Chapter 15 - Let the Hunt Begin

Honk!

In front of Glory Academy's entrance, a row of white buses with golden stars plastered on their sides can be found accommodating an endless stream of students.

The students wore excited gazes as they packed their luggage into specialized compartments, murmuring with one another as they felt their hearts beat loudly, "It's already starting!"

"I can't believe we're experiencing Glory Academy's camping trip for ourselves!"

"And it's in the Cotton Trees Forest no less! I heard the scenery there is just dazzling!"

"Trunks similar to swirling pillars of candy, and leaves similar to colorful cotton!"

As many were excited for the up and coming trip, a certain trio sat on their respective seats beside each other. One stared aloofly out the window, one browsed through his phone, while another held a book in her hand.

"Hmph, they're treating this trip as if it's for fun. We're here to train!" Alastor rolled his eyes and crossed his arms, staring out of the window at the gathering of students with an arrogant gaze.

"I sometimes wonder how you even became our friend, Alastor. If we're going by a first impression basis, you really are a big asshole." Aleksandra rebutted with a faint smile on her face as she leaned on Dolian's shoulder who was in between the two.

"Hey!" Alastor spun his head and glared at Aleksandra, "They're the ones that are at fault. Why are they acting like children when we're going there to train!"

"What's wrong with acting like children? Hell, we are children!" Aleksandra snorted as she rolled her eyes at Alastor.

"That-" Alastor paused, unable to refute her argument.

"Told you so." Aleksandra chortled, but she then noticed something.

"You're unexpectedly quiet, Dolian." She asked as the duo stared at Dolian's blank face.

Dolian seemed to regain his focus upon hearing her question as he yawned, "Sorry, I was sleepy."

"Sleepy?" Alastor raised his eyebrow and leaned his back on the bus window.

"It's because- yawn…" Dolian opened his mouth wide and rubbed his teary eyes, "It's because I only slept for 7 hours last night."

"7 hours? Isn't that plenty enough already?" Alastor widened his grin as he teased, "Or are you perhaps unable to function well without 8 hours of sleep like a baby."

'A baby Dolian?' Aleksandra suddenly visualized a young Dolian resting on her lap, causing her cheeks to blush faintly, dying it with a subtle rosy hue.

"Kind of." Dolian wasn't bothered by Alastor's feeble attempts at teasing and explained, "My quirk has been making me need more and more sleep lately, and I think that it might be because I'm nearing puberty already."

"Puberty?" Alastor moved his gaze to his legs where his leg hair has started to grow by the tiniest amount and nodded his head, "Hmm, I see."

"Does that mean you want to sleep?" Aleksandra inquired as she sat up straight and stopped leaning her back on Dolian's shoulders, embarrassed to learn that she was resting her body's weight on a drowsy boy.

"Yes…" Dolian's blinking turned more frequent and his eyelids seemed to turn heavy.

Alastor observed Dolian's languid appearance and insisted in a whisper, "Then you should sleep."

"I'll try my best to not disturb you while you rest." Alastor fixed his posture and got into a position where he can effectively reduce making accidental physical contact with Dolian.

"Y-You can rest on my lap if you want to…" Aleksandra proposed, and without even uttering a word, Dolian mumbled a strange sound and the back of his head now rested on her lap.

As one of the direct witnesses to that series of events, Alastor calmly and naturally turned his head to the other side, observing the cars and roads that passed by through the window as he muttered, "In a world where storms bend to my whim, a third wheel I shall be deemed."

…

The numerous white buses soon came to a stop deep within a strange mystical forest.

The trees there seemed to have been a product not of the real world but of another reality altogether.

The wood was large and long reaching high into the sky, with a thick base and a thin top. What was supposed to be normal leaves were instead colorful cotton clumped into large spheres, dying the plain green ground of verdant grass with color.

From the buses, hordes of students walked out in groups. They held their bags and luggage along with them, and they headed towards the series of buildings in the distance constructed from wood.

Besides the groups of students were Glory Academy's pro heroes and teachers, accompanying the students to their lodging and helping them to get accustomed to this new and unfamiliar place.

Within those groups of students, a certain trio was walking towards their very own shared lodging.

"Who would have thought we'll be in the same building?" Dolian yawned as he carried his massive bag with a single hand, showcasing his strength which was abnormal for a boy as young as him.

Floating beside Alger was his luggage as he manipulated the winds to hold it for him. He surveyed the surrounding houses beside theirs and he commented, "We better get going. If not, we won't be able to pick our desired rooms."

"That's right." Aleksandra nodded her head as the trio picked up their pace and entered the shared house that they'll be living in with their fellow students and classmates.

As they glanced around the living room, they nodded at their fellow students and waited for the others to arrive. When all of their fellow housemates were finally complete, Dolian coughed to grab their attention and took out a jar from his bag.

Inside the jar, strips of paper can be found inside it, with the number of strips being exactly the same as the number of rooms inside the house.

"Are you all fine with a lottery method to determine our rooms?" Dolian smiled and asked, "This house only has five rooms and we're ten here, so all of us will have to share a room with a partner."

"While we were on the bus, I've already surveyed our house through the documents given by the teachers and assigned a number to each room, so now we'll just have to grab a number and that number will correspond to the room we'll stay in."

"Wow…"

"As expected of Dolian."

"The rumors really are true. He's a great role model."

One by one, their fellow students expressed their agreement as Dolian beamed a smile at them, "That's great!"

