Chapter 18
“Look at this, Miss Emily.”
“Yes?”
Emily jerked her head back at the newspaper suddenly spread before her eyes, then straightened up. Sophia peeked her head out from behind the newspaper. After the freshman welcome party on Monday and the hectic Tuesday that followed with the lingering atmosphere of the party, it was already Wednesday’s first period, Life Magic class.
“What is it?”
The classroom was quite empty as it was still before class time. Sophia, pointing to a spot in the newspaper, spoke excitedly to Emily, who had come to school early and was trying to stifle a small yawn and stay awake.
“Here, look here! This is a newspaper that covers social news, and there’s a story about Prince Lucas here!”
As Emily’s gaze followed Sophia’s fingertip, she saw a headline in large letters that read, “Second Prince Lucas, Dating a Commoner!” Below it was a photo of two people standing side by side in the banquet hall.
“Um… are they allowed to take photos like this? How did information from inside the Academy get exposed to the outside? Is this okay?”
Emily looked at Sophia in surprise.
“It seems one of the students at the banquet took a photo and sold it to the newspaper for money. I heard that student has been disciplined for two weeks. But everyone’s keeping quiet about it, and there’s a rumor that it was actually on Prince Lucas’s orders. Who would dare to earn money by going against the prince’s wishes, especially a noble attending the same academy?”
Sophia looked around briefly before sitting next to Emily and whispering softly. Emily nodded at her words. It certainly made sense.
“But this, do you think Kira knows about it? If this gets out, not only Prince Lucas but Kira will receive enormous attention… Do you know anything about it, Miss Emily?”
Emily shook her head slightly at Sophia, who looked worried.
“I just saw this newspaper now too. I don’t think she knows. I’ll have to ask her when I see her later.”
“…I just don’t understand what everyone is thinking.”
Sophia sighed and folded the newspaper. Emily inwardly clicked her tongue, unable to imagine how much the social circles would tear apart a sixteen-year-old girl who wasn’t even an adult yet.
Then, as something occurred to her, Emily turned to Sophia.
“Oh, by the way, Sophia, do you know the name of the young lady who had a drink spilled on her at the freshman welcome party? You know, the one whose dress was ruined when Kira fell and dropped her glass.”
“Ah, you mean Miss Chloe? She’s from the Viscount Allen family. It was quite a scene at the party, wasn’t it? My heart was pounding when I saw her shouting.”
“Yes, that’s right. Do you happen to know which classes she’s taking?”
“Miss Chloe is in the Magic Department, same year as us. She’ll probably attend all the required general education classes.”
Emily was surprised at this. She had thought she’d never encountered her before, but they’d been taking the same classes!
“I see. Then she’ll be attending the ‘Magic and Theology’ class today too, right?”
“No, actually… I heard she went home for a few days. It seems that after showing such a scene at the Academy party and with rumors spreading, she decided to leave for a while.”
“Rumors? What kind of rumors… Do you know when she’ll be back?”
“Actually, after the party, rumors spread that Miss Chloe has a difficult personality. Since it’s during the semester, she could only take two or three days off, so she’ll probably be back soon. To be honest, I feel a bit sorry for Miss Chloe. It might be hard for her to find a suitable marriage partner until the rumors die down.”
“Oh my…”
Emily was momentarily speechless at Sophia’s words. She recalled Chloe’s purple eyes, reddened with anger and embarrassment after being drenched with drink at the banquet. Seeing Emily at a loss for words, Sophia also looked troubled.
Both of them were also of marriageable age, so they could well imagine how much of a blow this incident must have been to Miss Chloe. Even Emily’s mother had repeatedly warned her to be careful not to let strange rumors spread while dating at the Academy, as it could block her path to marriage.
-Slide
As the two were lost in thought, Calroph entered the classroom. He was holding a large basket in one hand and an attendance book and textbook in the other.
“Everyone, take your seats.”
After the students sat down, Calroph placed the basket, textbook, and other items on the teacher’s desk. The students’ attention turned to them.
“Teacher, what’s in that basket?”
When a student in the front row raised their hand and asked, Calroph removed the cloth covering the basket.
“Remember I said we’d be training to control mana more precisely in the last class? These are the tools for that training.”
