Code of Rainbow

by Weiqi Wang

  On the other side, the chubby boy yelled. ‘How dare you stare at me? Water Boy!’

  ‘Oh, I thought I just did? And my name is Soarame!’ Soarame had never been provocative but always been responsive. ‘What about you, The Mouth?’

  ‘Wow, you actually have a backbone! You remember my name, Kriagon! I’ll deal with you later!’ Kriagon was irritated by the Water Boy firing back at him. How could a Water fire? This was simply incompatible.

  ‘Kriagon? Good name!’ Soarame suddenly laughed. ‘So you cry, and “cry again”?’

  Hearing Soarame, everyone in the room also laughed. Even Dileys couldn’t help chuckling and patted Soarame’s head.

  Kriagon’s face reddened with anger. He rushed towards Soarame to charge at him, but was pulled back swiftly by an older student.

  ‘Enough!’ Exclaimed a cold voice from a distance, and instantly the whole crowd quieted down. Soarame raised his head to find another tall male student walking towards him. He seemed to be revered by the other older students, including Dileys. They were all standing upright. ‘Rodka!’

  Rodka nodded and walked up to Soarame and Kriagon. ‘All freshmen listen up, especially you two! This is the Institute of Libral, not some street corner. Fights are strictly forbidden! You’ll be excused today because you are new here, but if this happens again you’ll be suspended — one more time, expelled! Do you understand?’

  ‘Yes!’ Everyone answered together, including a pale-faced Kriagon.

  ‘I’m going to mark your name down, though.’ Rodka turned towards Soarame. ‘What’s your name?’

  ‘Soarame.’ Answered Soarame aloud. ‘He started it!’

  ‘I know. But that doesn’t mean making fun of others’ names is right.’ Before Soarame could argue, Rodka turned to Kriagon. ‘You laughed at Soarame for majoring in Water, correct?’

  Seeing Kriagon’s awkward countenance, Rodka looked around at everyone. ‘This is another lesson to you all — in this school, no fighting is the first rule. The second rule is no discrimination of any kind: race, gender, age, magic power, magic gifts, lineage of magic, or one’s original country, anything at all! We have zero, zero tolerance against discrimination and you’d better keep it in mind at all times!’

  ‘But Rodka…’ Kriagon complained. ‘Casavin was the first one to mock Water… you just missed him!’

  ‘What? It was Casavin?’ Rodka glanced at Dileys. Seeing her nod sheepishly, he frowned. ‘I’ll go and get him right away.’

  With that, Rodka turned and left under everyone’s awestruck gaze, especially the new students.

  ‘Rodka is a genius and he’s very famous here. He’s a Grade 5 tri-lineage wizard of Wind, Fire, and Light!’ Dileys’ face blushed as she spoke. ‘Oh, he is in Stanfaul College, by the way. If you can get in there you could see him a lot.’

  ‘Then Stanfaul College it is!’ Soarame was excited to hear this. ‘Okay, I’m going to queue then!’

  ‘Ah! You really want to take the risk?’ Dileys tried to persuade Soarame to think it over, but couldn’t defeat Soarame’s persistence. ‘Fine, but you can pick three colleges in order, so you should at least choose two more for backup.’

  ‘Okay, but which two?’ Soarame looked at Dileys. ‘Dileys, which college are you in?’

  ‘Bosstin College.’ Answered Dileys.

  ‘Then Bosstin is my second choice!’ Soarame marked a number two before “Bosstin College” with his pen.

  ‘Wait, oh my god.’ Dileys watched Soarame, speechless. ‘Soarame, don’t you want to think about it before making the choice? Bosstin College is a very ordinary college, far from Stanfaul. You are jumping from one extreme right to another.’

  ‘I already thought about it. I want to be in the same college with you.’ Soarame believed this reason to be good enough. ‘Which college is Casavin in?’

  ‘Ah… that pest is in Halston College.’ Dileys answered after a pause. ‘Wait, you aren’t thinking…’

  ‘Then Halston is my third!’ Soarame’s words almost struck Dileys down.

  ‘You can’t be serious, Soarame!’ Dileys was anxious. ‘It’s okay to go for Rodka or me, but why Casavin?’

