Chapter 97: Through the Teachers’ Eyes III ( Magic Castle Bonus )

For the first several hours of the examination, the leaders had been isolated from one another. They had been forced to make decisions using only the people, resources, and information available within their own regions.

That was over.

For the first time, all five could speak directly.

The Mirage Hermit remained exactly where he had been standing, his expression showing considerably more interest than the professors knew he actually possessed.

Theoran rested both hands on his cane.

"This should be revealing."

Darius grinned.

"Finally, something we agree on."

The Hermit glanced toward him.

"I didn’t say anything."

"You were thinking it."

"An unfortunate side effect of spending too much time around children."

Professor Selene ignored them.

The first communication had already begun.

Elizabeth spoke first.

Of course she did.

"Before everyone speaks at once, we should establish locations, resources, casualties, and route conditions."

Darius laughed quietly.

"She lasted approximately three seconds before taking control."

"Organizing," Theoran corrected.

"She would call it organizing."

"So would anyone being accurate."

On the projection, James frowned.

"You’re not in charge of this conversation."

Elizabeth smiled.

"Excellent. Then begin."

Darius stared at the screen.

Then laughed louder.

"I almost feel sorry for him."

"You shouldn’t," Theoran said. "He’s engaged to her. He volunteered for a lifetime of this."

"His parents volunteered."

"An important distinction."

Selene shook her head.

"Focus."

The leaders began reporting.

James first.

Class Two had thirty-five students remaining.

Three eliminated.

Weapons.

Armor.

Shields.

Limited ranged ammunition.

The Hermit watched James’s expression rather than listening to the inventory.

There was no pride when he reported the eliminations.

That was useful.

Then Sophie.

Thirty-six remaining.

One eliminated.

Maps.

Route information.

Food.

And the repaired eastern bridge.

Alash raised his hand.

Physically, several kilometers away from Sophie.

Penelope Declair, walking beside him, looked at the raised hand with visible confusion.

Darius noticed.

"Can she not see the network?"

"No," the Hermit said.

"She can’t hear it either?"

"No."

Darius’s smile slowly widened.

On-screen, Alash asked Sophie whether she had repaired the bridge.

When she confirmed it, he said:

"Thank you."

Penelope immediately looked at him.

"Who are you thanking?"

Darius laughed.

Selene covered her mouth.

Even Theoran’s expression shifted.

The Hermit remained impassive.

"He looks insane."

"Only to her," Selene said.

"That doesn’t make it better."

Alash held up one finger toward Penelope as though promising an explanation later, then returned his attention to the invisible conversation.

Daphne reported next.

Thirty-five remaining.

Two eliminations during the temple collapse.

Mana crystals.

When James asked how many, Daphne answered:

"Enough."

Darius nodded appreciatively.

"I like that answer."

"You would," Selene said.

Elizabeth eventually forced an approximation out of her.

Then everyone looked toward Class Five.

Alash answered:

"Alive."

Darius closed his eyes.

On-screen, Elizabeth displayed considerably more patience.

"Your class."

Alash finally reported thirty-seven.

The faculty section became noticeably quieter.

Darius’s eyes narrowed.

"Still all of them."

"Yes," Selene said.

They had already watched the attack on Class Five.

They had watched Alash spread several golden barriers across the road while the five-meter creature repeatedly struck them.

They had watched thirty-six students evacuate patients behind him.

They had watched him continue holding until the final stretcher cleared.

Not one Class Five student had been eliminated.

Daphne asked the obvious question.

"How?"

Alash considered it for perhaps a second.

"Barrier."

Darius stared at him.

"That’s his explanation?"

"Apparently."

"He maintained several barriers against an entire attack while evacuating more than a hundred wounded people."

"Yes."

"And his explanation is ’Barrier.’"

The Hermit spoke without looking away from the screen.

"What explanation would you prefer?"

"Something proportional to what happened."

"Why?"

Darius opened his mouth.

Then stopped.

Theoran smiled faintly.

"You keep walking into those."

"I know."

Elizabeth asked whether Alash had protected the entire class.

"And the wounded," he replied.

This time, several Healing professors exchanged glances.

Selene watched Alash more carefully.

"He doesn’t realize how abnormal that sounds."

Theoran shook his head.

"I think he realizes."

"Then why say it like that?"

"Because to him, the important part is that nobody was eliminated. The difficulty of accomplishing it is secondary."

The Hermit’s pale eyes shifted toward Theoran for a moment.

Then back to the screen.

"Better."

Darius glanced over.

"You’re complimenting him?"

"No."

"You keep saying that."

The conversation continued.

When Elizabeth asked what Class Five possessed, Alash answered:

"Wounded people."

Daphne immediately frowned.

"Those aren’t resources."

Alash almost replied, then stopped.

Penelope couldn’t hear Daphne.

Instead, he simply said:

"They’re what we have."

Daphne considered it.

"Fair."

Selene smiled faintly.

