The trio comfortably sat on the bed as they conversed with one another. Anna and Flavia were sitting on the bottom half of the bed, and Max sat opposite to them.
After talking for a while, Anna's previous awkwardness vanished and Flavia, who tended to be reserved around Max, also relaxed considerably.
"Hm?" While talking, Flavia suddenly noticed the exquisite wooden box laying on the bed. For a moment, her eyes twinkled with curiosity before she shifted her attention to Anna and Max.
Anna noticed this and smiled. "This is a gift he brought from the Elvin city, Ninam, for me."
"Elvin city? No wonder it felt familiar." Flavia nodded lightly.
"Hm?" Anna was a little surprised but on further thought, she found it quite normal because given her background, it was really no big deal that she had seen other things from the Elvin cities.
She grabbed Flavia's hand and asked excitedly, "I haven't seen what is inside. Shall we open it?"
"This… Ah, alright." Flavia glanced at Max and hesitated a little. Despite being curious to see what was the gift he brought for Anna, she didn't want to seem overly eager. However, in the end, she nodded her head.
At the same time, she couldn't help but think, 'Since I'm also his friend, maybe he brought something for me too?'
'No, what am I thinking?' She immediately shook her head. 'It's no big deal even if didn't. We aren't t-that close after all.' As this thought arose in her mind, she felt sad.
Click!
Seeing her nod, Anna hurriedly opened the box. When she saw the light golden ring sitting inside the box, her eyes immediately widened in surprise.
Whoosh!
She turned her head toward Max and stuttered, "A-A spatial ring?"
Max chuckled lightly upon seeing the shocked expression on her face and nodded, "Yes."
However, contrary to what he expected, as soon as Anna saw him nod, she became angry and shouted, "You…! Why did you buy this?"
"Huh?" Her sudden outburst surprised Max.
Flavia was also shocked. Wasn't she supposed to be happy to receive such a gift?
Seeing his expression, Anna sighed and continued, "I don't know where you found enough Mana stones to buy this spatial ring, but it would've been countless times better if you had just used them for your own cultivation recourses. However, now you have wasted them on me."
Flavia nodded in understanding after she heard this. Although a spatial ring was quite handy to carry things, in the end it was only that, convenient. It didn't help you grow stronger.
Since inner disciple only get a 100 Mana stones per months and the mission also didn't give too many, it wasn't wise to spend thousands of Mana stones on the ring.
Max smiled wryly when he heard this. Without saying anything, he waved his hand.
Whoosh!
Suddenly, a small mountain of Mana stones appeared in the air.
Max pointed at it and winked at Anna, "I still have more than enough for other uses and I can earn more if I want to, so don't worry, alright?"
Both Anna and Flavia were too stunned to listen to what he said and were looking at the sparkling mountain of Mana stones hovering in the air with their mouth agape.
"This… little Max… how do you have so many Mana stones?" Anna asked in astonishment, still looking at the Mana stone mountain.
Whoosh!
Max smiled and with a wave of his hand, he stored them in his inventory and said, "I earned them in the Ninam city."
Anna suddenly leapt toward him and grabbed his hand. With twinkling eyes, she asked excitedly asked, "How many do you have? Can we send some back to our home?"
Max looked into her eyes and nodded, "Yes. We can. I've more than enough."
Anna's eyes teared up, and she fell on his chest and cried softly, "Thank you, thank you, Max."
Max hugged her and caressed her back. "Don't thank me. They are my family too."
"Mhm." Anna nodded and then sobbingly continued, "You know, ever since I joined the academy, I've been trying to earn some Mana stones to send back home so mother and everyone else could raise their strength too. However, I never had more than 20 Mana stones at one time."
"Hmm. You don't have to worry about that now. I'll take care of it." Max patted her back.
"Mhm. I know you will." Anna nodded. Wiping her tears, she broke the hug and after hesitating for a while, she asked, "Do you know why our family never had more than a handful of Mana stones even though our father is a viscount?"
"Yes, I know. It's because of that count Wiley." Max nodded, his eyes glinting with a murderous light.
"Yes, it's because of that bastard." Anna cursed through gritted teeth. She wasn't surprised that Max knew about it because she had guessed that their father must have told him before he left to join the academy selection exam.
Max extended his hands and cupped her face. Looking into her eyes, he firmly spoke, "Don't worry, he'll pay very soon for what he did to our family."
"Mhm. He will." Anna nodded, calming down.
By their side, Flavia watched them silently as they conversed. However, when Max mentioned count Wiley, her expression changed.
After both of them calmed down, she asked, "Anna, the count Wiley, you just mentioned. Is he the one from Vista city?"
"Huh? Yeah. He is. Do you know him?" Anna raised her brows.
"Yes." Flavia nodded. Sighing, she looked at Max and asked, "You remember Dalton from selection exams, right?"
"Huh. How can I forget him?" Max chuckled, a bit of killing intent leaking out from him, which surprised Flavia. A moment later, however, she understood and a guilty expression appeared on her face.
"I'm sorry, Max. It's because I talked to you—" she apologized.
"Nah. It's alright." Shaking his head, Max cut her off and asked, "How is he related to count Wiley?"
