"Your offer sounds horrible. I remember you just tried to intoxicate me and even fought me, for absolutely no reason. Give me one reason why I should trust you?"

Silence.

"Well,... okay look. We heard from a secret source that you actually beat Reece and his goons. Clearly that's impossible for a first year student. Now, I know we tried to... you know, get you to talk, but that was purely because we probably would've lost in a fight with you without the morphine. I apologize if we were rude towards you but there really wasn't a lot we could've done here."

Johan didn't know what to say. He couldn't have known that they got information from somebody who either saw the fight or at least heard it from somebody who did.

THAT'S BOTHERSOME. THE ONLY WAY TO GET THE MOST OUT OF THIS IS TO MAKE A DEAL WITH THEM. HER OFFER ISN'T TOO BAD JUST TELL HER THAT SHE WON'T TELL ANYBODY ELSE OR YOU WILL LEAK THEIR SECRET AS WELL. GET THEIR PART FIRST.

"...I'll tell you what you want but I don't know if you will tell me the truth. So tell what is this club about and who are you guys?"

Ramona looked at him with a smirk.

"Hmm, as you wish, Mr. Negotiator."

She paused for a moment. Johan could see a hint of sadness in her eyes. As if she was reminiscing about something.

"Where do we begin? Well, at first I was just a newbie Ranker like you and came here with hopes of making it as a strong Ranker. Just like everybody else. I met friends along the way and some of us got very close.

At some point there was a period of time where one of my friends started to disappear from our dorm at night. After watching out for her we noticed that she went to the training facility for a few hours and then came back. So we asked her obviously what that was about and after doing so for a couple of times, she finally spilled the beans. Mr. Benjamin, a teacher at the facility, and some other students were giving her special training. Even though we were surprised that she didn't tell us, none of us were mad at her because her talents surpassed ours.

Then for a while we didn't see her at all and got worried but even after telling the principal nobody did anything. Two weeks later as we were trying to get to the ground of this entire situation, we heard from a girl who was close to one of the guys Mr. Benjamin trained personally, that he and our friend left somewhere and when he came back she wasn't there anymore.

We obviously figured out that something wasn't right and that there was no way that this could go on. So we decided to go to the police on our own but even that failed as there was no evidence that she just ran away or Mr. Benjamin did something to her. Months passing by the same thing happened again to a different student and then again. It happened once in a while up until Reece started to do the special training. From that point on it became way more frequent."

Johan was shocked from hearing all of this. He would've never expected this to be something this deep.

"...I see. That's what he tried to do to me as well. But he did it in our first session. I'm guessing you guys made this club to gather yourselves and try to get as many information as possible?"

"Yup. Exactly that."

"I have a question though. The girl from earlier said that you only allow girls in here. Why is that? Is there something you're not telling me?"

Ramona's face changed expressions.

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

"Ahh, well, it seems the beans have been spilled. We let in boys as well but some of them belonged to Reece's group and they tried to infiltrate the club to get info on what we knew. Since then we just allowed girls in that had experiences with that."

He nodded. After hearing the story, he told them what had happened between him and Mr. Benjamin and then how Reece attacked him and was trying to get him somewhere.

"So they tried to do it to you, as well but it failed. That's good. Now we have somebody who actually escaped what was happening there."

"Well, 'escaped' is the wrong term here. I beat them and that's why I can't just go to the principal and tell him the story. They will be asking me about my abilities which I can't disclose."

"Why not? What's wrong with them? You're very strong, in fact strong enough to perhaps surpass Kaiser, the highest ranked Ranker in most of Germania."

Johan became a little nervous. Sweat started to form on his forehead.

"There... are some reasons why I can't tell anyone. That counts for you, too."

"No problem. We made a deal and that was not included. You're good. Now, what do you say? Want to help us get to the ground with this? We could really need somebody this strong."

IT COULD HELP YOU CATCH REECE WITHOUT HAVING TO REVEAL ANYMORE OF YOURSELF. IF ANYTHING YOU WILL GET HELP AND INFORMATION FROM PEOPLE WHO ALEADY KNOW MORE.

"Okay, I will join. Who else is in here?"

"All of that will come later. We have a meeting every now and then. I'll take your contact and will call you when there is a problem."

Johan gave her his number and left afterwards.

...

A couple of days had passed, when Hannah von Parseval had decided to lay low. Her first part of the plan had semi functioned and now it was turn for part two.

"We're moving. The main party has officially captured our position. Carl confirmed it."

The white-haired girl called her lackeys and they started moving. It was a snowy day again, since Hannah had used one of her items. With the mounting animals they had, it was easy for them to move through the snow. Her plan was it to keep moving locations for several days, until all of the troupes were down. So in the cave that she left, there were several traps installed for them. Now those were not enough for the whole army to be taken down but it would severely damage them. Then there were the side groups, of which she had already taken down one, that needed to be erased as well.

Her phone rang.

"Boss, the enemy has entered the cave. Since they're suspicious, they only went in with a third of their troupes."

"No worries. Proceed with the plan. Tear them down from the outside. Don't send anybody there, though."

"Roger that."

clack

"Guys, keep it moving. We're almost at the second location."

When they arrived at the place they were supposed to be, all of them couldn't believe their eyes.

"Who do we have here?"

A giant of a man was standing there with countless soldiers.

"Hannah, run! They had us cap-"

bang

One of her teammates was shot in front of her.

"You!!"

"Relax. We had a deal. I told him to keep his mouth shut and I will let him live. But, oh well, he didn't want to keep the end of his bargain. Now come here and sit down, before I eradicate your entire team."

She bit her lip. This was not part of her plan.

'Sh#t! How could this happen?'

"Now, come on. We don't have much time."

Hesitantly she looked at her comrades and started walking towards the guy. He had a smirk on his face.

"Good girl."

She was thinking how they could escape this situation but there was simply no way. Except for...

whooom

A giant wave froze everything in its way. Hannah had thrown one of her only ice bombs on the ground. It would freeze everything except for extremely hot fire. Even she herself froze down and nobody moved an inch, other than a guy who was way back the route they came from.

"Carl, we've failed. They were there already. We need you here right now. Boss froze everybody. I'll try to get her out of the situation."

"Roger that."

He dashed towards the location and tried to heat the ice around Hannah. He was a fire user but his flames weren't hot enough to instantly melt down the ice. Slowly the leader of the enemy group started to crack the ice around him. Even though it was minuscule, the impact was enough to leave behind some cracks.

'Sh#t! This can't go on like this.'

He concentrated on a ball of fire and condensed an immense amount of heat. He then let it melt the ice faster. After a minute her ice also started to crack but it was too late.

"Haah, you fool!"

The giant jumped up and threw a hammer after the guy.

"Woah!"

He barely escaped it but was instantly captured by the enemy leader.

"You stupid fool. Should've escaped when you had the chance. Now die!!"

When the hammer was about to hit, Hannah broke free from her self-inflicted ice and jumped into his side.

"Arrggh! You... finally. Let's end this for once and all."

...