For the next thirty minutes or so, Sylvester didn’t get any closer to successfully do a single chain cast, unable to maintain his mana and causing the spell to crash and dematerialize. It was a valiant effort, but in the end it amounted to nothing.

It is only thanks to capacity refresh that he was able to continually try and try again with not much blowback, but it was about as effective as trying to break a brick wall with a rubber hammer.

“Damn it!” Sylvester shouted inwardly in frustration.

“There has to be a trick here I can do, I just need to figure it out.” He thought to himself as he prepared to go for another attempt. Suddenly Professor Bridget caught everyone’s attention.

“Now class, this all we’re going to be doing for today but we will be discussing more intricacies about the theories surrounding this technique in the next few classes.” She declared to which the room resounded with a collective groan.

The class had ended and all Sylvester felt was frustration mixed with a slight sense of delight in his circumstances.

“Man I suck at chain casting.” He thought to himself.

“Growing pains are literally quite the pain huh?” He joked to himself as he tried to put his current failure into perspective. This was only the third day, hell it’s the first day proper and there’s probably more bumps lying ahead.

After they were dismissed by Bridget, Sylvester decided to head to the grocery to buy some essentials and hopefully some cheaper food he can cook in an emergency.

He is not looking forward to this, after all he never really learned to cook anything more than frying an egg or chicken. Sadly he has to suck it all up and hope for the best.

“Next week for sure, I’ll do better with managing my money.” He declared to himself in a rather hopeless delusion as he headed towards the inevitable doom.

Using the ID GPS once again, he quickly found the grocery store. It was tucked away in a complex of small modern looking structures, resembling an open mall of sorts. On the way he also spotted a few recreational spots like a basketball court and even a gym.

Luckily for Sylvester, it doesn’t seem like a lot of people are out at the moment so the place wasn’t packed. Moving in he went ahead and looked for the items he wanted.

“So, canned goods would be my best bet for now and maybe some instant noodles.” He lamented over his next few meals.

“Uuggh, better suck it up then and just work with it. Next week for sure, next week for sure.” He continued.

Taking a grocery basket he then brought back with him some assorted canned goods and one pack of instant noodles. As for other essentials he bought some cheap deodorant and a new tube of toothpaste.

“Damn, this really isn’t nutritious.” He said begrudgingly as he dragged his feet towards the cashier.

There were no lines forming on any of the available counters so Sylvester didn’t really spend much time at the cashier. He then noticed that all of the staff working at the grocery were normal people and not mages.

His mind started to ponder why there seems to be quite the presence of none mage personnel at the academy. He thought it kind of defeated the purpose of some hidden and secretive academy after all.

“Then again, we do have internet connection. Meh what do I know?”

As he was busy getting lost in his own thoughts, the voice of the cashier pulled him back to the real world.

“That would be a total of 250 credits. Your card please.” The polite lady manning the cashier said in a light tone.

“Wha- Ah okay okay wait.” Sylvester was out of it for a short moment until he finally regained his senses. He then took out the ID from his pocket and handed it over to the lady. The cashier lady has already packed his purchase inside a paper bag whilst he was deep in thought.

As she swiped it into the machine like a credit card, it was as if Sylvester could physically feel the “money” he was losing.

The cashier handed the card back and thanked him, a gesture he returned.

Sylvester then went back to his dorm to pass the time, but mostly so he could steer away from the temptation of buying food outside.

Upon arriving he greeted the twins at the entrance and went up to his room. He then lazily placed the items on top of the table at the living room area and then went inside the sleeping quarters. Taking off his shoes, Sylvester walked towards the cabinet to take out the school’s rule book.

“Might as well, since my next class is at 1 PM anyways and it’s what? like 10:30?” He thought to himself as he plopped down to his bed.

Sylvester continued to read the book, lost in its pages, until he felt his stomach all tingly.

“Aha, it seems the need to eat is here. Thankfully I am fully prepared!” He inwardly declared as he got up and moved outside.

Checking on the time through his phone he now knew that it was about 11:45 AM, just about the right time to cook up lunch. A sad lunch that involves boiling noodles and pouring seasonings over it.

“Just power through it woo! Next week for sure, next week for sure!” He once again chanted, looking for a pot large enough to boil water on when suddenly he heard a strange noise.

His head perked up and looked back towards the source of the noise. From where he was it sounded like a muffled ringtone that sounded like a crowd chanting some words and then clapping a few times.

Sylvester then looked at his phone and was greeted by a silent black screen.

“It seems that whatever that is is coming from the sleeping quarte- oh no.” As he ascertained the sound’s source, a realization dawned on him.

