Free Web NovelChapter 30: A Monster in the Classroom
"Phew... that class was certainly something."
After finishing breakfast, Silas returned to his dormitory and spent the next five hours meditating. By the time he ended his session, his wristwatch was already buzzing, reminding him that it was time for his next class.
The Monster Studies lecture began at midday, just like the Meditation class. Curious, Silas checked the rest of his schedule and noticed a pattern. During the first week, he would attend no more than two classes a day, and most days involved only one. More importantly, every class except Fighting started at noon or later, while Fighting itself began sharply at ten every morning.
The academy’s priorities could not have been more obvious.
The Fighting class offered higher rewards, with students earning points through daily sparring matches that contributed to their individual records. Silas knew those points would eventually matter. However, his safety mattered more.
He had no intention of throwing himself into constant fights, as it was safer to keep his Raven ability hidden for as long as possible.
Once today’s class ended, he planned to return to his dormitory and devote himself to training Raven seriously for the first time after joining the academy.
After witnessing the way Shadowheart had wielded his ability during their battle, Silas had gained more inspiration than he cared to admit. He refused to lag behind the curse dwelling within his own heart.
Naturally, he had not expected much from the first Monster Studies lecture. He had imagined a boring introduction accompanied by an equally tedious speech.
Instead, the class proved surprisingly fascinating. For starters, the instructor was unlike any teacher Silas had ever seen.
The young man introduced himself by the nickname Monsters Maniac. Dressed in a white lab coat, oversized round glasses perched on his nose, and an impressively long brown beard, he looked more like an eccentric researcher than a teacher.
Yet his appearance paled in comparison to what he brought into the classroom, a real monster. Inside a massive cage forged from special ores stood a Spiky Spotted Tiger.
Even restrained by chains wrapped around its neck, limbs, and three tails, the creature radiated terrifying ferocity. It roared continuously, hurling itself against the bars with enough force to make the reinforced cage tremble. At times, it even unleashed two abilities simultaneously in its attempts to break free.
It was a C-grade monster, one that Silas had never encountered before. Watching the tiger struggle against its restraints, he finally understood just how insignificant he truly was.
"I need to become stronger."
His fists clenched beneath the desk as determination quietly settled within him.
Among the fourteen students attending the lecture, however, one person managed to draw even more attention than the teacher himself. Her name was Lara.
At first glance, she appeared no different from Cher in terms of age or appearance. However, that illusion lasted only moments.
While Cher carried herself with cold elegance, Lara looked as though she had emptied an entire paint store onto her wardrobe. Draped in a riot of bright colours, she resembled a peacock masquerading as a human being.
Silas had initially assumed it was merely an unusual fashion choice born of unusual taste. Then the teacher nervously informed her that Spiky Spotted Tigers were highly sensitive to vivid colours.
The warning itself wasn’t surprising; her response was. Lara cheerfully admitted that she had researched the tiger beforehand and deliberately dressed that way because she wanted to observe how violently it reacted.
Nothing about that explanation made sense. Even the revelation that she was a Tamer didn’t justify what she did.
It wasn’t enough for her to provoke the beast from a safe distance. At one point, she casually walked up to the cage itself, standing close enough to send both the tiger and the instructor into a frenzy. freēwebnovel.com
Lara’s smile never faltered even when she stood a few inches away from the monster. It wasn’t the smile of someone ignorant of danger; it was the smile of someone who understood it perfectly and remained curious anyway.
Despite his ridiculous nickname, the moment the tiger slammed into the cage, the teacher didn’t flinch. His lazy expression vanished as he stepped forward and pushed Lara away from the cage.
Silas stared at the spectacle in disbelief.
’Why do all the girls in this academy seem terrifyingly insane?’
He sighed and turned away.
’And why do they always end up next to me?’
After nearly causing a disaster, Lara ignored the countless empty seats available in the enormous lecture hall and settled beside him instead. Even when he silently moved several seats away, a moment later, she followed.
"You are one of those blessed by Gaia, aren’t you?" she asked, and Silas totally ignored her.
Unfortunately, her enthusiasm did not end when class did. As Silas walked back toward his dormitory, Lara bounced alongside him, talking without pause.
"You know, other people might envy you or even hate you," she said cheerfully. "But personally, I think you’re a fascinating specimen."
Silas felt his eyebrow twitch. He couldn’t tell whether he possessed an extraordinary talent for attracting lunatics or whether fate simply despised him. Even Cher, considering how they had first met, seemed positively docile compared to Lara.
After enduring half an hour of endless questions, unsolicited opinions, and one-sided conversation without contributing more than a few words himself, Silas finally escaped by stepping into his dormitory and shutting the door behind him.
He leaned against it and closed his eyes. He sincerely hoped their next class together involved assigned seating.
"Now then... time to train."
After eating a bowl of instant noodles, Silas entered the training room attached to his dormitory. The room contained an impressive assortment of equipment: a treadmill, weights, punching bags, and various machines designed to strengthen the body.
He ignored all of them. Silas had no interest in sculpting himself into a mountain of muscle.
Instead, he pushed everything aside until only a simple training dummy remained standing in the otherwise empty room. The puppet was anchored to the floor by a heavy metal base. Even moving it required considerable effort.
Taking a deep breath, Silas stood opposite the dummy and drew his daggers. Then he attempted to throw and recall all five at once.
Clang! Clang! Clang!
"Damn it..."
He quickly discovered that launching five daggers wasn’t the problem; retrieving them was. Out of every ten attempts, he lost control of the blades midway through their return eight times. The result fell far short of what he had envisioned.
"That bastard... He must have done something I overlooked."
After four hours of relentless practice and literally zero progress, Silas finally stopped.
Under normal circumstances, he would have entered the Time Mind World to analyse his performance and identify flaws in his technique. But now he didn’t dare.
Instead, he sat quietly and reflected upon everything he remembered. It was a much slower approach, with no guarantee of success, but it was one hundred percent safer.
Even recalling Shadowheart’s actions stirred fear and anxiety deep within him. Every instinct urged him to look away from those memories. Yet each time he remembered the effortless way with which Shadowheart had wielded Raven, desire eclipsed fear.
"I have to get over it," Silas muttered. "Otherwise, I’ll never understand how it did it."
If Shadowheart had possessed additional abilities or some unique mutation, Silas might have accepted the gap between them. But that wasn’t the case. Shadowheart had used Silas’s own body, with the same mana and the same ability. The only difference had been mastery.
Suppressing the instinctive fear clawing at his mind, Silas forced himself to relive every detail of that battle. Eventually, he noticed something he had previously overlooked.
Whenever Shadowheart released the daggers, his body moved in exactly the same way. Likewise, he adopted a distinct posture when recalling them.
The differences were subtle, but Silas didn’t overlook them. He immediately stood up and tested the theory.
Fwoosh! Fwoosh! Fwoosh!
This time, all five daggers answered his will flawlessly. They shot forward and returned to him again and again without deviation. He didn’t lose control even once.
"So that was it..."
Half an hour later, Silas stood there drenched in sweat and struggling to catch his breath.
"I’ve been using Raven incorrectly this entire time."
Excitement surged through him, only to be smothered beneath overwhelming exhaustion. He had been fighting against sleep for the past ten minutes. Eventually, his body began issuing warnings he couldn’t ignore. Each passing minute brought another yawn.
"I need a way to increase my mana reserves," he murmured as he collapsed onto his bed. "Otherwise, thirty minutes of proper training will always be my limit."
It was his final thought before sleep claimed him. Fortunately, unlike the previous night, nothing strange awaited him in the darkness.
