The bell for the end of 'Foundational Mana Theory' rang, its chiming tone echoing like a salvation bell for Instructor Ignis. The poor man practically fled the podium, his floating crown of fire completely extinguished by the sheer stress of teaching the Imperial Princess while she sat in the trash-tier row.
Kaiser, however, was currently experiencing a very different kind of stress.
For the last forty-five minutes of the lecture, Princess Valeria had not relinquished her iron grip on his wrist. Beneath the wooden desk, hidden from the three hundred jealous, gaping students, her delicate hand was clamped around him. Her skin was usually absolute-zero, but Kaiser had been subtly cycling his [Basic Abyssal Breathing Technique] to generate a localized, heavy warmth along his arm.
The result was a bizarre, incredibly intimate equilibrium. The freezing cold of the Frost Empress met the consuming dark heat of the Abyss, creating a comfortable, tingling sensation that seemed to completely mesmerize Valeria. She had spent half the lecture just staring at their joined hands with a blank, fascinated expression.
"Princess," Kaiser whispered smoothly, leaning in just enough that his raven-black hair brushed her shoulder. "As much as I enjoy playing human space-heater, the class is over. And if you hold on any longer, I think my step-sister might actually spontaneously combust."
Valeria blinked, her silver eyes snapping up. She looked toward the third row.
Seraphina was marching up the tiered stairs, her boots stomping against the marble with lethal intent. Her crimson hair seemed to literally defy gravity, floating slightly around her shoulders as her red aura leaked out in uncontrollable, jealous waves.
Valeria's grip tightened on Kaiser's wrist for a fraction of a second, her eyes narrowing at the approaching knight-in-training. Reluctantly, she released him, her hand returning to her lap. She immediately looked down, her flawless, pale cheeks dusting with a faint pink as she realized exactly how long she had been touching him.
"Kaiser," Seraphina growled, stopping at the edge of their desk. She completely ignored the Princess, glaring entirely at her step-brother. "Stand up. We are going to the training grounds. Your footwork is still garbage, and clearly, sitting in the back row is making you lazy."
It was a blatant, transparent excuse to drag him away.
Before Kaiser could formulate a witty, teasing response, Valeria stood up. She didn't look at Seraphina; she didn't even acknowledge the girl's existence. The Princess simply turned to Kaiser, her expression returning to its flawlessly cold, porcelain mask.
"Tomorrow," Valeria commanded, her voice carrying an absolute, royal decree. "You will sit here again. If you attempt to move, I will freeze your legs to the floor."
Without waiting for a response, Valeria turned on her heel and glided out of the lecture hall, leaving a trail of terrified, whispering students parting like the Red Sea before her.
Kaiser let out a low whistle, rubbing his wrist. "Well, she's certainly decisive."
"What did you do to her?!" Seraphina hissed, slamming her hands down on his desk, ignoring the splinters. "Kaiser, she is the Crown Princess! She possesses an SS-Rank core! If she decides you are a toy and breaks you, not even Mother will be able to save your life!"
"Aw, Seraphina," Kaiser flashed her a devastatingly charming, sapphire-eyed smile, leaning forward until their noses almost touched. "Are you worried she's going to steal me away before you get to break my legs yourself?"
Seraphina's brain short-circuited. The intense proximity, the lingering scent of ozone and deep abyss, and the sheer audacity of his smirk hit her like a physical blow. Her face erupted in a violent shade of scarlet.
"I—You—Arrogant parasite!" she sputtered, backing up so fast she nearly tripped over the stairs. "Just... just meet me at the training grounds in ten minutes!"
She fled the room faster than Instructor Ignis had.
Kaiser chuckled, standing up and stretching his limbs. Two targets, two completely different flavors of fluster. The game was progressing beautifully.
However, before he could take a single step toward the exit, the ambient light in the room suddenly dimmed. The shadows cast by the wooden desks elongated unnaturally, stretching across the floor like dark serpents converging on Kaiser's position.
From the center of the shadows, a massive raven composed entirely of dark purple, ethereal flames manifested. It landed on Kaiser's desk, its glowing eyes locking onto him.
The remaining students in the hall gasped, scrambling backward.
The flaming raven opened its beak, and a woman's voice echoed out—a voice that was impossibly smooth, mature, and dripping with a lazy, overwhelming authority.
"Rank 300, Kaiser Warborn. Your presence is required. Proceed to the central spire immediately."
The raven dissolved into a cloud of purple ash, leaving a faint scent of old parchment and dark magic in the air.
Murmurs instantly broke out.
"The central spire? That's the Principal's office."
"He's getting expelled. He must have cheated on the written exam."
"Good riddance to the F-rank trash."
Kaiser sighed, dusting off his uniform. "No rest for the wicked, I suppose."
He wasn't worried about being expelled. He was a gamer; when the game summons you to the highest tower on day one, it means you've triggered a hidden quest line.
The central spire was a towering monolith of black marble that pierced the clouds above the Academy. Kaiser ascended the winding spiral staircase, his [Aura Cloak] tightly secured, keeping his powerful E+ rank Abyssal core hidden from the wards pulsing in the walls.
When he reached the top, he found a modest wooden door. An impossibly old elf with a beard dragging on the floor was sweeping the hallway with a straw broom. This was the man who had given the welcoming speech—the Headmaster.
"Ah, the Warborn boy," the ancient elf smiled warmly, stepping aside. "Don't keep her waiting, young man. She hasn't summoned a first-year directly since the Vesperian King was a student."
Kaiser nodded, feeling a sudden prickle of genuine caution. If the Headmaster was just the receptionist... who exactly was the Principal?
He pushed the door open.
