Planting seed

I was in my room with Barbara, Rosaline and Leisha, who had recently joined the team and our last member.

"So, there is capital punishment for those who goes against the temple's teaching. My world had similar situation and even now, we haven't been able to give freedom to people. So, we can't totally get rid of religion from the base but we have to make it less extreme. Priority is to reach level 100 but I also need support of influential people. I can ask the king but change at such a fundamental level would have opposition too and can cause coup d'état, so, we have to be careful. I wonder how it would go if I just reveal the fact that I'm the apostle. I know those in power would do everything to stay in power. We have to somehow infiltrate the temple itself. I'm thinking of switching to religious studies instead of military tactics. I chose military tactics to get a strong and now that I have one, we can shift."

"But that would be a problem to Barbara and Leisha who wants to become holy knights." Rosaline said.

"No, since Kenji is the apostle, I think helping him would bring me closer to God. I have no problem changing my subjects." Barbara said and Leisha agreed with her.

"Choosing your entire future... it's somehow ironic." I laughed a bit.

"Ironic? How so?" Leisha asked.

"Because Gods want you to be free yet here you are doing things for the sake of them."

"But isn't it our freedom to choose to follow God instead? We would still fulfil our dreams but in a different manner." Barbara refuted.

"Interesting perspective. So, tomorrow we will change our class to religious studies and move to temple. I think we can just say I didn't like military tactics class and see how it goes."

"Hey. If you don't mind, can I ask you about your life in your world?" Leisha asked.

"Huh-" I looked at her wondering what to tell her as the entire life flashed before my eyes. "It was... boring." I responded with an awkward laugh.

"In my world, we are expected to study for at least 15 years before we get a job so I was a student when we were summoned."

"15 years?! We only study for 3." Rosaline butted in.

"Yeah. It's like you're a scholar or something." Barbara added in.

"Well yea so nothing interesting ever happened." I said before laying back on the bed. I'm in this new world... I'm going to start anew and leave everything including my anger all in past.

"I see. Always studying must be boring." Leisha must've expected some interesting stories but I don't have many fun stories.

"Y'know one time... So, basically, I was sitting in my classroom and a friend of mine slapped me and ran outside. I chased after him and bumped into someone and fell onto the group of girls. My face was right up someone's butt. But they didn't mind since it was an accident." I laughed awkwardly. I'm so happy they understood the situation without calling the teacher.

"I can't expect you to behave in such a manner. Young you must've been different." Rosaline said.

"Younger me? I was quite loud and obnoxious as a child." I sighed thinking about past. A lot of emotions filled up my heard but one that dominated all those emotions was anger. But it's all meaningless now. I have friends now so I don't have to worry about them.

"To become this mature, you must've experienced quite a lot of life." Barbara questioned.

"You can put it that way." I didn't want the conversation to go on for much longer. "Anyways since Rosaline has done the ritual, next on the list is Barbara. We will be going to fight the boss. It is at level 35 so, we must not have that much trouble. And last on the list is Leisha because she hasn't even capped at level 20 yet. For me... I would have to wait for all 7 crystals."

"We will get summer vacations so then we will go and hunt for the remaining four crystals for Kenji." Leisha and Rosaline agreed to Barbara's plans.

I have to start planting the seeds soon. The opinion of people on temple has to go down and I will start that by using Kristine. Using her is like playing with fire but she would be of good use.

...

Yet another week had passed and we had to hunt down Ginni pa. It was an ice element boss found in Sky-fall mountain. It was a longer journey than the previous one but we had access to a cart that was taking adventurers to a village near the mountain. Apparently some weird ice had appeared that had blocked the entrance to the mountain and even fire couldn't melt it.

That wasn't exactly our problem so I would prefer not doing anything about it. We would just climb the mountain if need be. The mountain bordered another nation so we can't just go around the thing.

Once we had arrived at the village, my team decided to leave for the mountain immediately. We did end up going around a little bit but not enough to enter borders of the neighboring nation and started our journey up the mountain. Ginni pa was actually near the entrance than at the top so our journey was only about an hour long through the mountains before we found it. It was just a ball floating the air not moving whatsoever. We could just leave with the crystals but we have to try. From our experimentation from last week, nature magic does not react with ice magic so Leisha might not be much use here except as a support for Rosaline to keep burning reaction on-going.

It was not only weaker to fire magic but also electro magic which I can use. Fire and electro magic causes an explosion that does fire damage to the enemies so we can do that too.

My magic mastery has to increase so I chose the usual offering blade and all four of us took our positions.

The ball then got surrounded by mist before it blew it away in form of ice cold gust. Rosaline and I jumped in while Barbara was on stand-by making sure she had her strongest healing magic ready. Leisha kept shooting the monster with her nature magic arrows and Rosaline and I kept it on fire. I kept switching between fire and electro magic to make sure the monster died quickly but my stamina was limited and it started running out faster because of the sudden switches between two elements.

