“You’re here.”-Rachel said with a smile as I get to the site we usually train on.

“Yeah. Are you ready? I want to advance as much as I can with you.”-I said to her while putting my stuff on the floor, except for my sword.

“Wait…”-She said before turning to look between her stuff and picking some decorative-paper stuff. “Here, this is what I promised earlier.”-She said with a smile while giving me the package.

“Mm?”-I looked at it. “Oh, right! I forgot… Sorry for that, and thanks.”-I said while leaving the sword and walking to pick the gift.

“No problem, you must have a lot of things on your mind.”-She said without changing the expression on her face. “Still, I hope you like it.”-She gave it to me.

“I still think you didn’t have to do this. The money was more than enough for me.”-I said while receiving the gift. “Pfft…”-I almost dropped it and start laughing.

“Wh-what? Is something wrong with it!?”-Rachel asks really flustered.

“No… Nothing, it’s just that… Well, it took me by surprise, that’s all.”

“Huh? I don’t understand what do you mean…”-She said.

“The package. I wouldn’t take you for one to pick this kind of design, that’s all.”-I said while showing her the package.

It was colorful, with little smiling animal characters, from dogs to cats, to even ducks. And they all had something in common, they were cutely designed.

“I-it’s there a problem with it…?”-She slightly averted her eyes.

“Mm? No, not really, it’s just that you’re really serious in your personal interactions, I guessed you would be the same with other stuff, but between this and the way you text, I guess it’s just the way you interact with others that has that seriousness ingrained to it.”

“…”-She looks down, not answering. “Is it something bad…?”-She just asked.

“Not particularly. I mean, everybody has their perks, both good and bad ones, and even that’s not something sure, it all depends on who you ask.”-I said, to which she turned to look at me. “Either way, you shouldn’t worry about what you look like in other people’s eyes. You better worry about feeling good with yourself.”-I shrugged.

“…”-She looked at me without saying anything.

“*kuhum* Well, that’s not something that I should meddle in, either way. So… About the gift… Can I open it?”-I asked her while lifting the package.

“Huh? Ah, yes! Sure, please do so.”-She said while gesturing to me with her hands.

After that, I opened the package with care, trying not to break the paper. And from it, I took a long, black coat with crimson lines all around it.

“Mm?”-I frowned while looking at it.

“Is there… A problem? You don’t like it?”-She asked me with a little worried tone on her voice.

“No, it’s not that. It’s the contrary. I’m surprised by how well it goes with me. I really like it.”-I say while extending the coat. It’s a hooded long-coat, completely obsidian black, with details made in crimson red, and what’s better. It’s not just any coat.

[Royal Black Knight’s Coat]

[A coat created by English Royal Court’s master craftsman, patched with refined parts of artifacts to increase its defense.]

[Partial Artifact]

[Pinnacle-grade temperature’s control. Intermediate-grade Defense. Camouflage functionality. Face distortion functionality (when the hood is used). Change functionality: Coat ↔ Jacket.]

“Wow… This isn’t just some coat…”-I look at it.

{If I’m not mistaken, Hajin’s shouldn’t be like this one… Which is good, I don’t want to go wearing what he’s wearing. Also, this should be even better, I guess that being her teacher does give some benefits, and just in time.}-I thought to myself.

“Yes. As I said before, defensive equipment is England’s pride.”-Rachel said with a smile, being proud of her own country.

{I guess she isn’t a princess just in title, huh.}-I smirk.

“Wh-what?”-She asks while getting a slight shade of red on her cheeks.

“Nothing, really.”-I keep my smirk. “It’s just that I’ve been able to see a lot of faces from you tonight, usually it’s just a smile or two, but you’ve changed your expression quite a bit since I got here.”

“…”-She averted her eyes, while the shade of red slightly intensified. “That’s not true…”

“Oh well, if you say so.”-I said while taking out my black sweat jacket

“H-huh!?”-Which surprised Rachel. “W-what are you doing, Cristopher-ssi!?”

