Chapter 48 Foils
In one of the areas in the outer circle, a young man with golden hair and noble light followed by another person navigated their way through the island.
Lance Schultz, wearing a cold and irritated expression, walked through the forest before suddenly stopping his steps.
After he stopped, the footsteps following behind him also stopped as well, adding to his unreasonable irritation for the day.
'This man…'
Lance closed his eyes, taking a deep breath. With one swift motion, he swung his spear in a graceful arc behind him.
"...Why are you following ?"
TNG!
Behind him, Rain blocked the spear using the sheathed sword from his waist rather easily, looking at him with a calm and kind smile.
"Is this what they call a friendly greeting? I'm Rain Violetstar, by the way."
However, that profoundly calm and kind smile only fueled more unreasonable irritation to Lance, which he recognized as truly irrational!
Lance couldn't exactly decipher why, but there was sothing about the man that made him instinctively annoyed and irritated.
Restraining his irritation, Lance took back his spear and walked away again.
"I recognize that you're strong, but will you stop following ? I would much prefer to be alone, clown. If there's sothing you want to say, say it."
"Is that why you stopped calling cur earlier? But now, my nickna is commoner… you sure do like your nicknas."
Rain pondered out loud.
"...Last warning. Stay away from my sight."
Lance took a deep breath before moving along. He felt veins bulge on his forehead as he walked away, however, the trailing footsteps behind him didn't disappear at all. It was then he decided he would just ignore it.
However, Rain Violetstar was not in agreent with him at all.
"Where are you going?"
So part of Lance wanted to ignore him, but he thought that would instead make the man's attitude far more annoying.
"Finding the academy entrance."
Lance answered plainly. To his utmost gratitude, that stopped Rain from speaking—but he took that back monts later.
Then, Rain was struck with a realization.
"Lance Schultz… are you part of the Great Noble Schultz family?"
Lance froze for a mont before he continued walking again, as though he heard nothing at all. It was that slight pause that made Rain realize that it was most likely a sensitive topic.
Rain wasn't socially inept, well partly inept, but to his credit—he was perceptive of mood changes and people's mannerisms in general.
After a while, Rain got bored again and asked another question.
"Hm, why do you call people cur? That's quite rude, isn't it?"
"Is that your attempt to provoke a conversation? I would not like a lecture of rudeness to soone that stalks around like a clueless idiot."
"A clueless idiot… tsk, you're too cold and rude. Where did that term co from? With that attitude, you will never have any friends at this academy."
Rain grumbled loudly, shaking his head. However, his words made Lance suddenly stop and narrow his eyes in disdain.
"Who said I was intending to make friends in this academy?"
"You weren't? Then why attend this school in the first place?"
"That's none of your business."
Lance strongly replied, walking away more quickly.
Seeing him walk further away, Rain smiled before following him from a distance.
Truth be told, Rain was rather amused by the man's cold and arrogant personality. But if he said that out loud, he was sure that he would be greeted by the man's striking spear.
As much as possible, he didn't want to antagonize a potential friend or classmate. After all, he swore that he would make new friends and relationships in this academy.
After wandering aimlessly throughout his life, Rain had enough of his aimless bleak way of living and decided to enroll at the academy to put sothing in his colorless life.
"Hey, Lance! Wait for !"
***
After a while, Rain and Lance reached their first impasse.
They discovered a dark, misty cave below a mountain slope.
It was a massive cave, tall and wide, seemingly containing endless darkness while soft, elusive fog continued to flow out and in throughout its surroundings.
Lance squinted his eyes, looking through the cave in confusion.
"What's this mist… it seems strange…"
"Oh, it's an ignis fatuus fog. A deceptive fog that can make one who cos in contact experience hallucinations and lose their sense of direction."
However, Rain imdiately recognized it with his deep knowledge. When mana and dungeons arrived in the world, living beings weren't the only ones affected by the change.
Similarly, the terrains and environnt were also affected by the wondrous aspect of mana, bringing forth magical and strange occurrences in nature.
One such example was the Ignis fatuus fog, a strange fog that emits extre hallucinogens that can make an ordinary person turn insane with the slightest contact.
Hearing his words, Lance his eyes twitched.
"...I didn't ask, you know."
"It's alright, I just accidentally blurted it out loud."
Rain smiled and shook his head. However, the next mont, his eyes suddenly widened in surprise while staring at the mist.
Inside the cave, a faint silhouette suddenly outlined.
It was a massive shadow, seemingly that of a large dragon with two serpentine wings. It flew around the elusive fog for quite so ti before going deeper into the cave.
Seeing that, Lance's frown intensified.
"What was that?"
"A wyvern."
Rain smiled bitterly.
"More accurately, a dream wyvern. They're beast emperors, mutated monsters with low C-rank strength. It's best if we avoid it, let's take a detour."
Above beast kings were beast emperors, mutated beasts that were in another class on their own. It seed the rumor was true, the academy contained beast emperors on its island.
Rain shook his head. However, he soon realized that there was sothing wrong. He looked beside him and saw that Lance was gone.
However, he was sure that this wasn't an illusion caused by the Ignis fatuus fog, after all, he was immune to ntal attacks or psyche interferences.
Rain turned to look at the fog for a mont, internally deciding whether to go or not. He clenched his jaw before letting out a long sigh.
Then, he too entered the Ignis Fatuus cave fog.
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