Mystical Journey

In the scarlet-red Crater Field

Two hundred meters apart, two red Mechs were dodging and shooting at each other madly. White and red lasers missed each other by hairs, most of them landing on the ground and creating many burnt black marks.

The Mech on the left was a standard red humanoid, wielding two guns. It looked very average, and was the most basic Mech model.

And the one on the right was a completely different Mech, a large red spider, not humanoid at all. The spider's front four legs had four laser cannons attached to the outside of its joints, and its many digital compound eyes gave off a chilling effect.

"Let's call it a day here." The humanoid Mech stopped shooting suddenly, avoiding a laser beam as thick as an arm, and standing still beside a crater.

"We still can't decide a winner," a helpless voice came from within the spider. "How many times have we fought since we met the day before yesterday?"

"Fifteen times, this is the sixteenth," the humanoid Mech replied.

"Fine, sixteen… I really wonder, what kind of a person are you inside?" The person inside the spider sighed. "Forget it, I'm going offline too, the money this time is yours."

"Thanks."

"No problem."

With a whoosh, the red spider abruptly distorted, and disappeared from where it stood.

'Congratulations, you defeated Kanar. You received 1000 Universal Units, please keep up the good work.'

The voice came from the system.

Only then did Garen recover. Staring at the spinning cube in front of him, he chose to exit the map.

For the past few days, he had been training the Hellfrost Peacock Technique on one hand and getting to know the online battle skills on the other. But after messing around aimlessly for some time, he had somehow actually encountered a true fighter.

Kanar, a long-range shooter using the spider model Mech. He was more than just strong, he could control four shooters and aim them as he pleased at his enemy, and he could even properly use the crisscrossing lasers to have them reflect off each other, reaching angles that he would have never been able to shoot.

The first time they met, Garen nearly lost badly, but thankfully his basics were also very strong. After they had gotten accustomed to each other, the two of them began their intense opposition. Garen's precision was terrifying, no matter how his opponent changed directions, he could still track him down quickly. Even with the Spider's mobility and leaping, his accuracy was still over 50%. But his own mobility was too low, he only ever moved in a small range.

And the Spider's shooting was more reliant on its unexpectedness, and was even stronger in its strange and highly mutable high-speed movements. After Garen took a few small losses, the two sides were engaged in a deadlock.

They had fought over ten matches consecutively over two days, with equals wins and losses, but Kanar the Spider knew that this was in fact his loss, because he was using a specialized model whereas his opponent was only using the most standard Mech model.

Garen exited the map, and returned to the selection room where everything was like a starry sky.

He glanced at his remaining Universal Units: 12560.

This was the result of his labor over the past few days, although there were wins and losses, he still won more than he lost. Unless he met those completely irrational outliers, who had terrifying levels of Mechs or Willpower, he would not lose.

He tapped opened his 'friends' panel, and there was only one name inside -- Kanar. They had bonded over their battles, and added each other as friends. But now Kanar's icon had turned grey, he had evidently gone offline.

"Last match." Garen glanced through the whole Level 1 battlefield, and pressed the sort by ranking option. "Let's see how far I am from the peak-level fighters."

Suddenly the room changed with a whoosh, and after it settled quickly, several new rooms appeared in front of him.

Suddenly he saw a room opened by a vaguely familiar ID, the room name was: 'Dobe if you got the balls then go 1-1 with me!' and the username with it was 'YourDaddy'.

"This guy still hasn't given up," Garen laughed. After he tortured this person last time, he would always open up a room and waste money to keep it there.

This idiot was somehow one of the frontrunners in Level 1, that was evidently a result of the overwhelming advantage from his powerful specialized Willpower and the Mechs he bought with money.

If he hadn't tricked him last time, Garen believed that it would have been hard for him to beat that guy. Be it in Mechanical power, weaponry, or defense, he was no match for him. If he had not destroyed his opponent's propeller back there and let him fall into the crater, Garen probably would have no other way to finish him off.

Plus, Garen was not going into the practice match rooms anymore now, he went straight into matches with rewards of at least 1000 units or more, otherwise, he would not be able to earn at all.

He glanced at his watch terminal, it was three in the afternoon, and there was a missed call from that shop owner over there.

Garen was slightly happy, that must definitely mean that the White Peacock Stones were here. He dialed back quickly, and after some ringing, an old man's head appeared on his watch screen.

"The things are here, when are you coming over to get them?" the cart owner uncle said excitedly as soon as he saw Garen.

"Straight to the flea market?"

