First talk with Fade!

The City outskirts, An Abandoned small house.

This house is located in a very remote area to the west of the city, behind a mountain and near a small river stream. There's no other house nearby, but only forest and mountains.

A narrow road, which seems to not have been maintained for years, is leading to this dilapidated house. A masked man suddenly appeared out of the forests and entered the house.

From the outside, the house seems to be in a dilapidated state; even several parts of the roof can be seen missing. But strangely, except for the broken roof, most of the other parts of the house are intact, and even the windows are still there and do not have any scratches.

Although there's furniture in the house, everything is covered in dust.

The man hurriedly walked towards the uppermost floor and entered the master bedroom. He walked towards an old-looking painting and tilted it towards the right.

As if a mechanism had been triggered, the furniture in the room slid away on its own, and the dust on the floor disappeared instantly.

Then, a magic circle started to shine brightly on the floor.

Seeing this, the man hurriedly made a little cut on his finger and dropped some blood in the middle of the magic circle.

Instantly, the magic circle brightened and took effect.

With a flash of light, the man disappeared, and the circle faded away. The furniture automatically moved to its original location, and everything returned to how it was before the magic circle's activation.

This is how a short-distance teleportation circle with blood recognition ability works.

These types of teleportation circles have a smaller range and several restrictions on them, but they are very fast and secretive.

You can even add your or several other people's blood samples.

This way, only some specific individuals would be able to use this circle. If others tried to use it, the circle would explode, and a signal would be sent to the mage who carved this magic circle. Thus giving the user enough time to escape if needed.

(Of course, if the rank of the mage trying to infiltrate the circle is higher than the one who carved it, it is possible to still be able to use it without triggering the defense mechanism.)

...

After the man teleported through the circle, he found himself in a dark area.

He brought out a mana lamp to see around him. When the mana lamp lit up, a dark corridor appeared in the man's sight.

The man started to walk through the dark corridor and after walking for about 15 minutes, he stood in front of a small metal gate, Several magic circles were engraved on the gate for safety purposes.

Although this gate looks small and frail, it is so durable that it can withstand a full-powered attack from an S-rank individual.

The man stopped in front of the door and knocked with a particular rhythm, The door opened and the masked man walked inside.

Several other similarly masked men were sitting around a huge round table.

The man walked slowly and also sat on an empty seat. No one said anything and time passed slowly.

After 15 minutes, the last person also came and finally, the person sitting at the head seat near the table spoke in a calm tone:

"Now that everyone has gathered, let's start the meeting. Report your task completion status first."

"I have completed mine." (One)

"I have completed mine." (Two)

"I have completed mine." (Three)

After the 10th person finished his report, the leader nodded his head and spoke:

"Good, all the work is going as planned. That 'person' has also infiltrated the academy as planned."

"The plan will be carried out as planned before; there are no changes as of yet..."

"We have to capture 'Lia' and 'Kira' before the chaos from the mana bomb dies down."

"There should be no mistake in the execution of this plan..."

"We have to force both of their fathers to give up 'that' artifact to us... Kidnapping them is the best method right now; we have to avoid the watchful eyes of the SS-rankers..."

"Does anyone have anything else to report?"

One of the other masked men suddenly raised his hand.

"Yeah, Seven, what do you want to say?"

"I want to report that my subordinates have found that the girl 'Lia' is seen frequently with a black-haired kid. What to do if he gets in the way." (Seven)

"Ah, about that kid…. just kill him!... if he gets in the way... There's no need for any hindrance in our way in the first place; we don't have that much time."

"We have critical information right now, that Ashtel Rex will go to conquer a peak S-rank dungeon that day, Neo Aldif is out of the capital right now, and Raji Croft is currently in closed seclusion researching a new spell; this is the right moment for us to strike...."

(Ashtel, Neo, and Raji—these three are the SS-rankers of the human race.)

"Moreover, we even have 'that' artifact given by 'them' to avoid getting discovered by the S-rankers and others... we will succeed..." 

"Understood!"

"Since no one else has anything to say, then let's end the meeting..."

Others also nodded their head on the man's question:

"Okay then, the meeting ends here!"

After the leader ended the meeting, all of the people left the place one by one. All of their actions were carried out in a very smooth and secretive manner.

This is not the first time these people have done these types of things. They are far more proficient in these secretive things to be called novices.

All of these people have the rank of B+ and the Leader has the rank of A+. This can already be compared to an elite team of any of the S-rank guilds.

Although they would not be a match for an S-rank individual, this is still a good lineup to get rid of anyone below S-rank. 

