Chapter 148 Sunday Night

Lee Seng and the others appeared in the huge portal room. The smell wasn't like the forest base and the bright lights only made Lee Seng want to keep his eyes shut. The portal building wasn't too loud. It seemed quieter. People weren't going places and Lee Seng rubbed his eyes open as he pulled his phone out.

"Do you want me to punch in the destination to the Third Year dorm building?" Lee Seng asked.

"No, I got it." Jason answered. Lee Seng nodded and slipped his phone back into his pocket. The large screen in front of him flashed their to and from destinations before the room began to glow bright. In the next moment, they had appeared in the small Third Year portal room.

"We're back." Lee Seng groaned and stretched.

"I can finally take a nice shower." Felicia sighed.

"I think I smell like goblin guts." Ritsuka sniffed his shirt. The four pushed out of the room and moved to the stairs.

"Do you think this is a good idea?" Felicia asked. "We did just do a lot of walking and Ritsuka might be..."

"No pain, no gain." Jason answered before he started down the stairs.

"What he said." Lee Seng followed after. Felicia didn't even glance at Ritsuka and followed after.

"Oh, c'mon guys! I don't want to experience stairs anymore!" Ritsuka complained as he started down the stairs. Lee Seng and Jason waved at Felicia as she continued down the flight of stairs to the first floor. They waited for Ritsuka who was groaning and moaning about stairs. Ritsuka rested half of his body on the railing as he forced himself down the steps.

"I. Hate. You. Guys." He continuously repeated. Jason and Lee Seng watched as he landed on the landing of the second floor and they both turned. Jason opened the door and moved. Lee Seng held the door open and turned to look at Ritsuka.

"C'mon, Ritsuka. You've made it three-fourths of the way. Just a bit more and you can off yourself in the warm embrace of a shower." Lee Seng motioned. Ritsuka groaned and pushed past Lee Seng and the door.

"I'm never going down 10 platform worth of stairs ever again!" Ritsuka shouted.

"Yea, yea. It's alright. No more stairs for today." Lee Seng patted. Ritsuka and Lee Seng made it to the elevator hallway when they both split, turning around. "Get some rest, 'kay? I'll see you tomorrow."

"Mmm, see ya." Ritsuka waved. Lee Seng began to turn when Ritsuka shouted again. "Oh!"

"What?" Lee Seng turned.

"Wanna eat breakfast with me tomorrow before classes?"

"Uhhhhh, sure. You wanna meet at the entrance or...?"

"I'll come grab you."

"Alright, is that it?"

"Mmm, bye for real."

"Bye."

Lee Seng moved to his door and brought up the code on his phone. He showed it to the door scanner and listened to the door unlock. He pushed the door open and noticed lights were on.

"Yeah, so that's gonna be... like twenty-three or twenty-four things we'll need for the project then." Manny spoke. Lee Seng shut the door and turned around and noticed his Dark Matter skintight shirt was gone. His veins weren't pulsing and his shirt and jacket were back. Lee Seng moved over and slipped his shoes off before turning to see Manny and Liz working writing away on their tablets.

"Yo, you're back." Manny looked up. Lee Seng tiredly nodded. "How was it?"

"Tiring." Lee Seng sighed. "I think the few hours of sleep I got is finally getting to me now. I exhausted so much energy."

"The hordes weren't that bad?" Liz asked.

"They were bad." Lee Seng pulled his jacket off and opened the closet. He threw the jacket in and started to fish for boxers and shorts.

"How bad?" Manny asked.

"There were anomalies within the goblins."

"Anomalies?"

"Mmm, black veined goblins that were as strong as a high low B-rank."

"LOW B-RANK?" Liz said loudly. She covered her mouth and Manny laughed at her. "Shut up, Manny!" She slapped him and he covered himself as Liz barraged him with slaps. Lee Seng closed his closet with shorts and boxers in hand. "How were they low B-rank?"

"Well," Lee Seng folded his arms and leaned against the closet door. "They had tougher exteriors and hit hard. They can manipulate the black liquid coursing through their veins. I'm pretty sure its some sort of variant to Dark Matter, but we won't know anything until we're told... If we're ever told."

"So the black liquid Dark Matter-like thing made them low B-ranks?" Manny asked.

"Depending on how well they manipulate it, I guess." Lee Seng shrugged. "Frankly, I think we got high C-ranks cause they weren't too annoying to fight. Akali was my leader, so we had an easier time."

