The academy’s members have a pretty stark hierarchy.
Basically, it’s divided into three levels: lower, middle, and upper classes. But since the academy is a four-year system, overall, it’s split into 12 groups.
Excluding the first-years who haven’t received proper education yet, who do you think gets pushed to the very bottom when you list the rest?
– Second-year lower class
– Third-year lower class
– Fourth-year lower class
Yep, that’s how it goes.
In terms of actual skill, they wouldn’t be completely outclassed by younger students just because they’ve been around longer. For example, the average fourth-year lower class could probably hold their own against a second-year middle class.
But still… the fact that a fourth-year is even competing with a second-year is kinda laughable.
Yeah, laughable folks. That’s what the lower class was.
A graveyard for the talentless. The academy’s punching bag. They were called that for a reason.
But it’s not weird that they’re labeled like that because the student distribution in the academy isn’t pyramid-shaped.
It’s more like a diamond shape, with fewer upper and lower classes and a majority in the middle class.
In terms of ratio, it’s probably 10% upper class, 65% middle class, and 25% lower class.
So naturally, the upper class is idolized, and the lower class is looked down upon.
Then, what about the treatment of the first-year lower class, the weakest of the weak?
Hmm… surprisingly, it’s not bad.
Since so many gems have been discovered from there, people tend to keep an eye on their growth.
Think of it as a newbie protection period. Once they lose that “newbie” tag and become second-year lower class, all bets are off.
In the actual game, if you couldn’t escape the lower class and got promoted to second year, the difficulty would spike vertically.
Even if you cleared the main story perfectly, there was a high chance of getting a bad rating.
Your reputation would plummet, cutting the number of quests you could take in half.
And even if you managed to scrape through those halved quests, the rewards would be halved again…
On top of that, all sorts of disruptive events would pop up at random, making time management impossible. It wasn’t just “hard”—it was beyond that.
It was so brutal that there was an achievement for escaping the lower class after second-year promotion, and the completion rate was less than 0.01%.
I did manage to achieve it, but thinking about the number of tries it took, I never want to do it again.
Just couldn’t escape the lower class in first year, huh?
Did it? It’s better for your mental health to just delete the save and start over from the beginning.
…Why am I suddenly talking about this?
“Artes.”
“Who… Oh, you’re that… Rudion?”
“Isn’t it time for you to be training right now?”
“Me?”
“Yeah, you.”
“I finished all my lectures and came out.”
“So, you’re not doing any personal training or anything?”
“Training? Never done it. Don’t plan to either.”
It feels like the protagonist is just one step away from becoming a total mess.
Running into Artes was completely by chance.
After Lilith’s training session. Normally, I would’ve been dragged around by Seria until evening, but thanks to Alkiné, who saw her skills and wanted to chat, I finally had some free time to myself.
But with nothing particular to do, I decided to head back to the dormitory to catch some sleep when I spotted him. Sitting on a bench, staring blankly at the sky, a familiar face.
Artes.
No wonder he’s the protagonist, with his tall stature and handsome looks.
His fiery red hair and golden eyes made him stand out, even just lounging on a bench.
He’s… well, no need for a long explanation, he’s just a hero.
Not because he’s the protagonist or good-looking, but because he’ll unlock his hero traits later and become a real hero.
I hadn’t seen him in a month, so I forgot about him, but seeing him like this made me happy, so I approached him.
‘Why does he look so thin?’
Contrary to my expectation that he would have built up some muscle by now, his physique was no different from when I first saw him during the entrance exam. In fact, it seemed like he had lost weight, maybe not eating properly.
Curious about his condition, I struck up a conversation and got a shocking response.
“Training? Never done it. Don’t plan to either.”
…It seems something has gone terribly wrong without me realizing.
Usually, just following the story would get you to a level where you could join the intermediate class by midterms.
Could it be that without Reina, the growth experience episodes have disappeared?
I knew that my appearance had slightly twisted the protagonist’s growth path… but I didn’t expect it to be this twisted.
I thought he could grow on his own even if left alone.
