Thwack!

"Come now, come now dodge!"

Swoosh!

Grasping the hilt of the wooden sword, Shin swiftly moves to parry the descending slash. However, just before his sword made contact, he disappeared from view.

Barely a split second and he reappeared again; this time his sword was behind the downwards slash and aimed at the head adorned with slicked-back silver hair.

Unfortunately the strike missed completely. Gin was effortless in his evasion, simply twirling around the strike and appearing behind Shin's back.

"Not bad; you have made great improvements with your 'Veil Step,' as you've called it." Gin commented on Shin's performance, still wearing a happy smile.

Shin, on the other hand, looked drenched. His hair was stuck to his face, and the bruises on his arms and hands were painful reminders of his progress thus far.

A week has passed since Shin undertook the Captain's training course. And each day was a hellish routine from morning till evening.

His warm-up consisted of 100 individual push-ups, pull-ups, and squats. Thereafter, he had to jog around the entire perimeter of Outpost 0, wearing weights of over 80 kg.

And after a 10-minute rest, he would be thrown into combat training, which covered judo, boxing, and swordplay against his menacing Captain. Finally, he would head to the gun range to practice his marksmanship, with each missed mark resulting in 10 more push-ups.

The evening was the worst part of the entire routine. Shin had to read and memorize entire passages related to the supernatural. This meant the information of certain entities, how to defeat them, and even some miscellaneous entries, such as Charm recipes, that spanned hundreds of ingredients.

And the punishment for failing a quiz:

Shin would get thrown outside during the Waking Hour and made to survive its duration.

I swear, at least one hit! Just one hit against that smug face. He silently cursed. Despite the torturous week he had, Shin still managed to greatly improve himself. He even went as far as creating a combat style to complement his new ability.

Shin named it the 'Veil Step.' Even though it was a weakened version of the 'Wanderer' charm, he still enjoyed the benefits. Instead of the 10 seconds of 'invisibility' the charm gave, his weakened version allowed him only 3 seconds.

…

A few days have passed, and Melissa had still not gone to school. Her friends became worried, messaging her every hour trying to figure out what's wrong.

When she played that ritual game, she didn't believe the rumors at first, but after that day strange things began to occur.

First her short-haired friend, Min, became deathly ill. Thereafter, all sorts of unfortunate events happened around her, like a bus running a red light and nearly running over pedestrians in front of her or a brick falling from an apartment building just barely missing her.

But each time one of these misfortunate events happened, she would see a shadowy figure looming, silently watching her from afar.

The fear of uncertainty had gotten to her. That's why she decided to stay home and hopefully prevent any more bad things from happening.

"Please go away." She softly whimpered, hiding under her blankets.

…

Thwack! Tack! Swoosh!

Still engaged in their spar, Shin began to press his advantage. He would constantly switch between feints and hits while still trying to find a slight opening in Gin's defenses.

But Gin was still unperturbed by the assault; for each strike that Shin would feint, he would immediately capitalize on it by performing a swift counter by tapping Shin's hand.

Shin knew perfectly well that he was currently unable to do anything against his Captain, but he was still going to give it his all.

Jumping a few steps back, he then brought the wooden sword up to his chin. Positioning it like a javelin, with its tip aimed straight at Gin. Letting out a heavy exhale, he planted his left foot forward and began a quick charge.

Approaching his Captain, he immediately cocked his sword arm and threw the wooden sword straight at Gin.

Gin was surprised at this action; he looked at the approaching sword as his silver eyebrows raised. Effortlessly parrying the sword in midair, he turned his attention towards Shin, but he was nowhere to be seen.

Immediately he returned his gaze back to the spinning sword.

Appearing out of the veil, Shin grabbed the sword and went straight for a sideways slash.

Thwack!

Dammit!

The spar had finally ended. Shin was left with a sword strike against the head. And Gin, although unharmed, had a small cut on his shirt from the sneaky slash Shin performed.

"Not bad, you almost had me. Almost." Gin said as a smirk blossomed on his face.

Rubbing his head, Shin quickly retorted. "You promised if I can hit you, you'd tell me about the Path knowledge."

Looking down at the small cut on his shirt, Gin sighed as he replied, "Fine."

Taking a seat at the end of the sparring mat, Shin began to greedily drain the bottle of water. He was going to savor this impromptu break before his Captain would start the next round of torture.

"Relax, after today the training will be put on pause for a while."

Hearing his Captain's words, Shin's eyes immediately widened. The twinkle of happiness finally returned.

Seeing him all giddy, Gin quickly hurled an Essence Pearl at him. Sensing the incoming projectile, Shin grabbed it and quickly began infusing the essence as if it was part of the routine.

Over the past week, through multiple trials, Shin discovered that each time he used his ability to enter the wanderer's veil, it would drain spirituality from deep inside him. Not his own spirituality, but that of whatever caused his hand to mutate into a mouth.

Thus, after every sparring session, he had to refill the drained spirituality. But it was not all bad; the more essence he absorbed, the more spirituality his own body developed.

"Have I ever told you the story of the cursed lamp?"

Seeing his Captain speak in a solemn tone, Shin quietly shook his head.

"In a time long passed, a young street urchin boy picked up a simple golden lamp. When he held this lamp, his first thought was the excitement of finally affording a warm meal once he sold it."

"However, it seemed that the boy truly didn't know what he had obtained."

"When he used his dirty clothes to wipe the dirt off the golden lamp, he actually awoke the sleeping spirit inside. And what this spirit offered him was something beyond his wildest dreams."

When he saw his Captain paused, Shin couldn't help but ask, "What did it offer him, Sir?"

"The power to wish for anything he desired." Gin simply responded.