Chapter 24 : : An Undead Dungeon

"What do you want…" Kale said but didn't resist her pulling.

"Shhh…" Layla put a finger on her lips and silenced him "Look, she is my roommate," She said in an excited tone.

Kale peeked inside the room and saw a girl teeing her long hair into a ponytail in front of the mirror.

She was a tall girl with waist-length hair that had slight drills at the end and olive eyes, the curves over her ample chest and perky butt were clearly visible when she twisted her thin waist and threw her hair behind her head.

Kale noticed the bright eyes and the faint grin on Layla's lips, and felt some pity for the girl who just finished taking care of her hair 'She is going to have a hard time in the future,'

His words of course not intended for Layla but the girl.

When the girl turned around, she noticed Kale standing outside the door with Layla.

Layla hurriedly reacted, her expression took a 180' turned as she introduced him "Alice, he is Kale, I told you about him before right? The one who informed me about the 30% discount event,"

Alice's eyes flickered and she nodded. Layla then continued "Kale, she is Alice, her path is Martial Mage, you can't judge her by beautiful appearance alone, she is an excellent archer. I can only guess how formidable she will be after becoming an Archer Mage,"

"She is exaggerating it," Alice retorted but there was a faint smile on her lips, she didn't seem to hate the flattery.

Archer Mage is a subcategory in the Martial Mage path where a practitioner masters Archery related martial technique then uses spells to strengthen the arrows when aiming.

If the total number of subcategories is calculated from all paths then it was above a hundred moreover it was only for early basic subclasses, if advanced subclasses are to be added then it will be way more complicated to just differentiate and count them.

"If she said it then there should be some truth in her words, I would like to have proper chat but we are getting late for the class, our first class should be the same so how about going together," Kale asked in a polite tone. He didn't actually care about chatting with new students, but he still valued Layla.

Alice nodded in agreement "You're right, Layla let's go, for now, we can chat later,"

Soon Kale headed out with the other three of them, when Alice met Arlo, Layla didn't forget to start her flattery session again.

The academy only had two types of classes for students each day, but it never forced them to attend classes, as long as they could pass the tests they can stay in the academy or else they will be expelled.

The first class is the primary class, which all type of practitioner attends together, the class is held to provide the knowledge, teach about new things, and broaden their horizon.

The second class is secondary class, it is different for everyone, it depends on which subclass they are going to take, for instance, Kale chose Wood Mage as his first subclass because it was a necessity when aiming for the Plant Mage subclass so he had to attend Class W3.

He didn't choose just mage or mutant path but mutant mage path, so he had to actually attend two different secondary classes that is if he wants to, he is an Augmenter-Type mutant so if he wants to take a second class related to it then he can go to Class A1.

The timings of the secondary classes are arranged in a way that a student can take multiple classes easily if they want to.

***

The classroom of the academy was similar to a lecture hall in college, the benches were arranged in an arc, the latter benches were a little above the former ones and a platform was present at their focal point with a big digital board attached to the wall behind it.

When Kale entered the classroom, he saw several groups of students chatting while laughing at each other, some were making friends whereas some preferred to stay alone.

He chose a random empty area, in the last third row to sit with the other three.

Layla sat on his right and Arlo on his left, as for Alice she sat on Layla's right.

"Kale, is it you?" A familiar voice rang in Kale's ears which instantly made him frown.

He turned and saw Misha coming from the side, a black-haired girl and short chubby boy were following her from behind.

"Do you know her?" Layla asked in a low tone.

"Unfortunately," Kale replied in low voice. Layla raised her eyebrow and observed the approaching girl. Misha didn't look bad but Kale's words left a soar impression of Misha in her mind.

"Bro just how many girls do you know here?" Arlo couldn't help but ask. He was wondering how such a cold guy who preferred to stay alone knew so many girls before the classes even started when he himself didn't know a single one.

Has my charm decreased over the years? He thought.

Kale gave him a superficial look "Just show her your combat strength and she will approach you sooner or later,"

Arlo's brows twitched, he then looked at the girl again.

By the time he finished speaking, Misha already arrived in the row before theirs.

"It's been a while, Princess Misha," Kale said before others could speak. This sentence surprised others and they also faintly understood the meaning behind it.

Arlo and Layla's looks slightly changed but they soon recovered to their usual self.

"Didn't I say before, we are classmates you don't need to call me that. Just call me Misha," Misha said with a smile, she then introduced the two beside her "Meet Bella and Ron, they both are my childhood friends,"

"Hello, I'm Bella Tailon from Tailon Family, what about you?"