He didn't step into an office. He stepped into a pocket dimension.
The room was a sprawling, multi-tiered library. The ceiling didn't exist; instead, a breathtaking galaxy of swirling nebulas and ancient stars rotated slowly overhead. Countless grimoires floated through the air like birds.
In the center of the room, sitting behind a massive desk carved from the skull of an ancient leviathan, was the Principal.
Kaiser's breath caught in his throat.
She was, without a single doubt, the most lethally stunning, mature woman he had ever laid eyes on. She had cascades of deep, velvety purple hair that pooled around her shoulders, and eyes that glowed like polished emeralds. She wore a tailored, high-collared black dress that did absolutely nothing to hide a voluptuous, sinfully generous figure. Silver-rimmed spectacles rested on the bridge of her nose, giving her an air of terrifying, strict intellect.
She was currently smoking a long, slender pipe. When she exhaled, the smoke didn't dissipate; it formed tiny, dancing constellations in the air.
[TARGET ACQUIRED: Principal Morgana Thorne (The Arch-Witch of the Genesis Era)]
[Current Affection: 5% (She finds your existence highly anomalous and mildly entertaining. She is currently debating whether to study you or dissect you.)]
[Warning: Target possesses an Unquantifiable Core (Beyond SSS-Rank). Target is older than the Vesperian Empire. Any attempt at deception will result in Host's soul being forcefully extracted and placed in a jar.]
A Genesis Era Arch-Witch, Kaiser's [Otaku's Insight] practically screamed at him. She's the raid boss of the entire continent.
"Close the door, Kaiser Warborn," Morgana spoke. Her voice was like dark honey poured over crushed glass—sweet, thick, and incredibly dangerous.
Kaiser complied, stepping forward. He didn't bow. He didn't cower. He adopted his smooth, confident posture, stopping a few feet from her leviathan-skull desk.
"You summoned me, Principal Thorne?" Kaiser asked, offering a polite, but undeniably charming smile.
Morgana leaned back in her high-backed leather chair, her emerald eyes lazily trailing up and down his frame. She tapped a stack of parchment on her desk with a manicured nail.
"I read your written exam," Morgana said, taking a slow drag from her pipe. "You scored a one hundred percent. A flawless display of magical theory, dimensional physics, and demonic physiology. Instructors are calling you a genius hiding behind a weak core."
"I'm flattered," Kaiser replied.
"Don't be," Morgana's eyes narrowed slightly behind her glasses. "Because the theories you used to answer question forty-two regarding localized fusion within a D-Rank core... do not exist in any textbook within the borders of this Empire. That theory was hypothesized by a dark scholar three hundred years ago. A scholar whose works I personally locked in the forbidden vaults below this very spire."
She leaned forward, resting her chin on her hands, her cleavage pressing tantalizingly against the dark fabric of her dress. Her aura—heavy, ancient, and impossibly dense—began to slowly leak into the room, pressing down on Kaiser's shoulders like a physical weight.
"So, tell me, Rank 300," Morgana purred softly. "How does an F-Rank weakling from the Warborn estate possess forbidden knowledge? And more importantly..."
She snapped her fingers.
Instantly, Kaiser's [Aura Cloak]—the system skill he had spent 400 SP on to perfectly hide his signature—was forcefully shattered. It didn't just break; it completely dissolved.
The heavy, bruised-purple, gravity-warping presence of his E+ Rank Abyssal Core flooded the room.
"...Why does your core smell like the deepest, darkest trenches of the Void?" Morgana finished, her emerald eyes practically glowing with intense, predatory curiosity.
Panic flared in Kaiser's chest, but his gamer instincts brutally suppressed it. The system couldn't hide him from a being of this magnitude. Lying was a death sentence.
Kaiser let out a soft chuckle. He stopped fighting the suppression. Instead of looking away, he locked his sapphire blue eyes directly onto her glowing emeralds. Slowly, deliberately, he let his disguise fall.
His raven hair lightened into a cascading mane of pure, luminescent white. His sapphire eyes bled away, replaced by the endless, terrifying pitch-black abyss of his true form.
Morgana's breath visibly hitched. Her pipe slipped from her fingers, clattering softly against the leviathan skull.
For the first time in perhaps a century, the Arch-Witch was caught entirely off guard. The boy standing before her didn't look like a human anymore. He radiated an otherworldly, haunting beauty, and his eyes... looking into his eyes was like staring directly into the primordial void before the universe was born.
The passive skill, [Alluring Abyss], was firing at absolute maximum output, amplified by his true form.
"Well, Principal," Kaiser murmured, his voice resonant and deeply magnetic, devoid of any fear. He took a single, confident step forward, resting his hands firmly on the edge of her massive desk, leaning into her space. "I suppose my secret is out. Are you going to expel me, put me in a jar, or are we going to skip to the part where you make me your personal project?"
Morgana stared at his face, her emerald eyes wide, completely captivated by the black void of his gaze. The crushing pressure of her aura evaporated, replaced by a sudden, intense heat that had nothing to do with magic.
A slow, deeply sensual smile spread across the Arch-Witch's ruby lips. A faint flush appeared on her mature cheeks.
[Target: Morgana Thorne. Emotion detected: Unprecedented Intrigue, Deep Arousal, Predatory Fixation.]
[Affection updated: 5% -> 18% (Warning: Target views you as the most fascinating 'toy' she has encountered in a millennia. Proceed with extreme caution.)]
"Expel you?" Morgana whispered, leaning over the desk until her face was mere inches from his, the scent of dark magic and expensive perfume intoxicating his senses. "Oh, no, little anomaly. I'm going to keep you very close. Welcome to the Zenith Grand Academy."