OUTSIDE THE ACADEMY ISLAND
Rain stood quietly on the side of the road over the footpath while a luxurious long black limousine remained parked directly in front of him.
Beside the car stood Bam Yellow himself with both hands resting behind his back calmly while the city lights reflected faintly across the vehicle's polished black surface.
The moment Rain approached closer, Bam Yellow smiled faintly.
"I've been waiting for you," the old man said warmly.
"Am I late?" Rain replied calmly while keeping his cool expression completely intact, his eyes staring directly into Bam Yellow's eyes without backing down even slightly.
"Of course not," Bam answered smoothly. "But before we start talking… perhaps we should continue this somewhere more private."
At the same moment, the driver silently stepped forward before respectfully opening the limousine door for Rain.
Rain's eyes quietly swept across the absurdly luxurious interior visible from outside.
'…Rich bastard.'
Even the inside looked expensive enough to buy several normal houses.
"Sure. Where?" Rain casually asked while entering the car without hesitation.
The soft leather seat slightly sank the moment he sat down properly.
'Damn comfortable too.'
Bam Yellow entered afterward before the driver quietly closed the door behind them.
Click
"You'll know soon enough," Bam replied with the same unreadable smile while the limousine slowly started moving once again through the city road.
---
"Now this feels refreshing…" Rain murmured under his breath while his eyes remained completely fixed on the floating screen.
After all the ridiculous hard work, suffering, embarrassment, and mental damage he went through today, the numbers had finally increased properly.
[Name:Rain Brightwell]
[Race: Human]
[Age: 18]
[Strength: 21]
[Agility: 19]
[Stamina: 21]
[Endurance: 20]
[Mana: 11]
[Charm: 11]
[Intelligence: 14]
[Luck: 8]
[True Core: None]
[Remaining Points – 400]
The most appetizing part however was definitely those beautiful points waiting for him.
His eyes almost became teary from happiness, but Rain stubbornly held it back while tightly clenching his fist.
'Finally… finally! I got it!'
He had finally obtained one of the most essential things every gacha player desperately needed in life— currency for pulls, and now he finally had it in his hands.
Not much, but honestly still absolutely worth it.
'This guy is definitely not as simple as he looks…'
A sharp gaze pierced directly toward Rain.
Rain's eyes immediately darted sideways toward the old man sitting near him.
"What?" Rain asked while lazily resting his chin over one hand. "Why are you staring at me like that, old man?"
Bam Yellow quietly sat there beside him inside the luxurious black limousine moving smoothly through the highway. The kind of absurdly expensive long car only rich monsters casually bought without caring about the price at all.
The seats themselves were ridiculously soft and comfortable too, enough to make normal people never want to leave once they sat down properly.
Bam let out a small sigh before finally speaking again.
"Nothing… I was just thinking perhaps we should talk about business now."
The black limousine continued moving smoothly through the highway toward some completely unknown destination.
Rain naturally remained cautious, but at the same time he was curious enough to willingly take the risk and continue following along because one thing was already pretty obvious to him— this old bastard had absolutely no intention of harming him directly... atleast right now.
Not when Bam himself was the one who approached Rain first for some unknown purpose important enough to personally involve himself in.
"Yeah sure," Rain replied casually while lazily waving one hand like he genuinely didn't care at all.
"So… are you and Clytie having good times together inside the academy?" Bam Yellow suddenly asked while calmly looking outside the car window.
"Me and her… you can say that," Rain answered casually while resting his head against the soft seat.
"Ha…"
A small laugh escaped from Bam afterward.
"I honestly never thought these old bones of mine would stay alive long enough to witness the day my granddaughter could finally have more than one friend."
His eyes slowly narrowed slightly afterward.
"And seeing different species connecting like this too… truly amazing."
Rain quietly stared at the old man secretly from the side.
'…Just look at this old geezer pretending in front of me.'
"All species are living beings afterall," Bam continued calmly. "Those entities created us hoping we could someday live together in peace and harmony. That was their original purpose from the very beginning."
"Is that so?" Rain replied lightly.
'…Entities?' His eyes narrowed slightly.
'As far as I know… he's must be talking about the Goddesses.'
Rain let out a slow breath before his gaze gradually became sharper and colder.
"Can't you cut to the chase already?" he asked directly without bothering to hide his impatience anymore.
Bam Yellow stared at him for a few seconds before suddenly laughing quietly.
"Hahaha… I like that attitude of yours," he said while the smile on his face slowly turned colder too. "It reminds me of my younger days."
Rain however stayed silent while continuing to stare at the old man without relaxing even slightly.
Bam leaned slightly backward into the luxurious seat before speaking again.
"Tell me… do you know what kind of worth humans possess in front of the other races? And where exactly we stand in terms of power rankings?"
"Hm…" Rain rested his chin over one hand lazily.
"Shouldn't you know the answer better than me?" he replied calmly.
Bam slowly shook his head afterward.
"No. I know because you understand it just as well as I do… We are merely insects in front of them, the weakest among all races whom they can crush with the tip of their fingers whenever they want. We stand at the absolute bottom of the food chain because unlike them, we possess almost nothing— no special racial abilities, no overwhelming magic, no monstrous physical properties… We are weak."