“Mm? Changing my clothes, why? It’s just the jacket. I told you, I really liked this one.”-I said while dropping the sweat jacket to the floor.

“…”-She just tried to evade looking at me, which was weird, as I was using a white t-shirt, so it’s not like I had my torso naked. It was at that moment that she seemed to notice the long tattoo sleeve on my right arm, and looked at it quite intently, but I chose to ignore that gaze.

“Love it.”-I said as I looked at my new coat. “I must say… You truly knew how to choose the design and color.”

“It’s… Nothing, really, England Royal Court’s master craftsman was the one to do all the job and designing, I just gave him a few pointers…”-She said, still looking at my right arm that was covered by the coat now.

{Oh, right. She hasn’t seen that yet, though, I didn’t know it was weird, I mean… Tattoos should be kind of normal here, right?}-I thought to myself while snapping my fingers at her. “So, shall we begin? While the night is still young, I do have some stuff to do after this.”-I said while smiling, picking up my sweat jacket and going towards my stuff, where I exchanged the jacket for my sword.

Once I turned around, I actually found Rachel with a little smile and her rapier ready to spar.

“Well, it has been some time, right?”-I stretched my arms and neck. “Let’s see how you fare now.”

“Yes…”-She said before stopping for a bit. “Master…”-She smiled deeper at me.

“Pfft… That sounds funny coming from you. Come on. You’re still really far away to actually calling me master.”-I smirked while taking the first step against her, starting our spar.

***

“Huff… Huff… Huff… Huff… Huff…”-Rachel was on the floor out of breath.

“You did well.”-I said, not trying to be sarcastic.

“Huff… Huff… Huff… I… Couldn’t… Touch you…”-She said while panting.

“Oh, well, it’s not like you could do that before, right?”-I shrugged. “Still, you hold out pretty well this time. The last time record was six minutes a fight, today you actually went all the way towards 8 minutes. That’s a whole 2 minutes increase per fight. I do think you did well.”- I went towards her, and sat right behind her, waiting for her to recover while looking at a few things on my smartwatch.

“Huff… Thanks…”-She just said that while panting.

After a little while, she caught her breath, and we could start with the Natural Energy use.

“One.”-I said, while she took a deep breath. This time I focused so I could do three cycles before she had to get it out. “Two. Well done. It seems like you really practiced as I told you. Your mana, and even your body, is almost ready to accept the Natural Energy, I thought you would need one more week, but if we keep going like this, at the end of the week you’ll be ready.”

“Really?”-She turned to me with a surprised face.

“Yes. And that leaves you two whole weeks of training so I can help you contract your first spirit and learn how to use this energy with its help. That way you won’t have to actually use that silly way of using Natural Energy they have here. Well… It’s not really bad per se… But for someone like you who’s been training in melee combat all her life, it’s just not suitable. Now focus, I’ll start again. One.”-I said while starting the breathing technique.

Sadly, we still have a time limit, as her body wasn’t completely adapted to it, and I actually had to go train myself and train with Olivia.

{Man… Training three peoples is a pain… Why did I accept it…? I’m glad that I only have to help Hajin with recovery and a few pointers, or I wouldn’t see the end of the day.}-I thought to myself while helping Rachel.

After we finished, I finally stood up, getting ready to go pick up my stuff and go to the training center, as I have a little more than 15 minutes.

“Well, tomorrow let’s try to do it a little earlier… Also, this Friday the hunting club is having a staying-over trip to Norway, so I guess we’ll have to program our training to the morning before classes… That will be slightly hard, I guess… So, what do you say? May we left it to early that day, or do you have another idea?”

“Can’t we leave it to Saturday’s night?”-She asks.

“No, I’ll be doing something on Saturday, and also on Sunday, so I have the weekend a little tight. It’s either really early on Friday, or leave it until Monday… At much, I think that we could do it on Sunday night, at 8 or 9, maybe 10:00 PM, more or less, but I wouldn’t be too sure of it.”-I say. “So, you tell me.”

“… I won’t have problems with Friday morning.”-She said after thinking for a little bit.

