The Genius Summoner of the Necromancer School
Running up and down the steep mountain slopes had been going on for over 30 minutes.
Simon and the students of Class A were breathlessly following Hong Peng when suddenly the path came to an end.
In Simon's view, two cliffs appeared, with a stream rushing between them, creating white foam.
"You need to use the Shadow to leap across the valley ahead," Hong Peng said, causing some students to become frightened.
"Jump over there?" one student asked nervously.
"It's okay. You just need a little technique. Like when you create Shadow on the palm of your hand, this time you release it from the soles of your feet," she explained, demonstrating by leaping into the air.
Under her feet, black smoke exploded with a bang, and she showed off double and triple jumps in the air.
Exclamations of admiration erupted from all around.
"You don't even need to do aerial jumps," she said, landing with a tumble.
"At the moment you step off, release the Shadow from your feet as if you're spraying it. It's the feeling of stepping on the Shadow and jumping."
Hong Peng, leading the way, ran past the students, stepped on the ground, and leaped.
With a whoosh, she soared several meters, easily crossing the valley and landing on the other side.
"Come on!" she laughed, waving her arms.
The students following her had mixed feelings.
The valley wasn't very deep, but no one wanted to become a laughingstock by falling in at the start of the semester.
Some students who needed more preparation slowed down, while those who were confident shouted and leaped forward.
"Here we go!" they yelled.
They jumped.
Beneath their feet, a faint black smoke could be seen.
Three out of five landed gracefully, one rolled on the ground, and another barely managed to grab the edge of the cliff.
"Well done!" Hong Peng approached and helped pull him up.
The male student awkwardly smiled as he climbed the hill.
"The timing of releasing the Shadow was a bit late. Try to do it faster next time!"
"Thank you, professor!"
Following that, other students also stepped on the ground and leaped.
The class of Kizen freshmen seemed to be living up to their reputation, as all twenty successfully jumped across.
Simon, watching from behind, felt a bit anxious.
'The feeling of stepping on the Shadow, the feeling of stepping on the Shadow...'
"You look like you're overthinking, Simon," Dick said, casually waving his fingers.
"I'll go first!"
He ran off, showing his back, then jumped off the ground, pulling his knees to his chest as he soared into the air.
"Wow!" The cheers from the female students made Dick's lips curl up.
However, the cheers weren't for him.
When Dick looked up, he saw Hector spinning in the air a meter higher than him.
Swoosh!
Then Hector slid down, landing perfectly with both feet on the ground.
"Well done!" Hong Peng smiled brightly, giving a thumbs-up.
Hector also gave a thumbs-up and finished with a polite bow.
"Nice, Hector!" "As expected!" He high-fived the factions that had crossed first.
"... I just can't warm up to that guy," Dick muttered, his face buried in the dirt after a failed landing.
"Whoa!" At that moment, a second cheer erupted from behind.
Dick and Hector turned around in surprise.
'What the...!'
Simon was flying through the air with both feet pointing upwards.
Then his waist bent, and his legs came down, skidding backward on the ground.
Screech!
His body stopped right in front of a nearby rock, passing by Dick and Hector.
"Very well done!" Hong Peng clapped her hands in delight.
'This guy...' Hector's facial muscles twisted unpleasantly.
Simon bowed to Hong Peng and returned to the students.
Dick, who had been leaning against a tree with a smug look, raised his palm.
Simon grinned and high-fived him with a loud smack.
'He's starting to show the qualities of a special student number one.'
'Wasn't he a major in martial arts?'
The students whispered about Simon, and Hector's expression grew more rigid.
He could see his plans going awry.
"Alright! Other students, jump!" From then on, things proceeded quickly.
Contrary to their initial hesitation, most students succeeded, and only two from the class failed.
However, the assistants waiting in the valley caught them, preventing them from falling into the water.
"Hmm."
Dick opened a notebook and started jotting something down.
Curious, Simon asked, "What are you doing?"
"Recruitment list for group classes. They'll start next week, so I need to prepare."
The notebook was filled with the names of notable Class A students, their strengths, and personalities.
To Simon, Dick seemed different from other students.
While most struggled to keep up with the classes, Dick was always observing others.
"What do you think based on your investigation so far?"
"Our class is generally high-level. Everyone's good, but..."
Dick shrugged as he closed the notebook.
"That one seems a bit lacking. Might drop out once the protection period ends."
Simon looked in the direction Dick was indicating.
It was the female student who had climbed onto the hippo thanks to Simon earlier, now being helped up by an assistant.
"Is everyone here? Then let's move to the next area!" As all the students gathered, Hong Peng started running again without giving them a moment to catch their breath.
The students, startled, followed her.
'Haha! What is this?' It was different from the classes confined to the classroom.
It felt like a truly dynamic lesson.
After running for another 20 minutes, they emerged from the forest to a wide-open hill.
The slight slope made it easy to pick up speed.
As everyone followed Hong Peng, the same situation from a few hours ago was happening again.
