A deep sigh and the creak of the unoiled door hinges mixed into each other, signaling Alec's entrance into the dorm. However, as soon as he stepped in, Alec was greeted with a flashbang of light to the face, temporarily blinding him.

Raising his arm and blocking his eyes, Alec cursed under his breath. A cacophony of noises washed over, disorienting him alongside the bright flash of light. As his eyes adjusted, Alec found his friends facing each other off, standing about two steps away from each other in a circle.

"That's cheating!" Alexei shouted as his cards stopped floating.

"What's cheating? Playing a well-calculated move?" Evan asked with a condescending smile on his face. Alexei clicked his tongue at his words and looked through the cards in his hand.

"I think we have to do that," Thomas said, to which Alexei nodded in agreement.

'Huh... I'm invested now. I guess they are teaming up against Evan,' Alec thought to himself. Closing the door behind him, he crossed his arms and leaned against the wall.

With a flashy move, Thomas raised both of his arms. In one hand was a card with its back turned, in the other was the rest of his deck. The general shy demeanor of his was nowhere to be found.

"I play..." he said. Then momentarily stopped to give more of a dramatic effect to his revelation. "Arcane Storm!"

'Huh... It's this card again,' Alec thought to himself. He inspected the battlefield and noted the lack of unit cards on there. 'Why would they use an anti-personnel area of effect card now?'

Suddenly the battlefield was encased in a storm of magic missiles, rotating around, damaging practically nothing.

Then, the next moment, Alexei unleashed two other cards. These were two simple magic missiles, which were seemingly meaningless.

However, both Alec and Evan understood what they were trying to do.

'They are hiding the magic missiles in the storm...' Alec thought. He turned his gaze toward Evan to watch his next move.

Evan's pupils moved rapidly, inspecting the hundreds of magic missiles one by one at a moment's notice. Then, with a smug grin, he unleashed two magic missile cards of his own, which miraculously dodged every arcane storm missile and precisely collided with the ones Alexei had unleashed.

"Fuck!" Alexei shouted, his face draining of blood. He turned to Thomas in worry. "I'm out! You have anything?"

Shaking his head bitterly, Thomas bit his fingernail and answered.

"I'm out too. That arcane storm was my last."

"I win then," Evan said. He released two arcane lance cards and unleashed them toward the two, depleting their hit points in one go.

"You guys actually got beaten 2 versus 1?" Alec asked as he walked further into the room, which prompted Evan to jump in place.

"Since when have you been there?" Evan asked.

"Since just now," Alec answered. Even if he didn't show it on his face, he was happy to see Evan playing around like the old times. He didn't seem so distant now.

"Hey, Evan," Thomas asked with worry on his face. "I know this is rude to ask, but did you increase your mind stat by any chance?"

At his question, Evan flinched. His back was toward the other two, but Alec could clearly see the guilty expression on Evan's face.

"A little bit," he said dryly.

"How much is a little bit?" Alec asked. He had also been curious about that for some time. 'Why would he spend his precious stat points out of nowhere? Wouldn't it be better to hold onto them for maximization?'

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"I-" Evan muttered. However, his voice trailed off. Alec, with a worried frown on his face, patted Evan's shoulder. However, Evan threw him an angry glare before storming out of the room.

For a few short moments, an awkward silence encompassed the room. The trio looked at the door left semi-open by Evan.

The one to break the silence was Alexei.

"That was... Awkward," he muttered. Alec nodded along but there was an awkward feeling in his heart, as if he already knew the reason. However, when he tried asking the mana brain, he noticed it to be unresponsive.

"Anyway," Thomas said before walking to his bed and sitting down with a deep sigh. His eyes first trailed Alexei who climbed the ladder to the upper bunkbed then looked toward Alec. "Are you going to the library's second level today?"

"Nah, that's tomorrow," Alec said, adjusting his shirt.

