Chapter 56
Chapter 56
Translator: True Detective
Chapter 56 – Lan Qi Is a Good Student Wherever He Goes
2024-05-22 Author: Poor Xixi
The stage, which had suddenly turned horrific, seemed to snuff out the very atmosphere that a performance was supposed to bring.
However, this silence existed only in the eyes of Lan Qi and Huperion.
Very soon, many of the students on stage erupted into even more joyous cheers, as if such theatrically charged slaughter was what truly fascinated them.
The familiars that had begun moving went about their task with practiced skill, cleaning up the stage. In just over ten seconds, they had restored it to its original neatness and order.
And the host-teacher on stage, as if nothing had ever happened, kept that elegant smile and began calmly inviting the next student performer to step up!
Blood and absurdity intertwined to the extreme—this, in fact, was the kind of performance that demons delighted in.
Even Huperion, who bore half-demonic blood herself, felt that the demonic world of this era was far too grotesque to accept.
“So this… this is what demon music is like?”
Lan Qi murmured to himself.
At this moment, he was staring only at the four mentors, with the same serious, attentive look as if he were in class, listening to a lecture.
Sitting farthest left was a suit of pitch-black armor, its body wrapped in a soul-fire thin as cicada wings—like a walking wisp of ghostly flame.
Beside it, the music mentor was a spectral being, its half-spirit face forever with eyes closed, as if immersed in eternal slumber.
The third mentor’s body was inscribed all over with venomous runic patterns, like some mysterious and dangerous forbidden experiment.
And the last seemed carved from a towering snow mountain, with skin like snow itself, shaggy white fur covering its body, exhaling a chilling frost-mist.
Lan Qi recalled reading in the handbook that these four music mentors were called Ghostly Armor, Slumbering Phantom, Diseased Toxin Body, and Demon of Snow.
Though not strong in combat and of low rank, they were currently in high repute within the demonic music scene, thus specially invited as guest music mentors at Demon Academy, serving as judges for this graduation exam.
If the exam guide was correct, stating: [Each guest music mentor will strictly and fairly judge the performance in the dimension of their specialty], then only by meeting their respective conditions would one earn their approval.
And so—
For a full fifty minutes—
Lan Qi and Huperion sat in the audience, watching over a dozen performances, until they finally clarified what the four conditions were.
Ghostly Armor judged only by atmosphere—the strength of the crowd’s emotions and cheers was his sole standard.
Slumbering Phantom would acknowledge the performance only if the music was so lulling and intoxicating that it sent him into slumber.
Diseased Toxin Body demanded wails and howls on the level of a spiritual attack.
Demon of Snow required shockingly grand visual stage effects.
This, after much cross-checking, was the absurd conclusion the two arrived at.
Compared to human understanding of music, the music of demons was indeed rather… extraordinary.
Individually, each condition wasn’t too bad.
But if a single performance managed to achieve two of them at once—
The resulting spectacle was nothing short of a hellish nightmare no human could endure.
Up until now, Lan Qi had even seen a performance in this classroom that managed to win the approval of three mentors!
And that performance—
Its sheer explosiveness had already radiated out to the real world, overwhelming audiences watching the live broadcast.
“Aiya! Aiya! What kind of music is this?!”
At Ikerite Academy, students watching on the outdoor giant screen couldn’t help but cover their ears.
Many scrunched their faces tight, tears leaking from the corners of their eyes, facial muscles convulsing, their skin turning deathly pale.
Their heads felt as if smashed by a heavy hammer, paralyzed by a shock that spread from forehead to the back of the skull.
The sound itself seemed capable of tearing a hole in the air.
Ever since Lan Qi and Huperion had entered that music classroom, the students gathered at Jerra Memorial Square before the giant screen had been suffering the same relentless pounding for dozens of minutes!
“The ones who can’t even pass are still bearable.”
“But every so-called ‘qualified performance’ that earns recognition from at least two mentors is basically a weaponized psychic assault!”
“That guy just now, who managed three mentors’ approval—he nearly killed me through the screen!!”
The demonic music roared like crashing waves in their eardrums, as if someone had forced them to gulp down a concoction of pickled cucumbers a thousand times concentrated in Death Pepper brine.
“Please, please—don’t let another 3-mentor performance appear, I can’t take such avant-garde art!”
“But… could there be a performance that wins the recognition of all four mentors…?”
One student asked anxiously.
He remembered that the handbook Lan Qi and Huperion had flipped through never mentioned what kind of reward would be given for gaining approval from all four music mentors.
“Impossible. Some of these mentors’ conditions directly contradict each other. At most, three approvals—that’s the absolute limit. There’s no way all four could be satisfied simultaneously.”
“If there were a performance at full approval level, forget the demons in that classroom—even we on this side might collapse by the dozens.”
The students of Ikerite Academy finally understood why this music classroom was rated Difficulty 2.
Challengers must wield harsh sonic magic, psychic magic, illusion arts—any kind of sorcery that could fuse with music—to possibly meet the standards of at least two mentors and earn 2 credit coins.
And if one had a truly heaven-defying spell repertoire and performance level, meeting the standards of three mentors, then not only would they receive 3 credit coins, they’d also be rewarded with a demonic instrument that amplifies the effects of demonic sound-magic.
But the cruelest part of this classroom was—
The earlier one performed, the less time one had to gather intelligence and prepare.
Yet the later one performed, the more one’s own spirit would be tortured by the psychic assaults of all the demonic music already unleashed!
In this grand theater, the more malicious the demon students were, the more they would ramp up their performance whenever they noticed others in the audience couldn’t endure it—relentlessly tormenting the weak.
This was a trial that tested judgment, spell repertoire, and endurance all at once.
On the outdoor screen, the broadcast showed Huperion clutching her ears, head buried, feet stamping desperately—she seemed on the verge of breaking.
Compared to the students watching from the safety of the real world, she was at the live concert, fully immersed in the demonic sonic bombardment!
Meanwhile, Bacher had already collapsed, foaming at the mouth.
But—
Beside them sat their heavyweight companion—
Lan Qi’s eyes were at this moment brimming with trembling excitement. From time to time he even applauded and cheered for the demonic classmates’ performances, as though he had already completely blended into the class!