"Do you know where the toilet is?"

Hearing Zeph’s words, which seemed confusing to him, Bruce couldn’t help but furrow his brows.

His face transformed into a frown as he tried to understand the meaning behind Zeph’s words before a smirk formed on his face.

"Don’t tell me you want to go because you’re scared."

His smile faded as he found something amiss.

Bruce, as a third-year student, was far from naive. He noticed the lack of the reaction he expected from the class; no one laughed or even whispered.

Usually, juniors would at least try to impress him or show some facial expressions when he tried to intimidate someone.

It didn’t take him long to realize that Zeph’s image was quite different from what it appeared to be. Calming his mind, he looked towards Zeph,"Listen, kid, the front seat is mine"

He placed his hands on Zeph’s shoulders, but before they could reach them, his hands were caught in mid-air.

"Can you wait for a moment?"

Zeph, without any facial expression, lost in his thoughts, didn’t pay any attention to Bruce’s words as he clenched Bruce’s wrist.

"Pffft~"

Suddenly hearing a mocking laugh from behind, Bruce’s anger grew, but he tried to maintain his composure to save face in front of the onlookers, especially a pink-haired girl who was observing everything with a small smile.

Bruce had a crush on the most popular girl of the third year — Alisia Quintain

He came to know from some of his followers about Alisia trying to dig information about Zephyr Liander, causing his lovesick mind to take over his senses.

The moment he saw Zeph, he recognized him due to his special golden eyes that were very rare.

Finding it an opportunity, he tried to impress Alisia by making Zeph tell about himself with his own mouth after he put him in his place.

Bruce used his Dariant male physique, known for their physical strength, to increase his grip, finally resting his hands on Zeph’s shoulders.

However, he was unaware that Zeph had loosened his grip in the middle, to cause all these events intentionally, before he turned his attention towards Bruce.

"Okay, I’ll give up the seat."

"What the hell, Zeph? Why are you scared of this guy?"

Thalia couldn’t understand why Zeph was intimidated by Bruce and protested but not getting any response from him.

Turning her gaze, she glared at Bruce.

A smirk formed on Bruce’s face, understanding the success of his intimidation on this poor kid who fearfully accepted his mercy as he gave a sideeye to Thalia.

Which didn’t go unnoticed by Alexios as he gritted his teeth and a small nerve bulged on his forehead. ’This fucker,how dare he make fun of my sister’,

Zeph noticing Bruce’s facial expression completed his half sentence, "I need to use the restroom that was the reason why I’m leaving my seat. Don’t get any ideas, Dumbass"

Hearing this, Bruce’s face twitched as he felt embarrassed, before increasing his grip on Zeph’s shoulder, but not getting any response from him, and seeing a smirk forming on Zeph’s face, he snapped.

"You bastard"

SWISH

Suddenly, he retreated his hands while clenching them into fists, and a powerful wind followed Bruce’s punch.

BANG

His eyes widened as he felt his punch being blocked by a figure with emerald hair and pointy ears, with an otherworldly beauty and an aura revealing the figure’s identity as an elf.

"P-professor Banzihum,"

Bruce stammered as he felt surprised that a professor had arrived so early when even classes had not started.

Seeing Banzihum’s cold expression, a sweat bead slid through Bruce’s forehead.

The entire class, except for a pastel-pink-haired girl, expected Bruce to receive severe punishment.

"P-professor, I-i"

"Professor, Bruce was just kidding. He wanted to play a prank on me. Isn’t that right, Bruce?" Zeph interrupted Bruce before he could speak or give clarification for his actions.

Hearing Zeph’s words, Banzihum narrowed his eyes.

’This kid,’ he was forced to come out of his hiding due to feeling a sudden surge of killing intent from Zeph.

Though he didn’t care if Bruce died or not, the problem was, if something happened in his presence, it would cause problems, as it was impossible for Adriannel to not notice these things.

"Is this true?"

Banzihum, with his firm tone, looked towards Bruce, who seemed all sweaty and confused before nodding hastily as he felt relieved hearing Zeph’s words.

"Don’t do this in class. Go take your seat."

Hearing the professor’s words, Bruce nodded and left the place without giving any single glance to Zeph, who kept looking at Banzihum’s back as he started his lecture session.

...

Zeph’s POV

"Do you know where the toilet is?"

This guy reminded me of another idiot who pissed me off and almost got his head in the toilet flush.

