero raised his lightning claws above Jack and Jack rolled out of the way as he turned Fire Maiden back into a sword.
"Nice dodge, but I'm faster." With unbelievable speed, Hero began circling Jack so fast he could see after images. Jack got into a make-shift defensive stance as Hero began barraging him with elementally infused punches. The first punch to Jack's head was imbued with fire, the next one to his legs was infused with ice, the third with wind to the arms.
Jack began thinking. This guy has the strength of a warrior class, yet he doesn't need a conduit to use magic, on top of that, his speed was like a thief class. Jack suddenly noticed that Hero appeared to be punching him in a pattern, first his head, then his legs, arms, chest, and repeat. He just finished punching Jack's arms, so now he was going to attack the chest. Jack ducked beneath Hero's swing and did a sweeping kick with the prosthetic leg before attempting to slash Hero's chest. Hero had quick reflexes, so he used his still sheathed sword to block the slash before it could even pierce his coat. He used his sheathed sword to strike Jack's legs, but Jack jumped back before activating Fire Maiden's whip function. Jack also pressed a secondary button, and the blades moved a bit to reveal small tubes that began releasing a lime green colored gas into the air. Jack then decided to slash randomly at Hero with the whip, but his tactic wasn't to hurt him. Hero used his sheathed sword to deflect all of the slashes effortlessly, all while wearing a smile on his face. Jack kept this up until he could no longer see Hero through the gas, then Jack held down the trigger that turns the weapon into it's short sword form. As the blade began reeling back together, the blades closed and the blade put itself together so quickly it made sparks, igniting the gas. The gas spread the flames until what was left was a massive explosion that almost burned Jack's face off, and Hero was directly inside the flaming sphere. There was no way that Hero could have withstood that attack head o-"
"Nice attack, but like I said, I won't lose." With a wave of his hand, the flames all dispersed into embers, and all that was left was Hero, who had a scorched face, yet didn't even seem phased by it. "I'm the hero of this story after all." Hero suddenly unsheathed his sword with a determined expression, and the blade was glowing a brilliant light. "Universe Sword Style: Sun."
Then everything went black.
Dammit.
(Later)
Jack's eyes opened to see he was surrounded by a white curtain like the one someone would see in a hospital. Jack felt a blanket on his chest along with the clothes he was wearing earlier. Jack sat up from his original spot and remembered why he was here in the first place. Jack lost against Hero, and now he can't go with everyone to Sanctuary. Jack pressed his palms against his face before letting out an annoyed sigh. How would he face them now? This place was his best bet at figuring out who he was in the first place. Also, where was his prosthetic leg? Jack leaned over the right side of the hospital bed he was on to see if his leg was there, but instead, his dumbass lost his balance and fell off the bed with a loud thud.
"FACK!" Jack shouted before hitting the ground, and if anyone was around, they would have heard him. Much to Jack's surprise, the curtains opened to reveal Headmaster Herakles and Geppetto. "Um...hello?"
"Hey Jack! Good news! All of you got into Sanctuary!" Geppetto informed Jack as Herakles picked Jack up by his single leg and set him on the hospital bed. As for Jack, he was in shock because of this whole ordeal. Jack lost, why is he being allowed into Sanctuary? "Headmaster Herakles has something to explain."
"Geppetto, this is classified information." Herakles looked at Geppetto, who crossed his arms and glared at Herakles. "Ugh...fine, but Jack, if you want an explanation, you're gonna have to make a promise."
"Sure thing."
"The promise is that you'll do what I say after hearing this, since what I'm about to tell you is Government Tier S-Class Classified Information." Herakles warned Jack. "By listening to this information, you'll be a part of a secret circle in the government on top of being a student of sanctuary."
"However, joining this circle will be the only way for you to go to Sanctuary." Geppetto stood beside Herakles. "If you join us, you come here as a kind of agent, but if you want to go home to live a normal life, then we will send you home without any issues."
