Night Time

It has been a long day for Jade. It was almost midnight.

By this time, he had managed to learn hardening and also what he called rapidness, it was a technique he built up by withstanding in the polar opposite of the first area, an unbelievably hot area.

In order to do so, and reach the 5 minutes mark in it too, he had to try something a bit different than just to harden his skin.

After all when he tried that, he noticed that after less than a minute, he started sweating from his every part of his skin profusely, so while his skin was not affected, it did not stop the body from overheating and dehydrating, which lead him to start feeling lightheaded and went for a break to drink water. A lot of water !

So he took a different approach, this time around he decided to focus on his blood. After all, the problem of overheating was nothing more than blood circulating in fast manner that causes it to flow increasingly on the skin.

He tried to stabilize his blood flow, and make the circulation a bit slower.

It took him a couple of hours and lots of liters of water but in the end he managed to prevail victorious.

And as a result of his success, he noticed that by tying to resist the speeding of the blood flow, he was now capable of controlling it, and changing the flow at will. Which made him move fluidly than ever, jump higher than ever, and punch faster than ever.

He noticed that while he was tired from all the training he did not feel particularly sleepy.

He had to go back to his room. After all, he was sweating and his close were all wet.

He went through the second floor.

' It seemed to be in the same state as I left it before ' Almost every cubicle was occupied and not much calls to speak of.

He left that floor wondering when there shift ends.

In the first floor, the tavern seemed livelier than it was in the morning. Duka was busy making drinks so he did not want to bother him and went out straight ahead.

***

Back at the hotel, Jade was pleasantly surprised to discover that this place had a shower. And so he took off his clothes and enjoyed one of the best showers he ever had. It was well deserved!

He did not have a change of clothes so he washed what he had and left the to dry on the window. It was time for him to go to sleep.

' I wonder if I could go back to Earth the same way I came here '

He was about to isolate himself but stopped at the last second.

' I will try this later. For now, I think I will stay here ' after all, the training he had taken today gave him a euphoria he had never experienced before in his entire life.

***

Three hours later, Jade still could not fall asleep.

' What the hell is wrong with me ? It is not like my mind is busy thinking about something in particular ' He could not tolerate it anymore, so he decided to go for a walk in the city.

He still had the problem of the wet clothes, but he went to check on them he found them dry completely.

' They must be made of something similar to nylon or polyester '

***

The city was so similar to what the European cities in the middle ages were like; completely ankle-deep in a putrid mix of wet mud, rotten fish, garbage, entrails, and animal dung. People seemed to dump their own buckets of faeces and urine into the street or simply sloshed it out the window.

It was a view straight out of a history book.

Other than this description, there were not much action going on, so he kept on strolling through the area until he reached what appeared to be a giant wall.

It had an entrance and was guarded by a few men that looked like they are part of the defense forces of this kingdom.

' I have nothing to lose, so here goes nothing ' Jade went in their direction to try passing to the other side.

To his utter disbelieve, the guards seemed not to care even a little to his existence, they threw him a glance and went back to their unfocused stare into nowhere in particular.

' I don't like this... '

" Excuse me, can I ask you something ? " He went to one of the guards. He straightened up his back out of surprise and looked at him as if he saw a ghost.

" Sure ... " He was reluctant.

" You see, I am still new this kingdom. As a matter of fact, I am one of those you call - manipulators - " The guard's state of shock disappeared completely and changed into that of resentment.

" Why didn't you try to stop me from passing here without a control check ? What is the point of having you here or even having a wall at all? "

" Eghh, you are either a liar considering that it is hard for someone who is in a guild to not know such a trivial matter or you are indeed one of them and in both you cases you won't be passing through here today "

" What?! A second ago, you didn't even give half a glance, and now you are telling me I can't pass? "

" How should I know that someone wearing such a worn down clothes would be an adventurer ? "

He had a point, after all everyone in that building seemed to have a nice attire.

' Damn that woman, why wouldn't she let me work at their call center until I became a real adventurer? '

Jade didn't seek any trouble, so he just apologized to the man and turned back around, not caring for the reason why he resented the adventurers that much.

He still didn't feel sleepy the slightest, so he decided to go back to the Boundless Voice building, and see if he can learn a bit more about this.

' I am not sure, but this might be caused by the fact that this body is not my real one so I don't feel sleepy in it ? Wait ! What if all of this is just a dream ? That would make sense, wouldn't it ? ' He directly dismissed the idea, since all the pain he felt while training wouldn't have happened if he was - just dreaming -.