It was 40 minutes past 9 AM, the same day. Vorden had already come and reminded Quinn once before too that he couldn't be late. Although Sen looked quite carefree, he was apparently more anxious that Quinn, considering that he was the one who decided on this.
Quinn was never a formal or classy lad; in fact, he thought of it a pain in the ass to even choose a decent combination of clothes, especially formal ones. But since he never usually does things like this, he tried to at least dress up decently. He wore, out of the small array of formal clothing that he had, a black shirt with the top button, below the collar button, not attached, revealing his chest muscles partially, and a chain that he used to wear on special occasions that was given to him by his father, who was quite the enthusiast of jewelery; and a pair of a shade of brown pants that seemed to fit him perfectly.
Without further delay, after rolling up his sleeves, Quinn dashed out, but not without his silver card that contained quite a sum of money. However, as he headed out, he couldn't help but think of his interaction with Luna a while back.
Eventually, after arriving at the designated location, somewhere in the city, within a minute as he flew past everything so fast that his figure blurred and could not be seen by the naked eye, he saw another first-year student of the military sitting on a wooden bench, under the shade of a great tree.
She wore a lovely sun hat that cast a delicate shadow over her face, giving her an air of quiet elegance. Her summer dress, a light and flowing fabric with a floral pattern, perfectly suited the gentle breeze and the warmth of the sun.
Upon a closer look, Quinn noticed that it was Petra, an acquaintance he had formed during the portal outing not too long ago. Seeing her reminded him of the incidents that happened at Butani, and a bitter memory of Zayne as well. It also seemed to serve as an indicator for how much he had grown since then, in the matter of a few days.
Quickly snapping out of his thoughts, he spoke after briefly appreciating her beauty and the serene atmosphere around her as she read through a small booklet: "Hey, Petra," he sat down beside her and shuffled to create a comfortable distance between the two of them, "Long time no see. How've you been holding up? The situation was... quite hectic, back at Butani, after all."
Closing her small book and keeping it away, she looked at the person beside her, "Ah! Quinn!" she smiled as she looked at him, and removed her hat. "I thought I wouldn't see for some time. After all, what you displayed back then, with Victor, was incredible. I was sure that the higher-ups would try and get in contact with you! But, I guess they hadn't since you're still here, right?"
'Hmm, I'd forgotten,' thought Quinn, 'Since I displayed my powers back then... when I raised a giant shadow to protect the students, I expected the military to come and get me. Guess I gotta wait for them to come and get me... but—rather than going through all of that trouble with the military, I think I'll just go and register as a Traveller and a Dungeon Crawller, and hopefully, get a decent rank for the power test so that I can explain my ability and its strength; hopefully after I come up with a decent backstory as to how I attained this ability... .
"After all, the school never assesses the students until the time of the preparation of the intra-school tournament, but they keep a record of students with no abilities, and I had none until the first day of military school. So, it'd be no surprise if they just come knocking at my door...'
Taking a second to think about all of this, Quinn tried to steer away from the topic, "Yeah... anyway, what're you doing out here? It's pretty humid."
"Ahh..." Petra continued, in an embaressed tone, even though it looked like she did not want Quinn to know about it that she was also, in fact, dragged into a similar situation such as himself by her friend. "My friend... Emma, told me to come with her to a sort of... well, it is a double date. Bu- but, I swear that I'm not seeing anyone or anything! I just kinda got dragged into this, I don't even know who's coming other than my friend!"
"Oh. That so?" Quinn gently smiled at her, enjoying the interaction between the two of them. He had already taken into consideration that Petra might have been invited as well, so he did not bother to mention anything about it.
The two of them continued to share conversations, until finally, the rest of the remaining two people arrived at the scene, beneath the great tree. It was Sen and Petra's friend that she mentioned every so often: Emma.
They greeted each other and introduced themselves. "Wait, Quinn, you're...my date?!" Petra asked—surprised and flustered—looking at all three of them, one after the other. 'Well, if we met like this, it wasn't really a blind date... .' thought Quinn.
"Haha, I thought you would've noticed, but I guess not," Quinn laughed a bit nervously, "Also, you, you could've just told me who it was we were meeting with. Surely you didn't think you can even call this a blind date now. Not that I've been to any, so I wouldn't know..." Quinn pointed at Sen, poking him on his forehead, as if he were trying to drill into it.
The small group of students filled with laughs and giggles every now and then, and they made their way to the city where there were countless amenities for one to explore, but not enough time in a day. Walking along, behind them, Quinn smiled gently as he looked at the clear sky.
Petra seemed to be looking around for someone and as she turned around, she smiled as she jogged towards Quinn, grabbing his hand and pulling him closer to the group, "C'mon, why are you walking so far away from us."
Letting himself be dragged, Quinn thought: 'Hmm... maybe this isn't bad either. I can always do whatever I was planning on another date.'