Chapter 60: A Tempting Idea
Nolan's grave voice resounded through the entire Kratos training area, and he meant every single word.
Right now, he wanted nothing but to simply train, and there was this idiot of a young man who kept disturbing him.
The young man was strong, truly, but if he kept interrupting, Nolan would beat him up until he was a pulp for wasting his time.
"Tch, you're an idiot if you think I, Adrian Colossal, am scared of a threat from the puniest piece of trash in the academy," the young man scoffed as Nolan turned to raise an eyebrow at him.
"Adrian... Collosal???" Nolan replied, his voice cold and flat, as he studied the young man before him.
Adrian puffed out his chest, his pride evident in his posture.
"Yes, I am Adrian!" he declared, as if his name alone was supposed to mean something.
He paused, noticing Nolan's expression remained unchanged.
"I've never heard of you before..." Nolan replied with a deadpan expression, resulting in the young man pointing a finger at his face, his lips moving up and down before he snorted.
"Lies. You've never heard of the Godly Ten?" he asked in disbelief as Nolan's eyebrow furrowed.
He had indeed heard of the Godly Ten from Wiro, but he had never heard of the name Adrian Colossal or any of the specific names among the Godly Ten.
"Are you one of the Godly Ten?" Nolan asked as the young man snorted in pride.
"What do you think?"
"I think you're very weak and not worthy of the title..." Nolan replied in the same deadpan tone, and the young man's jaw dropped to the ground.
Nolan had heard from Wiro that the Godly Ten were the ten strongest prodigies among the academy's first years.
This strange red-haired guy just happened to be one of them?
He might have been able to knock out Nolan previously and send him crashing into the battle stage, but that was only because he caught him off guard.
Nolan didn't think he wanted to seriously fight him.
Besides, he expected that he himself wouldn't be able to match the power of the Godly Ten based on how Wiro had described them.
But he could still exchange blows with the young man.
There was no way Nolan would believe that he could match the top prodigies of the academy newcomers.
He was strong, but not so arrogant as to believe he was capable of that.
"Y-You!" The young man stammered in exasperation, his chest heaving up and down in anger, his crimson hair flapping behind him even in the absence of wind.
Adrian was starting to feel it again.
His rage—it was starting to want to burst out of him. It wanted nothing more than to tear this "trash" before him apart, but he knew well that if his rage really overtook him, Nolan wouldn't be the only one to die...
"Haaaaa... Huuuuu... Haaaaa... Huuuuu..."
For the next few seconds, Nolan watched as the young man rhythmically breathed in and out.
Slowly, his strange, primal transformation—which Nolan could guess was the result of his first descent skill—began settling back into his body.
His crimson hair dropped on his shoulder until eventually, he returned to his normal human appearance once more.
"I am Adrian Colossal, the tenth of the Godly Ten..." he introduced himself formally this time, and Nolan raised an eyebrow when he discovered Adrian didn't seem to be joking.
He really might be the number ten of the Godly Ten, but he was the weakest among them, and that was true.
Adrian was the last of the Godly Ten, the weakest, so to speak, but he was still strong nonetheless.
At least, he was sure that he was stronger than the trashest trash of the academy. It would be fun to play around with him, vent all his frustration on him.
"You know me already..." Nolan replied to the greeting before heading out of the battle stage, and this time Adrian didn't follow him.
"You want to use the training room to improve your skills, don't you? And I too want to do that, so I won't allow you there..." Adrian called out as Nolan paused in his steps, his eyes narrowing.
"But I have a better idea. Why don't we use our skills on each other instead?"
"A real opponent instead of a senseless dummy?"
"It will be a simple spar, and you can rest assured that I won't at least kill you..." Adrian said with a smirk as Nolan raised an eyebrow at him, but his attention was diverted when the strange system notification panel appeared.
[Main Quest Activated]
[Spar with a Worthy Opponent]
[Rewards: +1000 EXP!]
This time, the system's notification was a little strange as it informed him to just spar. It never told him to win or defeat Adrian—just to spar.
And its reward was also a lot lower than Nolan expected.
But still, 1000 EXP was still EXP, and besides, just as Adrian himself called out, wouldn't it be better to test out his new skills on a member of the Godly Ten than on a senseless dummy?
It might risk exposing his new skills, but it was only a matter of time before his skills got exposed anyway, and Nolan didn't think the students hid their skills that much from each other.
Since most students have the same descents, they end up awakening the same descent skills, and even if there are variations, they wouldn't be that much different.
Some students can even tell what type of descent someone has simply by the person activating their descent skills.
It wasn't something really secretive at all, and so Nolan felt no need to ignore Adrian's offer anymore.
"Okay then, but you'll be dreaming if you think you can leave me close to death... " He added as he jumped back onto the battle stage and watched Adrian hands slowly moved towards his cloth, In a motion of wanting to take them off.
"Heh, we'll see about that..."