"The first rumor is about some students spotting someone living in the woods, did anyone work on this one and see what this is about?"
"I did" Fiora replied looking at Edward and continued "It's a beastfolk girl, she refuses to to go to the dormitory and lives in the areas filled with trees, as for baths she takes them in the morning near the fountain... " Fiora's voice trailed off before she looked at Kaia "You need to tell her, it's not allowed in the academy"
"Technically, it is, that's why I haven't bothered with the case" Kaia shrugged
"It is?" Fiora couldn't help but question, as far as she knew it should be put under public indecency.
"She's just carefully skirting the rules, not breaking them, but definitely walking a fine line, honestly, I think I might take her under my supervision" Kaia replied and there were no objections that came her way and that settled it.
"So, then the next is about the alleyways, the rumors are simple, if you go in any alleyway at night, you can meet a statue of the goddess and if you offer the goddess a valuable amount then you could get your wish granted. Anyone worked on this?"
"I did" Darian replied and continued "It's the guy I was talking about earlier who I want under my supervision, he had already taken hold of almost all the alleyways that first-years are allowed to visit which lack cameras. Those rumors are just false rumors he spread to rack in some cash. I am sure this guy will be in control of all the underground shit things that happen in the academy"
"Why do we have this underground schtick again in our academy?" Valen asked
"Because the headmaster said it somehow reflects real-world underground schtick" Kaia replied, she hated those fuckers since whenever cases related to those guys were involved it was always hard to deal with them because of the lack of evidence and she has to act on the circumstantial evidence.
"That old fart..."
"Alright, let's talk about another one, this one isn't a rumor but rather a case that has already been dealt with by Kaia, it's about the girl who burned down the entire warehouse and in the process caused her classmates to suffer injuries,"
"What's this one about...?" Asked Cyrus looking at Kaia for answers.
"It was just an incident of some guys bullying this girl and her sister called all those bullies to the warehouse and then proceeded to absolutely kick their asses, she is a fucking psycho, honestly, I don't agree with her joining in the council" Replied Kaia and everyone noted her opinion.
"Next is about a pair of first-years who decided to go ahead and build their own small cafe in the academy, they have promoted it quite well ...and I think these are the two you want under your supervision, aren't they Selene?" Edward looked at Selene and she gave a nod without saying anything.
"The next one is about..."
The student council meeting continued and once they were done deciding upon the students they wanted in and the ones that still needed to be dismissed, they all went their way back to their work.
.
.
.
.
Half a month has passed and as such it was quite understandable that the professors would want to conduct a small surprise quiz, the tale as old as time.
Why did I think it would be okay to attend the class today?
Why did I not skip the class?
I looked at the source that had nagged me a lot to come and attend the class today.
"Hey, I saved you from missing the test, you should be thankful to me!" Julianna said giving me a hollow laugh, she didn't expect that the quiz would be today.
This bitch...
I sighed as I remembered about this event.
It was a surprise quiz test that didn't have any date mentioned and as such there was no way of knowing when it would happen even if I had read the novel.
"You attend classes every day, you insist on me coming and studying, if you fucking don't score more than me today, you know you are getting your ass beaten, right?"
The judgment day has come.
For Julianna.
If I could score more than her then there's no way she would have any leeway on me or any right to lecture me, I will attain what you call freedom.
"You do know, you can't score more than me, you suck in almost every subject," Julianna said with confidence which was pretty understandable but instead of replying to her I looked at my system window.
This was my way to cheating.
System-san, you will be giving me all the answers, so be prepared.
I muttered under my breath so that no one could hear me except the system screen.
[I don't know the answers, either TwT. It's not like I have studied any of these subjects]
No, I know you are dumb. I am not asking you to answer rather just go to Lucy's class and see what answers she is marking also, there's one more person I want you to go and check the answers with, afterward cross-check them, and show them all to me. I will see which one's correct and which one's not.
In the novel, the student who had scored the highest on every subject quiz was Ashly, the only other student who could have scored higher than her— a perfect is Lucy but she won't be doing it since she wanna play the role of just an above average student, she probably won't even answer all the questions.
That's why, I asked the system to check on those two and their answer sheets, I was going to just copy what Ashly will mark for answers and Lucy's to see if Ashly marked something wrong or a question that Ashly couldn't solve but Lucy solved.
Basically, Imma cheat from the two toppers and since no one can see the system window of others, there's no way I could get got.
As the saying goes, work smart, not hard.
It was a simple plan but it was enough for me to score decently in the exams.
Soon enough, Oliver started to pass the exam sheets to the students.
The quiz will be about 30 minutes and it was the multiple choice question type as such I decided to go and nap for a little while since it had taken time for Ashly and Lucy to do their quizzes, they didn't even know I was gonna be cheating from them.
Work hard, system-san.
[You are evil, evil.]
I shrugged and the system window went away and came back just a minute or so before the exam was about to end and I quickly started answering the questions while Julianna just stared at me as if I had gone mad.
I finished right before the time ended and Oliver collected all the sheets back.
With the exam finished I stretched my arms wide.
I worked hard during the test.
