INSIGNIAS: THE LUX SIGNIFER ACADEMY

It will be the Christmas season soon. This was Skhy’s first thought when he saw the falling flakes of snow. He stood in front of a huge glass window in the coffee shop located in the main building. The window faced toward the entrance of the Lux Signifer Academy. The coliseum, legionnaires’ office, grass, and everything he saw was covered with snow. He took a seat on the soft sofa chair beside the window without taking his eyes off the snow. For the first time after he arrived in the academy, he felt everything around him moving in slow motion. This month marked the second death anniversary of his parents. He visited their house weeks before. He expected the worse but the abandoned house still stood majestically. He went inside and found everything untouched. There were a lot of questions in his mind but he was worried about the people he left behind to fight. According to the Premier, they were sent back to their homes. Where did my mom’s sister go?

He knew that unmasking the secrets of the academy will be stressful and will ignite anger and fear but once he knew the truths, something inside of him was slowly being eaten. Trust… His team hadn’t met up with Aubree, Aurora, Ellie, and Savvier. He chose to face them himself. Aurora was suspicious but Skhy told them that he didn’t want to tire them. Besides, Hanne and Nate were still recuperating. Aubree was still bubbly and nice. The people closest to you might be your greatest enemies… He wondered if his allies knew about Aubree. Karl and Steve told him to wait. Until when?

“Coffee?” He looked up upon hearing her voice. She was holding a cup of hot coffee and an iced coffee.

“Thanks,” he said with a smile. Tessa set down the glasses on the coffee table then sat down. He eyed the iced coffee in front of her.

“Why do drink cold coffee in winter?” he asked with a grin.

“Hmm I just like it,” she replied then took a sip. Silence enveloped them as they drank. If it was up to Skhy, he would start working and reading but Tessa told him to rest and drink something first. He wondered if she knew about the death anniversary but he hadn’t told anyone. Faz knew but he wouldn’t tell anyone. Tessa, Nate, and Lei had been telling him to rest but he felt like he’d been resting all this time. He felt like he hasn’t done enough to solve anything.

Lei’s name made him remember her confession. Or was it really a confession? Maybe she was just saying that she cares for him like a friend. But he vividly remembered her flushed face and green orbs staring at him. It was as if Carol was still alive but it wasn’t him she was talking to.

“Ice…” He needed to talk to Lei later. But…what should I say?

“What? Are you ok?” He looked up and saw Tessa’s concerned expression. Skhy nodded. He sipped the last of his coffee.

“Let’s go.” Tessa nodded. They left the small empty coffee shop and went upstairs to a secluded area in the Genesis. Students don’t usually stay in this area because it’s far from the shelves. They chose a table near a glass window. He grabbed the map and his dad’s book in his backpack then looked around. He placed the map on the table and opened the book where the strange writing is. There were only a few sentences on each page. He turned to the last page where there was a picture of concentric circles and a table of letters. Skhy placed the book on the map.

“I think these are instructions on how to decode,” he said. Tessa scanned the page before nodding.

“But the instructions are also encrypted.” Right. When he heard the incoming footsteps, he immediately closed the book and rolled the map. He quickly took a seat.

“Hey!” Skhy breathed a sigh of relief when he heard Clyne’s voice. He noticed the books they were holding.

“There are a lot,” Aria revealed. “We took the one with general information.” They slowly put the three books on the table.

“Thank you.” She took a seat beside Tessa and Clyne hesitantly sat next to Skhy. He unrolled the map and opened the Abecedarians again while the three went through the books from the library.

“Everything is encrypted,” Skhy said.

“Is this the end?” Aria asked.

“Don’t be pessimistic,” Clyne complained.

“I’m being realistic.”

Skhy stared at the three concentric circles. Each letter represents two letters. The inner-circle was labelled with a symbol that looked like an inverted V (^). The middle circle with the ‘greater than’ (>) sign. The outer circle with V. He turned to the map. The sets of letters were written in three lines. Each line started with a symbol, (>), (^), and (V), respectively. He turned to the table of letters. It had 35 columns and rows. The alphabet and nine symbols…

“I don’t know if this will help, but I talked to the librarian,” Clyne said. Skhy glanced at him but kept his attention to the ciphers.

“He said when using old ciphers, the last line is the first line.” Start from the bottom…

“It might help us. Thanks, Clyne,” Tessa said.

