by Nikostar A
Earth Credits were an extremely valuable resource at the academy. First-year students were given one thousand credits each month while second-year students received two thousand credits, regardless of what background they had.
To become a powerful mage, the use of resources was an absolute necessity. Many of those resources were readily available in the shop; special items that could help mana recovery or that could increase the mana flow in the spirit circuits. All these items were highly sought after but were very expensive!
It was very rare for first years to ever be able to purchase one of them as they were not meant to do so. The course was designed for freshers to mostly learn the theory and to familiarise themselves with their spirit circuits. It was only in their second year that the students would actively push their limits and improve their mana reservoir and practical skills.
People usually followed the guidance given but unfortunately, there would always be a few exceptions. Since the rifts appeared, several organizations were formed to explore these areas but to do so, they needed to recruit mages!
These organizations spent a lot of money in investing in some promising students. Long before they even joined the academy, they were already taught the theory of magic and which spirit circuit to use.
However, to become an official mage, the student still needed to go through the awakening process and as a result, they needed to join the academy. The organization had nothing against that detail, but they were bothered about their promising recruits wasting an entire year at the academy.
Compared to the other students, those selected recruits did not need time to learn the theory or to familiarise themselves with their new power. They were already taught the basics and needed to focus on expanding their mana reservoir and practicing their spells.
This was where the rigid system of the academy became a major obstacle. In order to promote fairness between the students, they were all given exactly the same amount of resources. To them, one thousand Earth Credits per month were simply not enough!
Earth Credits were the only currency that could be used at the academy and with all the transactions being closely monitored, it was almost impossible for the organization to help their recruits.
It was a major problem for them but after brainstorming the issue, they finally came up with this clever plan; to have their other members share with the new ones. The solution was not ideal but by sharing resources among its members, the organization would benefit as a whole.
Alexander was naturally aware of the organizations' actions. He did not explicitly remember this particular event but during his school life, there had been several instances where students ended up severely punished when attempting to share their credits among themselves.
He was not sure if the student in battle room 19 was going to actually try to voluntarily lose but it was irrelevant to him. Alexander would not say no to some additional Earth Credits but he was primarily looking for someone to test his stargazer's abilities. Since it was going to be his first time doing so, it was better to do so against a weakened opponent to minimize the risk of backlash.
Alexander walked through the corridor, giving access to the stage where the instructors were guiding the students, but he did not talk to them yet. He waited for a few more students to attempt the challenge before doing so as well.
The reason was simple; he wanted to be allocated to battle room 19. It was fairly easy to choose his opponent as the instructors were simply allocating the students in the room order. After allocating a student to room 20, they would then allocate the next one to room 1 and the cycle would repeat itself.
"If you are going to fight, wear this talisman. As soon as you feel a considerable amount of pain, it will activate and protect you against the attack. The other student also has one. The winner is the first one to destroy the other's talisman. Once a student wins, using any other spells is strictly forbidden!" said the instructor while handing Alexander a small brown necklace.
"Got it!"
"Wait here, it will be your turn in a few minutes. Most students cannot even hold for one minute. I hope you are not just overestimating yourself."
As he was speaking, the instructor's X-Driver suddenly started beeping. He turned toward the battle room 19 and as he expected, he saw the defeated fresher stumbling out of the room.
"You are next!" said the instructor while pushing the student in front of Alexander.
"After him, it's your turn. Just put your X-Driver in the slot at the entrance of the battle room. It will validate your identity and will transfer the credits directly to your account if you manage to win."
Alexander nodded but did not answer. From his position, he could no longer watch the screens, but he already knew the results of all the challenges just by looking at the face of the freshers stepping out of the battle rooms.
He did not have to wait very long as just thirty seconds after the student in front of him entered the battle room 19, the instructor's X-Driver once again beeped.
"You're up!"
Alexander calmly walked toward his allocated room. He followed the instructions and placed his X-Driver in its allocated room before entering the room.
Inside, he was immediately greeted by the second-year student. "Welcome, welcome. You should be the seventh or the eighth? I already lost count. Come at me with all you've got, man!"
Alexander smiled at his opponent and carefully walked to his marked position. With all the other students waiting outside, the system did not waste any time and started the countdown.
The two mages were forbidden from casting any spells or from leaving the small circle drawn under their feet before the end of the countdown.
However, these rules did not matter to Alexander. He took a deep breath before moving his body into the posture of the first constellation.
