Chapter 111
The next morning.
After the mission evaluation, Simon’s new daily routine began.
“Did everyone have a good break?”
“Yes, professor!”
It was Jane’s Elementary Black Magic class for the first time in a while.
Simon sat at the same table as Dick, Maelyn, and Kamibarez, listening to Jane’s lecture. Occasionally, when he made eye contact with Cindy Vivace or Jaime Victoria at the neighboring table, both of whom he’d grown closer to through the “Mutant” club, he exchanged greetings. He also nodded in acknowledgment toward Toto, with whom he had also bonded further through the club.
“This week, we have some announcements.”
Jane spoke.
As always, Keyzen’s major incidents followed that very phrase of hers. Everyone waited for her next words with tense expressions.
“First, your midterm results are out.”
Ah—
Sighs echoed from all around the classroom.
Dick slammed his head onto the table, while Maelyn tapped her fingers rhythmically, unable to hide her anticipation. Kamibarez flapped the bat wings on her back with her usual nervous expression.
“Your midterm scores and rankings will be distributed. Of course, the rankings are based solely on written exam scores, without any performance assessments included.”
Teaching assistants busily moved about, calling students’ names. The score reports were peculiarly delivered in sealed envelopes.
“Simon Follentia?”
“Yes!”
Simon politely received the envelope from the assistant.
He had only vaguely felt that he had done his best, without actually estimating his scores. But now, with the results in hand, a surge of anxiety overwhelmed him.
Simon gulped and opened the envelope, pulling out the crisp sheet.
[Simon Follentia]
Katarology: 63.00
Darkness Dynamics: 65.00
Summonology: 87.00
Spiritology: 44.00
Haematology: 61.00
Toxicology: 60.00
Magical Combat: 73.00
Defense Against Holiness: 70.00
Total: 65.375 [Rank: 458th]
“Wow!”
It turned out much better than Simon had expected.
He had scored an average of 37 on Jane’s first test. And now, he had jumped to an average of 65.
That’s nearly a 30-point increase!
To achieve a stable mid-tier ranking purely through written exams at a place like Keyzen—filled with geniuses—was meaningful in and of itself.
Simon felt elated that his efforts had paid off, and that he could prove he had a chance even without prior knowledge.
As soon as Simon looked up, he locked eyes with Maelyn, who wore a determined expression.
She forced a smile and asked,
“What did you get in Summonology?”
“You first.”
“Ugh, come on! I asked you first!”
Maelyn whined for an answer. Dick, sitting next to them, peeked at Simon’s score sheet and grinned with a “Ohh~.”
“Simon, you really studied hard! You’re no pushover, Maelyn.”
“So, what’s your score!”
Simon responded with a bitter smile.
“Eighty-seven.”
Maelyn’s expression turned complex and subtle.
A mix of a smile, frustration, and relief?
Now it was Simon’s turn to feel anxious.
“I told you mine, so hurry up and say it.”
“Sigh.”
As if revealing poker cards, she laid her score sheet on the table.
“I lost. Eighty-five.”
“Wooooow!”
Kamibarez let out a joyous cheer and tightly grabbed Simon’s hand.
“Congratulations! Simon!! Now you get to stay in Keyzen with us!”
“Th-Thanks, Kami.”
As she looked at an emotional Kamibarez, Maelyn quietly smiled.
She never intended to kick Simon out of Keyzen over some bet in the first place.
Besides, other than her weak subject—Summonology—Maelyn had scored over 90 in every other subject. Once again, she averaged 90.
But her overall ranking was unexpectedly surprising.
Total: 92.00 [Rank: 2nd]
Even with an absurd 92 average, Maelyn wasn’t first overall.
“Keyzen really is vast.”
She let out a deep sigh. Simon offered comforting words.
“Still, you’re ranked 2nd in all of Keyzen, right? That’s seriously amazing.”
“Eh, no way—midterms don’t mean much.”
She waved her hand.
“At Keyzen, practical assessments are more important than written ones. Things like dueling evaluations, performance tests, and mission scores. The weight for those is much higher, so once the monster students’ scores get added in, I’ll probably be pushed right out of the top 10.”
“St-Still, we all made it into the ‘Mansion’, right? We can expect decent scores from Island Survival!”
There was great potential for Simon’s ranking to rise.
He had always been stronger in actual combat.
His Cyclops hunt scored a perfect 100, the highest in Class A.
He had also done well in the practical evaluation before midterms, thanks to Maelyn’s help.
Since they made it into the Mansion in Island Survival, that score was also expected to place him in the upper tiers.
Additionally, he had completed the missions in both the Arnish Fiefdom and Blue Harbor perfectly.
He remained undefeated in duels and belonged to the top-tier squad.
With all these practical scores factored in, Simon’s final ranking at the end of the semester was bound to rise, and he felt his heart swell with anticipation.
“Attention.”
As the students were chattering away comparing scores, Jane’s voice made them all fall silent at once.
“Now you have an idea of where you stand. Top students, well done—but don’t get complacent and keep aiming higher. For those of you in the lower ranks, there’s still time to rebound, so keep pushing.”
She made eye contact with the students as she continued.
“We’re only halfway through the first semester.”
“Yes, professor!”
“This week overlaps with the mission period, so there won’t be any major events. I hope you’ll use this time to prepare for the duel evaluations, supplement your weaknesses, and maximize your capabilities.”
The corners of her lips curved slightly.
“That’s the only way you’ll survive the next performance test.”
Her ominous remark tightened the tension in the students’ eyes. Jane looked behind her.
“Assistant. Are the next duel evaluation matchups out?”
“Yes! They’ve just been released, professor.”
Jane received a document. Students craned their necks to see.
Duel evaluations, where they had to fight fellow Keyzen students one-on-one, were always the hottest topic of discussion.
