Chapter 61: Church’s gaze

The morning sun barely pierced the heavy, grey clouds hanging over the academy platforms when the Class 1-A lecture hall filled to absolute capacity.

The atmosphere inside the tiered room was intensely suffocating, the ambient noise of the previous weeks completely replaced by a tense, resentful quiet. Standing at the front podium for their theory block was Instructor Sterling, his stern face set into a precise, cold mask as he adjusted his spectacles and prepared to layout the parameters for the upcoming expedition.

"Quiet down," Instructor Sterling barked, his voice echoing cleanly off the vaulted stone ceiling. "Today, we finalize the structural layout for our mandatory excursion. As previously decreed, all the freshmen classes are transitioning directly into active wilderness evaluation. We are setting out tomorrow morning for the Marshlands."

He tapped his wooden pointer against the slate blackboard, his sharp eyes sweeping across the rows.

"This hunt is directly sanctioned under joint administrative oversight," Sterling continued, his precise voice dropping into a serious weight. "Due to the recent structural adjustments within the institution, our expedition will also be accompanied by two deacons from the Holy Church."

Thomas raised a brow from his position in the very back row, his dark eyes wide open as a sudden wave of genuine intrigue washed over his features. Throughout his entire fifteen years of living, he had never once run into members of the church before. In fact, he had never even stepped foot inside a church building in his life, because under the ancient, unyielding laws of the kingdom, spiritual access was a strict privilege that only High-bloods enjoyed. Hearing that he was finally going to see members of the Holy Church face-to-face left him completely quiet.

Ryan subtly leaned over the wooden desk, lowering his voice into a cautious whisper. "Tom, why the hell are deacons from the Holy Church coming down to a freshman mana beast hunt?"

Thomas merely shrugged his shoulders, his expression remaining smooth as glass. "Beats me."

Scritch.𝒻𝘳ℯℯ𝑤ℯ𝒷𝘯ℴ𝓋ℯ𝘭.𝑐ℴ𝑚

The sudden, rhythmic sound of a chair dragging against the stone floorboards right beside Thomas’s desk caused his entire circle to freeze. Walking calmly up the tiered steps of the back rows was Julian. Without a single word of warning to the commoners, the core successor of House Carter elegantly pulled back the wooden seat right next to Thomas and sat directly down beside him.

"Well, if I must guess, it is strictly because of your little stunt the other day," Julian said coldly, his elegant voice carrying an icy authority as he adjusted his silver-rimmed glasses. He didn’t look at Thomas, keeping his bare ebony eyes fixed squarely on the front podium. "By openly telling the president to fuck off on the sand, you have officially drawn the eye of the church. They are the single power in Samra that is positioned even more powerful than the Royal House itself. I do not envy you, lesser."

Thomas, Ryan, Mina, and Lina were all completely dumbfounded by the bizarre, impossible sight before their eyes. The fact that the proud Julian was willingly seating himself in the backrows next to lessers completely defied the natural pecking order of the school.

And they were absolutely not the only ones left in a state of utter shock. A prominent High-blood student sitting in the front row violently turned his head around, his face twisting into a confused scowl as he gaped at the scene.

"Lord Julian?" the noble student called out, his voice cracking slightly. "There are plenty of open seats down here in the front rows. Why are you sitting back there?"

Julian slowly turned his head to deliver a venomous, piercing look through his lenses. "You heard the new rules enacted by the Headmaster," Julian answered smoothly, a bitter, condescending smirk playing at the edge of his lips. "I, for one, am an absolute stickler for rules. So what better way for me to do that than to practice exactly what the Headmaster intends for this class? In fact, all of you should start acting a little bit nice to their kind while under academy grounds."

A suffocating wave of pure, toxic jealousy and resentment instantly rippled through the High-blood rows, but the nobles didn’t dare argue with him.

Instructor Sterling’s face violently flushed with pure irritation at the backrow disruption. He was thoroughly pissed off at them for interrupting his precise lesson format. He slammed his heavy fist flat down against the wooden podium with a resounding BOOM that caused the inkwells to rattle.

"Silence!" Sterling roared, his sharp gaze locking directly onto Julian and Thomas. "Since you have the absolute audacity to treat my theory block like a social lounge, you will face immediate pairing adjustments. The curriculum dictates everyone will be paired in groups to hunt and study mana beasts. Julian, since you love the back row so much, your group and Thomas’s group shall form a single group of five as intended. The rest of this class will split into three separate groups of five."

Julian offered a single, stiff nod of his head, accepting his structural punishment without releasing a single word of complaint.

"Your destination is locked," Sterling continued coldly, turning back to the blackboard. "You will be deployed directly to the absolute harshest, most volatile part of the Marshlands. You will be required to track, engage, and return with physical samples of the native fauna. Furthermore, this operation operates as a versus system for individual points. The more points your collective group accumulates through hunting metrics, the more points that specific individual will receive upon evaluation."

He channeled a sharp spark of mana into a runic crystal terminal beside his desk, illuminating a translucent blue ledger projection that displayed the current class points per individual for everyone to see.

Every single student in Class 1-A had a clean score of zero. But as Thomas’s gaze traveled to the absolute bottom of the registry, his dark eyes narrowed slightly in sudden shock.Right beside his name, the ledger explicitly read: Minus 10 Points.

The surrounding High-blood students instantly spotted the negative metric, and a wave of cruel, satisfied sneers and low, mocking giggles erupted from the front rows as they relished his public humiliation.

"Instructor," Thomas said flatly, his voice carrying an unrefined grit. "Why am I starting with negative ten?"

"It is your officia punishment issued by the Headmaster for your lack of decorum during the emergency assembly," Sterling answered with absolute indifference.

Thomas did not ask further and quietly nodded his head, "We are setting out tomorrow morning at the first bell," Instructor Sterling announced, sweeping his arm toward the threshold. "Classes are dismissed for the rest of the day so you may prepare your gear. You will also find packages containing your brand-new, completely standardized uniforms delivered directly to your dorm blocks by noon. Class dismissed."