Chapter 71
Chapter 71
…He’d always been this kind of person.
For a moment, I felt a little embarrassed.
Bernstein was a single-minded man who cared about nothing but the students of the Magic Faculty.
That was who he was.
He had sided with Former President Randolf not out of any selfish ambition, but solely because he believed it was the right thing to do.
And this time, too, he was trying to help me out of pure goodwill, with no political motive.
…I was only thinking about what I could get out of it.
Professor Bernstein must have noticed what was on my mind, because he gave a faint, amused laugh.
“Moved? If you’re so moved that you decide to join our faction, I won’t stop you.”
“…I didn’t know you could joke, Professor.”
“It’s true that I don’t care which faction you belong to. You’re still a professor at Rubines, no matter what.”
I realized that Professor Bernstein would continue to treat me without prejudice.
I feel a little bad. But I can’t exactly line up with Professor Bernstein, either. I’ll have to repay him properly.
There was only one way to give Professor Bernstein the best possible repayment.
“Thank you. I’ll repay the help you’re giving me with the results of my lectures.”
I lifted the corners of my mouth, just as the Black Flame Dragon instructed me.
“Soon, Professor, you’ll see a miracle happen to your students.”
The students would come to understand what magic was.
“Ugh, we’ve got Professor Ban the Trash’s class again today? How many times is that this week?”
“It’s a required common course. We can’t do anything about it. Man, what a waste of time. Should we just skip and go listen in on Baron Aiden’s class for Section One?”
The first two months for First-Year Students were the welcome period.
Every student took classes without regard to faculty.
The common required courses were also designed to finish within two months, so classes were packed into the schedule.
“Wait, isn’t today the Joint Quiz for the two sections of Understanding the Basics of Magic? Did you study?”
“How can we study when we haven’t learned anything!”
“Ugh, looks like our Section Two is going to bring up the rear. I know it won’t count toward our actual grades, but…”
“But the quiz material didn’t seem that hard. Has Linear Theory always been this easy?”
At someone’s sudden remark, the students fell silent for a moment.
Come to think of it…
I gave up on Linear Theory. So why do I understand this section?
Understanding the Basics of Magic was divided into two broad subjects.
The first was the basic background knowledge of magic.
That was the part Ban hadn’t said a word about.
The second was Linear Theory, the foundation of Star-Rank magic.
Unless they belonged to the Magic Faculty, most students found it too difficult to understand, so they gave up on it and focused all their efforts on studying the background knowledge instead.
Could the lecture actually have worked?
No way. He just drew pictures.
This section must just be unusually easy.
When class time arrived, Ban entered.
“After today’s lecture, we’ll have a Joint Quiz. Has everyone studied?”
“Yes, we have.”
“Forget everything you studied. It’s trash knowledge.”
“!!”
Everyone looked baffled.
Whether or not they did, Ban glanced toward the door. Soon, a young man appeared, looking distinctly uncomfortable.
“Professor Ballas will be serving as our demonstration assistant today.”
“…It’s nice to meet you all.”
As everyone looked puzzled, Ban continued.
“What’s the topic on Linear Theory for this quiz?”
“‘How does a line become a star?’”
“So how does a line become a star? Can anyone answer?”
“…A predetermined combination of lines grants a star its magical power.”
It was the standard answer printed in the textbook.
But—
“This is why I called the knowledge you studied trash.”
“!!”
“A predetermined combination? Then what about an irregular combination? Does that fail to produce a magical effect?”
Everyone was left speechless.
Not only the students from other faculties who had crammed nothing but the quiz material, but even students from the Magic Faculty, who had already learned the basics of magic, couldn’t answer.
“Professor Ballas, please draw a star of ice. The textbook version, exactly as shown.”
“…Very well.”
Flash!
A solid crystal of ice appeared in the air.
Ballas was an expert in Fractal Theory.
His star, as a result, was every bit as sturdy. It looked as though it had been copied straight from the textbook.
By contrast—
“Everyone, take a good look at my star.”
The star Ban drew was a complete mess.
Some of the lines were even misaligned, and others were crooked and uneven.
It was barely even fit to be called a star.
“Whose star is more correct?”
“…Professor Ballas’s.”
“By what standard are you judging them? Because the lines that make up his star are combined precisely? Look.”
Crash!
Ban’s ice shattered Ballas’s ice to pieces.
“!!”
Everyone’s eyes widened.
What they had just seen could not be explained by the common sense they knew.
“By the standard you just gave, my star shouldn’t be capable of becoming magic. So how did it turn out?”
“D-Didn’t you arbitrarily formalize the irregular pattern and give it a magical effect, Professor?”
A student from the Magic Faculty spoke up, repeating something they had heard somewhere.
High-level mages often altered the shapes of stars.
In magical terminology, it was called “Formalization of Irregular Patterns.”
But Ballas, standing beside Ban, spoke with a face like he’d just bitten into shit.
“That’s no formalization. No one could formalize a pattern that messy.”
“!!”
“Professor Ban produced a magical effect using irregular lines with no pattern whatsoever—lines no better than scribbles.”
The room fell silent.
Everyone there had at least some knowledge of magic.
They knew how absurd Ballas’s words were.
“If you understand exactly what linear forms, made up of lines and points, mean, then you can draw a star in any shape.”
“……”
“Of course, I don’t expect you to reach that level. The purpose of this course is simply for you to understand the basics of magic. Now, open your practice notebooks.”
Rustle.
A familiar preparation.
Throughout the previous lecture, Ban had had them open their practice books and draw lines and points.
But this time, there was a difference.
“Today, we’ll draw only the Mana Star, the most basic pattern. Use this video as a reference.”