As the countdown was slowly approaching zero, Alexander smiled and symbolically thought:
"Arado"
Chapter 10: Easy money
[Arado, the laborer]
These were the name and title of the first constellation. Its title was far from being impressive, but laborers were the basis of all societies. Without laborers to do the required manual work, it would have been impossible for Earth to reach this degree of development.
What were the characteristics of a laborer? They were mainly jack of all trades, able to do all sort of manual jobs. The key word was 'manual'. Even if they stood at the bottom of the society doing odd jobs, after hours and hours of work, their body would naturally develop to a certain extent.
This was the effect of Arado; a temporary overall improvement in all of its user's physical abilities.
Alexander did not need to think of the constellation's name to activate its effect; it was just a symbolical move as the first constellation he was ever using.
The countdown reached zero and the duel officially started. Alexander did not feel anything different at first but as soon as he started to move, he felt the changes in his body.
With his body surging with strength, he charged toward the second-year student.
"Fast!"
Compared to before, Alexander felt like his body had become much lighter. It was bustling with energy and did not even feel the resistive forces of the air around him. His physical conditions were temporarily brought to a completely different level. Although it was not at the level of world-class athletes, it was above what regular people could do.
Just by looking at his opponent's face, he knew the effects were apparent. The impact on Alexander was already big but for a mage, whose physical abilities were generally low, he started sweating when he saw how fast his opponent was.
While being an elemental mage, it was inevitable for one's physical conditions to degrade. Mages spent a lot of time meditating, constantly trying to improve their mana reservoir and their spirit circuits. As they focused on their magic elements, their body was the one suffering.
"You are fast but in the end, we are her
e to become mages. There is a reason why we are superior to normal soldiers!"
Despite his initial fright, the second-year student recollected his thoughts and activated his spirit circuits.
Alexander saw through his actions. It was not just his body that was improved; his senses also became considerably more sensitive. With just one look, Alexander could tell exactly what spell he was casting.
'His control is not so good. I can guess which spirit circuit he is using. It's a fireball. With the circuits he is using, it should be a medium size one with a straight trajectory!'
His whole body was on alert. Alexander swiftly analyzed the situation and easily dodged the path of the fireball he predicted.
As he anticipated, a fireball flew past him and exploded on the wall behind him. The only detail Alexander misjudged was the size of the fireball.
'Right, I forgot. Since we are in a room made of Aimantite, the power of all spells is reduced. Maybe I won't even need to use spells.'
Originally, Alexander was planning to quickly end the fight with a couple of spells after testing Arado. He was already satisfied with the results but knowing that all magic powers were weakened, a reckless idea sprouted in his mind: he wanted to completely beat that guy using only his stargazer power.
Alexander never thought of this at first since he thought that he would have to keep his X-Driver with him. One should not underestimate the innocent-looking smartphone. It was one of the few tools the academy used to closely monitor its students. Not only did it act like a tracker, constantly giving away the student's position, it could also register what spells the student used at any particular time.
It was a strong security measure to make sure that internal fighting did not occur outside. The X-Driver was a powerful device, but it would only be able to detect powers of an elemental mage. The rest of humanity was still unaware of the existence of stargazers but if Alexander was suddenly seen using magic without the X-Driver recording anything, he would immediately arouse suspicion.
Thankfully, the battle room was not equipped with such sensors able to identify which spells were being used. It was all thanks to the Aimantite that was known to interfere with the sensor's reading.
So far, Alexander was confident in using the first three constellations of the stargazers and all three of them had combat-related effects.
His ambition was to defeat the second-year student using only physical attack. Would it not be great for a mage to lose to being punched?
But Alexander was not naive either. He knew the limits of having a strong body. He jumped to the side, dodging the next attack of his visibly frustrated opponent.
Frank had been having a good time so far. Several freshers came to challenge him but none of them were able to make him use more than four spells. He had already used half of his mana reservoir but even when his friends advised him to rest, he refused and did not leave the battle room, claiming that he wanted to test his limits.
Frank was not lying; he really wanted to test himself but at the same time, the second reason for his task was that he was told to waste as much mana as possible and to wait for someone. When that person would challenge him, all he would need to do was to throw the fight discreetly!
Frank was very happy to do so. He could safely secure his future by simply losing one fight. Unfortunately, things never went as planned. Before he could meet that special person, Frank was forced to face a powerful opponent.
He had already used two spells but he has yet to hit his opponent. To top it off, his opponent only used his own physical abilities!
