【Skill Learned: No Tilt Knife Throwing: You can throw a knife in a straight line now you just need to look cool while doing it. Limit 1 projectile, 20 meters. LVL 1】

It had taken a slightly unreasonable amount of time in Faer's opinion to learn this low hanging fruit skill. But it was worth it.

If you considered knocking down paper cups with a pencil from the other side of the library worth it.

Throwing a pencil at one the targets he set up he watched in mild amusement as the writing implement went through the cup as it knocked it off the table.

The grind never ended and he also had nothing better to do since that had been the only thing he had to go over and he had been just fine in terms of education.

So as it turns out throwing pencils through cups was good use of his time.

Besides training with Akihiko it might be best to go see the school's clubs, they might be half decent. Might even get a skill out of it if he's lucky.

Though it was a bit iffy, he wasn't sure what all the requisites for learning new skills were but he was relatively sure repeated action might be on the table given his【CQB Hand to Hand (Novice)】gained 2 levels since he arrived.

Honestly he was worried he might run out of good luck considering 2 out of the 3 days he's been in this world he's been almost killed. But that could easily be wiped away if last night was of any real consideration, and as Faer often heard in his last life, complacency kills.

Stowing up his target practice for now the boy figured that now should be a decent time to get back to class.

Being as tall as he was he towered over most of the general populace and since his skin was so dark there was obviously no blending in, so he didn't bother.

Projecting his presence was as simple as standing tall with his shoulder relaxed and taking his time to get from point A to B.

"Jacar,"

Speak of the devil, it was Akihiko.

"Mr. Sanada, did you need something?"

Whereas most were content to mind their own business it was bit much when one the school's star athletes had stopped to speak to one of the school's newest curiosities.

"They know each other?"

"This energy, it's too intense..!"

"This is just like my…"

"Fuuka, you still write that trash?"

"A meeting between two rivals!"

Of course Faer was half tempted to lean into it to see if he could farm out some more conflict. Throwing up a persona of being the Boxer's rival could be interesting except for a few limiting factors getting in the way.

Although he had been fighting with a knife primarily he was definitely more of an mma styled fighter, meaning he used his legs where he could.

That would take too long to train out of.

There was really also so long he could even look like he gave a shit about being his rival when he had no interest in boxing as a sport and based on how the shorter man was last night he quite frankly barely cared either.

"Are you free to train after school?"

"My schedule is free for now."

With a simultaneous nod the two stepped past each other back to their respective destinations.

"This is the friendship of two men…"

"I thought for sure they were going to attack each other."

"The Gaijin Ogre Meets the Lightning Prince…"

"Fuuka…"

"No, she's got a point. Americans are a lot like Ogres, even the polite ones. My Cousin's friend told me so."

What the hell is with these kids? It's not like the hallways are so quiet that all noise would be drowned out.

Turning head ever so slight-

『You earned 15 conflict points.』

"Oh shit, he heard! You see Fuuka, this is why nobody likes you. Why don't you disappear before you get us all killed!"

"I-I-I'm sorry!"

Not even bothering to turn his head any further Faer made his way back to the class, ready to finish this day up before it turned to even more of a circus act.

Class, despite his expectations, was a quiet affair.

No quiet rumors he'd have to sit through. His name was still said wrong but to be fair it was a difficult name to pronounce so he wouldn't begrudge them over it.

Waiting in the hallway Faer was half tempted to check the store since he might've had a bit of time but unfortunately…

"Hey you! You can't stand there! You're taking up space in the hallway."

Bringing his gaze down Faer found himself faced with a boy with slicked back black hair, of course wearing the Gekkoukan High uniform, those his was especially crisp given its iron appearance.

"Hm, What is it?"

"What do you mean, "What is it?"! I told you to move."

Looking over his shoulder Faer saw… nothing except the bend of the hallway he was nowhere near. To his right, a bulletin board he was off center from. To left the rest of the hallway. And in front this… guy.

