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An Otherworldly Scholar - 209
🕑 Added 2025-03-08 02:45:58 +0000 UTC“You might not realize it yet, but you are fortunate to have Mister Clarke as your teacher,” Zaon’s voice filled the room. “You’d be a fool if you walk out of this class.”
The cadets joined heads and whispered. There were plenty of ways to motivate people, but I didn’t expect Zaon to use the fear of missing out as a drive to keep the group together. It was clever. New cadets would take any shortcut to survive the dreaded first year.
Nobody walked out. Not even Leonie and Yvain, whose parents were Imperial Knights. I examined their faces. Neither seemed particularly disgusted with my Knight Killer background. They must’ve known how high-level warriors solved their problems.
Fenwick raised his hand.
“Those who left over lunch will also get into the Basilisk Squad?”
I didn’t answer right away. I didn’t know what would happen to those who decided to drop out of their squad. Would other instructors adopt them? If they had enough contacts, they might have a chance elsewhere. Raising noble brats had its advantages.
“No. Those who left during lunch will not have the same benefit as I didn’t make a deal with them,” I said, clapping my hands.
Adult decisions had adult consequences, even if someone—probably Rhovan and the other Knights—fed them false information. Of course, I would take them back if they decided to return, but not before a sincere apology.
Leonie’s hand shot up.
Unlike Fenwick, she waited until I allowed her to speak.
“Yes, Leonie? Do you want to intercede for those who left?”
“No. I want to know more about the Lich’s Monster Surge. What were the highest-level monsters like? Why was a Warden Seed sprouting at the same time? And why did the Corruption Spire appear in the orc city?”
The other cadets nodded, their eyes fixed on me.
Good stories could sway opinions as much as good arguments, and my ‘movie’ seemed to have a profound effect on the cadets. They looked at me like I was some sort of superhero.
“How did you survive the first levels if you were a Scholar? Me was almost killed by a Lv.7 Sand Imp once, and I am Blade Dancer,” Aeliana added with her thick accent.
“I’m afraid I won’t be answering those questions at this time. We are already behind schedule. We will focus on training,” I said, clapping my hands. The cadets grumbled, and I knew I would lose them if I didn’t feed them a few crumbs of information. Suddenly, I had an idea. “Those who survive the first selection exam will be entitled to ask me one question. I will answer it truthfully. Deal?”
After a moment of deliberation, the cadets agreed.
The carrot hung from the stick.
“Let’s continue with the introductions, then. Has anyone thought of a way to defeat me?” I asked, examining their faces for any hint of guilt.
[Classroom Overlord] didn’t show me who completed the homework, so I had to resort to classic methods—reading not-so-subtle facial expressions. Malkah’s henchmen looked away. I grinned. It was that easy.
“What about you, Mister? What’s your name?”
The boy sitting right of Malkah—Henchman A—straightened up and puffed his chest. He was the tallest cadet in the room, his face square as a block of cinder, prominent brow ridges, and his shoulders wide like a young bull—the one who had tried to get me back at the pumpkin orchard.
“My name is Odo, sir. Lv.9 Sentinel, son of a Kigrian Knight, and a loyal subject to Lord Malkah,” he proudly said. “I don’t have a clue how to defeat you.”
Not what I expected, but admitting ignorance was the first step toward illumination.
“What about you, sir?” I asked, pointing at Henchman B.
“I’m Harwin, sir. Lv.10 Ranger, son of Stablemaster at House Stormvale, and even loyal-er subject to Lord Malkah,” he said.
Unlike Odo, he was slender like a whip, with an aquiline nose and sharp eyes.
He scratched his chin, deep in thought.
“I would swarm you until you can’t defend yourself,” Harvin said.
Fenwick, Aeliana, and two other recruits whose names I still ignored couldn’t hold their laughter.
Swarm tactics. It is an answer worthy of a villain’s henchman, not very imaginative but effective in principle. Even a seasoned swordsman would eventually fall against numbers. I decided I liked it.
“Let’s test your hypothesis. You three versus us two,” I said, putting a hand on Zaon’s shoulder.
