Ega’s school day started quite early with dawn prayer, a rather cold shower - since a hot one would make him sleepy - and a quick breakfast. His house was located in one of the small islands that are now part of Kota Seribu. He didn’t know the previous name of the island, but it was currently named Bayu Timur. Maybe because it was rather close to the windmills on the eastern side of the city.

Renma took a bus to the bus stop near his school. He didn’t need to pay, all he needed to do was just to show his student ID card.

Usually, he would reach school by around six or quarter past six depending on how lazy he was after he had woken up.

Today, Friday, the 26th of January, he reached school at around half to seven because he had spent a few minutes in Zurefgar before going to school.

Like what had been rumoured by Fathan, Renma saw in his friend list that Macepaw was online in such an early hour. He didn’t bother to greet the shaman because he was too lazy to be disturbed by Macepaw. He just wanted to talk to an NPC that would give him a special mission for the special ability that only rakhs priests could do.

The problem was, he would need to interact again with a certain NPC he clearly had avoided. The elven priest trainer in Grandar told him to meet Ril’Dil in Gur’ash Marsh.

Yep… Ril freaking Dil.

Welp, at least Ega was confident any of his friends could help him with the mission later. Except Alvin. But most probably Mana and Pras could give him the smoother experience in dealing with the quest.

Regarding the two, Ega was not sure if it was just him or the new deskmates were more intimate after what happened yesterday.

For example, just when Ega reached the class, he saw them both engaging in a discussion with Fathan and Pitoy near the class’ whiteboard. The two clearly seemed like they talk to each other quite often. And Ega could’ve sworn that Mana was standing very close to Pras. Like close close. Did something happen after he logged out last night?

Oh, by the way, there was a drawing of the southern part of the Grand Continent on the whiteboard. Complete with the notable locations and the related routes. Since the drawing was good. He knew exactly that it was definitely not Pras’ drawing. It’s probably Mana’s.

The most important part was that he saw Gur’ash Marsh being marked. “Gur’ash Marsh, eh? What a coincidence.”

“What coincidence?” Pitoy protested. “For Christ’s sake please mention the context.”

“Really, Pitoy, you expect something from a chunk of Ega?” Pras snickered.

“Ahahah, I need to go to Gur’ash, got a mission.”

“Whew, what mission?”

“Only for rakhs priests, so I can resurrect three people at once.”

“Now that’z giga nice.”

Ega left the others to continue with their discussion and put his bag on his chair. Apparently, Eggi was already in the class and was sitting on his own chair. He was clearly pissed off, but tried to distract himself by working on some math problems.

Probably he was still pissed off because of whatever thing that was with Mana last night. Ega won’t bother with that, that’s their problem. Anyway, the relationship of childhood friends seems to always be complicated like in manga and anime.

Just when he joined the conversation again, Ega was shocked when Alvin arrived in the class and exclaimed, “I already in Gur’ash.”

“Always one step ahead, aren’t you?” Pras commented.

“Shaman is so cool, you know,” Alvin grinned.

Unlike the others who were surprised, Mana was calm but she stared blankly at Alvin. Then, with a very flat but curious tone, she asked, “Why are you on Steven's blacklist?”

“Hahahah! Karma, that’s what it is!” Ega laughed so hard. Except Mana, the others were laughing as well but Ega was clearly the loudest.

Oh, Alvin also laughed at himself. Weird.

“But you are on Rosdan’s potential list,” Mana continued.

Ega fell silent. But Pras, Fathan, and Nubram got excited over it. Meanwhile, Alvin’s laughter got louder and louder that it rang so hard, haunting Ega’s mind until the school bell rang.

The first lesson of the day was physics by Mr Meier. Ega had quite a problem in listening since there was light pulling on his hair from behind whenever he leaned back on his chair. And the maniac that did it, Pras, only gave an eerie smile whenever Ega turned and gave him a protesting stare.

The worst happened right after physics class was finished. The tugging on his hair was hard enough that some strands of his hair were pulled off from its roots.

