A Troublesome Situation (1)

"There's quite a lot of people here…" I noted as found a seat in the corner of the classroom. 'And yet all of them are going to…'

I gazed around the classroom, since it was a club, there was mixture of different first years classes. I could see Mia interacting with a few other who is probably hitting on her. But, other than that I see anyone that is worth taking note of.

It was then the classroom door swung open and youth of unparalleled beauty and gentle smile stepped in. Everyone were immediately mesmerized by the sight of him, yet I could only feel a strong sense of disdain that made my stomach churned in disgust.

"Oh, it seems I was the last one to arrive, how embarrassing." He chuckled in a flustered manner. "Ah, let me introduce myself, my name is Owen Llewelyn, a third year and the one running this club. Please to be meeting you all." He bowed.

Owen Llewelyn, he was demon in disguise. His real name was Delmud, for the countless years, he has been making himself comfortable at PRSM Academy while continuously infect a small portion of the Academy students with the Demon Seed each year.

He is considered to be as strong as a Demon Captain and his skill is [Drowse Emanation] which essentially allows him to send anyone who has a lower mana capacity than him to sleep for a few minutes; it can only work within a certain radius.

Though, it seem he would disappear after graduation, the truth was he continuously changed his identity and would re-enter PRSM and continued to full-fill his duty given by the demon king, which was infecting the students, and possibly the futures of The Human Domain, with the Demon Seed.

Those that had their seed completely sprouted became mindless slaves for the demon, it was sickening.

"As you may know, we would start our activity in our next meeting, which is tomorrow, as today is just orientation, so I guess we can do a run-down of the location we are hunting at and what Mana Beast we may encounter." Owen began.

"The location we are going to go hunting in located right in between the Central of Human Domain and Frosa City of the West. Tomorrow at 3 in the afternoon, after classes ends, we would together head to station and head there together as a club."

"Now as for the creatures that we may encounters we also need to know there weaknesses…."

My mind began to blank out as I try to plan out what I would need to do. The problem was about the time of the next meeting and activities as well as the current situation we are in.

The club is always scheduled to take place from Tuesday to Thursday each week, so I can't really try and change that.

Shin would be killing a vice-general demon soon, which may mean his existence would become more apparent to the Demon King, if I tried to make him kill Delmud, it would make it even worst.

I couldn't really convince Mia not to go as one, like hell that stubborn girl is going to listen to me, and two, she may be suspicious of me when something unusual occurs during the activity.

The most tactical decision may be to just directly get her out before the Delmud made his move while giving her an awareness of what had occurred and make silently make my escape. Of course, I may have to give some sort of excuse to her afterward but that should be fine. Now, I just need to do some preparation.

"-ir! Sir!" It was then, a voice snapped me out of my daze. I looked up and realized that all the members was staring at me and Delm-, I guess he's Owen for now, is pointing at something in the board, I assume he just asked me a question.

"Oh, sorry, I didn't have enough sleep last night, hahaha." I mustered up a embarrassed smile while scratching the back of my head earning me a few mocking laughter from the students

"That is fine, but please get enough before tomorrow, you are going to need it," Owen said causing a round of light laughter and snickers fill the classroom before dying down. "Anyways, as I was asking, do you happen to know the weak point of the grade 3 Mana Beast Cerberus Minions?" He said as he pointed at the picture of a small 3 headed dog.

"Ah, I believe it is around their throat, where their Mana Core is located" I answered.

"Very good, that is correct, Cerberus Minions are especially known for their numbers, however they are extremely weak and can be kill in one shot by damaging their Mana Core which is located near their throat…"

Let's start preparing this afternoon…

—-

After club activity ended, I decided to walk around the market to find some useful artifacts that I may need.

However, it was then, I remembered something and began to contact a certain someone.

"Oi," I said as the other person picked up.

— what do you want?

"Hand over the shits you looted"

— … what?

Shin arrived soon after and met me in a park, which was quite desolated, but I get why it was like this, why would you need to hangout in the park when you can play with literal magic called mana and Skills at home.

"What is it now?" Shin asked.

