Chapter 71 October 3, 2022
Chapter 71 – Freuden Wolfsburg
‘If he knows that I’m a commoner, isn’t he going to attack me right away?’
Lynne swallowed her saliva.
She had thoughts that she could just pretend not to know him and get out of there.
“Hm. You are?”
Freuden looked at Lynne and raised his eyebrows.
Then he came close to her and stretched his head out to her abruptly.
Lynne’s heart sank at his reaction.
“Hmm.”
Lynne felt a burning sensation in her stomach as he was staring deeply at her.
Did the leader of the aristocratic faction recognize her?
‘No way, he didn’t remember anything about the Dynema Romley case, right? What if he held me responsible for that right now?’
Lynne’s brain went haywire.
According to the rumors she’d heard, Freuden was famous for being a demon who hated commoners and had no mercy.
In the meantime, Freuden didn’t avert his gaze from Lynne.
When his gaze eventually lingered on the book about the non-property magic that Lynne was holding in her arms…
Lynne hid the book behind her hurriedly without realizing it.
Freuden’s eyes narrowed at her.
“You…”
“Ye-yes?! Do you have anything to say?!”
“…No, it’s nothing.”
When Lynne showed an extremely intense reaction, Freuden shook his head as if saying never mind.
“More than that, how did you get here? Most students wouldn’t come this far.”
“Th-that’s…”
Lynne was contemplating how to make up the excuses for that.
Freuden squinted his eyes more suspiciously at Lynne’s attitude.
Lynne was nervous at such a sight.
Freuden was obviously a strikingly handsome man.
His skin was white, and his jawline was slender, so he had a very sharp image, but his unique eyes made him possess a considerable charisma.
His parted hairstyle that revealed his forehead raised his atmosphere even more.
Since the rumor had spread about how strong he was, Lynne was unknowingly feeling intimidated.
She replied frankly to the fear that she might die if she lied to make excuses.
“That’s because I heard someone singing.”
“Someone singing?”
“Yes. So unknowingly I… If… if I knew that this was your place, I wouldn’t have come here! Really! Please believe me!”
Lynne begged him, saying that she was wrong as if she thought that it was the time to do so.
Freuden looked at her with slightly opened eyes and then muttered, his gaze averted elsewhere.
“I see. So you heard a song.”
“Yes. The song…”
“How was it?”
“Pa-pardon?”
“No, never mind. I’m sure you just happened to be here.”
“Re-really? It’s a relief.”
“Instead, I want you to keep it a secret from other students. This is my private space. My own space that even my own royal bodyguards don’t know about.”
“Yeah…”
Lynne was at a loss for words at Freuden’s attitude that was completely different from her thoughts.
“Well, aren’t you mad?”
“Mad? Why should I?”
“W-well that’s because I…”
‘I’m a commoner, though.’
“I won’t blame you for coming here. You look like a freshman because you’re still in your times of wandering around. All you have to do is keep what you see in this place a secret.”
“O-of course! I won’t tell anyone! Really!”
“Are you going to promise me?”
“Yes! I promise you!”
“Yeah. Then it’s fine.”
He communicated better than she thought.
Lynne doubted that it was Freuden, the one that was rumored to be infamous for his notoriety.
‘No way, does he misunderstand and think that I’m an aristocrat? It doesn’t seem like that, though.’
At least, according to the rumors that she had heard so far, Freuden Wolfsburg had always been cold-hearted enough as if he was seemingly ready to eat someone.
However, the Freuden that she faced currently wasn’t like that at all.
That was when Lynne’s eyes wandered about the charming flower garden in front of her.
‘Did he raise all of them?’
Probably. From Freuden’s reaction, it must be his private space.
In other words, it was Freuden that had decorated all those neat and small vacant lots and flower beds.
‘I can’t believe it’s all made by Freuden.’
That Freuden?
The eldest son of the Wolfsburg family, one of the three duke families of the Empire?
He was a symbol of fear for the commoners, and even fellow aristocrats were stumped by him, right?