Zaon gave me a quizzical look.
“They are kids. We are going to demolish them,” he said.
“We will have a handicap,” I replied.
Talindra handed us the cursed parchments, and we wrote down our names. I couldn’t help but notice that Zaon’s passphrase was ‘Grumpy Gnome’. Mana sparks emerged from the contracts as the curse blocked our powers back to level one. Once again, my mind felt weak and my body sluggish.
Malkah climbed the platform, followed by Odo and Harwin, and walked to the weapons rack. Malkah picked a longsword, Odo an arming sword, and Harwin a spear.
Zaon took a longsword. I choose an arming sword.
“What’s the deal with Ilya and Holst?” I asked as we walked to the center.
I couldn’t get the picture out of my mind.
With five of us on the platform, the combat area felt cramped.
“Same students, different results,” Zaon said. “Holst realized your methods were superior and asked us for guidance. Firana outright ignored him. Wolf and I turned him down. Ilya agreed, but I can’t tell you why. She never told us.”
I always knew Holst was an intelligent man—the nobles of Farcrest believed he could become the next Prestige Class of the city—but I underestimated his drive to improve. People, especially those in high positions, usually resisted change, even to their own detriment.
Holst never ceased to surprise me.
“I guess I will have to ask her,” I said.
Odo and Harwin closed ranks around Malkah, ready to fight.
“You haven’t introduced yourself, Malkah,” I said, focusing on the present. This wasn’t children's play anymore. I was a Lv.1 facing stronger foes. It felt nostalgic.
“I’m Malkah of Stormvale, heir of Kigria Dukedom and Lv.5 Blood Reaver,” he said. Although his voice lacked almost any inflection, his body language told me he was tense. His shoulders were stiff, and he was squeezing the grip of his sword.
The cadets murmured.
I wasn’t expecting to have the son of a duke as my student. Still, the Jorn and Kigrian territories were poor, remote, and lacked almost any political and commercial power. Malkah wasn’t a high-profile noble like the Herran or Osgirians.
“How about we make a bet?” I said, catching Odo and Harwin’s attention. “If you win, I will immediately let you ask me any question about my past.”
“What if we lose?” Odo asked.
“There will be a punishment,” I said.
The three boys joined heads. Odo said it was too risky. Harwin countered, saying they would be ahead of everyone else if they got my secrets. Malkah sighed and told them to do whatever they wanted. After a minute, they came to an agreement.
“We will take it,” Harwin said.
“Good. Same rules as in the morning session. Instructor Mistwood will be the referee this time,” I said.
The faun woman nodded, quickening her step to stand by the platform’s side.
At least she had stopped jumping every time I said her name.
“Guards up!” Talindra said. “Fight!”
Odo charged at us, spear forward, with Harwin closely behind. Zaon parried the spear, and I took on Harwin’s following attack. The Ranger used [Quickstep], but I blocked his movement before it could reach Zaon’s flank. We exchanged blows while Malkah watched from a safe distance. The ‘henchmen’s’ style was crude, but they were used to fighting side by side. Any other combatant would’ve tripped over their partner in such a confined area.
Luckily for me, Zaon and I also had experience fighting together.
Zaon was still the ideal partner. I didn’t have to worry about his movements because he was always ahead of me. He seemed to sense what I wanted to do. He left me space to maneuver without a miss, even while swinging his longsword. Just like in everyday life, he was extremely mindful of others.
Odo and Harwin couldn’t break our defense. Harwin used his mobility to avoid our blades, and Odo used his Sentinel defensive skills to block our blows, but their efforts were barely enough to keep them in combat.
With an explosive blow, Zaon broke Odo’s [Steadfast Shield] and kicked him in the chest, sending him to the floor. The planks creaked under Odo’s weight. I engaged Harwin, preventing him from helping his friend. The boy with the aquiline nose grunted, his eyes gleaming with mana as he tried to follow the movement of my sword.
Seeing the easy hit, Zaon lunged at the fallen Odo.
Malkah darted forward, putting his sword between Odo and Zaon like a porcupine against a lion. I recognized the defensive Kigrian style. Malkah’s technique was flawless, and Zaon had to contort to dodge the sword. The window of attack was gone.