“After midterms, Island Survival, and the mission evaluations, it’s finally time for another duel assessment.”
Jane waved the document as she spoke.
“Now that we’re halfway through the semester, this is where things really begin. Gone are the days when you stumbled not knowing what black magic to use in a duel. By now, everyone has developed their own fighting style, and your opponents have likely grown just as much as you have.”
Simon nodded in agreement.
The time of cluelessness was long gone. No matter who you faced, everyone probably had a trump card or two up their sleeve, and the gap in skill had shrunk.
Especially for Simon, who was in a top-tier squad, he would inevitably have to fight the strongest students.
Who would his opponent be this time?
The assistants handed out papers listing the duel evaluation matchups. Simon accepted his copy and took a light breath before checking the name of his opponent.
It was someone he had already met before. Dick leaned over to see Simon’s matchup.
“Simon! Who’s your op… Oh.”
Dick clicked his tongue. Maelyn’s expression also turned complicated.
“This one’s not gonna be easy.”
[Second Arena – Round 1, Match 6]
Class A – Simon Follentia vs. Class M – Malcolm Randolph.
The very same aggressive special admission #10 with whom he had a bit of a clash at the Mansion during Island Survival.
Simon was about to face a named-level student for the first time.
* * *
That night.
Inside a dusty, abandoned building.
Screeech. Scree-screeeeech.
A silver staff scraped across the hard floor, sparking as it dragged.
“This school never gives me a moment of boredom.”
A man with yellow-tinged hair walked along, dragging the staff behind him.
Though it was an abandoned building, curtains hung over the windows. Students from Class M stood upright with tense expressions. Every one of them belonged to Malcolm’s faction.
Malcolm lifted the staff and rested it on his shoulder with a grunt as he sat on a lumpy "hill".
A pained groan echoed from beneath him.
In truth, it wasn’t a hill—just a pile of Keyzen students, collapsed and covered in blood. Some coughed and spit up blood.
“Well, look at you. You managed to make this. It’s not even something they teach in Toxicology.”
Malcolm picked up a potion bottle by its neck and gave it a casual shake.
“A memory-erasing potion. Drink it, and it erases the most traumatic recent memory.”
He placed the potion down on the floor.
“You were planning to use this on me, huh? Come on, say something.”
In front of him, chained to an old blackboard by both arms, hung a limp student.
Malcolm grinned.
“Haren Koak.”
“......”
Haren was drenched in blood from head to toe.
The blood dripping from his mouth pooled on the floor, surrounded by scattered teeth. Some of his fingers were bent at unnatural angles.
Malcolm extended his staff and tapped Haren's face with it.
“Were you so afraid of my retaliation that you cooked up something like this? Pathetic.”
Here’s how it started.
Back during Island Survival, Haren Koak had failed to carry out Serne’s orders and hadn’t regained Bahil’s trust either.
Now, with no one to protect him, it was time to pay the price for mocking Malcolm using Serne’s feather.
So he tried to strike first, planning an ambush before Malcolm could get to him.
At the time, Malcolm had been ruthlessly purging his own faction. He viewed the Class M students who had abandoned him during the humiliation with Serne’s feather as traitors and was cracking down hard.
Haren gathered those same traitors, whose interests now aligned with his, and bought a memory-erasing potion from the black market in Rochest.
Their plan was to lure Malcolm to the cafeteria and slip the potion into his food and drink.
—Malcolm! They tried to make you drink something weird!
But then, a traitor betrayed the traitors.
The whole scheme unraveled, and Malcolm, utterly furious, delivered merciless retribution on Haren’s group.
Which led to the current situation.
“You’re all so damn predictable.”
Malcolm sneered, shaking the potion bottle.
“You were going to feed me this and erase the memory of me groveling at Haren’s feet like a dog? No way. Not happening. I’ll never forget that humiliation.”
Cough! Cough!
Haren, still chained to the blackboard and coughing up blood, looked at Malcolm in sheer terror.
“P-Please, spare me…”
“Bullshit.”
Smack!
Malcolm struck Haren across the face with the staff.
“If you wanted to be spared…”
Crack!
“…then from the beginning…”
Snap!
“…you shouldn't have messed with me.”
Thud!
Blood splattered again and again.
Malcolm’s followers kept their heads down, but one mustered the courage to speak.
“M-Malcolm. Isn’t this going too far?”
“Yeah! If this gets out of hand, we could be in serious—”
Malcolm turned toward them with a chilling glare.
“Then why don’t you take over instead?”
At that, they all fell silent.
Malcolm came from a notorious gangster family, one of the three major gangs operating across the entire Dark Alliance.
He had inherited his father’s cruelty, and he had a thorough understanding of how to instill fear in people, of what fear really meant.
“Restrain them.”
He gestured.
His followers rushed to the fallen traitors, sat them upright in chairs, and tied their hands behind their backs with rope. They gagged their mouths with cloth as well.
“Lift the shirts.”
The traitors’ clothes were rolled up to expose their stomachs. Malcolm walked over and picked up a piece of metal being heated in fire.
The gagged traitors shrieked and struggled in vain.
“I came to this school hoping to live like a proper student. Why won’t any of you help me with that?”
“Mmmph! Mmmmmmph!”
The traitors violently shook their heads.
“Later, go cry to the professors, alright? That way I can let go of my regrets… and calmly pay a little visit to your families, just as a regular civilian. Sounds good?”
“Mmmph! Mmmmmmmph!!”
Malcolm’s lips twisted into a demonic smile.
“Help me.”
A horrifying scream erupted.
“Help me stay just a student.”
The operation to instill fear had begun. Malcolm turned around and grinned eerily.
“You’re last. Haren Koak.”
Haren trembled as tears and snot streamed down his face.
Superb.