A few days had passed since Arthur fainted.
There were a few interesting things that happened during these few days.
First, Arthur didn't know that he had passed the interview.
Second, Arthur didn't bother to check the notice that the Academy posted.
Third, because Arthur hadn't come to the Academy these few days, the teacher who interviewed him wondered what had happened to Arthur.
Fourth, the Academy finally decided to look for Arthur, and the one who would look for him was the Elf woman from before.
So, where is Arthur right now?
Well, he's still at the Light Boar Inn, waiting for someone to pick him up. No, it's not the teacher from the Academy. Arthur is waiting for Sebas.
Arthur had already informed Sebas about the situation that happened to him and asked the Avatar he created yesterday to look for Sebas and give him the information.
Yes, Arthur is still making an Avatar every time the cooldown is up. The only time he didn't make one was when he fainted before, and he couldn't make one even if he wanted to.
Arthur isn't in his room right now; he's in the backyard of the inn. He asked the owner if he could use the backyard for training, and the owner allowed him because the inn wasn't as full as when the Exam was held.
Arthur is still training the same thing as always, swinging his sword. But the difference is, Arthur is focusing his mind not on getting the skill or raising his stats. Arthur is trying to repeat what happened during his interview before.
But it seems that it's not as easy as Arthur thinks.
Maybe he was lucky before or he got enlightened at that time. Arthur had heard about enlightenment before, and he knows that enlightenment isn't something he can get just because he wants to.
Arthur remembers that it takes time, place, opportunity, luck, and all sorts of coincidences for someone to achieve enlightenment.
Arthur did try to empty his mind and just swing his sword, but what happened was that he just swung his sword for a few hours straight without thinking about anything. Arthur expected something like this to happen and didn't let it bother him.
After all, when he was practicing a few years back, all he did was the same thing. He just swung his sword without thinking about anything, and it almost became his habit.
With his experience and muscle memory, what he did was the fastest way for him to get a simple entry for the Sword Mastery skill.
He only needs to swing his sword a few thousand times with a good or even perfect posture, and Arthur will get the skill. Arthur then takes a break for a moment as he sits on the ground
'Sigh… Is it useless after all.'
Arthur almost gave up because he felt that he couldn't reach the same state he had achieved during the interview.
"Whatever, I'll just do what I always do."
Arthur decided to forget about it and simply train to raise his stats. His stats were a bit too low now because of all the things that had happened these past few days without training and simply creating Avatars.
So, after a few minutes of rest, Arthur started his training again without overthinking it.
While Arthur was busy with his training session, the elf teacher from the Academy finally found where Arthur was staying.
She quickly went to the Light Boar Inn where Arthur was staying. At the moment, she was wearing a robe that covered almost her entire body. She was quite famous, after all, and on top of that, elves are rarely seen outside of The Wailing Forest.
"Hello, do you want to eat or staying?"
The owner of the Light Boar Inn asked as she looked at the elf woman with a suspicious expression.
"I'm from the Hundred-Saint Academy. I'm here looking for Arthur Reinhart. I heard that he's staying here,"
The elf woman asked the owner as she showed the metal plate with the Academy symbol on it.
"Ah! Yes, he's staying here. I think he's still in the backyard right now. Do you want me to show you?"
"No need. It's there right?"
"Yes."
After pointing out where the backyard was, the elf woman went directly towards the backyard. Although the owner was curious, she knew better than to ask about it. Her husband worked as a guard in the Academy, and she knew a little bit about the Academy's operations. One thing her husband always said was, "Don't ever get curious about what the Academy does! Just follow!"
When the elf woman finally arrived at the backyard, she saw Arthur still training with his sword. She was about to call him, but then stopped as she saw how focused Arthur was. She decided to wait until he finished his training.
After a few minutes, she became quite bored and decided to sit on the ground, observing Arthur as he kept swinging his sword.
She looked at Arthur again more carefully. She felt that somehow, his form was worse than when he did the same thing during the interview before.
Then she noticed that as Arthur swung his sword, she could see him improving. Every few swings, there were slight changes in Arthur's technique. Whether it was his breath, his form, his posture, or his strength, although subtle, it was getting better and better as Arthur continued to swing his sword.
"No way, did he create another Avatar?"
The elf woman wondered silently, observing Arthur's intense focus on his training.
She found it hard to believe, but that was the only explanation for these bizarre occurrences.
'Wait a minute, he created one before the interview began, and now from the look of it, he created one not too long ago. How high is the level of his talent?'
The elf woman pondered, impressed by Arthur's apparent skill and ability to create Avatars.
As far as she knew, the Avatar talent required 30 days at level 1 and 15 at level 2. That's all she knew about this talent. So, if Arthur could create two in a few days, then at least the level of his talent was at level 4 or higher.
"Crazy! This guy is crazy! How could he spend so much time training that useless talent? Shit, how could he even achieve that?"
The elf woman muttered to herself, astonished by Arthur's dedication and ability.
She knew how hard it was for the holder of the Avatar talent to raise the level of the talent. Moreover, she had also heard about how draining it felt to create an Avatar, as it took half of the talent holder's stats.
After another 20 minutes, Arthur finally stopped training. He was sweating all over his body, showing how weak his stamina was, but he was quite happy as he felt that he had become a little bit stronger.
Arthur then looked around and finally saw the elf woman sitting on the side, watching him. He realized that the woman was the elf teacher from the interview before.
"I'm sorry, but what are you doing here?"
Arthur asked as he walks towards the elf woman.
"Sigh.. it seems that you really didn't see the notice," the elf woman sighed.
"Notice? What notice? Is it possible that I passed the test? There's no way, right?" Arthur asked, his tone filled with disbelief.
"Since you really don't know, then I won't say anything about this. Here, take this. That will be your student card. If you put your mana into the card, it will show you some basic information about the rules. Don't forget to come tomorrow."
Just as the elf woman was about to walk away, she looked back and said,
"Oh, my name is Aredhel Aelorothl. I'll see you later."
With that, the elf woman, Aredhel, left Arthur, who was still processing everything. Arthur clearly didn't know why he had passed the interview, considering that almost everything he had was at a low level.
That's why he hadn't bothered to check the notice and was planning to wait for Sebas to come. He also needed to plan what he would do in the future because he hadn't expected to pass the interview.
The goal was to get close to a noble family to establish a connection. He had managed to get close to the Blair and Heartfilia families, but since he hadn't passed, he needed to change his plan.
Arthur already had some plans and decided to wait for Sebas to talk about it with him again. But now, knowing that he had actually passed the interview, the plan had to change again.
Arthur walked towards his room to revise his plan. After he arrived in his room, he started to think about it again.
First, he needed to leave a message for Sebas about the whole situation and ask him to stay in the city in case Arthur needed to communicate with him.
Also, Arthur planned to go to the Academy today. He had a lot to catch up on, from studying to visiting places like his dorm or his classroom.
After all that, he also needed to prepare for what would happen when classes began. He was a few days late, and the students and teachers were bound to not see Arthur in a good light.
I mean, who the hell was he to dare to come to the Academy a few days late, even though the Academy had already given notice about who had passed the interview?
There were a lot of prideful nobles there, and they wouldn't dare to come late. But here Arthur was, daring to come even though he was already a few days late. He was only a new Baron, for god's sake, even a prince would come on time.
So, Arthur needed to prepare for the whole situation.
"Sigh… It's better for me not to go to the Academy."