Everyone took a moment to breathe. The six that took part in the battle felt the tension leaving their bodies, as they sit down, taking deep breaths. Only now they how tired they were actually feeling.
Slowly, all the students that had run away returned. Without exceptions, they had their heads down in shame.
"The best of the best, am I right, everyone?" Luo asked loud enough so none could miss him. The mocking tone in his voice was impossible to miss.
They had a small hope that Lhian would defend them, or at least ask him to stop as she usually does, but this time they heard nothing from their appointed leader.
"H-hey, where is that guy that was supposed to protect us? He disappeared as soon as danger showed up!"
"Yeah, he is a coward!"
One of the students started saying, after noticing Mares' absence. Realizing that there would be no defense for them, they decided to use the fact that Mares had supposedly dropped his position, to make themselves look less bad.
"Are you questioning my teacher's choice?"
Their attempt instantly backfired tremendously. Lhian looked at the group that tried to start accusing Mares, and they trembled. It was the first time they saw the silver blue haired looking so seriously at any member of the student body. She seemed to be silently challenging them to repeat their words, to see if they dared to do so.
They had underestimated how disappointed she was at their performance.
"O-of course not, b-"
The student did not have time to finish his words as a sharp noise suddenly cut the air.
A flying void beast of the same rank as the Earthly Brute had managed to pass unnoticed and was now falling at an alarming speed in the direction of some of them.
They were all taken by surprise, and panic was raised in Lhian as she realized she would not be able to save them on time.
The students that were targeted froze in place. Before they had at least managed to run from the Earthly Brute, but now that the threat was rapidly in their direction, their bodies stopped responding, even if their minds screamed for them to try to react in any capacity.
Then a column of air rotating at ridiculous speed hit the flying void beast in the center of its body, penetrating it and creating a hole that passed through the other side of the beast. The impulse of the attack also sent the now corpse away from where the students were, falling at their side instead.
"I think you all misunderstood something."
A voice reached all the students' ears, while they were still in a state of a stupor because of the fast events that happened. Lhian recognized the voice as belonging to Mares and looked in the direction it came from, to see him standing above the flying void beast's corpse.
"My only job is to protect you all in case of a situation like this, in which someone would die. For everything else, you are on your own."
His words lacked any sort of feeling, but they still manage to hurt even more the small amount of pride the students were holding to. They were simply left out with no excuse.
"I am sorry sir! I am sorry for my colleagues' stupid words! We should not rely on you, and I will do my best to prevent this situation from repeating!"
Lhian said, almost screaming, while taking a bow in Mares' direction. Previously, part of her wanted to try to impress him, to show that she and her group were not so far behind him, that was as old as then. But reality had come crashing down, and now she couldn't even feel like trying to compare the student body to the silver eyed. She was ashamed he witness how clueless they were.
The only ones that were not feeling any guilt or shame were the group of five that had taken part in the battle. Different from everyone else, they were looking at Mares with shining eyes of admiration.
"Don't blame yourself, it's fine."
The long-haired suddenly appeared beside Lhian. In his hand was the box Qiulei had given to him, and if one were to look at the void beast's lying corpse, one would notice the core was long gone.
"Though, if I were you, I would get going. In a few moments, the blood and corpse will attract more beasts, like that one." He said, pointing to the corpse of the flying beast.
Lhian's eyes went wide with the realization. She had the urge to smack herself for forgetting something so basic, before passing her orders for everyone to regroup and start moving again. Mares' words were not light, so they all heard him and wished for nothing more than to get away from this place as fast as they possibly could.
Mares looked around, and faster than the others could notice, he also got the Earthly Brute core, before appearing behind Lhian. He did notice that the eccentric group of five were closer to him and their appointed leader now than before, and he was aware of how they seemed impressed with him, but he wasn't paying too much mind to it.
"I am really sorry Mars."
Lhian said, low enough for only the silver eyed to hear her. If it was not for the mask, she might have seen a small smile on his lips.
"As I said, it's fine. You did well actually. Is an interesting technique that you have."
Hearing his compliment, the happiness on Lhian's face was evident, as a huge smile formed on her lips and a proud light shined in her pupils.
"You think so? Heh, I always hear I am talented, but most of the time they are just trying to be polite because of my teacher. But if someone as strong as you say so, hehe, I am flattered."
She was scratching the back of her head as she said so.
"Your teacher seems to have a high standing in your academy."
He pointed out, with mild hopes that she could explain a little more about Qiulei's position. By the way, Talho treated her, and how everyone else seemed to just follow along with what she wanted, Mares even questioned if she wasn't the owner of the academy.
"Hehe, of course. I sometimes still have trouble believing she is my teacher. She is one of the most important people in the academy."
