It was a cool chilly morning, the sun hasn’t even fully risen. There was still some part covered with dew, hence visibility was low to some point. But in this particular area, silence seems to fill it up making it as still as a graveyard. A huge shadow could be seen on the ground and footsteps which were slow but steady, causing vibrations on the ground at every step could be heard.
On getting to a point, a door is slid open and the view is changed to inside the open space which is huge and filled with chairs, seeming to be capable of accommodating a huge crowd, but it was devoid of any life-form at this moment, even down to the native insects of this world. It was at this point that a voice is heard, seeming to come from the shadow, “Huh, seems like I came a bit early”.
Today is the first day of school for Andrew and Marian, and they were both dressed up, Andrew is the reason that they were this late to school, he didn’t seem as motivated as Marian was about coming to school and he had to be woken up countless times and finally with the old madam threatening about throwing away his wine did he get down from the bed. Seems like the entrance ceremony is the only time Andrew intends to be early to school as he yawns on getting down from the carriage and stretches hard, almost ripping his uniform.
“Hurry up, we are late”, Marian says on seeing Andrew just standing there and spacing out. “Ohh, are we?”, Andrew asks while being dragged by Marian without any resistance. Marian just clicks her tongue in annoyance while contemplating if she should probably start planning to get to school on her own and when Andrew feels like, he could come on his own.
But after a moment of thought, she discards such an idea. The reason she didn’t go along with Andrew on the examination day was due to the fact that she thought he has gone on his own, and she felt somehow that day. But after finding out that he went to see Olivia off, her mind became settled.
They raced through the building and soon they were in front of the classroom. But the teacher was already in class and they seem to be the last set of people who came to class. Marian was nervous about entering the class, Andrew just stares at her briefly before he slides open the door. The door being slid open caused all eyes to focus on the newcomers, but this didn’t cause Andrew to fidget or feel nervous one single bit, but he instead walks into the classroom, while Marian was still outside, staring blankly at the courage Andrew had to do such a thing. But she still steps in and bows lowly in the direction of the teacher who was a middle-aged man, a bit robust but average in height.
The man stares at Andrew with obvious anger, “Stop there”, his voice resounds in the hall. But Andrew keeps walking by like he wasn’t the one being talked to. “I said stop there or are you deaf?”, the teacher roars in a loud voice.
The man was actually in the speed realm and if such an aura was used on the normal students, perhaps they would have been shaken. But this was Andrew who has been through dozens of life or death situations, has been at death’s door multiple times and has also fought against experts in the same realm as that of the vice principal. Such an aura used before such an expert was meaningless, but Andrew still decides to give him face and turns towards him.
On noticing that he has gotten the attention of Andrew, the man felt good thinking that Andrew feared him, hence he has no choice but listen to him. But the indifference in Andrew’s eyes, as he stared at him, made him angry, it even got to the point that he even felt like Andrew was like a predator looking at him as if he was some kind of prey, and he involuntarily took a step back.
But it was a minute feeling after all, and the fact that he even took a step back due to just a stare from Andrew got him more annoyed. “Why are you just coming to my class?”, he asks while taking steps towards Andrew. ‘It couldn’t have been him who caused me to move back. That’s impossible, at least not from a kid of this age. It must have been an illusion’, was what he told himself while walking towards Andrew. But there were just two people who reacted out of the whole class, one of whom was Alex who stared at Andrew with an interesting gleam in his eyes, ‘He seems to be stronger than the teacher, but I wonder if he is as strong as I am. But all that doesn’t matter, as I would crush you no matter what’. The other one was a fat boy who sat on two seats all by himself, he just raised his fat head which he laid on the desk formerly and rested it back immediately while saying inwardly, ‘That aura came out of nowhere just now. Is the teacher stronger than I think he is?’.
This was the same boy who came super early to school. He was the son of the minister of finance in the capital. He scored exactly fifty per cent on the exam, he was the last on the list. But no one in his family would think that he was not brilliant to score more than as he was always praised by his father and even though he had elder brothers, he is the young master of the family, the one to lead the next generation of the family. He is actually in the strength realm just like the teacher. Seems like they are other crouching tigers and hidden scorpions in this set of students and by some sort of coincidence, they all ended up in the same set.