"No, come to a rented house beside it, we'll exchange the goods and money on the spot," the uncle shook his head. "We'd be too obvious in the flea market."

"Sure."

"The place is at the building next to the gazebo by the right main street."

Turning off his watch, Garen stood up and looked around him. There were not many people online to battle at this time, most students were at class.

The classes here were not that different from the previous world, the lecturer would drag on and on, talking about nonsense for half a day. Garen went for a few classes and then decided to play hooky, no one cared about your attendance here, as long as you could pay the fees and reach the final standard required for graduation, it didn't matter even if you didn't attend a single class.

Leaving his position, he picked up his school coat and walked out.

When he left the simulation room, a few people who had been sitting up behind him got up at the same time. They exchanged a glance, and then followed him quickly.

By the time Garen left the simulation building, it was already nearing the evening outside, the sunlight was slightly dimming, and it was not too hot.

Garen went against the flow of the crowd, walking towards the school gates. When he passed the school gates, some students dressed in white uniforms with silver linings just happened to walk out of the school gates at the same time, their expressions somber. They got onto a silver levitating car, with teachers from the school waiting at the gate especially for them.

When Garen walked past this group of more than ten students, he felt hints of killing intent, and he grew serious.

"These people have all taken life and seen blood."

He retreated to a side, mingling in with the crowd of regular students who were gathered to watch, and observed this group as they quickly got into the car.

Some people were discussing the identities of these students in low voices.

"They're the elite students."

Someone mentioned the answer.

"The best students of the academy, huh… I heard that not only do they not need to pay school fees, they even get a salary from the academy every month, and a considerable one, at that."

"Well, duh, their powers are all Level 2 and above, they're our Blackboard Academy's most elite forces, usually it's the teachers from the inner circle that teach and tutor them."

"I heard that the elite students are students, but they're also the academy's central forces, wonder if that's true," two boys were chatting softly not far from where Garen was standing.

"It's true, apparently there are even Level 3 and above elites among these students, they're really powerful. An elite fighter who has an overall ranking of Level 3, if armed with a suitable Mech, could take several dozens of us, no problem," another girl replied determinedly. "My older sister is an elite student, she gets a salary of at least 50,000 units every month, it's more than enough to handle our household expenses. She can also choose any academy lecturer she wants to tutor her, but she needs to spend a certain amount for that."

"That's already really good! Normal students like us can't even meet lecturers like that, okay?" the boy from before said jealously.

"But they have certain responsibilities too, the school's true firepower is actually them. They will only step down if the actually enter the military or when they turn thirty, or when they become instructors end up serving as the administrators in other areas," the girl explained in detail.

Garen got a little closer to these people, he wanted to listen more carefully. It was not just him, many of the other students were gathering, listening to the girl's explanation.

"But usually the elite students wouldn't go out on missions, the police are enough to handle most regular incidents, only special cases would require these powerful Level 2 and above elites. Something must have happened outside, that's why they've been mobilized."

"I heard there was a fatal riot in East Star City, this incident involved a lot of people, I wonder if they were mobilized for that," someone said from among the crowd.

"Should be," the girl nodded, "my older sister has moved out, she's part of the first batch of elites, and this is the third batch. I wonder what happened, for them to mobilize three teams of elites."

"Could it be that other regions are attacking us?"

"How could that be? Our Blackboard Region is one of the strongest regions out there, we'd be the ones attacking others."

Garen stoppedd listening there, turning around and darting out of the crowd. He watched as the elite students' levitating car flew off slowly, rapidly leaving the academy gates.

Only then did he walk towards the place he was supposed to meet that uncle.

"I had better get the stones first before anything else, this body is too average, and I can't find potential points. Perhaps my only hope of improving this body lies in the Hellfrost Peacock Technique."

The academy was located in the central area of Blackboard City, other than the huge mountain wall behind it, the other three sides were all busy streets and markets, with huge swathes of bustling shops in the central business district. Honking sounds came from the flow of never-ending traffic.

There were many outstation tourists wandering the walkways, as well as a few residents who lived nearby, and the occasional students from Bloackboard Academy. Whenever these students passed by, the people around them would always give them a glance.

Garen mingled into the crowd, his black hair tied into a ponytail behind him. Afte.

There were mostly tourists from abroad walking across the sidewalks, and a few residents who lived nearby, as well as a couple of Blackboard Academy students mixed in between. Whenever these students passed by, the people around them would also glance at them a little longer than usual.

Garen mingled with the crowd, his black hair tied up into a ponytail behind his head. After he cleaned up and looked neater, he gave off a calm and quiet aura, not very handsome, but soothing to the eye.