Mares hummed at her words.
"Is your academy big?"
Lhian laughed hard hearing that question.
"Hehe, sorry… to be honest, is just a bit surprising that you seem to know nothing of it. The Battle Crown Academy is pretty famous."
'Indeed. It was already so way before a thousand years ago, I suppose they must have grown a lot since then.'
Esen said.
'Huh… why you never told me?'
'Did it interest you?'
It didn't really, and Mares knew that. His curiosity was about Qiulei, not the academy.
'Fair enough.'
"If your academy is so famous, do you need to come here to have some hunting practice? Since your teacher has influence and your academy seems to be big, from what you told me, I suppose there would have been other places you could go to. Sorry if I am intruding too much."
Lhian shocked her head at his words.
"No, is a normal doubt that anyone else would also have. To be honest, even if we are called the Battle Crown Academy, for some time now the academy's focus has been shifting from focusing on power and battle to studies and scholarly subjects. Students in their first stage, like us, would be far from getting permission to have actual practice." She explained with her arms crossed. "There is a bit of division currently. My teacher and other members of the higher part of the academy don't like that we are going this way, while the other group says there is no longer any need to focus on battles, since we are in times of peace, and that should focus on more, refined subjects." She said the last part with sarcasm.
"So, I suppose even with your teacher's position, she had to use a less usual method."
The silver blue haired nodded.
"Exactly."
She seemed she was going to say something else, but one of the patrolling groups had come back and they were clearly scared.
"Miss Lhian, we noticed that probably eight to ten void beasts are going in the direction of where we had the previous encounter. If we keep going this way, we might meet three or two of them."
The words were passed to Lhian, who lost the casual demeanor she had while talking with Mares.
'Now they see the void beasts approaching.'
The silver-eyed thought with a sneer. Having a taste of reality was a great way for them to take things more seriously.
'Is not only that. The Earthly Brute, though its name might say the opposite, is quite stealthy.'
'Really?'
The white-haired nodded in his mind space.
"Did you identify them? What are the alternative routes?"
Lhian asked, already looking at the map in her hand, trying to think of other paths they could take to their destination.
"Why don't we just fight them?"
Luo and his group got closer, as the wolf humanoid alien offered the idea, making Lhian look at him as if he was insane.
"Didn't you see how it went last time?"
"We did, and we won!"
Clest, the third-eyed, said confidently.
"We were lucky." Lhian retorted.
"Wasn't the whole point of this to make us have real experience? Running away seems counterproductive."
Vessino said while crossing his four arms.
That made Lhian stop. It was indeed true that they had come to get experience, but their morale couldn't be lower, and she now had negative trust in the battle competency of her colleagues. Between the option of an utter defeat in which Mares would have to help them again, or avoiding the battle, she tended to prefer the last option. But still, she knew their point was valid, if they just kept running it would defeat the whole purpose of their journey.
"And besides, we have boss here, so we should make use of this opportunity and take as many chances as we can. If everything goes wrong, the boss saves us."
Luo said with a huge grin, as he patted Mares back.
Lhian and Mares looked at each other and then at the group of five, which had the same smiles.
"Excuse me?"
Behind the mask, one would be able to see Mares showing a severely confused expression.
"Boss?"
Lhian was not much better. Probably because they called her chief ironically, but when they called Mares' boss, it was with respect.
"Of course! The way he dealt with the Inpati was amazing!"
Luo said, seemingly amazed by Mares' early display. Not only he, but his whole group was also like that.
"Wait, now you act like this? Weren't you paying attention to his fight in the coliseum?"
The silver blue haired asked, with a vein threatening to pop up on her forehead. She was rather embarrassed by their actions.
"Huh? Oh, we only heard about it, we were mostly sleeping."
Callon, the one with a mask, answered honestly, with a chuckle that had no shame. Lhian had to resist the urge to facepalm herself, and even the students that were tense before watched the conversation with amazement.
"Aham, I think you should focus on the matter in your hands now."
Though he wanted to ask some questions, Mares decided to remind them about what should be their priorities.
"Yeah, the boss is right. So, what you say Lhian?"
Ignoring how they called Mares boss and addressed her in a very casual way, the leader of the students got thoughtful. She knew she had to make a decision fast. And after thinking about what the quintet said, about how they should try to take advantage of the situation, even if she did not enjoy taking advantage of Mares, she was inclined to agree that they should try to battle.
"Well," Before she could get to a decision though, the silver-eyed raised his voice. "If you do choose to fight, I might have a way to make my job easier, and help you."
Lhian was curious, the other students dreadful, and the quintet, for lack of a better description, hyped.