Board Thread:Off Topic/@comment-25396609-20150910235150/@comment-25396609-20151018040008

An academy is simply a school, you go and learn, get your degree, and leave. They are most likely tied to a kingdom or academy post-graduation only by personal preference.

Yang's semblance connection to personality is quite simple. Like she said, she IS a thrill seeker, though that is not her sole reason being a huntress it is a large part of her personality. Someone who seeks danger is not afraid of being hurt, hell, they enjoy it to some degree, the adrenaline rush. That said, she is empowered by taking damage because of her desire to face danger.

A persons history is not their entire personality, he is a former criminal, yes, but that is a fairly minor part of it, and you make it quite clear he was never terribly thrilled with a criminal life, so having his semblance be based on stealing anything is not a valid connection to personality.

This next section is mostly my own assumptions, but i tried to make it somewhat logical.

On to the age thing, he really doesn't need to be trained as a hunstman, I personally assume it works on a voluntary registration system, where registered huntsman and huntresses have some degree of police authority, and are simply required to pass skill requirements and display sound judgement. On the other hand, a huntsman who is not licensed in such a way would have more freedom but not be able to do things like take criminals into custody.

As he does not eed to have attended an academy to become licensed as a huntsman, he does not need to have attended school with a bunch of teenagers (which, considering the age he would be attending is a bt on the creepy side, he would be sharing a room with 3 teenagers for four years) he can simply become certified on skill alone without any formal training, similarly to how Blake entered Beacon without formalized training.