Professor Hammel couldn't swallow the humiliation any longer.
He violently shoved himself up from the disciplinary committee's table, his heavy wooden chair crashing backward onto the polished floor. His face was flushed an ugly, congested purple. The ambient mana around him began to violently vibrate and distort, fully revealing the oppressive pressure of his true rank: A 4th-Circle Mage.
"Enough!" Hammel roared. A shockwave of magical pressure exploded across the amphitheater, causing the students in the front rows to cry out and scramble backward in sheer panic. "You are nothing but a charlatan using cheap optical illusions to deceive us! You dare claim our sacred science is garbage? I will personally show you the difference between a true Professor and a pathetic insect with too much tongue!"
In that exact moment, a translucent blue interface flickered into existence before my eyes, invisible to the rest of the room.
[Ding! Direct hostile threat detected.]
[Sudden Quest: Humiliate the High Rank.]
Objective: Defeat the Mage "Hammel" (4th-Circle) utilizing only your '1st Circle'.
Reward: Skill Activation - [Sequential Cancellation] + 5 Permanent Mana Capacity.
Penalty for Failure: Death, or exposure as a fraud.
[Skill Details: Sequential Cancellation]
Description: The absolute ability to deconstruct magical or kinetic structures by targeting and severing the 'anchor points' within an opponent's spell matrix.
Application: Nullifies enemy magic prior to completion, or forcefully 'short-circuits' an opponent's mana pathways at precise anatomical nodes.
I stared up at Hammel with absolute, freezing detachment. Not a single strand of my hair moved under the crushing weight of his 4th-Circle aura.
"A 4th-Circle?" I mused, my voice dripping with aristocratic condescension as I slowly, deliberately adjusted the cuff of my black leather glove. "All this theatrical noise for an energy output that bleeds 70% of its mass into thin air? You don't even warrant the effort of a complete equation."
"I will incinerate you!" Hammel shrieked, fully losing his mind.
He aggressively gathered his energy, forcefully tearing a massive, hyper-complex array of runes into the air. It was a high-tier Fire attribute spell: [Hellfire Detonation]. The temperature in the Grand Hall skyrocketed instantly. The woodwork began to smolder, and students were openly screaming, trampling each other in their desperation to flee the blast zone.
I didn't flinch. I locked my eyes on Hammel, my voice slicing through the chaos with terrifying calm. "Since you cling so desperately to your paper rank... I will crush you using only a single circle. Not out of respect, Hammel. But to demonstrate that your absolute 'peak' is nothing more than the rock bottom of my foundation."
I flared the mana of my stabilized First Circle.
Hammel unleashed his attack. A colossal, roaring sphere of superheated plasma surged toward me, threatening to melt the very stone beneath my boots.
I didn't move my feet. I merely raised my right index finger.
Operating at a terrifying mental velocity, I calculated the precise trajectory, heat density, and structural flaws of his spell. I drafted a microscopic 'Neutralization Equation' in the air.
The exact millisecond the raging inferno collided with my tiny, geometric circle... it simply vanished.
There was no explosion. No dramatic clash of power. The massive fireball was instantaneously snuffed out, erased from existence as if it had never been cast at all.
"W-What...?" Hammel staggered backward, his eyes bulging from their sockets in sheer, unadulterated horror.
"I simply inverted the magical vectors within your core matrix," I stated, my dress shoes clicking rhythmically against the stone as I began a slow, measured advance toward him. "You pump mana like a brute, Hammel. It was mathematically trivial to redirect the spell's kinetic energy to cannibalize itself."
I reached the disciplinary table. Hammel was violently trembling, his hands shaking so severely he couldn't even form a basic defensive rune.
I reached out, my gloved hand gripping the collar of his gilded Professor's robes. I effortlessly hauled him forward until his terrified eyes were inches from my cold, dead stare.
"A 4th-Circle core in the hands of an imbecile like you," I whispered, "is a crime against science."
I gave him a slight, dismissive shove. Hammel collapsed backward, landing pathetically on his backside in front of the entire student body and the paralyzed Academy staff. His pride, his rank, his entire existence had been utterly shattered.
[Ding! Quest Successfully Completed.]
[Reward: Skill Activated - Sequential Cancellation.]
[Status Update: Maximum Mana Capacity permanently increased by +5.]
I released my grip on his robes, turning my back on the broken man. I picked up my leather briefcase and looked up at Principal Oswald, whose face was currently slick with cold sweat.
"Now then," I murmured, preparing to leave the podium. "Are there any other 'geniuses' who wish to test their rank against my single circle? Or can we finally conclude this pathetic circus and return to actual work?"
My gaze swept over the crowd, lingering for a fraction of a second on Elena. She was staring at me, her previous arrogance completely replaced by a mixture of profound awe and primal fear.
Not a single person in the massive hall dared to breathe, let alone speak. They had all been entirely suffocated beneath the crushing, undeniable authority of the new Adrian Faulkner.