In the middle of the night, the bronze city, much like the day, was also alive at night.
Although there were not as many students walking the streets, certain establishments were still full.
One such establishment was none other than the training center, where there were still students in the hallways as well as in the practice rooms.
And in the halls, with her figure standing out from the other students, a girl with long straight black hair was making her way as if it were her home.
Though her expression was nonchalant, it was clear from the air around her that her mood was not good at all, something students nearby noticed and took note of before avoiding getting in her way.
"Just... how did they do it." Syvis muttered, in her mind present the memory of the moment Faith and Jay had managed to form a link.
It was no longer just that she had a problem with Jay having chosen the blonde esper over her, but the fact that the two of them had accomplished something that, in theory, only certain privileged people could do.
This was what angered her even more, that someone like Faith, who she considered an annoying person who surely made it to rank (C) by sheer luck, had accomplished something that Syvis herself hadn't been able to do.
How was it possible that she herself, someone who had always been praised for her talent as an esper, could not achieve something that her peers could?
It was already one thing that she had remained in the city of bronze, that was something she could accept, since it was the criteria of the academy itself and she knew better than to question those results.
But that a student from the bronze city, especially Faith, actually managed to perform a technique among espers before her, was something that had struck a chord in her.
It was this blow to her pride that had kept her all day, after she got out of class, in one of the special energy control rooms for espers.
Although she didn't have a partner to practice with yet, watching Jay and Faith do it, she thought it wouldn't be hard to pick up the feeling, especially for someone as talented as she was.
However, despite spending several hours trying to make her energy as 'friendly' as possible, she was unable to maintain it for even a couple of seconds, indicating that she was failing at something.
With a somewhat bitter feeling in her mouth, Syvis could do nothing but retreat and return to her residence.
Though of course, this didn't mean she was giving up or anything like that, but rather that she was going to postpone this training until tomorrow, and preferably, with a partner.
Thinking of a partner's face, she couldn't help but think of Jay, but remembering that the person in question had teamed up with Faith, anger surfaced within her again.
"Urghh..."
"Hey."
At that moment, a hand landed on her shoulder, with a particularly strong grip, making it clear that it wasn't going to let go of Syvis anytime soon.
Bringing her gaze back, still being with the anger of remembering Jay's 'betrayal', she couldn't help but have a hostile expression on her face, "What?!"
However, upon turning, what she saw was nothing more than the face of a rather familiar person, who responded to her hostile gaze with her own wild grin.
"Such wild eyes, I like that!" Said the training center instructor.
Being taken by surprise to meet her boss all of a sudden, Syvis quickly changed her attitude, "Instructor, I'm sorry, I didn't recognize you."
Putting her arm around the esper's neck, the instructor simply chuckled before replying, "It's okay, rather, I see you've continued to do a good job with the plants, good there."
"Yes, thank you, I have been..."
With that exchange, the two then began a conversation as they moved toward the residence.
In a couple of minutes, instructor and student arrived at the residence, heading towards the living room to continue their conversation about both work and other less important things.
"Right, your partner, Sacrest, doesn't seem to be around, he sure is a restless guy, going out at night, do you know where he is? I wanted to talk to him too." The instructor asked as she didn't feel Jay's energy either at the residence or at the training center.
At the mention of said esper, Syvis stood still for a moment, but putting a blank expression on her face, she replied, "Ah, not really, he's always minding his own business."
Syvis' response was normal, however, in front of a rank (B) pugilist like the instructor was, it was as clear as day that something had happened between the two of them.
The instructor didn't know what it was since she had been busy, but considering they were young, it was probably just some youth drama, so she didn't think much of it.
"I had to talk about something important with both of you, but I guess I can explain it to you and then you pass the message along."
As she finished saying that, the instructor pulled a small map from her pocket and spread it out on the table.
On its surface was drawn in luxurious detail the entirety of the bronze city, plus a good portion of the outskirts, covering approximately one or two kilometers around.
Finally, the most striking part was that there were dozens and dozens of different colored glowing dots scattered throughout the city, with most being orange, others blue and only a handful green.
"This..."
Although she didn't know what it was, Syvis could sense that there was some kind of special energy coming from the map.
"It's nice, isn't it? It's a magical artifact specially made by the academy to be able to monitor the position of the students in the academy." Said the instructor relaxedly.
Hearing this, Syvis was a bit amazed, not at having a magical artifact in front of her, but at what the artifact in question could do.
Noticing her curiosity, the instructor was quick to begin explaining the reason why she was showing her this map.
After the events of the chimera attack, the management had decided to further increase their surveillance network over the students, all in order to better prevent such situations.
However, they could no longer rely completely on the teachers because they were, without a doubt, limited, especially in a city as populated as the bronze city was.
In this case, although the number of teachers was in the dozens and the number of assistants being just over a hundred, compared to the thousands of students that inhabited the city, they fell short.
To this end, they thought that instead of increasing the level of surveillance of teachers and assistants, which they were already doing, they would also make use of the vast number of students to also help them increase their range of surveillance.
And the way they were going to do this was with none other than this magical artifact which was a downgraded version of the map that the teachers had access to.
Of course, it wasn't that they were going to give it to just any student either, but to those who, in some way or another, were in special positions where they saw a large flow of students.
And for this criteria, the training center's cleaners, namely Jay and Syvism, passed with flying colors.
As for the strength of these, that was not important, as they were not chosen to deal with unforeseen situations, but to alert a teacher or assistant.
Waving her hand over the map, the instructor then pointed to the colored dots, "The orange dots are you students, the blue ones are assistants and the green ones are teachers, you can also identify monsters of any kind, although there doesn't seem to be any close right now, they are red in color."
While the instructor mentioned it simply, the reality was that none of these functions was something easy to achieve even for a super of rank (B), but was a complex job with dozens of magical formations behind it.
With this alone, Syvis again reaffirmed that the academy was on a completely different level from what she was used to seeing.
Now with her initial surprise being replaced by curiosity, Syvis asked, "This... could this also be able to be used to search for a specific person?"
Hearing this, the instructor, instead of asking why, just smiled broadly and proceeded to place her hand on top of the map, "Of course it can, although this function is only available if certain requirement are met, that you have to have had contact with the person in question at least once. We don't want you abusing this to harass someone either after all, and notice that doing so will result in expulsion."
Making clear the consequences of misusing this artifact, the instructor continued tapping the map.
"Now then, how about we try it out, let's see what your partner is doing at this time of night."
Saying that, the map began to glow slightly, with all the dots, regardless of color, quickly disappearing.
Gradually, only a few dots remained, which, after a few seconds, also disappeared.
Finally, only one orange dot remained on the map.
With a satisfied smile, the instructor rested her gaze on Syvis, "See, that's how you.... do it?"
However, she had to cut her sentence in half, with a surprised expression filling her face.
"...What the hell?"
Now with the smile wiped off her face, the instructor closely inspected the map, which, it had to be mentioned, no longer had a single bright spot on it.
At this moment, in the surroundings of the bronze city and in the bronze city itself, which were drawn on the map, there was not a single trace of Jay.
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