CHAPTER 64 - ACT 1 (1)

As time flowed, summer arrived in full.

The sun grew brighter and the weather warmed, and with those changes came the next step of the story.

“So it’s finally here,” Soren muttered as he looked at the notice posted on the board.

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[Official Notice]

All first-year students enrolled in Magic, Combat, and Divine Studies are hereby informed that the Practical Examination will be held on Monday at 9:00 AM.

Attendance is mandatory.

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The final exam of the first semester.

Not only would it be a huge turning point for the story, but given his previous conversation with Lilliana, it would also be a somewhat important deal for Soren, as his results could determine whether he is placed in class E or class D in the second semester.

‘It also gives me a chance to finally fix everything.’

If he played his cards right, then Soren would be able to completely step away from the story and no longer have to agonise over his every action after the practical exam was over.

Then, after the exam ended, there would be two months of summer break, in which Soren would be able to finally travel outside of Stellaris Academy and claim some more hidden pieces, thus enhancing his strength.

‘And I’ll finally get a return on some of my investments.’

As one of the major plot points in the game, the final exam marked the end of Act 1 in the main story.

This meant that the world would undergo drastic changes afterwards.

In ❰The Knight of Stellaris❱, these changes were shown in the form of new quests appearing and old quests disappearing, and most importantly for Soren, the stock market changing.

After gaining the money from gambling, Soren immediately invested the vast majority of that sum in the stock exchange using his game knowledge, which, in short, meant that after the final exam, Soren would be rich.

‘I can’t wait.’

There were many items and accessories that he wanted to buy, but he held off due to his limited savings.

‘That reminds me…’

Soren halted his steps that were aimed in the direction of the dormitory and instead redirected them towards the building in the centre of Stellaris Academy’s campus, the administrative building, where all professors' personal offices were located.

Typically, someone like Soren would have no purpose in coming to a building filled with such important figures, but there was something he still had yet to cash in on, and now was the perfect time to do so.

Knock knock

– Who is it?

“Soren Arden, first-year class F.”

– Give me a second.

After about a minute of waiting, the door swung open, and there stood a man who towered over Soren’s short frame.

The man before him was Serfort Karnstein, the dean of martial studies and the overseer of the entire martial studies major.

A man whose name was once feared far and wide, an ex-member of Fialova’s elite group, Trinity.

‘He’s fucking huge.’

Soren couldn’t help but let his mouth go agape as he took in the appearance of Serfort.

His neat uniform looked as if it were about to tear at any moment, as it contained the massive muscles beneath.

“What can I do for you today, Student Soren?”

“I was here to request my rewards from my duel against Ivan Olfram.”

“Oh, I see. Well, as you know, Student Ivan has already received due punishment for his actions against you in the duel, so I worry that I may not be of help to yourself.”

“That’s fine, but the reward was that the winner can make any demand of the loser. If that demand doesn’t require Ivan to be personally there, but instead mentions his belongings, would that be allowed?”

“If that was the exact wording of the reward, then I don’t see why not,” Serfort said with a slight nod.

“Then could I possibly receive the relic he was wearing during the duel?”

This was the reward that Soren had decided upon after taking a few days to think about it; he had, of course, worried that he might be turned down, given Ivan’s punishment, but luckily Serfort had been more than agreeable.

The dungeon relic that Soren had been eyeing was the one that had completely blocked his point-blank [Ignition] spell that he had fired from his mouth.

Any items that negated damage, even to a minor extent, were priceless to someone as frail as Soren.

“I will put a request for that in now. Is that all?”

“Yes, thank you very much,” Soren responded with a smile.

“It’s no bother at all. I heard that the first-year’s final exams are next week? I hope you do well, Student Soren. I apologise that you had to go through such a situation.”

‘He’s nicer than I thought.’

Although Soren had knowledge of the game and knew that Serfort was an amicable man, he had still worried up until now, given his appearance and background.

Soren responded to Serfort's kind words with polite words, then swiftly turned and left the administrative building now that he had completed everything he had to do.

‘Let’s have a nap, then I can practice some more blood magic later.’

After seeing the strength of blood magic in his duel against Ivan, Soren had long since decided to make the element his primary focus for the foreseeable future.

He opened his dormitory door, threw off his clothes and dove into his bed, his eyes quickly closing as his fatigue caught up with him.

* ••✦ ♡ ✦•••

Knock knock

“Mail for Soren Arden.” The maid said politely as Soren opened his dormitory door.

