NOVEL NEXT Chapter 66
<66 - All Done Now>
“Then you can’t use it, Inseok.”
“Ow!”
As I lifted my head in shock after banging it on a boulder the size of my arm, Son Ohchun was looking down at me with a disappointed expression.
“Hey, little mouse. Did hanging out with that employer turn you into a merchant or something?”
“Eek! That hurts!”
“I hit you to make it hurt. Isn’t asking for points extortion?”
“But those guys said terrible things to Hestia!”
Hestia also targeted her victims with some degree of discretion. If you looked closely, they were all people who deserved it.
“But do you really want to extort from someone weaker than you? It would be one thing if you beat them to death, but you shouldn’t act like a ruthless businessman extorting them.”
“Got it… I’ll hold back next time…”
“Not just next time, but this time too.”
“Yes… This time too…”
Son Ohchun is a regular comrade, a long-standing member of the Oknodie’s original party. It would be troublesome if he got upset for not listening just once, so I decided to concede this time.
However, the students with black eyes were starting to fear us even more.
“Here’s the flag.”
“I-it’s okay! I don’t have to take the flag, just please let me live!”
“Huh? He says it’s fine?”
“Come on. He’s saying that out of fear. Hurry up and give him the flag.”
“Y-yes…”
In the end, one guy reluctantly took the flag. But as soon as he got it, he burst into tears, wailing loudly.
Meanwhile, the friends who were having their meal at nearby seats had their heads glued to their trays, not moving their utensils, remaining still as if a mouse had died.
What’s up with this atmosphere?
I thought we were being nice by returning the flag, like Uncle Son Ohchun said, but why are they so scared?!
“What’s wrong? Did something bad happen?”
“N-no! It’s just that we’re a bit quiet.”
“Hey, shut up and eat your food.”
Another student, trying to cover for his friend with the bruises, got poked in the ribs by yet another student to keep quiet.
Feeling a bit hurt by how much they seemed to fear us, I shifted my gaze away when I noticed some prickly stares directed towards me.
“That guy’s done for in the academy.”
“Does he come by to beat us off every now and then if he’s bored?”
“Maybe instead of extorting the flag, he’ll just beat us until we die.”
“Let’s get out of here.”
“If we get caught, we might get targeted too.”
“I haven’t even drunk my milk yet…”
“Do you want to get crushed in the academy or drink your milk comfortably?”
Suddenly, students threw away their milk, taking away their trays like they were trash.
They stripped off all the expensive meat and fled the cafeteria in a panic.
Oknodie, seeing the fleeing victims and their friends, was taken aback.
“Hey! You need to apologize for that!”
“It’s fine, you don’t have to!”
“You need to take the flag too!”
“You take it! We’ll give you everything, just please forgive us!”
“??”
Despite being obediently fearful and playing nice, Oknodie only earned more fear.
*
“There was such an incident; please scold them!”
“Why should we?”
The instructors, who were patrolling the academy, responded bureaucratically to the students who ran up to tell them everything under the sun.
“The violence that occurred during the competition for the flags to accomplish the principal’s assignments does not violate school rules. There will be no forceful intervention.”
“What kind of law is that?!”
“You all took advantage of your power to demand ‘protection fees’ from the lower class students and control their time at the Group B training facility; the instructors weren’t involved in that either.”
It wasn’t because they were weaker than the students or afraid of their backing.
“The principal respects human free will. Whether it is a good will or a bad will.”
The principal is not bound by good or evil. Thus, the academy’s principle is to basically refrain from actively interfering with the students.
“In exchange, the instructors evaluate the activities of the students in the academy. Who has broken which rules, who has lived exemplary lives to receive which points, and measuring those points.”
Pointism reigns supreme. The academy’s definition is solely manifested through points.
Only then did the students realize that the principal’s words about points being everything were as straightforward as they seemed.
“If you’re frustrated, take the martial arts class at the Knight Department. If you learn the strength of knowledge, you shouldn’t get beaten up.”
“Hmph. Fine. It was our mistake to rely on the instructors. We’ll handle noble problems like nobles!”
“Nobles should settle their scores with connections!”
Only another noble could preserve the face of a noble. The students resolved to go and complain to the professor, who was from the empire’s noble class.
*
Wednesday, 3rd period, Professor Weird’s Fundamentals and Understanding of Mana Usage lecture time.
Today, the dryad professor, dressed in a shocking outfit with more exposed area than concealed by leaves and vines, captured the students’ attention.
