Chapter 4: Dekan’s Marvelous Confidence

“We’re almost at the campus. Do you want me to show you around?” asked Theresia.

“Of course!”

Dekan was filled with expectations toward his future campus life.

Early in the morning, their horse carriage arrived at the campus.

The Hevenlit Magic Academy was located near the borders of the capital. It was enormous like a small town. It seemed somewhat lacking to call it a ‘campus.’

“Subarashii~”

“What?”

Theresia discovered that Dekan would often spurt out strange words.

“It’s Japanese, an ancient language,” said Dekan.

Dekan and Theresia arrived at the north entrance. After Theresia showed her student ID card, Dekan followed her into the campus. He began to look all around. Sure enough, the campus was enormous.

A giant pond. Fountains and flowerbeds extend from the entrance all the way into the school buildings.

Dekan nodded his head repeatedly. He was very pleased.

Even before his arrival at the campus, he had already sent off all his luggage from the carriage to a nearby inn for storage.

He did not bring with him a lot of clothes or daily necessities. Most of his luggage were his tools for card making.

One must travel on foot upon entering the campus. Dekan encountered a countless amount of interesting, appealing and imposing buildings.

“This district and these buildings here are all part of the College of Alchemy. Your entrance exam will be conducted in this main building here.”

Theresia pointed to an enormous yet strangely designed building.

The Hevenlit Magic Academy was split into four different colleges.

These four colleges were respectively the College of Summoning, Mage College, Knight College and the College of Alchemy.

The former three corresponded to three commonly seen battle styles.

Of course, there were talented people who would create their own unique path.

As for the College of Alchemy, it embodied medicine making, magic card making and various other manufacturing studies.

“With your skills, it should be extremely easy for you to pass the test for the College of Alchemy!”

Theresia placed her hand on her waist. It seemed as if she was planning to raise her nose up toward the sky.

Even though she was not the person who will be taking the entrance exam, she was the person who brought Lil Dekan from the kingdom’s border.

She was extremely proud of her friend.

“Mmhmm. But, I plan to take the test for Knight College!” said Dekan proudly.

“Mmhmm, mmhmm, you will definitely be able… ehhh?!”

Theresia started replying only to suddenly realize that something was amiss.

Knight College?

Didn’t you declare yourself to be a magic card maker who’s not fond of fighting?

“Dekan, did you read over the student enrollment brochure?”

Theresia placed her hand on Dekan’s shoulder and asked him with a very serious expression.

Even though she knew that Dekan possessed exceptional talents, this was not the way to display one’s talents!

If Dekan was to fail the exam, even if he was to understand which exam he should’ve taken, he wouldn’t be able to take the exam for the College of Alchemy until next year!

Theresia did not wish to witness Dekan wasting a precious year!

Dekan nodded his head: “The Knight College had the least amount of compulsory courses and the greatest amount of freedom in choosing one’s courses. The students there are still able to gain access to all the resources I need.”

“As for the College of Alchemy… those courses… they’re different from my approach. Even if I were to learn them, it wouldn’t be of much use to me. Moreover, I don’t want to have a personal advisor.”

“While it’s possible for me to choose either the Mage College or the College of Summoning, I am a complete failure when it comes to magic exams. As for the summoning exam, I have not prepared for that at all…”

Dekan had earnestly studied the various academic courses presented by the four different colleges of the Hevenlit Magic Academy.

Apart from the Mage College and the College of Summoning, he was pretty certain that he would be able to pass the exams for the Knight College and the College of Alchemy.

The structure of the Knight College allowed students to progress to their own abilities. Those with true abilities will inevitably top over all others. As such, they give a vast amount of freedom to their students.

Moreover, there were a ton of muscle-brained idiots in the Knight College. They were people that were unwilling to bother taking time to learn about the foundations of magic, information about the Shadow Worlds and whatnot.

The Knight College does not force them to study those courses either. Instead, as long as the students were able to obtain sufficient combat credits in the Shadow Worlds, they would be allowed to enter the next grade.

It was a sort of compromise toward idiots.

Comparatively, the College of Alchemy paid great attention toward foundation and learning.

The reason for that was because most students in the College of Alchemy would not be personally participating in the raiding of the Shadow Worlds.

As such, the College of Alchemy’s academic programs were extremely arduous.

Theresia started to ponder carefully.

She was able to understand Dekan’s train of thought.

Perhaps a genius like him wouldn’t want to be mired in minor details.

He wanted to become an unrestricted hero who would skip classes all day.

All that said, there was a major problem.

Would Dekan be able to pass the entrance exam for the Knight College?

The Knight College’s entrance exam was known to be extremely challenging -- it was a test of the examinee’s combat ability.

“Could it be that you’re an exceptional martial artist?”

Theresia pinched Dekan’s arm. She seemed to be checking if he had the physique of a martial artist.

“No no no, I am not at all specialized in direct combat.”

Dekan shook his head.

That said, the strength Theresia used to pinch him was perfect.

If possible, he would love to have her give him a whole body massage.

“Then how are you supposed to pass the Knight College’s exam?”

Theresia started to look at Dekan with worries in her eyes.

“I should be fine taking down the examiner,” said Dekan indifferently.

Generally, the Knight College’s exams would match the examinee with an examiner who’s under restrictions. Thus, as long as the examinee could defeat the examiner, they would be able to pass the entrance exam.

“Take down?! Depending on the structure of the exam, many of the higher grade students were unable to defeat their examiners! Also, do you know about the exam restrictions that have been imposed by the Knight College in recent years?”

“Of course. When undergoing exams, the examinees are only allowed to use one summoning magic card. There’s no restrictions toward equipment.”

Naturally, Dekan had seen the rules.

That rule was meant to prevent examinees without talents for battles from insisting on entering the Knight College.

Generally, they would be summoners or mages.

There’s all kinds of reasons as to why they would want to take the Knight College’s exams. For example, ‘I’m going to challenge Hell difficulty,’ I’m going to show off my close-combat mage abilities,’ ‘I’m the armored king, you can take your time fighting with my summons,’ and various others.

If one didn’t have sufficient skill, it would be very difficult to pass the exams from the College of Summoning and the Mage College.

That said, those who were able to forcibly pass the Knight College’s entrance exams were all highly talented!

The Knight College wholly welcomed those fully equipment-donned mages that were able to pass their entrance exams.

But…

Theresia had never heard of a card maker deciding to take on the entrance exam for the Knight College because they didn’t want to enter the College of Alchemy!

The only possible way would be for that card maker to be extremely powerful without having to depend on summoning cards or magic cards…

“Theresia, you don’t have to worry. Although my fighting abilities are horrible, there’s not that many squares that can defeat me in a one on one.”

“...square?”

“I’m talking about ordinary people that aren’t wicked.”

“Where did you learn all these terms…”

Theresia looked at Dekan with contempt.

Although she had only known him for a short while, he doesn’t strike her as someone who would boast.

Could it be that he really possesses cards to martial artists?

After seeing the Goblin Gangster and Goblin Sheriff he made, she felt that he was an outrageous card maker.

It seemed like one cannot view him with common sense.

Perhaps… he might really be able to shock everyone in the Knight College’s entrance exam?