"They’re adapting to each other quickly."

"They’ve exchanged approximately twenty sentences," Darius said.

"Which is apparently enough for Vortex and Spinster."

Elizabeth asked for the current patient count.

Alash turned toward Penelope.

"How many?"

Penelope, still completely unaware of the four people apparently speaking inside her fiancé’s head, informed him that one hundred and twenty-two patients still required assistance.

Alash repeated the number.

James stared.

"You brought one hundred and twenty-two wounded people?"

"Yes."

"All of them?"

"Most."

"Why?"

Alash’s answer was immediate.

"They were there."

Darius stared at the screen.

"That is not an explanation."

"It is to him," Selene said.

"That’s becoming a problem."

Theoran remained focused on Elizabeth.

The princess had gone quiet.

Earlier in the examination, Elizabeth herself had faced a similar question when deciding what to do with civilians whose usefulness she could quantify far more easily than their worth.

Now she asked the question Alash’s slower group would eventually force them all to confront.

"You could leave them."

Alash’s expression changed.

"If we leave them now, they probably die."

"They’re constructs."

"Probably."

Elizabeth became silent.

Theoran noticed the exact instant her reasoning shifted.

She understood the word.

Probably.

Not certainty.

An assumption.

The same type of assumption she had made when deciding a child had nothing useful to contribute before hearing what he knew.

Then she nodded.

"Agreed."

Darius looked toward the Hermit.

"Was that what you wanted?"

"No."

"You keep saying that."

"Because you keep asking the wrong question."

"What was the right question?"

The Hermit gestured toward Elizabeth and Alash.

"She challenged his decision. He defended it. She changed her position when his reasoning survived the challenge."

Theoran nodded.

"Neither needed to win the conversation."

"Exactly."

On-screen, James asked whether they were apparently bringing civilians now.

Elizabeth answered that Class One had approximately eighty of its own.

Alash blinked.

"You too?"

Sophie laughed.

Daphne closed her eyes.

"Wonderful. Two classes have adopted the kingdom."

"Temporary adoption," Alash replied.

Penelope immediately turned toward him.

"Who did you adopt?"

Darius laughed again.

"Declair may be the person suffering most in this examination."

Selene smiled.

"She’ll survive."

"Unconfirmed," Darius said, mimicking Alash.

The resources came next.

Transportation and food.

Weapons.

Information.

Mana.

Medicine.

For the first time, the five leaders could see the design behind their starting regions.

The Hermit had not given any class a complete solution.

He had given each one a piece of a larger solution.

Alash said it first.

"The Hermit deliberately separated necessary resources."

Elizabeth immediately followed.

"So no class possesses everything required for the final stage."

"Assumption," Daphne corrected.

Elizabeth looked toward her.

"Strong inference."

"Better."

Theoran looked at the Hermit.

"You seem pleased."

"I seem nothing."

"You designed precisely this realization."

"Yes."

"Then you’re pleased."

"Those statements are unrelated."

Darius muttered, "This is why nobody invites him anywhere."

"I hear you."

"Good."

Sophie projected the route map and identified the likely convergence point.

Classes Two and Three would meet first.

Class One would approach from the northwest.

Class Four from the south.

Class Five from the east.

Alash would arrive last because of the wounded.

Elizabeth began reorganizing resources before anyone physically met.

Gravity support from Class Four.

Class Two escorting the more vulnerable groups.

Class Three controlling scouting and navigation.

Class Five handling medical support.

The professors watched the plan assemble with surprising speed.

Darius’s expression gradually became more serious.

"Yesterday they barely knew each other."

"Some of them studied one another beforehand," Theoran said.

"That isn’t the same as working together."

"No."

The Hermit finally spoke.

"Which is why this matters."

Elizabeth moved next to post-convergence resource distribution.

Weapons wherever needed.

Medical supplies redistributed.

Mana crystals assigned to high-consumption roles.

Daphne immediately limited the crystals.

Elizabeth smiled.

Daphne accused her of already planning to ask for more.

James asked Sophie if Elizabeth and Daphne always behaved like this.

Sophie reminded him that they had known each other for less than a day.

Darius rubbed his forehead.

"They sound like they’ve been arguing for years."

"Some people are efficient," the Hermit said.

Then Elizabeth asked for objections.

Alash raised one hand.

"I would like a nap."

For several seconds, the faculty remained quiet.

Then Darius spoke.

"He asked for a nap."

Selene nodded slowly.

"He did."

"In the middle of the first strategic meeting between all five class leaders."

"Yes."

"After discovering that Class Five is the slowest group, is carrying one hundred and twenty-two wounded people, and will probably require support from every other class."

"Also yes."

Darius looked toward Theoran.

"And this is the boy you made a class leader."

Theoran kept his eyes on Alash’s screen.

"I am beginning to regret how often you ask that question."

On the projection, Penelope was still staring at Alash as though she had personally been betrayed by the request.

