Adam bolted to the corridor of the Common Hall in a blur of flapping uniform and sky-blue hair.

Desmond wrapped his feet in purple lightning boots, steps crackling against the floor. "YAHOO! Try to catch us, fools!"

The students who had been eyeing him burst into a ruckus.

"Catch them!"

"You're not leaving until we make you spit out how you're cheating!"

Half the students drew their wands. Chains, snakes, or cuff-shaped spells erupted in a whistling barrage to restrain them.

"You expect that to stop me?" Laughing, Adam lifted his palm.

Winds spiralled into a dark vortex with a strident roar. Space wrapped like origami as Adam left it and continued his escape. Dust rose from between slabs, and the layer of grime left by students' hands was forcefully peeled off walls—devoured by the vortex. When spells entered its boundary, they hummed before the wind tore them to pieces and gravity crushed whatever mana remained.

Wide-eyed, the students from the other two Houses snapped their gaze to the commotion, meat dropping from their forks with a wet plop. But when they saw the other half of the crowd surrounding Elliot, five of them leapt from their seats.

They rushed to the trembling boy, hands reaching for wands at their belts, eyes alight with mana.

"Back off from my junior disciple!" The silver gem slotted at the base of Joshua's intricate wand pulsed as he drew it.

Viktor's other disciples formed a wall in front of Elliot. Beside the boy, Quintella exchanged a glance with Bao. They gestured to the side simultaneously. "I don't know what they want, but good luck, Elliot!" She tucked Bao into her chest pocket, raised a cheerful fist, and moved ten seats away.

"Ah?" Elliot gasped as the princess abandoned him, before a steely glint entered his eyes. It was better. He shouldn't embroil her in his problems, whatever they were.

He turned toward the accusing party, his voice cracking. "What do you even want from me? We worked hard for these points!"

However, the bitter, jealous, and doubtful students from Viktor's class joined the exorcists.

"Drop the act, dimwit. We all know Adam did the heavy lifting. You were just a side figure, a minor enchanter anyone of us could have replaced."

Another teenager pointed his wand at Elliot. "I've perfected my craft for five years. But you!" He hissed through clenched teeth. "You pathetic, undeserving worm dared to steal an apprenticeship. I won't accept it!"

"Steal?!" Joshua's eyes narrowed, and his hand found Elliot's trembling shoulder. "Are you insulting Teacher Viktor's intelligence, or just calling him blind? Elliot's not the brightest, but he works hard, listens to instructions, and, more importantly, doesn't waste his time wallowing like a sore loser. Last warning. Back. Off!"

The students from Viktor's class grimaced, but it was Trevor who answered, his voice loaded with exaggerated ridicule. "Look at you all, going out of your way to stick your noses in our House's problems."

His gaze then locked onto Elliot. "Becoming chummy with rivals? I knew you were a dimwit, Elliot, not a traitor. Send them back and admit how Adam cheats, and we'll leave you to play with your mediocrity. Or would you perhaps prefer to change House? Go on. Take Adam with you." He smirked at Joshua. "We'll even give you Desmond as a freebie."

Nadia stepped beside him, along with the other half of the students who had failed to capture Adam. Her lips curled in a frosty smile as they shoved the students who had intruded on their side away. "Threatening us at our own table. Are you asking for a harsher beating than during last year's tournament, Joshua?"

From the tables on the rostrum, the managers of each dorm dropped their forks—just as Joshua waved his wand with a smile.

A spell shrieked without warning.

Trevor and Nadia's pupils constricted as sixty wands crackled with mana in response.

Elliot bit his lip. A fight would break out just because they were... so jealous they wouldn't believe Adam and he could earn these points?

Before hell broke loose, a shadow fell on the hall.

Then, silence.

The air thickened with energies that made everyone's blood run cold, making them feel as if three monsters had extinguished their spells with a mere breath, as Magna and two other managers—a slender woman with a perpetual frown and a stocky man with a neatly trimmed beard—towered between the two groups.

Magna snorted first, then shook his head. "I'll give Rector Haldris the immense pleasure of reprimanding your immaturity."

The other managers nodded, and as if summoned, Haldris appeared on the rostrum's central seat. His single golden eye pulsed with disappointment barely visible beneath the flaring anger.

With a wave of his hand, Adam and Desmond appeared in the hall.

"By the light! What happened?!" Desmond shouted, while Adam's eyes darted to Haldris.

But the rector ignored them, locking onto Trevor, his voice like an echo from an abyss. "What is the motto of your House?"

Despite the icy sweat sticking his shirt to his back, Trevor forced himself to answer. But his voice came out low, without his earlier confidence. "Through our will we cleanse."

Haldris slammed his thick palm on the table. Cutlery flew in a clinking cacophony that did nothing to diminish the intensity of his voice. "Not through your will, or the strongest will—through OUR will! When I look at you, I only see a crowd of children who know nothing about loyalty, discipline. Kids who waste their time squabbling over how someone earned a few points or mocking those who lost them."

He rose from his seat, swinging his arm in front of him brutally. "I'm tired of seeing you insult this house a little more with each passing day. Minus two hundred points to anyone who dared draw their wands inside the Common Hall." He turned to Magna. "Perhaps knowledge will make them wiser. Turn the exorcists' lounge into a detention classroom. Curfew at dusk, study until nightfall for a week."

His eyes darted to Adam, Desmond, and Elliot, then Quintella, who trained at dawn and night, before he delivered the coup de grâce. "Desmond, Adam, Elliot, and Quintella are exempted. Let this be a lesson you'll learn, for the next one won't be as pleasant."

As soon as his words rumbled, he faded as if he had never been there, leaving behind a lingering bitterness in every student.

The silence stretched for three heartbeats that seemed to last for an eternity before a student shattered it with a desperate scream.

"T-that bastard!" He pointed at Adam. "We almost lost sixteen thousand points in two days because of him!"

Another rushed to the ranking board, his eyes wide in horror. "We're deep in the negative now!"

"Damn it! We've already lost this year's competition. He is... he is far worse than Desmond!"

At his words, everyone's gaze turned toward Adam like a flock of wolves who wished only one thing: to shred him to pieces.

"Oho..." Adam scratched his head before he shrugged. His lips curled into a smirk that split his face as he sneered. "Want to continue? I'm sure Teacher Magna would love to distribute more punishment." He waved, strolling to the corridor by the center as if he owned the hall. "I guess even Desmond has more points than you lot now. How does it feel?"

Magna glared at the students of the House of Exorcism as they raised their wands again. Instantly, they lowered them, fists painfully clenching the wood, their lips bitten until blood dripped down their chins.

Desmond laughed as he followed. "I guess we're the good students now, and all of you outcasts. YAHOOO! That's crazy, really."

Elliot rushed behind them, nodding at Joshua. "Sorry you lost points because of me, and... thank you for your help, senior."

"It's just a thousand points. Don't worry." Joshua winked, his eyes lingering on the small golem tucked against the boy's chest. "But you can show me how you crafted the golem if you're really sorry."

Finally, Quintella slipped out with Bao, chuckling at how her big brother was truly the best at everything he did—even at being a troublemaker.