When Victor walked into the private room, he found Rufus already waiting inside, using a holo-screen to study. Upon noticing Victor's arrival, Rufus closed the window and turned to face him, skipping straight to the point. "I want you to help me cultivate my abilities faster."
"I don't know if I can help you right now. I'm still practicing with my ability." Victor responded truthfully.
Rufus shrugged as if he had been expecting this. "That's fine. I just want you to work with me for now. As long as you work with me, I'll answer any questions you have about our three transfer students' equipment and abilities, and I'll even answer questions about what I have heard from the outside world. In exchange, you have to give me information about the students and teachers here. What do you think?"
Victor thought for a moment. To be honest, he had already decided on working with Rufus. Not only was he incredibly skilled as a combatant, but he seemed pretty smart as well. Having the top strategist in their school on his side sounded like quite the boon. However, he really didn't know how useful Rufus' information would be.
He had quite a few questions, so on a whim he just decided to try his luck. "Alright, I'll join you if you can answer one of my questions. I have been thinking about this lately, but have you heard anything about grey liquid in our sim-pods?"
Seeing Rufus' confused expression, Victor explained with greater detail the scene of his awakening.
"Well, I have I don't know if this has anything to do with the liquid, but I heard a rumor that one of the reasons your abilities awakened so late is because some part of you was suppressed until now."
Victor was mildly surprised. He was not actually expecting an answer. "What do you mean a part of us was suppressed?"
Rufus then looked around awkwardly, and it took several rounds of questioning from Victor before he began. "Have you ever liked a girl before?"
"Yeah, two of my friends are girls." Victor answered, not really sure where this was going.
Rufus immediately face-palmed. "No. Not like that. I mean romantically."
"Romantically?" Victor repeated, even more confused.
"Yeah, like the way a mother and father show love to each other? Er, well, they are supposed to..." Rufus then trailed off.
"I mean, none of us have really met our parents..." Victor explained.
Rufus looked even more mortified as he asked another question with trepidation. "Ok. Ok. So do you know how babies are made?"
Victor's face recoiled with disgust. "Oh yeah, our teacher told us about that yesterday."
Rufus sighed in relief, glad he was able to skip over those parts. "Well, the rumor goes that those who grew up on this planet had their desire to reproduce taken away and only returned to them on the day of the awakening."
"Desire to reproduce?" Victor asked, still confused. "What does that feel like?"
The last sentence finally set Rufus off, as he started screaming, unable to handle this conversation any longer. "SHUT UP. I CAN'T TALK ABOUT THIS ANYMORE."
Hearing such an outburst, Victor really couldn't understand what went wrong in the conversation, but seeing how emotional Rufus was, Victor decided to drop the subject.
'So what I'm hearing is that the grey liquid was supposed to restore a part of us that had been suppressed? But why?'
"Ok, you fulfilled your end of the bargain. So I guess this means we'll be working together in the future." Victor spoke awkwardly, trying to change the subject.
Having finally calmed down, Rufus nodded and put on the most serious expression he could muster. "Alright, I'll give you all the free shards I have now so you can quickly train up your abilities. The faster you saturate your components, the faster you can help me."
Victor was instantly stunned. "What? How can you trust me so easily? What if I ran off with all the shards?"
Rufus then looked at Victor like he was an idiot. "Do you think I don't take precautions?"
Suddenly Victor got a system notification.
"This is a system contract," Rufus explained lightly. "These are expensive to obtain but well worth the effort. Using this template, we can make amendments as much as we want before making the contract official."
After a quick review, Victor and Rufus began to negotiate the terms of their agreement while using the contract as a template. The agreement generally indicated that both of them were obligated to come to the other's aid if necessary, and both of them had to keep each other's secrets. The contract was only valid for 1 year, and the contract could be amended at any time to reflect their current needs as long as both of them agreed.
At the bottom of the contract, both of them had agreed that Rufus would funnel all his shards to Victor until he saturated his components, and then Victor was obligated to pay back all the white shards Rufus had loaned him.
Once they mutually agreed upon the wording, the contract disappeared, binding both parties, and Victor felt a wave of stars rush into his ability core.
"That's 74 shards from me plus whatever you got." Rufus spoke.
'78 total then.' Victor thought
Rufus then continued. "I'll try to transfer more shards to you at the end of each day. If we both work together, hopefully you will saturate your components before two weeks pass."
Victor smirked in anticipation. "With the daily check-ins plus our other earnings, we could probably knock it out in less than ten days."
"Transfer students don't have a daily check-in," Rufus contradicted from the side. "That mission you guys got was made for newbies who were not yet used to the system. Those of us who have grown up with it all our lives don't get the free rewards."
As Rufus continued to speak, his expression continually turned darker. "Actually, it's a little frustrating watching the number of shards I would spend a month or more struggling to obtain be easily earned with just a couple of short minutes of reading. No wonder you guys get so much hate outside this planet. While I can't say you deserve it, it's definitely understandable."
Seeing the frustration on Rufus' face, Victor tactfully decided to keep quiet. 'Life beyond this planet seems like it will get even more difficult once this year is over. Perhaps this is all the more reason I should get as strong as fast as possible.'
"Ahhh, whatever. I knew how this game works and decided to play anyway, so I can't really complain." Rufus grumbled as he deflated.
"How do you know so much about what goes on in here?" Victor knew that Rufus was not very well off, so he wasn't exactly sure how he knew so much.
Rufus thought for a moment before he answered carefully. "You're the 49th graduating class. So that means if we really want to know what's up in here, we just have to ask any of the scattered 48 years of alumni. While they aren't common, seeking one out just takes a little bit of time and effort. I had help from some of my friends to set me up with this opportunity."
"So how much do you really know about what's coming this year?" Victor asked.
"Well, most things change every year, and there are differences from school to school. But for this first phase, one of the most consistent events that occurs in some form or another is a faction war." Rufus spoke nonchalantly.
"Faction war?" Victor repeated incredulously. "Between who?"
"The factions involved vary by school, but the most common conflict is between transfer students and domestic students."
"What? But there are only 100 of them and 1000 of us. How does that make sense?" Victor exclaimed.
Rufus raised an eyebrow at Victor's us-versus-them statement. "Let me remind you that technically I am part of the 'them' crowd. Anyway, usually what it comes down to is information asymmetry. Most of those transferring in know about the faction war and don't bother to inform the domestic students. Typically, transfer students begin recruiting others to join their faction, and as it expands and goes unchallenged, the domestic students eventually unite to resist.
"And the teachers just let this happen?" Victor exclaimed.
"Actually the teachers encourage it. Either the factions form naturally, or the teachers create some. Whether it's the transfer students or the teachers, conflict is bound to erupt across campus, and that's exactly the point. They don't want their graduate to come out soft, so they invent adversity. Didn't I tell you before? That's precisely the reason why we are brought here. Stir up trouble, raise chaos, and possibly profit." Rufus stood up and shrugged before checking the time.
"Well, this has been great, but I have to get back to studying. We don't have much time after all. At minimum we have two more months." Rufus spoke before returning to his terminal, where the hologram reappeared before his eyes.
Victor, having been overwhelmed by the latest revelation, hurriedly made his way home. Only when he reached the comfort of his abode did he relax slightly. However, that urgency never fully disappeared. With what he knew now, Victor carried a hint of dread as he looked toward the future.