James looked somewhere between confused and offended.

Sophie was laughing.

Daphne had closed her eyes.

Elizabeth, somehow, had simply answered:

"No."

Alash sighed.

"Then no objections."

The connection ended.

Darius pointed at the now-empty communication display.

"He accepted that remarkably easily."

Theoran’s eyebrow rose.

"What were you expecting?"

"Negotiation."

"He negotiated seven minutes of rest earlier today," Selene said. "Perhaps he knows when the market is unfavorable."

Darius stared at her.

"You’ve started analyzing his sleep habits."

"I’ve been watching him for several hours. They are difficult to avoid."

The Mirage Hermit remained silent.

That made Darius suspicious.

He looked toward him.

"You aren’t bothered."

"No."

"Why?"

The Hermit finally shifted his attention away from the screens.

"Because he waited until the work was finished."

Darius frowned.

Selene looked back toward Alash’s projection.

The Hermit continued.

"He did not ask for rest while locations were unknown. He did not ask while resources were being identified. He did not ask while they were deciding how to move the civilians or where the classes would converge."

His pale eyes returned to Alash.

"He waited until every relevant decision had been made, then asked whether anything else required him."

Darius paused.

When phrased that way...

Theoran smiled faintly.

"You were expecting laziness."

"It was laziness."

"Those are not mutually exclusive."

Selene’s mouth curved.

"Efficient laziness."

Darius groaned.

"Do not encourage that phrase."

The Hermit ignored him.

"Vortex’s problem has never been that he refuses to act."

Theoran glanced toward him.

"No?"

"He refuses unnecessary action."

Darius crossed his arms.

"That sounds suspiciously generous."

"It isn’t."

The Hermit’s expression remained unreadable.

"If he decides something does not require him, he disengages almost immediately. That can become negligence just as easily as efficiency."

On the screen, Alash was already walking again while Penelope questioned the strange collection of words she had heard him speaking to apparently empty air.

The boy looked exhausted.

Still moving.

Still checking patients.

Still carrying no visible interest in behaving like a leader.

Selene watched him for several seconds.

"And yet when something does require him..."

"He acts," Theoran finished.

The Hermit nodded once.

"Usually while complaining."

Darius looked back toward the screen.

"So asking for a nap wasn’t failure."

"No."

"Growth?"

The Hermit considered that.

"Neither."

Darius sighed.

"Naturally."

"It was simply honest."

That made him pause.

The Hermit gestured toward the other leaders.

"Elizabeth would continue planning after the plan was already sufficient."

The princess was, in fact, still reviewing the projected route even though the communication had ended.

"James would search for something else to fight."

James was currently checking the edge on his sword.

"Sophie would wonder whether anyone still had concerns."

Sophie had already turned toward one of her classmates.

"Daphne would find something she could carry herself."

Daphne was inspecting the crystal carts.

Then the Hermit pointed toward Alash.

"He asked if he could sleep."

Darius stared at all five screens.

Then reluctantly nodded.

"I hate that this makes sense."

Theoran smiled.

"That’s four."

Darius turned.

"Four what?"

"Times you’ve admitted the students taught you something."

"I absolutely did not say that."

Selene laughed.

***

The first communication did not immediately bring the classes together.

There was still distance between them.

And the Hermit had no intention of allowing that distance to remain uneventful.

Classes Two and Three met first.

Darius watched James’s group reach Sophie’s position and almost immediately encounter another monster migration.

James’s first instinct was obvious.

Attack the center.

Personally.

Then he stopped.

"Six with me in the center."

Tristan Rhael smiled.

James threatened him without needing words.

Darius laughed.

"Progress."

James fought with other students rather than in front of them.

Sophie supplied scouting information.

Class Three restricted movement with Ice.

Class Two handled the front.

Lightning struck grouped targets.

Not one student was eliminated.

Darius looked toward the Hermit.

"Fine."

The Hermit glanced at him.

"Three."

"Stop counting."

Elsewhere, Classes One and Four met on the southern road.

That interaction involved significantly fewer monsters.

And considerably more negotiation.

Elizabeth wanted mana.

Daphne wanted wagons.

Neither wanted to admit precisely how much they needed the other.

By the end, Daphne had acquired three wagons, food support, basic medical supplies, and first selection from future recovered equipment.

Elizabeth acquired thirteen percent of Class Four’s current mana supply when necessary, along with emergency Gravity support.

Darius stared.

"Who won?"

Theoran looked offended by the question.

"That is not how mutually beneficial negotiation works."

"So Elizabeth."

"Nobody."

"Elizabeth."

Selene laughed.

The Hermit ignored them.

More important than the bargain was what happened afterward.

A wagon broke.

Daphne nearly used Gravity.

Then stopped when Nadia, Lucan, a Metal mage, and a carpenter solved the problem without her.

The Hermit noticed.

So did Theoran.

Neither commented.

They didn’t need to.