"Next, Yulia."
The moment the name was called and she stood up, Sakika's heart started pounding for no reason. And he couldn't look away from her.
Her uniform had white and gold trim—another scholarship student.
Murmurs spread through the room again. Probably because of the girl's appearance.
Her hair was long and silky, reaching down to her waist with a pale green tint, and her large emerald eyes dominated her face. Her features still held traces of youth, but they were well-balanced—she was more cute than beautiful.
She stood with perfect posture, straight-backed and elegant.
Nerves had made her face a little stiff, but that barely put a dent in her striking looks.
The girl called Yulia stepped forward for her assessment.
"Mana volume: one hundred thousand. Attribute: wind. The Axleid family's got some serious talent."
The Axleid family—one of the five great noble houses that controlled wind magic.
The students' chatter got even louder. If she was an Axleid daughter, that perfect posture made total sense. She'd probably been drilled on etiquette since she could walk.
Yulia reached out with her pale, slender hand and lightly touched the quality measurement device.
"...B rank. Better than Andrew, that's for sure."
B rank. High-quality mana that you'd be lucky to find anywhere in this country. Maybe it came from years of hard work, or maybe she was just born with it—either way, she was going to be a force to reckon with.
Through all the commotion, I could see Yulia looking relieved as she headed back to her seat.
"Next up, Lilith."
A student who looked like a girl stood up, her body wrapped in robes with a hood hiding her face. This time, the voices that rose up from different corners of the room had a nastier edge to them.
"What's the dropout still doing here?"
"She's a disgrace to S-class."
"That hood thing is creepy as hell."
The whispered insults made me grimace. I knew that feeling of disgust all too well—it sure as hell wasn't pleasant, and now it was being aimed at the girl called Lilith.
I caught a glimpse of what looked like Lilith's friend in the seat next to her, her fists clenched tight. Gaia must be one of her friend too, because he was giving off that same murderous vibe he'd had earlier when I was getting trash-talked, though not quite as intense.
Not worth stepping in over. Besides, I was pretty pissed at the kids throwing insults at her myself. I couldn't exactly tell him to dial back the hostility.
"Mana volume: fifteen thousand. Attribute: wind."
Her mana was way too low. At this age, most people had around forty thousand. But Lilith only had fifteen thousand. Maybe that's why she was getting picked on.
Complete opposite of me. And for the complete opposite reason, she'd ended up in the same kind of situation I'd been in back then. I let out a bitter laugh. Back in the day, I'd been hated and avoided even worse than she was.
"Quality is E rank... Alright, next up, Naoma."
Once the measurement was done, the nasty atmosphere cleared right up. The girl sitting next to Lilith's seat stood up. She had flax-colored hair and pale green eyes, with sharp features that stood out.
From her name, she was probably from the eastern nation. Though she looked just like everyone else here.
The eastern nation spoke a different language than the central nation. They spoke Zipang, while we spoke Orth.
Zipang had this weird pronunciation that made it obvious someone was from the east just by hearing their name.
Naoma exchanged smiles with Lilith as they passed each other, then walked up front. She touched the mana measurement device.
"Mana volume: seventy thousand. Attribute: light."
Pretty high mana volume. Looked like Naoma was a solid student. Now that I got a better look, she was wearing the honor student uniform.
Next, she touched the quality measurement device.
"D rank... Next up—"
Things went smoothly for a while after that, but then the room started buzzing again. Apparently this student was famous around the academy.
A male student called Arc stepped forward. He had slightly long brown hair and black eyes, with silver-rimmed glasses that screamed honor student. His uniform had white and gold trim.
There was something different about his whole vibe compared to everyone else. That was the kind of presence you only got from someone who'd seen real combat.
Who the hell was this guy? The way he moved was cleaner than other kids his age. He'd definitely been training hard.
Arc's assessment began.
"...Mana volume: one 135,000. Attribute: earth. As expected from the second-ranked student."
Second in the year. No wonder the students were making noise. That made me wonder who was first. Had to be someone in this top-tier class, and it wasn't hard to guess. I glanced over at the guy next to me. Gaia didn't notice me looking—he just watched the assessment with a bored expression.
"Quality is C rank. Next up, Gaia."
"I'll be right back."
Gaia gave me a quick heads-up and stood up. The classroom erupted even more than it had for Arc. Gaia walked up to the front desk and started his assessment.
"...Mana volume: 157,000. Attributes: fire, dark, black flame. The top student lives up to his reputation."
So he really was ranked first. Even though he was probably holding back, he still came out on top.
"One hundred fifty-seven thousand!"
"Holy crap!"
"Gaia's so cool!"
"My God... Gaia's amazing..."
Students called out in amazement. To them, Gaia was probably the ideal. But just like me, Gaia was wearing mana-suppressing gear, and he was probably holding back even with that on.
On top of that, Gaia's real attributes were the normal attributes of fire and dark, plus the evolved attribute of fire—black flame and blue flame. Evolved attributes were higher-tier versions of normal attributes, with more powerful magic and better effects. You could learn them through effort if you had the base attribute, though some people were born with them. He was hiding the fact that he had blue flame.
Gaia ignored the students' voices like he couldn't care less and touched the quality measurement device.
"! ...A rank."
The students got even louder. Even Eve looked surprised by this.
"I'd heard about it, but seeing it firsthand is something else... That's incredible, Gaia."
"Thanks."
He turned around like nothing had happened, his expression as blank as always.
"Next up, Sakika."
When I stood up, I got hit with cold, condescending stares, and my face went completely blank without thinking about it. Even if I'd brought this on myself, it still sucked.
"Do your best."
As I walked past Andrew's seat, he called out loud enough for the whole class to hear, grinning like an idiot. Laughter rippled through the room.
But it stopped dead. Gaia had frozen a few steps away from me, and he was radiating that murderous aura again.
"Gaia."
I said his name quietly. The killing intent disappeared immediately, and silence fell over the class. But Andrew's next comment brought the atmosphere right back.
"...Typical dropout. Can't do anything without someone else helping him out."
The class burst into laughter again. I could see Gaia biting his lip hard.
I'd put Gaia in a bad spot. I let out a breath and headed for the front desk.
I'd make the device read my mana as around fifteen thousand, but I needed to figure out what attributes to show. I had all the normal attributes plus evolved and derivative attributes. I had special attributes too, but this mana measurement device could only detect normal attributes, so that didn't matter right now.
After thinking it over, I went with fire and light attributes.
Different attributes had different characteristics. Attack-focused fire attribute and light attribute—which excelled at defense, healing, and speed—would make a good balanced combination.
I touched the mana measurement device and let just a tiny bit of fire and light attribute mana flow through.
"Mana volume: sixteen thousand. Attributes: fire, light. Not bad for E-rank."
The classroom got even noisier.
"Way to go, dropout boy. Better than expected."
Andrew was deliberately copying Eve's way of talking, probably trying to provoke me. Too bad for him—my emotional control wasn't that sloppy.
Malicious laughter filled the classroom, the kind that made your skin crawl. Not exactly pleasant to listen to, but I couldn't waste time dealing with every single one of them.