"I will part ways with you guys here. Given how I only expected a single student from your area, I only prepared a single token for you guys. That means, before I will get my hands on another one, you will have to temporarily share the house. I hope this is okay with you."
As the female teacher said those words, a slight glint of something between jealousy and mischief appeared in her eyes, only to disappear as quickly as it appeared.
"I assume it will be fixed soon? It won't be too appropriate for a man and woman of our age to live in cohabitation just like that…"
Some might take my words for the typical v-card style of completely fucking up a great chance. But pointing hands like that would only prove how thirsty and thus internally unsatisfied were the ones that could only think about the moment through the perspective of their lower friend's brain.
Right now, what I required the most was a safe and private place where I could discover and practice the secrets of my system. Doing so with the constant scrutiny of any form of roommate would be a pain, far outweighing any of the pros of living with a woman.
Also, if the girls from this world were anywhere close to being similar to the girls of earth, then living with one was something greatly different to what most of the people that have yet to experience it would think about the entire thing. It was one of those things, that looked beautiful only as far as one stood… far away from the situation!
"Yeah. But let's stop talking now. Julian!"
Not even turning her head around all that much, the woman screamed once again, quickly summoning yet another of her juniors or servants. Given how little I knew about this world, I wasn't willing to quickly judge this kind of aspects, as it could lead to even more misunderstandings down the line.
"Yes, Ma'am?"
Standing nearly at attention, a young man that would soon reach his twenties appeared beside the teacher, flexing his well-sculpted muscles through the thin shirt of his. Not even bothering to wear the proper robes, he clearly pulled himself away from some other tasks, as if the teacher wouldn't approve of any delay.
"I need you to do the basic guide for the two of them and help them establish themselves in the academy. For now, they one have one token but you can already look for reasonably comfortable lodging in the vincity of the one we have already."
As soon as this strange woman said those words, a ball of light once again hid her entire posture, only to disappear in thin air the very next moment!
"Follow me."
Not daring to waste any time, the man that the woman summoned instantly threw us into the guide that she mentioned.
In a few next moments, I managed to learn a very minimal amount of stuff. From how we had to advance our ranks to gain access to the higher islands, through the locations of the main points of interests, all the way to where our house and classes were. During this trip, I couldn't help but get more and more excited.
Even though this was an entirely new world for me, instead of looking at it with fear, I could only see it through the glasses of the opportunity. So far, I knew that my fighting skills were somehow considered exceptional, while my basic power was way lower than expected. This is what I could derive from all the events that happened in the past few hours. But I could also tell that ever since my breakthrough to the novice rank, I felt a strange, wild power coursing through my veins, only waiting to be tamed!
That's why, as soon as the entire guide ended with me and the girl being left completely alone with just a few bags of basic equipment that the academy supplied all its students with. Standing in the middle of a small and relatively empty building, I could already tell that with just a few items I could turn this space into not only effective but also comfortable working-space.
"Just in case you forgot, I'm Pavlo."
Putting down the bags filled with stuff like robes, textbooks and basic provisions directly on the floor, I pulled out the set that was supposed to become my new daily robes before turning my head to the girl.
"Ah… Rubia. It's nice to meet you."
From the flustered response of the girl, I could tell that she still required some time to herself in order to fight off the demons in her thoughts. To be fair, with everything happening so rapidly, even I myself had some problems to get accustomed to this new pace of the events.
"I will make sure to remember. For now, I don't want to waste any of our time, so I will be heading off to the training hall."
After helping this girl, it would be not only stupid but also wasteful of me not to give her space right now. Given all the things that I wanted to properly analyze in my system, entering one of those training halls that our guide has shown to us just a mere moment ago seemed like the most reasonable choice out of them all.
*First Chapter: Gearing up*
*Main quest: Complete the cleaner's basic gear*
*Secondary quest: Obtain Bottom Personal Protection Equipment*
*Secondary quest: Obtain Upper Personal Protection Equipment*
*Secondary quest: Obtain auxiliary parts of Personal Protection Equipment*
*Each side task can be completed by either reaching the bottleneck in the respective aspect of the cleaning skill, by fulfilling hidden, emergency or storyline quest.*
Just as I was about to open the doors to the small, circular building that housed the training area that I sought after so much, a new set of messages appeared in front of my eyes, nearly instantly making me lose my stability and almost trip on my own leg. Barely avoiding smashing my head into the wall of the building, I cursed under my nose before pushing the doors open and sitting down on the open floor of the single room as the doors locked themselves behind me.
"Let's start with that strange force of mine…"
As soon as my general level broke through some kind of threshold, a new power appeared in the system. Given how I had no tangible benefits out of levelling my aspects with the exception of this 'skill available' slots flashing right into my eyes, I was determined to find a way to improve this force of mine.
After all, it was the centrepiece of the rank that I was currently at!
But before that, I wasn't willing to keep up with that annoying flashes from the actively disturbing me lines of text. Putting the problem of finding ways to fulfil those new quests of mine, I focused on my internal state, looking for some hook that would allow me to discover something new inside of me.
And to my surprise, it wasn't even that hard!
It simply felt as if some kind of strange liquid was flowing through my veins. Said liquid was so heavy that while I could freely move it around at will, the resistance of my veins once I attempted to push it suddenly reminded me that the candy-like nature of this world so far didn't mean that it was free of its own honest dose of hardships!
After suffering through the pain of the vines stretching all over, I finally felt how this thick liquid started to move. Soon, I managed to extract a single drop of it from a spall puncture I created with the tip of my finger right on the bottom part of my wrist.
"Strange…"
The look of this liquid was incredibly peculiar, as I was nearly perfectly familiar with both its structure, viciously and scent it gave off. Even though I had the name plainly written right on the messages displaying my status, I still had to take a moment to accept the fact that I was actually cultivating a fucking detergent!
"Dang it!"
With a sudden burst of anger, my hand moved on its own, splashing the drop of my own detergent against the floor. While I never wished to be like the main character of those trashy novels I read as a kid, it didn't change the fact that I was in a peculiar situation. Instead of just training the same things as everyone else with the added advantage of the system for my comfort, I actually had to cultivate some useless kind of force that most likely existed for the sole reason of fitting the theme of my system!
Swoosh!
Before I could react, my attention was pulled to a small blink that came out of the floor. More precisely, the place where the drop of my force splashed!
*Congratulation!*
*Host cleared an object!*
*Awarding 1 objective cleaning point*
Just as I started to worry about this thing, the reality proved to not be as bad as I was anxious it could be. It seemed that this life of mine in this world wouldn't be that tough after all!
But instead of lingering at those thoughts, I realised that I still had something greatly interesting to take care off. In the end, the sooner I would get rid of those flashing "Skill Slot Available" messages, the better!