"You are fast. But speed alone is not enough!" exclaimed Frank. He swiftly stopped casting offensive spells and switched to a utility one.
[Sluggish]
When he saw Frank activate his spirit circuits, Alexander instantly knew the effect of the next spell. He felt his body becoming heavier and harder to move.
However, Alexander paid it no mind. Spells like these were the very reason why mages were the bane of normal soldiers, but Alexander never planned on winning like that. His body was already shifting into the third constellation's posture!
[Cali, the arsonist]
There was no need to explain the constellation's title and effect. It obviously provided Alexander with the ability to summon flames and control fire!
Frank smiled when he noticed that his spell has succeeded. 'Let's see how you dodge my attacks now that you are slowed down!'
Unfortunately, his smile quickly froze. At first, he did not understand why his opponent was taking on this strange posture; Alexander putting all the pressure on his right leg while stretching his arms in front of him. His fingers were neatly arranged, forming a small triangle!
Frank did not think much of this move but that was until a flame suddenly appeared in the middle of the triangle, rushing toward him. Furthermore, it was not a single flame like the fireball he used earlier; instead, it was a continuous stream of flames!
"This... Is this [Dragon Breath]?" exclaimed Frank.
He panicked and rapidly used his spirit circuits to form a shield. However, his move was hasty and incomplete. In just a few seconds, the shield broke down under the roasting flames and Frank's talisman of protection was forcefully activated.
Seeing the results of the third constellation, Alexander stopped the flow of star energy and returned to a normal posture. He politely smiled at Frank, "Well done, you're strong."
"You..." Frank took a step back in panic. "Was that Dragon Breath?"
"Oh? You know Dragon Breath? Aren't you a second year?" answered Alexander with a surprised expression.
[Dragon Breath] was a spell taught in the third-year course. It was a rather popular spell as it possessed strong firepower.
'Looks like I've got an excuse to use now. If they ask me how I managed to create such a flame, I can just say it's Dragon Breath.'
***
Outside of the battle room, not many people discovered that a fresher won over a second year. Twenty duels were taking place at the same time, making it hard for the students to follow every one of them. Most of them would usually look at the screens where the handsome men or the pretty women were displaying their skills.
Still, a few students noticed the events, especially those who were waiting in line as they were the first to see the instructors' face change.
"Look, something happened in battle room 19!"
"Wait, did the fresher win? Impossible? What happened? I was focused on battle room 10"
"Look at battle room 19! Something just happened!"
When they noticed the commotion, many students turned their attention to Alexander's battle room.
Su Buqing and Raphael were one of the few who had been watching Alexander since the very beginning. They looked at each other, "Did he really just beat the second year that easily?"
"Looks like it. Didn't he say that he was just a 5.1? Did he lie about his performance index?"
While the commotion was slowly growing in size among the spectators, the situation in the instructors' meeting room was already explosive!
"What was that? Answer me!"
Carmen Ashmore glared at the instructors who were quivering in fear. She had nothing against Alexander in particular but just like Alexander was able to notice the student's reluctance to take some rest, many instructors also noticed this small detail.
They did not openly voice it out yet as it could just have been a coincidence but now, Carmen was almost certain that some sort of transaction was taking place.
"Get someone to make a quick investigation on those two students! The one in charge of battle room 19, describe in detail what happened! Don't open the battle room yet! Stall for some time!"
"Yes, miss," answered a few instructors as they immediately got to work.
The one in charge of the battle room 19 did not dare to look at the headmistress directly. With a lowered head, he explained, "I don't think the senior student purposely threw the towel. He started aggre
ssively with a straight fireball and a shockwave. His aim was on point and when he noticed his opponent's tactic, he also tried to use a utility spell. It was just that the fresher was too strong. I suspect that the new student immediately started the duel with a physical boost, allowing him to easily dodge all the attacks and he finished the duel with what looks like Dragon Breath"
"Dragon Breath? Isn't that a third-year spell? How can he already use it? Show me the replay!"
The screen in front of the instructors changed, replaying Alexander's duel with Frank.
"This... It seems that you are right. What about the information on the students?"
"I did not find anything wrong about this Alexander. He is a normal student from country A. There is nothing particularly amazing in his record and his performance index is only 5.1. However, the student named Frank is suspected to have had contact with the Flemming group. I would also like to mention that one of the students currently waiting in line to fight Frank is also rumored to have been recruited by the Flemming Association."
