At that very moment, within the Ikerite Magic Academy.
Vice Dean Ron, who had been in the middle of teaching a class in an academic building, immediately dismissed his students early with a grim expression upon receiving an urgent message. He hurried straight to the conference room in the main building of the School of Sages.
He pushed open the heavy double doors.
Though the conference room was decorated in soothing tones, a tense atmosphere seemed frozen in the enclosed space. Every instructor wore a grave look, their eyes locked onto the screen in the center of the room.
"Loren, how are they doing?" Ron asked anxiously as he took a seat beside Dean Loren.
Originally, Ron had assumed a Tier 2 Shadow World would pose no challenge whatsoever to Lanqi and Hyperion, and that they could likely handle a Tier 3 world as well.
After all, with the pair's combined tiers, the system should have placed them into either a difficult Tier 2 Shadow World or an easy Tier 3 one.
Yet Ron had never imagined that two complete novices, on their very first foray into a Shadow World, would be swept into an exceptionally perilous Tier 4 instance—
A demon realm in an unknown time and space, a place where no ordinary human could survive.
There were only two explanations for being matched into a Shadow World far exceeding one's own tier.
The first was sheer rotten luck triggering an astronomically low-probability event, though in such cases, the other teammates were usually well above average.
The second was a foul play scenario: a high-tier challenger intentionally teaming up with a low-tier one to completely overpower an entry-level Shadow World, corrupting the normal matchmaking mechanism.
"...Under normal circumstances, this would already be considered a catastrophic incident. But with those two, they might not necessarily have bad compatibility with this Shadow World," Loren, Dean of the School of Sages, murmured as he watched the broadcast relayed from the School of Magic Engineering onto the central magic screen.
Vice Dean Ron nodded in understanding.
He caught Loren's drift; there were simply things Loren, as dean, had to phrase tactfully.
Most challengers—especially those below Platinum rank who lacked seasoned experience—would find themselves crippled upon arriving in an intensely dangerous Shadow World. The bizarre environment, grotesque rules, and gruesome, maddening historical scenes would shatter their composure, severely dulling their wits and judgment.
Yet there were also those who, the more deranged the Shadow World became, the better they could display "talents rarely suited for the real world."
A demon realm had no human laws.
And once Lanqi was unburdened by legal constraints...
They hardly dared to speculate.
...
In the territory belonging to the School of Sages, inside a small loft designed in the style of a library.
Grand, ornate carved bookshelves stretched along the walls all the way to the ceiling, resembling the ramparts of an ancient castle.
On the second floor of this building was an independent magic screen that even allowed the occupants to actively select from the rotating campus broadcasts.
"Hahaha! Modan, you got played by an idiot today!"
A young woman in a black dress sat in the head seat, clutching her stomach and kicking her legs in helpless laughter as she watched the screen.
This was their team's private building, a unique venue granted to them by the academy.
Even though Modan was a Gold-rank challenger and the ostensible leader of the team, one glance made it clear who the real boss was.
The woman in the black gauze gown was a fourth-year Platinum-rank student, possessing formidable power and noble prestige that outmatched the vast majority of the faculty.
"Yeah. Looks like I won't have to see him again," said Modan Gaxiges, the son of Marquis Gaxiges. The dark gloom that had previously hung over his face was now considerably lighter.
"Still, you'd better prepare yourself just in case he turns out not to be an idiot, you know?"
...
Inside a private laboratory belonging to the School of Magic Engineering, the spacious, luminous interior was exquisitely designed. Dominated by shades of white and gray, the space fostered a quiet, focused serenity.
From the high ceiling, light poured evenly into every corner, while magic screens were embedded across the circular walls to display all manner of data and information.
At workbenches of various shapes scattered throughout the lab, magic artificers were absorbed in their research.
"No way. Is this really the kid Her Highness Vivian mentioned? This year's top scorer in the School of Sages?"
From a short distance away came the voice of a companion standing before a magic screen.
A handsome young man clad in work overalls and thick gauntlets, who was in the middle of repairing a magical apparatus, pushed up his protective goggles and turned his gaze toward the screen.
"Good thing we didn't recruit him," remarked a young woman beside him who wore a different uniform of the School of Magic Engineering.
Unlike the young man, pinned to her collar was a Silver-rank registered card maker badge from the Card Makers Association.
"I heard this kid's thought process is a bit different from ordinary people. Maybe he's doing it on purpose," the young man muttered, scratching his head in puzzlement.
"But..." the young woman began.
With the exam hall's mechanism now completely wrecked, the situation looked like an absolute dead end no matter how one sliced it.
"You don't get it, do you?" the young man said thoughtfully, pulling off his gauntlets and setting down his tools before hopping onto a workbench to watch the magic screen.
He had the same pale blond hair as Vivian, Princess of Hutton, yet his attire was utterly plain and unadorned, no different from an everyday commoner.
Unless he was returning to the royal palace, he always dressed this way.
As a result, people often failed to realize he was actually a prince, thinking only that he carried an extraordinary presence.
"Did you figure something out?" the young woman asked.
"I don't really get it either," the young man replied.
"..."
The young woman fell silent, crossing her arms and turning her head away.
If assaulting royalty weren't a punishable offense, her hands would already be around his neck.
...
The dormitory building of the School of Knights.
In the corridors and stairwells, students who had just finished their day's classes trickled through the lobby in a steady stream, some looking invigorated and others visibly exhausted.
Since it was right around dismissal and dinner, the hallways were markedly busier than in the afternoon.
"Hurry over to Jera Memorial Square! If we're any later, all the steps will be taken!"
"Who would've thought the School of Sages had a pure reckless brute of their own?"
Not far off.
Outside a dorm room by the corner of the ground-floor corridor, an ash-blond student with sunglasses perched insolently halfway down his nose had two nails held between his lips. He was in the middle of mounting a nameplate engraved with [Frey Detective Agency] beside his doorway.
The students who happened to glance at Frey wore expressions of mild astonishment.
Setting aside the absurd question of why a detective agency existed in an academy in the first place—
Why on earth did the School of Knights have a detective?
Yet as soon as the passing freshmen recognized that white-haired, purple-eyed young man radiating the explosive power of a wild wolf, they no longer found it strange.
"..."
Frey stared at the nameplate, remaining quiet in contemplation.
He had no idea what had suddenly happened on campus to make this evening so unusually chaotic.
For several minutes now, he had watched student after student sprint in just to dump their books in their rooms before racing back outside, all chattering about the same thing.
"Whatever. I'll go take a look later," Frey muttered, returning his focus to the task at hand.
Chapter 49