Getting The Main Cast Together

(Third Person Pov)

Right after the teacher explained the rules, Aqua received a notification on his phone.

Your class has been challenged to a duel to fight, as someone who is part of the special class you will have to fight too, the venue and the timings will be shared shortly if you fail to reach the venue on time you will be automatically considered to have lost. You cannot decline this duel since the challenger is lower ranked than you.

Since you are part of the special class, the penalty for losing the match will be your expulsion. So do try your best!

Aqua found himself startled by the message.

My class?

He wondered as he looked at his bracelet again, signifying the number 2 written on it.

Noah must have gotten the 1st.

Aqua thought to himself. To him that was obvious.

"Hey"

Responding to the tap on his shoulder, Aqua looked behind him.

"What happened?" Aqua asked looking at Emma and Aleister with troubled expressions on their faces.

"Did our class just get challenged?" Aleister asked.

Aqua nodded, finding himself surprised like the other two.

"Um... I have a question" A feminine voice called for the teacher's attention.

Aqua looked in the direction of the girl, she had white hair along with a few strands of black mixed in, and her eyes were like an amethyst.

"Hm? What is it?"

"Um, What would happen if someone were to be challenged by multiple people?" She asked.

At that moment it hit Aqua.

As long as he goes through with his 5 duels and wins, it's the end and if the person who challenged him has a lower rank he can't refuse to have the duel but what if multiple people have challenged him at the same time? Who will the be 5 individuals he will have to fight?

Will he have the right to choose the person he is up against or not was essentially what Aqua wanted to know about.

"If that happens, the academy will select how it will go down" The teacher answered, his answer left a lot to be desired but the girl who had asked the question didn't say anything but instead simply nodded.

"Well, does anyone have any more questions? If not, then you are all dismissed from tomorrow onwards your classes will commence in your new classrooms, and be prepared because your leisure time in the academy is over."

And with that, their class was concluded.

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Soon after leaving the classroom Aqua, Emma, and Aleister met up with Allen and Elinalise in the cafe.

"Congrats on making it to the special class," Aleister said with a smile.

"We might not remain in the special class for long" Allen replied which caused the others to frown.

"What do you mean?" Emma asked with a frown to which Allen simply showed her the mail on his phone.

"Dude are you worried about the challenge!? We can win that easily. I mean, we are essential top rankers in our year. Besides, look at one of the 3 psychopaths standing in front of you! How can you think we would lose?" Aleister replied while Allen shook his head.

"We are being challenged as a class, we don't know our classmates or anything about them. It would be a different thing when you fight alone but when you are fighting along with others, it's a different thing. Besides..." his words trailed off.

"Besides what?" Emma asked squinting her eyes.

"The message from the early morning is a bit concerning, if it's like what I think it's like, we are getting screwed" Allen replied.

"Now that I remember I have lots of questions about this special class, grade ranking and the message we got from earlier" Emma said with a frown on her face.

"We got a message in the morning?" Aqua asked, his question caused others to raise their eyebrows at him.

"Did you not read the message?" 

Aqua simply decided to act like he didn't hear it and opened his phone and found the unread email as he opened it.

Congratulations! You have been chosen to be part of the special class, Eximius-100. To truly, become the student of the special class please enter in the top 20 grade rankings within the next 12 hours. If you fail to do so, you will be expelled from the academy. Good luck!

"What the..."

Aqua muttered.

"Dude, I know you are a psychopath but at least check your emails!" Aleister complained, ignoring him Aqua simply looked at Allen.

"The grade rankings are decided upon how much one has improved. While the special class is for exceptional students. It doesn't matter if you have trained or not, improved or not exceptional individuals are exceptional but some exceptional people are lazy, which results in them not improving but they are still labeled as exceptional by the academy. Now, it's not hard to see how these students not being in the top rankings would cause a lot of problems, and students with higher grade rankings wouldn't like it if they weren't the ones in the special class. The solution to that is simple, just ask these exceptional individuals to change their rankings just as fast as they were given the rankings. In case the exceptional individual doesn't make it to the top rankings they will be expelled. It doesn't matter how exceptional one is if they are not willing to put in the work they will be labeled trash. They are simply given one chance. There is a reason why our classes start tomorrow." Allen surmised his deductions to Aqua.

"And that's where the problem comes in, we still have yet to know the actual number of students in our class. All we know is that we have 20 students who are exceptional this year but will we have the actual 20 students when the time for the duel comes? How many will there be? And how much coordination will we be able to have?"

"And above all this, do you guys understand that we have no way of knowing who this exceptional individual is? Let's say the person who didn't make it to the top 20 rankings challenges Aleister or Emma who are actual exceptional students, what do you think will happen? We will just end up taking each other down instead."

"Also, it's enough to conclude that special classes have different sets of rules. Losing the upcoming match might be more harmful for us than it is for regular classes." 

Allen concluded sipping on his cold coffee.

"It went over my head! But I agree with everything Allen says! Just tell me who should I beat up!" Elinalise said drinking her strawberry shake.

