Lanci stood in the exam waiting area of the Sage Academy's courtyard, his mind still preoccupied with the sweet treats of the Holy Country.
"They say that the food in the Shadow World tastes as real as in the actual world, but the ones in the Artificial Shadow World are merely illusions. The dessert I spent half the day baking had no taste..."
In the midst of his musing, information about other exam-takers' clearance times drifted into his ears.
It turns out that most successful candidates needed about forty to fifty minutes to barely meet the clearance requirements.
It seems their consciousness of law isn't strong enough.
Just as Lanci was lost in thought.
"How long did it take you?"
A light voice sounded not far from Lanci.
Lanci turned his head and found a tall girl of his age looking at him.
Her eyes were amber-colored, cold, and proud, as if she could look down on the whole world just by a glance.
Considering her obviously valuable attire and jewelry, she was probably a noble of a prominent family in this kingdom.
It seemed that she had noticed another particularly relaxed candidate around her.
Such a person who didn't seem to care about the exam results was rare in the entire examination room.
"..."
Lanci remained silent, estimating in his heart.
In fact, the whole process took him about ten minutes.
"Less than fifty minutes."
Lanci answered amiably.
He sensed that this young lady, who seemed remarkable at first sight, must be a troublemaker with high spirits.
So, if his clearance speed were actually faster than hers and he said it in front of her, she would surely be upset.
So, it would be safer to say less than fifty minutes.
This is known as wisdom of life.
"I see."
Immediately, the young lady nodded expressionlessly and then no longer paid attention to Lanci.
So, he was just a person who didn't care about his grades after all.
Hyperion thought to herself.
She had been misguided by his excessively composed temperament before.
Then he probably wouldn't become her teammate in the third round of the examination.
As the daughter of the Duke Alansar, Hyperion had long been aware of the examination mechanism for the third round of the Sage Academy this year—
Students of different functions would team up with teachers for combat.
Under this kind of test question.
A team would usually be assigned a support mage or a healing mage.
And sometimes, depending on the ratio of candidates, it might consist entirely of damage mages.
A good healer/supporter can reduce the difficulty of the entire team's third-round assessment, while a poor one can greatly increase the pressure on other team members.
According to the grouping rules, the results of the second round of the examination would be referenced this year.
That is, candidates who ranked high in the Sage Academy would most likely become teammates, and then compete against stronger teachers.
Hyperion, who was bound to top the list in the second round, as a damage mage, naturally did not want to end up with a mediocre healer or supporter during the high-stakes third-round challenge.
Besides, there were people in the kingdom who did not want her to be admitted to the school smoothly.
Being with her, the difficulty of the practical examination would undoubtedly become very exaggerated.
Only by getting a good supporter, the probability of passing could increase somewhat.
Of course.
Those who didn't want her to be admitted, being the wielders of great powers, would also try their best to manipulate their cronies in the academy to arrange the worst for her, or even actor students, within the eligible teammates.
Just thinking about these things stirred up an uncontrollable ripple of killing intent in Hyperion's heart.
"Give me a few more years... I will settle scores with all of you... tear you to pieces..."
She thought viciously to herself from the core.
Her expression, however, remained as calm as ever.
...
While the examination room was gradually growing noisy from waiting.
A cool young man with grey messy hair leaned against a wall at the edge of the courtyard, his arms folded. He was now wearing a pair of small round sunglasses, looking both lazy and somewhat arrogant.
He could clearly hear the conversation content of the other candidates.
Most of them were discussing the details of the second-round examination and the time they spent.
Finally.
He closed his eyes in disdain and contempt.
He didn't understand.
Why did these people calculate their clearance time...
by "minute"?
Frey furrowed his brows slightly, contemplating the problem.
Clearly, the focus of the exam was the examinees' ability to think about loans and borrowing.
Borrowing money against one's assets could simply achieve the target, why would it take that long?
...
The main examiner of this exam was Dean Loren of the Sage Academy, who was waiting for the terminal to tally the final score for the second round of the evaluation.
Listening to the students' discussion, he knew full well that few of those who were proud of their thirty-minute completion time were about to question their life choices.