At least the aristocrats that she knew were so extravagant that she was astonished by their basic hobbies.
They would buy expensive clothes, buy fancy accessories, or have a tea party amongst themselves.
The same went for the lower aristocrats, but if it was a higher aristocrat, of course they were bound to be more extravagant than that, she didn’t think that they would be any less extravagant.
But Freuden was different.
‘I can’t believe he’s such a plain aristocrat.’
In addition, the vacant lot, small flower bed, and his soft singing sound…
‘No way, did senior Freuden sing that song?’
Lynne was about to ask that, but she immediately took it back.
‘No. It’s much better not to attract his attention here uselessly.’
Freuden was unexpectedly merciful, unlike what she knew, so it was the right choice to get out safely using that gap.
“I-I won’t spread rumors. I didn’t see anything today. Yes. So I’ll get going.”
“Yeah.”
‘So he didn’t hold me back.’
Freuden really seemed to have no intention of belittling or looking down on her for being a commoner.
Lynne was relieved inside.
“Then, I’ll go.”
It was when Lynne was stepping back slowly…
“Lynne.”
“Yes?!”
“You can come here again if you want.”
“…Pardon?”
“I’m telling you that you can come here again. Hmm. Yeah. I’m especially giving you permission.”
“…”
Lynne didn’t understand what that was all about.
Was he mocking her? Or was it something he said sincerely?
Even if it was a mere teasing and not sincere words, it was still scary in its own way.
—Because that would mean Freuden threw a joke at her.
“Ah, yes.”
It must be just something he said, right?
As she moved away from Freuden, Lynne could only think that she was just dreaming.
Because that day was full of unbelievable things.
With a quick step, she escaped from Freuden’s secret garden.
But why…?
As she moved away from the vacant lot, she felt like Freuden’s eyes kept staring at her behind her back.
Ludger’s class had begun.
Ludger, who entered the lecture on time without being a second late, naturally skimmed through the platform where the students were sitting.
They had shown extremely bored faces previously, but after he showed his Coordinate spell, the students’ concentrations had returned.
One month would proceed easily that way.
Ludger opened his mouth while nodding his head with satisfaction.
“The first exam period is coming soon.”
His low voice echoed throughout the classroom.
First exam…
There were many exams to be taken during their school year, but the word ‘first exam’ were heavy to the students.
Moreover, that was the first exam for the first-year students after they entered Sören.
There was no way they considered the weight to be light.
Most of all, they had only a sense of duty to do well on their first exam.
“As I have told you guys last time as well, I plan to teach the Source Code only to the top students who do well on their exam.”
“Of course, I won’t teach you the whole Source Code. What you can get from the first exam is one of the Frameworks that make up the Source Code.”
The Source Code spell consisted of a total of four Frameworks.
In other words, even if they obtained the Framework through the first exam, it was practically meaningless if they did not make it to the top five in the next one.
If they wanted to learn Source Code magic, they had to do well from the first exam to the final exam at the end of the semester.
—They had to maintain an uncontested top-five ranking in all four tests.
“I also wonder who will be able to learn my Source Code magic in the end. We can see this first exam as a stepping stone to mark the beginning.”
Gulp.
Some of the students swallowed their saliva and clenched their fists.
Their reactions were mixed with half expectations and tension.
In the meantime, however, there were also some people who showed their composure.
“As this is the first exam, there will be nothing that’s very difficult. It’s an exam to see how well you’ve been listening to my classes based on the fundamental topics.”
There were sighs of relief everywhere at Ludger’s words.
Still, Ludger said he wouldn’t make it difficult, so they decided that there was no need to be greatly nervous.
“I think you already know all the subjects yourselves, but I’ll let you know just in case. If you still don’t know, write down what I’m telling you now.”
As soon as he said those words, the students took their pens out of their writing supplies.
Even if they already knew it, since he would tell them again, they decided to write it down just in case.
‘Tsk. So stupid.’
