Belinda left the Arena and saw Bertold. He stood on the side of the road and waited. When he saw her, he nodded and walked away.

Belinda was speechless. After spending three years with him, she could understand why Bertold didn’t have any friends. His way to tell ’morning, follow me’ had a lot of problems! If he did this with others, from 100 people, all of them would turn away and leave!

Belinda ran after him. „Where are we going?”

„To Horác.”

She was shocked. „Are you angry at me?!”

„No...”

  Then why do you send me to the lion’s den?!

Belinda didn’t believe in him and tried to remember. „Ah, because I told Gregori about my special training?”

Bertold slowly shook his head. „Even if he knew, he can’t use it.”

„Why?”

„... Because of his personality.”

Belinda was confused. She didn’t understand what the problem with it was.

Bertold watched her and sighed. „You are too kind. When those beasts attacked you, you didn’t even dare to hit them too strongly... not to mention to kill them.”

She nodded. It was true. Those beasts wanted the food and didn’t intend to hurt her, so why did she need to hurt them?

„That’s why this training suitable for you.”

„I see, but I told these things to Gregori, so...”

„Do you remember about the field practice?” Bertold stopped and looked into her eyes. „That time, under the group attack of the konkeys he killed a lot of them. Once he feels that he is under a lot of pressure, he will attack without thinking. That’s an instinct deeply rooted in his soul.”

Belinda was surprised. She spent a lot of time with Gregori, but never noticed this. In this case, that training really would be useless to him.

„If he’s lucky, then after he killed 3-4 beasts the other will run away. If not and run into a group, then he will have a hard time...” Bertold said, while continued to walk.

Belinda understood this, but she had another question. „Don’t tell me... you came and watched all of our training because of it?”

Bertold hesitated a little. „... It’s not that I don’t believe he treats you as a friend, but accidents can always happen. I was afraid, he would ask for a fight without holding back, so I created a training plan. This way I can force him to hold back... you did a good job on the exam, so from now on you don’t need to train with him that much.”

  You still didn’t believe in him and want to separate us...

They went into the Refining club building and Bertold whispered. „You reached the 4th level and can help Horác.”

  So you just want to throw me into another battlefield?! You hate that job that much?! I can even hear the satisfaction in your voice!

Belinda felt dejected and followed Bertold. She wished the road would be longer, but they reached the laboratory in no time.

Bertold opened the door and let Belinda go in in front of him. As if he was afraid she would run away...

Belinda felt wronged and looked back at him, but it had no effect.

Horác held some glasses in his hands and watched them deep in thought. When he saw his visitors his eyes lit up and put them down. His newly developed poison became worthless.

He happily walked over. „Hello, hello! You guys worked hard! I’m so happy to see your cultivation finally reached the 4th level!”

Belinda shivered. She didn’t like the way, how Horác looked at her.

Bertold stood in front of her and snapped his fingers. „Calm down!”

Horác froze on the spot. He lifted his hand and covered his eyes. „Sorry. I spent the whole month with research and I even forgot to take a break. I was too excited...” He sighed and turned away. „Do you want to drink something? After one of my failures, I created a new type of tea.”

„No, thank you!” Belinda refused. She didn’t need to think about it. She wanted to live!

Bertold didn’t say anything. He sat down and took out a cup from his space and slowly drank his own tea.

Belinda was speechless. She sat down too and took out a bottle. It was her own fruit shake. It was almost lunch time, so she drank it, but she thought about another thing.

  Will I become a tea maniac too?

They spent a quarter of an hour without speaking. Horác was too focused and needed some time to become relaxed.

He put down his teacup and sighed. „Finally you can help me out.” he took out a book and gave it to Belinda. „These are my notes. I’ll teach you in the beginning, but later it will be Bertold’s job. That time these notes will be necessary.”

Belinda accepted the book and opened it. There were some herbs’ pictures and a lot of things were written next to them. There wasn’t enough place, so some notes were written with really little letters. Even if Belinda’s eyesight became better, it was still hard to read them.

  Why didn’t you just write them on another page? There’re a lot of empty ones left.

Horác took out a box. „You can read it later. Let’s start with a low level herb.”

Belinda looked into the box. It was a commonly used 1st level herb. Even if it had that special aura, its level was too low. It was only effective against some low level beasts.

„Maybe its level is low, but don’t look down on it. If the poison wasn’t removed, then the pill created from it will be a failure.” Horác patted the box. „You stopped to learn after refining fruit candy, so you don’t know, the next lesson is to handle this herb.”

  Didn’t you the one, who told me that I didn’t need to learn more?!

Belinda really wanted to hit Horác. If she needed to learn more, then why didn’t let her continue? Why did he stop her and now said it as if it was her decision?!