Death Mage with an SS-Rank Talent-Chapter 107

Next Morning...

Aaron woke up early in the morning as usual. After completing his morning routine, similar to the previous day, he intended to go to the library, but with a small change.

He needs to collect the rewards for the tournament first. He has already delayed it for a day, and it would not be respectful if he delays again.

So, after freshening up and having his breakfast, Aaron first went to the Student Resource Center to collect his rewards. He was the top scorer of the tournament. So there should be quite a lot of rewards waiting for him.

Though the rewards were not specified, they should be very good, at least that’s what Aaron hopes. This is, after all, one of the top five academies.

The early years of any awakener are the best years for growth. So, hindering them at this point by giving fewer resources would hinder their growth, which is quite the opposite of what they wanted to achieve in the first place.

So, it should be easily understandable that the academy might give substantial rewards for being the first in the tournament.

---

Student Resource Center...

"Hey Zara", Aaron said, appearing before his favourite receptionist.

He was lucky that there were no cocky students blocking his path when he arrived at the center. He believed that there would be some who might not have accepted the results of the tournament.

People like that don’t just exist in novels but in real life too.

To avoid wasting the valuable time he had, he didn’t go to collect the rewards like others had the previous day. He went to the library instead, but he got an email from the academy to collect the rewards as soon as possible. So, he has no choice but to come in the morning to collect them.

It was not like he was afraid of them. He only thought that arguing and fighting idiots like them would be just a waste of time.

The ones who would come are lackeys of someone else, who, instead of wasting their time by waiting here to confront Aaron, would instead send their henchmen to probe Aaron. These idiots, without thinking, waste their time like this.

They could have used that time to know more or level up in dungeons, but no, they would rather waste their time like this and remain at the bottom of society like rats.

Whether they become rats or cockroaches, Aaron doesn’t care about them. What troubles him is what would follow once he gets dragged into this mess.

If the henchemen confront him, Aaron has to fight them for sure, and he can’t lose. If that happens, that would create a bad opinion of him among the officials of the academy.

Though he intended to be low-key, he didn’t want to be invisible or look weak. No, he wanted consistent growth, without attracting unwanted attention.

If he wants to grow, he would attract someone’s attention. That’s for sure, there is no way around it, and he didn’t want to either. He wanted enough attention that could help him grow consistently to a higher stage, and that’s it.

Nothing more, nothing less.

Attracting the right amount of attention leads to better growth, but attracting unwanted attention would only lead to probable downfall or collateral damages that he was unwilling to accept.

So, to not lose the attention the academy has on him, he can only win, no matter who the opponent is.

If these henchmen fail to take down the intended target, only then would the boss appear. Who, if lost, would invoke his rather big background to cause problems for his target.

This is a never-ending cycle, which Aaron doesn’t want to step into. If he does, he would be stuck in that cycle forever, unless he perishes or every party connected to the other contender perishes.

This is how things go.

Anyone who dares to send people against him should have a big background. So, if Aaron defeats him, that idiot would surely use the background to cause problems for Aaron. To remove those troubles, it could come to killing each other, and if such a thing happens, would the big family behind the second generation keep quiet?

No, they won’t. They would continue causing trouble for Aaron until either he perishes or they perish.

Being a big family means they should have a lot of friends and connections, which were beneficial to both parties. So by removing that big family, Aaron caused damage to the interests of many, which they couldn’t ignore.

If it was just a business connection, then as long as there was another route to retain those benefits, most would not cause any more issues, but friends of the big family may not keep quiet.

They may cause more problems for Aaron.

As said before, if he steps into mud, thinking that it’s just mud, it could soon become a quagmire that could drown him.

This is why Aaron didn’t go to the resource center the previous day, and instead went directly to the library. If not for the email that the academy sent to collect the resources as soon as possible, he would have waited for a little longer.

Luckily, when he arrived at the center, there were no henchmen, and Zara was working. going to others might be problematic as they might spread about his appearance to others. So, he went to the one who already knew him.

---

Zara, when he heard Aaron’s voice, immediately looked up in surprise.

"Aaron, I knew it. Congratulations on achieving the first rank", she said in a mixed tone of happiness and envy.

Who wouldn’t be envious of the first ranker?

Everyone wants to take the first place if possible, but knows that it is not easy to achieve that and would settle for a position where they would be envious of other people’s achievements.

What differentiates a good person from a bad one is that a good person would be just envious of others’ achievements but wouldn’t take action against others, but bad and deranged ones, they can’t see others prosper. They would do something that would crash others and become like them, instead of using those same resources to improve themselves.

Luckily for Aaron, Zara is not someone who would act against others just because they had something that she didn’t.

"Haha, I was just lucky", Aaron tried to downplay a little, but Zara didn’t believe him.

How can being a bit lucky net him so many points?

If he were only a few tens or hundreds of points higher than the second ranker, then she might have believed that he was a bit lucky.

No, he was thousands of points higher than the second ranker. So, there was no way that she would believe that he was just lucky.

She knew that he was just like this from the start. There is no way that he would admit fully. So instead of wasting time on useless banter, she changed the subject.

"So, you are here for the rewards right?" she asked.

Aaron nodded, "Yes".

"Okay, follow me", she said as she closed the counter and took him to the place where he could get his rewards.