Waiting for no one, time passed like it usually did.

With Cassia’s name being dragged through the mud across the entire academy.

This continued until the end of the school year.

Cassia wasn’t hopeful for her second year at the academy.

She hated the idea of spending more time in a place she wasn’t welcome.

Lucky for her, on a summer evening a few days from which school would start back up.

The principal told her she would lay low at Aligning Academy until the storm blew over.

‘I’m glad. I can finally leave this place.’

Cassia wasn’t happy as she knew that others would see it as running away.

This would hurt her uncle’s reputation but she just could not take it anymore.

Upon finishing the arrangements and getting the help of a teacher to find her a dorm room.

She met Reno.

She knew that as a less privileged student.

If she didn’t tell Reno her name then he would most likely never know who she was.

It was a fail-safe in case her new roommate wasn’t a decent guy.

The surprising thing was that she had been the not decent one when she asked Reno if he was from a low-ranked rift.

‘I’m so stupid! You shouldn’t poke fun at someone’s home.’

‘Hopefully, he doesn’t disdain me after this. I don’t think I can deal with a roommate who hates me as I’ve just arrived.’

To her surprise, however, Reno not only took it well but carried on the conversation like it was no big deal.

This along with him saying it’s fine when she tried to apologize, made her approve of him as a roommate.

Sometime later when Reno had caught her trying to compress her energy.

She was worried that he would freak out and spread the news like her previous friend group had done

Instead of freaking out, Reno had asked for some of her food and seemed to blow the incident under the rug.

Along with that, she had finally become his friend!

After that, she had even met Reno’s best friend, Grania.

She was a bit of a pervert but also funny in her way.

Ever since becoming a friend of Reno, Cassia started to enjoy her days more and more.

Even though she was a shy and insecure person, Reno had drawn her into the limelight a bit more.

For Reno, this might not have been much but for Cassia, it was a world-changing grace she didn’t deserve.

Cassia then ran over to Reno and grabbed his hand.

“Let’s meet Koa and head to class then."

"I don’t want Trista to end up scolding you.”

Reno nodded. “You and me both.”

As soon as Cassia was about to exit the class door.

A massive hammer came swinging down from the left of the hallway.

Before the hammer could even generate any breeze to blow a strand of Cassia’s hair.

It stopped in the air.

Along with this, Cassia’s facial expression which had been smiling and gleeful turned to a blank face.

Anyone who knew her well would know that this always happened when she started fighting.

“Stay behind me Reno.”

Reno wasn’t sure what was going on at first but after seeing the hammer, he had an idea.

‘I swear. Don’t these people have class? Can’t even let me breathe for a minute.’

Reno nodded and stayed behind Cassia.

‘I’m sure I could manage on my own but I still haven’t seen Cassia fight seriously so it’s better I stay put for this one.’

The person who had swung the hammer was baffled.

‘I can’t move my hammer anymore. It won’t budge.’

‘What’s going on? It’s as if the hammer is buried 10 ft in the ground.’

Seeing that nothing was happening.

A girl with energy emanating from her hand rushed in to try and help the person who had swung the hammer.

“Don’t worry. I’ll stall her, you get back to the group.”

Seeing that the girl who they were fighting was only a second year, the brawler didn’t hesitate.

The weird thing was that as her fist reinforced by energy was about to collide with Cassia’s face, it stopped.

No matter how much she struggled, she just couldn’t get her hand to move.

The group of girls in the background were wondering why two of their own were fooling around and not knocking out the target.

Different from the rest, one person in the group of girls was freaking out.

The other had on a grin that most would call evil.

The one that was grinning was Flora.

‘With how easy it was to beat up Koa, even if it’s Cassia Arwen it should be fine.’

‘I heard that at her old school, she even got beat black and blue by someone who wasn’t even E-rank.’

‘With all the third years backing me up, this will be a cinch.’

What Flora didn’t know was that, to not lose face.

The leader of Grania’s old friend group had changed the narrative of what had happened.

The person that was freaking out was the leader of the upperclassmen.

‘The Koa girl was pretty strong but with four of our members and me, we were able to knock her out.’

‘This person now, I can only say that we might be royally fucked.’

As the strongest person and leader of that group of upperclassmen.

Patrina had been able to mostly do what she wanted during the third year as she was not only book smart but also street smart.

As such, upon seeing the move that Cassia was using, she was getting the feeling that they should retreat.

‘Maybe it’s just a bluff though. A second year can’t be this strong.’

‘To be able to not only use [Etta’s Enchanting Technique: Air Lock] once but twice!’

Combat techniques were divided into three different categories across the board.

Mystic, Occult, and Enchanting.

Mystic meant that the technique was considered versatile and could include abilities for defending, attacking, searching, and other miscellaneous things.

Techniques in this category were used by beginner mages as well as beginner physics the most.

Occult meant that all the abilities were one type alone such as only attacking, defending, etc.

Due to this, beginner melee combatants, intermediate mages as well as intermediate physics were the main users of these.

Enchanting techniques now were a mix of the two and could either be of one type or versatile with lots of different abilities.

The key difference that separated it into its group was that even some of the weakest enchanting techniques were loads stronger than most mystic or occult techniques.

The trade-off was that even some of the weakest Enchanting moves could leave someone whose body and energy reserve could not manage in a coma.

In certain situations, it could even kill them depending on the move.

This is why most people in academies used mystic or occult techniques the most.

Patrina, the leader of the group was a physic as well so she had some idea of the move that Cassia was using.

‘Not only is [Etta’s Enchanting Technique: Air Lock] super demanding on energy reserves but it also requires a high calculation level.’

‘If the user is not fast enough to catch their opponent in a lock then they’ll have wasted energy for nothing.’

‘This makes it even weirder that my subordinates were able to get airlocked without any error so far.’

‘Something’s off about this situation. That’s what my gut is telling me.”

Seeing the group of girls behind the brawler who had tried to attack her and Reno, Cassia sighed.

“For being a bunch of pests, I hope you lot don’t bore me.”

Cassia then released the airlocks that had stopped the two girls.

The two of them fell over as soon as the air lock was deactivated.

“Also, if any of you dare to attack the boy behind me.”

“Forget playing around, I’ll instantly kill you.”

“I hope I’ve made my point clear.”

Hearing Cassia’s threats, some of the group became afraid.

Even Patrina had become wary.

‘Usually, I’d laugh at a threat like that.’

‘With what this girl has shown so far, however, along with her calm demeanor.”

‘I don’t think I dare to.’