"I'm Ron Veneroan, Misha had spoken a lot about you these days I wonder which family do you belong to,"

Kale nodded and reluctantly exchanged a few words with them. In this exchange, both the girl and boy asked questions and answered with modesty but every single of their sentence was showing their background while also probing his. Kale naturally didn't say much and finished the conversation soon.

But how could it be so simple.

"Kale isn't it time for you to introduce your friends too?" Misha said with a smile. While her friends were chatting with Kale, she was observing the people around him, she had gathered her intel too, she failed to recognize Arlo and Alice but Layla had gained some fame by just aiming for being a Beast Tamer.

"What can I say, you should know more about Layla than me, as for Arlo and Alice I only met them a little while ago and doesn't know much about them," Kale returned with a faint smile.

He didn't reveal a single thing about Arlo, the very fact that he wore a mask during his time at the arena proved that he wasn't interested in spreading his family's name without restraint. As for Alice, he wasn't sure so he didn't say anything about her being an Archer, if she wished to, then she can reveal it anytime.

Misha was about to speak when they heard the sound of someone tapping the table and looked at the platform in the center,

A tall man with long red hair was standing on the platform, from his red robe and black pants it could be seen that he was the instructor.

When the students heard his tapping, they noticed him and became quiet.

Seeing that everyone became quiet, the man nodded in satisfaction and spoke "Hello everyone, I'm Simon and I'm a Magma Mage, it's nice to meet you all as for further introductions… well, let's skip it a little, you will have a lot of time to know about me and each other that is, if you are not expelled early. From today onwards I will be your primary class instructor,"

Everyone's expression was weird, they felt that their instructor was somewhat carefree. Instead of motivating, he was demotivating them but they couldn't deny his words, the first year of the academy was indeed the time where most students were expelled that's why they had to be very careful when choosing their class.

'A Magma Mage?' Kale looked at the man with interest, he had heard about the basic requirements for unlocking Magma Mage subclass it was to merge Fire Mage subclass with Earth Mage subclass, it was similar to Glacier Mage but these things were easier said than done, only those who had achieved it knows the difficulty level of doing it.

"Now, sit down we will start the class…" Simon said.

The class was mainly based on the basic information about the practitioner and the world that normal people weren't aware of.

The information was too much to finish in one class, so Simon first asked the important question related to it only when the students failed to give the right answer did he touch on the topic.

"Good the batch this time seems more capable, now can someone tell me about what is a dungeon? To be precise how is it made?" Simon asked while scanning through the class.

The question in itself was simple but to give an elaborate answer was a problem.

Alice raised her hand.

Simon nodded signaling her to speak.

"Dungeons are naturally created monster nest which attracts, empowers and even gives birth to monsters, whether the inhabitants are Magic Beasts, Spirit Beast, Demonic Beasts or multi-type depends on the type of dungeon it is," Alice said.

Simon signaled her to sit down and said. "I see, but is there someone else who can elaborate a little more on how the dungeon is formed?"

This time it was Misha who spoke "When a powerful beast falls and its core is left unattained then there is a meniscal chance that it won't disintegrate and will start to attract the energy around instead. It will then start to drive the weak beast around crazy, making them slaughter around it and make their nest around it, even the monster that aren't affected by it will choose to form their nest near it because this will help them increase their strength.

In time the nest will keep growing in space, it can develop floors and chambers depending on the monsters that dug it, by that time the core that started it will sink to its deepest part turning into a dungeon core. The core will retain or develop the will of the monster it used to be part of, the monsters that are close to the species of the monster whose dungeon core it is, will experience an extra strength boost compared to other monsters.

After the core develops a will, it would act like a living creature, to be precise the whole dungeon will start to act like a living creature, it will gain the ability to devour corpses of those that fell on its grounds to nurture itself, the dungeon will become intelligent enough to place a strong guardian at every floor near the passage to move on or retreat, but because the intelligence of dungeon is limited it will make some simple but strict rules for itself to work proficiently.

Adventurers and Practitioners take advantage of those rules to sometimes turn the dungeon into training grounds and a place to farm resources like Magic Core, Beast Core, Magic Crystal, Origin Crystal… etc.,"

Simon nodded. He knew Misha was from Royal Family so she was bound to have more knowledge than others, it wasn't surprising that she could give such a detailed answer. He said "Correct, dungeons are without a doubt one of the best farming grounds for resources. You all know that two things that never let our Imperial Academy lack resources, the first is Evergreen Fox Paradise at the other side of the academy and the second is none other than the dungeon our academy is built on… An Undead Dungeon,"