Professor Pass

"Let's go."

Flav side and left the room. Li and Dumdum followed, and soon after, they met Joanna on the road.

Flav went to inform Iris and Joanna about the mission, but to his surprise, Iris already had other plans. Seeing that she didn't tell him what they were, Flav remained silent and accepted that he'll have to take the ghost with him.

Five minutes after walking, the four arrived at the Principal's building. The receptionists there needed to approve of missions before any students could leave. This protocol made sense as to make sure that they had taken all measures and had provided no false info.

Entering the building, they headed towards the receptionist. Now that the school year started, many people entered the building, which formed a huge line. Seeing others taking slips of paper from a contraption on the side, Flav followed suit.

"They have these here too…?" Li unconsciously muttered.

Flav looked at him with a raised brow. "You've seen this thing before?" he asked.

"Eh, uh no."

Flav wasn't blind and saw Li being dodgy.

'No matter, if he doesn't wanna tell me, then I won't force him.'

Shrugging, Flav waited his turn in line. Ten minutes later, their turn came.

"Hello, how can we help you today?" the receptionist said in a monotonous tone.

Flav took out a flyer from his robe and showed it to the receptionist. "I would like to register this mission for four," he answered politely.

The receptionist took the flyer and scanned the group. He didn't seem surprised by the weird combination or more of he didn't care.

When the receptionist arrived at Xuan Li, he stopped and turned to Flav. "Does he have a pass from a professor?" he asked.

"Pass? What's that?"

"For Wood Class students, they need a special pass from their professors to take on missions," he explained. "Does he have a pass?"

Flav looked at Xuan Li who shook his head. It was understandable for him to not know. Ever since arriving at the Academy, Li never went out on a mission, and even before officially becoming one, he never had an assigned mission (test) like the others.

Turning awkwardly to the receptionist, Flav tried smiling. "Can you le-,"

"No pass, no mission."

"Plea-,"

"No pass. No mission." he repeated coldly.

Flav nearly begged but the receptionist didn't budge. After a few more tries he turned to Li and Dumdum. "Sorry, it seems you can't come."

"It's alright."

"It's not like I really wanted to go! HMPH!"

Seeing the two's reactions, Flav sighed and turned to Joanna. She looked absentminded, staring into space.

"Let's go, ghosty."

"New nickname?" she asked, playful as ever.

Flav ignored her and left the building. Since Li couldn't go, Dumdum who was registered as his companion was the same. With no other choice, Li headed to class.

"Damn it! I wanted to go. Something dangerous might have been there!"

Li's outcries reached Flav who had already been a distance away. 'His suicidal tendencies are as strong as ever.'

Joanna walked behind him, her hands clasped behind her back. She walked coquettishly.

"So, what's the mission?" she finally asked.

Flav stopped and looked at her with even eyes. "Our mission is extremely dangerous. It's 4 stars. We need to recover a magic item called the skull crusher. The last known location of it is the Valley of Sander." he explained slowly, in the smallest and most concise way.

Joanna's eyes turned serious. "The Valley of Sanders? That place is dangerous! My teacher told me about it and she said, "If you ever go to the Valley of Sanders, beware of the moving objects." The way she said it made me engrave it to memory!"

'Her teacher huh? She doesn't speak much of her. Hmm, the moving objects?'

"What moving objects? I tried finding as much info about it as I could but I came up with little results."

Joanna quirked her brows. "I also don't get it. My teacher said nothing after that and no matter what I asked she never answered. Oh, we can't check with her, if you had such plans. She already left somewhere. It's also why I could come today."

Joanna shut all of the paths Flav saw. SIghing, he rubbed his head.

"Then we need to find stuff ourselves. If the reported thief hid there, then they must know their way around the area. This will be more dangerous than I thought. They could use the surroundings to their advantage and we'll become chicks ready to get hunted."

'Will I have to use some of those techniques? That would reveal too much. Only Daemon and probably Ouht know of who I really am. I can't afford to expose more.

Flav's options slowly narrowed the more he considered them.

By the time they finished talking, they had arrived at the school's gate. Unlike the first two times, they can't travel by teleportation. If everyone teleported, the energy the Academy would need to spend would cause it to become poor.

Anyone who wanted to teleport would need to pay a hefty amount of Ascension Points and no one would waste points on teleportation unless it was important.

Carriages filled the front gate of the Academy and many students boarded such carriages and caravans while others descended.

Screams and shouts of locations surrounded the area. The ones who would take the request would raise their hands and the student would choose who to go with.

Flav looked around him before shouting, "Valley of Sanders, anyone?"

Many carriage drivers looked at his direction before looking away. Seven of such drivers raised their hands though and Flav scanned them.

"Take the one on the far right. Although the carriage looks like it will break at any second, I feel some energy from it." Joanna commented.

She had a higher sensitivity to energy due to her origin and Flav decided to go with her. The drivers looked on as Flav chose his carriage before looking away. They listened on to see if anyone else would request them.