3 Beginning the search

Ensen stared at the odd gold-outlined message box in deep thought. Although he never cared about earning money, his two weeks of pay and the substantial severance package he was getting from his former career added up to quite a bit. In addition to that, while his apartment wasn't the nicest place around, it was relatively cheap because of that. So he had quite a bit in savings over the past few years.

After thinking deeply, Ensen decided to follow the mission the odd system had given to him. While he did think about creating his own private Academy before, he always gave up on the idea due to his lack of skills in the administrative department. But if his assumptions about the system were right, then it would help improve his skills to a decent level at the very least.

Ensen walked over to his kitchen once again. He had a rather worn-down white fridge with visible marks and scratches on the surface, and the situation with the oven was barely any different. The oven seemed even more beaten up in comparison with the fridge, there were even visible dents in the door of the black oven... for some reason. They were all there when he began renting this place so he was never really worried about it.

He walked over to the battle-damaged fridge and gently opened the door, grabbing a half-eaten sandwich that was left-over from yesterday's breakfast. It was a BLT sandwich that seemed... edible at the very least.

He thought over his options with the mission. While there was no timeframe for this to be done, he wanted it done as soon as he could, as it was hindering further advancements. As such, he brought out his phone and began looking around for possible places he could purchase land and maybe even a pre-existing school. After all, that would speed things up by a large margin.

After searching around, Ensen found two plots of land that had the potential to be his new Academy. However, he was still unsatisfied with his choices. After all, plots of land were expensive. Even more expensive then he thought. While he could afford these places if he took out a loan, he would rather not do that, because who knows if his Academy would be profitable for a few months, if at all.

Because of this, Ensen kept looking. He scanned nearly every large real-estate site and eventually found another potential site that could work. Marking down the locations, Ensen got dressed in a light blue hoodie with a grey shirt underneath and some nice blue pants. After he was dressed, he headed out the door to head towards his car.

After taking the elevator down to the ground floor, he calmly walked towards his car that was at his designated parking space. With seemingly a new purpose in life, Ensen gave out a slight smile as he unlocked his car and started it up. Taking another glance at his phone, he noted the address for the first plot of land and began driving towards the location.

After around 40 minutes in rush-hour traffic, Ensen finally arrived at the first plot of land and he was... underwhelmed, to say the least. The right side of the land was bordering a popular bar on the side of the street, and on the other side was where the rather undeveloped part of the town began. Because of this, garbage littered the street, and the whole area gave off an unfriendly vibe.

Ensen decided to walk around the plot at the very least, even though he knew in his heart that this place wasn't suitable for a private academy. Getting out of his car, he quickly locked the door and began briskly walking towards the plot of land, trying to minimize the time he would stay here.

The whole plot was surrounded by a chainlink fence, although numerous holes showed that the fence was not respected. With light nervousness in his steps, Ensen approached one of the holes in the fence and walked onto the plot. The very first thing he smelled was a mixture of tobacco and other various unpleasant substances. While that smell could go away with proper cleaning, it made him even less hopeful for this property.

For the next few minutes, he paced around the property, analyzing nearly every inch. What he saw was astounding to him. Garbage littered the property, just like outside but to an even greater extent. Charred logs were scattered about the grounds, indicating a campfire of some sort has held here recently. He even found a few tents just standing there in the open. After around 15 minutes of walking around the plot, he believed he had seen all he needed to, and he quickly gave up on the plot.

Without any more thoughts of his part, he quickly returned to his car and drove farther in town, completely creeped out by that plot of land. After a few minutes of constant driving, Ensen made a decent amount of distance from the plot because it was no longer rush-hour. He slowly pulled into a nearby parking lot and pulled out his phone once more, checking the address for the 2nd plot of land he had looked at.

