"Hmmm," A little hum escaped Ryuk’s lips before he dipped his clothes back into his bag, zipping it up.
"Let’s check out that store," he said to Quinn.
A chance to get clothes for free!? Ryuk wasn’t going to pass that up.
Besides, he would also get a quick sightseeing of the entire area—something he would eventually have to do some other time since he was a newcomer in the place.
It was essentially hitting two birds with one stone.
"Okay then," Quinn replied with a small smile as he led Ryuk to the door.
Together, they shut the door, leaving the room in silence.
---
"And that is why it’s all free..." Quinn finished as Ryuk, beside him, nodded. Both of them were traveling along a deserted path.
As Ryuk walked with Quinn, he quickly figured the guy out.
One thing was clear: Quinn was most likely the weakest student among all the fallen races’ geniuses.
From how he had stated his relationships with other geniuses, Ryuk was able to grasp that easily.
Now it made more sense why Sir Drakoria said it was better if the weak hung out with the weak.
Ryuk, who was weak himself, had been placed together with Quinn, who was also the weakest fallen.
It was a pretty good pairing.
Secondly, Ryuk learned that Quinn’s timidity was more of a defense mechanism.
The boy, right now, couldn’t stop running his mouth, buzzing loudly in Ryuk’s ears.
The reason why he was shut in before was that he was weak, and the other geniuses ignored him.
But finding Ryuk, who treated him like an equal, made him escape that shell of his pretty quickly, becoming more open.
Ryuk never interrupted him nor seemed disturbed by his unending rant, because he was also learning more about the base through it.
According to what he picked up from Quinn’s ramblings, he was quick to learn a few things:
There were a total of five bases within this place, and three were the most visited by the geniuses.
The places were none other than their dorm rooms, their training areas, cultivation areas, classes, and the less frequented place—the cafeteria.
Those were the most visited places in the base.
The only mandatory place to visit was the classes, which usually started from 7:00 in the morning up to 2:00 in the afternoon.
Then most students would either head to the training room immediately or to the cultivation areas.
Apart from attending classes, students were free to do anything else they wanted.
It was an idea that Ryuk found great since he only had to be there for seven hours. The remaining 17 hours, he could use to train and improve his strength.
Every additional time now was a great help to Ryuk.
After learning about the schedules, he also learned an important detail: everything in the place was essentially free for the geniuses.
There were clothing stores, weapon stores, and so on, and everything was free.
Students could essentially just walk in and take whatever they wanted.
The only things that weren’t free were the Apex Treasures. Students had to buy these to increase their strength.
They used something referred to as points, and the higher rank one was, the more points they gained on a daily basis.
Ryuk also learned about the rankings.
The students were anything but equal and were clearly ranked.
Right now, Quinn was ranked 59, and Ryuk was automatically Rank 60.
He was the last, and the last received no points at all.
The only way to pass the other person in rank was to challenge them to a duel and win.
He had also learned that among the now 60 geniuses, a total of 10 had been automatically marked as the strongest and nearly undefeatable by the remaining 49.
They were referred to as the Monstrous Ten.
Their ranks had remained unchanged, and they had been able to defeat anyone who tried to take away their positions.
In fact, Quinn stated that those 10 didn’t challenge each other because they were more than confident they would all gain admission to the Ascension Academy.
The way Quinn praised and adored them made Ryuk narrow his eyes even more.
Those ten monstrous geniuses wouldn’t be easy opponents.
After 30 seconds of walking, they finally arrived in front of the store and entered it.
Behind the counter was a lady with a book up to her face, seemingly engrossed in reading.
"Hello, Satisfya," Quinn greeted with an elated expression, but the lady didn’t even raise her head from the book, causing Quinn to smile wryly.
"Just wanted to introduce you to my roommate, Ryuk."
"He’s new and in need of some things here in the store," Quinn said to her, but as usual, the fallen angel didn’t reply and simply swiped to the next page of her book.
"Let’s get going already..." Ryuk said as he turned to the side and walked away from the lady’s desk.
Quinn quickly chased after Ryuk after giving another faltering smile to Satisfya, catching up with him just as they both disappeared around the corner.
After both of them left, the girl slowly raised her head from the book, staring in the direction where Ryuk and Quinn had disappeared.
"A boy at the Origin Level cultivation partaking in the test? That’s weird..." the lady mused silently before shrugging and continuing her reading, though occasionally she looked back toward the path where the boys had gone, her eyebrows furrowed.
-------
"Wait up, Ryuk..." Quinn said as he finally arrived at Ryuk’s side.
The young man had his eyes on the hanging clothes, his gaze flashing with a brilliant light as his hands weaved through them.
"Why didn’t you say anything to Satisfya? She might not be fine with that, you know?" Quinn asked, noting how Ryuk had worn an "I don’t give a damn" aura in front of the lady and simply moved on.
It was something he was curious about.
Could Ryuk have known her from somewhere and hated her?