Deya Plateau, somewhere.
As a gentle breeze stirred countless blades of grass, a young girl floated prominently above the boundless plateau, gazing down at a grayish haze on the horizon.
“So that’s the so-called Newbie Mist dungeon? Hmph, just from its aura, it’s already lost to the Heavenly Fire.”
The girl’s expression was full of disdain, her arms crossed over her chest.
Her short black hair, streaked with fiery red highlights, fluttered in the wind, perfectly matching the red-and-white colors of her Faith Mage attire, giving her an agile, spirited appearance.
But to others, the fiery red markings on her body were a symbol of danger.
Because the Faith robe she wore bore no mark of any true deity, indicating she did not worship any god.
Coupled with that distinctive red color, any adventurer with even a little experience could guess her identity.
She was a follower of Heavenly Fire, one of the Five Great Cataclysms—a complete heretic!
“Teacher, really. This task was handed down by Heavenly Fire himself, yet I’m the one who has to deal with it?”
The girl shook her head. She didn’t even know why she had been told to ‘go bomb the Mist’— was it some kind of joke?
In fact, before her teacher assigned the mission to her, it had already changed hands several times because it was personally issued by Heavenly Fire.
At first, Heavenly Fire wanted his ninth-tier follower to “probe the Mist,” but those old bastards who had reached ninth tier under him were no pushovers.
They immediately passed the task down to their own students, who then passed it down to their students…
After several layers of outsourcing, the mission finally landed in the hands of a girl named Ariel.
“What? This task was personally assigned by Heavenly Fire? I’ll do it, I’ll do it!”
Filled with admiration for Heavenly Fire, Ariel accepted happily.
Not yet battered by society, she had no idea that any mission dispatched by Heavenly Fire was never anything good…
And so, the young mage Ariel, just having reached seventh tier, arrived at Deya Plateau.
To prevent her from being clueless about how to probe the Mist, her teacher kindly advised her to try bombing the Mist with meteors.
“Well, since I’m already here, let me see how powerful a strike I can pull off at seventh tier!”
Gripping her magic staff tightly, Ariel began to slowly charge up. A huge red matrix appeared behind her, then instantly collapsed into a medium-sized magical meteor.
This was a favorite move of Heavenly Fire’s followers called the Grand Meteor Spell, and now Ariel’s plan was to repeatedly stack the Grand Meteor Spell until her mana was completely drained, aiming to summon the largest meteor she could ever conjure!
So Ariel began the endless cycle of summoning matrices and fusing them…
……
Deya Magic Academy.
Suna emerged weakly from the restroom in the teaching building. She had just washed her face for a long time and felt slightly more awake, but her eyes were still red-rimmed.
“I hope that demon won’t go back on its word.”
Her legs trembled slightly as she made her way slowly toward the registration desk in the plaza.
After waiting in line for five minutes, she finally stood before a stern bald examiner whose nameplate read:
“Examiner: Krof.”
“Fill out this form and your registration will be complete.” Krof handed Suna a sheet requesting some basic information about the candidate.
Name, gender, age… all straightforward questions. Suna had thought the Royal Magic Academy’s admissions process would be very different. Seems she was just overthinking.
After quickly filling out the form, Suna turned to leave. Meanwhile, as Krof checked the information she had just submitted, his expression gradually grew subtle.
He said to someone nearby,
“Tell His Highness that the two students she wanted have both registered. The exams can proceed.” ……
Five minutes later, the Royal Magic Academy closed registration.
“Huh? What’s going on? Registration’s already over?!”
“What the heck does ‘registration full’ mean? It’s barely been open for a while!”
Hundreds of students still waiting in line were baffled. What was going on? There were still so many people who hadn’t signed up!
The students grumbled loudly, catching Suna’s attention as she paused and looked back in confusion before letting out a long breath.
“So registration ended so fast? Whew, glad I made it just in time.”
Immediately afterward, the academy’s broadcast system announced that all successfully registered students should proceed to the exam hall for the written test.
“What? Already? I haven’t even reviewed yet!”
Suna was stunned. She had just finished registering, and now the exam was about to start?
And the written test covered several thick, obscure books: Rune Magic Analysis: Ancient Runes, Herbal Magic Encyclopedia, Soul Contract: Summoning Magic, and the like.
Just the table of contents for the Herbal Magic Encyclopedia was enough to keep Suna occupied for a whole month, let alone the other books…
“What should I do? And that damn demon still hasn’t done anything!”
Despite all the awful things it had done to her, it might as well help now! Suna grumbled.
As if summoned by her thoughts, the demon’s deep, hoarse voice echoed inside her mind.
“Just go take the exam.”
“Eek!” Suna was startled and hastily corrected herself.
“Y-yes! M-m-master…”
Did I just scold the demon? Hopefully, it won’t mind.
“It does.” The demon responded, sending a chill through Suna’s whole body.
This was bad……
Twenty minutes later, following the usual exam procedure, Suna was seated in a corner of the exam hall, waiting.
Soon, Krof and several other examiners entered and began distributing the test papers.
“Exam time is thirty minutes. You can start writing as soon as you receive your paper.”
Thirty minutes… that felt too short. Or was the test itself very brief? Suna glanced at the test paper in Krof’s hand and saw it was densely packed with questions.
Students in front of her all gasped upon receiving their papers, flipping through them in disbelief.
They recognized the words, but the way they were combined was incomprehensible.
“Someone please tell me what ‘ego, id, and super death ego’ even mean? Is this a magic question?”
But it didn’t matter much. Even if it was magic-related, who would think about something as absurd as “What happens to a child inside the body if a male transforms into a magical girl and then reverses the transformation?”
For a moment, no one in the exam hall made a move, which made Suna nervously swallow.
Soon, the bald examiner Krof handed the last paper— to Suna.
The first question on her test read:
“What is your ideal?”
Ideal? What kind of question was that? Suna glanced at some of the others.
“How much do you know about the Royal Magic Academy?”
“What are your favorite and least favorite foods?”
“What is your impression of the Beastkin?”
S-So simple!