It had now been one week of studying in the academy. Despite this still being the starting phase, Marilyn was not prepared for how to actually take in all of the learning and homework she had to do. In fact, this might have been harder than a normal college.
It was somewhat obvious that this would be the case, because the Royal Academy was a school of prodigies, and for one to challenge said prodigies they had to make a tough school curriculum too. And Marilyn was an average girl among prodigies, her only quality for this school being that she was always been passionate about wanting to learn since she was little.
In addition, external pressure may build up on her if she were to fail. Most of everyone in her class knew of her relation to one of the top students of this school, Helena Althorn. And if she were to not succeed in meeting their expectations, even if it would only happen in the long term, people might start to suspect her of being a fraud or someone that was involved in nepotism.
Despite all of the classes still in its introduction phase, the task they've given them and the conditions of said classes could only be described as such. Difficult and pressuring, especially with the deadline being next week, and especially with this one task of her writing a five thousand word essay on how her particular system of magic works.
“I should probably try and take my mind off of this for now…I don't want to stress myself out.” Said Marilyn, as she was currently walking down the hallway of the female’s dormitory section.
Cecilia was probably away as of now, so if she were to actually go to the dorm room, she would be alone. But despite her words of not wanting to be stressed out, she figured that out of all the possibilities, her working on this now would lead to long term benefits in the future.
Meaning, she would have to visit the library. At least that would be an interesting premise regardless of homework, she did indeed love reading, and she would want to expand her view on magic too.
"Well at least I get to learn more and try to grow faster in levels through it." She said.
Speaking of, the levelling mechanic of the tome system did have a slight flaw, favouring vertical growth over horizontal growth.
In essence, it tracked the max potency of a person, such as the maximum offensive power they could output at once, what level of strongest attack they could defend against, as well as how much Essence Energy they could muster at once. It did not calculate the full scope and range of abilities that a person would have.
Therefore, most people thought that they have to be increasing that max potency instead of expanding their world view.
"I wonder why that kind of mechanic exists though..." She said to herself again, as she thought of this topic in her head.
It worked well for in the case of people that focus on martial might which had a more linear progression, or treated magic as a secondary thing to their primary methodology. But for generalist mages like her that have a lot of spells that didn't exactly add to the levels that much…it was quite flawed.
It might be an intentional flaw, so as to make students realise that maximum potency was not everything. In fact, they did emphasise this during the recent combat class. But if the students were barely even adults and still have a teenage self-centred mind…would that really change much?
She would try to challenge that mindset of teenagers. Her mind was essentially that of an adult already, so she understood the value of knowledge more than anyone here. She would be focusing on growing the wider path instead of the taller one.
That's probably why it was introduced in the first place, to track the students that believe in raw power instead of skill and know-how and set them on a more correct path. That would be the more positive scenario though, worst case it might be because the academy was stupid. But for a school of this level of prestige, she couldn't believe the latter.
Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
Marilyn would be continuing her walk around the hallway of the dormitory building of the school as she thought of this. But, her eyes did meet up with a peculiar sight.
She had just recently left the female section of the dormitory, and was about to head down the staircase leading outside. However, she met a familiar face alongside that.
“Oh hey! You're heading downstairs too?” Black hair and deep blue eyes, a naturally nice expression all throughout, the apex of the soft common man and the middle ground between overly masculine and feminine for men in general.
“Adrian!” And she was happy to meet him. “And yeah, I am.”
The two paired up with each other as they met face to face, and with a smile as they headed downstairs Adrian began to speak.
“So, how's the academy been treating you?”
“It's uhh…not going well, but not doing bad either? It's unexpectedly hard at least.” She responded, causing him to laugh a bit.
“Yeah, it's a bit shocking to me too.” He said, “Since we’re studying in similar classes here, you got the five thousand word essay work, right?”
“Huh?” She blanked out for a moment, they did actually share classes due to their similar focuses now that she was actually reminded of it. “Oh yeah! Don't know why they would want that though, it's unnecessarily hectic you know what I mean?”
“Ehh, I understand you there. I don't exactly know why either, might be because they wanted to test how well we understood our skills?”
Marilyn thought about it for a little. “Could be, that answer makes the most sense to me.”
The two eventually reached outside as they conversed, heading to the streets of the academy, seeing the sight of students and academy staff as they passed by. The two briefly stopped because of it, just thinking about what to do here since they have free time.
And seeing this opportunity to learn more about him, she would ask, “Adrian, I have a question to ask you, do you mind?”
“Nope, ask away.”
“Why haven't I seen Elysia in the female dorm section? I mean we do see her in class, but did something happen to her?”
Adrian was mildly surprised by that question, but he just chuckled. He soon turned around and passed by her, opting for Marilyn to follow suit.
“We live together, that's why.” He said to her, a bit nonchalant.
“WHAT!?”
She was genuinely shocked by that, to the point that they stopped mid-stroll. They even got looks from several people passing by.
It was basically the academy policy for male and female dorms to be split up, but somehow Adrian and Elysia could live together in the same room?
“Right…it’s an oddity huh?”
“O-of course it is!” A small blush appeared on her face, imagining what kind of shenanigans the two had been doing for the past week.
Adrian was a nice and gentle man from what she could see, so she was really more worried about what Elysia could do to him with her reckless and overly friendly demeanour. It even caused Adrian to chuckle a little.
“Don't worry, she has done nothing to me, she's actually quite calm in private situations. We're basically just friendly roommates, nothing more.” He explained to her.
However, she was still sceptical of this, “B-but still…!”
“Yes, I know it's academy policy and all, but it's either me wasting a two person dorm by living alone, Elysia not getting a dorm because the female section is already full, or neither of us getting a dorm we already applied for because there are no single rooms left either. You know what I mean by this?”
Marilyn still held a degree of frustration and second-hand embarrassment from this, but she did eventually understand the situation here. The entrance exam of the academy was also meant to pair people up with each other in order to assign their dorm rooms together.
The most common type of dorm would be a two-person one, with a single-person dorm being the second most common, and three-person being the least. In the event of an uneven spread of genders in a team or an odd number of individuals within a team, those last two types of dorms served as a case for contingencies. But what would actually happen if those two dorms were already filled and a hassle to change around?
“Y-yeah…”
In fact, the more she thought about it, it was basically guaranteed that Elysia would get a dorm with Adrian, because Vincent did not apply for a dorm and Elysia did apply for one. The female section was already full, and there’s only one vacant slot in the male section, so really this was the only compromise that could be made to avoid unnecessary drama.
Still, it was very weird. They're guaranteed to get looks and gossip from people.
“Soooo…Marilyn, where to?”
She was caught up with her thoughts again, but she had successfully calmed down now, letting herself answer clearly. “The library. We both have the same most difficult task, so why don't we do it together too?"
Adrian curled up a smile and nodded. “Alrighty then, lead the way!”
Looks like their plan for today had been set, a two-person study session at the Royal Academy's grand library.