...

The Freya Academy, Shopping area.

Rio sat in the waiting area of a women's clothes shop, He was getting weird looks from passersby, his face remained expressionless but he felt weird in his mind.

Thinking back to the moment they entered this shop.

The lady at the counter gave a very gentle greeting to them and showed them all around the shop for various dresses.

Rio was having a bad premonition, and it came true.

He was bombarded by a huge amount of questions about 'how that dress looked?, how that one was?', etc. Seriously, he was dumbfounded by the sheer amount of talking speed Lia was displaying.

In the end, he was only able to just passively nod his head.

Not knowing anything about dressing and fashion trends, he was completely beaten to a pulp in this fight, without even being able to say anything at all.

Even the passersby looked at him with sympathy in their eyes.

Rio didn't know why the lady at the counter was smiling so much, as if she were enjoying a drama movie's romance scene.

'It seems shopping is more tiring than training...'

Just as Rio was getting bored, a familiar voice brought him out of his wandering thoughts.

"S-so, h-how do-does this l-look on me, its n-not like y-your opinion matters, bu-but I am ju-just asking..." 

Rio glanced at Lia, who was wearing a tight top and a mini-skirt with stockings.

His mind instantly became blank and he was not able to respond at all.

"What is that expression!? Just tell me already!" 

"cough! …. Well, you look really cute in this….. cough! But… cough! Isn't that too short…. Cough! I mean….. you know…" 

"Eh, what do you mean short?" 

Lia tilted her head in confusion; suddenly a small breeze of wind passed by, and cough! .....

Instantly, Lia's face became bright red, like an apple, and she ran away inside instantly.

"Idiot! Don't look!" 

"Hahaha…." 

...

After about half an hour of boring wait, she came back in a new outfit.

This time she wore casual clothes, yet she looked so damn good. Even the expressionless Rio can't help but stare at those huge mountains and curves.

Seeing Rio staring at her in such a manner, Lia blushed a bit and gave him a death glare while pretending to look fierce.

Yet this only made her look even more cute.

The shopping continued with several such small, sweet, and heart-warming incidents.

Time passed slowly without them noticing and afternoon had arrived; thus, Rio and Lia decided to have lunch in the nearby restaurant. They entered the restaurant and sat together to have lunch.

While both of them sat together, some passersby glanced and praised how perfect they looked together; some looked at Rio with envious eyes before they fainted from a certain someone's aura.

Just as the peaceful time continued, two uninvited guests arrived. (Fade and Kira have entered the chat bois!)

Since there were no other empty seats left, both of them sat opposite Rio and Lia.

You can consider this meeting a mere coincidence or the play of destiny. But this is how the original MC 'Fade' and the biggest anomaly of this world 'Rio' met for the first time, face to face.

Rio remained expressionless, while Lia became cold in an instant, and Kira and Fade had an expression of surprise on their faces. Yet they all sat together silently for a while.

Before Kira broke the silence:

"What a coincidence; I didn't expect you to be here too, Lia." 

'As expected of the heroine, she knows how to break an awkward situation.' 

"I just happened to be here; it is indeed a coincidence to meet you, out of all people in the world."

'Lia is cold towards Kira, just like in the novel.' 

Hearing Lia's remark, Fade had a frown on his face.

'Fade and Kira should already be very close around this period, I think, only a step away from becoming a couple...' 

"Why are you even here, since you knew I was here?" 

"well…." 

Kira didn't say anything further and a depressed look appeared on her face.

Seeing Kira so depressed, Fade got irritated, As a mad lover, how could he stay shut after witnessing this scene?

"Oh, come on! Would you stop arguing with Kira, I am fed up with your constant fighting with Kira!" 

"How can you not understand that it is already enough, I warn you not to trouble Kira anymore, otherwise-"

"Otherwise what?"

Rio's hand was already on the hilt of his sword at the moment; the moment Fade tried to attack Lia, his limbs would be sliced off right here on the spot. 

Sensing the tense atmosphere Fade stopped and glanced at the person sitting beside Lia.

This person had been silent since the start but now he is looking right in the eyes of Fade. Instinctively, Fade felt something wrong about this guy.

He cannot describe this strange feeling, which is making his heart beat very fast, making him feel uneasy.

This is the very feeling Fade got when he was looking at that S-rank octopus during their trip. He can't help but become more vigilant around this unknown person.

"And who are you?" 

The next answer that the unknown person gave made Fade, Kira, and Lia all dumbfounded:

"Me? I am Rio Flash, a swordsman and Lia's boyfriend."