"The meaning of this is that Authority holders' main tasks are Notium production and intervening in any unforeseen incidents that could bring harm to the city, and of course, if there happens to be something like a breach or any other existential crises, the duty and honor of all Authority holders is to protect the city at all....." Taking a look around, Teacher Anderson continued. "Cost...."
Listening attentively, Nox watched as the teacher continued.
"Plong"
Feeling a slight pain on the left side of his head, Nox did his best to ignore it, straining to hold it together, as he listened further.
"Plong"
Watching as a small pebble of... something flew past his face, his pupils tracing its course, as it flew past Nox, landing on our flamboyantly haired neighbor, whom Nox hadn't had the chance to find out the name. The asshole has been ignoring me since his arrival. How should I have found it out?
Looking at the pebble now motionless on his desk. The redhead shot him a glare that said, " Don't disturb me, scum."
Seeing this, Nox tried to extricate himself from the affair as he leaned back, avoiding meeting his gaze, throwing Trisha, who was the one to play around. Well, it's her fault; she was sniping those things at me.
As he was slowly moving out of view, letting the parties clash, he watched with wrapped attention.
Too bad I can't bet on the outcome; only Trisha would enjoy betting with him.
And, well... she can't participate for obvious reasons.
To be honest, it would be nice to see her get some payback, considering she didn't inform me that befriending her would lead to the entire class hating me, or at least avoiding me.
Watching, hoping to see a good show, Nox was destined to be disappointed, as the redhead slowly turned away with an arrogant snort, as if the howl thing was beneath him.
Seeing this, Nox got a bad feeling. This was not some kind of supernatural feeling; it was simply him judging Trisha's character and how she would act when met with such behavior. From his Interactions with her, he had built up a pretty good picture of how she would act in certain situations. Looking towards Trisha, a small hope that she wouldn't blow this thing out of proportion, quickly extinguished.
Wearing an innocent grin, she took a small pea of a woody substance, placed it on the table, held it down with one finger, and took aim.
Not wanting to fall between two warring nations, Nox tried to reach out to stop her. Sadly, he was too late.
"Oh, Noxy, stop your treacherous attempts, and Reinhard, you're no fun."
Hearing his name being mentioned, Reinhard turned his head to find a pea hitting directly between his eyebrows.
"Plong"
Shit.
As Nox saw this, his blood ran cold; one could almost feel the anger emanating from Reinhard, who seemed on the verge of letting loose a few vulgarities.
At least I'll see her learn her lesson. Haha, I guess I'll see a good show, even if there's some collateral on my end. Wearing a smug expression, Nox waited for Trisha's verdict, hiding his laughter behind a stern poker face.
He said nothing for a few seconds, visibly calming down. In a cold tone, he said, "In the next physical gradings, I'll grind the two of you into dust."
Haha, you two will suffer.
Wait what?
The two of you?
Hearing this, Nox's expression crumbled, and his mind went blank. H-how come I'm being implicated to such an extent?
Before he could even try to get out of this fude..
"Yeah, sure, we'll be waiting, scardie cat!"
Looking over at Trisha, his expression was no longer one of misery, but of scathing anger.
Lamenting the fact that her behavior had almost taken a 180 after a bit of interaction, she had been a bit weird from the get-go, basically probing my bottom line with jokes and provocations. Everything was over before it even began. Nox, no Noctis might have been smart, but she read him like a book and knew where to push and pull, thoroughly destroying his resistance against his nickname, for example. Why was she acting like that? Nox had no idea. Maybe trust issues, or she disliked not being in control of situations, and, because of that, she actively sought initiative, but in truth, Nox firmly believed she was simply a sadist who derived pleasure from eliciting reactions from people.
Pretending, as if she hadn't noticed, she passively ended the interaction, turned away, lying on the desk, suppressing an obvious chuckle, and closing her eyes to shut down any attempts at talking to her.
