The grand crystalline display in the central courtyard of the R.S. Advanced Academy updated its registry, casting a brilliant holographic glow that illuminated the names of the top ten entrants.
Entrance Exam Merit List:
1. Amon Von Crown [SSS Grade]
2. Jeanne Nova [SS Grade]
3. Calisto Castellano [SS Grade]
4. Ross Thoumeax [SS Grade]
5. Seraphina Nightfallen [SS Grade]
6. Mia Wales [S Grade]
7. Jose Brown [S Grade]
8. Rose Vasquez [S Grade]
9. Levine Blanc [S Grade]
10. Tia Denver [S Grade]
The Entrance Exam had finally, officially concluded.
Amon had performed at a level so staggeringly high, so conceptually flawless, that it was entirely unprecedented since the very founding of the R.S. Advanced Academy. By completely rewriting the historical baseline of the exam, he had permanently cemented himself as the absolute greatest entrant in the history of the institution.
And with that final, absolute victory, a familiar, luminescent golden window flared to life at the edge of his peripheral vision.
{Quest: Genius Final Boss}
Primary Objective: Secure first place in the R.S. Advanced Academy Entrance Exam (Completed)
Secondary Objective: Break Sophia Von Crown's record (Completed)
Hidden Objective: Save Jacqueline Augustus and prevent Victoria Jackson from being killed (Completed)
Rewards: Forbidden Magic Grimoire, [Mad Mind], False Visionary Sword (Click to claim)
Amon looked at the familiar translucent system interface from the corner of his eyes, his finger twitching slightly with the urge to tap the glowing icon. But he couldn't claim his prize just yet, given his current proximity to the two terrifyingly powerful women sitting directly across from him.
He had just finished delivering a precise, calculated debriefing of the catastrophic events that had unfolded inside the Black Chasm. Across the table, Headmistress Victoria Jackson and his mother, Grand Duchess Emilia Von Crown, sat in absolute, heavy silence. A few paces away, Jacqueline rested elegantly on a plush velvet sofa, quietly entertaining Nicole and Nancy with small, glowing mana constructs while listening intently to the conversation.
They were all gathered inside the Headmistress's Office. The room, which had only an hour prior been transformed into a lethal, absolute-zero glacier by Emilia's unbridled maternal rage, had been systematically restored to its original, immaculate condition.
The sprawling office was exceptionally spacious and elegantly decorated. The walls were lined with towering shelves carved from dark wood, packed to the brim with ancient leather tomes, softly pulsating magical artefacts, and highly sophisticated, random futuristic gadgets that Victoria loved to hoard. At the rear of the room, an enormous floor-to-ceiling glass window offered a panoramic, sweeping view of the vibrant academy grounds below.
"I am genuinely, deeply amazed," Victoria finally spoke, her face instantly breaking into a calm, playful smile as she rested her chin on her interlaced fingers. "Truthfully, a part of me half-expected you not to make it back out, and I was prepared to personally step into the fray. But the way you describe your execution... it honestly sounds like you were just cruising through a stroll in the park."
"A cruise where I was forced to put my literal life on the razor's edge," Amon replied, a prominent, irritated vein visibly popping on his forehead as his polished mastermind facade strained beneath her nonchalance. He levelled a sharp glare at the Headmistress. "If you had simply possessed the baseline decency to explain the tactical parameters when you sent me that damned hoax letter, I wouldn't have been forced to navigate such a statistically fatal situation blindly."
"Not to mention," Emilia intervened, her voice dropping into a register that made the ambient temperature of the room plunge once more. A dense, jagged frost immediately began to crystallise over the arms of her chair. "You dared to deploy my son into an active disaster zone without my explicit permission, Victoria."
"Well, it was what I like to call a highly calculated gamble," Victoria chuckled softly, completely unbothered by the creeping ice. She leaned back, her playful gaze drifting over to Amon. "When I bypassed the public records and looked through his actual past achievements—even the classified incidents you tried so desperately to hide away, Em-Em—what I saw wasn't just another talented Crown heir. I saw an anomaly. An absolute wildcard whose very presence shifts the trajectory of an entire conflict through his existence alone."
"My son is not some divine beast for you to experiment with, you freak." Emilia's aura flared violently, the cold fury in her eyes burning with an ominous intensity. "He is a human being. And much like any human, he is entirely susceptible to death. If he had perished inside that Black Chasm, I would have personally ensured that your entire damn existence was reduced to nothing but a fragmented memory for the forgotten."
"But let's look on the bright side," Victoria countered smoothly, her composure remaining utterly flawless as she gestured lightly with a slender hand. "He isn't dead. Plus, he has somehow managed to acquire two exceptionally high-tier women in the absolute span of a single afternoon."