After all, he has that overpowered trait called ‘Advance’…
Since I have the ‘Goer’.
The ‘Goer’. It’s a simple yet powerful trait that fixes the growth requirements for all stats.
So, instead of the requirements increasing like 100, 300, 500… they stay fixed at 100.
It’s a trait that really contrasts with me, whose stats are fixed, not the growth requirements.
…Suddenly feeling deprived. Was this how Lilith felt after seeing Seria’s magic? I guess I owe her not just one meal, but three.
Anyway, the fact that he maintains his current state even with such a trait confirms that the growth experience episodes have disappeared.
“Hey, why are you suddenly acting all friendly? You’re in the advanced class, what business do you have with someone like me?”
This darn protagonist. He has no idea I’m worried about him and just keeps grumbling.
But strangely, it doesn’t feel unpleasant. It’s like he emits some kind of friendly aura.
Maybe it’s just that I feel an internal closeness to Artes, but even considering that, it feels like we’ve been friends for a long time.
Is this the secret to being able to talk to any NPC in the game?
Well, whatever… Now that it’s come to this, there’s only one thing for me to do.
I’ll just have to raise him myself, what else can I do?
“Hey, Artes. Are you free right now?”
“Not really doing anything, why?”
Yeah, that’s why he was just lying around staring at the sky.
“Until dinner, you’re on special training.”
“What kind of… I don’t really need special training…”
“I’ll buy you dinner if you follow me.”
“…Well, if that’s the case.”
As expected, he’s at a point where he’s starting to struggle, so he followed right away when I mentioned buying him dinner. It seems he inherited the gamer’s trait of accepting any quest if there’s a reward.
Sigh… I thought he’d level up on his own and left him alone, but now I have to fix this.
Of course, it’s annoying. Right after sending Lilith down the mountain, this happens.
But I feel a bit sorry since it seems like it’s my fault for getting involved, and without a hero, the later developments would be problematic.
Still, he’s the protagonist, and with that cheat-like trait, if I just help him enough to move up to the intermediate class by the midterms, he should do fine on his own from then on.
First, I need to show him the taste of stat growth.
Ding!
As I was walking and thinking about that, suddenly the messenger in my bag started ringing.
I had originally turned off the alarm, but after Seria nagged me about why I wasn’t reading her messages, I just left it on.
Anyway, it’s not like anyone else besides Seria sends me messages.
This time, it was Seria’s message again.
[Seria: I’m done talking with Alkiné.]
[Seria: Where are you?]
It hadn’t been long, but it seemed their conversation ended quicker than expected.
Since I hadn’t gone too far from where we first split up, I decided to meet her back there.
“Rudion. Who’s that person next to you?”
“Oh, it’s the Princess.”
And just like that, Seria and Artes had their first meeting.
Originally, they were supposed to meet for the first time around mid-second semester when some incident happened… but it’s not like meeting here would cause any major issues, so whatever.
I answered Seria’s question first.
“This is Artes, a lowerclassman. I’m going to help him out for a while.”
“A lowerclassman? Why are you helping someone like that, Rudion?”
Don’t say that, Seria… Sure, he’s just a lowerclassman now, but later he’s the guy who’s going to take down the Demon King.
But if I said that, it’d be a spoiler, so I just brushed it off.
“Well, I think he’ll grow quickly if he puts in a little effort?”
“Rudion, you’re not the type to care about others like that.”
“That’s true, but…”
“Hmm…”
As I trailed off, Seria gave Artes a half-squinted look and muttered under her breath.
“…Well, since it’s a guy this time, I’ll let it slide.”
“What?”
“Nothing. Can I come along and watch too?”
“Even if I said no, you’d follow anyway.”
“Of course.”
Yeah, go ahead, Princess. It’s not like we’re doing anything special anyway.
And so, Artes’ training began.
The training consisted of… 100 push-ups, 100 sit-ups, 100 squats, and a 10km run.
From now on, I’ll use food as bait to make him do this every day.
“What kind of training is this? You’re just making him exercise alone.”
Seria questioned it like it was ridiculous, but there was no other way.
This is the only training method I know.