The herd of hippos that had brought the students was now climbing the mountain slope from the opposite side.
"Uh, uh?" "They're coming this way, professor?!"
But Hong Peng had already disappeared, as had the other assistants.
The students, flustered, stopped in their tracks, but the approaching hippos showed no sign of slowing down.
'Danger!' Simon also stopped and focused his eyes.
A hippo was charging straight at him.
'The feeling of stepping on the Shadow!'
Boom!
Simon soared into the sky, and the hippos passed beneath him, kicking up dust.
Several other students were also floating in the air like Simon.
'I'm falling!' Simon adjusted his balance to land as far away from the hippos as possible.
As soon as he landed, he had to roll frantically to avoid the hippos.
"Ugh!" Two more were coming straight at him.
Simon pushed off the ground with all his might, narrowly avoiding them.
'I almost died.' The fear of death made his hair stand on end, and his mind cleared.
Simon wiped the cold sweat from his brow and looked back.
'This can't be part of the lesson, right? At this rate, there'll be injuries...!'
Simon's eyes widened as he looked back.
He expected chaos, but the situation was entirely different from what he imagined.
A female student had cast a fatigue curse, causing the hippos to collapse in front of her, forming a wall.
A male student had used dark magic to dig into the ground and lay there.
Others were riding on top of the hippos, shouting leisurely, or using Shadow like a rope to escape into the trees.
Everyone was escaping the crisis in their own way.
"Kya hahaha!" Cindy Vivace was floating in the air using necromancy.
Simon realized then.
'I shouldn't be worrying about others right now.'
It was truly unnecessary worry.
And Simon had to compete with these 1,000 students.
"Are you okay, Simon?" Dick, who had climbed up using a Shadow pole, came down with a 'whoosh' sound.
"Don't worry too much. All those hippos are under Professor Hong Peng's control. Even when students fell, the hippos avoided them."
"... Oh, is that so?"
It was well-known that Hong Peng could use not only martial arts but also the powers of a druid lineage.
At that moment, assistants descended from the sky, clapping their hands and shouting.
"Alright, alright, no time to sit around! Get up!"
"The hippos will turn around and come back down soon! Everyone, get up!"
Hearing the word 'hippo,' the students jumped up in surprise.
An assistant gestured below.
"The professor is already waiting down there! We'll depart immediately!"
Once again, a full-speed sprint began.
After passing through a dense forest, a picturesque hill with colorful flowers appeared, and at the flat terrain below the hill, Hong Peng was waving her hand.
"There are no more obstacles! Let's go full speed to the professor!"
"Yeah!" The students cheered as they ran down the flower-covered hill.
Simon and Dick also ran excitedly down the slope.
The headwind from the opposite direction cooled their sweat.
Dandelion seeds fluttered in the wind, and leaves danced down like a performance.
Simon felt an inexplicable sense of liberation as he descended the hill.
"Well done! Now, take a break!" Hong Peng shouted.
The students sat down on the ground as if they had been waiting for this moment, and the assistants, who had prepared in advance, handed out drinks.
As the tension eased, laughter erupted from all around.
The excited students eagerly shared their heroic tales from earlier.
"Hey, look over there!" "Food's here!"
During the break, Kizen's assistants arrived with a food cart.
Everyone's eyes widened in surprise.
"Originally, we were supposed to eat after all the lessons, but I thought the students might be too tired, so I contacted Kizen. Is that okay?"
"Yay!" "You're the best, professor!"
And so, it was time to eat.
The menu was a high-protein diet centered around meat.
Kizen's food was already famous for its taste, and there was plenty to go around, even soy meat for vegetarians.
Everyone took their food and sat on the scenic grass, enjoying their meal while looking at the mountains and lake.
Simon and Dick also found a spot under the shade of a tree.
Eating outside after exercise made the food taste like honey.
"Ah, there's really no professor like this," Dick said, seemingly captivated by the charm of the martial arts class like the other students.
"Using her class time to feed the students, that's something you wouldn't expect from the strict Kizen."
Simon nodded in agreement, smiling.
"But it's a bit different from what I heard."
"What do you mean?"
"I heard that Professor Hong Peng is actually very much like a typical Kizen professor."
Dick looked puzzled.
"That natural and pure Professor Hong Peng? No way, wherever you heard that from, it's nonsense. Nonsense."
Simon blinked.
It was something he had heard directly from Lorraine.
Clap, clap.
Hong Peng clapped her hands, drawing the students' attention.
"Students! Let's wrap it up. We'll depart again in 10 minutes."
At her words, the assistants stood up and shouted.
"We'll depart in 10 minutes!" "Finish your meals and get ready!"
The assistants spread Hong Peng's message as they moved around.
The students, who had been leisurely relaxing, began to clean up their trays and stretch.
"Are we doing more?" "I thought we'd just rest and ride the hippos back."
The students murmured as they gathered.
Simon watched the assistants moving busily and thought, 'It seems like the real thing is about to start now.'