"Do you have an artifact or item that have the same effect as your Veil of Concealment?" I asked, getting straight to the point.

"Why do you need it?"

"To prevent the stubborn girl from being infected by the Demon Seed, why else? I already have a good concealment ability." I said in a deadpanned tone.

[Eternal Mimicry - Spatial Inventory]

"Right." Shin muttered as he brought out his spatial inventory. "But, I'll need some time, it's quite messy in here."

"What the fuck are you, Doraemon? And how many stuff did you stole?" I asked.

"Auctions, mansions, houses, I grab whatever I can put my hands on. It's just preparation I guess, you never know when you may need some of these items." He answered.

"How ironic, the destined hero of this world, stealing shits from hundreds.." I chuckled.

"Oh, shut up, these are just useless in their hands anyways." Shin retorted. "And don't call me a hero." He murmured.

After a few minutes he pulled out a transparent blanket like sheet.

"Here, my appraisal skill states that this is the Cloak of Vanishing, it can hide one's existence for duration of 1 hour each day, mana signature included of course." Shin handed me the Cloak of Vanishing. "I think I stole that from the auction house yesterday."

"Thanks, oh right, makes sure to at least mask your mana signature when fighting that vice-general," I reminded.

"Of course, I'll leave Mia to you then." Shin said before we parted way.

'Things seems to be going smooth for now.' Of course I am not the one to let my guard down on such occasion, I knew the early stage of the rounds would always go quite smoothly, the problem would start to occur as the war began and we were force to make more contacts with the demons.

Preventing Mia from being infected by the Demon Seed may create a slightly different future in the 726th round, however, I deemed it necessary and it would only prove to benefit us. Though I had decided to try and stick the storyline, I decided that some changes are needed if I am truly trying to reach the Epilogue in this round, part of it was because of that fact that no matter how successful the original 726th round was, it was still a failure.

I returned to the market and bought myself a small 10x10m dimensional storage which still cost over 150,000C

"What a scam."

I went back to my dorm and started reading the part where it mentioned how Mia was implanted with the Demon Seed.

The hunt was going smoothly until when Owen suddenly gathered everyone around for a "group meeting" at the end of the hunt to discuss about what they have hunted.

It would be then that he would use his Skill and put all the student to sleep and started implant the Demon Seed into each and every single one of them.

Everybody would soon wake up without ever being able to recall what had happen

Therefore, the most appropriate time in which I could get Mia out of there would be when everyone is busy hunting before the "group meeting".

"Haa… how troublesome," I sighed.

—-

The next day, after classes ended, I began my journey towards the station. To put in comparison, I guess it would be like train station on earth, but with hovering trains powered by mana. It's paths covers the entire human domain which was quite useful.

"Can you stop following me?" Mia suddenly said.

"But… we're going to the same destination….?" I sent her a confused look trying to comprehend how she did not think of that possibility.

What's with this girl? Why do I always end up arguing with her? Is our chemistry that shitty?

"Yeah, but I don't want people to think we know each other."

"Ah yes, the cliche line, then make some effort to avoid me, how hard is that?" I swear, even if the amount of braincells the characters in this novel is combined, I'm afraid to imagine how low it would be.

"Hmph." She began to pick up her pace.

"How rude." I inwardly laughed.

—-

I soon arrived at the station and noticed that the all the club members seems to have already gathered and was waiting.

"Was I the last one?" I asked while joining the group.

"Mr. Jin Shinpei, correct? Did you get enough sleep." Owen chuckled lightly.

"Of course," I said as I mustered up a smile.

"Good, now this should be everyone, we'll hop on the next train, and remember, our destination is 3 stations away." Owen instructed.

The train soon arrived and we all get on it. And can I just say the hovering train feel so damn smooth to ride on, it's like you are moving extremely fast but, like you don't feel like you are moving, and you're just there in a state that feels like you're just floating in the air.

After a while, we arrived at our destination and were to walk for an hour and 30 minutes or so before we arrived at our location.

