The first thing that Leo did when he reached a distance far enough from the academy was sneak into an alley. After making sure no one was watching him, he changed his appearance and clothes. He was now Orion instead of Leo.
After doing that, he walked to one of the inns and took a table there. He sat to the side and ordered a simple meal. After doing that, he just listened in to the information that the people around him were giving.
With his senses, he could easily hear everything happening inside the inn. He just sat in silence focusing on what everyone else was saying.
"Did you hear? The emperor finally punished the Whitmore Family for what they did," someone said.
As he was listening to what everyone was saying, something caught his attention. He quickly focused on the person who said it.
"Really? I thought they would be able to get away with it."
"They basically did. The punishment is that the Duke has to step down and hand his title to his heir. But that was going to happen anyway. It was only a matter of time. How is that any punishment at all?" Another person explained.
"The emperor only punished them because he had to. Otherwise, the people would riot. At this point, who would even remember an incident that happened in our district? It was one small city out of tens in one district. There are almost 30 districts like that. People will forget about this in another few months," the person who started the discussion added.
As the discussion went forward, Leo clenched his fists. He was getting angry but chose not to direct it toward the people talking. They were, after all, just drunk mercenaries talking about what someone else did.
Leo released his fists and got up. What he heard soured his mood and he didn't feel like staying at the inn. He hadn't heard any information that was useful to him anyway. He walked out of the inn in a soured mood.
As he was walking through the streets toward the Thousand Treasure Tower, someone bumped into him.
"Watch it!" A voice came but Leo ignored it. He wasn't even at fault. It was the person that was walking without looking at the road. They were talking to the person beside them instead.
"Hey! I'm talking to you!" The voice came again.
He looked back at the two people, One of them was quiet while the other was looking at him with anger. Both of them were girls that seemed to be a year older than them.
The one looking at him with anger had black hair and was wearing a red robe, while the other had blue hair and was dressed in black.
"Do you not know to watch where you're going?" She asked loudly. The people around them noticed the disturbance but ignored it.
"Yes. Do you have a problem with that? Maybe it will help you if you learn how to walk with your head facing the road instead of your friend," he said. He didn't talk as loud as her, but his snarky tone had the same aggressiveness.
He was already in a bad mood and having trouble for him in the middle of the street wasn't helping that.
"..." The black-haired girl was about to erupt but her companion stopped her.
"We should just go," the quiet girl said.
"Don't just leave him like that, Elysia. He should know that it's his fault! Who knows if he even bumped into us on purpose?" She said. She turned to him, about to shout.
When she talked to her friend, the gears inside Leo's mind started turning. He recognized the name from somewhere, but he couldn't place it properly. He was visibly in a daze.
"I am talking to you! Oh, how retarded is this? I can't even understand why someone with so little attention span is doing on the road!" She shouted at him. Meanwhile, Leo finally realized where the name was from.
He looked at the people in front of him and looked properly. He realized that one of them was an Early-Stage 3rd Circle Aura Knight while the other was a Late-Stage 2nd Circle Mage. And both of them looked like they were around 16 or 17 years old.
That meant both of them were likely attending an academy. With their talent, they were definitely in the Eldridge Academy. And he had first seen the name, Elysia in the Student Ranking. It was the name of the then 3rd Rank. He had also heard the name from Madison when she talked about the popularity ranking.
"I can't help but notice that you aren't saying anything," Leo said to Elysia.
She looked at him with her piercing eyes.
"I think we should just stop here," she said.
"I agree. I will go on my way," Leo said and started walking away.
"I am not done yet!" The hot-tempered girl shouted. She was about to keep cursing him, but Elysia stopped her.
"Don't waste your energy," she said.
Meanwhile, Leo was walking away from them with a smile on his face. The reason he asked Elysia about what she was thinking about was that he wanted to know how she would react to the fight with him.
It wouldn't matter to him since he was now Orion and they wouldn't even recognize him. But he would meet her as Leo when they would go to the Phoenix Trials.
If she was the 3rd Rank in the Student Ranking, then she would definitely be one of the candidates going along with him. He wanted to see how she was going to control the fight.
The final outcome would make no difference except fill his curiosity. And the outcome was that Elysia was someone who thought before talking, while the other one was just hot-tempered. And looking at them, he could easily tell that Elysia was a commoner while the other one was a noble.
He found out a little about how the second-year students behaved, and that was enough for him. He walked down the road toward the Thousand Treasure Tower.
He was only a dozen meters away from it, so the two had probably gone to it as well. The Thousand Treasure Tower and the forest were the two major locations that students went to when they exited the academy. So he actually expected them to go there.
He walked into the tower with the hope that he would find items that were going to help him during his next month. No matter what would happen, he was planning on leaving Eldridge for the month, so he wanted to buy anything useful for him to help him.
