Joel froze when he heard that question. He could tell that it was evidently a threat—a threat to kill him—and the look in Raze's eye told him that it was not a joke.
"I'll do my best to find out who that person is. Please, I'll do anything," Joel said.
"Good, seems you have understood the situation that you are in. So just get me some good results by the end of today, and all will be well.
Also, I am not asking this of you for nothing. You want to be part of the ten that get selected for the main competition, right?
You want that chance to be recognized as an Elite, right? Well, I can offer you that. I'll make sure you make it through the preliminaries, but that is all on the account that you actually get good information," Raze said as he patted Joel on the back.
"And look, we didn't even need to reach the park to finish our little talk," Raze said and left.
Joel stood in that position for a while. He didn't move at all until he was certain that Raze had walked far away.
[Hidden mission completed: First pawn created.]
[Reward: 500 EXP, 500 SP, New Spell unlocked]
As he walked, a string of notifications came in, and when they did, Raze paused. He stared at the screen in shock—he had finished a hidden mission?
He had no idea that there was something like this, but he was genuinely happy that there was, and it gave him so many good rewards.
[Level up! You have gained 2 free stat points.]
Another notification came through, and it was one that he loved to see—he had gotten to level 4.
"I guess being the bad guy pays," he said with a small laugh.
"Show me the spell," he asked the system.
[Spacial Blade: Fires a half-meter-thick invisible space blade at your enemy. Cost: 10 Mana points per shot.]
His eyes glowed as he saw the description of the spell. He eagerly ran toward the academy building. He went in and went toward the academy training grounds.
The academy training grounds were at the back of the academic building. They were filled with many equipment and tools for students to use during their free time to train.
It was an open space at the back—no roof, just direct sunlight. Raze walked through the door that led to the training ground. Immediately, he got there, he could hear the sounds of explosions, swords, arrows, and shields smashing.
There were a lot of students doing what they wanted to inside, but that didn't really matter to Raze. There was still enough space for him to do what he needed to.
The training grounds had dolls for attack practice. They were self-healing dolls that could take a lot of damage and heal up as long as they were not fully destroyed.
He carried one of the dolls and placed it in an empty space in the training ground. He stretched out his hand and fired a space blade easily.
He couldn't see the blade, but somehow, he was able to sense the direction it traveled in. The blade hit the doll and left a very deep cut—close to five inches deep.
He was shocked when he saw the damage the Spacial Blade did. He ran close to the doll before it could heal up and looked closer at the cut. It was clean and deep.
The cut healed up, and the doll went back to normal. He walked back to where he had shot from and got ready to take another shot when suddenly someone walked close to him.
He turned to see the person, and it was none other than Mia. She stood looking at Raze.
"Can I help you?" Raze asked.
She didn't answer for a while. She walked closer to Raze until she was looking at him face to face. "Who are you?" she asked.
"If you want to know me, coming up to my face is not the way to go," Raze said.
"Enough of all this charade, Raze. I know you, and this is not you. You have been acting different for days now, and it's not just normal different—it's like you are a different person," she said.
"You didn't know me well enough, Mia," Raze said. He bent forward, their faces so close that if she moved forward, it would touch.
He pulled back his head and took a few steps away from her. "You see, I warned you not to engage me, but you still did it, and that's really pissing me off, Mia," Raze said.
"Why should I do what you say? After all, you are a commoner, and I am a noble, and I can do whatever I want," she said, making it clear to Raze that she was higher than him.
Raze broke into laughter and then smiled at her. "Noble, right? Well, I have other plans for you nobles. This preliminary competition—watch out. I'll make a divide so great that nobles and commoners will never sit together or speak to one another again.
You said I've changed, right? Well, all you have seen is a glimpse of what is to come—blood, war, battles, death. All will come, and your hands will not be clean as well, Mia," Raze said.
"What do you plan to do? If you do anything like that, the academy will expel you for sure," Mia said.
"Hmm? Who said I'm going to do anything like that? There are pawns I can easily use, and the academy will never find out. The only reason I tell you this now is because I want you to watch as it all falls to ruin.
I want you to watch as it all collapses while you know the person that caused it and yet are unable to change anything," Raze said.
"And what stops me from telling the academy about this right now?" she asked.
Raze pulled out a yellow paper. "This is a recording rune with information that will very much implicate your special hero, and the day you speak, the academy will know.
You are not foolish enough to think I am bluffing, and even if you don't believe me, it doesn't really matter to me. You can risk his life by telling the academy on me, Mia," Raze said with a bright smile.