  ‘If I can’t be with friends and be happy, then I want to be with challengers to make me tough!’ Soarame’s words were surprising — he was actually reciting Scankeen’s words once in the past.

  Dileys was stunned. Seeing Soarame’s eyes glow with innocence, she couldn’t imagine those were his words — well, indeed it’s not. Dileys thought it over and over, but it seemed she could only come up with one reason to contradict Soarame. ‘But Halston College ranks far higher than Bosstin College. If you truly want to apply, you should make it your second choice.’

  The minute Dileys said it, she almost wanna bite herself. What the heck was I thinking? Just as she was about to correct her words, Soarame declared. ‘No need. I decide to punish it because of Casavin!’

  Hearing this, Dileys had to chuckle. As Soarame went off to the queue happily, Dileys couldn’t help wondering how the Deans of the colleges would react to his application form. Soarame’s style had never been put into practice before — everyone here exhausted themselves fighting for a better chance, but Soarame just threw dice.

  Soarame handed in his application happily and came scampering back. Dileys wanted to show Soarame around the campus, but for some reason the campus seemed to be in a different time zone from Cylone City — it was already getting dark here and Soarame knew that Filton was still waiting. Therefore, they said goodbye and agreed to meet each other again two days later, when there would be campus tours for the freshmen with the lead of some student volunteers — Dileys happened to be one of them.

  Stepping out of the school from the same cave, Soarame immediately saw Filton waiting for him in the sunshine. The contrast was very distracting — inside the campus the sun was setting, but it’s still around noon outside.

  ‘Congratulations!’ Filton was certainly pleased to know that Soarame passed the test; so were Sachastain and the guards.

  ‘Well done, Soarame!’ While the visitors cheered and applauded Soarame, Sachastain got close and looked at Soarame’s emblem. ‘You have a superior gift in Lightning? Wow!’

  ‘Yes, but I can’t practice it right now.’

  ‘Oh, take your time on it; that’s a minor issue.’ Sachastain sized Soarame up seriously and was amazed. ‘The Lightning gift is rare. Be patient and use your gift well!’

  ‘Thank you, I will. Sachastain, will you visit me some time?’

  ‘Of course! I promise you that I will visit you in your dorm after you settle down.’

  The three talked a bit and Soarame left with Filton. Watching Soarame’s back, Sachastain was seriously thinking about something —

  Maybe, this boy can be the one I’m looking for?

  THE CAMPUS AND CITIES

  The next morning, Filton and Soarame were walking along the street in Cylone City. The city centre was beautiful and magnificent; all the different buildings were well decorated, exemplifying the classic style of large cities. It was very busy everywhere, with all kinds of street shows and activities going on, and people from every corner of the world gathering and participating. Greeting, laughing and whispering surrounded them; Soarame and Filton enjoyed themselves by watching the antics and hearing music of different styles — oh, the snake player was a bit scary, though.

  Right now, Soarame was watching a street artist painting with ink in his own special way — unlike other painters, he simply poured ink onto the canvas and blew on it to make the ink flow, generating different shapes and patterns. Soarame was fascinated by his skills — a vivid plum-blossom tree emerged on the canvas just like that.

  ‘Hey, how are you guys?’ A street performer came along and greeted Filton. ‘We are having a game here, want to join us?’

  ‘What game?’ Filton asked. ‘As long as you’re not going to put a giant snake on my boy.’ Filton was leaving the next day, so Soarame was feeling sa
d. Filton thought that a game might cheer him up a bit.

  ‘Ha-ha, no. It’s a fun game and pretty easy, all you need to do is pour the beer into the bottle. The player with the most beer in a bottle wins the game and gets a gold coin. If you can fill the bottle more than half, you get an extra prize!’ The performer was holding a bowl of beer and a narrow-necked bottle. ‘Only 20 silver coins to play, it’s very cheap.’

  ‘Well, that…’ Realizing there was a payment, Filton went silent. 20 silver coins was not a small number to him, especially as he had to spend money on the trip back.

  ‘It’s okay Filton. I don’t want to play anyway.’ Soarame saw Filton’s hesitation and clearly knew why.

  ‘If you can’t afford 20 silver coins, why are you here?’ the performer rolled his eyes at Filton after figuring out what was going on. ‘You do know this is Cylone City, not your country yard, don’t you?’

