The Joint Exam
The Joint Exam.
Before anyone quite realized it, the new semester had opened, and more than a week had already passed since the first lectures began.
Students who were finally settling into the term studied hard to keep up with their coursework and trained until they sweated through their clothes, throwing themselves into campus life with genuine, lively energy.
The students of Combat Class G, however, looked half-dead—and they hadn't even started class yet.
The reason was simple.
"Hey."
"Student number 1021, Elena!"
"Hey."
"Student number 1021, Gilson!"
"What are you two?"
"...Pardon?"
"Excuse me…?! Did I mishear that?"
"Ah—no, ma'am!"
"Hey."
"Student number 1021, Elena!"
"Student number 1021, Gilson!"
"I said, what are you."
"...We didn't catch that?"
Elena and Gilson stood rigidly at attention, answering with all the force they could muster while cold sweat beaded down their faces. Even so, they carefully ventured the question again.
Their eyes were fixed on the young woman standing directly in front of them.
Compared to the solid, broad-shouldered combat students around her, the black-haired girl was almost daintily short. At a glance she might have looked cute—yet a subtle, alluring sensuality made her unmistakably striking. Her expression, however, was so fierce it came off as pure ill temper.
"What did I tell you. I said take out your gear and inspect it before class, didn't I?"
"Th-that's…"
"We didn't realize it was our turn this round, so we completely forgot—"
"Forgot? Oh, is that so? You forgot?"
"....We were wrong! Please forgive us!"
"We were wrong!!"
The sight of two massive men groveling before that young woman would have looked absurd to anyone who didn't know better.
But the two who were actually facing her—Rosaria Evergarden—felt their hearts hammering out of control, their legs trembling with the urge to bolt right then and there.
"You were wrong, so please forgive you… That's nice. If forgiveness fixed everything, why would anyone need an army? Hmm? The world would be so peaceful, wouldn't it?"
"....."
What does she want us to do…
I'd rather she just yelled… This is so much scarier…
"...Fine. School life gets busy. People forget things sometimes, right?"
"R-right!"
"We won't forget again!"
Rosaria's expression softened into a good-natured smile, as if she were about to wrap things up. Color returned to both men's faces as they nodded vigorously—
"Then I suppose you need a proper way to show you're truly sorry and won't do it again?"
"Yes!"
"That's right!"
"Fifty laps of the training grounds. Full sprint, of course."
"....Huh?"
"Fifty… full sprint… what?"
"Oh? You don't want to?"
"N-no, ma'am! Executing!"
"Executing!"
"I'll be watching. Stop running and it's ten extra laps."
Rosaria smiled sweetly as she handed down the utterly unreasonable order. Neither of them dared so much as a word of protest; they turned and started running with tears in their eyes, swallowing the bitter pill whole.
"She's insane… fifty laps at a full sprint?"
"She's completely lost it."
"Monster… she's a monster…"
The other students, who had been holding their breath as they watched, stared in open horror, their whole bodies trembling.
They were terrified of Rosaria's cruelty—and simultaneously flooded with relief that they weren't the ones who'd been caught.
"What are you all standing around staring for? Start your warm-ups already!"
"Yes! Understood!"
The moment Rosaria barked at them, the rest of the class took off across the training grounds as well.
"Hmm. Getting a grip on them like this once really does make things easier."
Watching the students thunder away in a cloud of dust, Rosaria murmured with a thoroughly satisfied smile.
"Wow. You've got them drilled into perfect shape already?"
"Ah—Professor. You're here."
"Yeah. Thanks to someone, my job's gotten a whole lot easier."
A voice from behind made her turn. Gerton had appeared at some point and was watching the sprinting students with the same look of satisfaction.
"Still, locking down these wild brats' discipline this thoroughly in one go—that's impressive."
Ever since the incident in the first class, Rosaria had personally demonstrated her strength to every student in Combat Class G and hammered discipline into them for good.
Under normal circumstances, no one would have any obligation to take orders from a fellow student. But after experiencing her firsthand, the class fell silent and obeyed without a peep.
Anyone who thought about resisting got a single kick that nearly sent them high-fiving the sun—an indirect reenactment of the Icarus myth. After that, they all went quiet in a hurry. Who would dare push back?
On top of that, Rosaria handled the class prep and warm-ups that Gerton would normally have to bark out himself. For him, it was pure convenience.
And watching her whip a bunch of physical, combat-department kids into shape this fast left him genuinely impressed.
In a single week, Rosaria had turned a pack of still-green students into full-fledged trainees.
"Eh, it's nothing special. I've always done this kind of thing."
Rosaria shrugged off Gerton's admiration as if it barely registered.
I was literally in the military. This much is nothing.
Right up until the moment she transmigrated into this world, Rosaria had been a soldier.
And during her corporal days, she had been the discipline NCO for her squad—so this came even more naturally.
The military dealt in lethal weapons and rough work; hierarchy had to be rock-solid. Once that hierarchy flipped, it was game over. Discipline mattered more than almost anything else.
Someone had to keep the unit sharp even if it meant being hated for it—and that someone had been Rosaria.
She hadn't been the type to pick fights for no reason, either. When nothing was wrong, she got along fine with her juniors.
But.
