The next morning, when Linen dragged himself into the classroom with two giant dark circles under his eyes, Hysteria was in the back beating the card sharks purely through dog-tier luck, making them cry for mercy. Elena, who had been quietly organizing her notes, looked up in concern:
"Linen, did you not sleep well last night?"
Eden Academy had held its magic exams recently, but in Elena's memory, Linen was absolutely not the type to lose sleep over grades.
"It's… hard to explain."
Linen rubbed his brow. Throughout the entire night, Miss Teresia had sat under his desk hugging her knees, glaring at him with high alert. No matter how he explained, she absolutely refused to leave the underside of his table.
Clearly, being forced to listen to Linen emotionally recite a spicy, pervy novel had caused some unknown mental shift in Teresia.
Linen expressed concern for the girl's mental state and then—naturally—took the opportunity to farm a wave of experience points.
Events that allow continuous XP farming were rare. Linen only stopped once the system told him he could not receive further rewards from the same incident.
And whenever Linen tried to ignore her and peacefully rest, he could feel a garbage-disposal-tier stare drilling into his back. Whenever he turned around, he would see the girl's head swiftly duck back beneath the desk.
Being stared at like that all night—how could he possibly sleep well? For the first time, Linen felt that low Affection Level wasn't always a good thing…
Glancing at Elena beside him, Linen suddenly thought: She's the "empathy heroine." She should know how to deal with… odd roommates, right?
"Could I ask you for advice on how to… interact with a strange companion?"
Linen quickly corrected himself, keeping Teresia's identity vague. The fact that she was staying in his room was absolute top-tier secrecy—something literally no one else knew.
"Eh? Me?!"
Seeing Linen nod, Elena was a bit flustered. Linen rarely asked her for help, so she needed to answer properly!
"Can you describe what kind of companion they are?"
Elena asked cautiously.
Linen began summarizing his impressions of Miss Teresia:
"Well, it's someone you're forced to live with due to certain circumstances,"
—Referring to sharing the same room.
"You have to be responsible for feeding her,"
—Referring to how small pastry cakes could explode.
"And when she gets angry, she hides under your desk, glares at you, and even makes threatening noises."
—Referring to how last night Teresia threatened to die together with him if he dared come near.
Elena nodded knowingly.
She understood. Linen was clearly talking about…
A pet!
Living in the same room, needing to be fed, occasionally making threatening noises like pouting, liking to hide under the desk—this was absolutely a pet!
She didn't expect Linen to be so gentle-hearted. Though… she'd visited his room a few times and had never seen this pet. Next time she should definitely ask to meet it. Elena had a feeling they would get along very well.
Pushing aside those thoughts, Elena began thinking seriously. She hadn't raised many pets, but caring for Ria was quite similar—including the type of troubles that came with it.
After all, while she and Ria usually got along well, they still argued sometimes. Her experience should still be helpful.
"Give her some independent space. Let her think on her own and calm down first. How about that?"
Elena suggested tentatively.
Linen stroked his chin thoughtfully. After the long night, Miss Teresia still held hostility toward him, but it had obviously lessened. If he went back a bit later today and gave her more time, maybe she would realize she had misunderstood him.
"And then, you should give her appropriate rewards. Food works well. You've already been doing that, right?"
Linen nodded. Very reasonable. If the first method didn't work, he could order more small cakes from the cafeteria. That tactic should be effective.
"And if neither of those work,"
Elena lightly scratched her cheek, revealing a slyly adorable smile.
"You can show a little anger and discipline her."
"That makes so much sense!"
Linen felt enlightened.
When he kidnapped Miss Teresia and drugged her the first time, things were so simple. How had he become so hesitant now? Completely backwards.
"I'm glad I could help."
Elena exhaled in relief. Whenever she and Hysteria argued, she usually tapped Hysteria's head lightly as punishment. But Linen obviously couldn't do that to his "pet." The least vulnerable area on most creatures would be…
"How about spanking its butt?"
Elena suggested earnestly:
"It's necessary. Otherwise it won't know who the owner is!"
Spanking the butt? "Owner"?
Everything prior had been perfectly reasonable—
But Elena's last two lines overloaded Linen's mental CPU.