Odo seized the moment and jumped back on his feet, and along with Malkah, they made Zaon retreat to a corner. Malkah’s defensive stance prevented Zaon from attempting any sort of committed attack, while Odo could freely attack
It took me a moment to understand their style. Odo and Harwin protected Malkah, and Malkah protected them in return. The weak point was obvious. Malkah couldn’t protect Harwin and Odo at the same time.
“Zaon, focus on Harwin,” I said.
I went for Odo.
The boy was a concrete wall. His long arms allowed him to cover huge distances, and he had pulled good defensive Sentinel skills. I didn’t want to use [Identify] on my students, but I could bet Odo had used [Sentinel’s Oath] to protect Malkah. The boy seemed to know when his lord was in danger, even if his eyes were stuck on my sword. Still, his form left much to be desired.
Zaon and I went for the flanks, and the Kigrian boys’ battle plan crumbled. Malkah was defending Harwin from Zaon’s relentless attack when I surpassed Odo’s defense, dodging the tip of his spear and hitting his shoulder.
“Odo is out!” Talindra yelled from the sideline.
The announcement was enough to dent Harwin’s focus. Zaon seized the moment and smacked the sword from his hands. He cursed and apologized. Only Malkah was left.
I stepped back and let Zaon fight him.
Malkah’s style changed. He grabbed the longsword with a single hand, and red mana sparks swirled around him. I recalled the Book of Classes. Blood Reaver had no Skills.
Malkah lunged.
Zaon jumped to the side, weightless as a feather, and hit Malkah’s sword arm hard enough to make the cadets flinch. The Kigrian heir, however, didn’t let go of his weapon. Red sparks crackled with increased intensity.
“Let them,” I said before Talindra could stop the fight.
They exchanged blows. The more Zaon hit Malkah, the more mana particles swirled around the cadet. As his aura grew, Malkah’s movements became faster, and his blows became more precise until Zaon couldn’t sustain the attack and started to retreat.
“Go on, Malkah! Show him!” Odo yelled from the sideline.
Blood Reavers were a rare Advanced Class. The Book of Classes called them one-in-a-million. They had no skills but gained physical strength and endurance from the wounds they suffered and inflicted. Even without any open wounds, Malkah’s capabilities had skyrocketed.
It was a cruel mechanic.
Zaon took a moment to realize what was happening, but Malkah was already faster and stronger.
“End it, Zaon,” I said.
The boy nodded and opened his guard, inviting Malkah to attack. Malkah accepted the challenge, but his sword cut thin air. Like a serpent, Zaon got to Malkah’s back and wrapped his arms around his neck, trapping one of his arms in a lock and preventing him from handling his sword. For a moment, I thought Zaon would throw Malkah from the platform, but Talindra stopped the fight.
“Enough!”
Zaon let go and returned to our side of the arena.
The red mana particles disappeared.
“Now, for the punishment,” I said, facing Malkah.
The boy clenched his teeth and lowered his head.
Odo and Harwin jumped between the boy and me.
“We’ll take Malkah’s punishment. It wasn’t his fault we lost. We slowed him down. He was not to blame,” Harwin said frantically.
Malkah, Harwin, and Odo seemed to expect me to hit them.
For the past two years, I had learned that physical punishments weren’t widespread in Ebros, at least not between combatant Classes. After all, a warrior in his 30s had enough strength to crush a skull. Non-combatants, on the other hand, had free reign to slap their unruly apprentices. Ginz had a lot of not-so-funny stories about that.
Harwin and Odo jumping into the crossfire to receive the blame was kinda heartwarming. What they lacked in skill, they made up for in loyalty.
“It’s only fair for the three of you to receive a punishment,” I said, looking at Zaon. “What about two hundred push-ups?”
“Three-fifty,” he said. “Two hundred for losing the bet, hundred and fifty for thinking they could win.”
There was no hint of remorse in Zaon’s face.
Was this what he meant by pushing the cadets to the limit?
“You heard your senior. Three hundred and fifty push-ups. You can start now.”