With his eyes dull as if not putting the teacher in his sight, Andrew asks, “Why were you screaming?”. Noticing the tone in which he was being spoken to, the teacher says, “Get out of my class this instant”. “And why should I?”, asks Andrew. “Because I said so”, the teacher says in anger, just a bit more and he would show this kid one or two. “I don’t think that’s actually in the rules of the school. So I would politely decline”, Andrew replies. After which he didn’t pay any more attention to the teacher and just walks towards his seat. Getting admitted into this school might make other people proud and not want to get on the bad side of any of the teachers, but that didn’t ring true for Andrew. He has his reasons why he came to school. Apart from the fun which he had initially stated, he has broken through quite rapidly this period and needed time to solidify his foundation. Although that shouldn’t waste much time, he felt like there was a voice in his head which was telling him to take it easy for a longer time and not hurry to break through for a while and after this period that he could be quick with his breakthrough and there would be no repercussions. His instincts have always been right and that voice has saved him quite a few times. So, since he decided to listen to this voice, he thought it would be cool to at least learn one or two from this kingdom. If he can’t learn from the school though, he has no qualms with just playing around for a while. He has after all not even broken any rule and the teacher wasn’t the one who helped him wrote his exams or even paid his tuition fees, so he didn’t deem it fit to give him face.
Although the man wanted to, he couldn’t argue with the fact that coming late to class wasn’t part of the rules laid behind but no student would want to do that since that would mean getting in the bad books of the teachers, as no teacher would like any student who comes late to their class.
“What’s your name boy?”, the teacher finally asks with a devious grin on his face. “It’s Andrew. The top student”, he replies nonchalantly while heading down towards the last row of the class.
The teacher was shocked at first when he heard the name and the fact that he was the top student. ‘So you are arrogant due to coming out on top huh’, he snorts inwardly. Then he went back to the podium with his recovered expression. He nods at Marian who hurriedly goes up to take her seat, it was not that he had not thought about taking it all on Marian since it looked like they both came in, but he gave up such an idea.
She sat far away from Andrew, not because she was avoiding him but due to the fact that she would be distracted if she sat close to him. The students were mostly all shocked about the way Andrew responded to the teacher, with the exception of some selected few who paid little to no attention to all that just happened.
The teacher soon resumed his lecture, he was responsible for etiquette classes, and he was just going through the basics of it all before Andrew stepped in. His classes ranged from anything that concerns proper eating habits to dancing to formal greetings and the rest. Which most of the students have already been trained in since they were little. So for most of them, this particular class was unneeded but it was a general class which could not be avoided.
Andrew quickly got bored with the class and almost starts dozing off, the teacher has been paying attention to him and his expression got ugly on seeing that he was about to sleep in his class. “Hey, top student”, the teacher called out. “Huh”, Andrew stood up while staring at him. “What was the last thing I said?”, the teacher asks. “Ohh”, Andrew’s eyes dim as if trying to remember what was being said. The teacher on noticing this was about to mock Andrew for his nonchalant attitude towards his teaching but he was stopped in his tracks as Andrew starts speaking, “Was it something along the lines of during a formal gathering, it’s compulsory to keep one hand free? And it is also good to stand up while greeting other people? Something like that right?”. The teacher was therefore unable to mouth out what he wanted to initially say. He had thought that the fact that Andrew was dozing off meant that he wouldn’t be able to remember what he had said but he seems to be wrong.
It felt like he was forcefully swallowing his vomit and the mocking smile on Andrew’s face made it all the worse. But he didn’t have to hold it in for long as soon enough the bell rang for the end of his period and thus he quickly left the class without so much as a single word. The presence of Andrew in his class was crazily annoying to him. Everyone would think that Andrew is rude but since seeing this teacher, he hasn’t been comfortable and he didn’t want to act the part of a good student. He didn’t come to this world and was given a second chance to bow his head lower than it was intended. So he didn’t mind the fact that the teacher was offended by him.
The next teacher that came in was about the subject of calligraphy. Unlike the previous class, Andrew didn’t behave rudely to this new teacher and was actually attentive and shockingly, he seems to have some idea of this subject and to a notable point too.