Adam moved Nikolai into the Villa and the evening was spent discussing the terms of a contract with the Raikiri Guild for Nikolai to have him artifacts exclusively for them.
Adam ended up giving away all of the 1000 platinum he had to Nikolai for his research and development purposes for all the artifact ideas he had, leaving Henrietta in charge to talk some practical sense into him.
Adam didn't care for the money, it's not like it was usable in the academy in the first place.
He could save that money for auctions that would take place in the future.
But what's the point when he will make an even more ginormous amount of money because of all the crazy stuff Nikolai planned to make and release into the market through the Raikiri Guild?
A personal cash cow for Adam to milk endlessly.
Adam got ready to leave for the academy.
During his time at the academy, he could only access the capital on weekends.
Every student lives in the academy dorms and exiting the academy grounds isn't allowed otherwise unless you gain special permission.
Money is not an issue in the academy since you have a separate currency system based on your performance and other activities.
You can even do volunteer work and help accomplish odd jobs for the people of the capital for some extra capital currency.
This system existed solely to ensure equality between the commoners and the nobles who studied there.
Animosity between nobles and commoners still existed but at least everyone had a level playing field.
It's a great idea, on paper.
Adam was about to witness it soon.
Finding his way to the academy was easy.
A tall beacon of light shot up into the sky at all times of the day.
The source of that light was none other than the biggest and highest concentration mana stone.
The Mana Cube.
A mana stone so big and in the shape of a perfect cube that was used at the centre of the academy grounds and constantly radiated pure mana from within it making the academy the best growth environment for budding Young talents in the entire continent.
This is why Stellar Academy was known to be the best Academy in Klienova.
Knowledge can be found anywhere.
The amount of resources you have for personal growth sets this academy apart from the others.
Making his way through the main gate, the entire front of the campus was bustling with aspiring students mostly from commoner households.
The noble kids of the empire already had a free ticket to becoming students at the academy for obvious reasons.
Adam was one of those Nepo babies as well.
As Adam made his way through the front of the campus he saw people from all around the continent joining in.
People from the land ruled by the shogunate in the west, people from the land ruled by the dynasty in the east, and even the children of the leaders of the demi-human clans and the warlock sultanate in the south.
That's how big this day is for the entire continent.
There were 2 separate lines for commoners and nobles, so much for equality.
The line for the nobles led to a hall with 4 testers all with their own Mana Orb that measured the mana of an individual, and a stone Stele artifact that measured the physical prowess of warriors and qi users from the east.
Either way, everyone had to have both measurements taken, this was their system through which they selected only the cream of the crop students for the next stage of the entrance examination.
And yes, this only applied to the commoners.
For the nobles, this entire examination was nothing but a formality.
They were all pre-selected to be students in the academy, the only purpose this served for the students from noble households was for the student ranking which determined the currency they would get monthly in the academy and bring prestige to their family name, along with other perks for gaining a high rank.
Adam finally made it out of the line and into the hall on his chest was a round badge with the number 111 on it.
80% of the hall was used for the testing of the nobles while only 20% of the hall was given to the commoners for testing.
Some commotion had started on the commoner side.
Adam didn't care for the testing results of the noble students right now since it wasn't the time for the main cast to have their testing just yet.
Adam looked towards his right at the commoner testing area, the worker responsible for recording the test results wasn't on his post but was nervously sweating waterfalls while bowing to a tall woman who stood in the line.
Boy was she tall, taller than Adam, between 6 foot 3 to 6 foot 4.
She had long white hair that was long enough to reach her knees, she wore a bright red pinkish lipstick along with a black eyeliner.
For clothing, she wore something quite out of the ordinary, a white shirt with black leggings and black boots.
On her waist was a belt that held a sword sheath that held oriental patterns on the grip and sheath.
The worker said in a shaky voice, "L... Lady Kexin Zhoufang w.. why are you in the line for the commoners, p..p..please don't do this otherwise the management and the dynasty will have an issue with each other."
The girl remained expressionless and stoic as she replied in a flat deadpan voice.
"Please do not call me Zhoufang as it is already known to the world that I have given up on my title as the princess of the dynasty. Call me by my new name Kexin Mortem Obire, right now I'm nothing more than a commoner."
"Lady Mortem Obire although you have forsaken your birthright as the princess that doesn't change the fact that you have connections to the emperor of the dynasty, please just go to the nobility side of the hall otherwise I might lose my job."
The worker was groveling at her feet, even though she had no expression on her face Adam could sense faint disgust behind those motionless black eyes of hers.
"Tch, fine. I will do you this kindness once. Never ask anything of me again."
"Thank you, your grace, thank you!" Said the worker as he got down on his knees kowtowing multiple times towards Kexin in front of everyone in the hall as she made her way to the nobility half of the hall.
As Kexin made her way through the hall she finally turned her gaze toward a pair of eyes that had been staring at her for a while now.
