First Day(3)
"Aisha Loudermilk!"
-"Present!"
"Academy Rank 135780! Come and collect your ID card!"
Taking notice of the call, the girl, whose name was yelled, got up from her seat and walked up to the podium.
There, Liz passed her a 3-inch flat metal cube. With a bitter expression on her face, the girl walked back to her seat.
She was probably worried about her unusually low rank.
With that, Liz resumed taking attendance.
"Kent Takeahint!"
-"Present!"
"Academy rank 122212! Come and collect your ID card!"
After a short pause, she yelled again.
"Tim Hawking!"
-"Here!"
"Academy rank 128936! Come and collect your ID card!" Liz continued.
"Tyler Erickson!"
-"Present!"
"Academy rank 129097! Come and get your ID card!"
The students kept coming as Liz kept calling out names and academy ranks.
"Grace Godwill!"
-"Yes!"
"Academy rank 012268! Come and get your ID card!"
As soon as Liz disclosed Grace's rank, murmuring broke out among the cadets. This was the first five-digit rank since the start of the attendance.
But they weren't aware that the upcoming rank announcements would shake them even more. Since there were quite a lot of people here who are stronger than the Godwill girl.
"Amelia Black!"
-"Present Ma'am!"
"Academy rank 009468! Come and get your ID card!"
Again, murmurs broke out amongst the cadets after a four-digit rank was announced.
Liz, on the other hand, didn't look too impressed.
I guess there are a lot of people who submitted false stats and that's why she isn't impressed by the rankings.
"Elijah Steelforged! Academy Rank 009467! Get your ID card here!"
-"Yes!"
"Chase Wood! Academy rank 007989! Come and get your ID card!"
-"Coming!"
"Anastasia Bigod! Academy rank 007231! Come and get your ID card here!"
-"Okay!"
…
After a full ten minutes, most of the students were finally done with their attendance.
"Lucas Morningstar! Academy rank… 116969! Get your ID card here!"
Huh? Did she pause before announcing my rank?
Why? Because I have two 69s in my rank?! Or did she notice that I sent false stats as well.
I looked around and saw a few kids giggling among themselves after hearing my rank.
"...Coming!"
I quickly got up from my desk and tramped over to the podium to collect my identification card.
Liz, who was busy scrolling through the tablet in her hand, which contained the names and ranks of the cadets inside, absentmindedly handed me a flat metal cube like everyone else.
Looks like having two 69s was the reason after all.
"Quinn Darkstar! Academy rank 000018! Get you…."
Grabbing it, I turned around and left for my seat while Liz called out another name.
On my way back, I pressed on the flat metal cube and a black translucent screen with white font popped out from it.
===
User ID: Lucas Morningstar [Face Image]
Academy Ranking: 116969/138000
Rank: Iron 2
Potential: Gold 3
Class: 1-A-1
Merit Points: 0
===
It was a holographic ID card.
Nice, now no one will notice my actual strength.
Thud–!
Right when I was lost in my thoughts, my shoulder bumped into someone. It didn't hurt at all but I should at least say something.
"Watch where you are going." I gave advise to the person who bumped into me until I peeked a glimpse at who it was.
It was Quinn.
He was glaring down at me with his icy cold olive eyes. Was that supposed to scare me or something? In my eyes, he is like a growling little puppy.
But I am not one to back down just because he is weaker than me.
"What?" He scowled back at me.
"I said watch where you are going." I repeated once again while looking him in the eye. The atmosphere around us turned cold and all the students were watching us.
I must be looking crazy in their eyes for picking a fight with Quinn.
"Do you want to die?" He asked me while glaring at me even more than before.
"Nah, I don't have any plans to die yet." I replied without hesitation. Contrary to how it may sound, I was quite serious when I said that.
Almost instantly a pressure began to bore down my body. He must be releasing his aura to suppress me since I am of lower rank in his eyes.
Too bad this pressure is nothing compared to the ocean depths.
Seeing that his aura didn't have any effect, he was about to increase it even further but someone interrupted us.
"Stop fighting you two, unless you want to get punished on your very first day." Instructor Liz stopped us in her usual monotonic voice.
"Tsk. Count yourself lucky." Quinn clicked his tongue and walked past me.
"Yeah, I am so lucky that I don't have get blood on my hands on the first day." I quipped back and walked towards my seat.
The students looked at me in shock for going against Quinn. Ignoring them, I sat in my seat and continued to look towards the podium with an indifferent look.
Slam—!
At that very moment, the door of the classroom was slammed open, making everyone shift their attention to it.
"Am I late?" The one who said that was a black-haired boy— the perpetrator who slammed the door open.
He had a chiseled face and dark brown eyes. He was neither slim nor too ripped. Lean-built would be the perfect description for him.
'Late on his first day, if this was a story then that guy would definitely be the protagonist' I thought to myself.
At that time I didn't know just how close to the truth I was.
The boy stood still on the door saddle, not daring to barge in without permission.
"What do you think?" replied Liz with a question from behind the podium while eyeing the black-haired boy.
"Arghh- maybe I'm a little late?" Nero said while scratching the back of his head.
"No, you are 15 minutes late," Liz corrected while tilting her head with an 'are you serious' expression on her face.
"So, can I come in?"
"No, you are expelled."
"Oh, come on, master! It's because of the task you gave me that I got here late!"
"Fighting a ‹Silver› ranked mana beast shouldn't be that hard."
"Shouldn't be that hard, my ass! Master, I almost died! Twice!"
It seems that this kid and Instructor are in a master-disciple relationship.
"Masta~! Please let me in!"
"It took you 78 minutes to kill a ‹Silver› ranked mana beast! Unacceptable!"
However, I must say the sight in front of me looked like a farce.
Everyone in the classroom however had their jaws dropped as soon as they heard that a boy killed a ‹Silver› ranked mana beast all by himself in just a little over 1 hour!