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Translated By Arcane Translations
Translator: Yuziro
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Michelle had intended to hand the documents directly to Charlotte… but Charlotte’s small request, “-I want to be alone” couldn’t be ignored.
So, Michelle examined the documents in Charlotte’s stead.
‘Ordinary.’
Among the materials Adrian had thrown on the floor, nothing particularly unusual stood out.
This is a study material.
But now that she looked at it, this was just a newspaper article.
And that one, now that she saw it, looked like some kind of magazine…
‘Is it too much of a stretch to think he hid a message in them? I thought there would be something.’
The daughter of the Meinens family sorted the documents.
Magazines with magazines, articles with articles, study materials with study materials.
She’d sorted them due to her compulsive nature, but nothing clicked yet.
The only noteworthy thing was that various materials were underlined with fluorescent mana.
‘I give up.’
There was nothing more to examine.
No matter how she looked at it, there was nothing unusual about these documents.
‘I was being too paranoid.’
Right, Adrian is a human with emotions too.
‘I don’t know why he particularly hates Charlotte, but if he hates her, he hates her.’
Time to actually eat.
Michelle headed towards the dining hall with uneven steps.
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“…Why are they like this? So noisy.”
The students were greatly agitated by something posted in front of the classroom.
She wanted to clear them away with her telekinesis, but she couldn’t treat her classmates like that.
Resigned, Michelle began to push past the students, one by one, to return to her seat when Isabel’s voice called out.
“Michelle!”
“What.”
“Did you see this? If you haven’t, take a look!”
Michelle’s gaze followed Isabel’s pointed finger.
‘A notice?’
It was a very large notice.
Ah, come to think of it, it was about time for such a huge notice to be posted.
With the academy-wide competition just around the corner, it would be strange if it wasn’t posted.
The competition was the largest event held at the academy, so there were countless announcements that needed to be made to the students in advance.
Therefore, the large size of the notice was inevitable.
But soon, Michelle’s head tilted.
It was because of the small piece of paper attached to the right side of the notice, written in Adrian’s handwriting.
Now that she looked, Isabel’s finger was pointing at it too.
“Huh?”
Michelle’s eyes trembled.
› Transformation – Lotten
› Healing – Isabel
.
.
.
›Mana Sprint – Charlotte Forte.
Charlotte was listed as the representative for the ‘Mana Sprint’ category.
The way points were calculated for the competition for each class was very simple.
The scores from each category were simply tallied.
However, Mana Sprint was the category with the highest point allocation in the competition.
In other words, the score obtained in this category often determined the overall ranking.
That being the case, why was Charlotte chosen as the representative?
‘It doesn’t make any sense.’
Michelle unconsciously covered her mouth with her hand.
It wasn’t that she was upset or angry that Charlotte was participating in the category with the highest point allocation.
Given Adrian’s current attitude towards Charlotte, it wouldn’t be surprising if he didn’t let her participate at all.
But to send Charlotte Forte to the most important category?
While ignoring her for a week?
“Michelle, isn’t it strange? What is Professor Adrian thinking?”
“It’s strange. More than strange.”
“Could it be that he hates Charlotte so much that he did this? Like, putting her in the most important category to embarrass her… People do that kind of thing when they hold grudges, right?”
“Don’t be ridiculous.”
Michelle shook her head.
He wouldn’t do something like that.
At least, not Adrian.
Her thoughts grew complicated, and so did her to-do list.
Just as Michelle turned around…
“Ah.”
“……”
Her eyes met with the main character of the Mana Sprint category, Charlotte Forte.
Saying their eyes met might be a bit of a stretch.
Charlotte was staring blankly at the list with an unfocused gaze.
Soon, Charlotte began to tear at her hair.
“Is… is he giving me a chance…? What do I do? If I don’t perform well there, he’ll hate me even more… What am I supposed to do…?”
“Charlotte.”
“What do I do? What should I do…? Can I even perform well? Ah, no. I have to. I have to, right…? That’s the only way he won’t hate me…”
“Charlotte Forte!”
“He hates me. He hates me. He’s going to hate me even more. He’s going to hate me even more…”
Sigh, Michelle let out a deep sigh.
