NOVEL NEXT Chapter 8: Alright
I don't own solo leveling or Naruto
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Sasuke Uchiha walked through the crowded front gates of his new highschool. It was a grand building, he had to admit, but he cursed every minute he was in here.
"Good luck and have fun, Mr. Uchiha!" Kil Nari waved him goodbye and then moved back to the limousine that dropped him off, not once turning back to acknowledge Choi's assistant.
"Woah~who is that guy?"
"He must come from a wealthy family!"
"He's kinda good looking~"
"He must be a new kid. I've never seen him around here before."
And another thing that got on his nerves were all the looks he was getting for arriving in a limousine. It wasn't an issue ignoring all the attempts to gain his attention due to his experiences in the ninja academy, but it was an irritating endeavour.
Making his way towards his home class, Room 1-C, he noticed several heads facing him as soon as he entered the room. Paying them no mind he picked the last remaining desk next to the window and sat down with his hands folded over his face.
"Hey, man! My name is Lee Baekhyun, but most people call me Lee and you are?" Lee introduced himself enthusiastically offering a handshake, however, Sasuke just gave him a blank stare not moving to return the offered greeting.
Lee Baekhyun was a wavy brown-haired teen of above-average height with muddy brown eyes and a small, barely noticeable scar under his nose.
Lee awkwardly retracted his hand, "Hehe... Well, this is my first year in high school and I'm hoping the jump from middle school isn't as bad as my cousins say it is. They can be real asshats, those guys!" he laughed, still put off by Sasuke's standoffish demeanour.
"My cousins are dead."
"Oh, um! I didn't mean anything by it, man. Uh, I'm sorry for your loss..." Lee stuttered helplessly at Sasuke's deadpan tone.
"Hn."
Lee just cringed visibly before taking a breath, "Um, I saw you coming out of that limo earlier. You must come from a wealthy family, right?" He inquired, hoping to make some small talk.
Sasuke glanced in his direction for the first time since the conversation started, "Why does it matter if I'm from a rich family? What are you hoping to gain?" His expression was blank but his icy tone struck Lee Baekhyun with trepidation.
"N-Nothing, I was just wanting to make small talk, you know! You seemed pretty lonely..." Lee waved his hands defensively and Sasuke just looked at him for a while. Baekhyun couldn't read anything from those onyx orbs that seemed to be dissecting his very soul, making him feel very exposed and somehow inadequate.
"What do you know of isolation?" Sasuke questioned his inquiry leaving the brown haired student tongue tied. Suddenly the bell rang grabbing the whole class's attention as they all knew that meant the school day had officially begun.
"Attention class!" the teacher's loud voice resounded to everyone in the classroom. "Get to your seats and settle down! This isn't middle school anymore!" The teacher's orders caused everyone to scramble to their seats and pay attention to what the man had to say.
He was a 6 ft tall, middle-aged man. He was wearing a beige jacket with a dark green pullover underneath and wore similarly coloured beige trousers.
"Good, I like that. Now that you've all settled down I think introductions are in order. I'll start," he picked up a piece of chalk and started writing on the chalkboard.
"I'm your homeroom teacher for this year. My name is Jang Chung-Ho, but you'll call me Mr. Jang. I teach history and geography."
Clapping his hands together he turned back to address the class,"I'm not the best at remembering names and faces so I won't ask you guys to come up to the front and introduce yourselves individually." a significant portion of them breathed a sigh of relief at that.
"But what you will do instead is something with the partner sitting next to you. I'll give everyone 10 minutes to find at least 5 things they have in common with the person sitting next to them and write it down on a piece of paper. After the allocated time expires one of you or both may stand up to introduce yourselves to the whole class. Make sure to say names guys, please!" he urged and that same portion of students that sighed in relief grumbled in displeasure knowing that most of them would still have to address the class.
"Your time starts now!"
Lee Baekhyun quickly turned to the right for a partner next to him, but he wasn't fast enough as she was already speaking with someone else. Gulping nervously, he turned to his left to address his blank faced raven-haired peer.
'Great...' he grumbled internally. He cleared his throat, "So, uh, looks like we're partners now."
"Looks like…"
"Uh, um, my name is Lee Baekhyun and my favourite colour is red," he said nervously.
'Come on, you bastard! Don't just look at me! Say something!' he screamed internally, knowing that he wouldn't dare shout those words at the intimidating kid.
"Uh, my favourite foods are tomatoes and soup," Lee spoke once again when Sasuke said nothing for too long a time. The brown haired teenager actually saw his stoic classmate perk up slightly at his words.
"I also like tomatoes..." he replied.
The ten minutes passed like a flash and soon the first duo was forced to introduce themselves having found at least 7 things they had in common.
It took 15 more minutes before it was Sasuke and Lee's turn. Both of them stood up to introduce themselves to the class.
'He already looks completely out of it. What happened to him?' Mr. Jang wondered, seeing Lee ready to pull his hair out at the seams.
"My name is Sasuke Uchiha." the spiky raven-haired youth introduced himself. He elbowed his classmate next to him when he didn't say anything for a few moments.
