Chapter 22

Chapter 22

The recruitment targets, prioritized from No.1 to No.10, were decided for tomorrow’s group class.

The No.1 target was ‘Jamie Victoria’.

She was a student aspiring for Curses and had excellent grades. Having a cheerful personality and the ability to take the initiative were favorable factors too.

No.2 was ‘Claudia Menzies’.

She was the ideal talent who was mainly good at hemomancy and pretty good at poisonous alchemy. If they could recruit her, things would be comfortable throughout the 1st semester.

Other than her, they’ve created a list up to 10th place.

“Even if we can’t recruit Jamie or Claudia, it’s important to let go of them and move on to the next students quickly. Ah! When recruiting, I’m going to appeal that you, the special admission No.1, is in my group. Would that be okay with you?”

“Yeah. It’s okay.”

The two lay down on the bed after making a lot of plans.

Simon was feeling somewhat proud. 

‘Would there be any other group that prepared this strategy like us?’

He was inwardly looking forward to their class tomorrow.

* * *

The next morning,

A new week at Kizen had begun.

When Simon entered the lecture room for the first period, Beginner Dark magic, it was completely different from last week, where it was deadly silent. Now people were babbling with the ones they knew.

When Simon sat quietly and pulled out his textbook, Rick placed his hand on Simon’s shoulder.

“Just came back from talking to Jamie!! I guess I’m done making everyone remember my face.”

Simon gave a look of admiration.

“You’re really good at this.”

“Hehe. Managing personal connections is essential for business. This was originally my job.”

Just then, footsteps were heard outside the lecture room. The students ran and sat on their seats. 

It was finally the moment where they’d find out who the professor in charge of Class A was.

“Please be Bahil!”

Muttered Rick. Simon also thought that it would be nice if Aaron of Summoning became the professor in charge of Class A.

Other than him, Hong Feng from Combat Magic was fine, and Eric seemed like he could teach dark magic in a kind and caring way.

In the moment when the door opened…

“Ah…!”

Everyone’s jaw dropped.

“Y-You gotta be kidding me, right?”

Rick’s eyes were shaking too, as if there was an earthquake.

The professor broke through the silence and stood in front of the platform.

A cold and sharp impression, short hair giving a highly restrained feeling, and charismatic purple eyes.

Kizen’s deputy president and a person who held the title of vice-president.

“I’m Jane Olivia.”

She was Kizen’s second-in-command.

“I have the title of vice-president, but during class, you can freely address me as Professor.”

The closest confidant of Nefthis, and a big shot who wielded the power of Kizen on her behalf.

She was close to the pinnacle when compared to the professors that they’d seen.

“……Why is that person in the 1st year’s class?”

Silently muttered Rick.

As he said, she didn’t usually teach students by herself as she was the deputy president, and even if she did, it was mostly the 3rd year classes.

“Well… as you go through life, you may encounter unexpected situations, Rick Hayward.”

Rick got startled and stiffened, as if he had seen a frightening image.

‘H-How does she know my name?’

The back of Rick’s head was drenched in a cold sweat. Jane turned her head to look at the students.

“I’ll be in charge of Class A’s Beginner Dark Magic class for one semester. As Rick mentioned earlier, I’ve only been in charge of 3rd-year classes, so……”

Her eyes narrowed.

“I want you to give enough effort so I won’t feel much difference in level.”

The sound of students gulping was heard all over the place.

Actually, it was great luck to attend a class of Kizen’s vice president, but they couldn’t just smile. Not with the rumors about her.

Jane was the person most suited to the slang term commonly used among students of ‘Kizen-ish’. 

She was famous for daringly expelling students from school if they didn’t show any talent or if she didn’t like their attitude.

Even the powerhouse of Kizen, the 3rd years, couldn’t avoid the blade of expulsion, so it was understandable that the Class A students were already in fear.

“Then, I’ll be beginning the class.”

Through the silence, Jane opened her mouth.