Flash!
The image was projected from the Magic Tool.
It showed the Mana Star being drawn.
Since it was the most basic pattern, everyone here knew what the star looked like.
But the energy contained within it was extraordinary.
Now even the greenest students could sense it.
It was a star Bernstein had drawn himself to help Ban, then inscribed into the video Magic Tool.
“Professor Ballas will demonstrate slowly as he draws that star. Follow along at his pace.”
Ballas’s expression turned serious.
Although he was unhappy about playing the role of demonstration assistant, tracing a star that embodied such profound accomplishment was an extraordinary opportunity for a mage.
Flash!
At Ballas’s gesture, lines were drawn in the air, and the students copied them exactly in their practice books.
Perhaps because they had practiced so many times by now?
They were able to follow along without difficulty.
At the same time, Ban’s voice rang out.
“The first side represents the sky.”
“The second side signifies steadfastness.”
“The vertex connecting the two lines signifies connection.”
“As you draw the lines, imagine the meaning of what I’m saying, and form it into a concrete image. This is the first step and the foundation of magic. Complicated equations come after that.”
Everyone focused, almost as if under a spell, without even realizing it.
Soon, the only sounds echoing through the classroom were Ban’s explanations and the scratch of pens filling the practice books.
High up in the Magic Faculty building at Rubiness Academy, in a spacious professors’ research office,
a young professor with a polished appearance was frowning.
Damn it, why do I have to teach this kind of basic class? What does he take me for, an A-fessor?
Being assigned the role of dealing with someone like Ban the Trash was so humiliating that he could hardly stand it.
Still, this should all be over soon. Once the results of today’s pop quiz come in, the Board of Directors has agreed to kick the bastard out.
There was no need to see the results to know how things would go.
The Linear Theory scores will all be more or less the same anyway, while their scores in the background knowledge of Magic Theory will be incomparably lower than my class’s.
Aiden had become an A-fessor thanks to his intensive, targeted teaching style.
In other words, his classes were optimized for exams.
He boldly skipped or condensed anything that wasn’t important to the score and focused intensively on what was.
What kind of age are we living in? Whether you’re a mage, a knight, a healer, or a central bureaucrat, exam credentials matter most.
He was leisurely waiting for the results when—
“P-Professor?”
“Oh? Are the results for the two classes out? What’s the difference in their averages? At least twenty points, right?”
For context, since this course had become a battle of pride between Director Karak’s faction and the Raphalt Ducal faction, the Magic Tower had been commissioned to set the pop quiz.
The Magic Tower had graded it as well.
“It’s a two-point difference.”
“Hm? That can’t be right. That’s all? With a difference like that, it’ll be hard to get Ban expelled…”
“Well… Professor Ban’s class scored higher.”
“…What did you say?”
“…Their scores are higher. The overall average is higher by two points. If you look only at the average for Linear Theory, it’s much higher.”
“!!”
Aiden snatched the results sheet in a hurry.
It was true.
How is the average for Linear Theory 55? The Magic Tower set the questions, so they were especially difficult! That’s impossible!
For the record, the average score for Linear Theory in Aiden’s class was 35.
It wasn’t that Aiden had failed to teach Linear Theory at all.
On the contrary, he had covered the key points precisely.
So that even students who didn’t understand could answer as many of the exam questions as possible.
That was how they’d managed to score even 35. But what in the world was going on with Ban’s students’ scores?
“Impossible! The overall average is 55, and the first-year students in the Magic Faculty averaged 70? There’s no way they could get scores like that!”
Just then—
“Well, well. It seems there must have been some kind of cheating.”
“!!”
At the sight of an arrogant-looking young man who had suddenly appeared, Aiden’s eyes widened.
“Who do we have here? Young Lord Senin, welcome. You must have had a long journey from Amethyst.”
The Amethyst Student Council’s audit team had finally arrived!
And it wasn’t just Senin.
“Lady Joanna is with you as well? Ha ha! It’s a pleasure to see you. This is the first time since we met at the Magic Society banquet.”
“I don’t remember you.”
“…Pardon?”
“I said I don’t remember seeing you. You’re making me uncomfortable, so would you stop acting so familiar for no reason?”
“…Ah, yes. I-I apologize.”
Joanna gave a disdainful snort, then left him to it. She went over to the sofa, crossed her legs, and sat down.
She was equally rude to everyone, without exception.
Suppressing the vein rising on his forehead, Aiden turned to Senin.
“…So, Young Lord Senin, you’re here to audit Professor Ban’s course.”
“Yes. Rubiness is a sister academy to our Amethyst. I can’t just look away while students’ rights are being violated by a professor who isn’t qualified to teach. I just heard that he’s even committed exam fraud?”
“…We don’t yet know whether it was fraud…”
As Aiden let his words trail off, Senin’s eyebrow twitched.
“It must have been fraud. Otherwise, results like these would be impossible. Wouldn’t you agree?”
The suggestion was to pin the blame on him.
“…Y-yes, Young Lord. You’re probably right. However, it’s difficult, since we have no evidence…”
“Don’t worry. The students’ eyes and mouths will be all the evidence we need.”
He was planning to spread rumors and use them to drive Ban out.
It was the trick Senin used most often.
But then—
“You’re underestimating Professor Ban too much, aren’t you? Do you think Professor Ban is like the other greenhorns around you?”
“!!”
Senin’s face stiffened.
“Lady Joanna? Then do you have some better way?”
“Prove it directly.”
“…What do you mean?”
Joanna spoke with a cold gaze.
“I’ll attend Professor Ban’s lecture myself and prove that his teaching is wrong.”