"Sorry, I was looking to see if I was blocking someone's way. I'm not. Is there a reason for you needing me to move?"

Getting flush in the face with an irritated look on his face, the boy opens his mouth.

"Jacur you ready to get going?"

Behind the boy was "Lightning Prince" himself.

"Yeah."

Ignoring the bumbling of the boy, the duo walked out of the school.

"I'll bring you to where I normally get practice at. It's somewhere nondescript but always has a decent amount of… targets we can practice with."

The duo had walked to where the old factory on the island was before walking into a warehouse that Akihiko seemed to know like the back of his hand.

"I found this place a while back. After checking with the authorities they said I was free to use it as I pleased so long as I didn't make a bug mess and so long as I vacated when someone wanted to buy this place."

"That was two years ago."

The warehouse was equipped with enough supplies that it could be considered a full gym or gymnastics area complete with mats for harsh landing.

This place.

"You take your training seriously."

"Of course, bad things happen here and before it spreads someone has to try to stop it."

"You and Ms. Kirijo."

"Not just us, everyone that's aware of this. You know I don't think about it too much but there's this saying that I learned. With Great Power Comes Great Responsibility."

Based on the look on his face Faer would hazard a guess that it's not just a saying to him.

"I have this power so I have to at least try to fix this. Do what I can to help."

"I can respect that."

It was a bit odd too. He could be considered hollowed but somewhere inside he felt as if that could have been a sentiment he echoed as well.

"Alright enough words, let's get warmed up and see where you're at."

As far warmups went, the battle hungry duo went about doing it in their own separate ways.

For Akihiko it is running through failure drills and mixed in with some light cardio. It was routine for the youth and anyone could see it from the fluidity of his movements.

For Faer it's… formless in a sense. Distantly he knew what his body could do and despite being younger it had 23 years of muscle memory to it. What it didn't have was the ease of movement that came with spending a significant portion of his life to a martial craft.

It was disheartening that much held over from his old identity. But that didn't mean he was untrained.

Slowly as the Contractor pushed himself through a set of dynamic stretches that had shown he was far more flexible than he previously thought he started going through coordination drills.

Strength and Endurance in equal measure, Dexterity to commit more complex actions, Agility to move faster.

He understood.

Each stat point was relative to the human average. It was evident in how much easier it was for the young man to do something like unassisted handstand push-ups. A feat he hardly had the coordination before let alone the strength and endurance to do 50 in a single set.

It made sense in a way that his own had started at 3. At 6' 192 lbs his three main lifts were 295 lbs bench, 495 lbs deadlift, and 475 lbs Squat.

It wasn't strength that put one on top of the world, but it made a difference.

All of that was useless In the face of improper leverage or lackluster training.

Or more importantly a mind sharp enough to create and or exploit opportunities.

Being a fighter and being a killer were two different things though. Faer wasn't an excellent fighter, he was just a decent enough killer due to his "instincts".

Though now it seemed the opportunity to rectify his deficiency was here.

"Alright you seemed warmed up. Why don't we see what you can do?"

That was all the warming he got, as Faer turned towards the voice he narrowly shifted out the way hook.

For his trouble; an upper cut with the same fist had buried itself into his stomach driving the air from his lungs in surprise.

Fighting down the panic, Faer picks up his guard, setting himself into an outboxing stance.

"Wrong!"

Then like thunder Akihiko appears outside his guard and throws a haymaker that Faer could see air parting itself around.

The next moment Faer is flying back skidding into a turf field that this place also had.

"You won't catch me like that. You can't fight monsters like you fight people, the pacing is completely different."

Never let it be said Faer, didn't try to keep things level but it seemed that the silver haired boy was pushing for an entirely different angle.

Getting up to his knees carefully the Faer had an idea that something like this would've happened if he tried challenging the Boxer.

He wasn't really his equal, after all but…

Flicking his gun into his hand the battered foreigner pressed out two shots aiming center mass.

The first shot went wide as the boxer tilted his body out the way while the second only managed to hit the sleeve of his shirt.