“Are you sure? You would have to wake up really early. I have no problem with it, but we do have classes after that.”

“Yes… I’m sure. That way I’ll have more time to adjust to the feeling for our training on Monday.”-So she says.

“Great.”-I smile at her. “Well, I’ll be going. See you! And, once again, thanks for the gift. I really liked it.”-I left the place.

“Thank to you for all your help, Cristopher-ssi.”-She said behind me.

After that, I just did as usual, went to train myself and Olivia, while also helping Hajin with recovery and giving him a few pointers, he’s been increasing his physical stats really fast lately, it must be thanks to the constant hunting and the training he’s been doing both in the morning and at night.

All the week was pretty much the same, training in the morning, going to classes, then training with Rachel, and finally training myself and Olivia at night almost at midnight. It was pretty much a routine, and with that routine, I spent the whole week prior to my Dungeon expedition.

“The finals are coming up in four weeks.”-Said Kim Soohyuk after our magic class with the prick on Friday afternoon. “Written exams would be the same, but combat exams will be slightly different.”-He said before smiling.

In four weeks, we are supposed to start our final exams, in which we’ll be tested for everything we’ve done this semester. And as he said, the combat exam will be totally different, as we would be sent towards some island full of monster, where we’ll go through some kind of survival exam within a controlled environment with high-intermediate ranked heroes and even some high ranked heroes.

“Everything you’ve learned until now will be tested in a single exam.”-He then smirked. “You don’t have to worry about safety. High-intermediate rank and high-rank Heroes will be closely watching you from the shadows.”

{It’s that supposed to intimidate us?}-I thought to myself.

“Now, go back and have fun. I’ll see you on Monday.”

 After his words, we all prepared to leave the class.

“Hey, is your practice going well?”-Standing beside Hajin, Chae Nayun started talking. “You didn’t forget, right? Our bet’s next week.”-She smirked at him.

“I’m leaving, see you later dude.”-I said to Hajin while standing up, not before looking at Rachel, who had a slightly tired face.

This morning we met at 5:00 AM, giving us enough time to train and even change clothes before going to classes. Today, she finally adapted completely to Natural Energy, meaning that her body now is able to tolerate the flow of said energy, and even accumulate it for small periods of time, though, I’m not teaching her Sage Mode for the moments, I don’t even know if I will teach her that.

“Wait, dude, what’s the hurry for?”-Hajin told me, before also standing up and turning to Chae Nayun. “No, I didn’t practice at all.”-He said then.

“…What?”-She just asked, as if not understanding what he said.

“I can win without practice.”-He said while smirking.

Meanwhile, I just started to walk towards the backdoor, leaving them behind, with Hajin following me a little after answering her.

“…Hey! Grr… This guy!”-Behind us, still inside the room, Chae Nayun was grumbling at Hajin. Also, I couldn’t help but notice that someone was giving me quite a glare. Before exiting the room, I turned to look at him, Shin Jonghak.

“…”-I just furrowed my browns at him. To which his glare intensified slightly. Not like I cared, as I just walked out of the room.

While walking towards our dorms, I asked Hajin.

“Why did you make that weird leaving comedy skit with her?”

“Mm? What do you mean?”-He asked.

“We’ll be seeing her today… Remember? The hunting club’s having an overnight trip…”

“…”-He opened his mouth. “I forgot…”

“Pfft… Good luck seeing her again.”

***

That night, we all went towards a few cabins in some mountain in Norway, where, as usual, we got sorted into pairs, with Chae Nayun ending up with Kim Hajin, while I ended up paired with someone that I actually knew.

This overnight outing would be to celebrate the restitution of the club after the incident involving Sven. The event of the trip would be a treasure hunt, with multiple prizes, from game consoles to some stuff, not like I actually care much from the prizes, I do think more about the place itself.

{Norway’s always a beautiful place to visit. Well, at least the natural parts of it.}-I thought while walking through the snowy mountain with my coat. It was approximately 6:00 PM here at Norway, but it was 2:00 AM back in Korea if my math weren’t wrong.

