For roughly 17 months, Asher had made massive improvements to his skill set and abilities. He was currently a third-stage Guardian mage, but he suppressed his talent to make him look like a peak second-stage Guardian. However, by just relying on that power, he was able to reach the top 10 in his generation. Part of the reason Asher held himself back was to make his progress speed not seem absurd, after all, he was still a null in the people's eyes. Despite that, his advancement speed was still far greater than a null.
In the history of the First Dawn academy, the first years were usually Human stage mages with few reaching the Late rank of that stage. Second-years were roughly made up of Late Human stage mages, first-stage Guardian mages, a few peak first-stage Guardian mages, and only the best of the best were at the second stage of the Guardian realm, albeit an unstable version[1], at the later months of the year. Third-years averaged between first-stage Guardians and second-stage Guardians. Once again, only the best of the best, the true elites amongst this gathering of elites, managed to reach the third stage of the Guardian stage in this period. In the fourth year, they were mostly second-stage Guardians, with few third-stage Guardians. Very rarely were there fourth-stage Guardians, and even then, they didn't exceed four.
This was because, in the Guardian stage, every three stages was a phase. Considering there were twelve stages, there were four phases in the Guardian realm. This classification came about due to the recognized difficulty in progression. Crossing from one phase to another was more difficult than moving from one stage to another in the Guardian realm. For example, moving from the second-stage Guardian realm to the third stage is considerably easier than progressing from the third stage to the fourth stage. Although it was said that difficulty increases as one goes higher, when one approaches a phase, the difficulty is on an entirely different level. It was also why the Great Dawn kingdom had quite a few ninth-stage Guardians like Darius and Fedor, the king, but no tenth-stage Guardian in that generation despite all the years gone. Moving from the ninth stage of the Guardian realm to the tenth stage was the same as moving from the third phase to the final fourth phase, and the struggle required to pull that off was great. Hence, the reason why there were none successful so far.
Back to the point, as a null, Asher's advancements should logically be slower than the average mages, and even with the True Calming potion as well as the brand-new potions he released in the past months, he would still be at most, on par with the average students of the academy. Third years usually averaged between the first and second stages of the Guardian realm, so as long as Asher didn't display strength greater than this, he wouldn't attract any scrutiny onto himself. Peak rank of the second stage was the best he could do and this even was already pulling on his luck. Nonetheless, with the skill and knowledge from his past life as well as his mental prowess, Asher could even defeat a late-rank third-stage Guardian mage with this strength.
Truthfully, with the awakening of his constitution, Asher could cultivate faster than others and maybe even aim for the fourth stage, but where his constitution was beyond the heaven-defying grade, his physique was just unique. If he overdid his training, his body wouldn't be able to handle it, and he might explode due to the excess mana in his body. Hence, Asher slowed down on increasing his magic level and focused more on developing his body physically. Even so, this was still considerably slow and difficult. The Arnhaunts didn't lack magic crystals or mana-increasing items, but materials that developed one's physical body were their weak point.
'The heavens are indeed just.' Asher would usually sigh whenever he recalled this.
The Arnhaunts were already blessed with the magic crystal mine, and this 'blessing' of theirs was also a curse of sorts. If they had also got something similar to the mine, but in regard to one's physique, the royal family would have been unable to permit their existence.
After completing five laps around the training field, executing one hundred sword slashes, and completing three man circulation cycles, Asher was finally able to have his bath and prepare accordingly for the midterm test in the afternoon.
A few hours later, the students had gathered in an open arena within the academy. It wasn't just Asher's group of nineteen but the other seventeen groups as well. Everyone present here was a member of the First Dawn academy's third-year class.
"It's the dean. Shh."
"It's the dean."
Everyone gathered suddenly hushed as a man walked to the podium.
In the First Dawn academy, the ranking system wasn't only limited to the students but the staff as well. The highest official position was the Director of the academy, currently taken by Roland Agares of the Agares marquis-rank family. Beneath that were the elder-level figures of the academy, better known as deans. Zero, who was in charge of the Grading panel[2] was also a dean, albeit one of the weaker ones. Deans took charge of various positions in the academy, with some leading a course while others led an activity or a division like Zero who was formally called the Dean of Grading.
Apart from the inauguration speech held during their first year, the students had never seen the director of the academy again. The one who took charge of the entire set was often referred to as the dean but was fully called the Dean of Academics. Every year, a different Dean of academics took over the class, although their positions were barely ever-changed. In other words, the first-year Dean of Academics has been the same person for the past decade, and he only catered to the first years of every session. The same was true for the second and third-year Dean of Academics. Only the fourth-year Dean of Academics recently took the position about two years ago, roughly half a year after Asher had entered the academy.
The idea was having different deans for different years was to prevent the students from following the same ideological teachings as one dean, whether regarding politics or magic. A dean could be from a particular family or more familiar with a certain type of magic or ideology and could be sided towards them, so to prevent a situation where an entire class had the same opinions as the dean, this system was brought into play.
The man who just arrived was the Dean of Academics for the third year, and as Asher's class were in their third year, they became automatically under him. He had a white beard and looked quite old. The genial smile on his face made him seem approachable like an average caring grandpa. Even his footsteps seemed slow as if age had caught up to him, but despite all of this, none of the students dared to look down on him. Half a year under the old man's 'care' had taught them a lot and enabled them to see through his genial old man facade. Even the instructor of Asher's group was fearful of the man and there were good reasons for that.
During the first assembly with the dean, a student had silently mocked him. The result? In front of the whole teenagers, the student was lifted into the air magically and had all his limbs broken painfully. Even till this point in time, the horrifying cries of the young boy seemed to reverberate in the ears of the students whenever they saw the old man. That wasn't all though. Not only did the young boy have his limbs broken, but he was also sent away from the academy. When the others thought his family -a count-rank family- would retaliate, the family head had actually appeared in the academy to offer an apology to the dean with a few items as compensation. What was even more shocking was that he didn't do so in hopes that his son could be accepted back into the academy, but only forgiven by the old man. It seemed as if the count had come to terms with his son's expulsion and only sought forgiveness.
No one understood why the boy was heavily punished at first, but after the assembly ended and the boy's friends were approached countless times, they finally explained the reason behind that. This went on to add further shock to the students and a layer of mystery to the old man's identity.
Although the young boy was at an inconspicuous spot and had spoken barely audibly -just enough for those close to him to hear- the old man had still picked that up even with a gap of almost 100 metres between them. Worst of all, he had retaliated in such a violent fashion. This made them realize that this was no genial old man.