Whether it was aim dodging or actual speed, Akihiko Sanada was no joke.

Pushing up to feet fully, Faer threw a cross while stowing the Evoker back into his inventory and like clockwork he was met by the senior fighter pushing his arm away as he looked to push into his guard.

That was fine, he didn't bother putting any weight behind the attack. It was set up for a roundhouse kick to the ribs.

It landed but before he could place his leg back down the Boxer dragged his leg up to his armpit.

Bringing his arm down in for a brutal punishment of the ill thought out attack the silver haired youth had no defense for the follow up pivot kick that cracked him across the jaw.

Finally creating an exploitable time frame against the silver haired boxer as he let go and stumbled back.

Unfortunately though while Faer's counter was in the right place he had been turned around by it.

In his counter he had committed a cardinal sin in fighting: giving your opponent your back.

Throwing himself into a roll before he hit the ground and using his hands to turn the movement into a roundabout hand spring the young man really had to count himself lucky.

Akihiko was already pulling himself together despite the bruising forming on his jaw.

It was time for round two.

Quick as a flash Akihiko pulled his pistol and instead of aiming it at him- he brought it to his head.

Faster than he could keep up with, Akihiko pulled the trigger, the sound of glass shattering echoed out.

A Phantom for lack of better wording appeared behind the boxer though it was more like heat mirage more than anything else.

"Sonic Punch!"

Faer found himself again flying but this time with a shattered rib cage, along with his thoracic spine reduced to shards. Or at least that's what it felt like.

「Health!」

【HP 4/169】

It hit him hard enough to wonder for a moment if he had ever left the desert.

Crashing like a sack of battered meat to ground it took a herculean effort to apply the bullshit he new healing powder was.

It felt like it was only a stop gap for the damage he sustained unlike a complete repair when used during the Dark Hour.

"Tch!"

Faer didn't have any special moves like that he could pull. But he did have one thing.

Getting to his feet, he could see that silver haired youth had been going through a minor internal struggle.

"Lucky hit. Let's keep going."

Though he buried it down the Boxer could help but wonder if he was close to being in the same situation Shinji had found himself in.

His opponent didn't give him any quarter charging in with all that he had.

Akihiko was still far faster than him, but he couldn't afford to slack off.

"Zio!"

And maybe because the foreigner that was his sparring partner had just taken a hit to his pride he was trying a little harder.

A knife flew up and the lightning arched right into it.

While the blade acted as a makeshift lightning rod the foreigner shot one more round at his Persona.

With a brief lance of pain in his he reflexively brought a hand to it even as he tried to keep an eye on his opponent.

"Sukukaja!"

The dark skinned foreigner sped up just enough to close the distance and Akihiko was just barely too slow to dodge the first jab and its follow up.

However, Akihiko has had worse, Dempsey rolling beneath the rest of the combo was child's play.

While Jaecar had learned to fight monsters over this brief exchange. He was too early to think a rudimentary tactic like that could overcome the difference in their strength.

Countering with an uppercut to the kidney and an even faster hook to the jaw the larger man had been knocked to the floor.

"That's enough… you're pretty good," the silver haired youth complimented.

While he hadn't been exhausted, Akihiko could still feel the exertion of a decent fight. He could see how his opponent managed to survive as long as he did.

Faer was nothing if not prideful, and stood beneath his own power refusing to even show he had been out of breath despite nearly having his upper body turning to pulp.

But it was a facade and he wasn't sure if either of them bought it given how slow he was breathing and how he was covered in scuff marks, bruises and blood.

"Yeah, you're not bad yourself."

"So this is where you've been, Akihiko."

Turning on a dime Faer had pulled his pistol on the newly presented threat- only to lower a moment later upon seeing red hair.

The heiress' face was carefully blank, and her body language contemplating as she had her arms crossed and one hand brought to her chin.

"I told you not two days ago and here you are risking yourself."

"I told you I don't like wasting my time. My training is starting to plateau."

