About a week had passed after that "calamity". A few after-attacks from some small monster herds took place, but Randall dispatched them all.
No exceptions.
Other than that, both him and his current companion followed a loose schedule, mainly focused on providing aid relief. This shifted slightly during the night of the tenth day.
A womanly figure slowly made its way into a house. Each movement, silent as the dirt staining her white shirt, created mini-puffs of dust.
Step by step, she approached a sleeping man.
By abusing the small gap in the roof, moonlight gently illuminated the other person in the room: A man.
Messy spikes of brown hair poked out of his nest of a head. Some fell down to his snow-like face, which had lesser traces of a smooth, pentagon-like shape.
She stared at a sleeping young man, deep in thought.
A few seconds later, she placed her hand on his shoulder, only to shake him. "Randall?"
And again. "Wake up..."
And a few more times.
… This went on multiple moments, until strange sounds emanated from the male's body.
"... Jean? What are you doing here?? It's too early…" His brown eyes struggled to stay open. The dark bags did their utmost to pull them down.
"Remember the test you asked about?" Her words, unstained by vocal appetizers, snapped Randall wide awake. "We can do it now. Follow me."
And so, he got up, and walked by her side.
Unlike before, only a handful of people hung out on the streets, all of which wore armor. Stability returned to some of the buildings' frames, after the townsfolk spent days getting them back to a relatively good condition.
Not even top shape… They couldn't afford to spare the resources, manpower, or even the time to do so. But for those who had nothing, that was more than enough.
"Randall, just to be sure, do you know how the ranks work?"
"Kind of."
"... Got it. I won't need to explain much, then."
She kept walking, and asked him to imagine a human planting a tree's seed on a hill.
"Done."
"Now, multiply that by eight."
"Done."
"Now, add a small flower field surrounding the tree-less center, and green hues covering all of them."
"... Done. Anything else?"
The woman shook her head, and stopped in front of a ruined house, by the outskirts of the town. Due to its location, the people agreed to leave it and the surrounding buildings for last.
After all, it was one of the zones that had received the most attacks.
"Here it is… Follow me," spoke the woman, before walking in.
A layer of ash coated the entire inner structure, along with a small table, whose broken remains rested, splattered across the wooden floor.
On a wooden plank, awaited a crystal sphere.
"... There it is. The 'Rank Teller'," spoke Jean, eyeing the item.
Randall didn't give much of an answer, as he looked around.
The mage sat in front of the sphere. "Randall, please sit opposite me. And stay calm."
He did as she said. "Do you have any guesses regarding my rank?"
Her brows sank slightly, albeit momentarily. "I feel like you're somewhere around Rank 3..."
"Okay." He made no follow-up statements, letting silence envelop the room once again. At least for a few moments.
Eventually, the mage broke it. "Now, gently place your hands on the crystal's sides."
His fingers, dry and coarse, slid to their sides. What used to be a pair of well-maintained hands, now only had a surface riddled with layers of weathered skin. "Like this?"
"Yep."
A magic circle appeared below the sphere. Warmth emanated by its bright, golden glow purged the cold out of the two humans' bodies.
It didn't take long for the circle to flicker, and the orb to brighten up quickly.
As light consumed the battered down room, a ray burst upwards. Shortly after, a blue layer seemingly materialized as a dome.
Inside, eight trees of fluctuating heights shot up erratically. All of their silhouettes seemingly strived to reach the "ceiling" of the magical structure.
Seven of them maintained a circular formation, with a thick, vibrant hue surrounding the trunks and crowns. However, one could see through two of them… to some extent.
Both looked upwards to the mirage. This action led to two drastically different reactions.
On the one hand, Randall's eyes almost had twinkles in them. What was definitely there though, was the gap in his open mouth, alongside his mesmerized reaction.
On the other hand, the woman had no time to admire her spell... Shock overcame her body pretty quickly.
That shock, it soon turned into horror.
In the center of the formation, sprouted a singular tree. All sorts of multi-coloured flowers grew on the somewhat transparent trunk. Its height easily eclipsed the others, outright breaking the ceiling…
"... So?"
In spite of her heart accelerating, and the panic that invaded her body as soon as she saw the growth of the valley, she remained calm.
She had to.
That didn't mean she'd answer right away, though. Her storming thoughts turned the normally mundane task of focusing into an ordeal.
The light from the magic circle flickered violently.
"Uh, Jean? Is everything good?"
"A-ah… Y-yes, I'm sorry," she replied, hurriedly.
"Good. Then, how is it looking?"
She took a deep breath, and fired her shot.
"... In order for you to understand, let me explain something," she stated, as a blue magic circle appeared on the ground.
Flames emerged from it, and created a pyramid with 7 floors, with the size shrinking significantly the higher up it went.
"We measure someone's fighting capabilities through the Tree Valley, a mirage of someone's past, present and future. It tells us the current condition of an individual, along with their potential, through a tree's material shape and a mirage of it, respectively."
She paused, and saw Randall nodding.
Jean pointed at the pyramid, and spoke. "At the bottom of this pyramid is the weakest grade, which we call Grade 7. By this point, the trees are pretty small, but they do exist."
She looked at every floor of the pyramid, and kept on. "Usually, one grows from Grade 7 to whatever grade their potential allows them to reach, with the absolute limit being Grade 1. For example, I'm currently a Grade… 4."
Then, her gaze returned to Randall's eyes, along with some slight traces of fear.
"B-but you… You are an anomaly."
"Ah? Why?"
And she took a deep breath, knowing that the way she handled this would potentially decide her immediate fate.
"According to the Teller... Seven of the eight trees are practically at the pinnacle. They'd fluctuate constantly, but their vague silhouettes remained the same. All of them are tall enough to qualify for Grade 1..."
"I see," he replied, before putting a hand on his chin. "What about the last one?"
She flinched, and forced herself to calm down.
A breath in. Another out.
"The last one… I-it pierced the ceiling."
"... Is that a bad thing?" He looked straight at her eyes.
"... I'm not sure. No one ever had the chance to analyze the power of someone over Grade 1, but... it'd probably look like that."
"Huh… I see." They weren't lying when they said that, it seems…" he muttered to himself, as he touched his body, almost excited.
"What...?" She just looked at him, puzzled and baffled. Both the magic circle and the pyramid disappeared, alongside the illusion of the valley.
His body sprang up. "I guess that means I can learn magic..."
Those words allowed a grin to break the otherwise composed face he maintained.
She couldn't help but keep an eye on the transmigrator's satisfied expression. Her heart slowly but surely calmed down.
They both stayed there for a few moments. Only for Jean to look at the crystal sphere, and grab it. "We should hand over the Rank Teller soon…"
"Right, we should get going. The town won't fix itself, after all," stated Randall. His shining figure strode over to the exit point. Not with the halo of confidence he had on his first day, but... For now, he still had light in his heart.
And so, they left the building.
"Hey, Jean."
"Yes?..."
"Don't treat me differently over this, will you?"
"... I-I won't."
The sunlight washed over them, reminding the outside world of the ashes that accumulated on their bodies.
They headed together to the budding Town Hall, with Jean feeling mildly off-settled all the way, and split up after each of them got a task.