In the early morning, Fang Raon dragged his feet through the soft snow and ran out of the forest.
His body looked heavy and sluggish. Moving like a puppet with strings tangled around limbs. He looked very tired.
In that moment, he arrived back at the mansion, and just like yesterday, Rock stepped outside with his arms crossed.
"You are late!"
"Y-y-y-yeah..."
Fang Raon answered back with struggle.
It was very hard for him to speak properly since he felt like his lungs were about to jump out of his throat.
"Continue yesterday’s training. You must reach level 3 before the end of the day, or you’ll quickly find that this kind of training is not the worst kind."
Rock said coldly and stepped back inside.
"Haah... Haah..."
Fang Raon pulled open the system interface and checked the current situation with the two basic skills.
[Basic Slash Lv. 2 - Mastery: 8%]
[Basic Parry Lv. 2 - Mastery: 0%]
It was the result of an entire day of training, but his mastery levels were still far from where he wanted them to be.
On the other hand, his attributes also had a slight change. Not a big change. It was still a change nonetheless.
[Stamina: 32 → 33]
[Attack: 28 → 29]
[Speed: 20 → 22]
’I still have ways to go.’
Fang Raon thought as he checked just how far he was from level 3 and had a fire lit up inside him.
[Next Level: 36%]
He gritted his teeth, picked up the unbalanced wooden training sword, and started with Basic Slash just like yesterday.
The sword cut through the air. Swoosh. He didn’t feel it, but he was getting stronger with each swing.
Through the window of the training room, the tired students of the Fourth Line looked at Fang Raon training outside.
"...How come Della also put him as a candidate for the team leader position? He is behind all of us in terms of strength and skill."
"...Yeah, I don’t know. They should just give Machary the position, and maybe we can start doing some raids next week."
Machary overheard them talk.
He didn’t correct them because it worked in his favor that they thought he was weaker than he actually was.
However, in reality, he was quite scared of Fang Raon.
’I don’t want to lose to him!’
Machary shouted inwardly with a cold look in his eyes.
...
Several days ago on the 13th floor.
"Huff! Huff!"
Machary jogged down a sidewalk, finishing up his morning jog, and shortly afterwards arrived at the inn.
It was where the party was staying while they were scouting the tower key location.
’My stamina is increasing at a decent pace. That is good. I noticed in my fight against Fang Raon that my stamina was a major weakness that I need to improve.
’I didn’t put enough effort into stamina beforehand. If I had had more stamina during my fight with him, I would’ve easily won.
’I will become a cardio beast so that no one can out-endurance me in a fight!’
Machary thought, and then he entered the inn and headed straight to the room, where everyone was waiting.
With a key, he opened the inn room and slowly made his way to the living room, but while quietly making his way there, he happened to hear some conversation happening over there.
"...Last raid, a problem arose that I thought would at some point in time. You all also noticed it, right?"
Abigail asked.
In the living room, there were only Abigail, Ragnar, and Poppy, as Fang Raon hadn’t logged on just yet.
Machary stopped moving and quickly hid.
’A problem?’
He wondered to himself.
"Yes..."
Poppy whispered with a troubled look.
With his muscular arms crossed, Ragnar hmph’d.
"It is what happens when there are two leaders who want to be the primary decision maker. Machary and Fang Raon would need to have a serious conversation about their roles in the group.
"Both of them cannot be raid leaders.
"One of them can be the raid leader, and the other can be in charge of recruiting members and managing the party."
Ragnar said.
"...Who’d you prefer to be raid leader, Ragnar?"
Abigail asked curiously.
"It is an obvious decision. We all know it. The raid is smooth sailing when a certain someone is leading, and it’s much harder when they are not..."
Ragnar said.
"...Fang Raon should be the raid leader."
Poppy said.
When Machary heard that, his heart dropped to the bottom of his stomach, and he squinted his eyes.
’There is no way that he is better than me.’
"It is already hard to do these raids with just five of us, and everyone has a lot of pressure to perform, as no one can be slacking, or we can all die.
"Fang Raon leads perfectly. If somebody makes a mistake, he always has a backup plan, and it’ll just give more confidence for everyone to do better.
"It’s like he’s always one step ahead, thinking of everything before it even happens.
"Machary, on the other hand... His plans rely a lot on people’s individual skills. If we make a single mistake, his plan just crumbles apart, resulting in chaos and confusion.
"Like in the 11th floor’s raid. We almost died because of his decision-making. He just doesn’t care as long as we cleared the floor.
"That doesn’t work in the long term, and if we don’t say anything, there will come a day when Machary leads us to our deaths."
Ragnar said with a frown.
Machary, hearing him speak, gritted his teeth and silently left the room, his fists clenched tight with anger.
...
At the present time.
’I will not lose.’
Machary picked up the wooden training sword and started swinging his sword, his sweat dripping down his face.
"..."
Rock watched from the sidelines, an uninterested look on his face, and then turned back to look outside.
He was sitting on a bench that gave him a perfect view outside to look at Fang Raon and saw his sword form.
’A decent form. He is quickly improving in swordsmanship. He definitely knew how to use a sword before I met him. It was pretty rusty, but I can see a shining diamond under the rust.
’In due time, the diamond will reveal itself...’