"Just so we're clear, I'm only giving you this option because you were Geppetto's prized student before losing your memories." Herakles didn't seem 100% on board with telling Jack everything, but he was being forced to anyways. "If you choose to come here, you will receive extra training in your class to ensure you won't just be able to keep up with your classmates, but also surpass them. However, once you join the circle, you're not allowed to leave until the threat is gone."
"Sign me the fuck up." Jack was having none of this 'deep life changing choice' mood going on. Jack just wants to go Sanctuary because he wants to figure out who he was and hang out with his friends.
"Are you sure?" Herakles asked Jack in slight disbelief as Geppetto struggled to hold in his laughter. "This isn't something people can decide in a five second window."
"Well what else am I gonna do? Become a barber?" Jack asked the man. "Do you have any idea how hard it is to become a good barber?"
"Well...he has a point." Geppetto shrugged while Herakles groaned in annoyance.
"Fine...you're just as stubborn as Geppetto said you were." Herakles groaned. "Let's start with the basics. Hero isn't human, he was created using the most powerful attributes of the most powerful people on Desponia. He was completed last night at precisely midnight. The reason we created Hero was to combat a threat we call Project: Despair. The details of Project: Despair will remain anonymous to you-"
"Is it connected to a game where you can't have a favorite character because 90% of the cast die?"
"No." Herakles karate chopped Jack's head in a disciplinary manner. "Anyways, Hero's exact class is Hero, making him the perfect balance of the mage, rogue, and warrior classes. However, he has one single flaw because he was released early."
"Wait, why was he released early?" Jack questioned as Heracles was about to karate chop his head again, but Jack dodged it, only to be met with another chop from his opposite hand.
"Stop interrupting me you brat!" Herakles shouted before clearing his throat. "As for why Hero was released early, it's because of something involving Project: Despair, the exact intel is classified. Hero's main flaw is his child-like ignorance and unpredictability, now here's where you come in; you're going to be supervising Hero. You're going to make sure he fulfills his destiny of properly disposing of Project: Despair as soon as possible, because Hero is the only person capable of destroying it. On top of that you have to keep this a secret from not only your friends, but also Hero. Hero doesn't know about any of this, and he thinks he's from a farming family in the North that died years ago. The reason for secrecy is to prevent Hero from learning the truth until he's ready."
"Well considering you named him 'Hero', I'd say your hopes for him are pretty high." Jack braced himself for another strike, but instead, he was handed some kind of brooch. Jack looked at the brooch and saw that it was a silver gear. "Eh?"
"Come on, don't tell me you already forgot about the team system we have going on here?" Herakles held up three fingers. "Most students are divided into three groups; the tanks, the DPS, and the supports. All students here wear brooches to show the group they're in, golden shields are worn by tanks, black swords symbolize the DPS, and white clovers represent the supports. I like to put all my students into teams of three consisting of one of each class, to make things more organized. But frankly it's hardly ever that neat and organized. Of course, there are exceptions. The 'chosen ones' like Hero are given a brooch depicting all three emblems. Chosen ones often work alone, or go with teams on difficult missions."
"What does the silver gear mean?" Jack was referring to his own brooch when he said this.
"It means you're the Utility, think of it as a unique symbol that shows that there's more to you that meets the eye. That also means you assist other teams with missions." Herakles suddenly patted Jack's head for some reason. "So just to review, you'll be attending Sanctuary, watching over Hero without him noticing or figuring out any of this, becoming one of the youngest government agents in the organization, keeping this a secret from your friends, training to become stronger, AND going on missions with teams whenever they need help. Now you can't escape it."
"Good luck Jack, and I'm sure Alice will be absolutely thrilled to hear you're going to attend Sanctuary." Geppetto and Herakles began leaving, but just before Herakles left, he told Jack something.
"Hey Jack."
"Yeah?"
"Your leg is on the left side of the bed."