Adam was still resting his head when the tutor dismissed the duke’s children. The two of them wore very different expressions as they left. Abigail, of course, wore her normal serial killer princess smile, while Marcus looked at the resting boy with consternation. For his part, Adam ignored the urgings of System Assistance long enough for the two to leave, having only received a nod of recognition from him. When the tutor approached, he raised his head again.
“Well, boy, how was your reading?” The man’s voice was pleasant enough, but Adam was mildly concerned at the attitude he seemed to have. It was better than that of the man who left books at his doorstep, but not by much Luckily, the new tutor's attitude more closely resembled disappointment rather than the more familiar disdain mixed with apathy that had been applied by the teachers at the orphanage.
“Enlightening, but dense. Thank you, it is clearing up a number of questions I had on the system.” He wasn’t sure how best to deal with the man, but figured honesty couldn’t hurt.
The man’s brows rose. “Really? Do tell. What have you learned today?”
Adam explained the things he’d learned. Knowledge skills along with expectations and preparations for evolutions were his main topics. The more he spoke the more interested the man became. Eventually, he even pulled up a chair.
When Adam was done reviewing the things he had learned from a combination of reading, listening, and suffering through Mother Knows Best pouring knowledge into his head, the tutor actually seemed fairly impressed.
“Well, you’ve certainly manage to learn quite a bit more than I had anticipated from that particular piece of text, particularly considering the duke's evaluation of your capabilities. I presume you have a knowledge skill or two that covers a broad scope?” His previous negative view of the boy was long gone.
Adam just nodded, not willing to expose his class to another person. He still needed to get over his fears in regards to Ruth. The duke telling the tutor he couldn't learn didn't really surprise him after everything else the man had put him through. As time passed, the duke was continuing to climb towards the top of the list of worst people Adam had known. Counting those still living, he was at the top of the list.
“Hmm, in that case the duke’s requirements won’t cause you much difficulty. If we set you up with a decent learning plan, self-study may actually be better for you.” The man paused to think it through, but Adam caught the difficulty immediately, and pressed the issue.
“What were the requirements from the duke?” After the meeting in the duke’s office, Adam had been even more nervous about the man’s plans for him. Martin had spoken with him at length about what he believed the man had intended for the boy, but time had shown that he didn’t quite seem to have a firm grasp on the nobleman’s intentions.
“Eh?” he asked, startled from his ruminations. “Well, he said your education was nonexistent and I wasn’t to waste time on you. He spoke as though you had no ability to learn, but that seems to have been incorrect.”
“Well, he’s right about the education at least.” Adam briefly explained his years in the orphanage, and a little about the breadth of knowledge that Mother Knows Best could award him, although he explained it away as being more than one skill. He wasn’t much better with sticking to the script about Care Bear, but he had improved a small amount. Lying wasn’t a skill that came with Mother to his knowledge. That didn't prevent him from explaining the details of his Care Bear class. Lie or not, the man did need to know some of Adam's abilities if he was to help him learn.
“That’s perfect then. With the restrictions he has me under, I’d struggle to educate you to the best of my abilities if you were a classroom student, however, self-study will give me a number of options.” He shuffled around on the chair a little, getting more comfortable. A small notebook and pencil appeared, him making notes while he continued speaking.
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“The skills that my teaching class gives me have some slightly strange supervisory requirements that need to be met to receive the benefits they give. For them to work on students in my classroom I need to give them a certain portion of my time, relative to the number of students. With you attending class along with Marcus and Abigail, I would need to give you at least a quarter of my time for you to receive the benefits. With the duke’s requirements of mostly ignoring you, in addition to spending the bulk of my time working with Marcus, there would be no way for me to manage a boost to your learning while still achieving the minimum necessary for the other children.” Adam could see that the man was a born teacher, enjoying even the lesson on his own skills, but he also failed to see how anything the man said would result in any benefit for him.
The tutor obviously saw his concern, giving the boy a wry smile. “I can see your worry, but let me finish.” Adam nodded, and he got back to it. “A student who is in class, but is assigned to self-study, only requires a tiny portion of my attention for the learning advances to apply. Something along the lines of a bit less than a minute per hour should cover it.” His eyes turned more intense as he sat up and leaned forwards and gestured towards Adam. “There are some caveats though, and they will affect you the most. One thing for you to remember about the benefits is that they will only apply outside of the classroom. Even more important than that, however, is that you must spend at least an equal amount of time studying outside of the classroom, as you spend in the classroom.”
Adam thought over the strange restrictions on the man’s skills. It didn’t quite make sense to him, except that he would now have to spend twice as long studying in the future as he had already been assigned, and only the outside portion would be at an advanced rate. When his eyes turned back to the man again, he immediately noticed the smile. There was obviously a trick in the explanation somewhere, but he couldn’t figure it out. Slightly irritated, he glared at the man. “Alright, what am I missing?”
The tutor’s eyes twinkled merrily. “Let’s just say that with a proper understanding of my skills, the duke would be forcing me to treat his son this way instead of you.”
Adam was once more trying to decide between confusion and anger. The man was hinting that he was doing the boy a huge favor while also getting one over on the duke, but Adam couldn’t figure out how, which lead to his confusion. The anger was from not being able to spot the advantage the man was speaking of, and the possibility that he was playing games with him.
With Adam slightly distracted and dealing with his emotional distress, the tutor had the time to finish drawing up the lesson plan for the boy. He focused on the basics first, knowing that he would have time to introduce more complicated matters later. With a better understanding of the boy’s educational level, he had a better perspective on where he needed to start. He could narrow it down further if he had gone through the assessments that he had pushed Adam into completing the day before, but it wouldn’t make much difference with him being assigned to self-study.
His list finished, the man studied Adam while he thought. One of his skills was designed to help him think through what he should say to receive the most impact by stretching his perception of time. The skill didn’t speed up his physical body at all, leaving it feeling sluggish in comparison to the heightened speed of his thoughts. Another of his skills, similar to Adam’s Organization, had been cataloguing the way the boy communicated, verbally and non-verbally, and it had noticed some interesting things. Things about the nanny, but also about himself.
Without a specific skill for detecting lying he couldn’t be positive, but the evidence he had pointed to the boy lying about his knowledge skill. Without more to go on he could only guess, but he suspected that Adam had a single knowledge skill that was staggeringly broad. If that was true, it implied that the boy had been lying to the duke about his class, or that the duke didn’t see the value of whatever his class was. He was leaning towards the first option. He was quite intrigued by the boy’s rebellion against his “master.”
After all, he was doing the same thing by giving the best of his abilities to the enslaved child as opposed to those of the duke.
Smiling, he reached a hand across the table. “My name is Scholar Davis Kleeb. I look forward to working with you Adam.”
There was still suspicion on Adam’s features, but he shook Kleeb’s hand anyways. He didn’t trust the man yet, maybe never, but he had seen the spark in his eyes when he mentioned that the duke would want whatever he was getting for his son. Adam wanted to believe that that spark had been of rebellion, but there were other options. The joy of a teacher, a well-played prank, or the glint of glee at the inevitable betrayal and torture, although he didn’t believe the later was an actual option. He would try to be cautious for the future, but he decided to go along with the man’s plans for the moment.