Chapter 1114: 101. Night Falls

After walking out the doors of the City-State United Pioneering Association, Muen discovered that Marcie seemed to have become a different person.

The usual her was lively, reckless, careless, and could even perform the divine technique of tripping on flat ground, the kind that basically only appeared in cartoons. Every move she made was filled with clear, guileless stupidity.

But now, she seemed to have suddenly become an unreachable noble young lady. Her head was high, her chest was lifted, her back was straight, her chin was slightly raised, and even the steps she took revealed an elegance she had never shown before, as well as...

“Ow!”

Marcie suddenly fell on the perfectly flat road where there was nothing at all and went sprawling face-first into the ground.

“...”

All right. Previous statement withdrawn. She was still filled with clear, guileless stupidity.

“Are you okay?” Muen walked over, considering whether he should give her a hand.

“I’m fine!”

Before Muen could think through the result, Marcie rolled over and sprang up from the ground in one smooth set of movements.

Then she continued with her head high, chest lifted, back straight, chin slightly raised...

“Um...”

“What?”

Marcie’s tone was full of defiance and coldness.

“You should wipe the mud off your face.”

Muen handed over a handkerchief and pressed down the corner of his mouth as he said, “With your face painted like that, everyone around us is laughing.”

“...”

The mud-smeared face gradually turned into a bright red face.

Marcie snatched the handkerchief over at a speed nearly impossible to see with the naked eye and wiped her face messily.

Her face was cleaned very quickly, but after the moves she had prepared for so long broke down one after another, it became very hard for her to bring out a third attempt.

“Damn it!”

Marcie pouted her little mouth and said unhappily, “My most important debut!”

“...What debut?”

“My debut as a trainee Pioneer, of course!”

Marcie shook her arm. Sunlight shone down, and suddenly a dazzling point of light flashed. Muen narrowed his eyes slightly and discovered that on Marcie’s wrist, a bracelet strung together from crystal-clear colored stones was reflecting the bright sunlight along with her movements.

At the same time, the stones collided, and a crisp sound echoed like a young girl’s singing voice.

“This is...”

“Hmph, you don’t understand, do you?”

Marcie raised the bracelet high at once, immediately drawing astonished gazes from the surrounding people.

“This is proof of being a trainee Pioneer. It’s a bracelet made from special colored stones, a symbol of my identity. At the same time, it also has a number on it. Although it’s only temporary and can’t be engraved on the back like a true Pioneer’s, as long as I keep working hard, one day, that will become my real Pioneer number!”

“I see.”

Muen looked carefully. There were indeed numbers carved on the colored stones of the bracelet, and there was also a faint aura of magic. Although it could not do something like the number on the Third Attendant’s back he had encountered before, which did not fade even after death, it could probably let other Pioneers locate her within a certain distance.

“Impressive. Looks like things went smoothly for you just now,” Muen said with a smile.

“Of course.”

Marcie folded her arms. “You need to be more respectful toward me in the future. You can’t scare me casually like before anymore.”

“Oh? Why?”

“You still don’t understand? I’m already a trainee Pioneer, and I’ll soon become a true Pioneer! I’m not the weak me from before anymore!”

“...”

So was there any difference? It still felt like she would cry for a long time if someone punched her once.

Muen complained inwardly.

“Right, you also seemed to go take the test just now. How did it go?”

Marcie glanced sideways at Muen, speaking earnestly like a senior. “With your skills, it shouldn’t have been difficult for you to cheat a little and pass the exam. Since you passed the exam, then after learning some related skills, plus your strength, becoming a trainee Pioneer should not be hard. Well? Did you make it?”

“Not exactly.”

Muen shook his head. “They don’t seem to intend to let me become a trainee Pioneer.”

“Is that so? Pitiful, but expected.”

Marcie sighed regretfully. “After all, you’re a guy of unknown origin, so they’ll definitely need to observe you for a while. And becoming a trainee Pioneer isn’t that easy either. Think about me. I was first place last year, and I had to wait until this year to become one. As for you, in the short term, you probably won’t be able to...”

“They directly let me become a true Pioneer.”

“A true Pioneer, huh? That’s not bad either, but compared to my trainee Pioneer status, it’s still... Wait. What did you say?”

Marcie suddenly turned her head. She turned so quickly and so forcefully that even Muen could not help worrying whether she might fling her little head off.

“I said, they directly made me a Pioneer.”

