Ning had made his way halfway up the second mountain to the left where there were fewer people around. He hoped people simply didn't want to come here because it was far away. If the reason for it lacking people was because there was nothing to unroot here, he would have wasted his time.
A few minutes later, Ning saw a small plant growing next to a rock and walked over there. He grabbed the plant by the stem and pulled it as hard as he could.
Despite the hard soil of the mountain, the plant came out relatively easily. Ning threw the plant onto his basket and moved on.
He had collected about 8 plants by now, and he still needed 12 more if he wanted to get a credit.
He looked at the sun going down and realized that he had 2 hours of sunlight at best to work with.
'Damn it, I shouldn't have wasted half a day sleeping,' he thought. Although, he had been absorbing one of the crystals the entire night, so he couldn't help it.
He walked up the mountain and found another plant. This one was small and couldn't just be ripped out. So, he took his shovel and dug into the soil.
With how strong he was, the shovel went into the soil as if he were digging up sand. The entire plant came out of the ground, root and all, and Ning tossed it into the basket on his back.
As he walked around, the dirt would come loose and fall through the cracks of the basket, leaving only the plant behind.
'I found 2 already,' he thought. 'Maybe I can find them all here.'
He walked around the mountain searching for more and more plants and indeed found quite a few. In just an hour, he found exactly 9 more of them.
With the previous 10, he now had 19 plants.
The sun was already red and the sky was slowly changing to red as well. Soon, it would turn to purple and he would lose all light.
His vision was good, but it was not so good that he could see easily at night unless there was a bright moon in the sky.
He walked around for a bit and found the last plant. 'Finally,' he thought and walked up to it.
He pulled out his shovel and was about to dig when he heard something.
A young man had arrived close to him, making little to no noise at all. Ning was surprised at first, but he quickly grew suspicious.
"Who are you? And why are you sneaking up on me?" he asked.
The young man had stopped in his tracks and gave a grin when he heard the question. He had a basket on his back too with quite a few plants on his basket. A lot more than Ning had.
"I want that plant," the young man said. "Leave and find something else."
"I found it first," Ning said. "Go find your own."
"Come on," the young man said. "I'm 1 away from reaching 40. I need that plant."
"And I'm 1 away from 19. I need it more than you," Ning told the young man. "Besides, I found it first, so it is mine."
"Hehe, your name isn't written on that plant and it wasn't in your basket. So you can't say it is yours just yet," the young man said.
"Oh, then I'll just put it in my basket," Ning said and turned around to dig.
"Stop!" the young man rushed forward with surprising agility to his steps. It was as if the wind itself was helping him move forward.
He put his shovel in front of him to stop Ning's own shovel.
Ning realized that he was being attacked, so he quickly spun and used his shovel to strike away the incoming shovel.
The young man was surprised, but he wasn't caught off guard. He had been trained way too often for something to catch him off guard enough to be a problem.
He stopped where he was attacked and brought the shovel around to strike at Ning's own shovel.
Ning turned the shovel in his hand and like a spear, shoved the shovel head onto the incoming shovel. He hit the shovel right at the base of the shovel head, knocking it back.
At the same time, he stepped forward and swung the shovel toward the young man's neck.
The young man was surprised and tried to step back, but Ning moved again, following him.
A sudden gust of wind appeared out of nowhere, pushing on Ning with a lot of force. Ning used the shovel to cut through the pierce through the incoming wind and arrived in front of the young man, pointing the shovel head at his neck.
"Stop, or I will hit you for real," Ning said.
The young man dropped the shovel and looked in surprise. "How… how did you do that?" he asked.
"My physical strength is stronger than whatever skill it was that you used," Ning said. He dropped the shovel and glared at the young man. "Now, go find your own plant before the sun sets and stop disturbing me."
The young man watched in awe for a moment before realizing that Ning had turned around to leave.
"Wait!" the young man shouted.
"What now?" Ning asked. "You still want to fight?"
"No," the young man said. "What's your name?"
Ning looked at the young man weirdly for a moment before speaking. "Ning," he said.
"Ning," the young man shouted. "Big brother Ning, my name is Tenn Foreman. Would you like to be training buddies with me?"
"Training buddies?" Ning asked.
"Yes," the young man said. "I've been looking for people to train with me, and you seem like a capable fighter. Would you please train with me?"
Ning thought for a moment. "After class?" he asked.
"After class," the young man said.
"Sure," Ning said. "But I leave if it's not worth my time."
"Understood," the young man said. "Please meet me outside of the dorm after the class ends. I will leave you alone for now, bye."
