Recruiting the Rejects
Rosa, Vivienne, Luna, Andy, Evangeline. Thankfully, they've all gathered.
I nodded in satisfaction as I surveyed the pack of bottom-tier students. The only catch was that course registration was still open. I needed to make sure these failures kept attending Leon's lectures.
The problem was that the failures were pickier than anyone else. Seducing someone like the Crown Prince would have been far easier — a mere glimpse of my abilities would have him signing up on the spot. But not these kids. They each required a tailored strategy.
Even the fact that I'd had the students herded into the lecture hall and made Leon call each of them up one by one was part of the plan. You could tell just by looking at Luna.
"Kukuk... So someone has finally seen my true worth."
One call of her name, and she was already cackling with delight, shoulders swaying like she'd won a lottery.
Terminal chuunibyou. That's Luna.
Luna was a petite girl with black hair. Objectively speaking, her looks were fine — the problem was the aura she gave off. A slouching, crooked posture, a gloomy smile, and a bizarre, unsettling laugh. She was a textbook terminal case. The real issue was that it wasn't an act. It was genuine.
There was exactly one reason I had openly chosen the hopeless Luna.
Luna will contract an Archdemon in the future.
A black mage's power depended on the rank of the demon they'd contracted. A black mage bound to an Archdemon was, in knightly terms, equivalent to a Sword Master.
Luna hadn't earned that contract through any great talent. It had simply happened because an Archdemon took a liking to her. Catching an Archdemon's eye was, admittedly, the pinnacle of black mage aptitude — but the fatal flaw was that Luna's fundamentals were catastrophically deficient. In the end, she'd be devoured whole by the Archdemon and transformed into one of the calamities.
But what if I solidified her foundations in advance?
I could avert one calamity — and simultaneously create a Lord of Death, rarer than any Sword Master.
That was why I'd chosen her.
As I approached, Luna flinched so visibly it was almost theatrical. She looked genuinely frightened. But she quickly recovered, forcing an air of composure as she smeared on her gloomy smile.
"Kukuk... I am not one to serve beneath just anyone."
In the game, Luna had refused to register for a single course for that very reason — and ended up earning the second-highest demerit count among the freshmen.
The first place, naturally, went to Evangeline.
I weighed my options, then leaned in and whispered to Luna in secret.
"It is an honor to stand before you, Lord of Darkness, Sovereign of the Night, Lady Luna."
My stomach was turning, but I swallowed it down. I told myself I was investing in a future Lord of Death.
"Kukuk... So you have seen through it, despite my barrier."
Luna answered while covering one eye with her hand. She was deliberately rasping her voice, but regrettably, it came out adorable and girlish.
"How could a mere barrier hope to hide the sun itself?"
"Kukuk... True. No barrier, however potent, could erase my existence entirely."
"Indeed. It is an honor, O Lord of Darkness."
"Lord of Darkness..."
A dreamy, glassy look washed over Luna's face. A thin line of drool slid from the corner of her mouth. Disgusting.
I suppressed my irritation and pressed on.
"I would speak longer, but too many eyes are upon us. Grant me the honor of serving as your right hand, O Lord of Darkness."
"Kukuk. Then serve me properly."
"Yes. Trust in me, I beseech you."
And I meant it. I intended to work her very, very properly.
I bowed my head and quietly withdrew.
Next after Luna—
The delinquent saintess, Rosa.
A uniform tailored so short it was a wonder it hadn't triggered a single dress-code violation, tattoos peeking out all over, piercings climbing her ears. In appearance she was a delinquent among delinquents. But for all that she was dead last among the candidates, Rosa was still, officially, a saintess candidate.
The Holy Nation kept countless saintess candidates in reserve — there was even another one among the Academy's freshmen. For last-place Rosa to become saintess, every candidate ahead of her would have to die first.
And in the game, there really was a route where that happened — where Rosa became the saintess.
The Rosa who became saintess at the very end received the grandiose title of the Last Saintess, but in truth she was nothing more than the bottom of the barrel. And the reason for her last place was simple.
Rosa doesn't believe in god.
Why a nonbeliever was a saintess candidate at all, I had no idea. I remembered Rosa for one reason only: her specialty.
Divine power came in three broad categories. Recovery-type Healing, support-type Blessing, and Judgment, which dealt damage to evil itself.
Rosa had no talent for Healing or Blessing. Even after becoming the Last Saintess, her healing and blessings were weaker than an average priest's. Instead, her divine power was concentrated entirely in Judgment.
The Holy Nation prioritized Blessing above all else, followed by Healing — and all but neglected Judgment, since it only worked against black magic. That was why Rosa, despite her candidacy, had all but been thrown away by the Holy Nation.
But my thinking was different.
As the game's story progressed into the later stages, elemental counters and matchups only grew more decisive. Knights had to take down mages; black mages had to take down knights. And priests—
Priests have to take down black mages.
And what that required wasn't Healing or Blessing. It was Judgment.
That was why I'd chosen Rosa. Because she had a genius-level, innate gift for it.
Just then, our eyes met. Her heavily made-up eyes sharpened into points.
"What're you staring at?"
Her voice was razor-edged, but to a man who'd crawled through a front line where curses about one's parents doubled as morning greetings, it might as well have been flirtation.
I recalled Rosa's file. Elysium Academy was famously student-friendly; it almost never punished students for anything. And yet Rosa had been disciplined there multiple times.
The offenses varied. Smoking on campus, indecent exposure, and—
Unauthorized leave.