  Soarame had been ready to leave until hearing this. Seeing Filton’s embarrassed face, Soarame was enraged. ‘So what’s the extra prize? If I can fill half of the bottle, what do I get?’

  ‘10 gold coins!’ The performer looked at Soarame, sneering. ‘Why not give it a try? It’s worth a month of your papa’s work.’

  ‘Let’s do it.’ Filton was mad too due to the performer’s attitude. He paid the fee and got a bowl and a bottle for Soarame. ‘As long as he can fill the bottle up, right?’

  ‘Oh, if you fill it up, I’ll give you 20 gold coins! But you only have one minute.’ The performer laughed at the two, then checked all the players. ‘Everyone ready? Three, two, one, go!’

  With that, all started to pour beer from their bowls into the narrow bottlenecks. The bowls were wide and flat, and the bottlenecks were so narrow that the game was rather difficult. Plus, the bowl could only hold as much as the bottle, so filling the bottle up was a mission impossible. All the players tried hard to carefully do the job, but there is a time limit so they couldn’t be too slow. As a result, everyone ended up spilling most of the beer. Soarame had realized the trick straightaway, and he knew that the same thing would happen to him if he were not a wizard, especially a Water wizard. However —

  ‘Oh dear, look at that boy!’ The audience started to notice Soarame soon enough, because he hadn’t spilt a drop.

  ‘What?’ The performer was stunned to watch Soarame doing this. ‘No way!’ Seeing Soarame’s bottle was already full, the performer almost cried. How ever, a deal is a deal, so he had to hand over 20 gold coins with a fake smile. Many people in the crowd had actually witnessed what had happened since the beginning of the encounter. They felt sorry for Filton and Soarame being insulted until now — there was the chance for them to cheer for the boy’s fabulous play and force the performer to live up to his words.

  ‘Well done, Soarame!’ Walking down the street happily, the two enjoyed looking at the different shops and restaurants. They were all nicely decorated and looked fascinating, especially a small building not too far away. The two approached the building and found it to be a magigear store. They were curious and entered it, only to find out that even the cheapest wand cost more than they could afford, so they had to leave soon. Interestingly, there was a dog-like magimal in the store and Soarame went to inquire about it, only to realize that it cost ten times more than the wand.

  ‘Well, I thought we could use the prize to buy you a magigear.’ Walking out of the store, Filton sighed. ‘Looks like we can only get a lunch instead.’ So the two of them entered a restaurant and enjoyed their last meal together. Filton wanted to leave the city in the afternoon, so that he could get a cheaper dinner and a hotel somewhere on the way back.

  Soarame knew Filton must be feeling really sorry for this, so he was determined to make money somehow during his school life here, and help his uncle as much as he could. The lunch was therefore pretty tasteless for Soarame, although the food was actually good. The two talked a lot during lunch before they came back to the Libral Gate. After repeatedly urging Soarame to take care of himself, Filton finally saw Soarame disappear into the cave again, holding back the tears. This time it was official — Soarame would start his school life and Filton would head back home and continue to be a tree feller, all alone.

  ‘Chelonad, can you hear me?’ Soarame walked out of the channel after passing the Libral Gate. ‘I want to go to my dorm.’

  ‘You should have done that yesterday.’ Chelonad’s voice sounded soon enough. ‘I know it’s hard to leave the family for the first time, but don’t worry, you will feel great here.’

  ‘Thank you. We had fun today in the city.’ Soarame briefly told the story of how he made 20 gold coins from the game.

  ‘Why didn’t you just tell him you are a wizard?’ Chelonad’s voice sounded amused. ‘He’d have apologised quickly enough.’

  ‘Well, Filton does need the money for his trip back.’ Soarame chuckled. ‘By the way, are there any jobs on campus?’

  ‘For you?’ Chelonad sounded surprised. ‘You want to work for a living?’

  ‘Yes, can I?’ Soarame was anxious to know the answer.

  ‘That’s interesting. Your master didn’t…’ Chelonad suddenly stumbled over his words. ‘You must didn’t know that a wizard can always find money.’

