The Protagonist Already Knows

I had looked at the medal in wraith form and personally seen the massive clump of golden mana inside it, spelling out my name, "Ash."

Ren must be seeing the same thing.

He must know that a medal with this mana could only be handed out by The Grove.

Ren looked up from the medal and gazed at me seriously.

"What...happened?"

I took my medal back out of his hands and curtly answered.

"All I can say is that there was a portal to the Dreg Dimension right above our room while we were all trapped in virtual reality."

As if piecing the clues together in his head, Ren looked downward at the ground for a moment before hesitantly saying.

"Why has...nothing been announced?"

Walking toward the exit to the sparring arena, I said while glancing backward.

"Let’s get food before the dining hall closes."

...

...

...

"I see..."

After telling Ren a modified version of our story, where I had simply notified a teacher of the portal and been hurt by a Dreg Demon in the process, I glanced at him.

He seemed visibly shaken, his ocean-blue pupils trembling and his legs tapping against the floor constantly.

For the upcoming "Capture the Flag" tournament, he would without a doubt be more cautious and thorough.

Ignoring the food on his tray, Ren suddenly looked up, scanning my entire body for a moment.

"Those rumors around you...were my fault. You got caught in the crossfire between Leon and me..."

Yawning, I simply tilted my head.

"It’s fine."

There was really no point in getting mad at the protagonist: he was always going to be a genuine and good person.

Ren looked surprised at my lack of a reaction but quickly nodded his head and smiled.

"You should have tried out for the first-year team. I think I’d fight well with you on my team."

"I wouldn’t have made it."

"You know, everyone has heard of your fight with Zander."

"..."

"I heard it was a one-sided beatdown! He didn’t even land a single h-"

Clicking my tongue as that memory flashed back in my head, I irritably said back.

"You keep bothering me. Are you sorry or not?"

Waving his hands up and down with a grin, Ren simply answered.

"Alright, I’ll stop. But are you allergic to praise or something?"

"Only when it comes from someone annoying like you."

Suddenly leaning across the table, Ren placed his mouth above my ear and quietly whispered.

"By the way, Evangel doesn’t believe the rumors at all!"

At that moment, before I could respond, a surprised gasp sounded from our side, as Ren’s mouth was still above my ear.

"Oh? You two know each other?"

Her amber-brown eyes alternating between Ren and me, Carissa glanced at the two of us, perhaps expecting us to be flown apart like two magnets repelling each other.

For some reason, though, as I just looked at Carissa, an overwhelming sense of anger and disgust exploded throughout my body as I avoided her eyes.

It was hard for me to even keep a straight face, let alone my composure, when speaking with her around.

I recognized the feeling but refused to acknowledge it.

Thus, abruptly standing up, I simply said to Ren before grabbing my tray and leaving the two of them behind.

"See you soon."

...

...

...

"The outcome of TURF WARS is...A TIE!!!!"

As the booming voice echoed through the speakers in the massive coliseum, the audience burst into groans and sighs.

Thousands of students and heroes had gathered today to watch the first match of the tournament, the stands packed to the brim.

Just like sports fans back on Earth, all of them were dressed up in merch representing their selected academy, yelling and cheering loudly.

Above the coliseum, massive holograms of Purdrerry’s tiger mascot and Meridian’s Lion mascot floated in the air.

Both of them instantly disintegrated, the words "Tie" appearing in their place.

In the middle of the coliseum, the thirty students from each academy bowed at each other before heading into opposing hallways.

Sighing in relief, I immediately redeemed the virtual casino slip on my smartwatch, watching my bank balance rise all the way up.

[Balance: $3,300,000]

After blinking a couple of times to make sure the balance was real, I immediately considered placing more bets, growing my money all the way to the moon, before shortly dismissing the idea.

If I won too many bets in such a short period of time, unnecessary attention would undoubtedly be placed on me.

Trying my best to hide the grin on my face, I exited the coliseum in the crowd of thousands of people and headed back to my dorm room under the afternoon sun.

With tournament group-stage matches officially starting, students only had morning classes, so I was free for the rest of the day.

The academy’s streets were packed, with The Sunken Pearl now open to countless heroes from all over the world during the day.

Taking a detour off the main street, I eventually found my way back to the dorm building, but as I opened the door, two familiar faces appeared before me.

"Dad, I told you my match isn’t until tomorrow."

"I just wanted to check in on your research! Didn’t you say you found a way to control two metal swords?"

Seeing Evangel and her dad, I simply nodded my head and passed by them, heading up to my dorm room.

Tomorrow, there would be two games.

Of course, Sunken Pearl had their first game against some low-rank academy, but the elven academy, The Grange, would also be playing the humans’ #2-ranked academy, Corridius.

The Grange had to win against Corridius tomorrow.

Otherwise, they would get a lower seeding in the knock-out stages of the tournament and never make the final to face The Sunken Pearl.

The only reason the drins had managed to swap out the flags in the finale was that one of the drins had snuck in as a professor at The Grange.

Just like Coal had, as the original person with rumors, it was my job to make sure they won tomorrow.