Noticing it wasn't too far away, Ensen decided to stop and get something to eat quickly, since the sandwich from earlier didn't fill him up much. He saw a small coffee shop and quickly pulled into the parking lot. Upon exiting the car, Ensen took a moment to pause and just admire the beauty around him. Unlike earlier, the area he was in was quite beautiful. Trees were lining the streets with some small bushes accompanying them. In addition to this, the buildings were quite old and still had their charm thanks to good upkeep. He could even hear birds chirping, seemingly hiding in the trees.

With Ensen regaining his calm, he walked inside the coffee shop. A small bell rang when the door was opened. The shop itself was quite small, only having room for 10 or so seats. But at the same time, it was a very high-class cafe. It had a small display case displaying various types of treats, nice old-fashion tables that fit the atmosphere of the location, and various plants scattered around the eating area.

Ensen scanned the display case, within the case were many different types of sweets and snacks. Such as muffins, cookies, different kinds of pastries, and more. Taking a glance, a sweet scone stood out to him. This scone had raspberry and thin-sliced almonds drizzled with a cream sauce. With his mouth nearly drooling in anticipation, Ensen walked directly up to the barista since there was no lineup.

After ordering the raspberry almond cream scone and a regular black coffee, Ensen waited for only about a minute until both were ready. Upon thanking the barista, he walked over to a nearby table and sat down, laying his phone down to the left of the table.

Without even pausing for a moment, Ensen being slowly eating the scone, savoring every bite of the delicious sweet. After a few short delightful minutes, the scone was finally gone. Leaving a satisfied smile on Ensen's face in its wake.

Feeling relaxed, Ensen decided to stay a little longer, slowly sipping his coffee and playing a little game on his phone. While he was focusing on his game, a sudden bell from the direction of the door rang out. Unbothered by this, Ensen didn't even look up from his phone.

"Oh hey, Ada. ready for your shift?" A sweet voice said, Ensen recognized it as the barista he talked to earlier.

An awkward smile emerged on Ensen's face immediately after hearing that. 'It couldn't be... right?' he thought as he slowly looked up from his phone. He saw a blonde-haired girl with large glasses in a light grey and black plaid shirt with grey jeans. Upon seeing this Ensen nearly involuntarily facepalmed.

'It really is Ada. Wait, isn't she supposed to still be in school?' Ensen thought, quickly checking the time on his phone out of curiosity. '...Or not I guess. Damn my internal clock is messed up. So, she works here? Last time I checked students at the SilverLeaf Academy weren't allowed to have part-time jobs. Well, not like it's my responsibility to enforce that anymore.'

Ensen chugged the rest of his coffee and began to plan his escape. It was simply too awkward for him to talk to his students the day after he was fired.

While he was slowly concocting the most incredible escape plan in the world, he heard a voice.

"Oh, is that Mr. Fuentes?" Said Ada, who's voice Ensen immediately recognized.

Trying to avoid talking to her, Ensen quickly went on his phone, pretending like he didn't hear or recognize her at all.

A few minutes passed, Ensen was beginning to have careful optimism about his attempt of hiding. He finally worked up the courage to look up, and what he saw left him stunned.

Ada was standing right in front of his table, with her hands on her hips and her eyes staring at him intently. To the right of Ada at the order area, the barista was standing there trying to hold in her laughter and was barely succeeding at it.

'Umm... this is awkward, she's just staring at me.' Ensen thought while trying to think of something to say.

"Oh... hey, Ada didn't see you there." He spoke, trying to be as casual as possible.

"Hmm... is that so?" Ada said, still staring accusingly at Ensen, seemingly making puppy dog eyes at him.

"Y-Yeah, of course, why else would I not answer you?" Ensen said, trying to keep his cool, and beginning to slightly fail at it. Trying to direct the conversation elsewhere, he then responded, trying to act casually "So... you work here?"

"Yeah, I do Mr. Fuentes. I would say don't get me in trouble, but you can't anymore." She said, sticking her tongue out jokingly. Suddenly her face turned slightly serious. Looking around, she quickly took a nearby chair and sat on it at Ensen's table.

"Anyways, I needed to talk to you Ensen. I know how to get your job back." She said proudly with a broad smile as if waiting for praise.