Life didn't get easier, even in another world.

Kairen stood in front of the door but hesitated to open it. He bit his lip and turned back to ask the same question one more time.

"Is there really no other way?"

The answers came almost immediately.

"Nah, you should see her. You've to get going right now or else you'll be late."

"Sigh. Don't be like that, Kairen. You must be shedding tears of happiness now instead of looking for a way to run away. People would do anything to get such an opportunity."

"But I don't want to!"

Kairen said that sentence once again with a stern voice. How many times had he repeated the same sentence in the past two hours? He didn't know. 

Standing in front of him, Kain and Alessia shook their heads with disappointment visible on their faces. 

"Alright, enough with the childish talk. It's getting late, you've got to go."

Kain opened the door and pushed Kairen outside.

"I'm sure she won't come to the gym, why should I go?"

Alessia massaged her eyes with two fingers and took a deep breath.

"Ah, god! Why is this boy so stupid? Why can't you understand? Even if she doesn't like to teach you, YOU'VE GOT TO GRAB UNTO HER AND BEG HER TO BE YOUR TEACHER! Do you get it?"

Her tone was getting a little bit scary while saying those words for the third time today. Kairen gulped, not daring to anger her more than this. 

"Okay then, get going."

Kain then literally kicked him out of his house.

"Goodbye, try hard!"

Click.

Kain said those last words and closed the door shut.

"...."

Kairen looked at the closed door of the house and sighed. He checked the time with his smartphone, it was half-past 4. He had to be in SMF's gym by 5 to meet captain Neal. 

Kairen sighed once again and started walking towards the gym.

'I'm sure she won't come...'

. . . . . . . . . .

But the reality was different from his expectations.

"...."

"...."

Kairen stared at the woman standing at the entrance of the training ground, that was also staring back at him. Apparently, she had been waiting for him for a while now.

Her embarrassed and ashamed look from the morning was completely gone and she now had an emotionless face and a gold gaze.

"Hello-"

"I thought you wouldn't come."

She folded her arms and raised one eyebrow and questioned Kairen why he was there. She acted as if he had done something wrong by coming to the gym.

Kairen didn't think much and said what was in his mind.

"I thought the same about you."

Captain Neal scuffed.

"Ha! You should be thankful to your deputy team leader. I couldn't just ignore her request."

Captain Neal entered the training ground and walked towards a few training targets installed in the training ground. 

"Oh? Isn't that captain Neal?"

"Who?"

"She is here, that's surprising."

"Who's that dude following her?"

"Hello, captain!"

People started to talk about captain Neal as soon as she stepped into the gym. 

'She is pretty famous.'

Captain Neal ignored all of the people and opened her mouth again.

"Anyway, cast a few spells. I need to see your skills first before doing anything."

Her tone was as if she was talking to a piece of garbage. As if she was forced to waste her precious time by doing something useless.

Though, that was true to some extent that she was forcefully doing this and wasting her time on someone insignificant.

She stood near one of the training targets and glared at Karien.

"Hurry up!"

"...Yes."

Kairen walked faster and stood right in front of one of the training targets. He could sense the people in the gym looking their way because seeing captain Neal here was unexpected, but he ignored them just like the captain did.

"Destroy these targets however you want."

"Yes."

Kairen started to cast a spell. A spell not too low level and not too high level. 

'Should I use a powerful spell or one that is only enough to destroy the target?'

He wasn't sure of it. He thought for a moment before deciding to use a spell not too strong and not too weak.

It didn't take long for him to cast his spell. He finished preparing his attack and hit the target under the gaze of captain Neal.

BOOM

The training target exploded and shattered to pieces as soon as Kairen's attack hit it. 

Kairen looked at the result of his magic, then turned to look at the captain.

"...."

What he saw was the indifferent and unimpressed face of a woman. Captain Neal looked at the destroyed target and opened her mouth.

"Was that the best spell you could cast?"

"...no."

"Then, cast the strongest spell you know."

"...Yes."

Kairen frowned a little bit from irritation. He didn't like the way she talked to him at all. 

'I thought I might've jumped to the conclusion too quickly before, but her personality really sucks.'

He knew she wasn't pleased with this situation at all, but she also knew that it wasn't Kairen's fault that she was forced to come here. 

Kairen knew that he wasn't in a position to get mad or irritated as he was currently wasting that woman's time, but he couldn't help but get irritated.

It wasn't that he didn't like her, he just didn't like people talking to him as if he was unworthy even if he truly was unworthy! 

Kairen wouldn't hate people so easily. Kairen 1 was one of the few people that he didn't like and hated without much solid reason. Kairen wouldn't really care that much about people or their behaviors to grow feelings like 'Hatred' or other such emotions towards them. 

This captain was the same, he just felt frustrated when she talked to him as if he was a piece of trash.

Kairen turned to look at the other training targets. He started to think about the spells he knew.

'The strongest...'

He didn't exactly know which spell was the strongest. There were a few high-level spells that he had learned before, but he wasn't sure which had the most destructive power. He thought for a moment before deciding on which one to use.

He started to cast the spell as soon as he decided on that.

his mana circled around him once before getting divided into five small dots. The dots continued to circle around his body without stopping.

The small dots got bigger and bigger the more mana he put into them. Kairen continued to add mana to the five dots and then he added an attribute to them.

The dots that were now the same size as a fist suddenly changed color and turned red and started burning. 

The five burning balls gathered together and merged with each other, creating a huge fireball. The huge fireball that was created by mixing five fire spells then shrank in size after the cores of all five spells merged with each other. 

Kairen threw his finished fireball at the targets without hesitation. The fireball flew in the air and spilled into numerous small flame balls and shattered everywhere. The flames hit the targes, creating numerous holes in some and burning the others to ashes.

Kairen proudly looked at the result of his magic. He hadn't cast it many times but he had done quite well, he thought. He took his gaze off of the destroyed targets and looked at captain Neal, asking 'How was it.' with his gaze.

"Your spells suck. There were way too many flaws that I can't tell them all at once."

That was all he got after casting one of the strongest spells he knew. He blinked and tilted his head.

"...."

Captain Neal turned towards him with a frown. 

"You lack the basic mana-control skills. You cast the magic without being able to properly deal with your mana. That's surprising how you had managed to cast your spells till now without paying attention to your mana flow."

"....."

"Also, you put way too much mana into your spells that it gets messed up. How can you use up your mana like that? Don't you run out of mana after casting one or two spells?"

"...."

Kairen nodded his head. 

He indeed ran out of mana after casting only a few spells.

"Putting too much mana in a spell doesn't make it stronger but lowers its power instead. It only sucks your mana without having any good results. Gosh, how did you complete your missions until now?"

"...."

Kairen looked down, fidgeting with his fingers.

"Also, your speed in casting the spells isn't good. It's good at the level of a normal mage, but not good enough for an SMF member. You have to cast your spells faster if you want to survive on the battlefield."

"...."

"Though your spells are stronger than average, it isn't good overall."

"...."

Kairen lovered his head even more.

"Oh man, your flaws are too much that I don't know where to start helping you from."