The Anomaly's Path

I kept my eyes locked on the ceiling beam, my fingers tightly gripping the object that had just flown at my face.

The figure shifted, moving with a smooth grace that did not match her lazy voice. She slid off the wooden beam and dropped straight down. It was a fall of at least forty feet, but she landed on the marble floor without any trouble. No loud thud. No cracks in the stone. Not even a puff of dust.

My senses instantly went into overdrive.

The moment her boots touched the ground, a small, almost invisible wave of power washed over the room. It was so tight, so perfectly controlled, that if I had not pushed my Flash Instinct so hard last night, I might have missed it.

My skin got goosebumps.

A deep warning rang in the back of my head. I took a good look at her, and for a second, I just stared. She was stunning.

She looked to be in her late twenties, with sharp, captivating features and deep, dark purple eyes that seemed to look right through your soul. Her pitch-black hair was tied back in a messy, careless ponytail, with several loose strands framing a face that looked entirely bored.

She wore a loose, dark grey combat jacket over a simple black undershirt, with the jacket left mostly unbuttoned and the sleeves rolled up to her elbows. Her pants were fitted black trousers tucked into scuffed leather boots.

She radiated a heavy, suffocating aura of pure indifference, looking completely untamed and wild.

I stared at her, my mind running through every character, hidden boss, and lore entry I had memorized from my past life.

Who the hell is she...?

I did not know her. Not at all. In the original game, this never happened. The new class divisions, the new teachers, this woman — none of this was in the game. Something had changed, again.

...And what made it worse was the sheer weight of her presence.

Her power was right there, pressing against me. I did not need to search for it. This was not just a Grandmaster. The raw, terrifying depth of the mana beneath her skin was on a completely different level.

A Transcendent. A low-rank Transcendent realm powerhouse.

Fuck. She was ranked even higher than Vice Principal Helene. What was someone of her caliber doing teaching a freshman class?

Whispers broke out among the remaining students as they got over the shock of her sudden entrance.

”Who is that...?”

”Is she our teacher? She looks incredibly beautiful, but...”

”Wait, I’ve never seen her among the elite faculty before.”

”Did they bring her in from the outside?”

”Ugh, look at all of you,” the woman sighed, rubbing the back of her neck as she looked over the fifty of us, completely ignoring the murmurs. ”They told me I was getting a special assignment, but this just looks like a massive pain in the ass.”

A wave of annoyance moved through the crowd.

These were all high-ranking nobles and strong fighters. They were not used to being called a headache on the first day. Not that I cared. I had insulted their whole existence yesterday. This was nothing.

”Excuse me,” Alice stepped forward, her arms crossed, her face angry. Her foot tapped on the stone floor like she was about to start kicking someone. Her eyes had a dangerous heat. ”Who are you? Where is our real teacher? We are class Ascendant. We deserve a proper introduction!”

The woman didn’t even look at Alice directly.

She just lazily waved a hand, her bored eyes drifting over the crowd. ”I am your official instructor. Professor Morgana. And unless you want to spend your first semester cleaning the monster stables, I suggest you shut your mouth when I’m speaking, little girl.”

Alice’s jaw tightened. Her body flared with raw power as her temper almost exploded. Roan’s lazy grin widened, his eyes lighting up with interest. ”...Well, this is interesting,” he murmured, not stepping back at all.

But Professor Morgana didn’t even blink. She just tilted her head, looking completely bored. ”You want to try something, girl? Go ahead. I promise you won’t land a single hit.”

Alice’s fists clenched, but she didn’t move.

Morgana pointed a finger toward the rest of the students. Without another word, she snapped her fingers.

Click.

The forty‑seven watches lying scattered on the floor suddenly hummed to life. Their blue crystals glowed, and they lifted into the air, hovering for a split second before shooting straight toward their owners. Each watch stopped right in front of a student, floating at chest level.

”Grab them,” Morgana said lazily. ”Put them on. Listen, because I’m only saying this once: do not lose it. Break it or lose it, you pay for it out of your own pocket.”

The remaining students quickly snatched the watches from the air. The heavy pressure coming from her kept everyone quiet.