"What the hell are you even talking about?" Amon snapped, his brows furrowing deeply as his genuine annoyance completely bled through his polite mask.
"Think about the metrics, my dear boy. You successfully rescued Jacqueline from literal conceptual torment, so I am entirely certain she feels an unpayable debt of gratitude toward you, which, knowing how things usually go, will inevitably evolve into an undeniable feeling of love over time," Victoria explained breezily.
Before Amon could even process the sheer absurdity of her statement, space subtly distorted. In a fraction of a second, Victoria vanished from her desk and reappeared directly beside his seat, her tone shifting into something thoroughly playful and sultry. She leaned in dangerously close, her breath brushing past his ear.
"And on the other hand... I have been completely, utterly swayed by you myself~" she purred, a predatory yet amused glint dancing in her eyes. "You see, I have always preferred men who are significantly younger than me, and you happen to be an absolute, flawless match for my personal tastes~ Strong, brilliant, young, and undeniably handsome~"
Jacqueline's face flushed a brilliant, deep crimson at the Headmistress's unvarnished shamelessness. Her hands tightened slightly around Nicole and Nancy's shoulders. Her crown's regal Seraphim wings flared in a desperate attempt to shield herself from the sheer audacity of her sister's words.
Amon, on the other hand, didn't even blink. He slowly turned his head to look at Victoria, his expression completely flatlining into a hollow, deadpan stare. "This woman has zero shame," he thought, his internal processor groaning under the sheer weight of her exhausting antics. "Absolutely zero."
Meanwhile, the space across the desk fractured.
With a sickeningly sharp metallic ring, Emilia manifested her jagged, abyssal ice-blade. Her fingers gripped the hilt so tightly that her knuckles turned stark white, the ominous black-and-blue energy of the weapon pulsing violently against the carpet. Her gaze locked onto the back of Victoria's neck like a heat-seeking missile, looking entirely unreservedly prepared to commit a murder right then and there.
The kids, however, were left completely out of the loop. Nicole tilted her head so far to the side she nearly tipped over, her crown's multi-eyed wings blinking in unison, while Nancy simply stared at Amon with wide, profoundly confused pink-red eyes, entirely unable to grasp why the adults in the room were suddenly radiating a mix of extreme embarrassment and murderous intent.
. . .
Amon collapsed onto his bed, utterly exhausted after a day he knew he would never forget. The physical wounds had been magically erased, but the psychological toll of fighting a cosmic horror, Masha's antics, and the meeting at Victoria's office had drained every single drop of his energy.
"Man... some sleep would be nice..." he mumbled to the empty room, his heavy eyelids drooping as he let himself sink into the plush mattress.
Right as his consciousness was about to drift off into a well-deserved sleep, the heavy wooden door of his quarters was suddenly, violently thrown open.
Standing on the threshold, framed by the corridor light, was Sophia Von Crown. Her arms were tightly crossed, and her elegant features were set into a thoroughly displeased expression.
"We need to talk, Amon," she said. Her voice was perfectly calm, but it possessed an underlying weight that was absolute and entirely non-negotiable.
"Well... there goes my rest..." Amon thought, internally crying tears of pure blood. He let out a silent, agonising groan into his pillow, already having a very good, mathematically precise guess of exactly what was about to happen.
"Why did you get an attendant?" Sophia asked, looking at Amon with a chilling, unblinking gaze that could have frozen a lesser warrior in their tracks.
"Ask that question to Mother, not me," Amon replied, sighing as he pushed himself up from the mattress. He smoothed out his crumpled shirt and looked back at her with a thoroughly calm, even expression. "She is the one who arbitrarily decided I should be assigned an attendant."
"That's strange," Sophia murmured, tilting her head slightly to the side as a faint, deeply ominous smile played on her lips. "I already asked Mother about it before coming here... and she explicitly told me to ask you."
"Dang, she completely threw me under the bus this time," Amon internally grimaced, realising his mother had ruthlessly deflected the sisterly wrath straight to his doorstep.
"So?" Sophia slowly sauntered deeper into the room, her elegant footsteps completely silent as an intense, suffocating aura bled from her silhouette, making the space around Amon feel incredibly uneasy. "Are you going to start explaining, or do I have to violently extract the truth out of you?"
DragonBoy69: "Damn, bro is absolutely fried..." |
LoreMasterKun: "I am still confused about something. He has the [Mark of Death], right? It literally allows him to tank attacks that would otherwise kill him, meaning he's practically unkillable in a fight. Why did he tell Victoria he put his life on the line to save Jacqueline when he wasn't in any real danger?"
