Chapter 183: The thesis that Instigates Fire/Disaster (4)
Splash!
━What the–?! What was that! Which b@stard splashed water from above?!
The honey beer Edict dropped gave the elf below a beer shower.
━Are you okay?!
━Damn it! It’s sticky! Hey, up there!! Who did this?!
Teclyn covers her mouth with both hands, gasping, and speaks to Edict.
“Hey, go apologize……”
“Shh. Quiet. They can hear you.”
Edict had already pulled his feet back from the railing, crouching low so as not to be seen.
He was huddled up so tightly, not moving a single finger, that it was as if he had been reborn as a pupa.
“…….”
Teclyn stares at Edict with a cold, exasperated look, as if he were a lost cause.
━Damn it! This is why I hate the Scroll Department! This goddamn department is cursed! My luck runs out just by passing by! These trash b@stards!! They’re really the worst!
In the end, the victim under the tree, unable to find the culprit, stomped off angrily.
Edict, who had been peeking down, laughed, finding it hilarious.
“Haha, the way he scurried off was like a rat that fell into water, no, honey beer.”
“You trash. And you call yourself the Department Representative. Ugh.”
Teclyn clicked her tongue in disapproval, looking at her hopeless friend.
Edict, the Representative of the Scroll Department, didn’t seem like a department representative at all.
He couldn’t resist adding a comment.
“That ‘trash’ must’ve meant literal trash rolling on the ground, not ‘scroll+scroll+trash,’ right?”
“Yeah.”
Thud, thud.
Teclyn kept kicking Edict with her foot.
Roll.
Edict rolls and rolls until he bumps into the railing.
Thump!
“Ouch. What are you doing?”
Edict looks at Teclyn and asks what she’s doing. She, still looking at him like he’s trash, replies.
“Taking out the trash.”
“You can’t just litter, you know. Ugh, gotta get up.”
Thud, thud.
Edict obediently admits to being trash and sits up, dusting himself off.
Swoosh.
Then he picks up a piece of paper lying around.
It was one of the note papers for the 3rd year class 『Phonological Approach to Ancient Elven Elemental Magic and Fairy Tone Exploration』.
“In the process of borrowing fairy language, the existence of mana and phonological systems inevitably emerges. For example, the emotion of fire is clearly revealed in the mana contained in fairy language, but the way intense emotions change the pronunciation of sounds also shows a certain degree of correlation……”
Edict started reading again from the part he had left off before drinking his beer.
Preparing for tomorrow’s exam.
He read like that for about a minute.
“Ah, screw it! I don’t get it! I give up! Take this!”
Edict flings the paper in his hand.
Teclyn picks it up, scans it, and makes an incredulous expression.
“……That was literally the first part you just threw away?”
For some reason, she had a bad feeling about this ever since she heard him mumbling to himself.
Could he really be looking at the first week’s lecture notes the day before the exam?
Teclyn looked back and forth between the paper and Edict with a truly unbelievable expression.
But could the Representative of the Scroll Department be intimidated by a mere look?
Edict boldly leans against the railing and puts on a knowing expression, like a true scholar, and starts making excuses.
“What’s the point of studying now anyway? It’s not like it’ll make a difference. I’ll get a D- whether I study now or not. I might as well just retake it next semester.”
A nonsensical excuse.
“Ugh…… You’re hopeless……”
As Teclyn shakes her head in disappointment, Edict makes a suggestion.
“Hey, why don’t you throw yours away too? Let’s think about the bigger picture.”
“You should be studying instead of wasting time.”
“No, this is something I have to think about as the department representative. Like the future of scroll magic, or why we bother clinging to scroll magic when it has no more room for development.”
Edict was a classic example of a bad idealist who worried about grand things while neglecting his own problems.
In fact, he chose the Scroll Department for similar reasons, drawn to the superficial appeal of it being a traditional and historical discipline.
He volunteered to be the Department Representative with the same mindset.
Teclyn, watching Edict, couldn’t help but shake her head at his hopeless self.
“If you’re going to get an academic warning while thinking about such things, you might as well start thinking about which franchise to choose for your Wyvern Chicken.”
“For chicken, it has to be the Scheun family’s Spicy Gold Flamin’ Hot Cheetos Wyvern Bashak Wings.”
Their conversation continued with more nonsense.
But in reality.
Teclyn knew Edict was always like this, even before they entered the Magic Academy. She knew it all too well.
“Stop messing around. If you’re going to throw it away anyway, at least read this. It’s quite interesting. I think you’ll like it.”
Teclyn had another reason for seeking out Edict besides scolding him for not studying.
“Hmm?”
Teclyn takes out a paper file from her inventory and hands it to Edict.
“You can throw away your exam, but as the Department Representative, you have to read this.”
“What’s this?”
“A copy of Senior Ezeri’s master’s thesis. The one she got scouted for 10 billion by Arc-en-Ciel.”
“Oh! The 10 billion lady?”
The news of Ezeri’s 10 billion scout offer, published in the Fael Newspaper that morning, was something no Scroll Department student could miss.
