The Story

"Where are you?" Their mother asked; she was talking on the phone.

"I'm near the front entrance," came a scratchy voice from the receiver, "did you arrive at the building?"

"Yes," continued their mother; she sounded slightly stressed, "we got off the strange bus, it disappeared, and now we are facing a massive castle!" And it was true; she and the four Chlevstroff children gazed at the large castle-like structure ahead of them.

Notna felt a chill run through his body as he observed the gargantuan building. The walls seemed to be made up of uneven beige bricks, each varying in size (from that of a small pebble to the size of large faces). Tall spiraling towers rose from the corners of the building; stabbing the sky, and large chocolate double doors were visible on the face of the building snuggled in large glistening steps. The stairs continued around the doorways and above; toward entrances located higher in the wall.

Lyuba pointed out that the face of the building resembled a giant chocolate cookie. Her three siblings observed the building and nodded in agreement.

"Good, now walk up to the entrance and you'll see me" came the scratchy voice; "I'm waving" and the phone hung up.

"Alright kids, let's go" said their mother enthusiastically as they continued their trek down the large golden path towards the huge chocolate colored doors ahead; their father seemed like a large spec standing in front of them.

The five Chlevstroffs observed their surroundings with wide eyes as they walked; the whole front campus was huge! Complete with a garden of flowers and trees of all shapes and size on the left. Notna spotted the walls of what seemed like a shrub maze in the distance; relieved that Lyuba was too short to see past the large flower garden to notice; otherwise she would tirelessly insist on attempting to go through it.

A large water fountain surrounded by smaller water fountains each complete with intertwined white statues that twinkled like diamonds with glistening crystal blue water shooting from each crevice, forming brilliant azure arcs (Valery was eyeing the water with great curiosity, Aliana noticed this and shook her head warningly).

Everyone was amazed. They got to the front doors and saw their father waving at them as if he had been doing it for a while now (a man dressed in yellow was walking away from him).

The little ones ran to him and gave him a hug as if they haven't seen him in a very long time (this was usually their normal greeting with their parents). The two older ones walked up, Aliana said 'hello' and Notna shook his hand.

Their mother smiled at him, "we made it!"

"Good" Laneid nodded with a smile and pointed to the door; "now off we go; Johnny needs our full support!" and with that, they walked through the massive double doors (which were wide open by now).

While the family was walking down the hall with the red carpet and white columns, they saw other groups of families walking in the same direction; keeping a rather large distance from one another. They were appearing from a wall that was behind them (the entrance looked like a part of the brick wall behind the six). 

'Some sort of teleportation device,' Notna reckoned. Those were expensive and rare. 'Also... a time barrier?'

"This school really is prestigious" Notna commented, looking around at the high ceiling and the scarlet carpet on the floor.

Their father chuckled; "You think this is amazing; you should have seen the entrance exam"

"Oh yeah! How did that go?" asked Aliana.

Their father described his long fall into the hole that landed him beside three judges who watched the progress of their examinees through floating orbs; there were hundreds of them thanks to which the judges missed nothing. If the contestants failed, the globe would glow red, if they succeeded, the globe would turn green. Each examinee had a different test according to their recorded skills and abilities which The Academy borrowed from the Department of Documents.