Names and Rankings

“Huh, so I guess this means this Kasara person should be class rep.” Miieie laughed.

That was the assertion. Traditionally, anyway.

Miieie still wasn’t sure what kind of duties she’d have as representative of her class. She assumed it was uninteresting, whatever it was. But she didn’t have time to ruminate on such things with the list in between her fingers. Her anxiety of being at the bottom of the list felt like a glacier in the coldest parts of the Seas of Bevwen–a glacier she couldn’t avoid sailing into.

Her eyes shot down the list as she nervously smiled as each name passed her by. She was not in the top percentile nor was she even in the middle of the pack. All of her hard work didn’t earn her anyplace good, but then again what was she exactly expecting? Everyone here had worked hard, so there was no reason she should feel entitled to being placed above them. Still, she felt bad that all of the hard work she put herself through didn’t mean all that much. Her name was at the bottom. But not the bottom bottom.

There was at least that much.

At the bottom was the boy she had met during the opening ceremony: Kalo Dane.

A brow raised on Miieie’s face and her eyes shot back to the top of the list.

At the top was that name again. Kasara Dane. Dane. That was what she thought. Two students at the top and bottom of the list who shared the same family name. Either cousins or siblings, Miieie figured. Not that it was important outside of knowing some neat thing about Kalo, other than he did worse on the entrance exam then Miieie did.

“Huh.”

“Something the matter, Miieie?”

Miieie shook her head and handed the wrinkled paper over to Rel, “I did pretty bad, eheheh.”

“Not as bad as Kalo.” Rel remarked as she read the list, “Geeze.”

“Yep! I’m not a total disgrace to my family name.”

It was a joke, but Miieie still felt regret as she tried laughing off the unfortunate result. Not only had she taken someone’s rightful place as head of the class and caused a whole lot of trouble by accident, she didn’t deserve any of it. She felt off. Part of her thought about returning home to Skilma to sulk, even if it wasn’t a viable option. Why did she have to pick Minerva’s of all academies to choose from? Why couldn’t she have picked Galstion’s in the east or Hariette’s in the west? She should’ve applied to the one Aric went for, but her big stupid brain had decided to be ambitious and stubborn.

All because of the fact that her parents had attended Minerva’s.

“Don’t worry about it, we’re all disgraces to our family name.” Rel quipped with a smirk.

“I am not a disgrace!” Endra snapped.

Rel laughed, “Whatever you say, third place.”

The silver-haired girl glared at her, her cheeks puffed in annoyance.

It was the kind of back-and-forth that made the guilt fade from Miieie’s mind, if for a moment.

Iris yawned, “It’s not important anyway. Our teacher isn’t exactly paying attention to the scores.”

Miieie looked at the blue-haired girl and nodded, “Yeah. That’s true.”

“Well, I fully intend to use it as motivation.” Endra retorted with a ‘hmph’.

“That’s a good idea.”

Endra’s remark did bring up a valid point that Miieie hadn’t really thought about. If Instructor Lamia or anyone else decided to use similar lists for other evaluations and exams, then she could probably do better by her name. She wasn’t sure why the idea of being that low bothered her. People judging her had never really been her problem before, so why was she thinking similarly to Endra? It was a thought she’d have to worry about at another time, though, as evident by the rumbling of her stomach.

“Gosh. I could go for some food. You guys wanna?”

“Yeah, let’s go.”

Rel didn’t seem like she cared too much about going up the ranks. As she tossed the paper aside the four of them moved on from the location and toward the cafeteria.

**

 As the four faded out of sight, a familiar figure approached the wrinkled piece of paper.

“Hm?” The girl paused as she pulled the paper off the ground. “...is this?”

“I knew it.”