The key was inflicting pain

"Who are you?!"

The boy with the metallic luster on his skin backed off a step, sweat dripping from his forehead. With the fact that he had no clue how his opponent closed in on him along with the blood-shot eyes, he had clearly been given a scare.

The two girls along with him also gulped at the scene. Soon they glimpsed over the letter on the wristwatch and couldn't help but collectively take a pronounced sigh of relief.

If the intruder was only a 'C' rank like themselves, they had nothing much to be afraid of.

The guy found renewed confidence as he made eye-contact with me and yelled, "What?! Are you smitten by the slut's charms too and want to stop us?!"

At his question, I shook my head calmly and said, "I just want to beat you."

This was the truth of the matter… I wanted to figure why a voice inside my head was telling me to punish people.

My words didn't make sense to the boy, as he bared his teeth at me and then charged.

"Fine, I'll teach you a lesson then!"

The boy with the metallic luster threw a punch at my face. If I was to be hit by that, it would be like getting rammed by a block of steel.

Swoosh-

Too bad for him, my reaction timing and speed were leagues above my opponent's. His fist soon passed by my face, and I took the opportunity to return the gift with my own fist.

Missing his punch from such a close range, the boy's eyes widened for a second before calming down. While his ability, Metal Armor, did not have a great offence, the defense was one of the best in its ranks.

It had gifted him with a prideful demeaner as he was a rare 2-and-a-half-star combatant amongst the masses of C-ranked first years.

The boy was completely sure that my fist would hurt from his metallic skin instead.

All this remained in his head as a punch to his gut was smoothly delivered.

Boom…!

The metallic boy was sent flying a few meters away and fell down on the ground. Puhak…! A puke of blood shortly escaped his mouth and the metallic glow around his body dimmed out completely.

"H… Ho- How?"

The boy's weak voice still couldn't hide the shock he felt. Not only him, even the two girls near him couldn't believe a C-ranker could so easily get past his metal armor.

If they could have seen the layer of dark ice that surrounded my fist, they may have been able to deduce some theories about how it happened.

The ability of darkness was truly lethal as it could absorb and negate abilities with ease.

I didn't bother explaining my ability, and my focus had been captured by a pleasing notification, [Inflicted pain and sufferings to enemy… Granting 150 XP!]

A maddening cackled laughter escaped my mouth as I finally saw this notification I had been waiting for. So, the key was inflicting pain huh? I immediately kept thinking of methods of how I can further raise my level and becoming monstrously strong.

To the people around, they witnessed me change between a mad chuckle or a demonic smile every second as I stood on top of the bleeding figure of the boy.

The two girl's faces became pale, and they trembled at the horrifying sight. They knew in their hearts they had no chance to beat the monstrous display of strength.

In the meantime, the adorable, pink-haired girl was looking at me with gleaming eyes.

Instead of fearing it, she was smitten by the cruel display. 'Did he do this for me?'

"Let's leave… He has a three-star combat potential!"

In the next moment, the other two girls quickly decided to escape. The first one had her speed amplified, while the other one latched on to ceiling like a gecko and crawled away.

Their attempt caused my lips to further curl upwards. With a quick wave of the hands, Swoosh- four spears of ice were summoned and sent towards my intended targets.

With their already fearful mental state, the girls had no chance of dodging my attack.

Puchi…! Two dark-ice spears impaled both legs of the running girl, while the gecko girl had her shoulder impaled.

With a shriek of pain, their bloodied bodies fell down on the ground and struggled with immense pain. The spears of ice were still impaled in their bodies, and its dark power had also already started draining their stamina.

With my head cocked head to one side, I focused my gaze on the bodies of the struggling students on the ground. 'Let me see if I can farm more XP out of them!'

I went to the boy with the metal powers and stepped over one of his hands.

"Arrrrgh!!" A wail of immense pain escaped the boy's mouth, as I was crushing the bones of his hands with a slight frown on my face.

I pressed down with my foot harder to illicit an even more painful reaction, breaking more bones in the process.

The screaming continued for more than a minute straight until the boy finally passed out. Still, there was no sign of the XP notification. It looked like I either needed to find a new enemy or just wait a certain amount of time.

In the meantime, I was carrying out my experimentation, the two girls had their skirts and ground stained with urine as they imagined themselves to be the next target of my torture. Some students had passed by the hallway, but they quickly escaped since there wasn't anyone high-ranked amongst them.

I was free to further carry out my experimentation, but it seemed like there was nothing to gain out of this anymore.

