The Mold (4)

Chapter 26 – The Mold (4)

A few hours ago...

Otis let out a few ragged breaths as he got out of the toilet, holding his tummy.

"Phew," he breathed, pinching his nostrils shut with his fingers to save him from the smell that he created with his own waste.

"That was really a blast," he said as he looked at the toilet one more time.

He then looked at his roommate's empty bed and released a sigh of relief.

"Thank goodness, he is not here."

Otis rubbed his belly again as it rumbled slightly. "I'm never trying that milk again. Never ever."

Relieved of his natural burdens, Otis glanced at the clock inside his dorm room and saw that he had missed basically every class for the day, thanks to his stomach and stopping issues.

He sighed in his heart as his eyes were fixed on the ticking clock.

'I should be able to make the last class,' he said to himself as he got ready to leave.

Although he didn't take long to get ready and leave the dormitory, nor did he waste much time to reach the lecture building. In the end, he missed even the last class that was taken by the motherly professor—Professor Karen Melgram.

Thanks to it being her first encounter with the freshers of the year, Professor Karen had tried to keep her class brief and concise, perhaps as a gift to them for the first day of class.

On arrival, Otis noticed several of his mates from Class 1A heading out of the building which he was intending to enter.

'They are done already,' he thought as he glanced at his watch. 'But there should still be a few minutes left. Or maybe the class didn't hold.'

While he was busy speculating, a sound similar to an alarm albeit less noisy, chimed. This marked the end of the lectures for the day, very much to Otis' disappointment. Nonetheless, he was already there and there was nothing he could do.

Otis watched for a while, noticing that the majority of the recruits like himself were headed towards a particular direction whereas a few of them made their way to the dorm.

'What's happening there?'

Pushed by his deepening curiosity for what was going on, Otis walked up to a few of his fellow recruits until he gathered enough information to make sense of the reason most people walked this particular path.

"The Mold, huh?" the young man muttered as he looked in the direction that led towards the facility.

He was excited to see what the Mold was. Unfortunately for him, he had missed the old Professor Melgram's class and had no mental picture of this magnificent establishment and yet followed his colleague's footsteps towards the place.

Otis arrived at the Mold and was impressed with what he was seeing, with the insides of the Mold leaving him a tad stunned as he gaped at it.

"Wow," he blurted out on seeing the interior design of the Mold.

Otis walked around the facility for some time before finally returning to where the rest of the recruits were.

"Are you ignoring me, Otis Vernon!" a boisterous young female yelled into his ears as soon as he entered the Level Zero of the Mold, nearly bursting his eardrums.

Otis bent his body backwards a little bit to create a small distance between him and this young lady. Grey hair with sea blue eyes that were like Otis'

"No," he answered. "I'm not ignoring you, Stacy. Chill out."

"That's a fucking lie and you know it, Otis," she persisted, blabbering into his ears and evoking a deadpan expression.

"Listen, my sweet cousin," Otis said as he rubbed her upper arms. "Let's talk when I'm out."

Using this as a cue, Otis escaped from his energetic cousin by entering one of the pods even though he had made no plans of taking the Level 0 Challenge in the first place.

—––

Srururu~

German noisily slurped the hot coffee from its plastic cup without any care in the world, his eyes staunchly fixed on Eric as he asked: "Who is this 'special' one?"

Indeed, his interest had been piqued and a little eagerness was taking root inside his heart as he wanted to see this trainee who had impressed Eric.

Eric turned around and faced the multiple screens in front of him as his eyes carefully scanned through them in search of that one trainee who had stood out a little among his peers.

"There he is," Eric announced, pointing his finger to the specific screen.

German lowered the coffee cup from his face as he slowly raised his eyes towards that particular screen.

His lips arched slightly into a half smile as he noticed the boy's blue gaze; his eyes almost as blue as the seas.

'Not surprising,' German muttered to himself. 'Here I was thinking that our prodigy kid was a nobody. Pfft!'

On that screen was a young boy, lean and tall in physique. His eyes were sea blue and his hair was white with shaved sides.

"Otis Vernon," Eric continued. "He's currently second in the system ranking for the ongoing Level 0 test—"

"Second?" German interrupted his deputy while raising his eyebrows in doubt.

Eric nodded, standing on what he had just said. "Yes. Second."

"And the one who is first doesn't stand out?"

Eric looked towards the screen that showed the trainee who was currently ranked first in the leaderboard of the Level 0 Challenge and sighed.

"Well, being first is certainly something noteworthy. However, the Vernon kid had gotten that high on the ranks without using his Skill even once."

German briefly shifted his gaze toward Otis' screen. He observed the boy aimlessly looking and scratching his head like he was confused about what next to do as he stood amid heaps of undead creature corpses.

It was quite impressive that Otis had gotten that far without having to use his Skill yet. However, that was nothing to German.

"He's a Vernon, Eric," the Head Instructor pointed out. "You shouldn't expect anything less. After all, from the looks of it, it seems that the kid had adequate mastery of the Vernon Sword Style. The Level 0 Challenge should be easy peasy for him."

"Vernon Sword Style?" Eric muttered, deeply invested in the words of his head.

German nodded his head before proceeding to down the remaining content of his coffee cup.

"Ahh," he moaned and wiped his mouth with a piece of cloth before proceeding to explain what Otis' fighting style was.

"Display his previous fights and zoom in on it," German instructed.

Eric did as German had told him and as he closely watched the young trainee, he couldn't help but express a slight marvel at the trainee's skill.

"What can you say about it?" German asked.

Eric looked him in the eyes and answered.

"That is indeed a beautiful sword style with great potential."