"Oh, damn... Um, my name is Lee Baekhyun, but call me Lee. Sasuke and I have exactly 5 things in common," he announced clearly for all to hear.
"The first thing is that we both like tomatoes. We both like exercising. We both have an interest in becoming hunters one day. We both hate sand. And finally, we're both human." he concluded, the last thing getting a few chuckle out the class.
"Thank you, Mr. Lee," Mr Jang nodded happily, "So, Mr. Sasuke, you are from Japan? I'm just assuming from your name... It is Japanese, isn't?" Mr. Jang addressed the thirteen year old.
"You could say that..." Sasuke responded vaguely, not really giving an answer but at the same time giving him an answer.
"Sorry, I'm just curious," the teacher apologised, to which Sasuke just nodded and sat back down.
He's even like that with Mr. Jang! This guy's the closest thing to talking with a brick wall!' Lee grumbled unhappily inside his head.
After the introductions, things moved on smoothly for the rest of the day for Sasuke Uchiha with the odd few girls trying to talk to him during the day, but he ignored each and everyone of their advances.
It was finally home time and Sasuke couldn't be happier to leave the school and get his hunter licence. There was at least one good thing that would come out from today.
"How was your first day at school, Mr. Uchiha?" Nari asked him as soon as he entered the black four door saloon car. He was thankful that she came to pick him up in a more modest vehicle, it meant less eyes on him.
"Let's get going to the Association. I want my hunter licence," he demanded. "That bad huh?" Nari laughed lightly, putting the car in gear and driving off to the Hunters Association evaluation centre.
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"This is it."
They walked up to the massive three story glassware building. Going through the sliding doors, which fascinated him a little, he was greeted to the site of a packed lobby area with lines of people everywhere.
"This might take a while," Nari commented and Sasuke couldn't agree with her more at that moment.
After 2 hours he finally made it to the front of the booking booth line and was greeted lazily by a lady in her 50s that looked to be done with the day's events.
"I'm looking to get my rank evaluated," Sasuke stated.
"Name?"
"Sasuke."
"Surname?"
"Uchiha."
The old lady gave a brief pause at his name, "A Jap? What are you doing in these parts?"
"To get my rank evaluated like I told," Sasuke replied with a slight infliction to his voice. "Are you raising your tone, boy?" the old lady sneered. Sasuke matched her with an icy glare already done with her antics.
"Uhm! This unethical behaviour from an official of the Hunters Association. He is just looking to get his hunter licence, there's no need for nationality to come into play," Nari spoke with a forceful tone, however, the old lady just raised a brow. "And who are you, sister?"
"My name is Kil Nari, personal assistant of Choi Jong-In. I'm sure you can guess what will happen to you if I comment about your behaviour right now. God forbid I report it to your superiors." the old lady widened her eyes considerably at the implications behind her words.
"O-Of course, Ms. Nari. Ah... Uchiha, could I please have your contact number and email address." Sasuke just handed her a piece of paper with those details scribbled onto it.
"Please move through to Room 10," she requested, giving Sasuke ticket number 34. "Don't mind her. The older generation are usually narrow-minded. I'll make sure Master Choi hears about this," Nari whispered the words to Sasuke, but he just scoffed.
"Like I care."
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About an hour later…
[Ticket no. 34, please make your way through the doors]
The monotone intercom came to life requesting Sasuke's number, "Well, this is where my road ends. Once you enter those doors it's all on you," Nari smiled. Sasuke just grunted, got up from his seat and walked through the double doors.
He was greeted by a gigantic black ball that sat on a metallic pedestal that was hooked with various wires and tubes into a control panel to the right of him. Behind the control panel stood a shaggy black-haired man in the standard Association black suit.
"Number 34, please place your dominant hand on the magic detector," the man ordered, not once looking up from his control panel screen.
Sasuke did as he was told and watched as the black crystal came to life with specks of golden light shifted and turned in a mesmerising fashion. After a few moments he was told to stop. "Wait, you're just a kid? How are you a B-rank already?!" the man exclaimed in shock after finally looking up from his control panel for the first time since Sasuke entered the room.
The young teenager just shrugged his shoulders in response. He wasn't too sure himself because he thought that the machine might not have been able to register his chakra since it was a source of power different from mana, but that didn't seem to be the case.
'Even though mana operates differently within the human body compared to chakra, they are still similar enough energies to be detected by these advanced detection machines.'
He did recall Choi saying to him that his chakra was harder to detect even with his sensitivity to magical energy.
'He must be some kind of prodigy!' the Association officer thought. It was his job to compile and file a report on all the newly ranked hunters of the day and send it to higher-ups so that the results could be put on watch lists for the monitoring division, but he would make sure to highlight this boy in particular, for today's report. 'He's going to be special. Feels good being around when important things happen!'
It was a short process getting his licence and finally leaving the Association building with Kil Nari in tow.
"It was alright," Sasuke spoke out of nowhere, giving Nari pause as she wondered what he was on about.
"Huh?"
"School. It was alright," he replied simply.
"Oh, I'm glad for that, Mr. Sasuke," she smiled, pulling the car into the driveway marking their journey for the day.
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AN: Also posting on Fanfiction. Net