I Became an Extra Without Growth in the Academy

Lilith Raphi. Now just Lilith, she was the princess of the Raphi Kingdom.

However, unfortunately, the Raphi Kingdom was located right next to the Demon Lord’s territory.

As a result, the kingdom was completely taken away by the Demon Lord’s army, and in the process, her family was scattered.

Eventually, she fled to Rubetia to survive, hiding her identity as a princess and living secretly in a convent.

One day, she followed the advice of a priest who visited the convent and tried using light magic, awakening as a Saintess. Realizing that the special power known as Holy Power was effective against the Demon Lord’s army that had destroyed her kingdom, she decided to temporarily set aside her goal of finding her scattered family.

Of course, she wanted to see her family, but more than that, she wanted revenge against the Demon Lord’s army that had taken her homeland.

But knowing her own shortcomings, she thought to first gain strength by entering the Akadeumi.

That was the beginning of Lilith’s story.

But the current situation was whoosh so different from what I knew. She wasn’t hiding in a convent, and judging by the pendant with her kingdom’s emblem, it didn’t look like she was hiding her identity as a princess either.

In the first place, her appearing in the entrance exam was something completely unheard of. Originally, she was supposed to appear suddenly at the end of the first semester after awakening as a Saintess… What on earth happened?

While those random thoughts swirled in my mind, one phrase Lilith uttered sent a chill down my spine.

“My specialty is light attribute magic, you know? So, know that tricks won’t work on me.”

Tricks. In this world, that term was often used to describe deceitful magic and cowardly tricks.

Also, the origin of trick magic was closely related to evil, making it easily dispelled by light attribute magic.

But is the game system a trick? Surely not. It was never something that could be compared to tricks in the first place.

Even if it was, it wouldn’t matter. Would my carefully arranged evasion timing Excel sheet not have light attribute techniques?

She’s looking at me like I’m some kind of con artist. She’s totally disregarding my career built on fair fights!

Saintess, my foot, she’s gonna get a reality check. If you’re a newbie, you just go “Wow, that’s so strong! Amazing!” not doubt me like that!

“Shall we start right away? You go first.”

I offered her the first move.

Maybe she thought my confidence was arrogance; she smiled brightly and activated her magic.

“Don’t regret it!”

The power of light began to dominate the space, brightening things up.

It was a purification barrier. In simple terms, a domain expansion… umm, anyway, within this barrier, any trickery would be turned into nothing.

Then, another spell was launched at me.

Zwaaaang!

A spear of light. It was a gukbap skill whose piercing power increased depending on the user’s magic.

The attack power was decent, the speed of the spear was fast, and on top of that, it had piercing power, so anyone who has dabbled in light magic would be aware of its danger.

However, the spear of light had quite a few drawbacks for a gukbap skill.

Since it was a skill that shot a spear, the range of attack was narrow, and it only flew in a straight line.

Thus, I could avoid it with just a slight sidestep without even using evasion… but if I did that now while she’s babbling about tricks, wouldn’t she actually think I used a trick?

That was something I could never accept, so I leaped forward instead. The spear of light pierced through my abdomen and continued onward.

If I had failed to avoid it, I would have had a hole, but upon checking my abdomen just in case, it was completely fine.

I had boasted that tricks wouldn’t work on me, so what do I do now? This is way too effective!

“How are… tricks working in this space…?”

“So, it’s not a trick then.”

“It can’t be!”

Disgusting Lilith. You need to just accept it by this point.

I mean, I’ll concede that it looks like some trick, but just because it looks like that doesn’t mean you can judge me poorly! Do you even know how dangerous superficial judgments can be? Ah, I guess you wouldn’t understand since you’re pretty!

Anyway. Since I showed that light magic doesn’t work, the others shouldn’t judge me too negatively.

Maybe this situation isn’t so bad?

“Eeeek!”

But Lilith, possibly hurt by her magic not working, suddenly enveloped herself in a swirl of light and charged at me.

Her repertoire of light magic seems quite broad? What’s going on? Did she awaken as a Saintess already?

“Die!”

With that rather aggressive exclamation, her fist flew towards me. Naturally, I dodged, and as I evaded, magical energy exploded… uh, no, that’s not magic. That color is definitely Holy Power.

Holy Power. Aside from the fact that it can only be used with light attribute techniques, it’s not much different from regular magic, but true to its name, it acts like a fatal poison to things related to demons, demon races, Demon Lord armies…

And the unlocking condition for Holy Power is the awakening of a Saintess.

This was a stat that could never be obtained by a fixed male protagonist.

But using Holy Power means Lilith has awakened as a Saintess right now. How can that be?

I didn’t know of any route where she could awaken without going to the convent…

After continuing to dodge Lilith’s relentless attacks, I pondered this, but the fact that meeting Lilith at this point in time was completely outside the script meant I couldn’t think of anything.

In the end, this situation indicated that I was witnessing a story unfolding entirely differently from what I knew.

As I reached that conclusion, a single thought suddenly flickered through my mind.

“Um, could it be…?”

In the past, part of an update plan that was posted in the developer’s notes.

[We are currently developing the Heaven difficulty, which is the next stage after the current Hell difficulty. Meet characters that grow even faster and delve into another story, uncovering truths that have not been revealed until now.]

They kept repeating that it was under development for months, then at some point they had quietly scrapped it, replacing it with some new content.

I remembered that the added content from that time was genuinely fun, and I completely forgot about the new difficulty.

