I was honestly quite scared to leave like that with him. They surely knew about his power, right? Or maybe he was hiding that information from the academy? I was doing that myself, so maybe others were too.
Either way, it was scary being out there, watching the patrolling guards walk around the academy, especially when they glanced our way. For a moment I froze, thinking they might have seen us. But no, the guard just walked past us.
Ethan gestured for me not to talk, since his invisibility didn’t mean no one could hear us. We slowly made our way through the academy, heading further back into areas that didn’t seem to have much security or students.
Then I spotted the exit Ethan wanted to show me. A portion of the fence was destroyed, and they hadn’t rebuilt it yet. Not just the fence, the barrier in that area wasn’t working either. They had to rebuild the barrier and power it using crystals.
And of course, the area around the destroyed barrier was heavily guarded. I counted 6 guards standing near the hole, some inside the academy’s perimeter and some outside.
They were there to make sure no student escaped, obviously, but that wasn’t the main purpose. If a student escaped, they could just go get them back. What would they even do out here anyway? Everything around was just wild forest.
The real reason was to make sure no monster tried to invade the academy through that hole. Dimensional rifts were scattered all over Earth, so it wasn’t any different around the New Order Hunter’s Academy.
It was common for monsters to leave the rifts and wander. In fact, monsters escaping the rifts had been a topic of concern recently, since it was increasing daily.
Anyway, we passed by the guards, trying to make no sound as we stepped on the ground. I was breathing heavily, watching the guards to see if they’d noticed us or not.
Thankfully, like always, those guards weren’t exactly doing a great job. I spotted a bunch of beers on the ground, stacked against a cooler. The guards had a table set up where they were playing cards while drinking.
"I really hate when these new students arrive. So much noise, and we always have to go after them. Why can’t they just follow the rules?"
"Young people don’t follow rules, mate. I bet you someone will try to sneak through this hole tonight and have sex in the forest."
"Whoa, hey, you sure you want to bet on this? 1000 dollars. Deal?"
When the guards said that, Ethan glanced at me and smirked. That fucking dude. I wanted to punch him in the face, but couldn’t, since that would blow our cover.
I wasn’t into that type of bro shit.
When we finally passed the hole, moving into the forest and getting further away from the academy, I finally relaxed. Ethan deactivated his ability.
"Did you hear that? The bet about..."
"Shut up, dude," I said, rolling my eyes. "Cut the crap. Where’s the rift?"
Ethan burst into laughter. "I’m just messing with you. I know you’re already eyeing that purple haired girl. What was her name?"
He was talking about Selena. Was this guy watching me or what?
"I’m not eyeing anyone. What I want is to get some crystals."
He led the way, looking like he’d been there before.
"I’m really curious how you’re going to get 120 crystals to pay me, and still make a profit, all in one hour. That isn’t possible unless you’re a really powerful rank A hunter, or in a big group. You’re alone in this."
"Don’t ask too much," I said. "I have my secrets, and you have yours."
Ethan didn’t say anything else after that.
The forest was full of sounds I didn’t even recognize. Nocturnal animals hunting their prey, and sometimes weird roars from far away, which I guessed belonged to monsters that had escaped the rifts and were wandering the forest. I hoped none of those creatures found us.
It was pretty hard to see without a proper light source. We used our phone flashlights, and that was pretty shit. I could only see a few feet ahead of me.
After walking for 5 minutes without having to listen to Ethan mumble about something, he finally opened his mouth.
"Can you smell that?" Ethan asked.
I took a deep breath, and a disgusting smell hit my nostrils.
"I farted," he said.
That guy was just unbelievable. I shoved him away.
"I’ll get my revenge. Don’t forget we live in the same room," I said.
Ethan laughed it off and said, "We’re here."
I looked ahead of us. In the middle of that wild forest, with nothing but vegetation around, I saw a dimensional rift. This one was green.
The color didn’t tell you if a rift was high rank or not. That was the problem. To know about a rift, hunters had to explore it, so being the first one to actually explore one was basically a roulette. Many hunters died doing that job.
A few people with special abilities could try to analyze a rift from outside to check its rank, but it wasn’t precise.
That wouldn’t be a problem for us, though. Most of the rifts around the academy had already been explored, meaning their difficulty level was already posted online.
"I checked, and this is the weakest rift, a rank F one. But you’re going in alone, so be careful. I’ll wait outside for one hour, don’t be late."
"How am I supposed to know if an hour’s passed if my phone won’t turn on inside the rift?" I asked him.
Obviously I knew how. Hunters used pocket watches, or just regular watches in general. For some reason, only electronic devices didn’t work properly inside the rifts.
Thing was, I didn’t have one on me. I glanced at Ethan’s wrist. He had a watch.
Ethan took it off and handed it to me.
"Don’t lose this."
"I won’t."
I wasn’t promising shit. Fuck that guy, he farted on my face.
I went inside the dimensional rift, with no idea what kind of monsters to expect. Bob was still going crazy back in my pocket dimension. With each passing minute, the hunger was driving him more insane.
I had to get him crystals.