I used dark shield and because of the Great-sword of valor, the shield strength was increased by 50%. It was a new weapon I had unlocked recently in academy and gave it to Rosaline who preferred it over a normal sword. It had two passives, awakened one increased shield strength and passive increased attack by 40% against enemies with less than 30% HP. It was a good weapon overall.

I stuck with electro magic and tried to use it as ring around me to do electro dmg while I changed my element to fire but then I awakened new skill.

New Skill: Electro healing.

Huh? I can heal? I tried using it and it did in fact heal me but the issue was that it was only healing me and even then healing was not on the same level as Barbara's healing.

"Barbara! Focus on only Rosaline! I can heal myself!" I shouted and used last bit of my strength to create an area affected by nature magic around the Ginni pa. This made sure the nature magic kept up while Rosaline did the fire damage. I fell on my butt and healed myself a bit more.

Rosaline and Leisha ended up beating the monster without much effort. For some reason, this monster was easier to beat than the inferno creeper. We got the loot and then we heard a loud bang from the real entrance of the mountain. We quickly ran to the place and saw the ice that was holding the place closed melt.

Adventurers, villagers and someone who looked like a priest saw us emerge from behind the ice.

"How?! Even I couldn't met the ice even with help of Lord Jeyma." The priest shrieked.

"Because he was on our side. You're a mere fraud who's evil actions let the lord abandon you." I said with smug expression. It was a good way to start my mission. People must lose faith in the temple.

"Y-YOU! What do you know?!" He exclaimed in fear.

"Everything. I will be reporting you to the king himself. I'm a summoned one after all. He will actually listen to what I have to say."

No single human is 'clean' per se. We have all done something we are ashamed off and some have committed criminal acts too. What I was saying was just a bunch of lies since I have no idea who this person is but I do know that he, like everyone else, has skeletons in his closet. Our team was the one that emerged from the melting ice that no one was able to melt so, people naturally considered our words to be believable and gave the priest doubtful looks.

"You will be coming with us." I said but the priest started running away. Maybe... I hit the nail on the head.

People started talking amongst themselves before a man came forward.

"I'm the village chief and I would like to extend my thanks to help of your team. We had been in trouble for a while because of this ice wall blocking the entrance. We couldn't trade with neighboring nations. Also... could you please tell us what this priest has done?"

"I can't give away all the answers. You have to figure things out yourselves. Quite a lot of priests are evil and soon their truth will come out." I smiled while lying out of my ass. I have no idea what that man did or who that man even is.

"You say quite a lot? We have to be careful then." He nodded to himself.

"We will be on our way." I said before my party and I left the village.

Our journey back to academy was eventless.

...

"So now next is Leisha on the list. Next week we will go to boss for your leveling up materials. It's called Juvenile Shroom. It is a monster that creates smaller monsters and is based on nature element. Fire and water are important elements." I said as I jumped on the bed in the dorm room. Teams were usually allowed in the dorms even after curfew hours.

"We've been a team for almost a month now and we have already reached level 20. It's all thanks to Kenji. If it wasn't for those boss level monsters, many people can't reach this level. Especially at our age." Rosaline said with a soft smile on her face.

So it's been almost a month since Kristine was arrested? I should go see her soon. I have a gift for her.

...

"U-umm... So Kenji what're your opinion on marriage?" Leisha asked and we all looked at her in utter shock.

HOW TONE-DEAF?! He was JUST starting to get over Kristine.

"Marriage? I was considering it with Kristine but I'm not sure anymore. Why did you ask?" Kenji responded.

"Kristine? Wait- I thought Barbara and Rosaline were your fiancées too?" Leisha said.

"Three fiancées? Are you dumb? Oh! Yeah... In my world, you're not really allowed to marry multiple people anymore. I mean people still do it but it's not as common so I'm not used to the concept." He answered.

Figured. His world has different marriage culture.

"So, what is your opinion on multiple spouses?" Leisha kept the awkward conversation going without understanding the context. Kristine almost murdered someone, Kenji obviously has trouble trusting others now.

"I mean... it sounds good but I don't completely understand how it works so, I can't have an educated opinion on the topic. I might not be as comfortable either. Having multiple women being sexually interested in you is interesting only in fantasy. Fantasy should stay that way."

"Makes sense." Leisha thought about another question before Barbara interrupted.

"I think it's disrespectful to Kenji. He helped us not only get stronger but also form a strong team. To respond to his help with romantic emotions is disrespectful in my eyes."

She sees him as a teacher so it's normal for her to think that way. But we all don't think the same obviously. Barbara doesn't have romantic feelings towards Kenji, that much I know but Leisha seems interested in him. Considering Kenji is used to monogamy, it's not farfetched to think that he might only choose one spouse. I should make a move but when exactly? Too early, he might kick me out of the team and too late, Leisha might confess first.

I should wait for now though. We have other things to worry about. A month has passed at the academy and after next month, we will have a month of summer vacations. I think some time during those vacations, I would confess to him if he doesn't do it first.