To cultivate the finest young wizards, in addition to the School Hunting Meet held every October, First University also conducted two university-wide hunting events.
One was the Winter Hunt held each December, while the other was the Spring Hunt held around April.
Both hunting events were actually centered on the same target: the boundless Silent Forest surrounding the First University Campus.
At the end of winter and the beginning of spring each year, hungry Magical Creatures from the Silent Forest would surge out and strike the school's territories, including Beta Town, in search of food and other ways out—what was commonly known as the Silent Black Tide.
First University held the Winter Hunt because, before hibernating, many Magical Creatures expanded their hunting grounds to stockpile energy, encroaching upon First University's territory and even harming students out on practical exercises. Thus, the school regularly held the Winter Hunt to stop those monsters that had slipped out from the depths of the forest to forage from wreaking havoc. Its range was mainly concentrated along the outskirts of the Silent Forest and both banks of the Silent River flowing around the school.
As for the Spring Hunt, the reason was similar. Every year after the Silent Black Tide, most of the Magical Creatures that had poured out of the Black Forest would recede with the "tide," but many remained in the areas ravaged by the Black Tide for one reason or another. The purpose of First University's Spring Hunt was to "clean up," sweeping the forest clean again so students could carry out practical activities more conveniently.
In short, both the Winter Hunt and the Spring Hunt largely revolved around the Silent Black Tide. During the 2008–2009 academic year, an early Silent Tideback had relieved some of the pressure before the official Black