“As everyone probably knows, Beginner Dark Magic is a class that oversees eight subjects and supplements the basics of Necromancers that those subjects cannot teach.”

As she signaled, the assistants took up a thick bundle of papers and handed them out to the students.

“Before that, you must know what your skill levels are in the eight subjects.”

Simon and Rick’s shoulders trembled.

A test for all subjects from the first class! It was a completely unexpected situation.

“The test duration is 22 minutes per subject. We’ll first take four subjects, then take a 4-minute break to take the remaining four subjects in succession. If I catch someone cheating, I’ll remember the name and expel the student from school when the student protection period ends.”

They didn’t even have time to take a breather.

Jane, who had simply put the students under pressure, declared with her arms crossed,

“Then, we’ll begin the test.”

* * *

It was the first-ever school test for Simon.

At the same time, it was one of the toughest and most painful three hours in his entire life.

Of course, it was more mentally painful than physically exhausting.

[7. After the paralysis curse was cast, the target’s body showed symptoms of muscular stiffness and myotonia before becoming petrified 20 minutes later. Assuming that the target’s internal mana loss rate is 0, which of the following is the correct jet-black value to add to the target’s curse resistance and paralysis magic circle?]

‘……I can’t solve it at all.’

The black parts are letters, and the white ones are paper. It was also clearly written in a continental language. However, Simon couldn’t understand the questions at all.

He was frustrated.

It must’ve been a solvable problem, but the situation where he had to sit spacing out while other students were moving their quills was frustrating.

A feeling of helplessness that he had never felt took over his body.

It was arrogant to think that he would adapt to Kizen well just because things had been going well recently or he had acquired his father’s undead Legion.

‘Yeah, this is the reality.’

As he hadn’t done any prior learning, he had to work harder than others.

Simon didn’t give up and became more desperate as he faced problems beyond his reach.

The three hours passed, feeling like an eternity.

“Euuuu.”

“It’s so hard.”

After the tests were all over, the expressions of the other students weren’t that good either.

Rick turned his head as he passed his test paper to the student behind him.

“How was it, Simon?”

Simon put on a bitter smile.

“………I guess I really have to study hard.”

“Same.”

After retrieving all the papers, Jane spoke, looking at the students.

“Good job with the test. Enjoy your lunch, and I’ll see you in two hours.”

“Thank you!”

No matter how terrible their moods were, their body standing up when hearing the word ‘lunch’ was the same.

As the Class A students ebbed away from the lecture room…

“Let us begin.”

“Yes!”

Jane and her assistants’ work had just begun. They divided and distributed the test papers, scoring in their own seats.

Among them, Jane was the absolute fastest.

Her hands were moving so fast that it couldn’t be seen with the naked eye. Her quill went all the way down and straight to the next page.

“……”

But at some point, a girl’s face appeared next to Jane’s desk.

She was placing her cheeks on the edge of the desk and blinking big blue eyes.

“……You must be busy, why did you come here, Nefthis?”

Hearing Jane’s cold question, the girl smiled innocently and said,

“To play!”

“……”

Jane ignored her and went back to scoring the papers.

As Nefthis got annoyed, she played pranks, grabbing onto the desk, and waving her legs. Jane struck Nefthis on the top of her head with the edge of her hand, unable to take it anymore.

“Ouch!”

“Please don’t disturb.”

“Waaaaaaah! You always hit me, Janeee!”

Holding the crown of her head, she burst into tears, ran, and grabbed the hem of a nearby assistant’s robe.

At the sudden appearance of the ruler of Kizen, the color of the assistant’s face also turned white.

“Phew.’

Jane sighed.

“Please don’t bother my poor subordinates and come this way.”

“No! I don’t wanna! You’re gonna hit me again if I go!”

“Hurry up.”

As Jane spoke coldly, Nefthis approached, pouting her lips.

“Everyone, please go to the empty lecture room next to this and finish scoring.”

“Yes!”

