Chapter 203:Final Exam (1)

Chapter 203: 203:Final Exam (1)

Ellen casually rested her chin on her hand, her eyes carefully scanning Raelynn up and down.

Compared to before, when Raelynn simply chose to just wear the same clothes as Raymond. Which lead to a whole lot of boring plain long sleeves and trousers. Luckily, (unluckily for Raelynn) she was currently dressed up in clothes entirely selected by Ellen herself.

"Hmm...I like the arm warmers, but don’t you think just white is a bit too plain?"

She clenched her hands, before shooting a glare at the original. Who had to stifle his laugh.

"...we’re not here to talk about my clothes."

"Right. I’m just thinking of how I could improve this."

Why? Why of all possibilities did it have to be her?!

As she quietly lamented her own existence, the original let out a small cough.

"Let’s just hurry up and test it first."

There wasn’t a lot of time left before the actual practical exam started, so any little bit of extra time they could squeeze out was always helpful.

Without further ado, under Ellen’s curious gaze. Raymond and Raelynn both locked eyes with each other.

Amber circles of mana materialized around her, lines,runes,symbols and shapes that Ellen couldn’t even comprehend clinging to her body before disappearing. The moment Ellen blinked. Raelynn, originally standing right in front of her had completely vanished out of thin air.

Raymond exhaled deeply, staring in front of him with a focused expression. As if he was looking at something invisible that she couldn’t see.

"...is something supposed to happen now?"

"I’m making sure that Raelynn’s existence has been properly stored."

Clenching a fist, the same amber circles of magic formed around him again. Upon blinking her eyes again, she found Raelynn inshoping looking back at her with the same eyes.

Ellen had harbored slight thoughts she might be able to differentiate the two. But nope, Ellen literally couldn’t tell whether the individual in front of her was Raelynn or Raymond. It was to be expected, since the two of them were the same person. But still, Raymond had said their personalities would divulge more the longer she existed.

So the process was also instantaneous as well...a shame, she was kind of hoping to see what the actual transformation looked like.

"So...did it work?" she cautiously asked.

Raymond stuck a hand out, instantly forming a crystalline spear of ice in his(her?) hand.

"Hmm, other than the fact I’m constantly leaking more mana then expected. It’s a success."

He looked at the system briefly.

Skills:

[Possibility Simulacrum][Level:1/10]

-A spell created by Rayleigh Von Mez. Allows the user to save and transform into saved possibility clones, harnessing their strength for your own. Currently saved possiblities:2008 (Raeylnn)

Raymond hadn’t even gotten the chance to name the spell yet, and the system had already done it for him. Luckily the name was actually already pretty close in mind to what Raymond was planning to name it.

He tossed the spear away, just based on that alone he could already get a rough feel for how to control this new body. It was shorter and smaller then what he was used to after all, not just physically. Since the internal circulatory system was also different, that meant how he used mana was also slightly different. The perfect morph might have melded it into the perfect physique, but he still had to learn how to utilize it.

"In other words, you need to spend a decent amount of time in this body in order to adapt?"

Ellen stared at him with a strange expression. Lost in his excitement, Raymond didn’t even notice it at first.

"Yea, I’ll probably just hide in here. Can’t let anyone else know about this spell after all."

Raymond had developed this spell as an alternative to Borrow Future Strength. Combined with his current strength, and this spell. He would be practically invincible during the final exam. So hiding it was naturally the smart option.

He also didn’t want to cause any rumors and have people see him in this form.

"I see..."

She casually stood up, approaching Raymond who was busy trying to acclimate to the new body.

"Just to reiterate, you’re not planning on going outside while like this correct?"

"Yes?"

Step

Step

"It’s weird. My body feels a light lighter then u—Ellen?! What are you d-

...

"What the hell kind of format is this?"

"Funny. Looking at it like this almost makes it seem fair."

The two of them, Arthur and Lily. stared at the latest announcement by the academy. The new experimental final exam they were trialling for this years students, and only this year because they were the only year with this many students in the special class.

A team battle, consisting of five teams—four teams with an equal distribution of students from class D to class A to make it as even as possible. Not including the special class students. The first and last place, followed by the second and second last etc...split four ways.

As for the fifth team, it was naturally just the special class students.

Yes, a whole 9 people against four hundred. Technically it was 9v100v100v100v100, but for the special class students it wouldn’t have made a difference anyways.

And the reason for that was also simple.

They were just too good.

Arthur let out a groan.

As part of the compensation for this new trial format. The academy was even willing to give everyone free points and rewards for this. Now normally they would never be this generous, but there was a reason they were being like this.

Because this exam would also affect your ranks!

In order to climb the ranks in your year, you had to challenge the ones ranked above you. No other way around it, this was the system used by the academy since it started all the way until now. Any third person might think this made the exams practically useless since neither the theoretical or practical meant anything. But most awakened jobs, guilds especially—would take a clear look at your whole track record. So no slacking if you wanted a good job.

Arthur was just a regular guy after all, he didn’t have a Family to rely on like the others. He came from a non-awakened middle-upper income background that just so happened to luck out when it came to him. So stuff like exams were very important to him.

But it being able to affect the ranks was too far!

Arthur wasn’t ashamed to admit it, he might have been pretty talented in his own right. But compared to true geniuses, he was basically nothing.

At best, he might be elite cannon fodder.

So he really wasn’t that confident in being able to maintain his rank after this. He had to resort to a lot of bribery, late night training, and barely victories just to claw up here. Doing it again would be a massive hastle.

His battle skills weren’t actually that good after all. Evident by the countless spars he had with the others.

He asked, "How is this even fair?"

"Maybe that’s the whole point? Like the academy wants us to team up against the special class. Give them a real run for their money."

Arthur shrugged, "Maybe, but there’s not really an incentive to work together. Everyone knows they can’t beat them, they’d rather settle for second. The few aiming for first cant do much when they’re all split apart."

Ever since the announcement, the common consensus was that there was no chance at first. Might as well just fight each other for second place instead. Those aiming for first were too few too little, being in a group of a hundred also made it hard to coordinate things when everyone else was also your age and there wasn’t a significant strength gap.

"Then...what if you became that incentive?"

He paused. Turning to her with an incredulous look on his face.

"...what? I think its a pretty good idea!"

"How in the world am I supposed to convince 400 people to work together?"

"How would I know? But you’re the richest in terms of points aren’t you? You’re smart, come up with some idea, make it so that if they eliminate the special class there’s a bonus or something. Anything as long it gets us to temporarily work together in order to stop them."

"...but they’re my friends."

It wasn’t that the idea hadn’t been in his mind at all, but rather that he was a bit hesitant on whether or not to do it.

It would have been one thing if the special class students were mean or arrogant like Troy. But they were just about the exact opposite. Good people all around who were basically destined for greatness. Arthur felt kind of bad for using underhanded tactics like that. Plus they were his friends.

Now it was Lily’s turn to stare at him with an incredulous look.

"What? I have honour you know. Like Red Ghost said ’professionals have standards’."

"Honour doesn’t win exams for you."

Good point. Arthur had nothing to say for that.

In the end, he sighed. "...Ill try something out. If it doesn’t work then so be it. If it does work, then so be it as well."

He was already mentally prepping his apologies to the rest. While he wasn’t confident in his plan working. It did still have a pretty decent chance or working. As long as he pulled enough strings with the top dogs of each group, he figured the chances were at least 40%.

"...this is going to be so embarrassing if we lose."

She patted him on the shoulder, "As long as we did our best."