As he drew closer to the source of the strange sound, the muffled crowd chants became clearer and clearer and soon they screamed a name Sylvester was all too familiar with.

“INANIS! *CLAP CLAP* ORBIS! *CLAP CLAP*” The voices chanted.

“Don’t tell me it’s the ID again?” He questioned in vain as he headed inside and sure enough, the loud cheering crowd came from the ID card that was ringing like a phone and vibrating like one too.

“Really? Why did I even bring my phone here?” Sylvester lamented as he took the ID and inspected it.

Looking at it closely it now showed a picture of a man and two buttons underneath it simulating the screen you would find on a smartphone. The person who was calling Sylvester was revealed to be-

“Artian? Oh no please no.” Sylvester began to panic as he pressed the button to answer the call. He then put the ID on his ear.

“Hello?” Sylvester initiated.

“Yo Sylvester, Artian here.” The voice from the other side of the line replied.

“Hello there, what’s up? Didn’t know this ID thing has a calling function.” Sylvester tried to stall.

“Yeah, this thing is pretty rad. Speaking of which, Estelle asked if you would like to go and eat lunch with us?” Artian asked the dread question.

In comes the thing Sylvester feared the most right now. Peer pressure.

With those words entering Sylvester’s ears his mind quickly went into overdrive weighing the pros and cons of his next possible moves.

“Okay okay let’s think this through first.” He started deliberating in his head.

“If I eat here, all alone, I can and will save some credits. I already bought some food anyway, albeit not the tastiest ones.” He started with the option of saying no.

“But if I say yes, I will only spend precious credits.” He then paused.

“Then again, it would be the best idea to just go with this first since I don’t have any people I can possibly call friends aside from these two. Building up future allies is also something I need to do.” Sylvester finished his thought.

“Plus if I decline, I’ll make myself look like an asshole since the two of them are friendly enough to invite someone that’s merely an acquaintance. I ain’t turning down a hand of friendship.” With that his decision was made.

“Okay I’ll go where you guys at?” Sylvester then immediately replied to Artian.

“Ah sweet, we haven’t really chosen where to eat so let’s meet up near the food market and we can go exploring together.” Artian replied.

“Okay, I’ll see you there.” Sylvester agreed and hung up the ID, and for a moment he was frozen in place.

“It’s okay!” He suddenly declared.

“THE CREDITS WILL REFRESH AT SUNDAY 12AM! IT’S OKAY, THIS IS FINE!” Sylvester told himself in a rather loud voice, trying really hard to convince himself that everything is fine.

Sylvester once again stepped outside and went down towards the first floor, greeted the twins at the front desk and went his way.

Soon he met up with the pair in front of the food market. They exchanged a few pleasantries and hellos before looking for a place to eat.

After a few minutes of searching the trio ended up eating at the grilled skewer’s place that also sold those deep fried dumplings.

This wasn’t the plan but because Estelle and Artian bickered over where to eat constantly trying to make one or the other choose where to go by constantly deflecting the question back towards the sender, Sylvester was forced to step in and made sure they went to eat somewhere cheap.

Since all three of them chose the same afternoon class there was really no need to split up once they were done with their meal.

It was only 12:40PM when they arrived, so they didn’t really expect anyone to be there, but just as Sylvester’s experienced earlier, someone already beat them to the punch.

Upon opening the door to the room, the trio saw the familiar figure of a woman staring out into the window once again.

Sitting on the second to the last row of seats near the back, Rossa with her eyes blanky looking out as if in a trance. It looks like all four of them would be in the same class this time.

Estelle then nonchalantly approached Rossa.

“Hello roomie!” She exclaimed, trying to grab Rossa’s attention.

The crimson eyed woman then turned her attention towards the voice and simply nodded in return, not even bothering to mutter a word. Her eyes then shifted towards the two men that followed behind Estelle for a short while before returning back to the cheerful lady who initiated the conversation.

“MInd if I sit here?” Estelle politely asked and after a short silence, Rossa replied.

“Do as you wish.”

Estelle then happily took her spot as Artian and Sylvester went to the row behind the two ladies, with Sylvester sitting next to the window once again.

Soon the students started trickling in as the time drew near, but unlike Sylvester’s morning class, the professor arrived on time.

With a loud bang the doors of the lecture hall opened and a bronze skinned man with a dragon tatoo on his face walked in with a serious expression. However despite the scary auro that radiated from him, it was all cancelled out by his green explorer attire and sandals.

He then glanced over the entire class before speaking.

“Good day to all of you!” He shouted. “You can call me Professor Paleo X! And I welcome you all to MageoPaleoArcheology 101!”