Teclyn, who brought a copy of the thesis, and Edict, the Representative of the Scroll Department, were both aware of it.
“She’s amazing. She’s become the light of our Scroll Department.”
He wasn’t just aware of it; he genuinely thought it was amazing.
“Then you must have read the thesis already, right?”
“…….”
Edict was speechless at Teclyn’s question.
“Sigh. You’re always talking about the future of scroll magic, but you haven’t even glanced at the thesis of the person who embodies that future?”
Ouch!
Teclyn’s words struck Edict like a needle.
He felt the need to defend himself.
“But I have an exam tomorrow. I really wanted to read it, but I didn’t have time because of the exam.”
“You haven’t even finished a single page since this morning, and you dare talk about studying?”
“……”
Edict’s excuse failed miserably from the start.
“Well then, let’s see~ how amazing this 10 billion thesis is~!”
Edict, immediately switching from making excuses to feigning ignorance, laid his eyes on the first page of the thesis.
“Ugh.”
Looking at him, Teclyn lets out a deep sigh of exasperation.
“Seriously, read it. Properly. This is truly rare, no, the very first thesis that properly contains ‘knowledge from another world.’”
“Knowledge from another world……?”
“Yeah. That’s the key point, actually.”
Edict reacts to Teclyn’s mention of knowledge from another world.
Come to think of it, he vaguely remembers seeing something about ‘otherworlder’ in the news article this morning.
He frowns.
“How dare they bring up knowledge from another world, with no lineage, into the sacred realm of scroll studies where tradition and history are paramount! Let’s see what this is about…… “
Edict decided to give the thesis a try.
“……Replacing the Magic Memory Stone used for refrigerant compression in heat pumps with scroll rune language…… Wait, what’s with this title?”
Edict was already put off by the incredibly long title that made him not want to read it.
Teclyn chuckles from beside him, seemingly relating to his sentiment.
“I was the same at first. If it’s that bad, why don’t you start from the middle or read the conclusion first?”
“I think I will.”
Edict straightened his posture and began reading the thesis from the middle.
“Skipping this part.”
A technique he learned from reading numerous theses.
Since you can never fully understand a thesis no matter how many times you read it, you should first skim through it, focusing on the parts you’re curious about and can understand.
So, he skipped all the parts about refrigerants and air conditioners, starting from where it mentioned 『scroll programming』.
But then.
“Hmm, uhm……?”
Edict found something unbelievable in the thesis.
“Kyung-joon…… Is he really human……?”
He mutters to himself, unable to contain his astonishment.
“T, This can’t be…… No, let’s read more……”
Edict had a sudden doubt but decided to focus on the thesis for now.
His gaze gradually changes.
‘His eyes are finally changing.’
Teclyn takes a step back.
To avoid disturbing Edict’s concentration.
Fwoosh.
Edict’s eyes completely changed.
His usual dull, unfocused eyes were gone, replaced by clear, emerald-colored ones.
At the same time, his entire body was enveloped in emerald mana.
Shuuuu.
Then, steam starts to escape from his body.
It wasn’t ordinary steam.
Because the surroundings were filled with the smell of alcohol.
“Cough, cough……!”
‘Just how much did he drink?’
Teclyn, caught in the secondhand drinking experience, couldn’t help but cough and wave her hands.
But the person himself was so focused that he seemed oblivious to everything, even the coughing.
Soon, Edict’s emerald eyes, now perfectly clear, started moving rapidly from side to side.
Right, left, right, left.
As if scanning the letters.
It was like watching Kyung-joon in his Trance state.
[Epic Skill 『Hooli Eyes』]
[A unique skill passed down through generations of the Hooli family bloodline. The Hooli family displays an unparalleled level of concentration once they set their minds to something. In this state, their resistance to other status effects increases dramatically.]
Edict Hooli.
Although Hooli wizards were known for their long-winded ramblings and inability to take care of themselves, they were also known for their tenacity. Once they set their minds on something, they would see it through to the very end.
This was the reason why the Hooli family, despite their shortcomings, were able to maintain their lineage as a family of wizards.
Before long.
Thump!
Edict put down the thesis.
“Huh? You’re done already?”
Edict had finished reading the entire thesis in an instant.
It was a stark contrast to his struggle with 『Phonological Approach to Elemental Linguistics』, which he couldn’t even finish a single chapter of despite studying all day.
“Ah……”
Edict looked like he was in a daze.
He took a deep breath.
And then exhaled.
With a shout!
“T, This is it! This is the future of our scroll magic! No! The future of the Fairy-Elven Alliance!”
Edict seemed deeply moved by the content of the thesis, so much so that he mentioned the future of the Fairy-Elven Alliance.
No, it was more than just being moved.
This was an emotion that transcended admiration and reached the point of reverence!
There was something within that heat pump thesis that could evoke such an emotion……
“Kyung-joon-nim! He is the God of Scrolls!!”
……And that something was none other than Kyung-joon.
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