“Oh it’s you again.” Rossa, surprisingly, responded first. Her annoyed tone made it clear that she didn’t appreciate their presence.

“You know them?” Artian asked in a low and hush voice, almost whispering.

“Not really. But they showed that one time me and Rossa were at the library a few days back.” Sylvester replied in an equally annoyed tone as Rossa.

“Oooh together at the library huuuh?” Estelle remarked as she showed a playful smile.

“What about it?” Sylvester reacted to Estelle’s weird remark.

“Oh nothing.” She replied, but the weird smile plastered on her face never disappeared.

“I just heard about your great performances during your tests and I must say mister Sylvester, it seems you have greatly improved your skills in a short amount of time.” Clarence started complimenting Sylvester.

“And how exactly do you know about that?” Artian inquired. “How do you know of what happened inside their classes?”

“Oh it’s nothing devious don’t worry.” Clarence began to explain. “Some of their classmates joined the Clarentum Inquisitors and all they had to do was report back to me.”

“I must say I feel quite flattered. Letting people join your illustrious organization just to spy on little ol me and Rossa over there.”

Sylvester then looked at Clarence with a mischievous smile, thinking about what words he should use to try and piss off the man in front of him. After all, it’s the least he can do since Clarence went ahead and interrupted a chat he was invested in for a second time.

Sadly, Rossa beat him to the punch.

“Is that all you have to say? Then please leave already. I have no plans of joining your organization.” Rossa said in a serious but uninterested tone.

“And if you're thinking about recruiting the two other people sitting at this table, then please, I implore you to save your breath and move on.” Rossa continued.

As Veins started showing up on Clarence’s forehead, a loud ringing can be heard from all around the restaurant. All of the students present started scrambling over their pockets since that weird ringing can only come from one source.

The ID card.

Sure enough, the strange and overly useful ID was displaying a vibrant image of an envelope, pulsating with the colors of a rainbow. Immediately they knew that this was another one of the headmaster’s antics.

Sylvester and Rossa however had a hunch on what the headmaster had to say this time around.

Pressing on the glowing icon of the envelope, the ID suddenly released particles of light from its screen. The IDs of all the students within the vicinity all did the same action. The particles of light then gathered at the center of the restaurant slowly forming and melding into the shape of a person.

“Hah, this never gets old.” Sylvester remarked as he already expects what will happen next.

The vague shape then let out an almost blinding flash of light and then the particles completely merged to create the figure of the Headmaster, and just like his previous appearances, he was now wearing something different and probably more apt for whatever it was he was going to announce.

Leonardo now donned a blue tracksuit with the school’s emblem printed on its back and a pair of overly large sunglasses that comically fit his face.

“Okay, I didn’t expect this.” Sylvester commented, as he was amused with the headmaster’s shenanigans.

“Good day to you my students!” The headmaster said in his usual bombastic and happy voice. “I trust that all of you are doing well in your studies. After all, it would seem that most of you have gone past the first round of tests right?”

“Yup, and everything went swimmingly if I say so myself.” Artian silently replied in his mind.

“Now then, I’m sure all of you are expecting some kind of wild announcement with this sudden appearance of mine. I even dressed for the occasion!” The headmaster continued.

“And with the fact that all of you have spent quite the substantial amount of time wandering around the walls of Inanis Orbis, I know for sure that you have heard whispers and murmurs about a regular event that always comes to pass.”

“Oh yes, the time has come at last!” Sylvester shouted from within his mind in his excitement.

“Today I will announce the rules and mechanics for the Festival of the beginning!” The headmaster declared, sending the students into a wild uproar.

“Ahh~ I can hear your screams of excitement from where I am at, it is truly a beautiful sound.” He continued.

“But settle down, I have a lot of information to unpack for all of you and it would be in your best interest to listen carefully.” he added and soon the voices died down into silent anticipation.

“Good. Now, I’m sure by now all of you know that the festival of the beginning is only open for Neophytes, but the rewards will be shared to the organization as well. Then there’s the whole rule thing too as a reward blah blah.” Leonardo quickly went through these points while sounding a bit uninterested.

