Chapter 354: Teaching the First Years (ii) [Bonus Chapter GT]

Solomon realized very quickly that the vast majority of the noble students were not going to pay attention to a single thing he said, regardless of what he taught or how flawlessly he demonstrated the forms. It was no longer a matter of winning the mission bounty as he clearly wasn’t going to win the popular vote if the class actively ignored him.

He leaned against the instructor’s desk, genuinely wondering why the class paid so much rapt attention to Marco, Kira, and Jax, but completely tuned him out.

’It cannot just be a matter of noble status,’ Solomon thought to himself, studying the crowd. ’Only Marco is a noble among their squad. Kira and Jax are commoners just like me. Why are they listening to them?’

He briefly considered just dropping the mission entirely. Taking the five-thousand-point penalty might honestly be the best choice for his own mental peace rather than dealing with a room full of arrogant, disinterested teenagers for an entire week.

Jax finally finished his defensive demonstration and stepped back. It was Solomon’s turn again.

Solomon picked up the wooden practice sword and stepped up to the podium. "Does anyone have any questions regarding the basic forms I demonstrated earlier?"

The very small handful of students who had actually been paying attention raised their hands. Solomon patiently called on them, answering their questions clearly and resolving their doubts regarding wrist alignment and footwork.

Elizabeth raised her hand from the front row. "Is it possible to mix multiple different sword styles into a single combat flow? For example, can the sweeping mechanics of a greatsword style be effectively applied to a rapier?"

"You can definitely mix certain foundational elements, but you have to be incredibly careful about the physics involved," Solomon answered, shifting into a teaching stance. "A greatsword relies heavily on centrifugal force and wide, sweeping momentum because of the sheer weight of the blade."

"A rapier relies almost entirely on linear thrusts and pinpoint precision. If you try to execute a sweeping greatsword cut using a light rapier, the blade lacks the necessary mass to carry the force through the target. The strike will simply bounce off armor or snap the thin sword entirely."

He swung the wooden sword in a slow, controlled thrust to demonstrate. "Copying specific footwork forms or evasive steps across different weapons is perfectly fine. But trying to directly copy the striking styles and heavy stances will completely mess up your foundation. Your body weight distribution and your center of gravity must always match the specific weapon you are currently holding."

Another student near the middle rows raised his hand. "How are you so incredibly strong?"

Solomon paused. He honestly didn’t know how to answer that question without detailing his fifteen years of agonizing mental torture inside the Paladin’s void, or explaining the biological mechanics of the immortal angel heart beating in his chest.

He simply didn’t know what the ’correct’ or ’safe’ answer was for a public classroom.

Before Solomon could formulate a vague response, a haughty noble boy sitting a few seats down from the questioner scoffed loudly.

"It is obviously just because of his SSS-rank talent," the noble boy sneered, crossing his arms. "He just got incredibly lucky with his awakening. If he had been born with a lower-ranked talent like the rest of us, he wouldn’t even be standing on that stage right now. The limit and true potential of a person is determined by their talent rank. His strength is just pure, unearned luck and absolutely nothing else."

Several other noble students immediately chimed in, nodding in agreement and echoing the exact same elitist sentiment.

Solomon stared at the whispering crowd. He wanted to counter the argument, to explain the brutal reality of his training, but he ultimately decided he had no need to. He didn’t even feel provoked.

’Maybe what they are saying is technically the truth in their eyes,’ Solomon reasoned inwardly. ’Talent rank does dictate a person’s baseline potential. But it absolutely does not determine everything.’

Solomon didn’t even know how his Convergence talent worked until very recently, yet he was plenty strong long before he swallowed the Eden crown. He had mastered the Eden Imperial Sword Arts through pure physical repetition before he ever learned to use his aura. And even when he finally activated the talent, the Eden bloodline’s ’Indefatigable’ ability wasn’t some instantaneous, world-ending magic.

It was just a passive stamina converter that required him to endure physical pain and exhaustion to function.

Just then, Maximus Thunderstrike stood up from his seat in the second row. The towering Vanguard student turned around, grabbed the arrogant noble boy by the collar, and delivered an open-handed slap directly across the boy’s face.

The slap was so incredibly loud it echoed like a gunshot. The entire amphitheater plunged into dead silence.

The slap was so crisp, so perfectly executed, that Solomon actually felt a desire to hear it again.

The proxy professor immediately rushed down from the back of the hall. "What is happening down here?! Why did you just strike another student?!"

Maximus released the boy’s collar and stood at attention. "I am trying to study and learn the sword mechanics, Professor. But this student just keeps blabbering nonsense and deliberately disturbing the class."

"If you are being disturbed by another student, you are supposed to raise your hand and let the professor know!" the proxy professor shouted, visibly furious at the breach of protocol. "You cannot take disciplinary matters into your own hands!"

"Everyone in this classroom was aware of the noise, the whispers, and the blatant disrespect," Maximus replied calmly, his deep voice echoing in the silent hall. "Yet no one, including you, did a single thing to stop it. Which logically meant his behavior did not bother anyone else in this room except for me. That is why I took it upon myself to solve the problem directly."

The proxy professor turned a brilliant shade of red. "That is a blatant violation of academy conduct! I am deducting one thousand points from your account immediately! Sit down and behave yourself!"

Maximus offered a rigid salute and sat back down, completely unbothered by the point deduction.

Solomon tapped his wooden sword against the podium to draw the class’s attention back to the front.

"I have decided that everyone in this room is right," Solomon announced, his voice carrying a cutting edge. "The specific talent rank you are blessed with at birth entirely dictates your ultimate potential."

He lowered the wooden sword and offered a devious, mocking smile to the noble crowd. "Which is exactly why, from this moment forward, I will exclusively only be teaching the students in this room who possess an A-rank or S-rank talent. Since lower-ranked talent students are inherently useless and possess absolutely zero potential for growth, it will just be a waste of my valuable time to teach them. They are inevitably going to be stuck at the absolute bottom of the food chain as dungeon feeders and corporate bootlickers anyway, so there is no point in trying to improve their garbage foundations."

Sitting in the front row, Elizabeth couldn’t hide the triumphant grin spreading across her lips.

She had been furious when the arrogant nobles deliberately ignored Solomon’s flawless demonstration and dismissed his hard-earned achievements as pure ’luck’. But she hadn’t stepped in to defend him, because she knew well that Solomon didn’t need anyone to back him up.

For however long she had known the silver-haired boy, she was well aware that he would never, ever let someone slide without taking brutal revenge on them, no matter how petty the slight was.

And now, his revenge had begun. This time, it wasn’t about physical violence... for now.

It was about systematically disciplining a room full of bratty, entitled nobles by throwing their own elitist logic right back in their faces.