Finally, my foot left the crushed arm of the boy and I headed out in another direction. The level of the injuries I inflicted on these people could potentially take them a week or two to recover; however, something told me that no authority figure would care.

"W…Wait!"

As I was walking away from the scene, someone rushed out to meet me.

It was that pink-haired girl who seemed to have been in conflict with the beaten group earlier.

I had almost forgotten that she was present in the scene. After all, I was completely engrossed in experimenting with the system.

Taking a closer look at the girl, my eyes widened in appreciation.

This girl was extremely cute… actually on par with Sylvia herself.

With her hand behind her hips, the girl finally mustered the courage and looked at me. "T-Thank you…" She said, her voice meek and soft.

"Hahaha, don't worry about it. Anyway, I'm Soren… What's your name?"

I gave the girl a dazzling smile. She stared at my smile for a long second before immediately looking down, a red tinge on her cheeks.

"Mika."

"That's a nice name…"

Since some people had started to approach the hallway from the sound of the wailing students, without waiting for Mika, I immediately took it upon myself to leave.

"See you around, Mika!"

Leaving the crime scene behind, I rushed out of the building and headed towards my dorm.

I wanted to find a few more people to attack for XP, but I wasn't going to let my sociopathic tendencies get to me yet.

To my slight surprise, I saw Mika following right behind me. Perhaps, she was just heading to the dorms just like me.

I made eye contact with her which immediately made her flustered. "N-No… I am not following you. I was ju-"

"You're heading to the dorms too, right? Why don't we walk with each other?"

Mika nodded meekly and walked on my side. We walked quietly with each other for the next few minutes.

With a touch of a smile on my face, I kept my gaze on Mika's face. She would occasionally sneak a peek on me before immediately turning her face elsewhere.

Perhaps it was because of the way she looked, but I kept finder her cuter by the second.

"So, why were they fighting you?" I asked, finally breaking the silence.

In the next moment, Mika turned towards me and said, "Those two girls were my roommates… But I promise I didn't do anything bad! Believ-"

"I believe you didn't do anything bad!"

With a slight frown apparent on my face, I reached out my hand to Mika's head. I began to think that this could escalate into a bigger problem, since those people may vent out at Mika upon recovering.

As I was thinking to myself, my hand was subconsciously stroking Mika's hair.

Mika's face glowed red, but she stayed still and stared at my thoughtful visage with her big eyes.

After a few moments, I figured that since I've already mistakenly involved myself in her mess, I should just see it through.

"Hey, Mika! Now you're my friend, so tell me if those people say anything to you!"

"F-Friend…? You really want to be my friend?" Mika's heart skipped a beat as she made eye-contact with my intense eyes.

With a confident voice, I replied, "Of course… From now on, we're friends!"

"Okay… We're friends."

With a healthy glow on her face, Mika nodded and then looked to the ground. We had already arrived at the dorms, so it was time for us to separate.

Just when I retracted my hand from the top of Mika's head, a queer notification resounded from my system.

[Alien probe on ability detected… Blocking detection]

Both Mika and I had our mouth slightly open in surprise as we gazed at each other again. I turned to look at her wristwatch again before noticing that she was somewhat hiding the majority of the display from my view.

In the end, I thought nothing of it. She probably had some low D-rank detection ability that she was a little embarrassed with.

"See you, Mika! And make sure to contact me when your roommates return!"

Mika's unfocused gaze vanished, and she nodded. A warm feeling stayed inside her as she heard my concerned tone.

We bid each other farewell and walked to the dorms.

**

A few hours later…

In the medical ward, three students were lying on the bed and writhing with pain.

A woman, fully dressed in medical lab coat, was staring at them with a puckered forehead.

Right then, a man in a military uniform walked into the ward with a bright smile on his face. He glanced at the three injured bodies and couldn't help but chuckle loudly.

"Bahaha! Dr. Priya… It's not even the first day of school yet, and you already have work. Kids these days sure have a lot of energy."

Priya ignored the humor in the man's words as she said, "This is bad, Mr. Murphy. These students have darkness particles running course in their bodies, hindering the use of my ability… Without the right expert, their bodies can take months to heal!"

Mr. Murphy turned his glance at the bodies with wide eyes and then mused by himself.

"A darkness ability user, huh? I wonder what rank it is… Hahaha, maybe you can consult him to remove his powers himself."

Dr. Priya took a long sigh and then started walking to her desk in the medical ward.

She thought to herself, 'Any ability that interferes with my healing powers shouldn't exist! You better not do anything similar in the future, boy!'