“The reason for this kind of arrangement is to make an opportunity for the Neophytes and the not so Neophyte students to bond and form their own connections. Of course this whole reward system is just a sort of jump start incentive for the Organizations to go out and attract potential members.” He continued.

“As to just how deep those connections go? I leave it up to the respective organization bodies.” Leonardo said as he gave a light shrug.

“I guess that’s one way to twist it.” Estelle remarked.

“Yeah but still, a lot of these bozos seem to really just value the link to your background more than you as a person” Artian complained.

“You got hounded by a few groups too didn’t ya?” Sylvester asked.

“Yup. It was really a pain in the ass you know? Fuckin hell.” Artian complained.

“Hey language!” Estelle suddenly interjected, but Artian simply ignored her this time.

“Now, time to get into the nitty gritty of this year’s event.” The headmaster suddenly declared and just like that the entire campus seemed to have completely gone silent.

“Wow, I feel bad for whoever gets a bad gas leak with all this silence.” Artian whispered to Sylvester.

“Pfft! Shup man I wanna listen!” Sylvester replied, trying his best to hold his laughter.

“For this batch’s Festival I have decided to do a massive treasure hunt!” The headmaster proudly declared.

“Eh that’s it?” Artian and Sylvester said in unison, with the two of them sound pretty disappointed.

“But wait there’s more to this “treasure hunt” than you think!” Leonardo quickly added as if responding to the collective disappointed thoughts of the student body.

“This event will be held at a closed off special area, that map of which will be given to you after tomorrow. It is a custom area made exclusively for this particular hunt.” The headmaster began to explain.

“Okay? Nothing too radical about that so far.” Sylvester commented, he then glanced over Rossa and saw that her eyes were glimmering with excitement.

“Now here comes the special details surrounding the treasure hunt.” The headmaster then raised his index finger forward as if trying to get the attention of the students.

All of a sudden a small black box appeared in front of Leonardo’s magical projection that immediately attracted the attention of the majority. He then took it with both of his hands and raised it up high into the air.

“I present to you, the black box of random goodies! Or just, random treasure box, your choice really.” Leonardo declared in a loud and excited tone, like a child who received a birthday present.

“I would like to explain what this fun little toy does but it would be better if you all got to see it for yourselves.” He explained.

Soon, white question marks then started appearing on the sides of the box at, blinking at random intervals until all sides were covered. All of a sudden the top of the box opened up as something from within shot upwards while the box itself dispersed a bit of glitter.

Leonardo then caught the unknown object that the box ejected and revealed it to the students drowning in anticipation.

It was a grenade.

“Huh?” Everyone had a collective moment of confusion as the headmaster smiled.

“Just as the name implied, this box will give you a random item every few minutes, with the interval being random as well.” He then paused and smiled again as he started tossing and catching the grenade on his hand.

“But there’s another mechanic to all of this, sadly we need to wait for a little bit since it takes a while for it to do its magic.” He continued.

Leonardo continued to play with the dangerous explosive on his hand when suddenly the black box started to change color, slowly turning white on all sides.

“Oh I see it’s almost time.”

“Now observe me dear students, this is the most important detail you should not forget.” He commended.

“Okay?” Artian reacted to the weird order.

Suddenly, the box, without warning, vanished from sight instantly, popping right out of existence. The sudden disappearance made Sylvester and the others flinch because the whole deal looked very unnatural.

“You see, this special random little box has a very peculiar trait.” He paused as he looked at the grenade that was still on his hand.

“If you don’t use the item it coughs up within a time limit, the box will disappear along with the item and teleport itself to a random location around the map! And that’s not all, the way you use the item is also a factor since it will judge whether you used the item correctly or not. ” He explained.

“And if it doesn’t like what you did then say goodbye to the box.”

An oppressive silence then dropped all over the campus, the students immediately realized just how much of a pain this treasure hunt is going to be.

“Isn’t this just so fun? Don’t you kids like receiving random items from randomized boxes? I thought all this up just for your batch since it seems to be all the fuzz among the newer generation.” The headmaster asked in glee as everyone seemed to have let out a collective groan.