Elena plays this hardcore?!
Just then, the class bell rang. Hysteria quickly gathered her cards and returned to her seat. Teacher Milian—wearing her purple tracksuit and emanating wage-slave despair—walked into the classroom.
"The results of the Arcana exam are out. Everyone, check your scores and group rankings."
Exams were inseparable from any academy—and Eden Academy was no different.
Put simply:
Exams are WAR!
And the moment scores are released—
It's the unveiling of battle results!
"Damn it, I spaced out during the exam, totally messed up!"
"Same here! I stayed up gaming and couldn't focus at all. I'm definitely scoring lower than you guys!"
"Waaaah, I flunked! I'm going to the rooftop—don't stop me!"
Complaints erupted all over the classroom as scores were handed out. Linen, however, didn't feel the slightest ripple in his heart. He didn't even look—just flipped the score sheet face down.
From experience, people who complain the loudest about "failing" are usually the ones who score highest. It's just covert bragging disguised as self-pity.
In simpler terms: Bastards who shows off!
Fortunately, nothing like that ever happened in his own group.
"Hehehe, I got ninety-six on Arcana Combat—third in the class! Impressed?"
Okay, forget what he said.
The moment Hysteria got her score sheet, she began bragging excitedly while Elena clapped joyfully beside her.
"Hehe, it's average, average~ What about you, El?"
"Me? Oh, just average."
Elena scratched her cheek, unable to refuse Hysteria, then reluctantly showed her score sheet.
"Second place? Ninety-eight?!"
Hysteria's pink lips parted slightly, her eyes full of disbelief.
"You're an Illusion-support mage! How are your combat scores that high?!"
"It's because Elena is also an Artificer."
Linen shot Hysteria a half-annoyed look as he explained:
"According to the rules, a summoner's familiars and an Artificer's self-made artifacts both count as their personal combat power."
"So that's it!"
Hysteria scratched her head. She'd seen how powerful Elena's weird artifacts were. Combined with her Illusion support, even upperclassman Vanya had taken heavy losses against her. Getting second place was only natural.
But…
"Then what are you so smug about, you small fry?"
Hysteria reached for Linen's score sheet. Her sharp eyes had noticed how Linen flipped it face-down immediately—a behavior of someone trying desperately to hide something.
He definitely messed up!
The thought of finally having something to legitimately shame Linen about made Hysteria tremble with excitement.
Small fry, small fry—watch how Her Highness Hysteria crushes you this time~
"Let me see your score sheet!"
A flicker of panic crossed Linen's face before he quickly blocked her.
"It's nothing worth seeing—don't!"
Seeing his reaction, Hysteria became even more certain she was right. She doubled down, breathing heavily with excitement:
"No! Let me see!!"
[Rejection!]
"Well… since you insist."
Seeing his objective achieved, Linen sighed dramatically and loosened his grip. The score sheet slipped right into Hysteria's hands—her momentum nearly making her fall over.
Something about Linen's final reaction set off alarm bells in Hysteria's mind…
But once the arrow was released, there was no turning back! Since she grabbed the small fry's score sheet, she had to look!
Besides, in the Spring Cup, Hysteria had defeated an upperclass team along with Elena and the sword girl. Linen Norton, the small fry, had merely blown up a few trees. How high could his combat score possibly be?
Thus thinking, Hysteria's eyes carefully slid down to the Arcana Combat section.
Elena, drawn in by the tension, leaned over to read as well.
And the result was unsurprising yet shocking:
"F… First place?!"
"How is that possible?!"
Hysteria felt like she'd been struck by lightning—Linen's score wasn't just not "small fry" level; it was actually a perfect one hundred?!
Instantly, her ninety-six felt utterly worthless.
Elena, meanwhile, showed an "as expected" expression. Though she'd rarely seen Linen in action, Elena, who could hear the strongest thoughts, instinctively knew the gap between herself and Linen probably wasn't small.
"It's first place overall," Linen corrected mildly, pointing at the header atop his scorecard.
