EIGHTEEN

It is the opening day of the Hunter's Academy, which what is the chosen name for the academy of the HA's Chairman's. People started coming out of the teleportation doors one by one and filling up the chairs in the assembly building and after a few minutes, the assembly started. One of the HA Chairman gave an opening speech before calling me out to give mine, I saw Ceres, Alice and Joel sitting beside each other in the third row. I specifically told the Chairman to include Ceres to the enrollees because Ceres has a natural skill for Alchemy, because in the other world, beside the dwarves, Centaurs are considered to be great Alchemist. He agreed.

"Good morning, Presidents, Hunters Association Chairman's, and Hunters, I your headmaster and teacher, welcome you to the opening of the Hunter's Academy, I hope for a great future for the academy, for all of us and for this to be a way for us achieve more and with your help to discover more in the future, thank you"-Demetri.

The end of my speech is also the end of my chanting on the hunters that will be my students, it's a chanting of memory removal that will be activated when they used the things that I will be teaching them for no good, and there is no exception, even Ceres, Alice and Joel, the spell is also made to be undetectable and unremovable.

After the half of the opening Assembly, all the important people, including me were invited in the grand dining hall for a meal and discuss further the other concerns, while the other hunters are allowed to roam around the academy. After having the meal, the end half of the assembly started and it is for the discussion of the precautions and what are the things they needed to prepare for next week, which is the start of class. After the assembly, we part ways and went home.

Arriving home, I went to the library to begin studying the artifact I found on Ceres the day I found him, still researching how it works and how it helps Ceres to be safe from the darkness fragment corruption. I have searched all the books and only found few information about it like it is the artifact of the first elden blood sorcerer. I looked at the artifact again under a magnifying glass and saw something I must have not seen before because I was not paying attention too much.

"After the use of one, five all together will be needed to make it work again, and if aim to defeat the darkness corruption"-Demetri

I twist it more and saw more words.

"Second of the five"-Demetri.

I read on the writing. It looks like I need five of it to activate it again, it will take time to find the other four, this corruption needed to be solve fast, it looks like the only solution to do it to replicate it, create a new artifact, but first I need to work on appraising the artifact to know what were its materials and how it was made, but before I do something, I heard Ceres calling for me, I shouted that I am in the library and not for long, he is at the door.

"Uncle, Stephan message us that we will be part of a dungeon raid"-Ceres.

"Okay, looks like Jack set this up for us per request, let's prepare for the raid"

After preparing for the raid, me and Ceres went to the dungeon location. Arriving at the location, Stephan is already there while a little while later Alice arrive. The members of the other team, walk towards our direction and introduce themselves.

"Hey there, it looks like we are group for today's raid, we'll be under your care for today"-mercenary team leader.

"We'll be under your care too"-Stephan.

I tried to read their minds but something is blocking me, looks like their mage did some spell for others not to read their mind, I can't remove the spell too, he must have done to make it irremovable. They are definitely hiding something. I feel a tug on my sleeves and switch my gaze from the other team to Ceres, who was still looking directly to the other team.

"Why Ceres? Is something wrong?"-Demetri.

"I smell blood on them"-Ceres.

Centaurs can sense if someone committed a horrifying sin, even if they washed it off, the smell is still there.

"Your kind never fails when it comes to that intuition, thanks for telling me Ceres, we must be wary at all times when it comes to these men, lets tell Stephan and Alice"

Before we enter the dungeon, I told Alice and Stephan about the intuition that Ceres have and be wary of the other mercenary team. I was the last one to enter the dungeon and after entering the dungeon, a portal door appear in front of us and began swallowing us one by one. I can still hear someone shouting outside that it is a portal break instead a dungeon break, before I was totally suck inside the portal.

We are transported in a swamp location, indicating that it is a portal outbreak, because when a portal outbreak happen it teleports the hunters in a different setting, a location in the other world. Some of the recorded location are a swamp, a jungle, snowy mountain, and desert. The beings inside it are more powerful and the lowest rank recorded is B, and seeing the color of the portal, yellow, it is a rank A.

"It looks like we are stuck in a portal, and by the color of it, it is a Rank A portal, is anyone here has any experience being inside a portal besides me?"-leader of the mercenary team.

"I do"-Stephan.

"We both know how portal works, half a day here is an hour outside, one by one let's say our ranks and hunter type so we can work on our plan on how to defeat the portal boss"- leader of the mercenary team.

One by one we say our ranks, and after I said what is mine, the not updated one which is still a rank E, some of them laughed and say some insulted remarks. I know because of this, all throughout the portal raid I will be disregarded, or worse will be left as a sacrifice.

"Seems like majority of us are B ranks, me, Stephan and the boy on their team are A ranks and the lowest is E, we can work this out, okay let's go find the portal boss, collect our bounty, and go home" - leader of the mercenary team.

The members of the other mercenary team shout in agreement with their leader. We just stand behind there and looking at them.