FangirlingIsMyPassion: "It's simple, the entity he faced possessed an absolute cheat skill that allowed it to deflect any attack, and adapt to anything that bypassed its deflection field. If I had to deduce, the boss would've eventually bulldozed right through his [Mark of Death] and erased him regardless." |
MachinaDeus: "That is the case, but let's just put the confusion aside and enjoy the show. Bro triggered his sister's absolute jealousy flags, and the content is about to treat us!" |
Amon flicked his eyes toward the cascading walls of live-text running along the corner of his peripheral vision, a fresh wave of irritation rippling through him. The stream chat was actively rooting for his immediate demise, completely thrilled by the prospect of watching him get interrogated.
"Why do you even care so much about me having an attendant, Sophia?" Amon questioned, his brows furrowing as he met her gaze directly, refusing to back down despite his exhaustion.
"Because the attendant in question happens to be a Champion of the Solathian Empire," Sophia answered, her tone dropping into a dangerous, icy glare as she stepped directly into his personal space. "And not to mention... she possesses absolutely everything required to seduce you."
"Jacqueline wanted to be my attendant because she felt incredibly grateful to me for saving her life during the execution of my official Prosecutor duties," Amon explained, letting out a long, weary sigh.
He offered the brief explanation with practised ease, though he deliberately omitted a massive chunk of the chaotic reality.
Before their meeting in the Headmistress's office had wrapped up, Jacqueline had earnestly expressed her desire to repay Amon for pulling her out of that localised purgatory. Seizing the opportunity to cause maximum chaos, Victoria had playfully suggested that Jacqueline should become his personal, live-in attendant.
The shameless proposal had thoroughly flustered Jacqueline and caused immense annoyance to Amon, but to his surprise, she had actually agreed to the arrangement. Even his mother, Emilia, hadn't been particularly against the idea, reasoning that having a demon powerhouse guarding her son's side was an excellent investment, especially given Amon's uncanny knack for finding himself in statistically fatal situations.
But Amon had absolutely no intention of telling Sophia about the Black Chasm or the boss fight he had. Who knew what kind of reckless, protective stunt his sister might pull if she ever learned what had actually transpired inside that subterranean hellscape.
"A Prosecutor duty?" Sophia echoed, her cold glare narrowing significantly as she analysed his face for any micro-expressions. She crossed her arms, her fingers tapping against her sleeve in a slow, rhythmic pattern. "You expect me to believe a Champion of the Solathian Empire simply signed an attendant contract just because you did your job?"
HowlerBrit: "She is not buying the excuse, bro! Look at her glare, she knows you're making things up!"
LoreMasterKun: "Smart move by Amon hiding the Chasm info. If Sophia found out Victoria used him as a human guinea pig for an illegal rescue mission, she'd probably team up with Emilia and actually level the academy." |
GerminSac: "Wait, so Victoria pulled one of her usual schemes, Jacqueline agreed because of a debt, and Mama Crown approved because her son likes to be a danger magnet? That's some next-level shenanigan LMFAO." |
MachinaDeus: "Bro is having to play mind games with his sister just to get some sleep... Sophia, let bro rest..." |
Amon kept his composure entirely steady, choosing to completely ignore the chat's running commentary as it flickered annoyingly in the corner of his eye. He leaned back slightly against his pillow, adjusting his posture to look as unbothered, nonchalant, and fundamentally bored as humanly possible.
"Believe what you wish, Sophia," Amon said smoothly, letting his voice dip into a perfect blend of absolute exhaustion and aristocratic indifference.
"But the contract is signed, Mother has officially sanctioned it, and unless you plan on actively opposing Mother's sanction, Jacqueline Augustus is legally my attendant. Now, if your interrogation is finally concluded... I would highly appreciate it if you stepped out and let me get some sleep."
Sophia opened her mouth to snap a fierce retort, her eyes glinting dangerously—but Amon was completely out of patience.
Snap.
He sharply snapped his fingers. Instantly, space violently folded around Sophia's silhouette. Before she could even register the spatial distortion, she vanished from the spot, cleanly teleported completely out of the residential wing.
In the same millisecond, the velvet curtains closed in heavily over the windows, sealing out the daylight, and the room's thick oak door slammed shut, its enchanted locks clicking into place with a definitive ring. Amon didn't stop there; with a casual wave of his hand, he cast several high-level, layered anti-teleportation and physical barriers across the room's structural vectors, ensuring that not even his sister's explosive temper could breach his sanctuary again.
Finally alone in the deep, peaceful shadows, Amon let his head sink back into the pillow, his consciousness instantly slipping away into the dark.