“H-hey… W-won’t w-we… Go hunt f-for, tr-treasures…?”-A somewhat nervous Lee Ha-Yun asked me.

“Mm? Why are you stuttering?”-I ask while turning to look at her.

“Wh-What!? I-I-I-I’m not st-stu-stuttering… Wh-why d-do you s-say th-that!?”-She got even more nervous while answering.

“…”-I frown at her, making her flinch. “You already know me. Why would you be acting like this?”

“…”-She looked away, as if not wanting to answer, with sweat coming down from her forehead.

{Seriously… I didn’t act that bad…}-I thought to myself.

“Look… You already know me, right? I won’t do anything to you, what’s there to be scare of? I may have acted a little bit over the line back in the combat exams, but that’s because that guy deserved it. Nothing more, nothing less.”-I said, trying to get her to calm down. “So… What do you say? Will you stop acting like that? Pinky?”

“I’m not called Pinky!!!! My name’s Lee Ha-Yun!!!”-She shouted back at me.

“Look at that! Now you’re back to the same Pinky I knew off. Well, let’s go. I wasn’t thinking about hunting for some treasure, but if you wish to.”-I shrugged while leading the way to someplace where I already found a treasure.

“Stop it with that name!”-She shouted while following me.

“By the way, why didn’t I see you on the day of Sven’s accident?”

“I had some stuff to do… I couldn’t attend that day.”-She said while frowning slightly. “And you? Why didn’t you come to orientation?”

“Oh, some personal business I had to take care of, couldn’t get there.”

“Um… Alright…”-She just shrugged.

After that, we went our way towards the place I sensed the treasure, and just as I thought, it was hidden inside a really small cave, which seemed more like some animal’s burrow, which was actually hidden by a lot of snow and some weird plants I haven’t seen before.

“There it is.”-I said while pointing to the small cave.

“Are you sure? I don’t see anything…”

“Don’t you remember that I have good eyes? There’s a prize in there.”-I answered her.

“Oh… Right! I forgot… Well, I’m going in!”-She said before taking her ax and starting to cut through the plants, crawling inside the small cave, and taking out the prize.

“Mm? What’s that?”-I asked.

“… It’s like some gaming console… I don’t know. I’m not a fan of gaming…”-She said while shrugging with a big box in her hands and a flag.

“Either way, it’s yours.”

“Huh? But you found it!”-She said.

“Yeah, I did, but you took it out. And I actually don’t have too much time to play games these days, so it’s better if you take it.”-I said, which wasn’t actually false.

“Oh, well, okay…”-She just said. “So, do we keep looking around? Maybe we can find something else.”

“Sure, I don’t have a problem with it.”

After that, we went around the mountain, but couldn’t find anything more until the time we had to go back to the cabins.

…

“Wow, you got the first-place flag!? I’m jealous!”-The club leader said to Hajin once he made it back to the cabins. After all, these gifts weren’t given by him, but by actually active heroes.

The rest of the members also gave him some looks of envy.

{Right… The first prize was the number of the hero Yun Seung-Ah and a promise of help from her. That sure would be worth a lot for the other cadets.}-I thought to myself.

“Well, now let’s eat!”-The club leader said while pointing towards some tables and a grill, it was a barbecue party next.

The guys started the grill and put some meat on it, but Hajin just frowned at them before going closer.

“I’ll handle the grilling. You guys can rest.”-He said.

“… You’re different than what the rumors say, huh…”-An upperclassman from the club said to Hajin before giving him the grilling tongues.

“So, you know how to grill?”-I ask him while sitting close to the grill in a small cut trunk after the upperclassman went away to the rest of the group. With a beer in my hand, thankfully, they actually let me drink here, so I bought a lot of beer back in Oslo.

“Yeah, I helped an aunt of mine on her BBQ restaurant back in our world.”-He whispered to me while grilling.

“Oh, nice. Say, you want a beer?”-I asked.

“Mm?”

“You know, beer plus barbecue… That’s like a dream combo, don’t you know?”-I said, handing him a beer.