They laughed at me in the first class. They needed a taste of something sharp.
After Letten's little speech, every student who had sided with him and mocked her was burned into her memory. Rosaria was not a particularly magnanimous person. She remembered every single face—and she was paying them back one by one.
In short, it was pure spite.
"You siblings really are something…"
"Siblings?"
"Well, combat's my specialty, so I don't know the details—but I hear your older brother's making a name for himself over in the magic department these days."
"...Not in a bad way, I hope?"
"...Hard to say? Everyone seemed pretty positive about him, though… Something on your mind?"
"No, nothing. That's good to hear."
So he's managing not to cause any disasters. Good.
Gerton's offhand remark told Rosaria how Felix was doing in the magic department, and she let out a quiet sigh of relief.
As both his older brother and younger sister, Rosaria knew exactly how impossible Felix's personality could be. Different departments meant they barely saw each other except right before the academy started, and the worry had been constant.
Even if they fought like they wanted to kill each other day to day, fretting the moment they were apart was just what older siblings did.
"By the way, Professor—while we're on the subject…"
"Hm?"
"I haven't actually learned anything from you since the first class."
The realization hit her mid-conversation: a full week of attending class, and she had received zero instruction from Gerton. She asked him about it.
"Mm… about that. Honestly, there's nothing I can teach you."
"...What?"
Gerton scratched his head, looking faintly awkward as he answered.
"Your skill level is high enough that you could jump straight into mercenary work without learning a thing here and still make a name for yourself. You'd still come up short against seniors about to graduate, sure… but in my class—Basic Weaponry—there's no teaching that matches your level."
"You've already blown past the basics on everything from plain swords to daggers, maces, greatswords, spears—the lot."
"Ah…"
Rosaria had learned a wide range of combat techniques from Gordon.
Gordon had once ranked at the absolute top of the mercenary world, and his guiding principle with her had been simple: To beat an opponent, you have to understand them. So he had taught her how every kind of weapon worked.
As a result, the "basics" of the weapons covered in this class were things she had already cleared with room to spare.
"If you were specializing in one weapon, maybe. But in a fundamentals class, anything I add would just feel weird. Your weapon's that thing, right?"
"That's true enough."
Gerton pointed at the weapon strapped across Rosaria's back.
The gun Felix had crafted for her from a branch of the World Tree was more than enough. She saw no reason to carry anything else.
A weapon that could shatter a skull at near-supersonic speed with a single pointed finger—and that even came with guidance (courtesy of Ariel)—made other arms redundant.
Gordon had taught her other weapons so she would understand how to counter them. He had never seriously trained her as a specialist in his own hidden-blade style.
"Speaking of which—what even is that weapon? Weird-looking thing, and I've never seen anyone use one."
"This is closer to a magic tool my bro—my older brother made. It's a bit special."
"That so… I'm curious, I'll admit…"
"It's still a prototype, so it's not really ready for regular use."
"...Well, magic tools sound fancy until you actually use them—then the defects start piling up. A weapon should be simple and solid. That's the best kind."
"Haha…"
Gerton had been interested in her gun, but the steam went out of him quickly. He gave the twin chain scythes at his waist a couple of pats and grinned. Rosaria managed a slightly awkward laugh of her own.
"Still, thanks to you, my students are wound up tight and ready. We should pull some solid scores on the joint exam this time."
"...The joint exam?"
She had been about to let the comment slide—then she caught it and asked again.
"Hm? You didn't know? This joint exam."
"Ah—aah… yeah, that. I knew about it. Yep~ the joint exam… man, that's going to be rough."
"Well, there are a few kids with promise, and then there's someone like you—so it should go fine, right? I'm a first-time professor myself, so I don't know much either. Hahaha!!"
"Ha, haha…"
How did this guy even become a professor… Well, in the original story some guy named Felix or whatever bought his way into a professorship with cash… Did this one grease some palms too?
More importantly—joint exam? What the hell is that?
Rosaria wondered, not for the first time, how Gerton had landed a teaching post—then her mind snagged on the joint exam and started turning it over.
"Hah… hahh… hah…!"
"W-wa… water…!"
"Ah. Looks like they're about done."
One by one, the students who had been sprinting as a warm-up staggered back, gasping for air. Gerton stepped forward.
"All right! Warm-up's over, right?! Then let's start class!"
"...Uweh?"
"R-right now…?"
The students sprawled across the dirt of the training grounds, completely spent from the run, stared at him with pupils shaking in disbelief.
"Kids these days… You call this hard? Back in my day? We didn't just run bare—we did it with sandbags strapped all over our bodies! Get up already!"
Gerton clicked his tongue and launched into a full "back in my day" lecture. The students forced their trembling legs under them and gathered.
"....Would I have been the same without a spirit?"
—Mom! Did you call me?
"Hm? No—just saying thanks, as always."
—Hehe!
Watching the scene, Rosaria wondered what it would have been like if she hadn't contracted a spirit. At some point Ariel had settled on her shoulder and was looking up at her; Rosaria brushed a finger lightly across the spirit's soft cheek.
Ariel burst into a peal of giggles.
"Anyway… a joint exam. I should look into that."
Resolving to find out what the joint exam actually was, Rosaria followed Gerton into the training grounds.