I looked down at the object in my hand. It was a heavy band made of dark, dull metal with a single blue crystal on top. I slid the cold band onto my left wrist, under my coat sleeve. It closed with a click.

”These watches are connected to the Astra Net,” Professor Morgana explained, her voice echoing lazily through the empty hall.

”They track your unique mana signature as a personal ID, your class schedule, your location on campus, and your individual merit points and contribution points. You can receive official messages from faculty or the student council, and alerts about exams. They can also access the Astra Net for basic communication and announcements.”

She paused, tapping her own watch. ”Now, push a small thread of your mana into the watch to connect it to your student profile.”

I sent a small, careful spark of my mana through my hand into the back of the watch. The moment my power touched the center, the blue crystal on top flashed bright. It hummed softly, and a sharp, glowing screen appeared in the air above my wrist, opening the full Astra Net interface.

Through the glowing screen, the world’s information network opened up in front of me. Powered by the mana in the air, the interface let us look at public forums, read the news, send private messages, or look up academy information like schedules and room numbers.

At the very top of the screen, my profile loaded up:

[ASTRA NET SYSTEM — SYNC COMPLETE]

User: Leo von Celestial (ID: Unique Match)

Class: Ascendant

Rank: 1 (Primus)

Merit Points (MT): 100,000

Credit Points: 0

Class Points: 0

Ah, right. The points.

I looked at the numbers. 100,000 Merit Points. My exam score of 87,450 converted straight, and the Primus bonus pushed it to an even hundred thousand. Credit Points were empty. Those came later — from tasks, contests, training performance.

Still, 100,000 was a lot. More than anyone else, probably. I smirked. As expected of the Primus.

Right at the bottom of the screen, a new tab was highlighted in blue: Class Points: 0

I looked around the hall. Forty-nine other blue screens lit up the dim hall as everyone connected their watches. The blue crystals on their wrists glowed faintly, matching their mana.

”Alright, now that you’ve got your toys running, let’s talk about some basic things,” Professor Morgana said, leaning her weight onto one leg. ”Like Helene told you, the whole freshman batch is divided into four classes. Veritas, Fortis, Audax, and this one, class Ascendant.”

She let out a dry laugh, her eyes moving across our group.

”...Let us be real. You fifty are not sitting here because you lack skill. You are sitting here because you are all troublemakers and misfits. You did not fit into the strict, neat boxes of the other three classes. The academy put you here because you are problems.”

Alice crossed her arms tighter and frowned, but she did not interrupt this time.

”And get comfortable with each other, because these classes will not change,” Morgana continued bluntly. ”The groups are fixed until the very end of the semester. So, like it or not, we are both stuck with each other. Any questions? No? Good.”

She didn’t even give anyone a chance to raise a hand before moving directly to the next topic.

”Next up: your classes.”

She continued.

”Daily lectures will take place in your designated home rooms, but you will also have combined classes with Veritas, Fortis, and Audax for grand combat drills and some other classes, or when you share a major with them. You’re going to have to deal with them face-to-face sooner or later. After the first month, your elective courses will start. It will be your own personal choice to pick what specialized fields you want to study. When the time comes, I will explain the rules.”

Her voice hardened slightly, a faint trace of her Transcendent pressure pressing down on the room.

”You are protected by academy laws from random violence inside the campus zones for now. But starting next month, the challenge system opens up. You can officially challenge each other, and even seniors or juniors can challenge you to rank duels. Anyone can challenge the Primus to take his title, but only once per month..”

She looked right at me, her sharp eyes stopping on my badge before moving back to the crowd.

”If your rank changes, your status changes, but you will still be stuck in this same class. And finally, if you do not improve by the end of the mid-term exams, the academy will expel you. They have all your data from the valley test. They know your potential. If you don’t grow, you’re out.”

She stopped walking, her sharp eyes scanning our pale faces before she faced us fully.

A heavy, suffocating silence filled the hall as her words sank in. Nobody dared to breathe. This wasn’t just an introduction — it was a declaration of war against our own survival.

Professor Morgana crossed her arms, a lazy smile playing on her lips. ”Everything I just told you is the basics of how you survive here. Any questions?”