Akihiko responds in kind, facing his body to the heiress.

"Aki-"

"Don't "Akihiko" me, Mitsuru!" The boy snaps before relaxing his face, "We both know it's a matter of time before something boils over either in Tartarus or on the streets."

"We've been doing this since what feels like forever and we barely understand the Dark Hour anymore than we do Demons."

It's a near thing but it looks like the red head was a about to say something that sh-

"And I don't suppose you have any better ideas," the red head responds with clear agitation, folding her arms completely across her chest.

"Maybe not, but hiding in the dorms hasn't solved anything and bringing in people that haven't even fought in the Dark Hour let alone have any fighting experience is asking for bad things to happen."

"Oh like when you and Shinjiro decided to tackle Tartarus on your own. With minimal supplies? Through the entire Dark Hour? You both got trapped for two days in there, and likely would have perished had-"

"And what about everyone else Mitsuru, everyone who did die, who we didn't find? The whole reason we were up there was because people were disappearing into the tower. You know that we had to do something about it."

"Casualties are going to happen Akihiko… that's the nature of our battle."

"I'm not arguing that, I'm just saying we should be doing more. There's no reason that we should be waiting for these new kids to be giving this a shot. The best moment to act was upon hearing all this crap and the second best is now."

Faer was pretty sure the duo forgot about his presence but given how the Kirijo heiress kept becoming more irate the more Faer was sure that somewhere along the line she had lost the boxer's respect.

"Enough, Akihiko! I need you for a meeting. Hear me out, there until then this conversation," the heiress says as she places her hand on her pistol.

"Is over."

"Fine. I know when to listen."

A sharp look of cold fury flashes on the redhead's face, but she says nothing and walks out the warehouse.

"I'll see you tonight, Jaca."

With that the Silver haired boxer walked past him and followed Mitsuru.

"Damn."

『Skill Activation: We All Lift Together: training yield increased by 5%.』

That notification told him pretty much nothing since he still couldn't see his own experience gains…

This island in some ways, felt familiar like coming home after a long road trip. In others it was completely foreign.

Aside from new businesses opening up and old ones closing down there was something different about this place.

…

Then again it wasn't like the world wasn't always proving itself to be a bigger place than he knew.

He should've known that much by now. Even if there wasn't much reason for him to be here it was still best to show up.

After all, it would suck to not show up on the one day that should seal his fate.

Yawning he placed his text books aside for now he wasn't going to get any more studying done at this point.

Taking his uniform out for the next day was trivial but it did mean he'd get to sleep in longer. MP3 player, check. Phone charging, check. Keys… there was a blue one he wasn't sure of the use of but other than that strange addition everything was there.

Reclining back on the new dorm bed Arisato Minato hoped not to need to get up and fight in the middle of the night. This was a nice room neither the biggest nor the smallest he's dealt with.

Better yet he didn't have any loud neighbors so he didn't need to drown out the world with music at all hours.

It was peaceful.

Speaking of peaceful, dreams like the one from the night before blunette weren't common, the weird dream he had about the man with long nose and exotic white haired lady wasn't something especially native to his natural rest cycle.

Case in point being how he was dreaming about sitting on his bed in the Shirogane Manor while his sister was cross referencing some of her research.

She had been using the cork board above her desk in their shared room to pin together an elaborate web of interest that Minato had no care for.

Minato himself had been keeping busy by reading a book on ancient Roman tactics while listening to his new CD Player.

She was a prodigy for sure but ultimately she would always be limited by her lacking ability to socialize without coming off in her… peculiar manner.

Personally he blamed it on the fact that she liked to seem older than she was.

Silly Nao, don't you know you're only setting yourself up for sabotage.

Well, it was a good thing that their grandparents took a liking to Naoto, Sayuri had nothing to offer and worse off seemed to be little more than a slave to someone else.

Oh he remembered this part.

"Brother, I think I've got this figured out. I just need to get grandfather to talk to the forensics labs to confirm some of my su-suspicions." His younger sister said, tripping over the complicated word.