“…”-He looked at me. “Sure… But you shouldn’t be giving kids beers…”

“Pfft… If you say so. Here, take it.”-I opened the beer and gave it to him. “How was your trip? Successful from what I can see haha…”-I said to him.

“Stop it… It was kind of weird after all that has happened between us…”-He said.

“Mm… Really? Oh well, I thought it wouldn’t be that bad. So, what was the first prize either way?”

“Nothing much. Yun Seung-Ah’s number and a promise from her. Do you want it?”

“Why would I? Nah. Keep it with you.”-I shrugged before sipping from my beer.

The rest of the party was just eating, drinking, at least for me and Hajin, and really few upperclassmen who came to grab a beer or two and talking about the upcoming exams. The leader and other upperclassmen were giving advice about the final exams.

“Hey, um… Haejin?”-The club leader came.

“It’s Hajin, Kim Hajin.”-Hajin corrected him.

“Ah, Kim Hajin. You’re a great griller, but you should eat some too.”-He said while turning to me. “You too, dude, you both have been here helping with the beer and the grill…”

“No problem, dude, we’ve been eating.”-I said while giving him an open beer.

“Yeah, I’m actually full, the griller’s usually the one who eats the most.”-Hajin said while shrugging.

“Oh, if you say so… And thanks.”-He took the beer and went back to the rest of the group.

The party went for 20 more minutes or so until everyone was completely satisfied and really full.

“Oh, well, the original plan was to go out for a night hunt… But let’s just rest as we are all full…”-The leader said once the barbecue party was over. “Team 1 will go to cabin A, while team two will go to cabin B, I’ll be staying over with team B. Also… To those in cabin A, one of you will have to take the couch, sorry about that guys…”-Said the leader.

We were 19 cadets in the club, it was originally 18 in the novel, but I was an addition to the place, and I was in team 1 alongside Chae Nayun, Pinky, and Kim Hajin.

Once inside the cabin, I did have to admit that it was really big. A two floors building, with three rooms in the first floor and the other six in the second floor. Which meant, that everyone will have their own room, with the exception of the cadet staying in the couch.

Inside the cabin, some of the cadets got the fabulous idea of playing the mafia game, a game which I didn’t like, so I just watched from the side while drinking beer. Though, I did laugh a lot at Chae Nayun, as she was really bad at playing the game, which caused all of us to actually laugh at her.

The reason being, she’s too truthful with her emotions and reactions, making it hard for her to actually hide her intentions while playing any of the characters of the game. Pinky wasn’t faring too well either, but her good luck was that Chae Nayun was so bad, that she didn’t lose that badly and could even stay alive in some games.

After the game ended, I and Hajin went outside, I did want to take some breath and the beautiful sight of the night starred sky, while Hajin had to make something on his laptop. He sat on a bench, while I just leaned on the small fence of the cabin’s entrance, looking at the sky. I was the one to take the couch, by the way.

“A nice sky huh.”-Hajin suddenly said.

“Yeah, you can’t find this back at the city…”-I answered while looking up.

The sky was really beautiful. It was completely filled with stars and lights, not a sight you could actually get inside the city.

“Yeah… I would normally be looking at this sky with a cigarette in my mouth… But… I guess I’ve stopped smoking…”

“You used to smoke?”-Chae Nayun’s voice suddenly came from over us.

“Whoa!”-And Hajin got startled by it. “W-what!? Where are you!?”

“Above you, idiot.”-She said, and we both turned to look at her.

“So, what are you doing awake at this hour?”-I asked her before sipping on my beer.

“Not your problem.”-She said. “So… Did you use to smoke? A real delinquent, huh? Do you also have tattoos?”-She asked, making Hajin flinch and grab his left arm, where the stigma was.

“What? Do you really have them? Let me see.”-She said while going a little bit more out of the window.

“I don’t.”-Hajin answered.

“Hmm…”-She just nodded, before looking at him directly. “…By the way, are you confident?”-She suddenly asked.

“Mm? About what?”

“About winning against me.”

