Talent outclassed by a large margin.

"And number three, your seating arrangement is determined by your rank on the leaderboard, with the further behind your seat is, the higher you rank on the leaderboard."

He whirled his hands in the air after he finished speaking, the trajectory of his fingers traced a mysterious pattern in the air.

Bloop!

The blackboard behind him lit up with blue light, displaying a list of names.

"This is an impromptu version of the leaderboard and since you guys haven't had anytime to score any merits, your initial position on the leaderboard will be determined by talent." The teacher said.

'Determined by talent this should be easy, I'm definitely ranking first' Ace those as he scanned through the leaderboard.

He started from the bottom up, looking for names that felt familiar—not that he knew alot of people here.

But as luck would have it he did find a few names he recognised.

«No4.Aequs Crystallum.»

'Aequs Crystallum? The Aequs? The same guy who laced my heart with those blood red chains.' Ace asked himself for confirmation as he looked around the class in a bid to find him.

'Now that I think of it, how come Aequs is in this class, he's supposed to be a warrior type bestowed since he has an affinity to vitality, I'm sure of it, he could concealed his vitality the first time we met; yesterday — that's something only a warrior can do.'

'But then again he also used the power of a Psychic earlier today when he used spirit mold to shield himself from the rain. Hmmm…' Ace became briefly puzzled.

'Wait! could it be that he has compound affinities." Ace felt briefly enlightened, if Aequs had a compound affinity consisting of spirit and vitality then that would explain it.

'But if Aequs has a compound affinity, an affinity second only to special grade talents, then how the heck is he fourth place on the leaderboard?! Who could have more talent than him?!'

Ace glanced up in anticipation.

«No3.Emilia Tyche.»

Another familiar name!

'Emilia Tyche, that kinda makes sense.'

Since Emilia Tyche was a holy maiden — A candidate for the succession of the holy saintess — it was understandable that she had great talent.

Ace looked up once more eager to see who had ranked above her.

«No2.Ace Virvitanima.»

'What?!'

'Am I reading this right?'

But he was reading it right s Ace glanced up a bit he saw who was number one.

«No1.Apeiron capiō»

'Who is he? And how is he more talented than me, A special grade talent.' Ace wondered.

Ace didn't feel angry that someone scored higher than him, rather than anger Ace felt curious and a bit excited, As having someone stronger or better than him have him a sense of pressure that dispelled any sense of complacency that he had previously.

'Who is this Apeiron guy anyways?' Ace narrowed his eyes for a bit.

The appearance of this Apeiron person threw a wrench in his plans.

His normal plan was to capitalize on his greatest advantage talent to make fast progress and attract the attention, so they could give him resources to advance faster.

And the support of the academy—especially Culmen—would help him secure a good political position in the continent of Elixum.

But his plans were at put at a slight risk by Apeiron. The other students Ace was sure about surpassing, His once in a century talent was not for show. But Apeiron apparently had an even greater talent than him, meaning he was more likely to catch the academy's attention than him.

Ace groaned in slight discomfort, he hated the fact that the plan he made was starting to crumble before it even started.

But when Ace thought more deeply about it, The appearance of Apeiron made no difference to him.

He was still going to work as hard as he could, he was still going to try his absolute best, the only minute change Apeiron brought to him was a sense of pressure that dispelled any form of complacency he had because of his excellent talent.

After Ace resolved himself to work even harder, he started to wonder who even was this Apeiron, who had greater talent than him a special grade talent.

Curious to find out, Ace leaned over to the student sitting beside him.

It was a lean brown haired boy with a thin physique, Although he radiated an aura of noble prestige, the way he sat, the look in his eyes, everything about him screamed a severe lack of confidence to Ace, he couldn't be someone important—he was probably the illegitimate child of some baroness—He was the perfect person to ask, someone low in the social ladder but high enough to know valuable information people like him didn't know.

'This is the type of people I had been planning to befriend before coming into Culmen, low-key but influential, not a freaking holy maiden like Emilia.' Ace lamented briefly before nudging his seatmate and asking him,

"Hey, hello, what's your name?"

He appeared a little flustered for a while before coming to his senses.

"Why did you scare me? I was really focused on the leaderboard." he said in an embarrassed tone—likely because his over the top reaction when Ace nudged him.

"My bad, I didn't mean it that way, I just wanted to know your name." Ace clarified, willing to make peace and not talk about his exaggerated reaction.

His eyes scanned Ace from top to bottom, making no secret of his distrust.

"My name is medi…" He hesitated for a while before he continued "…Medi Sartus."

"Since you told your name it's only fair I tell you mine. my name is Ace."

He raised a brow.

"Ace, The Ace second on the leaderboard?" Medi asked.

"The one and only."

He looked wide eyed.

"That's pretty impressive, you ranked above even the holy maiden in talent."

"But I'm still number two in the list." Ace said self deprecatingly.

"You don't have to beat yourself up, it was expected that he's in first place, after all he has a special grade talent and a potent noble bloodline, many even call him the best genius of the century." He said trying to comfort Ace.