He quickly turned around to identify the visitor. "Ahh, Yella."
Yeah, it was Yella’s voice, but beside her stood a familiar face: short ruby hair, red eyes, the same girl who’d bumped into Prince before the second practical test.
The two of them sat side by side near Prince on the large trunk.
Prince casually asked. "What are you doing here, Resy P-Prestina, right?"
Resy’s face flushed red just by knowing he remembered her name. She was still flustered. "A-ahh... Yes, L-Lord Prince. Ughh Noo... I mean I lost my team and found Miss Yella."
Yella continued after her. "Yeah, it’s already too late for her to return to her green zone."
Snow shifted a little closer to Prince on the trunk, her instincts kicking in as she shot a quick side-eye at the newcomers. "You two sure took your time showing up. We were just about to move anyway."
Yella smirked, crossing her arms under her chest in her usual dominating manner.
She leaned forward slightly, her sharp gaze locking onto Prince as if he were the only thing worth noticing in the whole forest.
"Oh? Jealous already, Snow? Lord Prince doesn’t mind a little extra company, do you?"
Her voice was smooth, confident, almost teasing as she brushed her blonde hair back.
"Especially after what I heard happened back there. You jumped in to save her life? How heroic, My Prince."
Resy sat quietly beside Yella, fidgeting with the hem of her uniform.
Her cheeks were still pink, and every time Prince glanced her way, she’d look down at her lap, only to peek up again through her lashes.
"L-Lord Prince, do you really remember my name? Most people don’t even notice me..."
Prince chuckled lightly, rubbing the back of his neck. "Of course I remember. You bumped into me pretty hard that day. It is truly hard to forget a face such as yours."
He meant it casually, but Resy’s ears turned bright red, and she let out a tiny squeak, hiding half her face behind her hands.
Snow huffed, elbowing Prince lightly in the side. "Don’t encourage her! And you—" she pointed at Yella, "—you should be taking Resy to the tree house, instead of bringing her here."
Yella laughed, a bold, full sound that rang through the trees.
She scooted even closer on Prince’s other side, basically sandwiching him between her and Snow now.
"Relax, Snow. We were just talking to each other and found you both, so I thought, why not talk together? Isn’t it fun?"
"Screw your fun." Snow muttered under her breath.
Even in this situation, his thoughts kept circling back to his old affinity.
’I need to get strong enough!’
’But how am I supposed to get Noctis Arcanum?’
All of them had a good exchange of words before heading straight to the area.
"Let’s call it a day." Prince announced.
They all nodded in agreement and said the final words that everyone says before going to bed. "Good night."
Prince noticed some students were still awake, guarding the green zone to make sure no other class students could steal their flags. They were on shift so the others could rest too.
And with this, Prince and the rest of the girls retreated into the tree house and settled in for the night.
...
Next Morning
Ironically, Prince woke up atat 9 a.m. sharp, when everyone had already woken up at 7 a.m.
Some students of class A went to steal flags of class D around 5 a.m.
Still, they hadn’t come back yet. Only one hour left for the practical test to finish.
Prince glanced around. There were some slime monsters, but his classmates were taking care of them.
He found himself surrounded by everyone else pulling their weight.
"Aaaarghhhh!"
"Help!"
He heard some screams from his class. He quickly traced the voice and asked the student lying on the ground. "What happened here?"
Whatever had happened, he hadn’t seen it himself.
A male student pointed his index finger at the front. Prince looked up, shifting his gaze from the student to a stupidly large slime monster.
The skies above the Class A area started changing to red, as the slime monster got bigger and bigger, turning its color from blue to red.
Upon seeing the monster, Prince was stunned for a moment, and a rough gasp escaped from his mouth.
"Hey! Move! Save yourself until the professors come here to help us." Prince shouted.
Students slowly got to their feet and started running away from the monster.
They didn’t even know where they were running; what mattered to them was their survival.
It was clear that anyone could identify its rank by its presence alone. The monster was definitely NO JOKE, an S-rank threat.