"You know, if you just asked me I could have just shown you my answers, you didn't have to just mark whatever down the answer sheet," Julianna said with a bit of concern.
"Nah, I don't need to cheat from an average student"
If you have the option to cheat from an average student and a top student, who would you choose to cheat from? Didn't take a genius to know the answer.
"That so, fine. Let's see how much you score in the exam" Julianna replied and with a bang started to move.
The written part of the exam was done, and next was the practical exam, the damned duel cliche of the academy of any novel.
I also slowly stood up and started walking to the designated duel place.
.
.
.
.
What the fuck?
I have no idea what kind of butterfly effect led to me facing the protagonist of the novel, he was supposed to be facing Alyssa, in other words, our classes were not supposed to be sparring with each other.
"Alright, once the other person loses consciousness or is unable to continue, the winner will be declared," the instructor announced as he outlined the obvious rule.
"Let's give it our all," Aqua said with a smile.
The hell is he on about?
Why would I give my all to beat the shit out of someone weaker than me, actually he is strong, the problem was, Aqua cannot give his all in a fight without permission, he is at the end of the day a lab rat sent by his organization, doing anything that is not allowed is not an option for Aqua.
In other words, no matter how you cut it, Aqua would lose to me since I have grown way stronger than when I first came to this world.
Unless he goes all out against me, we are not having a duel but just a one-sided beating.
But this is not the problem, the problem is, why the fuck am I fighting him?
"I never agreed to this fight" I looked at Oliver and protested.
"When has a student ever agreed to a test?" Oliver replied and then moved away as he signaled both Aqua and Noah to start their duel.
Oh, fuck naw.
Fine, I guess I will act like Alyssa did against Aqua.
In the novel, Alyssa goes ahead and destroys Aqua, something I am currently capable of doing as well since Aqua can't go all out at the current point like in the novel.
Honestly, it wasn't like I was stronger than Alyssa and I wasn't really any better than Aqua in terms of strength and everything but the thing that gave me the edge over them both was the simple fact that I was the novel reader, in the other words, I knew everything about their attack patterns that they have in their arsenal, they will have in their arsenal.
And this was enough for me to beat both of them.
Oh well, I guess I will mentor Aqua a little.
And...
I had far more options and attack patterns than these two have.
"I will let you have the first strike" I sighed as I said that to Aqua only to realize that this was a cliched line that every last fucker who has ever said to the protagonist has ended up losing.
Fuck, did I jinx myself?
"Don't mind if I do" Saying so, Aqua disappeared from my view and I twisted my wrist, positioning my sword horizontally behind my back but the next instant my instinct kicked in and I had to move myself away from the spot as I barely dodged the strike.
My eyes met Aqua's.
Just now, he changed his style midway.
This wasn't how Aqua did it in the novel.
I tightened the grip of my hilt losing the relaxed composure as I prepared myself to take this a teensy bit seriously.
"Your intentions are so clear, try to suppress them," I said giving him a pointer to help him, the change of trajectory in the attack was a good choice but Aqua's intention was so bare that my senses easily helped me back there or else I might have gotten hit.
Jeez, now I am even acting like an arrogant young master bastard.
Am I really going to lose today?
I took on another of his hits, this time a straight face-to-face strike meaning to cleave me in half.
"Pouring more mana isn't going to do anything, you will just run out of it soon enough if you keep this, just pour enough, and in places, your sword is meant to make the contact." I gave another pointer to him which is something he probably already knows, so I decide to do a live show of the technique in front of his eyes for him.
.
.
Just like Noah's duel, there were other duels that were taking place as well at the same time and one of them was between Aleister and Julianna.
"Haha, motherfucker, I have been wanting to beat the shit out of you since the first day" Julianna replied in a sweet voice, carrying a dagger in both her hands.
"The feelings are mutual, bitch" Aleister replied in kind with a smile carrying a bastard sword.
Their feud from the entrance ceremony had yet to settle.
And so they will settle it with this duel.
.
.
.
.
"It's ...my loss," Aqua said gritting his teeth, lying on the ground, his hands covering his eyes.
Aww, he is making me feel bad.
Oh well, unlike Alyssa I was pretty gentle and even gave him some pointers to work on, so he shouldn't be that affected like he was in the novel.
Right?
I don't know man, Imma just go back to my room.
"I can go to my room, right?" I asked Oliver who was standing on the side and replied with a nod.
I turned my head to the side where the commotion was being held, it was a duel that was going on between Julianna and Aleister.
They seemed to be bickering about something and I remembered the incident that had happened with both of them on the day of the entrance ceremony.
Julianna isn't gonna like it, is she?
At the end of the day, Julianna was just an extra in the novel while Aleister was a member of the main cast, he was stronger, way stronger than someone like Julianna so the duel's result was already set in stone.
The pairings for the duel were random, which was why someone like me who is just registered as a G+ ranker ended up fighting up against Aqua who is registered D- ranker, and Julianna who is just an F ranker is fighting up against an E ranker.
Of course, their rank difference will be taken into consideration when the evaluation begins.
