We began waiting patiently as the rest of the class filtered in. When Bella's squad arrived, I caught her eye and than waved her over. She picked up on the mood when she showed up and asked what was going on. I explained for them, since they were a little anxious over the whole ordeal. As I did, Bella's eyes flicked rapidly from them to the knight instructor, to the dungeon path repeatedly.

Bella sighed rather dramatically. "Nothing should come of it. Do not think of it as you leaving a squad member behind. Think of it as a stranger leaving your squad. I know we all have some ideals of knightly codes of honor we strive for, but you also can not force one to embrace the light."

I cocked my head at her quizzically. I vaguely recognized the metaphor, but I didn't think it quite applied. Bea and Tom though softened immediately.

"Yes! That's right!" they both said. They smiled at one another and then Bea glanced at me. I shrugged off my confusion and just smiled back at her.

Then it looked like everybody had piled in and we waited on the knight. She eventually turned and dismissed us as usual with a wave of her hand, and then went back to staring at the path Tom and Bea's squad came from.

We all glanced at each other and then just burst into smiles and laughs and walked away. Looks like there was no repercussions for the squad after all.

Bella, of course, nodded sagaciously. "I told you nothing would come of it. The squad is there for safety reasons. He's the one choosing to ignore it."

We kept our cheery mood all the way to dinner.

—----

This routine continued for the next month. Everyone's squads just got used to advancing and clearing hordes of goblins. There were some small adaptations.

Tom and Bea's squad got up to fifty goblins by the end of the month per fight, and also had the flanking maneuver done on them. The number one ranked guy continued to stay past when everyone else turned around and so was constantly alone.

Bella's squad progressed all the way up to seventy goblins, and had about half those sneak around back like what my squad originally encountered.

As for my squad, our goblin encounters grew to one hundred of the little creatures. It was pretty evenly split, about fifty-five in front and forty-five around back. This meant that per person, Em and I were getting a lot more goblins than the rest of the squad, but we seemed to be handling it fine so we didn't complain.

As our month ended I feel like everyone had adjusted to what we were doing a bit more. There was a lot more pep in people's steps and cheer around the dinner table.

The morning after our last day as a ten-man squad was just a normal obstacle course Solsday. Finally giving up on Tom and Bea, I decided to push myself through it as far as I could. I don't know if it was because I had not pushed myself since reaching tier four, or what was going on but I found that I was easily clearing things. In fact, I reached the final obstacle and cleared it too. I felt quite proud of myself about the whole thing, and then realized that I had to willingly drop to the ground. Based on past experiences I knew I would survive, but the height now was a solid six stories tall. It was just unnerving still to willingly jump that.

But I did.

I eventually decided that if I was going to do it, it was going to be a superhero landing that all those movies were so proud of. It stung, a little, but nothing I couldn't take. As I stood up and walked back I felt a bit giddy. I mean, I could still get stronger apparently but even right now I was more robust than any real person from back in my world.

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

While I was heading towards the back of the line I passed the knight instructor. He was looking with quite some confusion at me, but never said anything. Either way, I got to repeat my superhero landing seven more times that day. I was just glad that due to the altitude of the course as well as how it meandered back and forth, no one reasonably knew that I had completed it. Hopefully the rankings would give me a good placement and shock my friends.

—----

When we reported to the lady knight instructor for the dungeon she explained again that she would be splitting us into five man teams. With that, she began calling out the rankings and... I was first.

I could have only hoped for that, and did not think it would actually happen. I thought that surely someone else had completed it by now too, but I guess my expectation was a bit too high.

Stepping forward into my designation, I kind of sheepishly looked around to see my friends' faces. Just like I hoped Bea and Tom were shocked and their eyes were as wide open as possible. Bella actually looked excited for me, and since she was still ranked seventh I'm sure she was hoping for a challenge now. She might want to spar again after this revelation.

I also noticed a few other looks that I didn't expect. There was of course the number one, well former number one, guy who was quite blatant in his loathing stare. I guess I should have expected some kind of reaction, but the way he handled it was a bit over the top.

Then of course was Mel and her sister Em. Mel looked genuinely happy at my new position and was just nodding her head a kind of constant bob, like she knew it was going to happen. Em looked outright scary, putting the fiercest scowl I've ever seen on and glaring at me and not breaking eye contact even as other names were called. I looked away, but every time I saw her in the corner of my eye she still appeared to be looking my way. Gave me the shivers really.

Once the knight had run through the top twenty she started placing everyone else into the squads. By sheer happenstance I ended up with four squad members who were from my ten man squad. They were however, all guys and not anyone I felt I got terribly close with. It was two of the frontline fighters, both with a classic sword and shield combination, and the other two were using a spear.

Somehow Tom and Bea got grouped together with Bella, who then had Mel and Em added to finish off their five man squad. What kind of fairness is that? The squad makeup definitely seemed a lot different than what the knight did last time with such a nice breakdown for everyone. Now it was heavily skewed. I guess maybe this was to show our flexibility in adapting or something, but seemed a bit arbitrary to me.

But whatever, I couldn't do anything about it. As she finished I nodded to my new squad and did a little bit of small talk. They were a bit impressed that I had moved up into the number one ranking, which I just laughed off. Although I suddenly remembered Bea's comment from about a month ago about the new number two guy. How someone should put him in his place. I think I should lean into that now that the cat's out of the bag.

I excused myself for just a second and headed over to my friends.

"Hey guys, how about that eh? New squad looks great!" I placed a big smile on my face as I began.

"Will! What did you do! How did you get that spot?" Bea demanded rather sternly.

"Yeah it caught us by surprise Will, you couldn't clue us in?" Tom sighed exasperated. Bella and Mel nodded along in agreement and Em.... well she was still glaring of course.

"Whatever do you mean?" I asked all innocently, deciding to ham this part up. "Bea you're the one who suggested it, aren't you?"

"W...W...What?! I did no such thing, nor do I think you could have done it! What did you do Will!" She sputtered a bit, but eventually got it out.

"Of course you did! You specifically said someone really needs to put him in his place. Remember? So I tried. Looks like I succeeded too. You're welcome." I smiled and bowed magnanimously, really playing into the part.

My new squad at this point wandered over to us as well, seeing as how I was taking so long.

"Hey, why don't we go together for a bit and then split up later. I have kind of been wanting to check those branching paths for awhile, and knowing you guys were on the other would put my mind at ease. Sound fair?" I asked before they could get back to my new rank.

"Yes, let us go ahead and be on our way. We'll go together for a bit and then split off, but we really should get moving." Bella calmly stated and then began walking away, which I went ahead and followed closely.

This left the other eight no choice but to follow along themselves. As they hurried along, I caught up to be even with Bella.

"Thanks for going along with that. Bea was starting to work herself up, although I don't quite know why." I made sure she knew how grateful I was.

"Yes well, there will still be talks later, you understand? She'll probably corner you when you're stuffing your face with food you glutton." she smirked at me and kept walking.

I just smirked back. "That's a problem for future Will."