“What about you? Are you confident in giving up your bow if you lose?”-He retorted arrogantly.

“… That’s something that can’t happen, so it never crossed my mind.”-She answered confidently.

“You sure?”-I lifted my eyebrow.

“Yeah. I’m sure. It won’t happen.”-She smirked. “Even more when he’s not taking this seriously.”

“Oh well, I don’t want to see you crying after you lose.”-Hajin said while grinning.

“Pfft…”-I almost laughed. “Well said, dude.”-I said before taking a sip of my beer.

“Hey, you’re also some kind of delinquent or what? You’ve not stopped drinking beer since the barbecue party…”-She frowned at me.

“Delinquent? Mm… Nah, beer is beer, what does it have to do with being a delinquent or not?”

“You’re underaged.”

“Not with my Cube student’s card. You’re basically an adult with it.”-I just shrugged.

“*sigh…* Whatever…”-She said. “Hey, did you read the notices from France?”-She asked Hajin.

“Mm? Notices from France?”-He asked back.

“Yeah, Yeonha showed me. You’re apparently being treated like some kind of Korean Sherlock Holmes because of what happened there.”-She said.

“Hahaha did you hear that dude! You’re Sherlock Holmes! Maybe you should put up some kind of detective agency. With that fame, you’ll surely get a lot of clients.”-I smirked at him.

“Pfft… Yeah, if after losing to me you’re too devastated to keep being a hero, maybe you could start a detective agency, hahaha.”-Chae Nayun also laughed.

“Ha, ha, ha, very funny you two.”-He then glared at Chae Nayun. “Why don’t you just go to sleep?”

“I was going to, even if you didn’t tell me!”-She shouted before going inside.

“Pfft… She’s like a small kid.”-I laughed at her antics.

“Yeah…”-Hajin said before turning on his smartwatch.

“Mm? Are you looking for the news? Haha, are you that interested in being called a Korean Sherlock?”

“Shut up…”-He said, but still looked for the news on the smartwatch.

“Hey, what does cigarette tastes like?”-Chae Nayun suddenly said while showing out from the window once again.

“…”

“Go to sleep, airhead.”-I said to her.

***

“Well, I’ll be going then.”-I told Hajin once we were back in Cube.

We parted from Norway at 7:00 AM, and made it back to Korea at 3:30 PM, all thanks to the hour difference, as it was only a 30 minutes trip.

“You’ll be going to some dungeon?”-He asks me.

“Yeah, I’ll probably be there until tomorrow. I don’t know how hard will it be until I enter in contact with it.”

“Okay… Well, take care. Are you sure I can’t go?”

“You could. But I don’t know if I’ll be able to protect you. It’ll be a dangerous one. With your luck it would be great to take you there if it wasn’t for the danger.”-I said to him while shrugging.

“Well… I better stay put then. See you man, hope you get something good even without me there.”

“Yeah, hopefully…”

“So, in case I have to retrieve your corpse, which one will you go to?”

“Prague. Charles Bridge.”

“Huh? Charles Bridge…? Wait, isn’t that an underwater dungeon?”-He asks.

“Yes. That one.”

“So… You’re planning to jump into the river in the middle of the day?”-He asks while lifting his eyebrow.

“The time difference is like eight hours from here. So… It would be like 8:00 AM there. And no. I’ll wait a little bit around Prague, drinking and looking around. I’ll jump into the river at 10 there, that would be like… 6:00 AM here, so, I’ll text you, if you’re awake, then you’ll be able to answer me.”-I shrugged.

“Oh, well, take care. Hope you don’t have too many problems.”-He said before going away.

“Sure. See you tomorrow.”-I said before walking towards Cube’s Portal Station.

My next destination would be Prague in the Czech Republic. As Hajin said, I’ll be going to an underwater dungeon that’s located somewhere inside the river Vltava, the only reference point I had was the Charles Bridge, as it should be somewhere around it, maybe an underwater cave.

{Well, I’m glad I’m really good in Free-diving, as I won’t be able to use my underwater breathing…}-I thought to myself while walking towards the portal station.