Elysium Academy原则上... no. Elysium Academy prohibited students from leaving campus as a rule. Unless circumstances were exceptional, no one went outside. To leave, you needed either a professor escorting you or the approval of the Student Affairs office.
But Rosa snuck out constantly. She'd even been suspended for it — and kept sneaking out anyway.
She must have a reason she needs to get out.
What that reason was, I didn't know, and frankly it didn't matter. What mattered was that Rosa desperately wanted off campus.
"If you enroll in Professor Leon's lecture, I'm told you'll be permitted to leave campus with me once a week."
Rosa's eyes went round and wide. The polar opposite of her attitude a moment ago.
"...Seriously?"
She looked at Leon through narrowed, suspicious eyes. I glanced at Leon and nodded. Leon nodded along.
The corner of Rosa's mouth twitched violently. Still, unlike Luna, she didn't cave immediately.
Rosa held up two fingers at Leon.
"Twice."
"If you participate diligently in class."
"Deal."
"Pleasure doing business."
Rosa broke into a bright, sunny smile. It was the grin of a stray cat that had just stolen a fish.
Once a week or twice, it would be Leon going out regardless, so it made no difference to me.
Rosa's done. Next up—
At that moment, Andy raised his hand. Urgency was written all over his face.
"Professor, am I — am I really supposed to be here too?"
Andy asked, shooting a sideways glance at the specimens beside him. His expression said it all: do I really belong in the class for hopeless failures?
Strictly speaking, Andy wasn't one. His only problems were being dirt-poor and having the backbone of a tadpole.
Hmm. Honestly, maybe he does qualify.
I gave a light nod.
"But Professor—"
"Five gold."
"No, Professor, it's not about the money—"
"Ten gold."
"I'm telling you it's genuinely not about the gold."
"Fifty gold."
Andy's mouth hung open. He looked like a man who'd just been slapped across the face.
Before I could add another number, he nodded frantically.
"F-fine! I'll take the class! Please, just stop!"
Andy shouted, utterly spooked.
Andy's handled—
I turned my gaze and found Evangeline, chin lifted high as if to say, go ahead, try me.
Needless to say, Evangeline was the heart of the failure class. If this class had a class president, it had to be her — obviously.
But there was no need to sweet-talk her. The moment Andy registered, she'd follow right along. So I ignored Evangeline entirely and moved my eyes along.
Only one remained.
The Shame of the Imperial Family, Vivienne.
Vivienne was short and chubby, and clutched jerky in her hand instead of a sword. Charitably speaking, nothing about her said knight.
Vivienne was the Crown Prince's polar opposite. Where he was flawless to the last inch, she was deficient to the last inch. Short, plump, mediocre in talent, without even perseverance to compensate — and pathologically timid on top of it all.
In fact, Vivienne's entrance exam score had been second from the bottom. With Evangeline dead last, Vivienne was effectively the second-worst student in the year.
Most of the imperial family, the Crown Prince included, had placed at the very top of the entrance rankings, which made Vivienne something of a mutant. No wonder they called her the Shame of the Imperial Family.
But as the saying goes, even a worm will turn — and Vivienne had exactly one talent.
The Late Bloomer trait.
Ordinary people learn quickly at the start of any discipline, then slow down as they climb the ranks. Vivienne, on the other hand, was slow at the start... and equally slow at the end.
Taken at face value, that sounds like garbage. But the key was that her late-stage growth rate was exactly the same as her early-stage rate. By nature, growth slows the more you grow — and past a certain threshold, it slows to a near standstill. Even I, with S-rank stats, had been forced to swallow Outer God Fragments just to force my growth forward.
But even in the late game, Vivienne grew exactly as slowly as she had at the beginning.
If the Crown Prince grew at a rate of 100 early on and 0.01 in the late game, Vivienne grew at a rate of 1 in both. A hundred times slower than him at first — and a hundred times faster than him in the end.
That was why Vivienne was called the Slow Genius.
It was also why I'd chosen her. Awakening in the late game was beyond my reach, but early-stage enlightenment? That I could engineer just fine.
"I-I shall go and see."
At that, Vivienne backed away with a flustered face.
Milo, stationed by the back door, caught my eye and jerked his chin — you want me to grab this one? I shook my head lightly. It was still orientation week; forcing a registration would cause problems. And Vivienne, of all people, was hypersensitive on that front. She needed to be coaxed, gently and carefully.
Luckily, the way to coax her was simple.
"Hmm. Every other class already has imperial family members in it."
At the word imperial family, Vivienne's face went pale as ash.
Her weakness was the imperial family. She feared them — the Crown Prince most of all.
"If you're lucky, you might even end up attending lectures alongside the Crown Prince."
The mere thought had her trembling like a leaf.
"But this class's enrollment is exactly the people you see here. No imperial family. No Crown Prince."
I murmured it to Vivienne, casual as an aside.
Her eyes went huge.
"Is... is that truly so?"
"It is."
"Then I shall register for the class!"
"Good thinking."
I gave Vivienne's shoulder a gentle pat.
Something has gone horribly wrong.
Andy scanned the students seated around him and broke into a cold sweat. The delinquent lounging with her bare legs propped on the desk, the pig endlessly shoveling food into her mouth, the creepy little girl oozing gloomy laughter — all of them were problems.
But the biggest problem of all was—
"...This might actually be doable?"
Evangeline, brimming with confidence at the sight of this very roster.