"That's true. Akali and Akio were the Third Year leaders. Did they say anything about the other years?"

"From what was inferred in conversations I heard, the other years were doing the same thing." Lee Seng moved over to the bathroom door.

"They really sent out First Years to fight goblins. I wonder how that went." Liz looked at Manny.

"Probably like that scared adventurer who coward at the sight of me because I looked like this." Lee Seng assumed before the metal door shut behind him. Lee Seng grabbed his towel and set it on the shower hook outside of the shower stall. He set his clothes on the counter and stripped his clothes off. He stared into the mirror and observed his body.

"Nothing looks too different..." Lee Seng whispered. He turned around and started the shower. He waited until the water was between scorching hot and warm and started showering.

'Hey, Lee Seng. You should check how much souls you collected during that whole thing.' Keng spoke.

"Oh, yeah, huh. I forgot about that." Lee Seng scrubbed his hair and face. He made a claw over his heart and felt the familiar and uncomfortable pull of the soul orb coming out. The orb slowly pulled out and the gold and white orb hovered a few inches away from his chest. Lee Seng lifted it and peered into it.

Skills Unlocked:

Soul Eater Lv. 3 30/300 +10

Devour (Dark Matter Eater) lvl. 3 35/300 +34

Partial Fox Form (White Fox Cloak) Lvl. 2 59/200 +16

Tail Manipulation Lvl. 2 120/200 +118

Shapeshift Lvl. 1 1/100

Other:

Guardian Orb of Life

Soul Bead Lvl. 2 20/500 (700) +19

"Why did some of my skills gain experience?" Lee Seng asked, aloud. He noticed the orb had indicated how much experience was added from skills. "I thought I needed to allocate extra soul experience into the skills."

'Your skills will naturally keep levelling based on how much you used them.' Keng explained. 'You can put soul points in it, it just helps expedite the level.'

"Why did tail manipulation get more than halfway?"

'You did use it a lot today.'

"I used Devour a lot today, so I thought I would get more points."

'Continue practicing and killing things and you might get experience points. Maybe in no time, you'll get something interesting from it.'

Lee Seng nodded and lowered the orb back into his chest. He felt the warm embrace of the orb and the uncomfortable feeling as it pushed into him. Lee Seng continued showering and made sure to soak himself in the warm embrace of the shower. Ten minutes later, he shut the shower and wiped himself dry, dressed his lower-half, and grabbed his dirty clothes. He hung the towel and moved out of the bathroom.

The metal door slid open and Manny and Liz were still going at it on their tablets.

"You guys finishing homework or something?" Lee Seng rounded his bed and opened his closet door. He threw his dirty clothes in and grabbed a t-shirt and put it on. He shut the door and watched as Manny and Liz were looking at him.

"Yeah, last minute homework." Manny answered.

"Why did both of you look up at me?" Lee Seng asked.

"Staring at your sick abs." Manny smiled. Liz's face turned red and she buried her face in the tablet and acted like she was continuing her homework.

"Mmm, I decided I'd be nice until I sleep." Lee Seng tried to hide his smile but Manny just continued to stare. Lee Seng fished for his phone and found them slipped in his pocket. He pulled it on and noticed he had many unread messages from the group chat.

"Get comfortable. The real hell starts tomorrow." Manny imitated a fake low laugh before actually bursting out in laughter.

"Shut up, ugly." Liz elbowed Manny.

"Alright, alright. Let's finish this up." Manny motioned. Lee Seng moved his pillow against the wall and sat, pulling the covers over him.

"Oh yeah," Liz flicked her tablet pen at Manny. "We have to take them to grab their tablets tomorrow, right?"

"Uhh, I don't think so. Homeroom happens so they'll get it then." Manny answered.

"Oh, there's homeroom?" Lee Seng asked.

"Mmmhm, usually happens after transfer hell weekend. Tell the others about homeroom. It's random on who's in your homeroom by the way. It isn't alphabetical."

Lee Seng opened the Academy app and fished for his class information. He scrolled until he 'HOMEROOM' plastered at the bottom.

"Hmm, I didn't see this 'til now. Says I'm in... 3:367." Lee Seng told them.

"Oh, he's with us!" Liz elbowed Manny.

"Ow, stop jabbing me, Liz." Manny complained.

"I'm sorry, okay!?! It's just fun to hit youuuuuuuuu." Liz laughed.

"Good that you're with us. We don't have many people in our homeroom."

"Maybe the others are with us then. Ask them if you have their socials, Lee Seng."