As I made that realization the knight instructor dismissed us all with a wave of her hand. "Good job today everyone. There is one group still heading on their way back, but you all can head out and call it quits for the day."

I looked around anxiously trying to spot Bea or Tom as everyone filed out of the room. Bella caught my eye instead and headed over to me. She looked inquisitively at me, and I just smiled. "I think Bea and Tom are in the last group. I didn't see them around, so I'm going to stick around until they get back.

She quickly took stock of the situation as well, hurriedly glancing around. Huffing she just grabbed my arm and pulled me against the crowd until we were closer to the instructor, at which point she promptly sat down and patted the ground next to her.

Staring for a bit at her, I eventually shook myself free of my stupor and laughed. Sitting down beside her I smiled at her. "Thanks Bella, for sticking around. You're a real good friend, you know?"

She blushed fiercely before jerking her head around to stare off in the same direction as the instructor. "Yes... well, its about time you recognize my greatness." She elbowed me softly and continued, "Although you really don't have anything to worry about. I'm sure you noticed how weak those goblins were. No amount of them could really overrun one of the squads the knight instructor sorted out."

What she said made sense of course, but it didn't set my mind at ease. Our group easily handled about seventy or so even when being surrounded. The little guys were just so aggressive for being so... well... squishy.

"I know you're right, my squad handled about seventy or so four different times, so I'm sure they were up to the task. Hey, while I have you captive, do you know what happened to all the dead bodies?" I decided to go ahead and inquire on what had bothered me on the trek back.

"Seventy.... that's... anyway..... Yes, I do. The dungeon eats them to recycle what mana it can out of them. When we kill them we get a small rush of mana from them. Well, if you're nearby at least. Like I mentioned to you earlier during meditation, mana is intangible. It kind of lingers around the dead bodies of the creatures. If you're nearby, your mana tries to pull it in and assimilate it. Since the mana is wildly different though, we only successfully absorb a small portion of it. And some mana stays and lingers in the body itself. That is what the dungeon eats and takes back in." She looked proud as she finished her explanation. She would probably make a great teacher in my world. It was very endearing.

"Ahh, thanks. You sure are knowledgeable Bella. You must've had a lot of education in Lucerne huh?" I smiled at her as she blushed even more and stared down the path even harder.

Giving me the side-eye she responded, "Some. I feel like this is something you should know though. Maybe you just don't pay attention. Now shush. Let's wait for our friends."

—----

It felt like almost a whole 'nother hour before we finally heard sounds coming from the path. A short time later we finally saw the trudge out of the hall looking exhausted. Well, save for one of them. He strode out of the path full of vigor and looking pleased with himself. Narrowing my eyes realized I recognized him. Although I didn't know his name.

Nudging Bella and jerking my head his way I asked "Isn't that the one who's ranked number one? Why do you think he looks so happy?"

She simply nodded. "It is, we will have to ask Bea and Tom what happened. Come on, let's get up."

Waving to our friends they brightened up and headed our way.

"You guys didn't have to wait!" they said when they got close.

I smiled, "Sure we did. Bella here, the big softy, insisted we make sure you guys were okay." Pure indignation flashed across Bella's face as I continued, "But enough about us, you guys look exhausted. Let's go clean up and you guys can tell us what happened."

As we walked away from the instructor, they let us know what happened. Turns out the number one guy kept pushing them further and further and no one had the gumption actively go against him. Bea had pointed out several times they needed to return or they would be late, but he kept pushing on as if he had something to prove. Throughout their whole ordeal he tried to get as many kills to his name as possible, often leaving them behind. I asked if they had any formation going to help with that and they both just looked at me quizzically. I explained how well Mel led my squad around, and how we each had our own position in the party basically.

Shockingly though was the numerical difference in the amount of goblins each of us fought. Tom and Bea's squad encountered about thirty to forty in each encounter. Bella spoke up and said they were encountering about fifty or so in each fight. When I explained that my team was actively having seventy or so each fight, and mentioned the flanking they were surprised. Even Bella said that they had not been flanked in any of their fights, but she would make sure they would be prepared tomorrow. Turns out she was the leader in her squad, so she would prepare everybody.

"Do you think that maybe there's some more control to this than anything random?" I decided to pose the question as the differences in our fights was staggering.

Bea turned her head sharply "What do you mean by that?".

"Its just that your squads would have had a rough time if you had come across flanks, or honestly anymore goblins. I just feel like our squads each encountered the number of goblins we could handle, and how we could handle them. That kind of speaks to organization. Doesn't it?" As I finished my statement I reflected on how true it was. With the number one guy leaving Bea and Tom's squad to themselves if they had encountered the seventy that mine did, how they did, there would have been panic. Even Bella's to an extent, while I feel they could certainly handle more, nothing from the flank. And honestly they halls were only so wide, so only so many goblins could reach you at a time that way.

Bea and Bella looked thoughtful at that, but Tom just let out a big old yawn. He grinned sheepishly at us and then we all laughed, breaking our thoughts up.

"You're right Tom," I began, "Let's just go get some food and get to bed. This has been a rough day all around, yeah?" I cuffed him on the shoulder as we kept walking.

—----

Everyone at the dinner service was surprisingly somber. I guess they were reviewing everything that happened today. There was just so little chatter around that it was depressing.

I... I think I understood. These were all kids really that couldn't be older than fifteen. Up until now it was all kind of fun and games really. An obstacle course, training to get better. Today was just crashing hard on everybody as they got a real look at what their future life was like. Sure, these creatures in the dungeon didn't seem to be intelligent or anything, but just being conservative, everyone here probably killed ten to twenty a piece. That was a lot of death to take in suddenly.

It was shocking to me as well, but I felt like I adapted quicker than most. Probably because I was technically older on the inside. I realized I had to be the bright side for my friends in this instance.

Grabbing two trays of food from the get go, when we sat down I decided to be as humorous as I could and embellished happenings in my squad's fighting. I joked about how I fell on my butt because I stepped on a goblin without paying attention. I talked about how we got scared when a goblin's arm suddenly fell in a pile of bodies scaring people enough they actually yelled. That got Bea and Tom talking about their own encounters as well, but focused on the enjoyable things, rather than the gruesome aspect.

I think Bella caught on to what I was doing when I told these outlandish stories, but she only softly smiled and didn't press me on them.

I made a point to go get extra food trays and water when everyone ran out. I didn't want them in their thoughts alone, even in the brief walk to get refills.

It was just our own personal party of smiling and joking. It never caught on at the rest of the tables, but I could tell it definitely made a difference on my friends' demeanors.

As we retired for the night, I told everyone to practice what Bella taught us. It would be useful sooner rather than later either way, and I knew it would keep their minds occupied and hopefully not drifting to our experiences today.

Bella did catch on to that one though, and quickly agreed saying the more we practiced the sooner we would feel our mana and be able to actively adapt it for our fighting.

We all joked how we would learn it sooner than each other, but we thanked Bella profusely for getting us started.

As I lay there, focused on meditating and trying to feel this mana pool, it proved to be practice to tune everything out more than anything else.

Because my thoughts were constantly interrupted by sniffling kids, likely holding back sobs from today.