His voice remained calm the entire time, but the coldness hidden underneath became more obvious and suffocating the longer he spoke.
Rain silently listened without interrupting him once.
Bam's gaze slowly shifted toward the window while the city lights reflected faintly across his eyes.
"In this region… and in almost every other region too, humans are nothing more than bugs struggling to survive among predators."
'…He isn't wrong.'
Rain honestly couldn't deny the obvious truth there.
"Right. That's exactly what we are in the eyes of the other races," Bam said calmly while looking outside the car window.
A grin gradually appeared across the old man's face afterward.
"But you don't seriously think humans can stay oppressed forever… right?"
Bam's sharp eyes slowly shifted toward Rain afterward.
"Do you?"
Rain quietly stared back at him with an unwavering expression.
'…This bastard is definitely no good.'
Rain could already sense future trouble and danger surrounding this old man like poison hidden underneath calm water.
"But of course…" Bam continued while resting his chin over one hand lazily.
"What if humans gain enough power to crush those who look down on us?"
"What if WE become the ones suppressing them instead?"
'…We?'
Rain's eyes narrowed slightly hearing that word specifically.
Right at that moment—
Screeech!
The limousine suddenly slowed down because of a commotion happening ahead on the roadside.
Rain's gaze naturally shifted outside together with Bam's.
A ramen delivery boy had gotten into an accident.
From one look alone it was obvious the car driver was completely at fault.
The delivery boy's body was already badly injured from the collision, but instead of helping him— the rich-looking man who hit him openly started beating him even more in the middle of the street.
KICK!
"Trash should watch where it walks!" the man cursed loudly before kicking the injured boy again.
And the most disgusting part was that nobody around tried stopping him at all. Not a single person moved forward to help. Some only watched silently from distance while others deliberately avoided looking entirely, all simply because the rich man beating him wasn't human.
He belonged to another race.
Inside the black limousine, both Rain and Bam silently watched the entire scene unfold before their eyes.
"Those idiots really think we are Vermillion… some weak dogs they can crush whenever they want," Bam muttered calmly while lightly snapping his fingers once.
Snap!
A small smile rested on his face, but somehow the atmosphere around him instantly became colder afterward.
"The world was never equal for everyone," Bam continued quietly while looking outside the limousine window.
"So why shouldn't we take the initiative and claim what already belongs to us?"
His smile deepened slightly. Cold. Dangerous.
And almost right after those words left his mouth—
VROOOOM!
A loud engine sound suddenly roared across the highway outside.
Rain's eyes shifted toward the window just in time to witness a biker wearing a black helmet rushing forward at terrifying speed.
The next second—
CRACK!
A metal bat smashed directly into a rich-looking bully's skull with horrifying force.
Blood exploded violently into the air, splattering across the biker's helmet, clothes, and nearby road while the man's body twisted unnaturally before getting launched sideways like broken trash.
His corpse rolled across the ground several times before finally stopping motionless near the roadside.
Instant death.
For one brief second the entire area became eerily silent, like everyone's brain completely froze trying to process what they had just witnessed.
Then chaos erupted instantly afterward.
People screamed in terror.
A woman dropped her shopping bags while stumbling backward in panic.
Several cars slammed on their brakes at once causing loud honking noises to echo across the road nonstop.
One man immediately vomited after seeing the crushed skull leaking blood over the asphalt while another person hurriedly pulled out their phone with trembling hands trying to call emergency services.
Others simply stood there frozen in fear unable to even move properly.
Meanwhile the biker disappeared into the highway traffic almost instantly like a phantom who never existed in the first place.
Inside the luxurious limousine however—
Bam Yellow's expression didn't change even slightly while watching the entire scene outside calmly.
"The world is truly brutal," he said softly like he was merely commenting about weather.
Rain quietly watched everything with cold eyes completely unbothered by the blood, screams, or corpse outside.
'…Quite some show.'
And without anybody needing to explain it to him, Rain already knew exactly whose doing all of this was.
After some time, the car finally started moving smoothly again as the traffic police cleared the roads beforehand.
The black limousine continued traveling through the highway for quite a long while before eventually slowing down and finally stopping near an old shabby building standing completely isolated from the surroundings, with almost no neighboring houses anywhere nearby. Only surrounded by other old shaddy buildings.
Bam Yellow calmly stepped out of the car first.
"We are here," he said while adjusting his coat slightly.
Rain slowly stepped out afterward and his eyes immediately landed on the building in front of him.
Old. Far too old.
The walls were cracked everywhere, parts of the structure looked half-broken already, rust covered the metal areas, and the entire place looked like a complete abandoned piece of garbage nobody would even bother looking at twice.
Nothing looked interesting. Nothing looked special.
And somehow that alone made Rain even more interested.
"Follow me," Bam Yellow said before entering the building directly without hesitation.
Rain quietly narrowed his eyes while staring at the old structure one more time.
'…Yeah. This is definitely intersting.'
With curiosity slowly growing stronger inside him, Rain followed the smiling old bastard inside.