Banquet

As Adrian and Elise came into the mansion, Adrian couldn't help but look around. It all looked amazing, like he was in some kind of fantasy world. The walls were white, but they somehow emanated some sort of light.

The ceiling was made of wood but had been painted and decorated with many colors. The most prominent color, of course, was gold—a truly luxurious home to have. Adrian didn't care about all this, though; the most important thing for him was fighting and training.

He and Elise were walking down the hallways towards the hall where Sir Harlace was at. Elise tried starting a small conversation with Adrian.

"So, Adrian, why were you at the training field for so long?"

"Hmmm" Adrian was not concentrated, so he didn't hear her. Elise felt this was kind of annoying; men always listen when she speaks.

"..." She kept looking at Adrian, waiting for him to answer her question. It was not an important question, but it was not cool to ignore a woman.

"What?" Adrian, of course saw the stare after a few seconds, and he was wondering why she was looking at him with an annoyed look.

"Nothing, just come along!" She didn't feel like talking anymore, so she just showed Adrian where the hall was.

A few moments later, they arrived in front of a three-meter tall wooden door split in two. It was made of solid wood, so it looked quite heavy. What surprised Adrian was that Elise just casually walked over, and opened the door.

Adrian didn't wait too long as he walked into the hall. It was a massive hall with a table in the middle. Around that table were the nine contestants for the tournament, Sir Harlace and a woman beside Sir Harlace that Adrian hadn't seen before.

"Oh, glad you could join us!" Sir Harlace saw that Adrian and Elise walked in.

Before Adrian could say anything, he heard Elise comment on this, "I would have been here before, if not for this guy!" She glared at Adrian with an annoyed look. As she ended her sentence, she sat down on an empty seat next to Sir Harlace.

"What do you mean?" He looked at his daughter with a weird look.

"He was training for hours ... and I didn't know how to stop him!" She looked aggrieved.

Sir Harlace looked at Adrian with a weird look. Why would someone that just got wounded go back to training? He could only think of one thing; this guy is a training maniac. He already knew he was a battle maniac; now he was also a training maniac? That is one hell of a combo.

"So you are both a battle and training maniac, I see?" He didn't say this out loud; he basically whispered it. No one heard it except Adrian.

"I wouldn't say that!" Adrian gave a small smile and looked at Harlace. The others did not know what he was talking about, but sir Harlace did. He just returned Adrian's smile and beckoned for Adrian to sit at a free seat.

"Now that we are all here, the banquet can finally begin!" He stood up, about to say something.

"I am having this banquet for you guys that are going to participate in the tournament! I thought this would be a good opportunity to talk with each other!" He said this with an earnest look in his eyes. "Now, everyone, enjoy yourself!"

A few servants came in with food trays as his little speech ended with lots of food and drink. They placed plates with food in front of each of the people there and poured some red wine. It was pretty luxurious.

Adrian saw that the weak-looking guy was also good again and was sitting opposite him. "What a great fight we had earlier! Thank you, bro!" Adrian treated all the people he liked as brothers or sisters.

This surprised the weak-looking guy. He thought that he and Adrian would be enemies at the training ground from now on. They had damaged each other quite a bit. He himself was not a battle maniac like Adrian, but he still thought it was a fun fight.

"Yeah, great fight!"

"Let us do it again one day, okay?" Adrian was excited for them to fight again in the future. "And please teach me some hand-to-hand combat" Adrian had thought of this for a long time. He might not always have his weapons at hand when he fights monsters.

"Sure, but I won't go easy on you!" The weak-looking guy gave Adrian a small smile. He was also getting excited now.

"By the way, my name is Adrian!" Adrian chose to give his name first for once. He was usually the one that told his as the last one.

"I am Loki!" He told his name to Adrian, while giving a slight nod. Adrian returned the nod, and this ended their small conversation.

After a few moments, Sir Harlace really couldn't help it anymore. He had been curious about something for a while.

"So, Adrian, how old are you exactly!"

"16" Adrian had his usual indifferent façade on again. The only one he would show another facade there was Loki since he deemed him as a friend.

Everyone looked at Adrian with shocked gazes. He was not even 18 yet, but still, he was so strong. They all took a hit on their self-confidence. So young, yet so strong.

Loki looked at his newly acquired friend with amazement. He thought that his new friend was a good find for him.

"That is amazing! You are a genius!" Sir Harlace couldn't help but comment. He started to think about how great it would be to get Adrian into their family. He looked at his daughter with an expectant gaze but quickly looked away.

Elise did not see the gaze she got from her father, as she was still shocked about Adrian's age. She was 20 herself, but she had a feeling that he would not win against Adrian in a fight.

"I just like to train" That was all Adrian wanted to answer. To be fair, that was also the honest answer. He is a strong young man because he has trained every day for most of his life. The battles he had thought had also made some contributions.

This ended quickly since no one wanted to think about someone so young; he was probably one of the strongest ones here. Of course, Sir Harlace was the strongest there, but no one knew how strong he was or how high his level was.

Everyone other than him was around the same level, at least they thought so. Adrian was at the lowest level, as everybody there averaged around level 25.

However, they thought Adrian had a level higher than 30, which was why everyone there was very surprised. Sixteen years old and having a level higher than most of the skilled soldiers in the kingdom is quite impressive.

The banquet went on for quite a while longer. Adrian found out that only 3 of the nine people were adventurers like Adrian through this banquet. The rest of them, was part of the family. The weak-looking guy was one of the people part of the family. He was trained in the family's hand-to-hand combat style.

He was asked to join the tournament since he had a pretty unique talent, which was to repent any weapon made of metal. His skills in hand-to-hand combat were also top-notch. What was a little annoying was that his explosive strength was relatively low.

They had never found a solution to this. They have even made him go through hellish training; his strength just never went up. He had also tried using the points from leveling upon his strength stat, it actually went up, but the power it gave him was minimal.

He had been down about this for a long time, but he wanted to try fighting anyway. He wanted to travel the world, fight people and maybe look for a cure to this 'disability.'

After Adrian heard about all of this, he could only really offer to help to find a cure. If he ever found a cure, he would go find Loki straight away.

After the banquet ended, it was time to go back to sleep. Adrian went to get out of the mansion to go to the inn he was staying at. He was stopped by Sir Harlace, though.

"Adrian, where are you going?"

"Back to my in to sleep!" Adrian just looked at him with a weird look.

"Just stay here; we have arranged for you all to stay here!" Sir Harlace gave him a friendly smile.

"Oh, okay!" Adrian didn't know how to refuse. He didn't really have a reason to either. He just went with the flow.

After that, a maid came over to them, and Sir Harlace asked her to show Adrian where he should sleep.

Adrian just followed the maid to a small room in the mansion. He was unsure if Innes could stay here, but the dog just followed him without being stopped.