Wardogs

Chapter 39

Chapter 39

"Of course... Or you’re already used to the habit of waiting in front of my door and you just decided to use this place as a door also to block my movement," Gustav said with a contemplative look.

"Now you make me sound like a stalker..." Angy said while looking down.

"Yes you are a stalker," Gustav answered bluntly.

Angy’s face looked more down upon hearing that.

"Haha, I’m just messing with you," Gustav laughed lightly and proceeded to walk forward.

"Gustav you meanie," Angy voiced out while pouting and stomping her feet on the floor.

"You coming?" Gustav said while turning around to stare at her.

"Huh? Where are we going?" She asked while walking towards Gustav in front.

"Sightseeing... It’s cool if you don’t wanna come, it won’t do you any good to be seen with trash," Gustav turned around to keep walking.

"Trash? What’s that? I don’t care about that? Who said I don’t wanna come...?

I’m coming with you," She increased her pace and caught up with Gustav.

Gustav just smirked and kept walking, "Alright then let’s go,"

----

Gustav arrived back in his room after at night around pm.

He had spent more than six hours with Angy.

They walked around the hotel visiting different places floor by floor.

Where they spent a lot of time was in an arcade park where games were played.

Gustav was surprised to see so many fun games and gadgets.

He especially liked the virtual reality games a lot where he only had to use his mind to play.

There were quite a lot of them but the one he liked the most was one where he was piloting a spacecraft.

He had always wanted to go to space so the feeling of being completely immersed in the game which was like going to space for real, was second to none for him.

He learned how to play and even competed with some people there.

Most of them kept asking if he was actually a beginner like he said he was due to the way he learned fast.

"I guess it’s not as boring as I expected it to be... Hopefully, tomorrow’s tour brings some fun like this too," Gustav muttered while lying on his bed.

When he arrived a few moments ago, the room became silent. His roommates didn’t have the guts to converse normally in his presence.

Gustav wasn’t bothered by this. In fact, he was hoping it continued this way for the next three days. The silence wasn’t a bad thing to him.

- Friend Request

- Friend Request

- Friend Request

The next morning students woke very early and prepared themselves for the exchange event.

The students were grouped into hundreds. About eight students from every school were placed in a group.

Students from other schools were given the chance to mingle with one another this way.

They were put in busses according to their groups.

According to Atrihea city high school principal, the groups would be visiting different places in the city so there won’t be a crowd in a particular location.

Which meant, when group A was visiting the heart of the city, group B would be in another location at that moment. Same with other groups also.

At the end of the day, they would all visit the same places but at different times.

Gustav was placed in a group with some mixed-bloods from his class who mostly glared at him with contempt, mixed with wariness.

Their group was headed for a place known as Site # at the coast of the city.

There were five girls from his class in the group. The remaining three were boys.

Only two of the seven students didn’t glare at him in a weird manner but the same couldn’t be said for the rest.

One of them in particular couldn’t look him in the eyes. She would occasionally turn to look at him then turn her face away in embarrassment.

’Why am I placed in the same group with him?’ She bit her lower lip in frustration as she wondered.

This was Yuhiko, the same girl that received a beating from Gustav in the dojo.

When Gustav entered the bus with these students, he didn’t even take a single glance at anyone of them.

"No wonder the air smells foul, it stinks of trash!" One of the girls sitting beside Yuhiko voiced while glaring at Gustav.

"Right Yuhiko?" She asked Yuhiko who was absent-minded.

"Hey, Yuhiko," She called out again after noticing the absent-minded look on Yuhiko’s face.

"I said, doesn’t it reek of trash here?" She asked again while turning to the side to stare at Gustav who ignored her jaunts.

Yuhiko heard that and her eyes slightly widened as she turned her face to stare at Gustav.

Gustav turned his head to stare at her also. His expression was brimming with extreme aloofness as he made eye contact with Yuhiko.

’I guess this world will never lack idiots... What will you say Yuhiko? How will you respond?’