I assume that it was roughly 5:30 p.m right now. I could still see the sun setting, yet, it would most likely be pitch black in about an hour or so…

I suspect the reasons why Owen decided to use this place as his 'ritual ground' was because the forest was extremely thick and secluded so it was hard to see at night, and not only that there was a grade 1 Mana Beast called Dreaming Wisps, though there were harmless they can put people to sleep, they only appeared at night, thus he would use that as an excuse once the student had woken up.

"Alright ladies and gentlemen, I will be explaining what we are doing today." Owen began to recite the instructions. "Since today is a special occasion because it's our first real hunt, it would be anything goes, no set limit, hunt as much as you want!" Cheers began to erupt and died down as quick as it came.

Owen took out a map which seems to be the layout of the forest. "I will send you all a map of this forest after this, we would only be hunting in this area," he said while circling a section of the forest. "There are only Mana Beasts that are of grade 1-4 in this area, however, there may still be a unknown possibilities of meeting a grade 5 or 6 Mana Beast, if you can't take them on, please immediately send me your location and hold on as best as you can because I would be coming to assist you."

"We will be meeting back in this location at exactly 7, and since it's going to get quite dark, here are some Mana Lanterns and Night Vision Glasses." Owen took out some equipments and place them out on the ground.

"Now, let the hunt, begin." He revealed a gentle smile as he announce the beginning of the dreadful hunt.

[Wind Mimicry]

I immediately activated my Skill and concealed myself with the normal method and vanish into thin air.

After that Tag Game I was able to have a better grasp of my Skill, thus, improving my mastery and control towards it.

—-

A loud explosion erupted on the wall of fortress in the North of the Human Domain.

"HAHAHAHA WHERE IS THE PRINCESS OF ALYS? BRING HER HERE OR ELSE YOU SHALL FACE THE MIGHT OF I, VIGORATH, THE VICE GENERAL OF THE LORD'S SECOND ARMY!" It was then a large horned creature with deep red eyes appeared out of the smokes. Combination of red runes of ancient language engraved on its pitch black skins. It revealed a vicious smile before unleashing the extent of it's mana which was tainted with demonic energy.

The pressure it emanated was enough to frozen all the human who felt it's mana in place.

[Eternal Mimicry - Mana Alteration]

[Eternal Mimicry - Veil of Concealment]

[Eternal Mimicry - Manaless Zone]

"No matter how many times, I still laugh at your foolishness, you dare attack the Princess of Alys right in the territory of Golden Faith clan, the most powerful force defending the Human Domain?" In the midst of the seething demonic tainted mana that seemed to be dissipating, a white haired youth indifferently walked towards the creature, his golden eyes was devoid of any sense fear, only boredom seem to remain.

"You can not fool me, it reported that Baek Hyeon Yoo, the most powerful human, is currently not presented within the North Fortress." Vigorath spoke as he tried release more of his mana yet no matter how much he tried not a single ounce of mana can be release.

"W-What?!"

"The most powerful? How laughable." Shin revealed a mocking smile as he summoned the [Undying Gluttony]. "This world is already at my mercy."

[Eternal Mimicry - Divine Banishment]

—-

The night soon befall on the world. Still taking form as the wind, I gaze at the girl with wavy jet-black hair. Her cold amethyst colored eyes pierce through the night as she held her rapier elegantly, slashing down Mana Beasts, one after the other.

"Haa..." I inwardly sighed. I figured it was roughly 6:30 p.m. now, and it should be time for me to make my move. "This is going to be troublesome..."

Not to mention the fact that I had to convince her, I had to also make sure she is cautious around Owen and never returned to the Hunting Club. To do that I am most likely going to have to make her aware of what is going on, cause no way in hell the girl is going to listen to whatever the fuck I'm warning her about, and even if she did listen, she would probably not understand how grave the situation is. This also meant that I had to keep both of us concealed in a location that Owen can not detect and reach with his Skill while allowing her to witness what was going on.

But, I'm getting ahead of myself as the first order of business would be to convince her, by any means possible. Why did I make it sound like I set the difficulty of this task up to 'Impossible', you might've asked? Because I didn't, that was already the fucking default setting.

"Whatever, let's get this over with, my life is also endangered anyway..."