First Lesson

Ch 19

POV Charlotte Albrecht

I still can't believe I managed to join the Greenwich Institute with a 4th-level refinement.

I was sitting at the desk in my room C-A-109 after unpacking and arranging all my luggage.

My eyes were focused on the ring I had on my finger. It wouldn't have been possible without this artifact. Once again I realized the strength of the Albrecht family.

Right, now to fill out the form. I looked at the document of courses that was present on my table.

[

First Year Module:

Compulsory Courses: –

-Unarmed Combat I

-Physical Training I

-Reflex Training I

Electives –

-Heavy Weapon Combat I

-Light Weapon Combat I

-Ranged Weapon Combat I

.

Second Year Module:

Compulsory Courses: –

-Unarmed Combat II

-Physical Training II

-Reflex Training II

Electives –

-Heavy Weapon Combat II

-Light Weapon Combat II

-Ranged Weapon Combat II

.

Third Year Module:

Compulsory Courses: –

-Practical Combat I

-Aura Control I

-Battle Qi Control I

Electives –

-Sword Combat I

-Spear Combat I

-Heavy Sword Combat I

-Axe Combat I

-Short Blade Combat I

-Bow Combat I

.

Fourth Year Module:

Compulsory Courses: –

-Practical Combat II

-Aura Control II

-Battle Qi Control II

Electives –

-Sword Combat II

-Spear Combat II

-Heavy Sword Combat II

-Axe Combat II

-Short Blade Combat II

-Bow Combat II

.

Fifth Year Module:

No compulsory courses

Electives –

-Sword Combat III

-Spear Combat III

-Heavy Sword Combat III

-Axe Combat III

-Short Blade Combat III

-Bow Combat III

]

Choosing at least one of the electives was compulsory to graduate. There was no upper limit, but most students didn't take more than two, which was understandable. Learning one was perfectly fine and even those who took two types of weapons kept one as the main and the other as a side weapon for safety.

Since I was already trained quite a lot I didn't have to think much and quickly chose the path I was going to take. I knew doing so might expose that I was an assassin but it would have been exposed sooner or later when I fought in front of the high-level teachers anyways. The habits of occupation are too difficult to hide, especially when someone much stronger and more experienced than you was observing you. Rather than making the suspicion fall later why not clear the air from the start?

I quickly filled the form and submitted it at the front desk of my building before returning to my room and falling on the bed. It had been a long few days, from the time I had left home I was constantly on guard, trying to hide my level and join the academy, and all the stress that Leon had added on me played its role as well. In just a few minutes after my head touched the pillow, my brain slipped into dreamland.

** ** **

POV Krauss Carnel

The next day I made my way to the academic block with Alfred and a few more people from my building. They were all small nobles that were trying to join Alfred's friend group. Some of them had even fought by his side in the entrance test. This was a common scenario for any high noble, and another reason I didn't want to reveal my real identity.

It took us about half an hour of walking to finally reach our destination. Normally, people would just fly or use the various teleportation points to travel fast, but that required points which none of us had as of now.

Although we were there 10 minutes before the scheduled time we were still not the earliest ones there. And not only spell casters but combatants were also present. I had thought that we were going to be separated while teaching. Afterall, the things we had to focus on and learn were too different to be thought together.

Out of the corner of my eye I saw Charlotte enter as well, but I didn't react to it, and neither did she. We just passed each other as if we were strangers. The one person I didn't expect to see here was Pedro. He had also passed the test, which was probably at the cost of his followers seeing that his entourage had shrunken considerably compared to what I had seen before the final test.

We didn't have to wait much longer as a teacher entered the class snatching everyone's attention at once. It was the swordsman that I had seen during the test.

"Good Morning. My name is Tobias Weber, a Sword Combat Master. You may call me Sir Weber…"

He gave us a lecture explaining the use of points in the Institute and the general rules that we had to follow. Everything in this place was transacted through the points that we had to earn instead of coins and such used outside. This was probably there to remove the advantage the rich had, levelling the playing field.

There were quite a few ways to earn points – exams, competitions, and the most important one, missions. The institute had something similar to the adventurers' guild that gave out missions for rewards, except in this case the rewards were mostly points. This was the most commonplace method used by the students to earn points.

Related to these missions there was the concept of a combat pair in this Institute. Since sending a single student to complete missions in far off places lead to a large mortality rate this combat pairing system was implemented. Every student was paired up with a student of the opposite branch. That is, every spell caster had was partnered with a combatant.

Of course, if you wanted to leave in larger groups it was till possible, but it was compulsory to always take your partner when you went outside the academy. I had already known about this from before, and that is why I had asked Professor Tischer to pair Charlotte with me. It was a great chance to know about her background.

Surprisingly there wasn't any rule forbidding the use of spells or arts in the residential and commercial areas, but it was prohibited to attack anyone outside of the arenas. So curses and markings could still be cast as long as you were discrete enough with it. If you knew them that is.

Once his lecture about rules was done came the interesting part, the results of the entrance test. The announcement in there had said those with more than required points would be given an advantage later, and of course that advantage came in the form of additional points.

Suddenly my room key card which was in my pocket became a little hot which made me quickly take it out. But I wasn't the only one. Everyone in the room had the situation happening to them.

This heat lasted only a couple of seconds before disappearing as if all of it was my imagination but when I looked at the other side of the card there was an extra number written on it that wasn't there before.

"Your key cards' point storage function has been activated now. All your transactions will be done by using that." Sir Weber took a pause before continuing his explanation, "The number tokens you collected during the entrance test were directly converted into tokens and will now be displayed on your key card along with my rank."

And as expected there was a 000 000 001 000 displayed on my card and above it in black letters was my alias, 'Leon Durnell'. It was then I realized how much magical engineering went into this small card. The number of inscriptions that would be needed would be at least in the triple digits, and to fit it all into this small of a space was incredible.

Once Sir Weber explained to us everything he left the class with all the Combatant students for their Physical training class while another teacher, this time a woman entered the class which now only had spell casters.

"Let us begin our first class, Basic Spell Theory."

.

.

.

"Magicians have a mind palace in which their spell circles are located. By arranging these spell circles in various configurations, you create a spell model. On pouring your mana into this structure you evoke this spell. That means all the spells are different in only one aspect and that is the spell model…"

I didn't know what I was expecting with a course that was titled 'basic spell theory' but what this Petra Schmidt thought today was the most elementary stuff a spell caster needed. When she had introduced herself as an 8th Circle Archmage I thought she would teach something new, but what she was speaking felt like it was ripped out from a book named Elementary Spell Casting vol 1.

It wasn't only me who felt like this, many others were the same. Some had even started to doze off already. And although Miss Petra saw this she didn't really say anything. Even Alfred Rose who was sitting beside me looked very disinterested in the lecture. After an hour and a half, the class was finally over and she left the room without even looking back once as if she herself would rather not teach.

"That was very… underwhelming." Especially for the first class in such a prestigious academy. I said to no one in particular.

"It was for us who are already Adept and Expert Magicians, but for Apprentice magicians who haven't been given a proper education in spell casting it is still useful." Alfred replied with a wry smile.

"That's true."

During the lecture the one who was most interested in contents was that zero-circle girl with the physique. To those like her the basics were very important, afterall, it was on this base the rest of your knowledge would be built.

Just then the door burst open by another teacher, "Was there anybody teaching here just now?"

Suddenly I found the teacher who called herself Petra Schmidt very interesting.

** ** **