Whether it was academic courses like Arcana History, Number Theory, Astronomy, or practical subjects like Alchemy, Arcana Combat, and Weave Meditation, Linen's scores were consistently near the top—and his total was an unmistakably sparkling No. 1.
Only now did Hysteria tragically realize:
She'd been baited by Linen again…
Damn it, he's just showing off!
Just as Hysteria staggered back, feeling utterly crushed, she felt the back of her head collide softly into two QQ-bouncy slimes. Turning her head, she saw a gloomy-faced Milian standing right behind her.
While Hysteria was still pondering the mysterious sensation, Milian sighed helplessly:
"Actually, Linen's Arcana Combat score is number one in the entire school—the only student with a perfect score."
She wasn't displeased with Linen's high score—in fact, the opposite was true.
The Arcana Combat assessment involved each student battling a randomly selected instructor in a closed environment, graded on performance and endurance.
Eden Academy's instructors were all veterans of at least the Fourth Ring—completely fair when assessing students, whose average was First Ring, with exceptional ones barely reaching Second Ring.
Hysteria and Elena's styles were polar opposites:
One was extremely strategic, cleverly combining illusions and artifacts into dazzling combat displays; the other extremely straightforward, immediately starting every fight by relentlessly spamming Fireball spells.
But Linen's fight was just… awkward.
Because the instructor assigned to him didn't manage to defeat him…
At first, everything seemed normal. Linen and the instructor each occupied opposite corners, activating their Weave Meditation.
Seeing Linen, just a first-year student, unleash his Chaos Deck, the instructor nodded approvingly, readying a standard shield spell.
But then Linen suddenly put away his deck, closed the distance under Wind Arcana acceleration, and punched the instructor—shield and all—straight off the platform under the stunned gazes of the other examiners.
How were they supposed to grade an Arcana Combat test won with a fist?!
A group of teachers fiercely debated Linen's results. The noble teachers from Golden Court argued to invalidate his score or demand a retest, while older professors led by Gust insisted martial arts should count as personal strength.
Eventually, it was Sorgana herself who intervened, quelling the chaos and awarding Linen a perfect score—after all, using Wind Arcana to accelerate technically counted as Arcana application.
Milian had already suffered enough headaches over this—but she never expected another headache was just around the corner.
"Have the three of you checked your group rankings yet?" Milian asked.
The trio blinked, confused. Usually, everyone focused on personal scores first. Prompted by Milian, Linen glanced at the group ranking and discovered, astonishingly, that they were ranked twenty-fifth.
This was merely average within the class.
It made no sense—group rankings were the average of all members' total scores. With himself ranked first and Elena second overall, getting only an average rank meant…
Linen and Elena simultaneously turned their eyes toward Hysteria.
"Ehehe~" （○｀ 3′○）
Hysteria tried to cute her way out of trouble.
"Hysteria, show us your score sheet!" Elena firmly ordered.
"What's there to see on that—hey, give it back!"
Just as Hysteria tried to snatch it back, Linen swiftly pulled the score sheet from her grasp. Besides Arcana Combat, her grades in all other subjects were indeed spectacularly awful, with Alchemy as the crowning disaster.
Linen recalled this Alchemy exam's task was crafting a potion to heal an injured beast, with teacher evaluations given alongside grades. Linen's evaluation read, "A fierce yet effective potion." Elena's praised her as "Meticulous and outstanding."
Next to Hysteria's zero in Alchemy was a terrifying comment:
"Subject mutated violently and attempted to attack examiner…"
"Did it devolve into a paramecium like you after drinking your potion?" Linen facepalmed.
"It clearly became healthier! It was so energetic afterward! Those bastards graded it wrong!" Hysteria protested weakly, wilting under the cold gazes of her companions.
Finally, Linen stepped forward and spoke politely to Milian:
"Sorry for troubling you, Teacher Milian. We'll properly tutor this child after class, so hopefully she'll resemble a human student by finals."
Elena pushed down on Hysteria's head, forcing her into a bow:
"We appreciate your hard work…"
Milian instinctively bowed back. Somehow, she felt like a teacher facing an academically challenged student and her parents.
