After returning to the others, Ensen began his tour. While the building wasn’t that large it still took quite a while due to the students being overly curious. This was mainly because it was their first time entering a school in the first place.

“Principal, what’s that?!”

“... That’s a ceiling fan, Warren.”

“Oh I see, what about that thing?!”

“... That’s a recycling bin.”

While it was mainly Warren who asked the questions, other people also asked some questions at a lesser scale.

After around two hours the tour had finally finished.

The tour had ended in the music room which was rather empty at the moment except for a rather impressive mid-range piano.

Ensen did want to go straight away to the highest quality piano on the market so the ‘Paradigm Piano’ item that he had previously got wouldn’t go to waste, but he severely underestimated the price.

‘Having a Crystal Piano would be nice, but I would probably have to sell my soul to afford it.’ Ensen thought as he looked at the piano in the room.

Looking towards Leah, he noticed that she seemed rather interested in the piano. While she hadn’t played an instrument before, her love for writing music gave her great interest in doing so.

“Are you interested in playing the piano, Leah?” Ensen asked, although he already knew the answer, he wanted confirmation.

“Hmm… I guess I do. It’s my favorite instrument.” Leah said after a moment of thought.

“That’s good because there will be music classes occasionally. I’m sure you’ll love them.” Ensen responded.

While Leah was the only person with a skill related to music… if you didn’t include Warren’s classical dancing specialty, that did not mean that the others didn’t have natural talent per say. Even if they didn’t have talent in the field it would still be beneficial for them to learn the basics. After all, Ensen was relying on his musically talented students to first raise the awareness of his Academy.

Looking back at all of his students who were still smiling happily, Ensen thought to himself ‘I’m surprised their cheeks aren’t sore from smiling.’

Quickly ridding the thought from his mind, he began speaking “Alright everybody, so that’s pretty much it for today. Leah and Brian, you can walk home whenever you’d like, just remember to be safe. Anabella, Warren, and Stephen, we will leave in around 20 minutes probably. You can go walk around the building more if you’d like until then. Oh also, don’t forget your gift bags.”

Knowing that the opening day had come to an end, Ensen had mixed feelings. On one hand, he wanted the day to never end, but on the other hand, he wanted to help shape his students to be the best they could be.

His students seemed rather reluctant to leave. Knowing that they enjoyed the day as much as he did, Ensen talked to them for a minute before Leah and Brian needed to go home.

After they had both gone, the students from the orphanage soon followed in exiting the music room to roam around the hallway.

Following this, Gerhardt told Ensen that he had to return to his world.

Ensen was now left alone inside the music room. Shutting the door, he turned his gaze on the piano.

It had only occurred to him once he had seen the piano for himself that he forgot about his reward from the system a while back from completing the exercising chain missions.

Pulling up the information about the object, Ensen soon smiled in satisfaction.

[Paradigm Piano]

[The Paradigm Piano works with the user to accelerate their learning process on many areas with the piano as long as it is nearby. Usage of the piano will allow users to experience the growth of their piano skills by an extra 20%.]

[Requirements: Must be infused into a pre-existing piano]

Approaching the piano, Ensen focused on it while imagining the Paradigm Piano infusing into it.

As he continued to focus on it, he noticed a rather peculiar sight.

A white smoke resembling fog began to slowly expand from the center of the piano, obscuring his vision.

Trying his hardest to keep focus, Ensen prayed that he wouldn’t fall asleep exhausted like when he had absorbed the skill book about the piano.

A few minutes later, as his focus began to slightly wane, a change occurred in the fog. Starting from the middle of the piano similar to before, a golden shine quickly appeared before spreading out covering the entire room with a golden tint.

Closing his eyes from the sudden change of light, Ensen noticed that a few moments later he could tell that the light was fading.

Opening his eyes, Ensen noticed that the room had reverted to it’s state from before. Looking at the piano itself, he realized that there were some very minor details that had changed.

Such as the black piano keys becoming much darker to the extent where it seemed more like a dark void instead of a key.

Looking at the piano in satisfaction, Ensen looked at his phone and realized around 25 minutes had passed.

Praying that the remaining students had not seen what had occurred in the room, Ensen exited the music room and began looking for them.

Luckily they were simply sitting in the cafeteria. After asking what they had done for the past while, Ensen sighed in relief and began walking towards the car with them following behind.

With Warren sitting in the front seat once again as they returned to the orphanage, the drive home quickly devolved into karaoke like before.

‘How is Warren not tired? Does he have infinite energy? Can he solve the energy problem?’ Ensen thought as Warren attempted to sing the highest notes that he could.

Arriving in front of the orphanage, Ensen slowly pulled his car to a stop and got out with his students.

Walking towards the front door. Ensen said happily “So I’ll pick you guys up at the same time tomorrow. Classes will be starting too, so make sure you guys get a good amount of sleep.”

Nodding in understanding, they all thanked Ensen before going inside. Returning to his car, Ensen turned up the music slightly and hummed to himself as he began making his way home.

After a while, Ensen pulled into his parking spot and returning to his apartment. Feeling exhausted after all of the work he had done today, Ensen decided that he deserved a little break.

After taking a nice long shower, Ensen entered the kitchen and made himself some pasta and popcorn to leisurely eat as he scoured through the internet to find a good school tv show or movie.

Finding a good amount of recommendations for ‘High School Musical’, a rather old film series.

Binging the three movies in one sitting, Ensen quickly finished the movies.

‘That was… unexpected. But not bad.’ He thought to himself as he looked at his phone for the time.

Seeing that it was rather late, Ensen knew he needed to get a good night’s sleep in order to do his best tomorrow.

Heading to bed, Ensen quickly fell asleep from his exhaustion.

After having a well-deserved rest, Ensen was woken up from his alarm clock.

Quickly getting dressed and grabbing a piece of toast, he began to walk towards the elevator while eating.

Suddenly, the sound of a door opening was heard by Ensen. Taking a glance behind him, he noticed that it was Kaitlin that had just left her apartment.

Slowing his pace, Kaitlin soon caught up to him.

“Hey Kaitlin, did you like the restaurant I recommended?” Ensen said, purposely not mentioning that he saw her with other people there who did not seem like friends.

“Oh… It was good.” Kaitlin said absentmindedly with dull eyes.

‘Something seems wrong. She usually so guarded around people, so why does it seem like she is completely helpless right now?’ Ensen thought in concern.

“Are you alright Kaitlin? You seem… different than usual.” Ensen said after a moment.

Pausing her footsteps, Kaitlin stood in place with tense shoulders and her dull eyes. Following her lead, Ensen stopped moving right in front of her.

Looking closer, Ensen could see that there were bags under her eyes, telling him that she hadn’t slept in quite a while.

“Ensen, what is the point in living? Only to have everybody you’ve called a friend to betray you? Only to be abandoned by everybody that you love?” Kaitlin said with an indifferent tone of voice.

Looking at Kaitlin with confused eyes, Ensen had no idea what happened to her.

Standing there in front of Kaitlin, Ensen looked straight into her eyes as he pondered how to respond.

With the hallway void of sound, a thought occurred to him.

“Who says you were abandoned? I don’t know your story, but I do know that if a person truly does love you, it doesn’t matter where they are. I’m sure they’re thinking about you every day.”