A clerk showed lodgings to Miles and others after Milosh explained all the rules. The newcomer area was at the outer perimeter of the city and was close to the academy, which was also at the west of the city.

There was a mansion and a villa standing at the forefront. Mansion was of course a lot bigger than the villa. After those two, there were twenty huts behind them. Following those, there were fifty ten-story apartments.

There were soldiers, clerks, and other workers there to help students for their first days.

Miles entered the villa and looked around. He had a few clothes with him, but all of them got destroyed in the two weeks he spent in the Valley. He was still wearing the animal pelt, but luckily the academy had a dress code, so in the villa, there were ten spare uniforms. Miles donned one of them after he took a quick shower and looked around.

When they were brought in, the clerk helped them download an app required in the Academy. The area was isolated and communication with Unity was jammed. There was also no way of transferring money with the banks of Unity to prevent unapproved Merit trade. After all, some rich scions would try to trade merit points with Unity Dollar if it was possible.

After donning his clothes, Miles looked at the villa while waiting for dinner time to come. Although he spent two weeks in the Valley, he had plenty of meat to eat, so he wasn’t hungry. Villa had one bedroom, one living room with tv, a workstation to work on, a training room as good as they used in the train station, and a swimming pool. It was already better than anything Miles could hope for.

Soon an hour ended, and guides showed the canteen and other dining areas. Students were free to go anywhere they wanted. Academy only required them to join periodic classes and pay 100 merits every month. But they also considered the possibility of being unable to return from the Portal World, so as long as a student was able to pay 100 Merit Points monthly and pass all the exams for mandatory classes, they could be absent as long as a year.

The canteen was the cheapest dining area and required a merit point for a meal. But it was just plain food. The canteen was also offering medium, high and superclass foods, 5, 10 and 20 Merit Points respectively.

The super-class food was made of monster meats so it was more nutritious.

There were also restaurants with varying qualities in the city. There were even gourmets owning restaurants, even some of the students with great cooking skills or cooking-related superpowers owned restaurants in the city. They were of course pretty expensive. Some of the meals, depending on the meat of the monster, could go as high as several hundreds of thousands of Merit Points.

After Miles exchanged all the orbs and cores he gathered from killing monsters in the valley, he earned another 10 Merit points. All the new students were given 5 merit points enough for them to eat five meals. It was already night, and the next day they could eat three more meals, and the day after that they could eat breakfast, then they would starve if they still hadn't started to hunt.

Miles already had 20 Merit points, enough for a week even if he ate 3 meals a day thanks to Number 3 and the cores he brought with him.

After eating plain food at the canteen, Miles and others followed the guide and learned about other facilities. Unlike Number I and Miles, others had simple lodgings or not a place to sleep at all, so there were some communal training grounds, bathhouses, pools, and entertainment services. Luckily most strongholds had them too so students didn’t have to spend their Merit Points on them.

After the tour was done, students were brought back to the newcomer area. The night was still young, so there were some challenging others. To prevent people from bothering high rankers, there was the 10 merit points rule. Otherwise, almost all of them would challenge those above them over and over again. So after his performance, no one dared to challenge Miles.

When he was about to enter his new house, Number 1 stopped him. “Number 2, wanna come to my house for a drink?”

Miles looked at the girls and a few boys standing at a distance and looking at him with piercing eyes, then looked at brightly smiling Number 1. “Sure.” He said and locked his house with Coin once again and followed Number 1.

He too was curious about this person. After all, there weren’t many people as strong as Number 1 in his age group, also his resemblance to the Marooner intrigued him. He wasn’t sure if he was acting to be mixed with the Marooner or all of this was a coincidence.

After entering the mansion, Number 1 took him to the porch and they sat down. Number 1 brought out a light alcoholic beverage and they started to talk. Number 1 said first, “My name is Alex Jonsson, from Northen.”

“Miles Cross, from Capital,” Miles said as they shook hands. “You are from that famous Jonsson family right?”

“Yeah, and you are the grandson of the Cruel Heart.” Said Alex with a smile. Alex wasn’t as famous as Tian Ling and others because they lived on the North edge of Unity. Their family was the guardians of the north border and lived in the biggest city in the northern area, Northen.

“Why did you take the madman test? You are eligible to enroll with your skills.” Miles asked. Alex was stronger than any freshman. So, Miles was curious about his reasons for taking the test, only lunatics would choose.

“Well, my father said I can’t enroll in this academy because it wasn’t suitable for me. But after I insisted, he said I can only enroll if I take the alternative test to deter me. But I said I would take the double hard third test and walked all the way from Unity. Hahaha!” Alex said with a laugh.

Miles's eyes twitched as he looked at the laughing Alex and asked, “Why do you wear this armor if you are troubled about being mixed with the Marooner? It surely doesn’t help when it is added to your superpower.”

“This was a gift from a passed away friend,” Alex said as he looked at the dark sky full of stars.