Shaking off that odd feeling, Milian quickly added:
"Although you probably know, I still feel obligated to remind you: if you fail too many subjects during Eden Academy's final exams, you'll face expulsion. Please be careful."
"Expulsion?!" Elena unconsciously tightened her grip on Hysteria's hand. Hysteria looked startled as well, while Linen appeared unsurprised.
Eden Academy's rules applied equally to everyone—commoners, nobility, even visiting princesses.
If Linen remembered correctly, academic performance had always been Hysteria's weak point, and her struggles with finals consistently drove forward her unique main story.
After Elena's Artificer Exam and the universal Spring Cup arc, was it finally time for Hysteria's storyline to advance?
Tutoring Her Highness sounds like a great opportunity to farm Rejection Points…
But at that moment, Elena declared solemnly:
"I understand! I'll work hard to tutor Hysteria and ensure she's not expelled! Please rest assured, Teacher Milian—we live in the same dorm, I'll monitor her closely!"
However, Milian shook her head slowly:
"Elena, I'm afraid you have other matters to attend to."
"Eh?" Elena blinked in surprise.
"Do you remember at the banquet after the Spring Cup, Headmaster Sorgana hosted a special guest?" Milian's gaze shifted to Linen. "Linen should know this esteemed visitor."
No way—could it be her? Linen frowned slightly and tested:
"Holly Orlando?"
"Yes," Milian replied, glancing at him with mild surprise. "Exactly, the renowned Artificer Holly Orlando, famous throughout the Zijinghua Empire."
"At Headmaster Sorgana's request, she agreed to host a special Artificer class here. I personally hope Elena attends; your talent in Artifice is obvious."
It really is this storyline! Linen thought.
Milian's introduction was modest. Though average in personal strength, Holly's skill as an Artificer was among the very best—not only in Zijinghua but the entire continent.
Linen had long suspected it was Holly who helped Novie transform his absurd, occasionally contradictory artifact designs from theory into reality. Only someone of Holly's caliber could pull that off.
In Elena's main story, Holly didn't just lecture—she would choose one disciple from among the students, inevitably Elena herself.
He hadn't expected two main storylines to trigger simultaneously.
After hearing Milian's suggestion, Elena bit her lip in conflicted hesitation.
She naturally wanted to help Hysteria, both as her best friend and study-group partner.
But missing Holly Orlando's lessons? She genuinely couldn't bear it. She had to grow stronger. Elena hadn't forgotten her true reason for attending Eden—only strength would let her face those murderers…
Pat!
Suddenly, a hand landed on Elena's shoulder. Turning, Elena saw Hysteria smiling brightly, giving her a thumbs-up:
"Go ahead and attend whatever 'Lily's' classes, Elena-chan! Her Highness Hysteria promises to greet you with passing grades!"
You idiot…
Encouraged by her friend's smile, Elena squeezed the hem of her skirt, silently resolving herself.
I can't abandon my friend.
Given Hysteria's level of idiocy, studying alone guaranteed expulsion. Elena could grow strong even without Holly's classes!
"Teacher Milian I think—"
"She'll attend Teacher Holly's classes. Leave this idiot to me."
Another voice suddenly interrupted Elena, beating her to the punch.
"That would be ideal." Milian sighed with relief.
Elena widened her eyes, gazing gratefully at Linen:
"L-Linen… are you sure?"
She didn't doubt Linen's teaching skills—she doubted Hysteria's learning skills.
"Don't misunderstand. I'm not doing this so you can attend the lectures. It's just a whim." Linen kept his face stern.
Adults knew you couldn't have everything—only fairy tales allowed that luxury.
After considering, Linen decided establishing a reliable XP-farming pipeline with Hysteria was more practical than competing with Elena for an Artificer apprenticeship he barely understood.
Noticing Elena's worry, Linen added softly:
"Besides, didn't you already tell me how to handle companions with special personalities?"
Elena nodded vigorously, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand.
Linen was as always—gentle yet dishonest.
Suddenly, Elena froze—
Wait. Wasn't that advice about dealing with pets?
Was tutoring Hysteria like training a pet really acceptable?
And if not about pets, then… who was Linen asking about earlier?!
Elena suddenly became even more worried—in every possible sense.