Originally.
Such a result could be considered very excellent.
As an observer who had watched the students' examination status on the Magic Fluorescent Screen, Loren had a rough idea of the completion speed that each student would achieve.
Among all the examinees from the Knight College and the Sage Academy, apart from two individuals, even the quickest of the rest had taken 25 minutes and 3 seconds.
Meanwhile, Lanci had managed to accomplish his mission at the 9 minute 53 second mark.
While the other examinees were still trying to gather information, he had already arrested the entire target family.
Frey on the other hand, took only 7 seconds.
He had solved all problems right at the start.
In this relatively simple Artificial Shadow World, completion time was the most significant factor in scoring.
Frey had surely achieved an extremely extraordinary basic score in terms of speed.
However, since he had virtually no decryption process in this decryption-type Shadow World, he was unlikely to receive any additional scores.
As for Lanci's score, even Loren had no idea how the final tally would be calculated by the terminal.
If they were able to successfully complete the second and third round of evaluations, their scores in these two rounds would be aggregated into the overall balance, which would be counted as the final score.
The ranking by the overall score of the entrance exam would affect subsequent class assignments, priority for official challenger exemption recommendations, representation of first-year students at inter-academy exchange events, and so on in the respective academies.
The Artificial Shadow World terminal was about to operate as usual and calculate the students' scores.
Just as it began to process a particular node.
The mithril and demon crystal on the Artificial Shadow World's terminal suddenly sparked with an electrical arc, followed by exploding cocoons of electricity around it!
Along with the sudden freezing of the screen connected to the terminal, all images and pointers stopped moving.
The next instant, the constant appearance of chaotic pixels made the screen repeat and blur.
This commotion clearly captured the attention of all the examinees, causing a flurry of noise to erupt in the seventh floor examination hall.
Loren furrowed his brow deeply and without hesitation, he forcefully shut down the terminal with a grave expression.
Although doing so could potentially damage this valuable piece of magic equipment, he had to prioritize the safety of all students and staffers present.
Simultaneously, the chaotic sparks on the terminal also vanished.
At this, quite a few of the students heaved a sigh of relief, a sense of lingering fear still gripping them.
However.
When Loren attempted to restart the terminal using the secret key.
He found that the terminal remained immobile.
It seemed that it had been damaged by the unexpected glitch earlier.
"....No."
Loren shook his head in agony and pinched the bridge of his nose.
He was already exhausted from the day's exam, and the last thing he wanted was to get an earful from Professor Bolao of the Magic Engineering College.
Even without having to call in the expert, Professor Bolao, from the Magic Engineering College to conduct repairs, Loren had some vague idea of what had gone wrong.
Regardless, the Artificial Shadow World is not a divine creation like the real Shadow World.
For settlements in the artificially replicated Shadow World, preset and pre-inputted algorithm models are the only method of evaluation.
Frey's unconventional method, although a little strange, was straightforward and blunt.
Even if there were a few absent parameters, it would still be possible to calculate his score.
However, the replicators had not considered the possibility of someone like Lanci completely overthrowing the algorithm model with their completion method.
This fellow had instead introduced a slew of anomalous inputs!
Hence, the terminal glitched out and froze.
From a completion speed perspective, it should have been Frey from the Knight College ranking first in this round, followed closely by Lanci from the Sage Academy.
But due to Lanci's incredibly odd method, the specific scores of all the students could not be calculated in the end!
Every time Loren thought about having to deal with the urgent repair work with the Magic Engineering College, he could feel an intense headache come on.
Eventually.
Loren let out a deep sigh, and ignoring Lanci entirely, he looked towards the gathered examinees and said:
"We will manually evaluate the scores for the second round according to the exam records. Moreover, the third round, the practical evaluation, will be held the day after tomorrow. All examinees will receive the detailed exam schedule before the end of the day."
Out of sight, out of mind.
All this was the Lady Goddess testing him. Dean Loren absolutely must not lose his temper so easily...
After announcing the important news.
Dean Loren sent off all the examinees in the courtyard as if he were saying goodbye to a guest.