-Thursday Morning, 17th Of the 1st Month, Year 910-

"I-I'm s-so sorry!!" He keeps bowing, over and over again, apologizing to me for something.

"It's fine," I tell him, but he just keeps apologizing, "I said it's fine already. It's fine!"

I run over to him and grab his shoulders to stop him from bowing again, "Can you stop? I already said that it was fine. I'm not mad or anything, I'm just confused-"

"-A-A-Wahhh!" He suddenly starts crying.

"Wh-what's wrong with you, this time?" I let go of his shoulders and back up.

"I-sniff- I'm so-sniff-sorry- hic," He falls to his knees and apologizes again while crying.

"It's fine already," I walk over to him while rubbing the back of my head, "Honestly, you apologizing is more annoying."

"Here," I reach out my hand to him to help him up, "I'll help you up, so you can explain what's going on?"

"Sniff-M-Mm," He takes my hand and gets up.

"Let's sit down first, then you can explain," I let go of his hand and walk over to the couch to take a seat.

"Al-sniff-Alright," He follows behind me and sits down next to me.

"So, what's going on?" I turn and ask him for an explanation.

"We-Well-" He explains to me that he's been worrying about what type of person his roommate would be ever since he got the acceptance letter. At first, he hoped that I would be a nice person, but as time went on, he got more anxious, and slowly his image of me got worse and worse. I went from being a kind roommate to a rude kid who would insult him, then to a bully, and finally into a violent kid who would use him as a punching bag and kick him around whenever I felt like it.

"...I understand, but I don't think it's good to just assume things like that about some you haven't even met yet," I sigh after listening to Noah's explanation.

"I-I know," His head drops down.

'I can't really be mad at you when you look so down,' I pat his shoulder, and his head jumps up, "Although, I don't like that you assumed those things about me, I'm not mad at you. So you don't need to feel upset about it."

"Re-really?" He looks at me nervously.

"Mm," I nod with a smile.

"Th-Thank you!" He grabs one of my hands and smiles back at me, "Ca-can, we redo our introductions?"

"Sure, but can it wait until I put my stuff away?" Noah nods and lets go of my hand.

I take a look around our dorm room with Noah. It's a lot bigger than the rooms in any of the inns I've stayed in with Gramps. There are four rooms in total, two bedrooms, a living room, and a bathroom. I picked the bedroom on the right, and Noah took the one on the left.

Turning on the lamp to light up the room, I sit my bag on the bed. The bed takes up the most space in the room. It's bigger than the one I had back at home, with plain white sheets and a thick blue blanket folded up at the bottom of the bed. Next to the bed is a wooden dresser about the same size as the one in the Clear Sky Inn. I put my necklace on top of the dresser next to the lamp.

Like I usually do, I put my sword down on the side of the bed and start unpacking. First, I put my clothes in the top drawer of my dresser. After that, I throw my bag in the closet and open up my window curtains before turning off the lamp, "That's everything."

I smile, looking at my room for the next few years.

'It's almost time for lunch,' I walk out of my room and look at the clock in the living room, 'Maybe I should ask Noah if he wants to go with us?'

After a couple minutes, Noah walks out of his room and asks me, "A-Are you fi-finished?"

"Yeah," I nod, turning away from the clock.

"Th-That's good," Noah smiles while fiddling with his hands.

"Do you want to do the introductions now?" I ask him after we both sit down.

"M-Mm!" He nods his head and stands up, "I-I'll go first."

"Alright," I nod and stand up, facing him.

"M-My name is No-Noah Gast-Gastrove. I-I'm the se-second son of Marchioness Lilian Gastrove of the De-Devila Pro-Province. Pl-please tr-treat m-me well," He stops fiddling with his hands and reaches his right arm out to me.

"Ryner. I'm not a noble or anything like that. But please treat me well." I shake hands with him.

"Phew," He lets out a breath of relief and smiles.

I let go of his hand, and we both sit back down, "In a little bit, I'm going to go to lunch with my friends, do you want to come?"

"Ca-Can I?" I nod, and his expression brightens, "We'll leave in a little bit."

We spent some time talking until 11:55. We mainly talked about our results in the Combat Test. He told me that he was in Group 2 and that he was just barely able to beat his opponents in the First and Third round before the time ran out. As for the second round, he said that his opponent was really strong, so he surrendered without even trying to fight. I don't really like his attitude, but I didn't say anything about it because I don't want him to feel bad.

Bang! Bang!

"Ryner! Let's go!" Johnny shouts while banging on the door.

"Wh-Who i-is th-that?" Noah asks after curling up on the couch, shaking in fear.

"It's my friend, don't worry, he's not a bad guy. He's just really loud," I tell him with both hands over my ears.

Bang! Bang!

"Ryner! C'm-" Johnny tries calling out to me again, but angry shouts from the hallway cut him off, "-Shut up!"

