I did a light exercise and went jogging.
After returning to the dorm, as per usual I took a shower and ate my breakfast. The breakfast was simple, consisting of cereal, milk, and bread.
I left the room around 7:40 am. I stood in front of the class for a second.
I looked up at the classroom that says Beginner, Alpha. I pushed the door open and entered.
"Hey, Hey, did you see my post on TwitFlick?"
"The fight was epic where they slew the Ice Golem."
"This bag is made with the skin of a Rank-B monster. It is made by a rank 4 blacksmith." …
The same old noisy classroom. The only difference between when I first entered this class and now is that the number of students used to be higher than what it is right now.
Some students had failed the midterm while some were leaving Ace Academy due to the BloodyWolf incident. Even then the number of students seemed quite low compared to the beginning.
Almost a quarter of students were missing compared to the start of school.
The students chattered nonstop and I quietly went to sit in my place.
I could also see the MC and their group. As always, they were surrounded by other students.
10 minutes later, at 8:00 A.M.
Mia Frostine walked into the classroom.
As soon as she arrived, she clapped her hands and gathered the students' attention.
"Today is the start of the second semester. As you know, some of the students were not able to turn up due to getting caught up by the recent increase in Gates."
Gates is similar to the emergence of a new dungeon but it has a rather troublesome peculiarity that is to suck in the people in a certain vicinity.
It will appear randomly and transport the people inside the dungeon. The way to exit is either defeating the dungeon boss or waiting for gates to turn into a stable dungeon which could take months to years.
Your luck is gone if you were sucked into a high-ranked Gate. Apart from that, what makes Gates dangerous is their unpredictable environment.
You could be transported to a place with a high temperature where there is no water and food. To place so cold that no plant could be seen.
It is a problem for people but only some low-ranked and easy Gates appear constantly. The truly dangerous one will only occur maybe once or twice a year. Therefore, it was not treated as a big deal.
However, the amount increased quite exponentially this year. The Gates's appearance rate increased drastically and the Gate ranked at A has already happened four times this year.
Looks like Edolas will soon be caught in something terrible that is not even described in the novel.
"As you all know, the second semester comes with a big change. The main focus of the Academy will be on the Academies Tournament held in four months from now on."
As Mia Frostine said that she looked at her students and gave a satisfied smile. Her class students were one of the best combatant classes in the entire school including senior classes.
She believed many of her students would qualify for the tournament.
"I hope you all try your best to increase your power and participate in the tournament. You will be awarded generous rewards if you can make it into the Top-10."
Top-10 is harder than it sounds. Hundreds of schools will be participating in this tournament. The tournament was a festival like the Olympics and FIFA where all the people would watch the students participate.
Ordinary people will watch it for entertainment.
While the management team of the high-graded guild will look at the tournament to recruit the students with high potential.
Students are also there to show off their talent and strength to the world. Not only can you get the attention of the whole world but also have a chance to get recruited into top guilds.
There was no better opportunity than Tournament of Academies to get recruited into Diamond and Platinum graded guilds.
Academy will be able to showcase its strength with the help of students. The rank of students determines the rank of the academy.
Higher the rank, the better the support from The Authority. Able to get the latest training machines, weapons, and guest lectures from The Authority.
The high-ranking academy will also be given priority when choosing a dungeon for training students. The academy has lots to gain if they get into high ranks.
For the last decade, Ace Academy had bagged first place making it the number one academy in the whole Humalia Domain.
In the novel, this year Ace Academy loses that position to Arcane Academy. Though I can't tell for sure in this reality.
Contrary to the novel, Hiro Ernest has already broken through Rank-D - a month ago. With this speed, it might be possible for Hiro to reach Rank-C - by the time the tournament starts.
But I can't underestimate Arcane Academy which has Rank-C. Not only was he as talented as Zion and Lisa but he was older and is at a higher rank.
In the novel, even Hiro gets defeated by him. Omar Noel is one of the future antagonists in the novel. He gets recruited by the Dark guild through Professor Frey, the teacher of Arcane Academy.
"Before you can participate in the Official tournament, our school will conduct a selection and I hope you can make it. The experience of fighting with the genius of another school doesn't come easy. You should all try to get selected as participants."
Mia continued and told us what to expect in the selection.
"The selection method is not chosen yet but power is what comes down ultimately. As long as you grow stronger in this period of time, you have hope to qualify."
"The selection of participants will begin one month from now on. I hope you all practice hard and get selected."
After dictating whatever she needed to tell, she left the class. Apparently, our school will choose participants from the school in one month.
After that, they will focus on developing those participants for the tournament. It was a great chance since you could practically have all the potions and mana herb to help you become stronger.
It is certain that once someone gets selected as a participant, the gap between them and other students will increase. The top ten will get all the resources while others get none.
I also didn't forget my promise to Professor Mia. I had to qualify as a participant and try to get the win since that item was there.
The item that I want is an Art. A Movement Art to be specific. In the novel, MC Hiro gets the chance to take any treasure from the Academy treasurer after getting the win in the Tournament of Academies.
He would ponder between the Movement Art and a Sword Artifact but in the end, he chooses Sword Artifact as he already has a Movement Art albeit a rank lower than the Movement Art of the treasurer.
It is a good Movement Art which is level 6. I tried to get Movement Art from the auction and market but the highest I managed to encounter was LVL 4.
Art was rare since it is treated as a family treasure and not many would be selling high-level Art.
The Art that others could buy was usually a low-ranked one or those that Explorer got from their raids.
When high-level Art is auctioned, many rich people will try to get their hands on it. The rarity of LVL 6 was enough for most Diamond guilds to be attracted to an auction.
That day we were free to train and I decided to go to NightShade guild to train. Academy training ground is a little noisy for me to train properly.
I could freely get access to a good training room of the NightShade guild. It was better to train here than at the academy if professors were not present.
When professors were present, they would give us valuable advice and show us ways to improve our training or Art.
Most professors of Ace Academy are Rank-A and getting taught by them is very valuable.
As always I fought with NightShade guild members and I could bag a win now and then.
The fight was different compared to when I was just Rank-E. The more I fought, the more obvious it became that they had gone easy on me last time.
However, I was not sad to know these and was rather more encouraged to train. These people were also the same as me, an unknown mob in the novel.
I will train and train until I become the strongest. I will show that even a mob like me can become strong with enough training.
"Let's start the training!"