Gustav leaned his arm against the window side and placed his jaw on his fist as a small smirk formed on his face.

Yuhiko quickly turned her face around in embarrassment and stared at the person sitting beside her.

"Shut up b***h!" Yuhiko shouted out and gave her a slap across her cheek.

Pah!

Everyone was shocked at the sudden development. What was the reason for Yuhiko’s extreme reaction?

Even Gustav hadn’t expected that she was going to react that way.

"Wh-y di-d yo-u sl-ap me?" The girl held her face and voiced out with a look of pain and confusion

"You can see that we’re in a public place, in another city entirely, we’re supposed to be united... Learn to have manners," Yuhiko said with a look of Justice.

The students within the bus stared at her saint-like expression with a look of understanding.

The Echelon Academy Students in the bus too knew Yuhiko for her Saint like attitude so they also felt it was understandable.

’She’s standing up for the trash even though he had the guts to ask her out in the past,’ this was their thought process.

Gustav already knew what the situation looked like but he wasn’t bothered.

He only laughed internally.

The students from other schools started wondering why the girl referred to one of their own as trash in the first place.

A girl with white hair walked over to Gustav’s position and sat beside him.

’Hmm?’ Gustav noticed that she was the same girl that sat beside him during their trip to Atrihea city.

"Hello," She greeted Gustav in a low tone.

Gustav turned to stare at her for a few seconds before turning back to face the window.

"What do you want?" Gustav questioned with a look of suspicion.

He felt it wasn’t a coincidence for them to sit together twice especially when she was seated in another part of the bus earlier.

Also, he felt that anyone from his class who tried initiating a conversation with him would have some kind of ulterior motive. Another thing was she was also kind of popular in class but she was the type that always refrained from putting her nose in other people’s business. From what Gustav remembered, she was easy-going but also ignorant.

He didn’t have any reason to dislike her but he also didn’t have any reason to like her.

"I just wanna be friends," She said in a friendly manner.

"I’m Matilda," She said while stretching out her hand towards Gustav in a bid to shake him.

"I’m... Not interested," Gustav said without turning to even look at her.

Matilda had to drop her hand back down before she started speaking again.

"Isn’t this city nice... There are a lot of things here that aren’t present in ours," She spoke with a smile while looking through the window.

The bus was passed through different routes and they had streaked past several flying structures in the process. Some mechanical-looking birds also flew across the air in some parts of the city.

Some trees planted around had purple, red, white and several other colors of leaves causing the city to look naturally colorful.

Gustav was fond of nature too so her words kind of caught his attention but he still decided not to reply to her.

"The combination of nature and technology is beauty at its very peak," She said with glittering eyes while looking through the window.

"You’re starting to sound like a buzzing mosquito, What exactly do you want?" Gustav asked with a look of displeasure.

"Ouch, that’s a bit mean," She said with a wry smile and looked at Gustav’s face hoping for some kind of reaction but to her disappointment, Gustav still had the look of aloofness on his face.

"I just want to be your friend," She said with a pleading look.

"You’ve been attending Echelon Academy for years, it’s a bit too late to try and become my friend... What are you aiming to achieve by being the friend of trash?’ Gustav turned around to face her and stared into her eyes after he threw his question at her.

The look he gave made her flinch back a little,

- Site #

- Site #

- Site #

’He has truly changed... I can’t find a single bit of cowardice in his eyes, look or manner of speaking,’ Matilda was mesmerized by the way he stared at her without breaking eye contact.

"I think we both know that you’re not trash... At least not anymore," She said while turning her face away.

Gustav stared at her suspiciously for a few more seconds before turning to face the window again.

"I don’t know what you’re talking about..." Gustav said.

"So you’re going to keep playing dumb eh?" Maltida asked.

Gustav’s suspiciousness towards her was raised by a notch again.

"So you’re also gonna keep playing dumb by not telling me your motive for approaching me?" Gustav also questioned her.

