As the both of them walked towards the military vehicle, Erix noticed there was a huge height difference between them. 

He was only 1.65 meters, and so was quite small for a seventeen years old boy. 

As for the military man, he was probably 1.96 meters in height or more.

Erix was quite stressed. It was something that was going to happen soon, a totally new life, so he was scared of the unknown. And as usual, he put his hands on the necklace.

However, this time, only what he felt was his shirt's collar, not the inheritance from his parents.

"What! Where is it?!" Erix shouted and was ready to run back even though he knew it was impossible.

"We don't have time for that kid. Follow me now or you stay here. Your choice."

"Si-" Erix wanted to plead further but beholding the overbearing look on the man's face, he reluctantly agreed and continued walking.

'This is strange though.' Erix thought while walking.

'Now that I think about it, I haven't seen it since this morning. Nor in the bathroom when I took my clothes off. Even when I did my push-ups. I just didn't have a glimpse of it this morning. Where is it though?' He pondered for a short while until a crazy idea crossed his head.

'Does the system come from the necklace? But that's impossible. Why would it only activate itself now? Or was it because of that little prayer I made yesterday?'

'Now come to think of it, the system's shop is called the 'Unholy shop'. Is this thing religious?' Erix continued to reckon until they arrived in front of a long military vehicle. 

There were already teens in it that Erix had never seen in his life. Some were sleeping while some couldn't because of how excited they were about the trip.

Erix felt a little relieved having recognized none of the students there. With these new people, maybe his bullying would lessen. Since no one knew him, he had a chance of impressing them and making whole new friends.

He opted to sit at the back of the bus since it was the only seat available.

"Alright, it is time for us to head to the military academy," A mono voice of a male announced through the speaker, and at once the vehicle began moving.

The mumblings of students were all that could be heard throughout the entire ride.

However, not too long into the journey, Erix noticed something odd. 

The mumblings of students completely died down making the bus pin drop silent. So when he started checking out the interior of the bus, he noticed that half of the students were already asleep and the other half were drowsing off.

Before he could come up with a suitable possibility that might have resulted in that, the green screen of his system popped out.

[External gas particles have been detected in host's environment]

[Effect: Sleep]

[Cleansing action activated]

[Host cannot resist effect at this level]

'What? What the heck is this?' Erix asked but the system just ignored him and continued what it was doing.

[You are feeling sleepy]

[Eventually, host will pass out]

"Wait, no…. What happened…?" Erix thought once more but his eyelid became heavy. He tried to fight it but he felt his body getting weak. He didn't manage to keep his eyes open for long and in the end, he passed out.

Besides the military men who were nose-masked, Erix was the last person to pass out on the bus.

"Seems we have many promising students this year." One of the military men chipped in.

"You're right. All the students usually pass out immediately during teleportation, even those that were used to it. But strangely some of these students were able to withstand the gas for a long while. The instructor of these kids must be pleased." 

Even though they would be using teleporters, the bus was only used to make students pass out before the actual journey begins.

The military was processing like this to not let anyone attack them. It was also a safety measure to protect all the six bases used in training aspiring soldiers.

It was so because the military was very secretive about their whereabouts. Like that, no one could know where the bases were and they were even on earth, to begin with. 

The military was indeed based on earth but that doesn't mean they didn't exploit other planets in search of resources that were rare on earth. 

With this, no one knew where the bases were, apart from the military itself.

*****

After what felt like an eternity, Erix jolted back to consciousness when he felt water splash on his face. 

'Huh?' Erix rubbed his eyes to get a clearer sight of the place. 

Right now they were in a grey open field with a lot of fog in the air. 

He couldn't see anything from afar since the fog blocked most of his sight even if he was to focus for a while.

"Where am I?" He muttered to himself as he stood up from the ground.

Thankfully, the fog wasn't too dense to block his sight on things nearby.

However, looking around his standing radius, he saw the same students that were on the bus with him moments ago. 

They all had similar looks on their faces; confusion. The puzzlement in their faces spoke louder than words.

[Host has successfully stayed out of sunlight for 5 hours]

[All stats have received a 2% boost until Host is exposed to direct sunlight]

[Cooldown time before another activation: 24 hours]

As soon as the message appeared in his eyes, Erix felt a fresh ripple of energy in him. 

His whole body turned light and nimble.

He felt like a wholly different person. 

He has never felt so light and nimble before.

'What is this new energy? I kinda feel stronger right now. If I'm not mistaken, this is roughly the strength of an E-Human. But how come?' Erix thought but he didn't have time to think long about it because the military intervened immediately.

"Listen everyone. I want all of you to walk towards your front for about five minutes until you see other students, is that clear?!

"Yes sir!!" Everyone shouted to show their motivation even though they still had my unanswered questions. 

But they were on the military's ground so they needed to act accordingly.

The students then walked up for five minutes and as the military man said, they saw a crowd of students lined up behind each other.

There were 10 consecutive lines with 10 teachers that were supposed to supervise the entrance test students were about to take. Each line was made up of 20 students.

Reflex test, agility test, and strength test. All students must pass these three tests, and at the end, they will be receiving numbers on their wristwatches, corresponding to their performance in the test.

'Hell no! Please, not again. I don't want to live through this suffering again.' Erix cried inwardly as he went behind someone to wait for his turn. 

'I think life is crueler to me than anyone else."