Her pride was evident as she placed a hand beneath her chin and began to explain.

Bang Bang Bang

Huh, he didn't remember knocking. Even Naoto looked a bit surprised by the intrusion, but it didn't stop her lips from moving, but he still couldn't hear her over-

Bang Bang Bang

"Come on, wake up!"

The voice came out of Naoto's mouth but it wasn't her voice it was Yukari's.

Guess he wasn't sleeping.

Opening his gray eyes the boy was met instantly with annoyance. Hopefully Yukari was just knocking because she didn't know what was going on.

She seemed to do that a lot.

Since she was clearly awake their first time meeting it was probably safe to say she had no issues with staying awake.

Was it too ha-

"I'm coming in!"

Unlocking the door with a key she definitely shouldn't ha-

"I don't have time to explain. We have to get out of here, now!"

"Okay," the gray eyed boy responds, throwing on a pair of pants and his shoes.

"Before we go, do you have any weapons that you can use?" The girl in the cardigan asked, completely changing the tone that she had when she first arrived.

The question was enough to force Minato fully wake up and take in the girl, she was armed, firstly with that the same gun she put in his face when they first met now holstered to her hip. And more than that she was wearing a bow with a quiver full of arrows across her back.

So she likely was going to go fight those monsters. Hopefully it would just be those odd black ones, the talking ones were way too much trouble.

Well if she was here that probably meant that a fight was coming and it was too late to get away so he should probably get ready too.

Pulling out a slightly longer than standard xiphos he packed up just in case the boy looked at the girl and nodded.

"Alright follow me!"

The dormitory shakes, as the tell tale sign of lightning crashes in the distance.

Running to the back door Minato is briefly surprised as he hears Mitsuru's voice come across a radio he hadn't seen, "Takeba, do you read me!?"

"Y-Yes! I hear you!"

"Be careful! The situation is deteriorating. There was more than one large Shadow, it slipped past us and headed in your direction. We should be able to catch up soon but try to get away if possib-"

The transmission cuts out abruptly, and no sooner does a large double edged tapered sword cut into the door frame.

"We-"

The sound of the front door crunching cuts the girl off, who just as suddenly looks to it in a state of sullen shock.

It was definitely a shit situation but if they got lucky they might be able to take the roof fire exit. Grabbing Yukari by the wrist he pulls her back in time to avoid another sword stabbing through the door.

He'd rather avoid dying crushed by something if he could. Tight spaces were terrible. So it'd be best if they got to the roof to avoid the likely oversized monster from getting inside the dormitory

As he pulled the girl along he could hear whatever it was out there scaling the building as it seemed to be tracking their ascent up the building.

An elevator would be nice right now…

Finally pushing the fire exit door to the roof open Minato was met with someone he had only met briefly Akihiko Sanada.

He was fighting one of the monsters that wore masks and this one seemed to be all hands. Literally with the main body to hit and seemingly no real will or ability to plan, given that the upper classman seemed to be bobbing and weaving in time with an apparition that shot lightning.

"Se-Senpai, what should we do?" Yukari called out.

Startled, the boy looked back in the middle of his fight, just for a moment, no longer than a flicker with what Minato's eyes could discern. His fighting spirit was otherwise preoccupied too.

With the flash of a blade that the boy would normally be able to keep up with given his performance so far, he slipped, and a blade slipped through his shoulder. Hoisting him into the air, flicking him into a wall while the blade finished nearly severing his arm.

It took but a moment to realize his wounds were fatal, even as he brought his gun up to his head Minato wondered what the difference in time left would be.

To his left he could see Yukari doing the same.

"Yeah, I guess this is a crappy way to go."

Couldn't be him, is what he would say but that might be a lie. But he doesn't have a gun in his hand, he has a sword. Incidentally he left his ritual suicide blade at the Shirogane's so he would have to go using the way this blade was intended to be used.

With a sigh the blue haired boy charged in.