I knew what cringe line this third-rate villain was about to make, thinking it was some masterpiece joke.

"Don’t tell me you want to go because you’re scared"

I really felt amused right now, seeing his situation as no one found his words funny. Instead, he got a hint about what limit he had to keep.

Usually, any person like him would do this, they will try to gauge others strength and based on that follow this rule — acting strong in front of the weak and weak in front of the strong.

"Listen, kid, the front se....."

’Seraphina, can you sense professor Adriannel nearby?’

I wanted to confirm my safety first, though it was impossible for what I was thinking to become true, but better safe than sorry.

[ Human, I can sense Archmage’s Mana in the Academy’s Vicinity ]

So, it meant at least it was not what I had expected.

My fear was, if Chrintain Valley made its move now, though it seemed impossible due to the presence of Professor Adriannel, but still, what if he was not there?

"Can you wait for a moment?"

’Guess, I am being over-worried,’ My future knowledge was making me oversighted, knowing too much could also be not good.

"Pffft~"

Due to my mana hearing, I clearly recognized the owner of this voice, Jenny, and why was she laughing?

Pondering on the reason, I noticed my hands gripping Bruce’s wrist as he struggled.

At that moment, a realization came into my mind, what if the purpose of that Elf was to know the extent of my strength.

Of course, I knew I was not that prodigy among these monsters, but still, what if.

’I need to see which one of the professors is interested in me,’ Right now, the most important thing was to identify the elf’s real identity to keep my guard against him.

I loosened my grip and let Bruce’s hand fall on my shoulders, as I told him about me leaving the seat, but before I could complete my sentence, a familiar voice interrupted.

"What the hell, Zeph? Why are you scared of this guy?"

Scared and of this shit, really Thalia, can’t you, ’What the hell’

I looked at his face as he smirked and gave a side-eye to Thalia, ’Bastard, that is my woman, only I can do that to her’.

Though not sure about my feelings for Thalia, but at least, I would not let some random guy come and act haughty in front of my women.

"I need to use the restroom; I already mentioned that’s why I’m leaving my seat. Don’t get any ideas."

But right now, I needed to piss this pea-minded idiot, who was acting like a moron even being a third year, really laughable.

"You bastard"

Now, that was something I appreciated, I saw him clenching his fist before launching a punch.

SWISH

A sudden surge of killing intent filled my body as I glared at Bruce, who seemed unaware of anything, but it was not that hard for the professors to detect and due to rules of Academy he will definitely reveal himself.

BANG

’So, it was you,’ I looked at the back of Professor Banzihum, it was really a huge coincidence that the most loyal Elf of Chrintain Valley was the one spying on me.

Just like humans, not all elves were on the side of the Valley’s plans, but this guy, ’First, I have to save my toilet plunger’

"Professor, Bruce was just kidding. He wanted to play a prank on me. Isn’t that right, Bruce?"

After helping that guy, I tried to understand the reason behind Professor Banzihum’s sudden actions. 𝐟𝚛𝕖𝚎𝕨𝗲𝐛𝚗𝐨𝐯𝐞𝕝.𝐜𝗼𝗺

There were two doubts in my mind.

Maybe he just wanted to test the first ranker’s strength, but that contradicted the usual description of professors I had read.

Normally, if they really needed to know about the strength of students, they could easily check their «students aptitude» file, which contained all the information about their mana levels, skills, and achievements.

Second, Professor Banzihum wanted to make me commit some mistakes by acting over the limit and breaking some bones of Bruce.

He might have hoped that I would anger him enough to retaliate and, according to the rules of the academy, give me any desired punishment.

Usually, they were harsh, like sealing mana for a week or restricting any of the senses.

Whatever it was, I needed to be more cautious from now on.

...

"Didn’t you tell me that the professor would come late?"

Alisia looked towards the girl sitting beside her as she had for the first time provided wrong information to Alisia.

Jenny clenched her dress as felt irritated due to failure of all her hardwork, "But I was sure that the professor would not arrive before half an hour."

"It’s okay, maybe something unexpected happened," Alisia consoled Jenny as she turned towards Zeph.

It was Alisia’s plan to spread the information about her searching for a boy named Zephyr Liander, causing her most stupid pawn to take action and make her gauge the real strength of Zeph.

But it was all interrupted by a professor arriving out of nowhere.

’What are you, Zephyr Liander,’