Didn't change that Julianna was gonna lose, the thing that made it worse was the fact that Julianna was gonna lose against someone who she had beef with.
I can already see how this is gonna turn into a disaster and as such being the smart guy I am, I decided to run the fuck away while I can.
I ain't gonna be the part of this soap opera that's about to begin.
With that, I left the place and reached back to my room and then decided to enter the virtual world, ready to train myself further with Enyo.
.
.
.
.
It was 22:00 and I was forcefully logged out of the virtual world since I had reached my 8-hour limit.
I was in the flow there and this shitty device broke it.
My mood has been ruined.
Sitting up straight and pulling the vr headset from my head I stood up and started walking towards the kitchen to look for food only to find nothing there.
Usually, Julianna would have brought something and left it there for me, she always does but right now there was nothing there.
Did the loss affect her much more than I had imagined?
I pulled my hamburger out of my dimensional storage and ate it before finally deciding to give Julianna a visit.
Why am I even bothering is what I wanted to ask myself but I have been in her debt a lot recently, it wouldn't be right of me to ignore her when I knew she was sad but I also didn't really know what words I could provide her with since I knew even in the future Julianna wouldn't be able to beat Aleister since Aleister will just grow stronger and stronger at an incredible pace.
Maybe, hitting the arcade would work?
I didn't really know what I should do, so I decided to first at least give her a visit and then see what Imma do about it.
I opened my door, only to see Aleister and Lucy, standing in front of Julianna's door, the latter staring down the former with contempt in her eyes and the other simply looking guilty.
I closed my door.
Yup, no need for me to join.
She will be fine, she got friends. Let's go back and train our mana and all.
Ding!
Fuck, she noticed me didn't she?
I opened the door only to see Lucy glaring at me and Aleister sitting at Julianna's gate.
"What is it?" I asked
"If you don't start getting your shit together and act like a decent human, I will twist your balls"
Um... what?
Lucy calm the fuck down.
"What do you want me to do? Julianna lost fair and square, what am I supposed to tell her? Hey, don't need to be down, next time you might win. I know, the plot of the novel Lucy, I know Julianna would never be able to beat Aleister" I said in a whisper so that Aleister wouldn't hear me.
"I am not talking about the duel. Weren't you there when things went down?" Lucy asked, and I, from my vast experience realized.
"Something else happened...?"
"A hell of a lot of stuff happened"
If it was just the duel then Julianna would have been fine, I knew that much, she just needed some time alone, she would bounce back to being normal the next day but if something else happened then giving her space and shit might not be the right decision without knowing what went down.
"What exactly happened?" I asked.
"Look at the school forums"
I did what she said and...
Well, this is a bit complicated stuff ain't it?
I heaved out a sigh and then walked in front of Julianna's door but instead of ringing the doorbell I looked at Aleister first.
"Dude, I get you wanna talk to her and all about what happened between you guys but maybe later? For now, get the fuck out"
"I am not going anywhere before I apologize to her," Aleister said looking at me in the eyes.
Well, I tried to be civil.
I looked at him and then "Your fault for not listening" Saying so, I stomped on his stomach hard enough to knock him unconscious.
Thud!
"So, if none of you want your ass to be beaten y'all better stop trying to record shit right now" I spoke up looking at the bastards making trying to film a video on this floor and it did wonders as everyone closed their gates and went back to their room.
I grabbed Aleister by the collar and threw his ass into my room and then closed the door.
Alright, now let's ring the doorbell of her room.
Ding!
There was no response.
So, I did what I knew best.
Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding!
After pressing repeatedly without any breaks, I pulled back and shoved Lucy on the front.
....
Nothing happened.
Julianna didn't come out.
"By now she should have been shouting at my face and throwing stuff" I muttered out loud only to be met with Lucy's glare which I tried my best to not focus on.
"Ringing the bell doesn't work and calling doesn't work, nothing is working" Lucy replied with a grunt as if telling me she had been doing it for hours.
If that's the case then...
"Let's just go back to the room and sleep or study or whatever shit you wanna do" I turned around.
What? I can't do shit if she isn't opening, I will just have to wait until she comes out on her own.
"I will wait here" Lucy replied which was honestly quite another surprise for me.
In the novel, Lucy never got close to the main cast to the point that she would quite literally leave them to fucking die if she felt they were going to drag her down.
Calm, collected, and logical.
But that was nowhere to be seen in the Lucy I had known since I met her.
She wasn't calm—just awkward, unsure of how to handle most situations. She wasn't composed or collected; her poker face just worked and hid the fact that in a lot of situations she panics and worries like crazy. And logical? Not at all. Lucy was far more empathetic and emotional than she let on.
"If that's what you want to do" I replied and went inside my own room.
Julianna probably won't open the door and she won't come out on her own either.
Sometimes, sometimes you can't stand on your own no matter how much you want to. Fear takes hold of you so much that it clouds every judgment of yours, and you're left doubting even the most solid things you have known. In times like those, you need someone to drag you out.
I remembered the dish Julianna said she liked.
I have never really made it, so I don't really know how it would go but well for starters, let's give it a try.