Extra Pages: The Author's Odyssey
Chapter 117: The Night is still young [1]

Bang, Bang, Bang—!!!

The sound of repeated banging disturbed my sleep, interrupting me after just a few hours of slumber.

Someone was at my room's door. However, I wanted to sleep more.

So frustrated, I buried my head in the pillow,

hoping to muffle the noise and return to sleep.

Thankfully, the commotion stopped after a couple of minutes.

Tring, Tring, Tring~!!!

However, my peace was short-lived as my smart bracelet began to ring incessantly.

Now someone was calling me!

"Tsk!"

"Who the fuck is at this hour?" I said to the person who was on the other side of the phone.

[Lucas bro, it's me.]

This idiot doesn't know what time is?

"Sunny, why did you call me at this hour?" I said to him as my voice filled with irritation. It's 8:30 the night and I'm tired as hell after running around in the black market all day.

[Why did you leave after dinner?]

Instead of an answer, he asked another question.

If he was near me I would beat him to a pulp.

"Why else do I leave? To sleep of course."

[Lucas bro, the night is still young you can't sleep right now. Come out and let's have some fun.]

"No, you can have all the fun."

[Lucas bro-]

I cut call the before that idiot spurt something idiotic out of his mouth. Did he not get tired himself having all of this energy could be tiring some it's on way.

Well anyway, now I can sleep in peace.

I buried my head in the pillow again hoping to catch some sleep.

But I couldn't do that. Why? Because,

Bang, Bang, Bang—!!!

The sound of repeated banging disturbed my sleep again.

Okay, that's it, whoever is outside going to get himself killed by me right now.

-Click

I took out my sword from the AI bracelet and opened the door.

"Lucas bro, how could you cut the call?"

It was sunny,

"Die," I said and swung my sword straight for his head.

-Swoosh!

"Wait-"

Before he could finish what he wanted to say my sword was near his face.

At the last moment, Sunny ducks his head and is somehow able to save himself from getting killed.

"You could kill me with that sword!!" Sunny shouted, his breath speeding up at my unexpected action.

"What do you want sunny?" instead of answering him I put my sword up and asked him a question.

"Why are you this angry Lucas?" Like before, instead of answering my question, he asked me his question.

"Because I was sleeping but some idiot broke my sleep."

"You were sleeping?" Kent furrowed his brows and exclaimed. "Lame! It's only 8:34/PM, and the night is still young! Come on, let's go to a club or something!"

"Sunny," I sighed and put my sword down. "My eyes are heavy, and my body is tired today, so please let me sleep."

"I know you would make this kind of excuse, so I bought this along with me to convince you," Sunny said after I finished talking. I could see a potion in his hand but what kind of potion is I don't know.

"Catch this." saying that he threw the potion at me, catching potion with one hand I couldn't help but ask,

"What type of potion is this?"

"It's a [stamina recovery potion], drink up and you feel fine."

"Fine." looks like I can't run away from my fate.

I drink [stamina recovery potion] and in a few moments, all fatigue leaves my body.

"Now Dress up and look pretty, Lucas. Everyone everyone else is waiting for us downstairs!!"

"Huh?" I frowned. "Everyone who?"

"Adrian, Emma, Evelyn and others."

"We are not going alone?"

"When did I ever say we are going alone?"

There was nothing else to say anymore after that because I knew if I continued this conversation I would lose my brain cells for sure.

I changed my clothes and a few minutes I sunny reached the main hall of the mansion.

I could see the standing figures of Adrian, Emma, Evelyn, Lyra, Noah, and Kael.

There were a few people I could not see today, Isabell and Aric are not present at the moment.

Of course, there are Isla and Elera but they are not outgoing persons.

What troubles me more is that I could not see Aric here.

When I reached them I asked Adrian why is Aric not there.

"Well I and Emma called him but he did not answer so we thought he was asleep and we should not bother him"

"I see."

"Let's go," Adrian said to everyone after he answered me.

Everyone nodded their head and started to follow behind him, the other hand, walked side by side with him.

'Why did Aric not come?' I thought as we exited the large doors of the mansion.

***

-Slash!! -Slash!! -Slash!!

"Huff…huff…huff"

Standing shirtless inside an empty room filled with training dummies, an extremely handsome individual stood in the middle of the room heavily panting for air.

His perfectly honed body was drenched in sweat, and his eyes were bloodshot.

-Gulp!

Downing a potion and recovering some of his stamina, the young individual quickly dashed before one of the training dummies and swung broadsword with full might.

Small shockwaves spread throughout the room as the sound of the collision between his broadsword and the dummies reverberated around the place.

Exactly thirty minutes after continuously hitting the dummies, the young individual lay on the floor heavily gasping for air.

Staring at the ceiling, he clenched his jaw hard and he covered his eyes with his arm.

"…Just what am I lacking?"

Aric remembers his unit exam results from Goblin Dane Dungeon.

Compared to his 898 points Adrian has scored 900 points, they were 24 hours side by side but still, he came first.

It felt as if a wall that he couldn't climb was standing before him.

No matter how much work he put in, he couldn't replace any way to bridge the gap between himself and Adrian.

Was Adrian that much more talented than him?

Should he just accept the fact that Adrian was better than him?

"Damm it…"

He can't do that! He can't sully the name of his family, guild and most importantly his father.

"I will not lose to Adrian or anyone else" Aric grits his teeth and starts to practice again.