Chapter 13: The Selection (III)

"What is so funny about that?" Joan asked Thomas in a low voice, completely baffled.

"Joan, if you consider me a friend, please take my advice to heart—do not listen to a word that old scoundrel Walter says! You must give it your all in the draft and finish in the top four!"

"Why the top four?" Thomas’s unusual solemnity sent a ripple of unease through Joan.

"Because I don't want you to fall into Walter Lee's hands and become another sacrificial victim of his exploitation!" Thomas lowered his voice to warn Joan. "According to the draft rules, each mentor can select up to three new students, but must take at least one. Walter Lee holds the fifth pick. As long as your score squeezes into the top four, you can escape his clutches!"

"This Master Lee... is he very harsh on his students?" Joan asked tentatively.

"Harsh? He's downright cruel!" Hatred flickered across Thomas's eyes as he spoke of Walter Lee's character. "Walter Lee's students are notoriously difficult to graduate. There is a fifth-year student named Martin Smith who met all the graduation criteria three years ago, but the 'Old Owl' has repeatedly held him back year after year using all sorts of excuses. Now in his twenties, he is still wasting away on campus, forced to act as Walter Lee's unpaid assistant, doing every dirty and exhausting chore imaginable. Just imagine how miserable that is!"

Joan's scalp tingled as he listened.

No wonder Mr. Javier held such a low opinion of Walter Lee. While the man's teaching proficiency might be decent, his moral character fell terribly short of his title as a mentor!

"With a man like Walter Lee still acting like a tyrant in the school, why doesn't the headmaster do something about it?" Joan asked indignantly.

Thomas shrugged, looking somewhat helpless. "Mentors in the Arcane Department hold very lofty statuses. Besides, ever since Leighton College was founded, it has operated under a mentor-responsibility system. Whether a student receives a diploma depends not only on their academic performance, but also on whether their mentor is willing to sign off on it. If a mentor refuses, they can simply claim, 'This student has not yet mastered my true teachings. If I let them graduate and someone asks whose student they are, I cannot afford to lose that face.' To uphold the mentor's reputation, demanding strict standards from students is considered reasonable. Even if the headmaster knows the man is overly harsh, it's not easy for him to intervene. Otherwise, all the mentors in the school might unite to boycott the headmaster, and he would have no choice but to pack his bags and leave."

"That is truly dark..." Joan felt a chill run down his spine.

"What's even darker is that a man like Walter Lee isn't stupid at all; he knows how to tailor his treatment to who you are. He is extremely warm and amiable to students from wealthy backgrounds, and even if their academic performance falls short of graduation standards, he finds ways to bend the rules. That's why he is so well-liked in Leighton Port's high-society circles, and it's one of the reasons the headmaster doesn't dare offend him lightly. As for those country boys from impoverished backgrounds, he doesn't regard them as human beings at all. Those powerless, penniless youngsters are arbitrarily suppressed by him without ever daring to resist." Thomas patted Joan's shoulder, a complex expression in his eyes. "Now do you understand why Walter Lee just called those contracted students to his side? I was worried the 'Old Owl' had his eyes on you, so I followed them over to hear what tricks he was trying to play. Joan, if you are unfortunate enough to be chosen by him, I... I will find a way to pull strings through my family, either to help you change mentors or to get myself assigned to Walter Lee's tutelage. With me there to back you up, the 'Old Owl' will be somewhat restrained and won't dare to mistreat you too badly."

Joan was deeply moved, never expecting that a classmate he had met just today could be so fiercely loyal. It seemed that wealthy young masters in the city were not all bad; occasionally, there were warm-hearted and public-spirited people like Thomas.

Joan was quite lucky. He drew a lottery position near the bottom—third from last—which allowed him to thoroughly observe the performances of the other students before his own interview and learn how to handle this unfamiliar evaluation.

When his turn finally came, despite having built up some confidence and drafting a mental outline in advance, asking someone as naturally shy and introverted as him to give a self-introduction in front of all the mentors and students still required him to break through a difficult and invisible psychological barrier.

Standing in the center of the playground, the focus of hundreds of gazes, Joan inexplicably felt his throat go dry, tension turning his mind completely blank.

He stood there blankly for two full minutes, noticing that some of the mentors were already showing obvious signs of impatience. Yet, still unable to conquer his inner demons and speak fluently, he could only raise his hand with a sense of near despair and stammer, "Excuse me, may I... may I read from this?" With that, he held up a sheet of paper containing the outline he had written while watching the other interviews.

The mentors exchanged glances and chuckled.

Walter Lee frowned, believing Joan's stage fright was utterly disgraceful. "If everyone is going to read from a script, what is the point of an interview? We might as well just turn it into a written test!"

"A country boy who hasn't seen much of the world—getting stage fright is perfectly normal, nothing major," a chubby, ruddy-faced middle-aged mentor said with a smiling, placating tone. "Just let him read from the script! After all, we're selecting apprentice mages here, not expecting to train these kids to be lawyers or diplomats. What does it matter if his eloquence is a bit lacking? Am I right, everyone?"

"Master Rawls is right! When I was young, I didn't dare speak in public either. As I got older, my skin gradually grew thicker."

"Just let the boy read from his notes; there's no rule saying interviews must be memorized."

After a brief, chattering discussion among the mentors, Master Rawls's opinion ultimately won overwhelming support, and they all agreed to let Joan use his pre-written draft for his self-introduction.

Joan breathed a sigh of relief, silently thanking Master Rawls, who had inadvertently helped him through his ordeal. Holding the draft, he stammered through his origins and background, recounting everything truthfully except for concealing his "aberrant bloodline."

After introducing his background, the final self-assessment required him to state his mage level, spellcasting attributes, and signature spells. With a dozen pairs of eyes enhanced with "Greater Arcane Sight" staring up at him from below, Joan didn't dare conceal a thing and answered honestly:

"Second-circle mage, Intelligence attribute 22, and my most proficient spell is... 1st-circle Greater Mage Hand."

Before Joan could even finish his sentence, a tide of cascading gasps had already erupted around the playground. Including Thomas Chapman, every single new arcane-track student participating in the draft was deeply shocked by Joan's strength.