"You," Professor Sirius Quinn called out, pointing towards the red haired boy, "what's your name?"

The boy hesitantly looked around, but the lecturer's scary eyes were still on him so he hesitantly stood up and introduced,

"Flint," he said, "Flint Ardent."

"Would you mind telling us what rifts are?" Sirius said with a small smile on his lips, to anyone else, it'd just seem like he was a petty teacher getting back at a student, but no.

This was just his method of discipline and maybe also a way to get the kid actually interested in this class.

"Umm," Flint thought about it for a short while before replying, "a portal through which Eclipsed step into our world?"

"Correct," Sirius said with a proud smile on his face causing Flint's cheeks to take a slightly red shade.

"Rifts are portals that connect Aureum to what scholars call the Eclipsed Realm," hr continued, tapping his tablet to switch the hologram to a swirling, dark vortex.

He gave a light chuckle as he added, "creative name, I know. Academics aren't exactly poets."

Well most of the class didn't seem to share his sense of humor so he just cleared his throat and went on.

"Now then," he continued, "rifts are not random holes torn into the world, though I'm sure it feels like that when one suddenly

opens in your backyard."

A few students chuckled. Most didn't but Sirius didn't seem the least bit offended.

"Rifts," he said, gesturing to the projection, "are selected zones of the Eclipsed Realm forcibly overlapping with Aureum. Think of them like… windows that were never meant to be opened."

The hologram shifted, dividing into two layers. One was of Aureum which was above, and the other was of a world that seemed to be in perpetual darkness.

"These overlapping zones vary in size," Sirius explained, circling slowly as he tapped his tablet again. The dark layer expanded… then shrunk… then expanded again.

"And their size is the first and most important indicator of danger."

He raised a single finger.

"A small rift, barely the size of a door, will usually only allow lower-tier Eclipsed through. Tier ones, and occasionally a weak tier two."

A second finger went up.

"A medium rift, something the size of a house or building, will mostly let through tier twos and threes. These are the most common types encountered around the outskirts of of Solara Prime and other Zones with light barrier."

Then he raised a third finger, pausing for effect.

"And then we have the big ones. The kind that blanket an entire street… or an entire district."

The hologram abruptly widened until it spanned nearly the entire airspace above the podium, looking like some kind of tear in the fabric of space.

"In those," Sirius said quietly, "you will find tier fours, and rarely… tier fives."

The class shifted uncomfortably.

"Tier sixes," he added with a dismissive chuckle, "do not come through rifts. If a tier six ever stepped into Aureum, we would not be having this lecture. So let's not worry about bedtime stories."

He took another pause, looking at the looks on the faces of the students, most of which were a bit pale, especially when they considered that they'd have to enter rifts to clear.

"Alright then," Sirius Quinn said, clapping both hands together, "let's leave all this doom and gloom and talk about the cool stuff, Solar energy."

This successfully regained the attention of the students as they sat up straighter. He tapped on his tablet and caused the hologram to change again.

"You see," the lecturer started, "Humanity being pushed to the brink gave birth to an idea that, at that time, would seem completely insane."

Of course most of the students here knew what humanity did, they had stolen the sun, replaced it with an artificial one and used the original one to power their tech.

Even Nox, who was from the slums, knew that.

"In their quest to harness this divine power, humans tried… well, everything," Sirius said, tone turning wry.

The hologram changed again, now showing diagrams of early Solar machinery, that was just a crude metal harnesses, and silhouettes of human bodies surrounded by blazing light.

"At first, it was simple: devices, converters, collectors and machines that could bottle sunlight the same way we bottle water."

He tapped again. The hologram zoomed in on a strange metal frame shaped like a spine, with golden veins running through it.

"But then," Sirius continued, "desperation breeds… recklessness."

A murmur ran through the first-years.

"Humans attempted to directly absorb Solar Energy. Not through cores as we do today, but through their bodies," his lips twitched into an uneasy smile. "And, unsurprisingly, this did not go well."

The hologram switched, showing how the silhouettes burnt out from the inside, collapsing like ash.

Several students grimaced at the sight.

"Most who tried died instantly," Sirius said casually, though his voice carried a bit of heaviness in them, "the human body was never meant to handle pure Solar radiation in its rawest form."

"But…" He raised a finger. "A few survived."

A new hologram popped up, this one was also of a human...or so it seemed, but this human had features that separated them from the norm.

They had elongated ears of the holographic person, which reminded Nox of Luna.

"And those survivors," he continued, tapping two fingers against his own cheek where his scales were, "developed fantasy like traits, sone with eyes like mine and scales, while others look like creatures of fantasy known as elves. My clan happens to come from… one such survivor."

"Pretty cool right?" Sirius added with a smile on his face but before he could go on further a ding suddenly sounded from all the student's watches.

"Ah I guess that's all the time we get today," he said as he looked at the time, "then I guess I'll see you during our next class."

With a smile, Sirius Quinn walked out of the classroom, leaving the students behind.

Devon leaned back in his seat, stretching his arms over his head.

"Damn," he muttered, "first day and we already learn our old folks used to barbecue themselves tryna get superpowers."

Linda calmly gathered her tablet, "technically, they were attempting to—"

"We know, we know," Devon cut her off, waving a hand. "Science stuff."

He then stood up and stretched before saying, "aight then, time for something fun."

They were now supposed to head to their various divisions, which meant it was time for combat classes.

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