Ben had just chosen to walk back after spending some time with his classmates. He struggled to locate the group in the ever-increasing crowd. Nevertheless, he was able to get a look at Ester who was quite a lot taller than her peers.
Although he had friends of his own, Aron's group definitely had a lot of girls. He was not a fool to squander such a 'socializing' opportunity. Giddy, the boy skipped over to the group only to stop midway.
Ben's throat dried up in an instant, his eyes first tracking Aron in the circle and then resting on the girl to his left. The boy stood with his arm over her shoulders.
As soon as Ben recognized the face, his feet came to a stop. "This.. this.." Words will not come out of his mouth as he stuttered nervously. "Oh.. Ben? Hey brother.. come here."
To Ben's bad luck, Aron ended up glancing in his direction. The slave boy thought his roommate was hesitating to join them since there were new members in their band. But to his befuddlement, as soon as he called him out, Ben turned on his heel and disappeared into the crowd.
"Hn? What happened to him?" Even Chris has caught a glimpse of the boy when Aron spoke up. "Who knows? He might have been intimidated by the lack of male participation here."
Chris's words made everyone except Hera take part in a burst of hearty laughter. From the corner of her eyes, Hera will take a glance at the exquisite face so close to her. Right after that, she will dart it away from the face and notice Aron's left hand hovering right over her chest.
Hera was burning in shame inside. Then again, a part of her actually wanted Aron's fingers to touch her, though she will prefer to die before she ever admitted to that.
With the group having a good time, Hera was an exception. Whenever she was not sneaking glances at Aron's visage, she will be cursing Hestia in her mind.
Why does only she gets to have such a large bust? If she even had half of what the spectacled busty girl possessed, Aron's hands would have definitely scraped against them.
Scrapped against them? Wouldn't that mean he could reach out and grab them as well? Then gently press on them.
"Huh?" Busy laughing and chatting with the newly formed group, Aron felt some weight over his left shoulder. Following that, he observed Hera's body tumble over. Responding abruptly, he caught the girl in his arms. "Hera?"
Naturally, no one anticipated Hera to fall unconscious at such a time. "What happened?" Ester who was closest, reached out to help Aron out in holding the girl.
Only Julia remained unconcerned. She can very easily discern the matter. Like she has imagined, too much of Aron was fatal for this girl. "It's fine. She is a little exhausted today, that's all."
Julia stepped forth and replacing Aron's arm around Hera's extra slim waist, she tugged the girl onto herself. "Just give her a minute, she will recover." Although even Sophie and the other gang members had never seen Hera faint out of nowhere, he had absolute faith in Julia.
"You sure? We can bring her to the medical ward." Aron offered, but his offer was only met with a cold glance from Julia. "If I allow you to carry her around, she will probably never wake up. So try keeping your hands off her."
"Don't tell me it's my fault that she fainted?" "Who else it will be genius?" Sometimes it felt like Julia had a special love-hate relationship with him. Aron along with Chris and the other girls can only smile wryly at the fondness Julia displayed for Hera.
"Hera is not used to make interaction. Treat her with little more care.. you were tough on her." What can Aron say to this? If putting his arm on her shoulders was the crime, he was certainly guilty of it. Who would have known Hera was so weak?
"You can't blame brother Aron for that, Ms. Julia." Chris came to the rescue, finding his friend cornered. "Anyhow, I can only take it as a joke when you introduced her as the strength of your team."
Aron was literally being blamed for putting his arm over a girl's shoulder. No matter how Chris thought about it, it was unfair. Who would have possibly guessed the weight of an arm can make a girl faint? It was outrageous to put it lightly.
"You don't understand. She is strong.. stronger than anything." Julia affectionately caressed the unconscious girl's head, removing the hair from her sweaty temple. "But she is just as fragile mentally."
Only now the group understood what Julia was getting at. So Aron's presence mentally drained her. Although even this claim sounded just as stupid. It wasn't as outrageous as the first one.
"Arrange yourselves!!!" The band could not talk any further since the gathering period was up and a loud voice boomed from over the front stage.
"We will begin our morning prayers. Then we shall have an address by our esteemed principal. You have five minutes to stand in order." The girl in her late teens was loud enough for the whole assembly ground to start rustling.
"Cecilia Monroe. Fourth-year and the scion of the great Monroe family, sitting on top of abundant wealth all thanks to their unparalleled achievements in the field of Alchemy and cultivation enhancing drugs." Seeing the keen interest of the boy, Ester shared the girl's identity with her.
"She is one of the rising stars. Despite alchemy being her core competency, she had climbed to the tenth rank of the Arena rankings." "Thanks!" Aron and the twins appreciated the knowledge while they followed the students in front of them and arranged themselves in a proper queue.