“Ouch! Goddamnit Pra….”

Just as he screamed his protest, Ega stopped. Pras was not doing anything. It was Mana whose hands were holding a few strands of the poor hair.

“Owh, sorry, it looked fun,” said Mana without the slightest sense of remorse.

“Geez, you gotta redefine fun in your dictionary. At least Pras didn’t pull out my hair from its roots.”

“Ah, good idea.”

Mana’s strike was the final straw for Ega to forcibly push his desk and chair forward to avoid any further attacks. Ega dared to believe whatever Pras did earlier was to trigger Mana doing that.

Perhaps.

Well, he knew how shrewd his ex-deskmate is. He also knew how bad his current deskmate is. The annoying creature kept trying to emulate whatever Pras and Mana had done to annoy Ega. This time, Ega retaliated fiercely by attacking Alvin using his palms on his weak spot, his broad forehead.

Another problem appeared during lunch. Eggi has definitely softened up on Mana - who joined them again during lunch and voluntarily sat very close to Pras - but he was still annoyed by the fact that he needed to take a second form, especially a bear.

“I thought you said okay yesterday.” Ega frowned.

“Yes, begrudgingly,”

“Well, no more comments from me,” Ega shrugged. He didn’t want to meddle more about it. If Eggi only want to focus only on one form, so be it. As long as he doesn’t whine about it later.

Of course, this time Eggi’s childhood friend was around to comment on it, “Bjornur is actually quite good, though I barely see them in Clashing Realms.”

Eggi fumed, “That’s simple logic, they weren’t present because they are bad, they are half-hearted in what they want to be.”

“Oh, but because they are balanced, they would be good as your supporting form. It would be great if you balanced out the point distribution between the two form’s paths to reach Harmony.”

The word picked Ega’s interest. After swallowing his food, he asked, “What’s Harmony?”

It was not Mana nor Eggi who answered, but Pras. “A condition where mystic had equal power between his two forms. There are various bonuses gained depending on the two forms chosen, but at least Harmony generally will give lower cooldown in changing forms. If I’m not mistaken, Harmony on bear and cat will cause the panther form to have some shock damage and the bear form to have additional bleed damage or some sort.”

Except for Mana, Pras’ explanation had triggered the whole table to sprung into applause, “Sasuga Loremaster.”

“I hate all of you.”

“Anyway,” Eggi sighed. “Is there any option other than bear form for the more resilient type?”

Pitoy seemed to grow impatient with Eggi’s constant whining, he finally spoke, “Yeah the other form is scrofatus. You want to be a babirusa? What’s wrong with bears anyway?”

Eggi only groaned and returned to focus on his meal. That caused all other eyes on the table to look at Mana. It took her a few seconds to realise that.

“My, do I look that evil?” she commented while, of course, looking at her ‘dearest’ deskmate.

Pras shrugged, “Beats me, you almost baited a pack of hungry wolves to me yesterday. Glad I have traps, [Feign Death], and [Misdirection].”

“My, my, deskmate, I am still having trouble with how low guardian paladin's threats are compared to warriors.”

“Ahem!” Pitoy, Fathan, and Ega cleared their throat almost unisonly. Alvin was really late in doing that.

Ega really wondered what happened between the two deskmates last night. Their progress exceeded anyone’s expectation. Did they finally go on levelling together? For how long?

Though to be honest, in a sense 2 hours would be equal to a whole day dating experience for them due to AdVRSe. Logically, that would be enough to propel their relationship level to the moon.

“Oh, right,” Mana clapped her hands once. “When we were still kids, there was this rakhs sized teddy bear in front of a shop in a mall, and it accidentally fell on Eggi.”

“Accidentally? You pushed the doll to fall on me!”

“My, my, I definitely did not have the strength to do that. It was just a little push.”

“A little push?”

“It is just a prank, my brother from another parents.”

“Your prank scarred me for life!”

Ega didn’t bother to comment more. He just continued his meal so he won't be late for Friday prayer.

Boy… childhood friends' relations are really complicated.