Blood Queen Reborn

Chapter 153: The Next Outing

[You have successfully unlocked shadow cloak Lv.1]

[This skill allows you to use your own shadow to shroud you into darkness. Your opponents will struggle to see you depending on their level of perception. Best used in the shadow, or at night]

"You should try out the skill right now," the system said, "This place is dim enough for the skill to work."

Glancing over at Logan, he appeared to be fast asleep, no doubt having expended a lot of his energy on making armor. Not only that, but his room was surprisingly not that well lit, with only small lights from the machines to illuminate it. It was basically the perfect condition to use the new skill.

While she was still in the machine to record her ability, Erin activated it from the system screen.

[Shadow cloak activated]

[- 1 MC for every 10 seconds of use]

Immediately, shadows below her feet began to lift upwards, slowly enveloping every inch of her entire body. To an outside viewer, Erin appeared as a dark, mysterious mist.

"As you can see here, you can see the total amount of MC you have left while this skill is active," the system informed.

In the corner of her vision, there was a bar that was slowly going down while shadow cloak was on.

’This seems useful, if I wanted to be stealthy,’ Erin thought. It wasn’t a big priority to her right now.

"Don’t dismiss the skill just yet," the system said, "You can use it to hide from the sunlight in a pinch. We don’t want another Caladi incident, do we?"

Although the system was referring to when Erin was knocked out and was exposed to the sun for a long time, Erin was remembering the brutal fight against the dalki. Even though it had been 4 days since then, the memory still brought a deep fear.

She had to close her eyes and take a deep breath.

’Calm down, Erin. We survived, we’re alive. Layla is doing just fine.’

Once she was done with that, she turned off shadow cloak, and activated shadow equip on her new armor, placing it into her shadow space. Then, Layla left the gaming pod, and they headed back to their dorm room for the night.

—

Over the next few days, Erin was getting into a normal rhythm at the school again. She went to classes like normal, and visited Leo after class with Vorden to practice qi. Even though it had only been a few days, she was able to cultivate her qi from something as small as a grain of rice to a walnut. Apparently, Leo called her a natural at qi, but in Erin’s mind, it was such a minuscule amount that she wasn’t sure if it could help her in combat.

Despite seeing him nearly every day, Vorden remained silent about himself. One day after class, she tried using the shadow cloak to trail him, but after following him into an alleyway, he suddenly disappeared.

’Does he know I’m watching him, or is he just paranoid?’ Erin wondered, ’But why would he be paranoid?’

She didn’t know the full details, but she suspected that he copied some sort of teleportation ability as she wasn’t able to smell him after that.

Layla, meanwhile, was getting really used to using the shadow ability where it had almost become second nature. It had gotten to a point where she had to be careful not to accidentally learn the ability.

When it came to needing to eat human flesh, she had yet to eat another unique human, relying exclusively on the severed limbs Fex was able to get from the regenerative ability user.

It made her wonder if the guy was constantly worried why he was losing so many limbs within a week. Of course, she never met the guy so she couldn’t know for sure. One thing was for certain, and it was that, so long as Layla wasn’t injured, she didn’t need to eat every day.

Then there was Quinn who, as usual, was constantly trying to train his ability, and make himself stronger. For the time being, he would be stuck at level 4 due to a lack of higher leveled books, but he could still practice what he was already capable of.

One day, he noticed that he wasn’t spending as much time with Peter as he said he would, even though he promised to help him with learning how to control earth.

When he asked Peter if he wanted to hang out one day, he seemed strangely defensive, and said he had plans with Cia.

It was a little odd that he was spending so much time with Cia so suddenly, but he had seen her for himself, and didn’t think she was a problem. Not wanting to push the matter, Quinn decided to respect his wishes and give him space.

Late at night, however, Quinn couldn’t help but worry that there was something going on with Peter.

—

One day, an assembly was called, and all of the first year students were escorted to the assembly hall. As they did, a few of them were talking about what the assembly was about.

"Is this about the next portal expedition?"

"No, it’s gotta be the inter military base event. Clearly."

"Uh, dummy, that’s in a couple of weeks. The next expedition is this weekend."

"... Oh."

In the middle of the crowd, Erin was able to sense Layla’s presence, and pushed back a couple of students to get to her. She didn’t say anything, only that she was glad to be nearby.

Elsewhere, Cia spotted Peter, and waved to him to catch his attention. Similarly, they scooched past the other students to get nearby.

Nathan walked onto the stage, and stood in front of a microphone, a look of hesitation in his actions. For many, this was the first time that they had seen the General of their year.

"Is that the General?"

"Oh no, don’t tell me it’s war time now!" A student cried.

The general cleared his throat, "Okay, I’m not one for speeches, so let’s get straight to the point. The portal outing on this week; I’m here to tell you all it won’t be like usual. This year, the military has decided to expand their operation and get more aggressive in planetary explorations."

"He’s taking a while to get to the point," a kid whispered to his friend.

"So, what does that mean for you guys? Well, instead of the normal green portal, you guys get to jump ahead, and explore an orange portal instead."