Adopted Soldier

The news of Lyner being the one and only SS rank merc of Berdonia was a shock to the group, but not as much as Sayaka being an assassin. The way Lyner acted and talked was already a dead giveaway, so hearing him proclaiming himself to be a merc wasn't that surprising.

What truly surprised the group was his rank of SS. The mercs known to the public were usually B rank mercs, the most famous one was a movie star. On the other hand A rank mercs above were always unknown figures some even thought that there was no rank above B.

Seeing how the B rank merc who was a movie star, did all his stunts which were all unbelievable. They couldn't imagine what kind of skills Lyner truly had.

The guy who was usually asleep turned out to be someone unbelievable... Still now that they think about it, this could explain why he was treated like a King by the other staff members, and why he gets paid even if he sleeps all day.

...

Same with Sayaka the group wanted to do some Q and A with Lyner, but that proved difficult since once again he was already in deep sleep. Alex warned everyone present, if someone was stupid enough to get near Lyner while in that state, they might actually die.

After hearing what Alex said no one tried to wake up the sleeping dragon.

...

Lunch time was now over and everyone went back to their classrooms, except for Kei who directly went into the restroom, and hid himself in there. Kei was now sitting down on the toilet seat shivering in fear.

Awhile ago he looked like he accepted the idea of Sayaka being an assassin, as well as Lyner being the one and only SS rank merc of Berdonia. But in truth he was scared sh*tless, worse of all he was alone in this fear. Based on how everyone reacted it would seem like he was the only one scared.

In his head, that could only mean one thing. The other members had equally scary backgrounds.

"Okay I need to calm down." Kei tried to control the shivering of his body, as he started to hyperventilate. He then began to look at his phone and typed SS rank merc theories. This was something he does to calm down, when he learns a shocking news, he tries to gain more information.

This might sound counterproductive to some, but to Kei it wasn't. There were many theories about SS rank mercs, it said that each of three largest countries had one. Yet the one who was most famous was the recently appointed SS rank merc of Berdonia.

That merc even had a verse dedicated to him.

Run, run, run, cause here he comes.

Run, run, run, for the monster comes.

A Swish of his blade and your head begone

With the shot of his gun, you're all but done.

This new piece of information made Lyner seem like the boogeyman, but much scarier since he was real, and he was his club adviser. The more Kei searched online, the more Kei understood how frightening Lyner was.

Of course some of the information was bogus, but Kei knew which ones were lies, and which one were real. This was one of the skills he acquired after a long time gathering information, it was like a sixth sense of sorts.

'Sir Lyner has once raided the base of two of the ten Generals of the Granado Empire. He was even rumored to have killed the son of one of them.' At this point Kei was looking for information in the deep web. Some of the things written here about Lyner was too exaggerated to be true.

'This can't be real right? Sir Lyner was once ambushed by four S rank mercs, with one hundred B rank mercs, and even mid tier soldiers. It even says he left only one alive to tell the story. This is too much to be true...' Even though he was saying it was too much, Kei's instincts was telling him otherwise.

As he went in deeper Kei was shocked to see, that Lyner was not only involved with the top ranks of the Granado Empire, but the Southern union as well. He read that one of the three Saints, the female Saint had actually proposed to Lyner, and he fled.

That female Saint has tried numerous times to enter Berdonia to chase Lyner, but the government wouldn't allow it. Even though Berdonia and the Southern Union weren't antagonistic like the Granado Empire, they weren't friends either. The relationship between the two nations was in a neutral stance. So seeing that one of the Saints wants to mess around with an SS rank merc of another country, of course the country protected Lyner.

There was a lot more information about Lyner, but Kei wanted to check about Sayaka's family too. He looked online and all it says was Sayaka's family is a respected old family of Berdonia, that existed since its making, when Berdonia broke away from the Empire.

Obviously there was no mention about them being assassins, but there was a lot of information about them being great artisans. It was even mentioned that the masks they make were second to none.

Kei kept on digging until he found an old thread in one of the forums about famous killings. It was said here, that there was a theory that in Berdonia lives a fearsome family of assassins. This assassin family was so good that all there murders would look like accidents or suicide.

It was also said that this family produced the strongest assassin called... It was only up to there and the post doesn't continue anymore.

Kei tried to dig into it deeper but there was no more information about this so called legendary assassin family of Berdonia. All the forums and threads pertaining them don't exist, except that one old thread.

It was like they left that thread to be a warning for the others that were trying to learn more. Kei was now unsure, if he could truly look Sayaka in the face and not shiver in fear. Though for some reason it was not only fear, he was feeling, Kei was also feeling excited as well.

It was like he was part of something bigger. It was like he was the protagonist of a story, where he stumbles upon an exciting new world he wasn't suppose to be a part off, yet now he was.

Kei always dreamt of breaking away from his normal mundane life. That's also one of the reasons he liked collecting information about other people, since it felt like they were living a more exciting life than he was.

Yet now he was actually living in that exciting life, and he wants to back out? Could he even back out at this point? Kei was feeling really conflicted. He was just a normal high school boy, that was a bit better than most in collecting information. That was it, aside from that there was nothing special about him.

His scores in school weren't high nor were they low. His athletic ability was a bit better than most, and his looks were pretty much average. If you look at him in a crowd of people you would have difficulty finding him.

'This might be my only chance to join this kind of world.... What should I do?' Kei was in a crossroads in his life.