In the Nightmare Realm, in an old tavern lit by dim lamps, many people sat scattered around the room. Among them, four people were gathered at a corner table.
There was a man whose hair looked dark green as the light reflected off it. He had a lean, tall build and wore leather hunting clothing, with a dagger at his waist. Taking a sip of beer, he asked,
"Any news from Tellus?" His tone clearly showed he was the boss of the group.
A short man with several moles on his face—an ugly-looking fellow—spoke up. "Yes, Young Master Valtor. There is news that your brother has awakened."
A cold light flashed in his eyes upon hearing that. "Is he under the family's training?"
The ugly man grinned, making his face look even worse. "You don't need to worry, Young Master Valtor. Your brother is a coward. If you give the command, I'll kill that Zuko."
The man kept a calm expression. "No need. You cannot kill him in Tellus. There will be proof if you do that. Not to mention, Father cherishes him."
He sighed and drank a full mug before continuing, "We would be lucky if he accepts the training. The moment he steps into the Nightmare Realm… it will be his end."
A cold smirk appeared as he finished his words. "Now the most important thing is that I get more abilities. Let's go."
Saying that, the man left the tavern with his group.
---
It was morning, just minutes before class started.
The triplets, Drayen, and Fedric were already present. Today Leo was the most excited; even Drayen felt a bit jealous seeing the ability Leo got. Apart from Leo and Drayen, none of them had awakened an ability, but they had successfully absorbed the core and become Nightborne. They just didn't have any ability to test out.
This was what made it difficult to be a Nightborne. This was why talents were important. If they had super-grade talent, even if their luck was worse, they still had a chance of awakening. But without talent, mostly luck dominated the area.
Leo was breathing out fire constantly and showing off to Drayen and Fedric. Fedric's face was worse than Drayen's as he watched Leo's smug expression.
"See? How awesome I am."
He breathed out, and about half a foot of small fire came out.
Leo was the only one who had awakened among the triplets. Both sisters smacked his head. "Do you want to burn the benches?"
Drayen was laughing — Guess they already got back to normal.
Kira entered from the entrance. She saw Leo breathing fire. Leo's eyes were excited, clearly looking for praise.
Kira had a disappointing look on her face. "Anybody get other abilities other than this fire camp?"
Leo, who was expecting praise, stared at her. "Ma'am..."
"What?" Kira looked toward him.
The sisters couldn't hold on as they started murmuring and laughing at Leo.
Drayen lifted his hand. Kira gave a low critique for him as well. "Yeah, you told me the day before yesterday. It's not very good. But you are in luck, since the ability is a counter to Shadow Hounds."
Fedric and the triplets stared at him. Leo blurted out, "Gang leader, you didn't tell us! When did you tell Ma'am?"
Drayen was about to give his explanation when Kira spoke, "You can talk about this later. Didn't you all want to go and explore the village?"
Drayen was the most excited guy at her words, his eyes shining. "Finally."
Apart from Leo, who was still digesting the critique, everyone was happy as they talked.
Kira coughed, "Before going to the village, let me remind you. You guys don't have one good ability—the whole gang. So avoid trouble at any cost, and don't drift too far away from me."
After the short reminder, the group went to the Nightmare Realm using the portal in Etherion.
The Nightmare Realm was also daytime, so the trees on the streets were glowing. Combined with the lamps on the houses, it looked like a magical world. There were people walking on the mud streets; some were going for hunts judging by their gear.
Kira and the group were also wearing shadow-leather dresses, which were the common clothes of this village. The leather from Shadow Hounds was very light and black. Even after processing the skin, it remained dark black.
Drayen's eyes roamed around the huts and some of the two-storied buildings made of bricks. He noticed some people here were using items from Tellus. Some wore stylish slippers or colorful shoes from Tellus. Some wore hats from Tellus.
He saw that some kids were playing with plastic toys or other stuff from Tellus. Because of the merging of the two worlds, the culture was starting to mix.
Leo spoke, "They all look like humans."
Fedric corrected his spectacles as he said, "Are you deaf when the instructor was teaching? It's proven that Nightmare people and Tellus people are all humans."
Drayen spoke this time, "I didn't expect this level of culture mixing already. Not to mention people of Tellus don't even have a hint."
Kira spoke, "It's mostly because of the greed of the people in power."
Drayen agreed with a nod as he continued conversing with her.
Lia asked, "Fedric, don't you think Ma'am and Drayen got close? I mean… too close."
Fedric hadn't noticed before, but the two did seem very friendly. "Hmm, very suspicious." He adjusted his spectacles.
The market was at the center of the village. They could see that there were stalls and carts selling a bunch of items on the outskirts of the market. There were a variety of fruits, vegetables, or corpses of tainted on the carts. As they entered the inner area of the market, they saw all kinds of things. They sold some items from Tellus. They sold gear in the stores. They sold dresses. For a village market, it was big enough already. The majority of the market was related to hunting stuff. Items from Tellus were very popular and costly here in the Nightmare Realm.
Here, they had their own currency for trading goods. It wasn't barter; they had bills issued by the kingdom just like Tellus. Here they called it kami. One Rank One core was 1000 kami. Cores had a high value.
They didn't have much kami on them; they were just wandering around. The corpse of the Shadow Hound did have value, but aside from the claws and skin, the rest wasn't worth much. They barely sold for 40 kami, and the school took 20 kami as the fee for exchanging the core.
Drayen and the gang bought a fruit that was popular in this village—Kira paid for it. It looked like a potato, but when they ate it, it had a magical taste, different from the food of Tellus. They moved on.
----
In the computer science division, classes were going as usual. It was Mr. Dordo's class; he was teaching networking today.
"Alright, understand everyone. Next…" He was about to continue.
He noticed that Lara had slowly drifted off to sleep.
Oh, another awakener. Hehehe. There was a happy smile on his face.
He didn't want to use his ability, Sleeping Puppet. It was the ability to manipulate a sleeping person, and it only worked on unawakened or low-ranked ones. This was how he took care of the incident with Fedric, Drayen, and Zuko previously. It was troublesome to use that skill as it had many weaknesses. He didn't want to risk it. He waited for the bell to ring and announced an early let-off.
Lara was a cheerful girl, even after the bell rang and he announced the early dismissal. Her friends were trying to wake her up. They were getting anxious.
"Lara, what happened? Wake up," a girl shook her, but Lara's eyes remained closed and she was breathing extremely slowly.
Another girl panicked, "We should take her to the infirmary!"
Mr. Dordo acted panicked as he said, "Yes, we should hurry."
He took her to the place where Zuko, Drayen, and Fedric were when they were awakening—the infirmary.