"Why are you even going there? Can you understand the books? I thought you had gotten the first place accidentally," Thomas continued. Feeling slightly anxious, Alec scratched his chest and finally managed to look away from the door.

"Yep. I've been researching gravity magic for some time," he absent-mindedly answered. Which prompted a dry chuckle from both his friends.

Looking at their unimpressed and uninterested faces, Alec found their reaction to be the most desirable.

"And, shouldn't you have run after him?" Thomas asked. To which Alec shook his head even if they were looking away from him at the moment.

"I'll deal with it later," Alec answered. At the moment, he had to go and do his daily training.

Since the start of the holiday, Alec had streamlined his training process. He had previously been using very low grade upgrade potions, which had all lost their effectiveness a few weeks ago. Now, Alec had gone on to start using low grade ones. The only problem was the fact that these potions were incredibly expensive. So expensive that Alec could only create one a day without depleting all his mana. That necessitated him appointing a day to create those potions.

Showering and changing into a different set of clothes, Alec gathered his stuff and left the dorm after bidding his friends farewell.

'That makes me wonder, what are the ingredients for these potions?' Alec asked himself on the way. He had been using The Author's Pen to create potions for a long time but hadn't really questioned the fact before.

'Now that I know The Author's Pen uses possibility to create things, I assume this potion isn't just a group of chemicals that happened to come together. Not to mention, it is pretty cheap when I consider its effectiveness. So not only are they better than conventional potions and achieve seemingly impossible effects, but the ingredients should be relatively easy to find. The concoction process also has to be pretty easy...'

As Alec's mind churned, he found himself in front of the training grounds. He passed the blue energy barrier using the private room token he already had. On the way, he drank the potion of the day and watched his mana stat go up by one.

[Name: Alec Greenwood

Strength: 29

Agility: 28

Health: 30

Mind: 26

Mana: 31]

By now, Alec had gotten plenty used to the feeling of having his stats increased. So the sudden feeling of bloatedness didn't make him lose his composure. Instead, he kept his steps steady, raised his entrance token to the air, and watched the door of the private training room open.

Inside, a familiar face was waiting for him.

"Hi Edward," Alec greeted. The blonde-haired council president greeted Alec with a wide smile. He was waiting with his arms crossed, seemingly thinking about something right before Alec entered. "How was your day?" Alec asked.

"Same old same old," Edward answered. He tapped his finger on his arm a few times and continued speaking. "Third-year curriculum is pretty much all practical and project-oriented. So I have a lot of free time, which goes mostly to student council work."

"Does it get tiring?" Alec asked as he took off his jacket and hung it on the backrest of a chair.

"Definitely, but it's worth it," Edward answered. Alec smiled gently without answering. "What do you say? Should we get started?"

"Sure," Alec said, silently cursing at the fact that he didn't get any time to rest. Pushing himself off the chair by holding onto the armrests, Alec stretched his arms.

Edward, on the other hand, closed his eyes and took a deep breath. With a steady and upright posture, he slammed his hand onto the middle of his chest. His mouth moved rapidly, probably reciting something.

Then, both of them finished their preparations and entered the reinforced training chamber.

This room they had rented was much better than the one Alec had rented so far. Alec wasn't surprised. Edward was the student council president after all.

The training chamber was incredibly sturdy, enough to endure a fight between two low-level professors.

Walking to two different ends of the chamber, Alec and Edward faced each other.

While Alec closed his eyes to revise the movements he would be using, Edward started casting enhancement after enhancement on himself.

After a minute, Edward was glowing with rainbow lights from all the enhancements, which made Alec involuntarily chuckle whenever he saw.

"Duel, five minutes, mild injuries," Edward ordered. The training chamber lit up with red lights and a holographic countdown appeared in mid-air. A blue protective ward wrapped both of them and disappeared from sight.

As the countdown approached zero, Alec lowered his stance, and tens of magic circles appeared around Edward.

"Here I come!"