Trails that lead to nowhere

Welcome dear students

When the darkness faded Elise found herself in a giant brightly lit room full of people. Her hand was still holding Cerelia's who was now looking at the others smiling. The hall had countless paintings of people who were in fact flying around and a pair of golden stairs who led to a shocking lightning gate. Nobody seemed intrigued that two fourteen years old girls just appeared from thin air. They looked quite used to it.

There were teens their age until seventeen and some adults who were chatting happily. There were over two hundred students and about twenty adults. Each of them had something colorful on their right cheek like a sticker. Most of them were dressed in fancy 18th century clothes like Elise but some looked casual. She finally left Cerelia's hand and wandered around

"Welcome to Crystalinta International School. The school of Power mastering and Special magic learning."

"This is so awesome! To be honest with you was suspecting you were kidnapping me and if you really did that then thank you."

Cerelia left a chuckle out and started answering the questions of the girl.

"Well Crystalinta is thousand years old. It was created by people of your world who had special abilities. They found the Lightning and opened the door only to find a magnificent magical world to build their future safe from the judging eyes of the others. They built the school to learn the next generation magic and how to control their Powers. The first principals were Oralline Scanty, Solnir Alnary, Kathrin Mirc and Jamie Karvin, the big four."

"Why does everyone have a sticker on their their cheeks?"

"Sticker? Oh no no no. These aren't stickers." Said Cerelia pointing at her cheek which had two squares looking like flags. "These show where you are from and which branch you belong to. Like my country is Italy and I am from The Central Branch. There are five Branches: The North Branch, The South Branch, The East Branch, The West Branch and The Central Branch. Each Branch has its own special abilities and subjects. The sorting between them is made by your nationality. The Europeans are in The Central Branch, the Americans are in the North Branch, Africans in the South one, Asians in the East one and the small islanders on the West one."

"How about me? Which Branch and country am I?" asked Elise pointing at her cheek.

"You are France and Central Branch." Said the other smiling

"Great!" chirped the French "So this show where I am from? Like I am French."

"Not meant. I am not from Earth and I still have a country. The flag shows your roots. Looks like I have pizza addicts roots."

"Wait what does it mean you are not from Earth? Where are you from? Mars?"

"I am from Aliterra the world outside these walls."

"Aliterra?"

"It is like another version of Earth but a bit smaller and much more magical."

"Cool!"

"Pathetic. Such excitement for such a small thing. It is just school after all." Said a cold and slow voice behind them.

They turned only to meet a girl around their age dressed simply with dark night hair tied in a high ponytail and with an ocean blue eye. The other eye was a dark blue iris and the rest black. She had a pale white skin and looked pretty threating.

"Who are you?" asked Elise clearly annoyed crossing her arms.

"My name is Meissa Black. I come from The North Kingdom and apparently I am a Russian in The Central Branch. Worst fortune but what can I do?" she answered and pointed at her cheek with the two flags on it. "Long time no see Cerelia. What brings you back to school Miss Famous?"