“In the last class, we found puzzle pieces of natural mana. Today we will write the theoretical formulas needed to use those puzzle pieces.”
As the dryad professor turned her back to look at the blackboard with chalk in hand, the students’ eyes shifted from the blackboard to her back instead.
Even when facing her front, she evoked imaginations of her ample bosom covered only partially by the leaves, resembling ripe fruit.
Unbothered by exposure, the students were captivated by her abdomen’s impressive muscles and her cute belly button, so much so that half the students, regardless of gender, were under her spell, or so Oknodie was sure.
What about the other half?
They must have been enchanted by her back.
Looking at her elegantly curvy waist that descended in an S-shape drew thoughts from wanting to embrace her to wanting to trace her spine with their fingers.
As they got carried away, it belatedly dawned on the students that the speed at which she was writing on the blackboard was surprisingly fast.
“Oknodie, isn’t the professor’s hips amazing? I’ve never seen such a pretty bottom before. I’ve heard dryads are attractive, but does she work out her glutes too?”
“Dorothy, you’ll regret that. Hurry up and take notes.”
“Take notes? If the professor writes it all, I can just do it later… Huh? When did she write this much?!”
The answer lay with the vines.
The vines, which the dryad managed as freely as hands, each gripped a board marker and drew at a terrifying speed across the large blackboard measuring 1200×5000.
Ten or more vines were drawing simultaneously in a speed that would leave the students struggling to keep up, even if they had two hands.
Thus, it was inevitable that it would be overwhelming for the students to take notes.
As they struggled, the professor proudly turned around and asked, “So, did you all write it down? I’ll be erasing it now.”
“No, Professor!!!”
“How can you do this!!!”
“We just barely wrote everything down!!!”
“I didn’t manage to write a single thing! You need to give us time to take notes!”
Panic erupted with screams from all directions.
Professor Weird tilted her head in confusion.
“What does that have to do with me?”
“Huh??”
“I wrote it all down.”
“…”
That’s right.
Despite being a young and healthy professor who could very well be labeled an exhibitionist, she had one glaring flaw.
She was a selfish and cruel professor, oblivious to the hearts of her students.
‘The perfection of the dryad’s teachings doesn’t need to cater to students’ feelings. Why should I bother?’
Professor Weird genuinely believed this.
Oknodie, of course, realized this professor thought that way.
The only thing she took pride in was how diligently she had written everything, satisfied with showcasing her abilities to the world, not caring to shed light on knowledge and culture to these dimwitted students as a true educator!
“Uwah! I barely wrote anything!”
“I could only write half the formulas, and now I don’t understand anything! If a spell doesn’t work, it’s just garbage!”
Dorothy, the forest caretaker from the border, along with the haughty students from the empire’s magic towers, Rosgini from the Red Tower and Sandkooker from the Yellow Tower all faced absolute ruin.
“I need the notes from sector 1-2!”
“Is there anyone who wrote in sector 1-3?”
“I wrote in sector 1-4, but if anyone has notes from 1-3, can we exchange…?”
“I’ll give you 5 points! Please just show me once!!”
“I’ll throw in a delicious gel that’s served with side dishes for 5 points too!!”
“10 points!!!”
“What?! To give up two meals for a single page of notes? Are you crazy?!”
“I have as much money as I want. Points can be recovered. But once you lose grades, the disdain from your family is irreversible!!”
After class ended, the Fundamentals and Understanding of Mana Usage lecture had turned from an exchange market into absolute chaos.
Most students, following common sense, had continued taking notes from the far left, managing only to jot down on page 1-1 while almost no one had succeeded in taking notes on the other pages.
The ones who considered exchanging notes with students who took notes on other parts of the blackboard were an incredibly small number.
“Uwah! What do I do? I ruined the second lecture!”
“Don’t cry, Dorothy. I took notes.”
“Really? Which pages did you manage to write?”
“Pages 1-3 and 2-3.”
“What?! Page 1-3 had no inventory and 2-3 only had one person taking notes!”
“See, taking notes is about writing down the most valuable parts. This way, I can exchange them and create a complete version.”
Dorothy hung her head low.
“Still, I could only take page 1-1 and 2-1, 2-2.”
“It’s fine. I’ll show you mine.”
“Really?! The pages I have are of little value; are you sure that’s okay?”
“Of course. We’re friends, right?”
“Oknodie…!”
“Just make sure to charge other students 10 points per page for the notes you’ve taken and give me half the profit as a commission!”
“……”
They all knew the content but took notes purely for the sake of copying points.