Everyone scattered about choosing their partners, each senior walking over to choose the partners they would enjoy racing with while Cheryl stood where he was, still slightly confused on the reason for the race.
'What would we gain from this experience? How will it make us stronger? Why don't we go straight to training and then test our strength as we grow stronger?' He thought to himself quietly.
A hand placement on his shoulder startled him out of his thoughts, causing him to panic a bit before settling down.
"Damn, don't do that again." He brushed the hand off before staring at who it was.
"Sorry about that, I saw you standing here alone, lost in thought. So I decided to walk over and have a conversation with you, so tell me, you're a junior right?." He asked first, stretching his hands forward for a handshake after his speech.
"Yeah I am, I'm sorry as well. I'm not allowed to speak like that to a senior, or I'll have myself punished." He answered, taking the hand and shaking it with both hands.
"It's not a problem, as long as you apologise for it, then everything is fine." He answered back, pulling his hand away after the shake.
"To cut things short, I want to race you and become your race partner every early morning practice." He came out plainly.
Cheryl hadn't quite taken in the looks of the individual standing before him. He was still too busy, lost in his own world of thoughts, to realise who stood before him.
"Ohh, you…want to race me." Cheryl pointed back at himself in question.
He stared at the seniors physique, and he looked very athletic, with a slim build. A strong frame that seemed like he could climb a mountain and still feel energetic, and lastly, a height that slightly intimidated Cheryl.
With that height, he could guess his jump height was twice as much as him, within eleven or twelve feet from the ground.
"Yes I do. You seem like you would need help in this, and you also look like the perfect student to train. With your body fit, you can synchronise with your ability more fluently than ever. You would understand when you start training with me."
'If I was to race this guy head on, I'm losing without even him even trying to beat me, but he seems serious about his words of affirmation. If I do happen to train with him and attain this build, it might just skyrocket my ability to D tier as he said.'
'Right now, this race is meaningless as the ending has already been decided, but the training will be worth it. I can notice that commitment in his eyes. He looks good enough if I'm to be honest.'
Being an overthinker due to his loneliness, Cheryl had learnt to evaluate people based on perception, and though his evaluations weren't one hundred per cent correct, it hardly ever failed him
Most of the time, he used it to overcome situations in his family. From his multiple interactions with them, he could build scenarios in his head and guess their next line of speech or action without them even acting it out yet.
"I accept your offer, I hope we work together efficiently and produce meaningful results." Cheryl answered back after careful consideration.
The senior chuckled at Cheryl's response, which startled Cheryl for a second.
"I see you have potential. You just need proper guidance. Stick with me, and you'll grow every day unless there's something else on my schedule." The senior said confidently.
Cheryl smirked at his words, seeing his energetic nature.
"Well, since we'll be working together. You might as well know my name to avoid you calling me training senior when we're not here," he teased, hoping Cheryl would understand the joke.
Luckily for him, Cheryl wasn't the dull type to not appreciate a joke. No matter how boring it sounded, he always laughed to make the person feel better.
"My name is Kaelen Drax, but you can just call me Drax or senior Drax," he chuckled at the last part.
"I prefer just Drax. It sounds less mid. As your junior, I will have to introduce myself to show respect, so my name is Cheryl." He spoke out clearly, without stuttering a single word.
"Cheryl, no surname? Or you prefer not to say for some reason?. I personally don't mind, Cheryl sounds fine." He acknowledged.
Cheryl felt a bit of warmth in his chest for the acknowledgement. So far, little to no one had actually said something nice about his name. It's usually called too female or just weird.
Though he wasn't the type to take those kinds of stuff to heart but they never left his mind. But for the first time, someone actually said something else besides the ordinary he was used to hearing.
"Well, thank you. For me, Drax sounds extremely cool, like a final end boss." He chuckled, returning the act of kindness.
"Yeah!, finally someone who gets it. I've always felt that way anytime I pronounced my name, but no one else ever seemed to understand it, even my classmates" he said with slight happiness in his voice.
They almost started bonding when the instructor reminded them of their pending training.
"Right, we have to race, then we go over to physical training before we head for classes. For you guys, it will probably be an introduction and showing you all around as new interns, so you could get to know the school more." He explained as they went over to the line.
Every other student with their partners soon assembled at the front line for the next part of the morning training.
"Considering the number of students here, if we start one by one, then we won't go anywhere today, and the day will pass by without any of us achieving anything reasonable." He coughed before continuing.
"So to make things easier for everyone, so we can all go to our various needed locations after this. We'll go twenty by twenty, each team with forty students." He explained the procedure to the students.
"So I need twenty teams to line up at the front here and wait for my signal to start their race, and we continue like that until everyone is done with the race."
The first twenty teams set themselves at the front line as assigned, with Cheryl's team being one of them.
"Just do your best, I'll evaluate you from this race for our training, so don't hold back. Give me your all." He advised.
Cheryl nodded, bending low to set himself for the race.
'Give my all,' he smiled outwardly, facing the ground.