The Elusive Book Keeper

In the end, only six were left to go to the dining hall with Zane. Todd, Matt, John, Precious Snow, Olive and Jet. To Zane's surprise, even Jet had joined them though he had been oddly quiet for some reason. Their class was up a hill so they had to descend to get down. 

Todd had shown them the staircase at the back of the forest that led to one of the dining halls of the faculty of Combat. According to Todd, his elder brother took the Advanced Combat Sniping course last year and claimed this was a well-kept secret in the classroom.

The stairs were long and spiral, they had crackings all over and they could not even see the end. Zane was not sure it was stable so he tried to check with his feet. 

"If his staircase ends up leading us to the middle of an undiscovered ruin. I will kill you." John sneered.

Todd was not in the slightest bit afraid of John who had gotten the lowest score in the class so he laughed.

"If it indeed leads us to an undiscovered ruin, I don't think you will probably have time to kill him yet as you will be in mortal danger." Matt said.    

Whenever Matt speaks, Zane is always expecting invisible glasses to appear on his face. He shook his head to steer the image away.

"Interesting. I did not have any idea that you three are such cowards." Precious snow said with a stunning smile from where she stood at the very end of the line with Olive.

The three young boys simultaneously cleared the path without words. Mat even added a very polite, "After you."

Precious looked at them a little surprised then looked at Zane with the most aggrieved expression Zane had ever seen. Zane quickly made up his mind about her, she was definitely more dramatic than Charlotte.

From the left, one could see a large pitch-black forest that Zane reckoned they would be doing a lot of training. From the right, he could see other similar hills and scattered buildings with their respective training grounds. And the noise from the cacophony of students that are constantly buzzing about.

They reached the end of the stairs and truly it led to a small building that had a signboard Dining Hall 5. From the dark training suits and short knives, most of the students around are carried. It was safe to say that this was the area of most ȧssassin or rouges courses. What about thieves, Zane had never considered them before but were thieves accepted by Amherst College? To be safe, he moved the things in his inventory to the Gnosis inventory.

They entered the hall. It was loud with many conversations being carried over food. The seven of them went straight to the counter. 

The menu did not mention the food. They came mostly in workout oriented packages, Basic HIIT, Basic Cardio, Basic Calisthenics, etc and each had a small, medium and large size.

They started placing their orders, almost everyone except Olive and Jet went for the medium size meal, they both chose the large Basic HIIT. Zane looked at Olive's deceptively small frame, it did not look like it could handle that amount of food.

"I would like to pay for a Medium Basic HIIT, I would like to eat half here and the remaining half would be to-go." He said. The sign that only members of the Faculty of Combat would eat here for free was written in large font and with red paint. It was clearly visible to anyone who came to eat.

"Here you go. 1000 rands have been deducted from your school wallet." The man handed over a large tray and a takeout bag. Even though he had asked for half the size of the medium, the food on the tray was the largest Zane had ever tempted to eat. He always preferred to eat in smaller quantities throughout the day. He swallowed, he would just take it as part of his training.

They found a large table with enough seats closer to the door. The pitying looks some of them threw at Zane couldn't escape his eyes.

Todd just came out with it, "Why did you choose the Faculty of Research. Don't you know that the Faculty of Combat has the best foods, the most delicious and the largest? I heard that your faculty mostly have salads for lunch. The moment I heard that I made up my mind."

"Glutton." John quipped.

Todd just shook his head. "I am nit." He then proceeded to stare shamelessly at Olive's plate as if he was pointing the glutton out. Olive noticed his stare and turned the most fetching shade of red.

"But it would make sense if he was. You are Zane Black right, the 2nd ranker in CAT?"

Zane nodded. He ate some of the brown rice and Lima beans. Todd was not wrong, it was delicious. Although the meals, the chefs in the Valois family mansion were far more delicious.

The confirmation was all they needed.  Precious and Matt exchanged mutual glances.

Even Jet put down the roasted lamb he was eating, thought of something and began to stuff himself more ravenously, much more than before. 

"2346 points out of 2400 points." Matt helpfully supplied before going back to the vegetable and nuts salad on his plate.

"Are you some sort of reincarnated Scholar?" Todd's eyes gleamed with excitement.

"Idiot!" John supplied. 

Precious ġrȯȧnėd. Zane glanced at her. She was among those that like to debone their fish, break it into smaller pieces and add it to their bowl of rice. "You don't know how much my mother compared you to me last year. Every day, I would just be hoping you fall down and break your head." Realizing what she said, she chuckled awkwardly, "It is just a joke."

Zane smiled warmly at her, "I don't mind. I have heard worse. Besides, I am just the  second ranker, there is still the first ranker."

"He doesn't count," Todd said.

Everyone nodded their heads in unison.

Zane chuckled. He should be in the Desolate War Institution by now. It was true, comparing themselves with such a person would probably damage their self-esteem for life.

His eyes went back to the boy who was now munching on an extra-large sandwich and was slightly lowered as he focused on his food. He used a Potential Probe card on Olive.

{Name: Olive Knight

Talent: 20

Luck: 16

Will: 6

Zane smiled.. His smile was extra-large and extra genuine.