His face was still looking aloof and calm even though he was suspicious towards her.

Yuhiko had been stealing glances at Gustav’s seat which was on the left side and two rows behind.

’Why would Maltida approach him? Why are they talking to each other? What are they talking about?’ Yuhiko kept turning her face towards the back to steal glances at them occasionally.

The girl beside her had noticed this her weird behavior but was scared of questioning her due to what happened earlier.

She was suspicious about everything now. The way Yuhiko acted with her due to Gustav and when she also noticed Maltida conversing with Gustav.

Gustav kept ignoring Matilda during their journey to site #

-Fifteen minutes later

They had arrived at the coast of the city several minutes ago.

This was also the first time Gustav was seeing the sea.

He stared at the large body of blue waves that extended for miles with an astonished look.

He had only read about it and seen pictures.

Site # was located a few miles forward and very close to the sea.

To everyone’s surprise, Site # was not just a place, it was structure.

They could already see a large Greyish looking spacecraft before they arrived there.

It looked like a divine entity with the way it stood proudly in position. Although it was looking aged, it still had a kind of majestic feel to it.

It was shaped to look like the body of a frog without a head and limbs but the number of technological gadgets placed on different parts made it look menacing.

It was as large as thirty soccer fields placed together. It would be impossible for them to visit every part of it if there weren’t teleportation circles inside that could assist them with easy travels.

This particular location was where one of the very first spacecraft of the Slarkovs landed.

It wasn’t an ordinary spacecraft like the rest.

It was the spacecraft that was used by the chief of Slarkovs which was why a lot of historical value was placed on it.

It had stopped functioning for thousands of years but it was seen as a relic of old.

This spacecraft was one of Atrihea’s city’s pride and joy.

The city was actually founded by the chief of the Slarkovs.

When the students were being shown different places inside the ship, they were also being told this information by the guide.

Gustav now understood why he had been seeing more mixed-bloods that had looks similar to that of Slarkovs within the hotel.

Just like Plankton city, the population of humans and Slarkovs had also thinned out but the mixed-bloods here had looks similar to Slarkovs than those in Plankton city.

In Plankton city you could hardly find a mixed-blood that had any form of resemblance with Slarkovs. Angy was a rare case. It would be hard to find others like that.

Gustav remembered seeing mixed-bloods with tentacled beards. Some with heads shaped like the mouth of a fish and others with horns like Angy.

All these traits came from the DNA of Slarkovs.

The guide took them to the lodging room which was larger than the entire seventh floor Gustav lived in back in Plankton city.

After they visited the lodging rooms he took them to the kitchen. A lot of them were surprised.

’The spacecraft has a kitchen?’

The guide noticed the look of confusion on the Student’s face and explained.

"Travelling through space isn’t a few hours or one-day journey. Depending on the distance it could take months or even years!"

"Travelling from the earth right now with the fastest spacecraft, to where the Slarkovs planet used to be located would take two to three months... Back then when spacecraft weren’t as fast, it took the Slarkovs three years of journeying through space before they got to earth," The guide added.

It just so happened that the Slarkovs planet was more than three galaxies away. Which meant they traveled millions of light-years before getting to earth.

Gustav was surprised that it took that long and yet Earth was said to be the closest habitable planet for the Slarkovs. What if the earth wasn’t habitable and they had to journey farther?

Now he understood why having a kitchen within the spacecraft was necessary even though it still surprised him.

They moved towards the engine room next.

The engine room was also pretty large.

Even with Gustav’s knowledge of technologies, there were still some things that he had never come across.

Different build-ups were connected to one another.

A cylindrical-shaped red device hung in the middle of them all. Also, they could see large square-shaped appliances that were interconnected by large wires thicker than the bodies of two human beings placed together.

"Hypothroblastic megahunter!"

"Magnetic antimatter distributor!"

Gustav kept muttering some of the items that he could recognize.

He was taking note of the way these items were used together in the engine room.