He then approached the table in the living room and placed the jar on the table, but he then seemed to have remembered something and turned his head to his housemates, "Where are my manners? I've forgotten to introduce myself."

"My name is Dolian Tatori, it's nice to meet you all! I hope we all have a pleasant time with each other in this house." Dolian bowed his head, surprising the others once more as they did the same.

After they all introduced themselves and Dolian deepened his understanding of their character, he clapped his hands and opened the jar. "Let me go first."

He grabbed a piece of paper and opened it in front of all the others, and he wore a surprised look in his eyes, "Hehehe."

Dolian chuckled sheepishly and walked back towards Alastor and Aleksandra.

"What's your number?" Alastor asked and tried to pry into Dolian's paper, but he quickly folded it back to its previous state and hid it in his pockets.

"I'll reveal it in the end." Dolian smiled, winking at both Alastor and Aleksandra.

Alastor rolled his eyes at Dolian's childish acts, "Who cares if they're gonna be your roommate or not."

Hearing his words, Aleksandra turned her head away from Dolian's vision as her cheeks turned a faint shade of red, 'I-I do!'

Dolian smirked and arrogantly proclaimed, "Just so you know, I'm a great househusband."

"I can cook, clean, wash the dishes, and everything else! So if you're my roommate, you'll be living in heaven by being beside me!" Dolian pointed his nose to the sky and stared condescendingly at Alastor.

"How about you? It seems like you don't even know how to cook!" Dolian's words made Alastor's eyes twitch. Even though he sounded ridiculous, Dolian was unfortunately correct about Alastor being unable to cook.

"What does that have to do with all this, huh?" Alastor looked away, trying his hardest to divert the topic away from cooking.

"House skills, my dear friend, are necessary for survival!" Dolian's gaze turned piercing, "Cooking gives us moments of joy as we turn rough raw meat into palatable delicacies. Cleaning gives us the ability to live in a safer environment and reduces the chances of contracting disease."

"In the wild, a househusband can definitely survive better than a brute!" Dolian praised himself, uplifting his skills to another dimension.

'A househusband?' Amidst his loud clamoring, Aleksandra's lips quivered as she directed her gaze at a dark corner in the room, 'I-I also don't know how to cook…'

Just as Aleksandra was contemplating whether she should learn how to become a better cook from her mother, she suddenly heard Dolian's voice, "Aleks! It's your turn already!"

'My turn?' She glanced at the jar and suddenly remembered the crux of the matter. 'I must be in the same room as Dolian.'

Aleksandra took a deep breath within a split second to calm herself down and nodded at Dolian's reminder.

Without further ado, she walked up towards the jar and plunged her hand deep into the sea of paper strips.

She felt her heart thump wildly. The number she manages to get decides what kind of experience she'll live on their short camping trip in the wild.

If she manages to live in the same room as Dolian, then things would turn from joyful to heaven!

'Please, God! Please give me the same number as Dolian!' She prayed with all her might and pulled out her hand.

Without even glancing at it, she calmly walked back to Dolian with the strip of paper gripped tightly by her hand.

As she did so, Alastor walked past her and towards the jar, ready to pick his own number. The moment Alastor arrived at the jar, Aleksandra stopped right in front of Dolian.

"What's your number, Dolian?" She inquired.

"Well, since Alastor is the last one already, I might as well reveal it to the both of you right now." Dolian took out his paper from his pocket and slowly opened it, revealing the number within it to the two.

"Three?" Aleksandra's heart skipped a beat as she stared at the strip of paper held tightly by her hand.

"What about yours, hmm?" Dolian smiled and pouted, "I already revealed mine, so you should too!"

She nodded her head in agreement and grinned, "I haven't seen my number too."

"Woah!" Dolian's eyes turned excited, "That means we'll both see it for the first time!"

"That's right." Aleksandra bit her lip and, with a steeled heart, she opened the crumpled piece of paper like she was about to unseal pandora's box.

"Three!" Both exclaimed in surprise as Aleksandra felt her heart about to rupture out of her chest.

"We're in the same room!" Dolian wore a joyous smile as he hugged Aleksandra.

As the two enjoyed this pleasant surprise, Alastor stared at his paper and muttered, "Four?"

He turned his eyes to the side, locking eyes with a young boy who seemed like a kid compared to Alastor.

"Eek!"

…

"Ayumu, are you sure we shouldn't have sent Will with Dolian to their camping trip?" Hope asked from her messy table where numerous files and holograms were scattered around.

"Why should we?" Ayumu shook his head, "They already have all of their teachers protecting them, so we can be rest assured of their safety."

"But…" Hope stared at the series of files about the case she has been handling lately, the case where students were kidnapped by an unknown group of villains, and sighed, "Maybe I'm just being paranoid."

…

The moon hung high above the starry night sky, and in the usually vacant Cotton Trees Forest, a group of students enjoyed a vibrant evening under the protection of their teachers.

As they did so, a group of people wearing black cloaks suddenly appeared in the shadows. From the odd group, a man walked forward and stared at the lively group of students playing and eating around.

He then chuckled with a hint of craziness to his voice, and he muttered, "Let's commence the hunt, ladies and gentlemen."

And so, under the gazes of the teachers and students, a catastrophic explosion soon erupted from a random campfire.

AN: This chapter has 2132 words.

Welp, only a slight deviation occured to my original plans but that caused Dolian to go from mega smart to someone who has... yeah no, that's some spoilers. All I'm going to say is that Arc 1 will end in a rather weird way.

(April 1, 2023 - 492nd day of writing)