“Did you find anything?” Aria asked. Skhy nodded.

“To decode the writings on the page, we need to use the table encrypting the plaintext. As for the writings on the map, this disc,” he explained.

“The table…it looks like a Vigenere.” Tessa pointed to a page on the book she is holding. “Columns for plaintexts and rows for keys.” Skhy nodded in agreement.

“Oh! The circle looks like this one,” Clyne exclaimed while showing them a picture of three concentric circles with numbers in the middle.

“Do you think they work the same way?” Aria asked.

“Let’s find out.” Skhy realized that he had been saying the phrase a lot for the past months. How many secrets do we need to uncover?

For an hour, the four students tried to decode the writings in the Abecedarians. It took a while to find the keys for the plaintexts. They were written on the back of the page. Using the Vignere table, they wrote letters at the intersections of the two. There were five pages. Skhy worked with the first two while the others did the rest. On the first page and its back were the letters:

A R E S N I G K O U N Y E I D N R N

K H C Y F R O

S U M M U S H I E L O T C E

M N D B B L H E U Z P G N Z A J X N

L N M F N X P

O M B W T M I G H T F Y M L

After he decoded the first page, the final letters didn’t make sense. But when Skhy remembered what Clyne said earlier, he wrote everything backward. The four students stared at the decoded text with confusion. But it was clear that they found another mystery.

“They are instructions,” Aria said. “But not the instructions we’re expecting.” Skhy didn’t know the relevance of the writings to his mission to find and train the Seven. He wasn’t sure if they will help him uncover the secrets of Lux Signifer Academy and the Eschaton war.

“Ground O,” Clyne read. “What is that? And there’s a portal? Going to where?”

“Hold your horses,” Aria replied.

“Maybe Ground Zero?” Tessa suggested. Ground Zero… Where did I hear that before? He reread the hidden message. Did dad want me to see this?

“Let’s finish decoding everything first.” The three settled down on their seats and continued their work. The second page had more lines than the first ones. He finished within five minutes.

“I’m done,” Tessa said. Clyne and Aria also finished decoding. Skhy read everything. Mountains. Darkness. Portal. Hidden. Seven.

“It mentioned the Seven,” Tessa said.

“What does A.N. mean?” Clyne asked. Prepare. It was written before the initials. He raked his mind for a hidden meaning.

“We need to prepare for the next battle.”

“What?” Tessa asked. Skhy stared into space. Those were his dad’s words.

“Prepare. April Nine.” His wide widened. He was right. It’s near.

“Are you saying that the next fight will be three months from now?” Aria asked. He might be wrong but he didn’t want to brush the idea aside.

“It’s a possibility,” he responded. Tessa’s face was masked with horror but she quickly shook it away. Skhy wanted to comfort her but she spoke.

“The M. It’s been mentioned several times.”

“Yeah. Do you think it’s a name of a person?” Clyne asked. “Or a thing?”

“No. A place,” Aria replied. She pointed to the unfamiliar piece of land in the southern part of the country on the map.

“The Mort,” Skhy read. “Instructions on how to get there.”

“What are we going to do with this information?” Tessa asked. Skhy rested his back on the back of the chair. His shoulders ached and he felt like he was carrying something heavy on his shoulders.

“The Consortium and the spies are holding on it so the place must be important to them,” he started. “After Lei and the others find anything on the Cherubea, I might have to check the place.”

“Alone?” Tessa asked with a deep frown.

“You won’t go there alone,” Clyne said. “We can’t let you own the spotlight.” Skhy chuckled. He decided to talk to Hunter about an expedition. And him being a Regali.

“Why are you looking into the Premier’s secret garden?” Aria asked. He forgot to mention it yesterday.

“It belongs to the Consortium. I don’t think the Premier knew about it.” At first, he didn’t think about it but his intel told him that there’s only one kind of plant inside. Every week, they were being harvested and transported somewhere.

“Is the Premier really an innocent bystander?” Aria asked. He, too, had a doubt. Whether he is or isn’t, Skhy didn’t intend to trust his life and his team’s life to someone in the academy, even his allies. Skhy didn’t answer her but based on her satisfied smile, she understood what’s going in his mind.

“Alright. Let’s decode the writings on the map then plan our next step.”