Chapter 92 Why Are You Here?

The four continued to make small talk while they finished their meals. Lee Seng crumpled his things together and tossed them into the bag. He leaned backwards, arms supporting him as he drifted off into space.

'Its a really nice day.' Lee Seng thought. He closed his eyes. He could hear his new acquaintances chatting while the autumn wind rustled the leaves above.Lee Seng could hear the students chatting away in the distance.

"So did you guys hear about what they do to transfer students?" Ritsuka asked. Lee Seng opened his eyes and looked at the three. They were all looking at each other, eventually landing their eyes on Lee Seng.

"I haven't," Olivia and Evan spoke.

"I have," Lee Seng answered.

"What did you hear?" Ritsuka asked.

"They're gonna drag us out in the middle of the night while we're sleeping and throw all of the transfer students into a field zone. We have to make it out before the sun's highest or else we're screwed." Lee Seng explained.

"That... sounds... okay." The three slowly said. The three had a mix of emotions and Lee Seng was nodding along with them.

"There's traps in the field test zone or something too. And on top of it, there's another test on Sunday and I'm not really sure about that one."

The four sat in silence. Olivia, Evan and Ritsuka processed the information while Lee Seng casually shrugged it off. He could only think about potentially embarrassing himself by being in his boxers when he gets thrown out.

"I would suggest you wear clothes if you don't normally wear clothes to sleep." Lee Seng added. Evan, Olivia and Ritsuka gave Lee Seng a weird look and he raised his eyebrows and gave a smile. "Don't want to be caught with no clothes on."

"God, dude, you don't have to continue. We get it, we get it!" Ritsuka chuckled. Olivia gave a weird face to Lee Seng and turned away, slightly, to hide the fact she was caught off guard.

"Okay, PJs it is." Evan checked. "It doesn't sound too bad from what Lee Seng explained."

"Yeah, or he thinks it's a cakewalk." Olivia pointed. "He didn't seem to show too much extreme emotions when he was battling."

"He could just be accustomed to that sort of thing cause he basically trained with Numbers." Ritsuka theorized. Lee Seng sighed and waved his tail back and forth. He didn't really mind that people were talking about him and the Numbers. It was obvious to everyone in and around Caption City that he did spend a lot of years with the Numbers in his father's lab.

"That could explain why he doesn't react to all the gossip around him." Evan added. Ritsuka elbowed Evan and shushed him. "What? If he has ears like that, he has to be able to hear really well." Evan pointed at Lee Seng and Lee Seng's eyes focused back on the group.

"I could hear well even before I got the ears." Lee Seng remarked. "With ears like mine, you pick up on things you don't want to hear, so you learn to ignore it."

"Doesn't it bother you, though?" Olivia asked.

,m "Some days are harder than others. Some times I just want to muffle out everything and be somewhere else. Other times it's nice to have good hearing. I can eavesdrop on people from farther away from the normal person." Lee Seng answered. "My hearing used to be better after I got the serum, but I think I must've suppressed a lot of my original superhuman abilities."

"You suppressed them? Why? Even if you were powerless back then, being in the Top 1% of Biohuman with superhuman abilities is still great." Evan spoke. Lee Seng nodded. Evan was right about that. Lee Seng sighed and shifted in his spot.

"Everything bad happened too quickly. My Mom died, I didn't get enough Dark Matter to produce a power and was powerless, and my friends all left me. Things with the Creator didn't go well, either, so I ended up neglecting a lot of my training with my superhuman abilities." Lee Seng explained.

The three nodded and Lee Seng watched his three new found acquaintances finish their food and set their stuff to the side.

"Enough about me. Y'all probably know more about me than I know you three. Why'd you guys choose to transfer to the Academy?" Lee Seng asked.

"My siblings came here before and they all went to do big things. I just wanted the opportunity to follow in their footsteps, I guess." Ritsuka answered.

"Ahh, following in your siblings footsteps." Olivia nodded. "You want to do what your siblings are doing after the Academy?"

"I'm not really sure. I was praised and told I would do well because I have such a unique power, so I was heavily encouraged to follow my siblings and go to the Academy."

"Ahh, hopefully you figure things out while you're here." Lee Seng chimed in. Everyone else nodded and Ritsuka motioned for someone else to go.

"Well, I guess I'll go," Evan volunteered. "I was always told I had a useless power. I decided to train and figure it out. I got a good grasp on it and a teacher from my previous school told me I should transfer here and learn more."

"A useless power?" Ritsuka asked. "Pssh, it's really not that useless. From what I've seen you can get pretty scary with those charges."

"Yeah, I agree. I didn't want to fight you because I thought my power would be the perfect fuel to knocking someone out like nothing." Lee Seng added.

"Taking kinetic energy in general would be a huge advantage in the future. Just imagine if you continue practicing with your powers, here! You could pull kinetic energy passively." Olivia explained.

"I hope so," Evan scratched his neck. "I came here because I thought I could learn a few things, but it seems you guys are adamant that I have a useful power." Olivia shifted in her spot and cleared her throat.

"Well, I guess it's my turn. I guess I wanted to come because..." Olivia trailed off, putting on a thinking face. She hadn't put it into words why she wanted to be here, before. "Well, I guess I kinda wanted to prove myself. Three years ago was an entirely different time and a different me, I guess.

"My results were low and they weren't anything like my grandma's. I wanted to be helpful like my grandma is. She can heal people and I thought I would definitely follow in he footsteps cause my parents had powers that could be used in the hospitals.

"I didn't quite get a power close to theirs and found out by sticking my nose into other students getting bullied, my power is quite useful. I guess through that I wanted to be here."

The three boys nodded. Lee Seng could empathize with Olivia. He could understand her pain. He always thought he would get some sort of power but when he didn't, he felt lost.

"It only takes one moment to change our perception of our power just like a snap of a finger." Ritsuka snapped his fingers. "Whatever are reason is, it pushes us forward even if it isn't as great of a reason."

"And we're here now, so we all must've proved something." Evan added. Olivia smiled and nodded. Lee Seng's tail continued to sway as he listened.

He hadn't really listened to other people's reasons to want to grow their power and/or their dreams. He began to wonder when was the last time, he asked someone why they wanted to come to the Academy. Ritsuka tapped Lee Seng on his shoulder, tapping him out of his daze.

"Huh?" Lee Seng snapped out of his thoughts.

"What's the reason you wanted to come to the Academy?" Ritsuka asked.

"Hmmm..." Lee Seng began to think. He knew the reason he wanted to be here and that was because he didn't want to be near his Father. He shifted in his spot and clicked his tongue a couple of times. "I always wanted to come here for high school. I want to be an adventurer one day." Lee Seng answered.

He nodded, satisfied that he told them. It was partially the reason why he wanted to be here. He didn't want to seem shallow, so Lee Seng answered with his initial reason. He had to remind himself and inform the rest of the group of his dreams.

'Its weird to hear myself say that.' Lee Seng thought. Ritsuka and the others seemed satisfied with it.

"Why an adventurer?" Olivia leaned forward. She was curious. Her eyes seemed to zoom in on him with a growing interest.

"The Numbers always went out on missions. Sometimes they left for weeks at a time and came back looking worn out. I asked my older brother, Akio, about why he does the missions. He told me it was apart of his job, but he also wanted others to see the Old World. There's apparently a lot of beauty out there and I don't really like to be confined by the city." Lee Seng answered.