First Fight

The manual followed with detailed instructions regarding how to meditate and gather energy in the body. Lance decided to study the contents in detail when he got some time to himself.

He looked up to find Darius walking toward him with a what looked like a small kid beside him.

Both Lance and Darius were not very tall, standing at around 5 feet 9 inches. The kid though, was half their height. This was why Lance even called him kid in his mind.

Darius walked up to him and said, "This is Entsy. When I told him about you, he wanted to come with us."

Darius inconspicuously bent close and whispered in his ear," Don't underestimate him because of his height. He has a very strong nature and is the same age as us. Just don't say anything about height."

Lance shook the hand that Entsy had stretched out. He had middle eastern features, with black hair, black eyes and olive colored skin. His downward facing nose especially stood out in Lance's vision.

"I'm Etsy. I heard Darius talking about you and decided to come over. I hope we become great friends."

"I hope the same. I'm Lance, please to meet you.", said Lance as he returned the greeting. Etsy seemed very amiable. He wondered why Darius had seen the need to warn him.

"Lets go to the cafeteria! There's a map of IE on the back of every cultivation manual. For now though, just follow me!", said Darius as he started marching to the door.

The door could only accommodate one or at most 2 people at a time, which was strange considering the size of the room. As such, there was a queue to exit which the group of three joined.

With nothing else to do, they started chatting about their daily life. Lance was delighted to find out that the other two also liked playing video games, so they got into a long discussion about the Witcher franchise. This felt like a breath of fresh air in the wholly foreign place that Lance was in.

After a half hour of waiting, Lance's group reached the door. Just when they were exiting, they found themselves shoved aside by another group of three who had skipped the queue.

"Hey! There's a queue here!", shouted Lance at the group who were leaving as if they had done something very normal.

As the group turned around in the hallway, Lance could see who it was that was so brazen. The teen who had answered that he was first was in the center, being flanked by two huge people who seemed to be twins. They had blocky features and did not look like teens at all.

"Oh? But I feel we don't need to follow the queue. Do you have the guts to change my feelings?", asked the blonde-haired youth with a smirk on his face.

Lance didn't know how to respond. This wasn't an answer one would typically expect.

As he was thinking what to say, Darius who had exited behind him said,"Of course we do! Go show him Lance!"

Lance felt himself being pushed from behind towards the hostile group of three.

He realized that he had entered the first fight of his life without his own volition.

Lance couldn't help but curse, "Why is everyone I meet here so despicable?"