  ‘How?’ Soarame’s’ eyes brightened up. ‘I want to start now.’

  ‘Well, you are lucky then — the Wizard Law says you can work at school. But take your time — you just got here!’

  ‘Okay, I can take time today, but I will take all the jobs on campus, starting tomorrow.’

  ‘You can’t. The school only allows you to take one job at a time, and only on the weekends.’ Soarame’s words made Chelonad chuckle. ‘Okay, enough of this talk — your dorm is here.’

  ‘Here?’ Soarame found himself facing nothing. ‘What do you mean?’

  Soarame’s question was answered right away — a small house rose from the ground and emerged in front of Soarame.

  ‘Wow, Chelonad, you are not only good at growing trees!’ Soarame marvelled.

  ‘Of course. I’m good at a lot of things.’ Chelonad’s voice sounded proud. ‘This is just your bedroom cell. It will relocate after your college is determined.’

  ‘Relocate? How? Where?’ Soarame wondered.

  ‘I won’t know that either, until you are officially assigned to a college. Then this cell will fly somewhere and merge with several other cells to make a full dorm house there, and that will be your official dorm.’

  ‘Wait, did you say fly there?’

  ‘Yes, and you can enjoy the flight within the cell. This is deliberately designed for freshmen here. You can also invite up to four guests to fly with you, if you know anyone here.’ Chelonad said. ‘Okay, I will talk to you later.’

  ‘Thanks Chelonad!’ Soarame walked to the cell and opened the door. It was a small but neat en-suite bedroom, with furniture, restroom and everything he needed. Soarame noticed that there was a magic symbol on the wall, so he touched it and the room lit up. Soarame put his hands on the wall, trying to figure out what material it was — definitely not wood, metal or even rock. Soarame was amazed to find the wall felt warm and live, as if it was animate.

  This place is just amazing! Soarame sighed deeply. Hours ago he was excited about 20 gold coins, and now the boy started to realise more and more how silly that was.

  Soarame took some time to tidy up his stuff and had a nice sleep. He had a dream that night, seeing himself flying in the sky, enjoying the magnificent views of Cylone City and all that, and then he saw a line of carriages with the royal symbols of Atlantos on them.

  Deltaley? Soarame was surprised to see this face again. The prince of Atlantos was walking out of a carriage and getting into another one. Soarame landed beside Deltaley but found that no one could see him for some reason, as if he was transparent; so he followed Deltaley into the other carriage out of curiosity —

  ‘Filton?’ Soarame was surprised to see that Filton was sitting there having a meal, with the same fo
od as their last lunch together before they parted. Soarame walked up to Filton. ‘Why are you here?’

  Filton didn’t respond, probably because he couldn’t see Soarame either. So Soarame turned around to check on Deltaley, but found he had disappeared. Soarame had to walk out of the carriage, but suddenly found himself surrounded by Atlantos warriors, fully armed, with spears pointing at him. Deltaley walked up from behind the warriors, sneering at Soarame.

  ‘What is all this and why? You can see me now?’ Soarame was anxious and tried to talk to Deltaley, but Deltaley only responded with a hand wave — the warriors pounced forward and attacked Soarame with their sharp spears.

  ‘Ahh!’ Soarame woke up, soaked in cold sweat. ‘Oh god, what the heck was that?!’

  Getting up from his bed, Soarame washed his face and laughed at himself. He must have been too tired and had a weird dream. Seeing the sun already high, Soarame tidied himself up and called Chelonad for directions to the campus tour. Dileys was going to hold the tour this morning, and according to their arrangement Soarame was going to join her.

  The two met up at the gathering point soon enough. There were a number of new students waiting already; surprisingly, some of them had brought their magimals along. Soarame really fell for a cute little dog-like magimal; he was playing with it like everyone else, and tried to make friends along the way.

  ‘We are starting with the Water department because I study here.’ Dileys led the group to a giant building that looked like an enormous blue crystal cluster, surrounded by a group of other buildings that looked like smaller crystals. The halo shining from the “crystals” dazed the freshmen and made them go “wow” one after another. The group walked around the buildings while Dileys spared no efforts elucidating the history of the Water department and the culture around it; but she found that most of the freshers were only interested in the appearance of the building, and not the department or Water magic.