In Charlotte’s current state, it seemed impossible to have a conversation with her.
“Isabel, please take care of Charlotte.”
“Huh? Of course I’ll take care of her… Huh? Michelle! Where are you going?”
Michelle left the failing class students behind and quickly walked away.
Because she now had something she absolutely had to do.
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“There has to be a reason for this. There has to be.”
Muttering to herself, Michelle spread the documents Adrian had thrown across the four-person desk in the academy library.
“And I’m going to find that reason, starting now.”
First, Adrian was showing extreme animosity towards Charlotte.
Second, Adrian had selected Charlotte as the representative for Mana Sprint, the category with the highest point allocation.
At first glance, these two pieces of the puzzle seemed impossible to connect.
Even in other classes, professors typically chose their most cherished students as representatives for Mana Sprint.
There had to be a clue that connected these two pieces.
‘He’s annoying, but he’s not the type of professor to act without reason.’
Michelle first began to scrutinize the parts of the magazines, articles, and materials highlighted with mana.
-Books related to the above materials are available in the Rahel Academy library and…
-Player Ainter wins for the third time!
-The romance novel market is growing rapidly…
The underlining seemed random, but it was carefully selected.
The colors of the underlines were all different, but she decided to start with red.
And among the red underlines, she decided to extract the key words.
‘Let’s pick them out in order.’
[ Library ] [ Third ] [ Novel ]
‘…It seems there really is something here?’
It was too perfect a match to be a coincidence.
With the materials floating around her, controlled by her telekinesis, Michelle began to move, her eyes frantically scanning the documents.
Her destination was, of course, the third section of the bookshelves where the novels were kept.
‘This is where the problem starts.’
-Strengthening Fire Magic.
-Fundamentals of Elemental Synergy.
These two materials were underlined in orange.
It seemed to be the next step after the red underlines.
However, the problem was that only the first letter of each title was highlighted…
“Huh?”
Michelle let out a gasp.
It seemed she had found the answer much faster than expected.
It was the thickest novel prominently displayed in the third section.
Without hesitation, she pulled the book out using her telekinesis.
Compared to the surrounding books, it had significantly less dust.
‘Someone borrowed this recently.’
And that someone had to be Adrian.
Absolutely.
Now, the only thing left was…
-The Correlation Between Mana Distribution and Efficiency
This material was underlined in yellow.
One would be the question, and the other the answer.
‘The novel must be the answer.’
She couldn’t think otherwise.
The yellow underlines were only on the ‘pages’ of the material.
Sweat began to bead on her forehead.
Holding her breath, Michelle rapidly began to process the information.
Flower Garden was a peculiar novel.
It had a strange structure with only one sentence written on each page, which explained its thickness.
She matched the pages underlined in yellow with the pages of Flower Garden.
She listed them.
-Everyone has their circumstances.
-He had no choice.
-“I entrust her to you.”
-It took a whole week.
-Sincerity always prevails.
Thwack!
Michelle’s telekinesis faltered, and the materials floating around her crashed to the floor with a loud noise.
“What… is this?”
It was chilling.
Goosebumps erupted across her skin, momentarily disrupting her telekinesis. Each sentence was fragmented, but understanding the meaning wasn’t difficult.
“He entrusted Charlotte…? For a week? What circumstances…?”
Michelle pressed her hand to her forehead and closed her eyes tightly.
“Phew…”
What in the world was going on?
Should I pretend I don’t know?
In truth, no one could blame Michelle even if she pretended not to know.
It was normal to not decipher this level of coded message.
Moreover, even if Charlotte failed, it wouldn’t affect Michelle’s promotion.
So, no matter how she thought about it, pretending not to know was the right thing to do.
But…
“Damn professor…”
This was Adrian’s first request to Michelle.
“His first request is this? That pervert…”
The first request.
Adrian’s request to Michelle.
What was it?
It was a request the girl couldn’t refuse.
“Ugh, seriously!”
The girl started moving busily again.
Her to-do list was growing longer and longer.
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[Ms. Sherlock Holmes over here]