Barely holding it together, Nox knew that he couldn't do anything about Reinhard's verdict. The guy seemed like the type to firmly stick to his decisions. Even if he later realized he was in the wrong, he would most likely take that as the new pretext to start something. I would have offended such a deeply proud person even further.
Seeing that Reinhard had turned back to class, Nox sighed deeply and sank into his chair.
What he had just been challenged to was simply the physical evaluation. It was mandatory to have at least two fights every two weeks. These fights would determine one's place in the rankings.
One fight could be decided by oneself, and the other would be decided either randomly or by challenge.
Meaning he couldn't really avoid the thrashing, and it would most definitely be thrashing, as Nox just remembered the rank of Reinhard on the leaderboard. Let's just say he was one of the people who got benefits through the battle system.
Whining inwardly, Nox let his eyes wander throughout the classroom, taking his mind off the topic, as he couldn't do anything about it anyway. He eventually settled on Siana, who was, similarly to him, a loner, albeit for a completely different reason. While he had made a mistake in choosing the people he surrounded himself with, she simply exuded a glum, cold aura, making it hard to approach her.
Surprisingly enough, the aura she exuded today was far less cold than usual, making it a bit easier to approach her. Was it because of their conversation from yesterday? He did not know, but he did have a feeling that it had, at the very least, helped. Let's just hope she finds some friends and slowly overcomes her demons.
Remembering what she said about Authoritys, Nox made a quick sweep of the crowd. Most of the students were of a similar age. So does that mean young people simply are more compatible with concept fragments? Then why are there two clearly older people in our class? Is it because their bodies were strong enough to withhold it, or were they uniquely compatible with their Authorities? Maybe a combination of both. Or was the fragment simply too small, making it easier for them to accommodate it?
Thinking about fragment accommodation, Nox recalled the pain of taking in the fragment of fate. Was that a sign that he wasn't very compatible with fate? His personality didn't really suit matters connected to fate.
Fate, as far as common folk were concerned, was an all-encompassing force that dictated the outcomes of all living creatures, holding them on a tight leash, constricting the freedom of all, and creating order by doing so.
What kind of person was Noctis? He was someone who enjoyed taking risks to a certain extent; at the very least, he didn't care about control or making all outcomes predictable. In truth, he wanted the opposite in his life.
Logically speaking, in a certain sense, he was one of the most unsuitable people, character-wise, to inherit the fragment of fate. At the same time, however, he was strangely suitable, considering he had a bit of a gift when it came to predictions.
His paradoxical relationship to fate could explain the pain and resistance of the fragment colliding with him and still surviving it. Was this truly enough to survive a fragment of such size? It was speculation on his end, assuming that the size of the fragment had anything to do with the likelihood of surviving such an encounter. But it was a logical conclusion that, with the strength of the fragment, the burden would equally strengthen. Benefits always came with downsides, and nothing in this world was truly free in the end.
So, given that his assumption was right, it didn't seem likely that he would survive such a big fragment only on the basis that he was in the right age class and he had some preexisting conflict with the element.
Was there some other aspect Nox was overlooking, or didn't even know about?
Sighing inwardly, completely engrossed in contemplation.
Unbeknownst to him, at the side, Trish, who was pretending to sleep, noticed that Noctis had been staring at a student for a moment too long.
While he was contemplating, Nox's eyes had, without realizing it, settled on a certain familiar student.
Slowly, a devilish wide grin spread across Trisha's face as she spoke in a teasing tone.
"Ohhhh Noxy, come on, I'll get jealous at this rate."
Hearing this, a cold shiver ran down his spine. Oh no. Not again. His pupils constricting to pinpoints, he looked toward Trisha, flustered.
He had gotten a bit used to her chenanigens by now and knew that if he didn't react properly, he'd be left with a new,... much worse... nickname than before.
He might have been a bit annoyed by the comment, but that would be at most temporary discomfort.
I have to think fast. That can't be the thing she calls me for my time at the academy!
Nox was one thing, but Noxy is a fucking pet name!