Flora laughed inwardly at the urgent actions of such students.
She had already remembered everything that Ludger had taught her.
‘Of course, I remember it because I’m smart. It’s obviously not because I liked this professor’s class.’
While she was rationalizing to herself like that, Ludger told the students his subjects one by one.
“The set of exam questions ranges from Mana Dynamics I, the Fundamental of Natural Science, Elemental Understanding, and Elemental Beginning Introduction. The questions consist of a total of 20 essays.”
The essays were to prevent them from cheating just in case.
In addition, in the case of the questions that required calculation, he strongly warned them to write down all the formulas.
“Even if your answer is correct, if the formula is strange, I will consider it to be wrong. In the opposite case, I’ll still give you a partial score. So don’t bother if you only know it vaguely. and review your answers properly.”
Ludger’s explanation was neat.
Even the students didn’t have anything else to ask.
“Since it’s your first exam, I’ll go easy.”
“What do you mean by ‘easy’?”
“It’s an open-book exam.”
“Pardon?!”
Some freshmen responded to the shouts as if asking ‘What’s wrong?’.
The surprised response came from the sophomores.
‘They’re still freshmen, so they don’t know the meaning of open-book exam, I see.’
When it came to an open-book exam, they would think it was a very easy exam because they could look at the answer and write them down.
But in fact, it was different.
There was only one case in which the professor allowed the students to open their books…
‘The questions are going to be so hard that it’ll be hard to find the answers even with the books.’’
However, some students who didn’t know what it meant were just busy liking the word ‘open-book’.
The second-year students laughed inwardly at such first-year students.
They would understand it when they saw the spicy taste of the open-book exam.
‘He said he’s going to go easy, but he’s implementing an open-book exam from the first one? How difficult will the exams be after this?’
Knowing the true nature of the open-book exam, Lynne did not stop taking notes with a slightly blank look on her face.
In the meantime, she suddenly felt someone was looking at her, so she turned her head.
‘Oh.’
Flora Lumos was looking at her.
But her gaze disappeared as if it was just passing by.
‘What?’
But Lynne felt a strange discomfort without realizing it. She felt like Flora was looking at her with a slightly wary eye.
She had always been too observant of others to dismiss it as a mere illusion.
“I will stop explaining about the exam here. Let’s go straight to the lesson.”
Lynne had no choice but to set aside her doubts for the moment following Ludger’s words.
***
Soon after his class, night came to announce the approaching holiday.
Ludger soon got himself ready to go out, and then he drove down to Leathevelk in a carriage.
It was the day of the meeting.
The meeting was about how they would deal with Leathevelk’s underworld in the future.
Wearing a black long coat, he stood on the sidewalk that was decorated with tile blocks and wore his hat profoundly.
At that moment, a black-coated car stopped in front of him with a ringing engine sound.
The door of the car rattled open, and soon, a familiar face smiled at him.
“Get in.”
“Where did you get a car?”
Ludger naturally sat in seat behind Han’s and asked.
Hans, who was behind the wheel, answered as he started the car’s engine.
“Well, the Black Dawn Society members have been doing this and that. There was also a transportation industry among them, and they only brought the cars with the best performance.”
“I see.”
“Oh, of course, I don’t use it for personal use. But still, you’re coming, so you have to be cool like this, right? The place we have to go to is a place like that as well.”
“That’s true.”
“So about today’s meeting, how do you plan to go?”
“What do you mean ‘how’?”
Ludger took one-eyed spectacle out of his inner pocket, put it on, and arranged his collar.
“I’ll go as I always do.”
“Haha. As expected from you.”
Hans drove to the meeting place.
It was not long before they stopped at a bar on the side of the boulevard full of colorful lights.
Customers were crowded from the entrance, and women wearing heavy makeup were waving their hands to attract customers.
“It’s uselessly extravagant.”
“Well, wouldn’t it be better than doing the meeting in a dirty and dark place?”
“That’s true.”
“Let’s get going.”
The two got out of the vehicle.
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