This time, he was more aware as he approached the butterflies. The range they reacted in was very clear. It didn’t matter if he put a fingertip over the line or his entire head - they flew away instantly in either case. Then, with them fluttering around, it was luck more than skill whether he got a hand on it.

Tom paused and studied his target. Like a normal butterfly would, it was sitting on a flower, its wings beating slowly. He could feel the precognition energy in it.

His hand snapped forward. The butterfly took off, and he didn’t try to catch it. Instead, he followed it until his hand brushed against a wing. The moment he felt contact he pulled the power into him. The wing crumbled to a few bits of ash and the central body imploded to nothing as he removed the energy.

He had failed to grab it, but he had sucked the energy out successfully. Maybe that was the answer she had alluded to? This was a test to develop a crafting skill. It didn’t make sense to put such a huge focus on his agility. To achieve April’s challenge, Tom had to rely on the skill he was developing.

Quietly, he chuckled.

He moved on with a newfound focus. Maybe he could stun them by extracting a small amount of energy. Not enough to kill, just to disable. Or maybe the answer was to start manipulating the power away from him. If he could draw the energy from the white butterflies at a metre’s distance, or even that of half a metre, they would never be fast enough to escape him.

Energised, he kept going.

There was a sound of rustling leaves, and he spun to see a lizard dog pouncing upon him. Instinctively, he stepped backwards as the spear slipped into position with the tip perfectly aligned. The creature impaled itself. The shaft jarred under his hands, but didn’t splinter. Then he dropped the dying creature to the ground, withdrew his weapon, and moved away hurriedly.

Tom cursed silently at the unexpected encounter. He had thought he had cleared the area, and now the scent of its blood would draw other predators, even if from a noise perspective the fight had been nearly silent.

After creating distance, he went back to hunting the butterflies, all the while keeping an eye out for the real monsters. His mind was whirling as he tried to figure out how to use his half-formed skill to help the process.

There were no further revelations, but he left the trial happy with his progress. The playground April had created for him stretched his spear skills beautifully, and he could feel the improvements. It was a series of subtle enhancements: a slightly better grip to keep the tip steadier, his tactical retreats transitioning into delayed counterattacks more easily.

The improvements were clear and broad in their coverage.

He exited the trial, and Dimitri’s firm hand guided him away. He went to dinner, slept, attended classes, fought, practiced, ate some more, slept again, and like clockwork, another handful of days passed.

He was in class, with his thoughts in the clouds, as he mentally traced the merge and creation paths to get to Touch Heal.

“You there! Are you listening?”

A magical finger poked him in the side, and he startled upwards.

“Um… what… um…” his mind desperately checked his short-term memory to see what he had missed. “Um… you want me to read… um…”

Their current teacher, a champion from Earth, gestured impatiently. She looked to be seventeen, eighteen at the most, but, since she was from earth, he knew she was close to being at least a hundred. Where high vitalities, and, in this case, probably a trait slowed aging so dramatically, apparent age meant nothing.

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“Yes, sonny. Come up and read to the class.”

She appeared to be a teenager. Tom focused on that point. She used the word ‘sonny’, so had undoubtedly been far older on earth, and she had entered the competition as a teen. Which implied vanity had beat out practicality. He didn’t like her.

Kang, sitting next to him, elbowed him.

Tom hesitated a moment before acting. On one hand, this was the sort of occasion that it would be best to retreat into the system room, but on the other, he needed to improve his acting, and living in the pseudo system room was not a long term solution.

He got up and read two pages of Goldilocks and the Three Bears.

“That word’s porridge, dear,” she snapped at him. “Just like it said porridge on the last page.” Tom pretended to cower in response. She visibly calmed herself. “Don’t worry, sonny, it’s a hard word. You did great. Now, why don’t we let another person have a go. You…” She pointed straight at Bir. “Hopefully you can do better than he did.”

Bir’s face went red.

Her eyes flicked around worriedly. Everyone was staring at her, and Tom knew Bir well enough to know this was not the type of situation she flourished in. Not only was an aggressive adult talking to her, but the entire class was gawking as well. Her mouth formed words, but no noise came out.

“Can I?” Kang asked, jumping to his feet and walking towards the front of the room. “It’s my turn.”

“No, sit.” The woman ordered, and she had some sort of force domain because Kang was picked up and carried back to his chair. “We’re going in order, dearie. We don’t want your little friend to miss out, do you.”

Bir had shrunk away further, trying to become as small as a mouse, if that was possible. Her hands clutched the desk so tightly that her fingernails grew white. Tom didn’t understand how the teacher hadn’t noticed and why she hadn’t taken the easy way out that Kang had been quick-witted enough to offer.

“Come up, dear, I don’t bite.” She continued, her voice artificially gentle. It might work with a dog, but no one here was fooled.

“Can I read another page?” Tom asked before he could help himself. “I won’t say porridge wrong.”

The old crone, whose body was that of a pretty young girl, frowned at him:

“No. I told you go sit. It’s her turn.”

When he glanced back at the other two, Tom knew he had stuffed up. Kang was glaring at him. He had wanted to protect Bir, but doing it and putting his reincarnated status at risk was a definite no go.

Before he could do anything to fix the problem, he was lifted and placed back in his chair. All choice was taken away from him, but not in a violent manner. The domain was soft but unyielding in its strength. A velvet sledgehammer type of experience. There was no way he could resist, and, even if his attributes were ten times higher, he still would have struggled.

He was deposited in his seat.

Bir hadn’t moved. She was trembling. There were tears in her eyes.

Tom realised his rage wasn’t responding, and he noted it down as another data point. It was not just about Bir being hurt or humiliated; it was more about something being unjust that got his hackles up. Here, she was being treated like everyone else, but when that treatment, even if it was fair, resulted in her being paraded in front of the class, it wasn’t a circumstance she was able to cope with.

“It’s okay, sweetie. It’ll just be one page.”

Bir shivered, and he saw the stubborn way her eyes tightened. She jumped from the chair and sprinted toward the door.

“Stop,” the teacher snapped.

Bir froze almost mid stride. She hung there helplessly like Tom had when he had been grabbed by that soft but completely unyielding domain.

Then Dimitri was suddenly by Bir’s side and the pressure containing her vanished.

“No, Beatrice, we don’t do that.”

“Kids need discipline.”

Dimitri stared her down:

“We force attendance, but not participation. It was how we got parents to agree. This is council’s orders.”

“No one cares about that. She’s one of the orphans.”

“No, Beatrice. No. I don’t run things like that. Everyone gets treated equally.” Dimitri growled and his eyes flashed dangerously.

Tom remembered the message added to his title when he had confirmed that Dimitri was reincarnated. Tom and Corrine could say Dimitri’s name because the other man was strong enough to defeat the rank seventy assassins that hunted the reincarnated ones.

“Am I being clear?” Dimitri snarled.

They all felt the change when their primary caretaker chose to express himself. It felt like a terrifying beast was amongst them; like a wrong move would result in them being sliced into multiple parts.

Beatrice recoiled:

“I’ll- I’ll do better…” she stammered. “You.” She pointed at Kang. “You said you wanted to go next. Please, come up.”

Partially shielded by Dimitri’s body, Bir fled the room.