He then opened his hands to receive the two items that the maid had brought before thanking her and closing his door gently.

‘What’s this?’ He thought as he sat down at his desk, placing the two items before him.

The items he had been handed were a letter and a small box.

“Let’s start with the box, I guess?”

He pulled the box forward and lifted the lid to reveal a pair of earrings.

“Oh, these must’ve been Ivan’s.”

Given the lack of any note and the faint mana that could be felt emanating from the earrings, Soren could easily piece together that they were the dungeon relic he had requested from Serfort.

‘That was fast?’

He had only gone to Serfort’s office yesterday, and yet the accessory had not only been found but also given to Soren.

‘Not that I’m going to complain.’ He thought as he lifted the earrings from the box with a smile.

“They're pretty?”

He was somewhat surprised by how nice the jewellery looked; ordinarily, dungeon relics were often unattractive and gaudy in appearance, especially among lower-ranked items.

Yet, the earrings right in front of him looked so pleasing to the eye that he could’ve easily imagined walking into a top-tier jeweller's and spotting them.

“Should I just put them in or…?”

Soren stood up from his desk and walked over to his mirror, holding the earrings, then inspected his ears.

When he pulled on his earlobes to check if there were any signs of piercing, Soren couldn’t help but be slightly disappointed.

‘Seriously, why didn’t this guy do anything with his looks?’

It was fairly strange to him that the original Soren had never pierced his ears, given his attractive face, even more so given the fact that ear piercings were normal amongst nobles.

‘I’ll have to pierce them myself.’

He let out a sigh and created a tiny needle using [Hemokinesis] and held it up to his left earlobe and…

Stab!

The needle pierced through.

Soren didn’t immediately remove the needle, instead leaving it in place as he created another and turned his attention to his right ear before repeating the action.

Stab!

Once both ears had been pierced using the needles, Soren cast [Blood Absorption] on the needles, making them disappear, and then inserted the recently acquired accessories into the newly formed holes.

Click

“Phew… Done.”

Immediately after finishing his self-piercing, Soren let out a deep sigh as the tension in his body dissipated.

He had expected to be in a decent amount of pain afterwards, but fortunately, his [Pain Tolerance] skill had been raised enough so that minor wounds such as piercings hardly hurt, instead leaving a faint tingly feeling.

Soren stepped closer to the mirror and inspected his work.

There, dangling from both of his ears, were silver earrings with a blood-coloured gem in a teardrop shape.

“Perfect.”

He was over the moon that they matched his looks well; if Ivan’s dungeon relic had instead been some gaudy hoop earrings or something along those lines, Soren likely would have cried.

“Let’s see what they do. 「Information」”

As he said those words, a translucent window appeared before his eyes.

“Thank god.”

Soren was happy that the items had already been appraised, meaning that he did not need to waste time going all the way to Hammond’s place.

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[Bloodrop.] [7★]

[Skill: Null]

[Absorb the impact of a single attack.]

[Cooldown: 14 days.]

.

“Holy shit…” Soren clasped his hand over his mouth as he read through the information. “That’s OP.”

The reward he had almost died to obtain, a 7★ item that let him completely negate a single attack once every two weeks.

‘7★ already is insane.’

For comparison, [Lunaris’s Liquified Mana] had been 7★, and that was a hidden piece.

The highest rarity was 10★, and the accessory he had luckily stumbled upon by complete chance was only three levels below that.

Then there was the ability itself.

Considering the duel, it was likely that the wielder had to be aware and activate the item itself, but even then, it was overwhelmingly powerful.

‘Now I finally have a safety net.’

There were so many battles that Soren had faced, in which he would have the entire situation turned around on him from a single unfortunate wound, but now he had the ability to stop that.

The only problem was that during their duel, Ivan had used the relic, meaning that the cooldown was still active.

[Cooldown: 05:02:36:48]

In other words, there were still five days left until the relic would be usable again, and only four days remained until the final exam.

It was a shame, but Soren didn’t feel disappointed.

After all, he had still obtained a fantastic relic for his point in the story.

His freshly-pierced ears were still lightly dripping blood, but he could ignore it for the most part by casting [Blood Absorption] and [Clean] occasionally.

“That just leaves the letter, then.” He said as he turned back towards his desk.

Soren sat back down in his chair and carefully picked up the letter, inspecting it, only to narrow his eyes at his discovery.

“Shit.”

Stamped on the back of the letter was the seal of the Arden family.

————「❤︎」————