The trio gave me a shocked look but scrambled before I could change my mind.
Malkah’s expression remained burned in my mind.
“Alright, what do we have next?” I said.
Only four students remained: Fenwick and three others who had avoided catching my attention. Any given classroom had a few low-profile students: insufficient grades to be part of the ‘smart kids’, and not antsy enough to belong to the ‘troublemakers’, always going under the radar of most teachers.
“What about the couple in the back?” I asked, pointing to a boy and a girl sitting slightly apart from the main group.
“We are not a couple, sir,” the boy said.
The girl slapped his shoulder.
“If you say it like that, it sounds like there’s a problem with me!”
“There’s a lot of problems with you!”
The cadets laughed.
“Kinda reminds me of a certain pair,” I whispered in Zaon’s ear.
“No way. I am always very mindful of my words,” he replied.
I wasn’t so sure. I could pinpoint several occasions where Zaon’s candidness annoyed Firana. Ultimately, I didn’t because the feisty couple climbed the stairs onto the platform.
“I’m Cedrinor, and this is Genivra. We are from the Ascombe Marquisate, west of Vedras Dukedom. We are not a couple,” the boy said.
A vein protruded from Genivra’s forehead.
“We have been friends since forever,” she clarified.
“Our mothers gave birth in the same infirmary, in beds next to each other. We are both sixteen.”
“We were part of the city guard before coming to the Academy.”
“She has a short fuse.”
“He has the refinement of a brick.”
“She’s a Lv.12 Fencer.”
“He’s a Lv.12 Berserker.”
Down the platform, Leonie and Aeliana butted heads. They share a single brain cell.
I wasn’t so sure.
Cedrinor and Genivra were fairly high-level for fifteen-year-olds, meaning they were more experienced than the regular cadet. Those two had probably seen more monsters than the rest of the class combined, as going from Lv.10 to Lv.12 required more experience than going from Lv.1 to Lv.10.
Cedrinor’s appearance was fairly unremarkable. He was slightly taller than average. He had short dark brown hair and small amber eyes. However, his physique revealed a lot of training. Those weren’t ‘Class’ muscles but ‘hard work’ muscles. Genivra was the same. Her hair was straight, so black it almost looked blue under the right light. She used it in a utilitarian ponytail. Like Cedrinor, she was unremarkable. Neither exceptionally attractive nor ugly, only slightly taller than average but with strong shoulders used to wield weapons.
They reminded me of the kids at the orphanage.
“Let’s start,” I said.
Cedrinor picked two wooden axes and Genivra a long rapier.
Zaon changed his longsword for a rapier.
“On your guard!” Talindra said. “Fight!”
Magic power surged through Cedrinor’s body; his muscles bulged, and his eyes became two flames of blue mana. Before I could react, he was already on top of me. I jumped aside as the axes hit the ground. The wood creaked, and a mana barrier protected them. Cedrinor didn’t stop. He moved like a whirlwind, taking advantage of the natural momentum of the axes to perform a continuous attack. Like Firana when we first met, Cedrinor’s style didn’t have an established set of rules. Still, he seemed to follow certain principles. Whether principles had been taught by a master or discovered by himself, I couldn’t tell.
Cedrinor never returned to a resting position. He let the weight of the axes guide him into the following motion, constantly spinning and sweeping. When I blocked one of his blows, the other axe followed up without slowing down. He didn’t move like a Lv.12.
I clutched my sword and retreated. My arm was getting fatigued, and his defensive openings were almost nonexistent. Cedrinor was so reckless that even attempting a counter would open me to the attack of the second axe—perfect defense through a relentless attack.
Out of the corner of my eye, I glanced at Zaon and Genivra.
The girl seemed more interested in chatting with the boy than trying to hit him.
Zaon smiled, and Genivra’s sword arm faltered.
I sighed, wondering if Zaon should be categorized as a cognitohazard.
“Eyes up here, ruffian!” Cedrinor yelled as he tried to behead me.
