Chapter 16 16: School Politics

Ah, what a delightful morning, Rio thought as he sipped his morning coffee in the hallways of the Academy. The weekends journey were over, he didn't stay too long on the capital as he got bored at some point.

He didn't have to worry much about the weekdays either, ironically, the weekdays felt more of a break than the weekends. While Rio was walking the hallways, he noticed a familiar sillhoute.

He approached the person and tapped their shoulders. Rio didn't know why he did that, but it seemed fun to do.

"Ee!" Samantha yelped as she turned her back in suprise, she looked at the person that suprised her as she continued with a worried tone, "Do you find joy in inciting surpise over me, Mr Rio?"

"Maybe," Rio replied as he chuckled, he continued, "I just wanted to walk with you."

"You're quite straight-forward, Mr Rio." Samantha said in response with a smile on her face, invites like these were pretty common when one was a noble, she continued. "How was your weekend, Mr Rio?"

"It was quite hectic, I've gone to a border city." Rio answered as he followed Samantha, as they walk together like blooming flowers in the hallways.

"Oh, what border city? I might be familiar with them!" Samantha asked with a tinge of curiousity, she knew many cities due to her upbringing. It helped, that she loved beautiful sceneries the most.

"Hm, it's called Encantia City." Rio answered with a nod, the city was not that prominent to the point everybody knows it, but it had a semblance of fame. That was already good enough for a city amongst thousand others.

"Oh, did you visit the Valley of Encantia then, Mr Rio?" Samantha asked as her eyes turned into glowing stars, filled with fascination.

"Indeed, you know of it?" Rio asked in response as he sipped his morning coffee. Samantha's glowing curiousity was quite cute, it also helped that she was quite a noble beauty.

"The valley in which hills and and trees so green, and a pool of water below with absolute purity, and als—" Samantha said, before she another voice intervene amidst her loud voice.

"Quiet down, lover birds." A fat man said as he walked forward, he had fancy clothes and blonde hair.

Samantha felt embarassed after hearing that, she didn't know she was quite loud and getting confused as lovebirds no less. She looked at Rio and it seemed he was completely unfazed. A little part of her pride was destroyed.

"Oh, Mr. Bourgham. Good morning to you." Rio said as he greeted and put his hand forward, gesturing for an armshake. The man obsessed with elegance and etiquette was here.

"Good morning to you, young lad.'" Bourgham nodded with a small smile in his face, proper and polite younger people always left a good impression to him, he continued as he scrutinized Samantha intently, "So who's your lady?"

"Ah, no. She's not my lady. She's a friend of mine." Rio said as he scratched his head, he figured that suspicioun was reasonable. They really were talking loudly, like a couple no less.

"My name is Samantha Gaia Constantino! Mr. Bourgham Whacckanoele." Samantha said as she introduced herself to the fat noble man who gruntled in response.

"It's Whackermole, and just call me Mr. Bourgham." Bourgham tiredly sighed, his name being wrongly pronounced was a constant problem to him.

"Do you care to join us for the walk to the faculty, Mr. Bourgham?" Rio invited Bourgham as he sipped the coffee he was holding.

"No, I need to detour to the library lad." Bourgham said as he shook his head, he had some couple books he needed to get, he continued as he walked further, "Beside, you have a lady accompanied."

"I see, then good luck to you Mr. Bourgham" Rio nodded as he saw the back of the fat noble man walk away. He continued as he apologized to Samantha, "I'm quite sorry that you were associated with me at such a rumor."

"It's fine, Mr. Rio. I don't mind." Samantha said as she blinked her eyes and smiled.

"You don't mind being my lady?" Rio questioned as he teased, his eyes widening exagerratedly. That was quite a confession. It took Samantha a few seconds of pause before she realized what she said,

"N-no! I meant, that it was just a completely baseless and insiginificant rumor that doesn't need any attention otherwise would just fan the flames of it's popularity! Mr. Rio." Samantha answered rapidly, her cheeks tinted with pink, embarassed of the implications.