"Looks like he's about to get in trouble. Let's go before he gets into a fight," I get up from the couch and walk to the door with Noah following behind me, clinging onto my back.

"Ryner!" Johnny grabs onto my shoulders when I walk out of the door, scaring Noah off my back.

"Let go, you're scaring Noah," I sigh and shake his hands off, "Let's go, Jasmine's probably waiting for us."

We leave the dorm while being cursed at by some of our neighbors. Jasmine's already waiting for us on the stairs in front of the dorm.

"Are you guys ready?" Jasmine gets up, seeing us walk out the door.

"Mm, I brought my roommate with me," I tell her, pulling Noah off my back, "He's a little...weird."

After going through introductions, we walk to the cafeteria following Jasmine's lead. It took us about 12 minutes to get there from our dorm.

The cafeteria is a large circular building made of a white stone-like material. We walk in and go to the back of the cafeteria where they're serving lunch. Like everyone else, we get in line and wait for our turn. This is new to me, so I watch what everyone in front of me is doing so that I won't embarrass myself in front of my friends.

"Next," The line is moving pretty fast, but there's a lot of people, so it takes a while for my turn to come.

Remembering how the people in front of me ordered their lunch, I place my order. From the options, I order a turkey sandwich with mayonnaise, lettuce, and tomatoes. The lunch lady hands me a plate with my sandwich on top of it, and I walk out of line. Johnny and Jasmine are waiting for me at a table near the middle of the cafeteria. After Noah gets his lunch, we walk over to the table and sit down across from them.

As we're eating, we talk about what we've been doing since the exam ended. Like me, they just explored the city, looking around at different shops and stands. We keep talking as we eat, and somehow our topic changes to my fight with Jun.

"Noah! You may not believe it, but this guy right here shocked everyone in our exam group with his performance," Johnny says with a smug expression on his face.

"Re-Really?" Noah tilts his head with some mustard on the side of his lips.

"Yeah!" Johnny nods his head and tells the story with an excited expression, "During his last fight in the third round, Ryner and his opponent basically fought to the death. It was a total bloodfest! They just kept slashing at each other with their swords, and they didn't even stop when their sword broke! They just started swinging at each until they both passed out!"

"Wo-Woah!" Noah gasps, surprised by his story.

"They were in really bad shape, so I had to help Mrs. Janson take them to the infirmary with Jasmine. Seriously, just carrying him made the rest of my combat uniform turn red!" Hearing that, I scratch my head, feeling kinda bad for making his uniform dirty.

"Ar-Are you okay?" Noah asks, looking at me nervously.

"I'm fine the nu-nurse treated my wounds, so I only have a scar on my side now," I smile and motion him to wipe the mustard off.

He wipes the mustard off and says, "W-Wow, that's really amazing, I-I would-wouldn't have been able to keep fighting if I got hurt that bad."

Johnny and Jasmine, both nod, making me feel embarrassed, "Honestly, it hurt a lot, but I really wanted to win, so I endured it. But it ended in a tie because we both fainted."

"St-still it's really cool that you we-were able to fight through the pain," Noah's head falls down, "But me, on the other hand, if I even see a little bit of blood I faint."

"It's alright, Mrs. Janson told me that a lot of kids our age can't handle blood that well, so don't worry about it. You'll get over it eventually," I pat his shoulder to comfort him.

"I-I'll try my be-best!" Noah raises his head and smiles.

We continue on with our lunch, telling Noah about our other matches from the exam. As we're talking, two students walk over from behind me, "Hi! Can we sit with you guys?"

"Sure!" Johnny answers them with a smile.

I turn around, and my eyes stop on the pretty girl with short blonde hair and golden eyes-

Ba-bump Ba-bump

'Those eyes-

'She's one of them-

'That traitorous bastard!'

'She has his blood-

'I feel it! That man's blood-

'The man who killed us-

'The man who ended our clan!'

Ba-bump Ba-bump Ba-bump

'What's going on!?' My head's pounding and thoughts that don't belong to me, keep echoing in my head.

'Kill her!!'

'Avenger us!!'

'Shut up! Shut up!' I scream out in my head, trying to resist the thoughts.

'Avenge us!!!'

'Kill her!!!'

Bang

'NO!! Don't tell me what to do!' My head falls onto the table.

Ba-bump Ba-bump Ba-bump Ba-bump

'Avenge us!!!!' The voices shout together.

Ba-bump Ba-bump Ba-bump Ba-bump Ba-bump

'NO!! Leave me alone!! LEAVE ME ALONE!!!' I dig my fingers into my head.

'AVENGE US!!!!!' My body feels like it's burning up from the inside, and my strength is fading.

Ba-bump Ba-bump Ba-bump Ba-bump Ba-bump Ba-bump

'AVENGE-'

'GET OUT OF MY HEAD!!!!!' I cry out with the last of my strength as everything goes dark.