At the end of the five minutes amnesty, the girl on the stage waited for no one, directing the group behind her to sing out the prayers. Being raised in the orphanage associated with the church, Aron was reminded of his early teen years.
The peaceful rhyme continued over the next ten minutes when the students witnessed two women climb onto the stage. Aron recognized the first one as principal Madelyn and the one following behind her to be Ms. Wanda, her personal assistant.
Ms. Wanda had been the one looking after him when he injured himself while trying to pull the spear off the wall. As far as Aron could tell, both the principal and her assistant came off as truly sweet people.
"Good morning, my dear students." Medelyn's voice rumbled over assembly grounds, evoking the response out of the students from all four years.
"Thank you for waking up and dragging your lazy asses over here." Aron's lips twitched in both directions. Did he hear correctly? Did their esteemed principal just curse them publically?
Chris and Christina were no different, totally not expecting an elegant woman to use such crass words. And yet, there was no particular response from the students, as if they were used to this peculiar way of addressing.
"Ahem.. principal is a bit.. outspoken." Ester added from behind Aron, probably trying to safeguard some impression of their academy in the minds of the new students.
Outspoken was not the right word to describe that, but Aron can only nod his head. He was positive that he witnessed agitation on Ms. Wanda's face as well. "Within beating around the bush, let's come straight to the topic." The voice rang out once again, just as strong as the first time.
"We got to three topics up for announcement today. Firstly, as most of you might have already come to know, the academy recruited three new students this year. And by the popular decision of the faculty council, we have concluded that the three brats are worthy enough to be onboarded in the continuing year."
As expected, the assembly ground was buzzing with noise at the first announcement itself. Standing behind a grinning Madelyn, Wanda felt a headache approaching.
Faculty council? What faculty council?
It's not many can question her authority, so what was the need for a such blatant lie? Madelyn will most probably struggle to even count five names on this so-called faculty council.
It was obviously a one-sided decision from her to onboard the students in the current year itself, in spite of the fact that the last time they had done so, the academy faced a lot of flak from the powerful houses of the kingdom.
"I am sure all of you might have a lot of questions. But.." Madelyn searched the sleeves of her long gown for something, repeatedly failing to locate it. "Where did I put it?" After a while of her futile attempts, she eventually put her right hand into her cleavage and with that, her eyes shined brightly once again.
"Here.. it is. Ahem.." Madelyn cleared her throat, trying to present her graceful side to her students as if her actions could wash away her crude manners. "So where were we.. yeah.. so as I was telling, the respected elders of the Church of Eden had been kind enough to sponsor the three young lads."
She said that with her right hand holding three distinctly stamped papers on top of her head. "As such, the academy will appreciate it if you can direct your concerns and anxieties towards the church." There was a big fuck you written all across Madelyn's smug face.
Last time the parents and clans of these young demons have given her a lot of trouble when she went ahead and onboarded Hera mid-way through the semester. Hence, she was amply prepared to divert the crowd to the church this time around.
'Haha.. I would love to see you bastards haggle it out with those old bones at the church.' Though her words were said in front of the young students of her academy, even an eight-year-old can tell that they were not the target audience.
She was simply telling the authorities behind these kids to take their beef to the church itself. "I had planned to introduce the new students to you guys, but after the mess, you all created last time around.." Madelyn shook her head, disappointed in their behavior.
"I suppose they are better off not remaining anonymous for now. Then again, I guess most of you did learn a lesson or two after an extended visit to the infirmary Buhahaha..."
Aron stood stupefied. Did this woman just make an open mockery of her own students? How was this a principal of the most reputed academy in the country? How was she any different than a roadside hooligan?
Initially, he was surprised that no other faculty members attended this assembly, but not anymore. Had he been an instructor himself, he probably would have skipped this session as well.
"Cough.. cough.." It wasn't clear what brought an end to her brazen laughter. It can either be a realization that her laughter didn't reflect greatly on her position. Or else it can even be the sound of Wanda gnashing her teeth at her.
"With that matter sorted, let's focus on our next two topics. I got good news and a piece of not-so-good news." Madelyn let the atmosphere tense up before continuing her monologue. "Let's begin with the bad news first so that you guys can leave with a happy face in the end."
The smile on Madelyn's face widened, so much so that her eyes could not be seen. After that creepy smile sufficiently terrorized the wards, Madelyn tilted her head to one side. "As you guys might have guessed, this month marks the beginning of my third year as your principal, and yet.."
*Sigh* With a prevailing groan coming from their principal, Aron felt goosebumps all over his body. And he was not the only one who can make out a baleful aura dissipate from the stage.
Along with that, Aron dropped his head down. The ground under his feet was vibrating.. no it was shaking.. violently. Many of his peers fell onto their asses terrified.
"And yet you have not won a single Inter Academy Championship. What should I make out of this?" The shaking of the assembly grounds stopped momentarily, followed by the dreaded voice.