She really doesn't lose her beauty and elegance even in embarassment, huh? Rio thought as he observed her face. She was quite cute, his type even. She also had a great personality, it wouldn't be an exxageration to say she was perfect.

Then, Rio realized that he was quite attracted to her. Less of love and more of a small crush. Unsuprisingly, It didn't bother him. He was sure it would stay merely just a small infatuation, for he himself knows that love was something he would never feel. And he wouldn't allow himself to.

"We're here." Rio said as he looked at Samantha who was smiling, it seemed she recovered from her embarassment. Suprisingly, admist their conversation they already arrived the faculty.

"Indeed." Samantha nodded as she took off and walked towards her table, Rio followed her as she walked, their desk were situated beside each other.

Rio sat at his desk as he took out his laptop, he placed down the cup of coffee on his desk. He wanted to check what he will teach this time. With a little search and scroll, he found it.

'Ways to Use Magic.'

A topic where he needed to teach more flexible and unique ways on handling magic. It wasn't much of a problem, with the advanced novel contents he knew of and the topic he read last time. It will be quite a breeze.

Rio nodded to himself as he checked his schedule. It seems his class for Arcuied and the rest would later noon, he would be going to teach another class in the meanwhile.

Rio sipped his coffee only to realize that there were no more. Well, that was a bummer. He prepared the things he was going to bring to the class.

—

Rio was currently teaching at another class. Class B, to be precise. The class beside, the main characters class. There were twenty classes in total for every grade. In each class there were thirty students.

Thus, in simple math, every grade year has 600 students in total, if there were no accidents such as inmediate expulsion to students.

"How do we use magic?" Rio asked the seated students below him as he picked a chalk and write at the blackboard.

"By spiritual imagination." A male student with tanned skin and glasses answered in the question.

"Indeed, Ali." Rio praised in response as he wrote at the blackboard. His enchanced hearing let him hear a loud conversation going on at the back.

He flickered a chalk in his other hand, the chalk flying straight to the forehead of a male student. The male student growled in response, suprised by the sudden pain.

"Could you tell me what you found more interesting besides this lesson, Mr Danny?" Rio lightly smiled as his eyes stared directly at the student.

"I-it was my bad professor.." Danny cowered his head under the intense stare, feeling intimidated he stuttered as he spoke.

"As I was saying, how do we access magic?" Rio asked once more in the class. He grabbed another chalk as he drew a slightly conveluted shape in the board.

"We access it by the «Miracle Core»." Rio nodded as he tapped directly at the shape he drew. He continued, explaining it more conscisely, "The «Miracle Core» absorbs magic and purify it, hence we are able to use it."

"Do you people understand?" Rio asked the students as his eyes were directed to Danny, the student who was talking earlier. In fact he heard the conversation he had.

""Yes, professor!"" The whole class answered in a chorus as the bell rang, just enough time.

The conversation that he heard from the student, was about the typical hierharchy. As usual, when there are fortunate, there are also those unfortunate. There were many noble students in the academy, proportionally as much as the students without a noble lineage.

The academy hierharchy, it was seperated into two. One whose lineage is a noble, and therefore superior. The other which is merely an ordinary citizen and has no lineage.

For typical reasons, both of the opposite sides of the pea hated each other quite intently. The nobles, looked down upon those without a noble lineage. The peasants or ordinary citizens, who were aggressively angry at nobles, forming a rather prejudice among them.

And, Danny, the student earlier was part of the peasantry faction. He was recruiting members to their side to battle againts the noble faction. The academy knows about this issue too, however instead of removing it, they supported it in the name of giving students motivations and goals.

In truth, the academy really couldn't do anything about the internal war between nobles and peasants in their midst. It mostly had to do with how most of the investors in this academy were elitist nobles, and the fact that Director Greg who was previously an ordinary citizen favored those like him.

It was stuck as the investors couldn't anything about the peasants with Director Guinevere supporting them, and Director Guinevere couldnt do anything much about the elitist noble faction because most of the investments came from them.

All of it sounded like a pain, Rio thought as he sighed in relief, he wasn't going to be apart of this whole nonsense drama of arrogance and wrath. He had much better things to do in his time.