As if waiting for it, the assistants took the test papers and evacuated out of the lecture room in a hurry.

Nefthis put tension on her eyes and inflated her cheeks. 

“Jane! I think you’re too cold towards me these days!”

“I’m the same as usual…”

“Hmph. You really have changed! When I picked you up from the slums, you were an innocent child holding my hand tightly with frightened eyes while trembling!”

“This is what happened to that innocent child suffering from overwork and work-related stress 24/7.”

Jane told her flat and passed half of the test papers to Nefthis. She blinked her eyes.

“Hm? What’s this?”

“What do you mean by what? While you’re here, help me score these papers rather than disturbing me.”

“……”

After grasping the situation too late, Nefthis stepped back while laughing. She turned her back to try to run, but Jane, who moved faster, grabbed Nefthis and wrapped her arm around Nefthis’ waist.

“Uwaaah! No! Let me go! I don’t wanna work!”

Jane calmed down the struggling Nefthis with one more strike to her head, then made her sit properly and handed her the test papers and a quill.

“Jane, do you know that this is child abuse and violation of the labor law?”

“Who the hell is the damn child here? Stop complaining and do it.

“……Okay.”

And for a while, there was only the sound of the quill moving in silence. Jane, who had finished five test papers at once, glanced at Nefthis.

Nefthis, scoring the test paper with her cheeks inflating, wrote ‘Dumb’ on the wrong question.

“What are you doing? Please stop fooling around.”

Once again, a merciless attack on the head was made.

Nefthis covered where she was hit with both hands and teared up.

“Buuuut he’s actually dumb! He got the Question.2 component problem on Poisonous Alchemy correct but made a mistake on the comparison problem right beneath it!”

“Hm.”

Jane looked at the problem and smiled.

“He solved Question 2 using a formula, and Question 3 was solved with only common sense, without passing it through the brain. It’s a common mistake students make.”

“What a dumb! What’s his name?”

Nefthis turned over the paper and looked at the front side.

“Hm?”

The name was hidden.

“It’s a blind evaluation. If you grade by looking at the name, it might become biased.”

“………You’re going this far for just a test? How thorough.”

“Even if it’s just a test, there are a lot of interesting specimens.”

Jane pulled out a sheet of paper from which she had finished scoring.

“And this is the opposite of what you graded, Nefthis.”

“What is it?”

“From Question 1 to Question 15, they got all the basic questions wrong, which are basically free points. However.”

She turned over the test paper.

“Question 20. He challenged the most difficult problem.”

Question 20 on the last page.

The whole test paper was filled with formulas that could make someone dizzy. 

“What are all these?”

“Ancient runes of the Mechanics of Jet-Black, formulas of an instant skeleton from Summoning, and exhaust calculation method from Curses.”

“……Don’t tell me?”

“Yes. This student hasn’t prepared any lessons in advance. He deduced the answer by carefully combining only the contents of last week’s class.”

Nefthis read through the test paper.

“What? He used a summoning formula when it’s a problem that requires calculating the amount of jet-black? So he solved it by assuming that the resistance is proportional to the jet-black loss rate.”

“Yeah.”

“So did he get it right?”

“Using the Theron formula, the answer is 1,200,000.”

“Then what answer did this student write?”

“1,200,146.”

Jane’s expression became frighteningly serious.

“It wasn’t the answer that was intended by the question, but he gave an answer that was closer to the correct answer.”

Nefthis glanced at the test paper.

She could see that the strict Jane had marked Question 20 correct.

“Nefthis, there’s something I want to ask.”

“What is it?”

“Why did you assign me to the 1st year’s class? And…”

She tore the white paper covering the student’s name.

[Simon Polentia]

“In Class A, where is this boy?”

Nefthis rested her chin on both hands and smiled softly.

“Hehe. I don’t really understand what you’re talking about.”

Jane sighed inwardly.

‘……You’re like a 300-year-old fox after all.’

——