That stare was from a man of shorter stature than her, then again, nearly everyone here was shorter than her. He had a pair of purple eyes that she couldn't help but stare at. Something about them made her curious.
'Hoh? A kid here has eyes filled with Divinity? Interesting.... is he an avatar of the gods?'
She thought to herself while making a bright sly smile towards the man who had been staring at her as she made her way into the testing booth.
Suddenly, Adam saw a system window pop up as soon as the woman smiled, the content of the system window made him regret looking at that woman for so long.
|| THE GODDESS OF DEATH HAS ACKNOWLEDGED YOUR EXISTENCE. ||
|| THE HOST HAS ACQUIRED [MARK OF DEATH]{S} ||
|| DUE TO THE HOST'S BAD LUCK AND HIS BAD HABIT OF STARING FOR TOO LONG, THE GODDESS OF DEATH HAS TAKEN SPECIAL INTEREST IN HIM. ||
|| SUDDEN QUEST
OBJECTIVE: PROVE TO KEXIN THAT YOU AREN'T AN ALLY OF THE GODS.
REWARD: MIGHT HAVE MARK OF DEATH REMOVED, MIGHT NOT DIE.
FAILURE PENALTY: TRUE DEATH.
TIME LIMIT: UNTIL SHE RIDS YOU OF YOUR PUTRID EXISTENCE. ||
|| SYSTEM TIP: HOST YOUR LUCK IS SO HORRIBLE IT SHOULD BE STUDIED IN LABS BY SCIENTISTS.
HOW CAN SOMEONE THIS UNLUCKY EXIST LMAOOOOO. ||
Adam had already started to get tired of all the increasing dangers to his life to the point that he didn't even react to this sudden quest.
The [MARK OF DEATH] was a curse that allowed the caster to constantly track the cursed individual and also claim the cursed individual's soul once they died.
'So the princess of the dynasty of the east is the goddess of death in human form?'
The funniest part about this sudden quest was the fact even if he were to complete the quest successfully, there was still no guarantee of him living or having the mark removed from him.
At that point why even try to do this quest?
The failure penalty was true death which meant that his soul would be extinguished, unable to enter the cycle of reincarnation ever again.
" Applicant 2249, Kexin Mortem Obire please move into the testing booth."
Kexin moved inside a booth with a mana orb of measurement and a stone Stele for strength measurement.
The 4 monitors that were supposed to be showing the 4 applicants giving their tests were all switched to footage of Kexin.
This was the Academy's way of paying lip service to The Dynasty.
White light shined from the mana orb when Kexin touched it.
A perfect result.
As soon as she punched the stone Stele, the meter went up until the final measurement of the infinity sign at the top of the Stele.
This stone Stele was a bonafide punching machine.
Another perfect result.
The announcer soon chimed in through the speaker.
"Kexin Mortem Obire is this year's first supreme-rank talent!"
She then made her way towards the 2nd test which was a written test. She moved with a nonchalant gait as if the highest rank potential a student can have was not an achievement worth acknowledging to her.
After appeasing the dynasty with their little stunt of prioritizing Kexin's testing over everyone else's, the testing continued in the normal order.
Kexin was a character Adam knew next to nothing about, being taken advantage of by her without even having a chance to counter it left a bad taste in Adam's mouth.
A hand came on from behind and touched Adam's left shoulder.
"Hey Adam so you finally made it here!"
Mia said with a smile on her face and her positive energy radiating as it always did whenever she was in a public setting.
Before replying to her, Adam took a look at all the people behind her.
Nearly all of the main cast was together, excluding the villainess Cassandra and Isaac.
Behind Mia, stood Princess Alexandria Argento Stellar, and Charlotte Sia Loredan talking to each other.
Behind the females were none other than the ultimate main character and sidekick duo of Jake Kennedy and Mikhail Vander Puth.
None of these people had a good impression of Adam.
Adam after identifying everyone in the main cast looked back at Mia and said," Yeah, as you can see I am here after all, what have you been up to these past few days?"
"Oh so you see, I came here I met up with Charlotte and Alexi and then we....."
A story of about 5 days of events in great detail. Adam had zero interest in it.
The only reason he asked that question is because girls love to talk about their day and their lives no matter how uninteresting it is.
The only redeeming factor about this interaction was that at least it was helping him pass the time this early morning during the first stage of testing.
After 5 minutes of constant storytelling from her, slowly the eyes of the crowd around us started to turn towards us.
People didn't seem to be paying attention to the testing results of the other students anymore.
Who is this guy with the white hair and purple eyes that the renowned and beloved Lady Mia is talking to with such a happy and ecstatic demeanor?
While Mia was always nice to everyone, those were always very cordial and formal interactions. As if there was always a wall between her and the people she was talking to.
This excluded her friends but the person she was talking to seemed to be a completely unknown stranger to all.
