Reborn As A Nephilim: The Rise of A Manaless Prince

"Are you telling the truth?"

Professor Orfina asked with a scrutinizing glare.

After the group had managed to escape from the forest, they were shepherded straight towards the medical tent, where Arvell's condition was being treated.

They'd force-fed Arvell various concoctions, aiming to heal his body, but none of them seemed to work.

In the end, Arvell told them that his body was fine, and he was just exasperated after the ordeal.

Somehow the medical team all believed him and decided to redirect their attention to the other injured examinees.

Arvell returned Professor Orfina's penetrating gaze with a soft-yet confident smile.

"Yes. We only managed to harm that beast to that extent because we threw an enflamed object into its mouth."

Titus nodded in agreement.

While Titus didn't see Arvell pull it off, if he was alive while the beast was covered in horrible burns, it was pretty clear what had happened.

Of course, he'd not seen the corpse himself, but according to Lydia, Arvell and Professor Orfina, the beast was covered in many terrible burns.

Having heard from that many people, Titus had taken their word as the general truth.

Why would all three of them lie to him?

"Um… I did notice that it seemed to be afraid of fire. With its huge physique, any normal beast would have been fine taking my spell head-on, but for some reason, this beast tried its best to not let the fires touch it. It didn't eat me since it would have risked being touched by the fire." Lydia added.

"I see…"

Professor Orfina jotted some notes onto her clipboard and sighed to herself.

She inhaled deeply before shouting at the top of her lungs.

"MALCOLM!"

A young man who looked to be in his mid-twenties hurriedly entered the medical tent.

"You called professor?"

His appearance looked slightly ragged as if he had barely received any sleep.

The dark circles under his eyes only added to that impression.

"We'll have to cancel and end the exam early."

Malcolm's eyes went wide as he stared at Professor Orfina blankly.

"End the exam early?"

"We don't know how many examinees that thing has killed or if there are more of them lying around."

Realizing the truth in Professor Orfina's words, Malcolm nodded his head in understanding.

"T-that does make sense… I'll get right to it!"

He respectfully bowed to the professor before hurrying out of the tent to inform the other staff on standby.

They'd need to bring back all the examinees scattered throughout the forest.

A taxing ordeal, to say the least.

Arvell turned his Professor Orfina with a conflicted expression.

"If you don't me asking, do you have any idea how a big beast managed to sneak onto the examination grounds?"

While he was asking politely, Arvell was internally seething.

Due to a blunder on their part, he almost lost his life.

He wasn't too angry at Professor Orfina, considering she saved his life, albeit coming only at the last moment.

Arvell's anger was directed at the examination team as a whole.

Wasn't this Elantrya's most prestigious academy?

How could they make blunders this big?

"You don't need to act so reservedly; as a victim, you have every right to know."

Professor Orfina kneaded her brows with a pained expression.

"We don't know exactly why this occurred, but we have suspicions and several plausible theories. Right now, we're leaning toward the possibility that this beast ranked up from the peak late-stage rank 1 to early-stage rank 2, without our knowledge."

Arvell sighed when he heard this.

Indeed, this could happen, and it wasn't that rare of an occurrence either.

Ranking up was a phenomenon that beasts typically underwent after storing up enough energy within themselves.

Energy which they slowly accumulated from consuming other beings.

Namely humans and other beasts.

But…

If a beast was going to rank up, there would have been telltale signs from its behaviour.

Such as being far less aggressive and opting to avoid upfront confrontations.

Instead, they prioritized finding a safe place to successfully breakthrough instead.

This was commonly referred to as the 'calm before the storm' phenomenon by various beast hunters.

If a beast was acting unnaturally passive, that was a glaring red flag.

For an academy staff member to miss something that was basically common sense…

Arvell didn't even know what to say.

'Is this academy really worth attending, Lykos? From the big deal everyone made of this academy, its quality is surprisingly y lacking.

As much as I hate to admit it, living out in the wilderness seems the better option here.'

'I'd have to agree with you there. This is too pathetic, especially for such a prestigious academy.'

A small smile formed on Arvell's lips.

'At least I broke my insignia beforehand. So I can use that as a convenient excuse to not attend anymore.'

Lykos raised his eyebrow at Arvell's words.

'What happened to trying to meet your childhood friend again?'

Arvell closed his eyes as his mouth curved into a frown.

'Not being able to see her is regrettable… to say the least. Even so, as long as we are alive, there is always a 'next time.' If I can't see her now, I'll just have to meet her again in the future.'

Arvell decided to make his intentions to withdraw from the academy clear, but before he could open his mouth, Professor Orfina beat him to the punch.

"You were the one who broke your examination insignia, right?"

Arvell tried to nod but gave up after being unable to move.

"Yes."

"Ok, you don't need to worry about that anymore; I'll pretend like that never happened."

"Huh?"

Arvell's looked at Professor Orfina with visible confusion.

"But the exam rules strictly state that breaking your insignia garners an automatic fail."

A slight smile formed on Professor Orfina's lips.

"I'm the one who made the rules, and I'm the one who can change them as well. We'll consider your examination results as if you hadn't broken your insignia."

While that didn't mean he instantly passed the entrance exam, at least he didn't fail.

"Isn't that a little too convenient?"

Professor Orfina shrugged her shoulders with a tired look on her face.

"Perks of being in charge."