The Author's POV

Manticore building, Friday

-Fwaaa!

As black smoke rose in the air and enveloped my room, I stared at my right hand where a slick black ring rested on my index finger. Its design was rather dull as it looked like any regular ring that could be found on the market, however, if one looked closely, one would be able to see a red hue pulsating from it.

Staring at the ring on my finger, I softly mumbled

"Nice..."

[Human, you better keep your promise]

'Yes'

Nodding my head, I once again looked at the ring on my finger as I curiously asked.

"How does it feel being a ring?"

[hmph, if not for your deal, I would've never done this. How humiliating]

Yes, the ring on my finger was in fact, Angelica. Since I couldn't bring Angelica with me in her cat form, I decided to make her turn into a ring.

The reason I asked her to be a ring was because her cat form would be a burden to me.

If a situation arose where I had to run away, Angelica wouldn't be able to catch up to me and Kevin as she couldn't use her powers lest she wanted to let the demons around us know of her presence...and considering the fact that she had no core in her body, the situation would not be good for both her and me.

That aside, the primary reason why I didn't want her to be exposed was because it would ruin my plans as well as give away my location as demons had a way to tell if another demon was near them.

...until the part of my plan that required for her to expose herself played out, she had to hide as a ring.

Only with her would everything that I had planned for the past two months come to fruition. Therefore, I couldn't stress enough how important it was for her to remain as a ring. If even a little detail of my plan went wrong the chances of me surviving were slim to none.

To be honest, I still preferred her cat form, however, this would do for now.

Prior to now, I had thought about turning her into a ring before, but after a bit of thinking, I decided against this idea as that would mean I would have to carry her with me at all times, including class...which would just be annoying.

Especially considering the fact that she tended to nag all the time.

...please no.

'I know you hate it, but please bear with it for a bit. I promise I'll hold my end of the deal'

[You better, since we've signed the mana contract, you must naturally hold onto the end of your deal, lest you wanted to die...]

'I guess that's true'

As I conversed with Angelica for a couple of minutes, after I explained everything that I wanted to tell her, I then proceeded to touch my waist where a thin black sword quietly rested.

Bleak Star

The new sword that I had ordered a month and a half ago with Amanda.

Because it was freshly crafted it only arrived a week ago and so I didn't have much time to play with it. But as soon as I laid my hands on the sword, I knew that it was a cut above the other swords that I had used before.

Especially with how it felt on the grip of my hand.

The sword was neither too thin nor too thick and only weighed around two kilograms. To me, this was practically nothing as I could curl 100kg dumbbells without any problems now.

From the weight to its design the sword was perfect.

Moreover, I especially liked its effect [Psyon coating] that allowed me to coat the sword with elemental psyons.

have much time to experiment with the sword, but after learning about psyons from Donna

in doing so, I found out that by coating my sword with those two psyon, I could have lightning coating my

coupled with the Keiki style, would prove devastating as lightning was both strong and fast, which was exactly what the Keiki

devastating attack that focused on killing the opponent

-Clank!

entering my room was Kevin's tired figure. Currently, his condition didn't look the best as he looked extremely tired and worn out. This was especially made apparent from the glaring black

I couldn't help

look a

me, Kevin

been challenged every day by the exchange

head, I gloated at

is what happens when you show off

it had

guess that was also

had no other option but to accept their challenge or the people from

beat his opponent a couple of days ago, almost all of the academies have been trying to challenge him to

cycle that Kevin had to

honest, if it were me, I wouldn't have minded being called a coward if it saved me from the trouble of constantly getting challenged, but since Kevin had his own pride, he wouldn't stand for it and thus why was constantly accepted all challenges that came to

not like he didn't benefit

partners during this time. The only problem was that

only thing I could offer Kevin was my pity and sympathy. Taking a seat on the couch of

you when

head, Kevin

sure that no one noticed me, cameras and instructors

that

me, Kevin sighed and nodded his head. Extending

"Yeah...give it to me"

to be confused as I

"Give what?"

his eyes, in an annoyed tone,

know, I already told you beforehand, give me the D ranked

*Tsk*

my tongue I took out a spherical object

really give you

"Give it"

I took out the orb, staring at it for a couple of seconds, I tried to protest but after being cut off by Kevin's cold voice, I could only reluctantly give it

...goodbye 50+ million U

"Thanks"

of seconds, as he made sure that everything was

"Are you ready?"

"Yeah..."

in the eyes I nodded my head. Nodding his head back, just as Kevin was about to open the portal, recalling something,

do you have at

"Yes, I do"

head

I had two years' worth of supplies with me. With food not getting spoiled inside of dimensional storages I could pretty much store all the food that I

always keep with me at least a couple of

I had bought an extremely expensive dimensional bracelet that could hold 10x more than my previous bracelet. With my now expanded storage

water, books, clothes...basically anything that

I made sure to bring the red book with me as it was the best cheat I could have when traveling with Kevin. Just the book alone could increase the chances

was that important that I brought

thoughts, remembering something, staring

"What's the conversion rate?"

"one-ten"

Frowning, I carefully asked

ten days we spend there a

"Yes"