Muen blinked innocently. “Is something wrong?”

Marcie looked as if she had been struck by lightning.

Confusion.

Shock.

Bewilderment.

Disbelief... All kinds of expressions shifted across her little face like a flashing light ball.

In the end, she gritted her teeth fiercely.

“Impossible. Absolutely impossible!”

“You outsider only came here a few days ago! How could you possibly become a Pioneer?”

“Something like this, unless the president was threatened, he would absolutely never make such a rash decision!”

“You must be lying to me!”

“...”

Muen did not argue.

He only silently took out the parchment scroll Bear King Theresa had given him just now.

Then he casually tossed it to Marcie.

It was clearly only an ordinary parchment scroll, but in Marcie’s hands, it seemed to weigh a thousand pounds. She stared blankly at it for a long time, her little mouth moving as if she wanted to fiercely rebuke Muen and angrily curse him for being despicable enough to profane the identity of a Pioneer... but in the end, she could not say anything at all.

It was real.

As an expert in this field, as someone who had longed for the thing in her hands for who knew how long, she could distinguish its authenticity better than anyone.

This was real.

“You... You really became a Pioneer?”

“Is there a problem?” Muen shrugged. “I’m very strong.”

“You are very strong, but... I clearly spent so much time just to become a trainee...”

Marcie drooped her head. Her excitement from just now flew away without a trace. “You only came here a few days ago, and you could... This is too unfair.”

“What, are you angry?”

Muen tilted his head and studied Marcie at this moment, amused. “I thought you would congratulate me.”

“Congratulations.” Marcie threw the parchment scroll back to Muen.

“What? Say that again?”

“I said congratulations!”

“No sincerity at all...”

Muen rubbed his chin. “You clearly worship other Pioneers to death. Why is it that when it comes to me, you look so disgusted?”

“I...”

Marcie bit her lip.

Of course she worshiped Pioneers... more than anyone else did.

But... after spending these few days with this guy, she had disliked him, feared him, been shocked by him, and even bickered with him... The only thing she had never done was think about worshiping him.

After all, this guy was far too unserious. In the outside world, he had definitely used that face to deceive who knew how many girls!

Worship him?

Impossible!

“I’m leaving.”

Marcie turned and walked away.

She did not care whether this guy was a Pioneer or not!

...But after taking only two steps, Marcie suddenly turned back again.

Her gaze fixed tightly on Muen.

“I will never worship a guy like you.”

“But...”

“I’ll take you as my goal!”

“One day, I’ll catch up to you and become the most outstanding Pioneer in Annabawei, then lead the people here out of this land of fog.”

“When that time comes...”

Marcie planted her hands on her hips, her entire body bathed in the gentlest sunlight, every strand of hair seeming to glow.

“I’ll treat you to the most delicious black bread in this world as repayment for before! You just wait!”

Muen froze for a moment. “Only black bread?”

“Hmph, that’s what you get for not telling me more about the outside world... Well, if °• N 𝑜 v 𝑒 l i g h t •° there’s something better to eat by then, we’ll talk about it then. But for now, I won’t lose to you!”

Marcie stuck out her tongue and made a face at Muen.

On that face dotted with tiny freckles was the unique innocence and brightness of a young girl. The long night had not erased her hope. Instead, it had made her even stronger.

“I’m going.”

Marcie bounced away, every nimble step seeming able to bring eager light to those around her.

“One day, huh...”

Muen smiled along with her. “That really is hard to predict.”

He sighed, but after this fuss, the inexplicable gloom lingering in his heart seemed to have been swept away as well. Following the direction Marcie had left in, he took a step...

[Kill me.]

Buzz!

Suddenly.

Some strange murmur echoed beside Muen’s ears.

An unimaginable chill invaded Muen’s body from the outside, as if about to follow the momentum and pollute his soul.

Light vanished, and terrifying darkness pressed down toward him.

“Hmph.”

Muen only hesitated for a moment before black flames abruptly swayed deep in his eyes, and all the murmuring and cold were instantly driven away.

His perception returned to normal, as if everything just now had only been his illusion.

But... the warm sunlight was no longer there.

Muen raised his head. Amid the chaos and clamor of the surrounding crowd, all he saw was darkness filling his vision. ℴ

The murmurs and cold had only been illusions of perception.

The darkness was not.

It should clearly have been a bright, sunny daytime right now.

Yet night had descended, just like that, so suddenly.