The crowds started whispering.
"Hey, who is that guy talking to Lady Mia?"
"How would I know who he is? Shouldn't you know since you run an information guild solely for nobles?"
"Dude, I have been studying hard for the 2nd exam do you honestly expect me to keep track of trendy gossip?"
Adam's surroundings started to become quite noisy. Oddly enough, Mia seemed to be completely clueless about this development.
Suddenly, Charlotte pounced on Mia from behind, wrapping her arms around her neck.
"Mia, aren't you going to introduce me to your new handsome friend?"
One of the 4 perfect girls of the empire that have always acted like they were the crystallization of human virtue in public.
It was as if Charlotte and Mia were in a race to determine who could be the more virtuous of the two.
If the appeal of Mia was that she was a beauty so high above in status that your average man could only hope to ever get the chance to interact with her in a lifetime, then Charlotte's appeal would be the fantasy of a plausible ending where you might end up with her.
This is due to the fact that Charlotte has a very humble background as her father is at the lowest stature of the nobility, a baron.
Yet, due to the allure of her dark brown hair and a very healthy body along with light brown eyes that contrasted with her fair skin and bright red yet small lips created a scenery that was soothing for a man's heart to look at.
Something stirred within Adam as he noticed all these details about all these characters he knew so well all his life.
They used to be nothing more than pixels on a screen, now they were real and the difference froze Adam in place.
He wasn't frozen due to nervousness. Instead, he was frozen due to deep contemplation over his disbelief about the fact that human beings could be so beautiful.
All these thoughts happened in less than a second.
"Eh? What do you mean new friend? That's Adam you know?"
"Adam? What Adam? The only Adam I know is that fat pig who follows Cassandra everywhere."
Blatant disrespect. Probably because Charlotte didn't realise that the person she was disrespecting was right in front of her.
The change in Adam's appearance was too drastic for anyone to realise it was the same person.
Adam humored her as she humiliated him in public. He would trample them all beneath his feet soon enough.
During situations like these, sarcasm was the only medicine that healed this burning humiliation that Adam felt.
With a light chuckle Adam said,"Yes, I am the fat pig who followed Cassandra everywhere."
"Heh? But you don't look disgusting at all!"
Oops, her mask fell off. Maybe it was because of the shocking revelation, she ended up shouting this out for everyone in the hall to hear.
Everyone's attention was now on the trio thanks to Charlotte's slip-up.
Adam maintained his cool, the last thing any guy should do is lose his cool when a girl disrespects him publicly.
"Well what can I say, I started going on long walks in the parks of the Dacre Estate."
"Heh?! What do you mean by long walks? I saw you a month ago. Nobody changes this drastically with long walks! Did you walk 24/7 for the past 30 days?"
'This girl....'
Even for a heavyweight champion in womanizing jiu-jitsu, this was starting to get a little too much.
When this girl was honest it seemed she had a knack for getting under people's skin. Adam's patience was wearing thin.
Adam used his trump card, comedy.
"You are exactly right Charlotte! I walked for the entirety of the month without eating. Heck! I even walked all the way from the Dacre Estate to the academy!"
Adam made sure it was loud enough so that everyone in the crowd heard it.
Everyone in the crowd started laughing.
It was rare for someone to use high-quality sarcasm while making jokes.
Hearing the loud laughs, Charlotte finally noticed the audience she had ended up creating.
She froze. A rare occasion, as recorded by the Earth Queen Charlotte fan club.
Adam could see them at the edge of his vision blended into the crowd clicking pictures non-stop of this moment.
Plenty of people must have already recorded a video of Charlotte's 'honest' speech.
This could be all over the news tomorrow since she was such a popular figure in the nobility of the empire.
But, Adam had other plans, if everything went his way, nobody would be in tomorrow's news except for him.
Miraculously, an announcement from the staff saved Charlotte from experiencing the embarrassment of this moment any further.
"Applicant no.73 the sole heir to The Shogunate of the west himself, Yaketsuku Onigahara! Please come to booth 1 for testing. "
Regaining her composure, Charlotte used her quick social reflexes while dragging Mia along with her awkwardly.
"Haha, it was nice meeting you, Adam! let's talk again some other time."
"Huh? But I still have some much I want to tell him!"
"You can talk to him after our testing is done."
Mia had now been dragged away by Charlotte, and following them was none other than Princess Alexandria herself.
Who did nothing but narrow her eyes glaring at Adam as she walked by.
The woman probably had something going on in that head of hers. Adam had no clue.
Mikhail and Jake had already moved towards booth 1 before the girls because those two battle junkies really loved competition and Yaketsuku was popular in the entire continent as one of the strongest budding talents in the world.
'Yaketsuku... I finally get to see you in real life.'
Yaketsuku was Adam's favorite character in the game. While Adam already knew what results Yaketsuku would get, Adam hurried to one of the monitors just to see him in person.