Still, I felt a bit disappointed because I was somewhat looking forward to it.

Well, enough of those thoughts. What I needed to focus on was this sentence.

‘Meet characters that grow even faster and delve into another story.’

In other words, in that difficulty, characters would grow faster, leading to changes in the story.

Given this game’s unique trait of characters growing stronger through hardships, it made sense that only Lilith—the only one to have experienced hardship at this point—would be significantly affected.

I couldn’t be sure if it was true or not right away, but it seemed wise to make that judgment based on the assumption that it is.

It would become clearer as I observe the growth rate of the others moving forward.

“Well, anyway, after we enter the academy, everyone grows rapidly. I might be able to confirm it sooner than I think.”

“Eeeek! What the heck! How can a person just pass through like that! This is seriously creepy!”

“Ah, but if those guys get stronger faster, how am I supposed to keep up? Seriously, the balance is totally wrecked.”

“What have you been muttering about since earlier? We’re in a duel! Focus on the duel!”

For now, I just need to keep playing around until this noisy one gets tired. Her patterns were diverse, so it was more enjoyable to dodge than I expected.

But wouldn’t a princess who is also a Saintess be a bit more elegant, like Seria? She looked the part of a classic Saintess, yet her actions didn’t match.

Sure, many liked her for that gap, but there was still a bit of awkwardness stemming from the disparity between her appearance and behavior.

Eventually, she went wild until she exhausted all her magic, collapsing and needing to be carried away.

“…You really can’t judge a person by their looks after all.”

“She’s genuinely pretty… but it’s a bit of a letdown.”

That day, Lilith’s achievement was selected as one of the ‘Top 10 Perfect Conversation Starters for Awkward Encounters’ and she would forever carry the nickname ‘Crazy Dog’.

Even being former royalty didn’t spare her from being frozen in time. What a terrifying world…

The following duels went smoothly.

In fact, since I was able to use evasion, there was absolutely no way I could lose in such a one-on-one format.

Even if the main character were to come later with the final specs, I was confident I wouldn’t lose one-on-one. Though, I doubt I could even win…

Thanks to that, I managed to endure in the training ground until every character finished the exam.

“…Is it over?”

“Yup. There’s really nothing left to admire now.”

“Are you a monster? How can you fight for hours without even breaking a sweat?”

At this point, I was sure my stamina was also under the influence of the [Irregular] trait.

There was no way to frame surpassing this many opponents, and only turning the tide after letting them unleash their full power as sheer stamina.

With parries, evasion, dash-canceling, and auto recovery of stamina.

Just listing what was evident already seems ridiculous, and I was more scared of what else might still be hidden.

Now that I think about it, the game system was indeed the pinnacle of absurdity…

And I had been transported here with all of that in tow, so my conscience was pricked a bit… but you all just grow while I have to sit here twiddling my thumbs. Just look at this situation. I won’t even be able to get close to you later because of my lacking stats.

Thinking about that, my motivation suddenly plummeted.

sigh The future feels bleak. Anyway, now that the exam is over, shall we head up?

“…Hmm?”

At that moment, someone came down to the training ground.

Did someone who hadn’t taken the exam yet remain? I thought, glancing back, and saw a familiar face.

“Rudion!”

She, my first duel opponent, Seria, had come down.

How can the ultra introvert, Seria, walk into such a public space with everyone watching? What’s going on?

‘Oh no, could it be…’

In an instance, my past crime flashed before me: elbows to the face that knocked her out cold.

And now, appearing before me was Seria… with her personality, if she’s showing up in front of people, she must be really angry, right?

No way. Is she planning on publicly executing me in front of so many witnesses? That… well, I guess there’s no way around it. I was in the wrong after all.

Without hesitation, I slammed my head to the ground.

“I’m so sorry!!!”

“W-Why are you suddenly doing this?! Wait… stop putting your head on the ground! I told you to stop!”

With all my strength, I prostrated myself! Still no good? Then there’s only the grand bow left!

“What are you doing?! C-Can you please stop that and get up already!”

She started hitting my back, but her strength was only about 4. It wasn’t like her hits were totally ineffective, but I could easily withstand them.

“Are you forgiving me?”

“What exactly are you apologizing for? What do you want me to forgive? I have no idea what you’re talking about… sigh, fine. There are too many eyes here, so let’s talk outside.”

Seeing her start to worry about the onlookers was a good sign—thankfully, she seemed to have calmed down a lot.

After all, when you’re in the wrong, you should start by bowing your head.

But if she’s telling me to follow her… what on earth is she planning to do?

I was utterly terrified, but given what I had done, I really had no choice but to comply with her wishes.

That’s how Rudion followed Seria out of the exam hall.

The onlookers were speaking among themselves.

“…Are they dating?”

“No way. Do you even know who that girl is?”

“I do. I know… but why do they look like a girlfriend suffering because of a silly boyfriend in my eyes…”

“To be honest, Rudion? She looks so good with him.”

…

…

…

“But didn’t they duel alone when we first came here?”

“…Now that you mention it, they did, didn’t they?”

“Isn’t that kind of suspect for them to be secretly dating?”

“Come on, no way! But if they are, that sounds juicy. I love secret relationships!”

It seemed the image of Seria being knocked out cold by an elbow strike had long been erased from their memories.

I wonder how red her face would be if she heard this conversation.

Well, that’s anyone’s guess.

---