Inside the uncovered basket were gray eggs piled high. Seeing this, the students murmured in confusion, but Calroph tapped the desk again, asking them to focus.
“Now, now, don’t be confused and stay quiet. These aren’t the ordinary eggs you’re thinking of. In fact, they’re not eggs at all.”
“What are they, teacher?”
As another student raised their hand to ask, Calroph picked up one of the gray eggs and held it up for the students to see clearly.
“These are mana absorption stones created by the Academy teachers together for this class. When you put your mana into it, the pet most suitable for your mana will be born from this mana absorption stone. But it’s not really born; it’s just your mana temporarily taking form. It will disappear after a certain time. We teachers call it a ‘mana pet’.”
The students murmured at Calroph’s explanation. Sophia whispered quietly to Emily, seeming to understand.
“Oh, Miss Emily, I think I know what those are. I saw second-year Magic Department students in the corridor before with small animals the size of a palm on their shoulders. It must be those!”
“Small animals? Born from those eggs?”
As Emily turned to her in surprise, Sophia nodded.
“I think so.”
-Tap tap
“Now, everyone be quiet. I’ll explain in detail, so listen carefully. A mana pet isn’t necessarily born just by putting mana into this egg. You need to predetermine the amount of mana you’ll inject and its cycle.”
Calroph put the gray egg back in the basket and turned to write a formula on the blackboard as he continued speaking.
“Now, let’s say you inject the amount of mana from this formula once a day. To hatch this egg, you need to increase the amount of mana injected by 1.1 times every day. The initial amount of mana injected doesn’t matter, whether it’s large or small, but if you don’t inject the exact amount of mana at the exact cycle, the egg won’t hatch. So it might take a week for some to hatch, and three or four months for others.”
“Can the cycle be shorter?”
When the student who had asked earlier raised their hand again to question, Calroph nodded.
“Yes, the shorter the cycle and the higher the accuracy, the faster the egg will hatch. But if the cycle is too short, you won’t be able to sleep at night. In the last class, there was someone who set a two-hour cycle and had to wake up every two hours throughout the night to inject mana, but they gave up soon enough.”
“Teacher, if we make even one mistake in injection, will the egg never hatch?”
“No, if you bring it back to me, I’ll reset it to its initial state. It’ll be back to square one. But in that case, you’ll lose two points from your performance evaluation score, so keep that in mind.”
The students raised a commotion at Calroph’s words.
“Now, now, quiet down. I’ll hand them out one by one, so take them. You kids, if you knew how much magical power the teachers poured into making these absorption stones for days and nights, you should be receiving them with both hands in tears of gratitude, not in an uproar.”
Calroph clicked his tongue as if just recalling it was terrible, and passed the basket around starting from the front row. The students murmured as they passed the basket back row by row. Emily and Sophia also received the basket and each took one in hand. The egg-shaped mana absorption stone was colder and harder than expected. Its smooth surface without any patterns felt quite nice to touch.
“This looks like an egg-shaped stone.”
Sophia also looked closely at the egg in her hand, seemingly fascinated.
“It does. It’s really amazing. To think a mana pet will be born from this.”
“Now, if everyone has received an egg, copy down the formula on the blackboard, fill in the blank with the amount of mana you’ll inject and its cycle, and try injecting your mana.”
Calroph put away the empty basket under the teacher’s desk and tapped the blackboard for the students to copy down the formula. Everyone created their own formula, and some impatient students started injecting mana even before copying down the formula.
Emily and Sophia also copied the formula into their notebooks and injected mana into the absorption stone according to the formula the teacher had written.
-Whoosh
A small light flickered in the middle of the gray egg, then was instantly absorbed and disappeared. And a yellow line was drawn on the gray egg.
“This mana absorption stone will gradually turn yellow as you inject more mana, and eventually it will crack. The mana pet born that way is your own mana. Even if its form disappears over time, it’s just reabsorbed into you, so don’t worry.”
“Yes~”
“As you practice handling mana this delicately, you’ll find your skills improving before you know it. Everyone, work hard. And I’ll reflect the results in your performance evaluation scores.”
At the mention of performance evaluation, everyone voiced their complaints again, but Calroph ignored this and continued with the lesson. Emily looked curiously at the absorption stone with its yellow line, then placed it on her desk and started to focus on the class.