The girl couldn't care less about any of the stuff.

"...I feel like it's overly convoluted" Emma replied.

"It is but there's a reason why this academy stands where it does"

"What are we going to do now?"

"That's what I am trying to think about, if only there was a way to know who these students are"

Ring!

As if in direct reply to his wish, a notification popped up on his phone.

Join the group, it's for the students from the special class

Allen looked a bit baffled at this, he quickly joined the group and went to look at who the admin of this group was.

"Lucy.." Allen muttered.

"Oh, it's the girl who asked the last question the teacher, she is a student from our class." Emma chimed.

"Wait, she is exceptional too? I have never seen her on training grounds! Besides, she looks too frail!" Aleister replied.

Send your grade ranks, and do not challenge each other. Also, tell me which one of you wants to be the admin, I am not interested in representing or governing the group.

Allen found himself speechless at the later part of the message as he typed his response.

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"For now, just those of you here who have low rank challenge the other rankers besides us. Avoid inner fights, we have a duel coming at 8 tonight. We can try to strategize and become acquainted with each other's fighting styles till then. So get into the top 20 ranks as fast as you guys can" Allen said to the group of 13 people sitting around the table.

He had asked for everyone to meet up at the cafe on the group chat.

"Yes, we understand leader"

"Stop calling me leader"

"But you are the leader"

"No, I am not" Allen replied with displeasure, during the conversation, at some point, he had been given the name of the leader.

It made sense, Allen had taken the current command of the situation.

"Still, is it all needed? Can we really lose against one guy?"

Moments prior they had gotten the message about their venue, the timing of their duel, and the person who had challenged them.

Yes, a single person had challenged the entire class.

And that person happens to be Noah.

The moment Aqua learned about it, he made the run for the training grounds saying he had met them at the time of duel directly.

"Have you seen his video?" Allen asked

"Yeah, that's why I don't get why he isn't the part of special class but forget that I still don't think it would be easy for him to win. I mean, this time he won't be fighting weaker monsters than him but humans with a higher rank than his. Besides, we have Alyssa and Aqua who can match him. He can't possibly win against all of us" 

"Please don't jinx us."

"Haa~"

Allen let out a sigh, he himself was doubtful, it would be one thing for Noah to challenge them with his class but Noah had challenged the entire class alone.

In an individual battle against Noah, it wouldn't be possible to win but a battle like this? Yup, the chances of their winning were quite good except...

The abnormality that Noah's information consists of...

Allen thought remembering the information that he got from Emma, apparently, Emma called Julianna right after she had read the email and learned that Noah was the one who had challenged, she couldn't understand why he had fought against his own class and decided to look for Noah, Julianna then had told her about the situation and what her teacher had told her.

I don't know what the penalty is, it might as well be expulsion itself, why would they need students they thought of as exceptional but lost to a single individual? We might as well be trash to the academy. I can't afford to lose.

"Alright, let's separate and meet each other at 1 pm. End your duel and secure your positions by then and as for those who are already in the top 20, well train together. That's all" Allen concluded.

"What will you do till then?"

"I will go get the rest of the bastards to cooperate who didn't bother to show up"

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(Noah's Pov)

I looked in front of me, the main cast that stood with weapons clutched in their hands.

"Which weapon would you like to use?"

In duels, the weapons are provided by the academy. It's to keep students away from using their family wealth and using some high-grade weapon against someone with a low-grade one.

"I will go with a sword with the training wooden sword" I replied.

"...A training wooden sword"

"Yup"

Since I am asking for a downgrade, it shouldn't be a problem for me to get the weapon I am asking for.

With a bit of hesitation, I was handed the training wooden sword.

It's time to see how strong I am.

Okay, fine. I am here flex today.

The main cast looked like they were ready to face off against me.

Not like they could win.

I already knew about them, their skills, their movements, their actions, their attack patterns, and the attack patterns they would get when they evolved during mid-fights.

I am not planning on ending the fight soon. It will be stretched out until they all finally go past their limits.

You see, it seems like the plot is progressing faster than it was in the novel. Since the Demon Lord has gotten his level cap he has decided to progress things faster than before and with methods that hadn't been used in the novel.

I needed this side to progress just as fast as well.

In the novel, the first volume was entirely about the trust and cooperation among the class members.

The actions taken by Allen and Elinalise, in the beginning, would come to bite them back since the students they tried to threaten are now also part of their class.

Alyssa had trouble talking to others, she was in one word completely dumb about conversations, and she couldn't even hold a business talk unlike me.

Makes me feel good to see there are people worse than me...

Anyways, they are just a few examples but the thing is there were many things and hurdles that appeared but by the end of the volume, they had learned to work together.

But we don't have the luxury of moving with the same speed as the novel's plot, all thanks to yours truly.

So the best option was for me to force them to cooperate with each other, to have them solve their matters faster than before.

Who said they need the entire volume dedicated to them learning to trust each other?

When someone finds their life in danger they would unconsciously start moving with only one thing in mind, and that's their survival.

In situations like those, feelings become secondary.

Well then, shall we begin?