To his credit, he was trying hard to hit me. However, the axes' natural swinging movement made them predictable—hard to counter but predictable. I moved forward. The weakness of the axes was that only the head was dangerous; the rest of the weapon was a light stick. Cedrinor tried to step back, but my foot blocked his.
I raised my hand to protect my head from the swinging movement of his arms.
“Cedrinor is out!” Talindra shouted as the tip of my sword hit Cedrinor’s side.
The boy fell to his knee, drenched in sweat.
“Great fight, ruffian,” I said, offering him my hand.
“Thanks, sir,” Cedrinor replied with a grin.
By our side, Genivra disengaged Zaon and stepped back.
“I surrender,” she said.
[Foresight] told me I had heard it right.
“Are you for real?! Do you have mashed beets instead of brains?!” Cedrinor’s mood changed in a blink. “We are the finest Ascombeans! If we are going to lose, you should show off at least.”
Genivra was having none of it.
“I already showed enough! Right, Zaon?”
Cedrinor’s attack was so overwhelming that I didn’t have time to check on Genivra’s fighting skills. I looked at Zaon. The boy nodded.
“Her style is very meticulous. She has a long way to go, but I couldn’t find any bad habits.”
Genivra’s face lit up with a silly smile. She had been shot into cloud nine. It was like watching a train wreck in very slow motion.
Having Zaon as my assistant might not be a good idea with six girls in my class.
I clapped my hands, popping Genivra’s daydreaming.
“We have one last pair,” I said, focusing on the cadets.
Cedrinor and Genivra returned their training weapons and stepped down the platform.
“You’ll not be able to run away this time, Fenwick,” I said as the boy started unloading his army of little pets. Leonie and Aeliana were happy to babysit them.
Fenwick sighed and climbed the platform.
“As I said last time, my name is Fenwick, a Lv.7 Beastmaster. My town is too small to have a name, but it’s located south of the Gairon dukedom. You can say I’m the local funny guy. If any of you nobles need entertaining for a party, you know where to find me… here, at Classroom Cabbage,” he said, his brown curly falling disorderly over his face. His eyes were big and green, almost childish. His mischievous smile reminded me of Firana.
Fenwick stopped and did a double take.
“Why is this classroom called Cabbage, anyway?”
Talindra let out a nervous laugh.
“N-names are chosen randomly,” she stuttered.
“You sure about that, ma’am?” Fenwick was having none of it.
I clapped my hands.
“Let’s focus on introductions,” I said, shifting toward the last cadet.
She was a girl, shorter than Kili, with big round eyeglasses and a fat book under her arm. Unlike the rest, her uniform came with a black hood. Short, curly hair sprouted from the hood. Hoodie wearers were a race that would never disappear from the classroom. Upon closer inspection, I noticed her hair featured three distinct colors: orange, black, and white.
“I’m a Cat Spirit Beastfolk, Puppeteer Lv.5,” she said, pulling her hood back. “My name is Rup.”
Comments
Trevayne
Thanks for the chapter.
Matthew
I have a few questions about classroom numbers. Rob said only ten students came back after lunch, and based on everyone who talked in the afternoon we know who all is there, which means Kili didn't come back, was completely overlooked, or Rob miscounted. Also Rob mentioned 6 girls in his class but by my count there are only 4, 5 if you still count Kili even though she seems to have bailed on the afternoon class. The only way to get to 6 would be to include Talindra. Of course this all could be going off of information Rob has from his classroom overlord ability, and we just haven't seen it yet, I was just wondering. Mostly because Kili seems the most interesting out of the cadets so far and I'm hoping she didn't just vanish.
Ben Bass
TYFTC! Very nice seeing Zaon and Robert fighting so well together as if no time had passed. That right there shows how good fundamental training is and not relying on Classes/skills can be. I think this group is really understanding that and will go all in seeing how Rob’s Orphans are doing at the Academy.
dumbo3k
No no, they only get to be called something as grand and wonderful as Potato Knights if they manage to graduate from his classes! You can't just go and bestow the grandeur of a potato onto any old trainee!
oreganoe
super excited for this next arc!
I Dare Korval
Get the name changed to Potato, Rob must only train Potato Knights!
