Apprentice

A week went by quietly, with me just spending my days in the library reading the book on plants. Surprisingly it was actually very informative, with me learning that so many plants had different uses, I ended up becoming very interested in plants. On the day of the test, I met Alice at the entrance to my dormitory, and we took a walk into the forest. We walked along the forest, and Alice was quizzing me on the different plants we were encountering.

It was all going normal, until I started to recognize a weird pattern. 

"This one?"

"Poisonous."

"This?"

"Poison."

"This."

"..."

"Do you not know?"

She stopped walking and asked me. However I did know, but I had noticed that we were not walking along a path, but instead we were walking in a circle. Like we were going around a certain place.

"It's... Poison."

"Good."

"Are they all going to be poison around here..."

At this she stopped again, and turned while smiling.

"Yes. They are. Do you understand the importance of plant knowledge now?"

I was silent for a while. I was thinking about the purpose of my mentorship with Alice, and the quest the system gave me.

"Is this my only path?"

I asked, looking Alice in the eyes resolutely. She showed a rare sign of surprise at my question, or that I figured out the politics behind it.

"Haha... See... This is why it's a curse to be even a little perceptive... Yes. They don't trust you, so now you're going to be their hunting dog... I'm... Sorry. I wished that I could retire without having to train a successor, but your situation happened... Everything was just... Suspicious. So you will have to prove your loyalty to the human race by carrying out missions like this, while becoming a disposable pawn."

That's right. Abraham Cambry and Professor Gram had sent me here because they didn't believe me, and my excuse that a weapon I found in the black market was responsible for my sudden change.

I clutched my fists tightly together, trying to overcome the anger and frustration I was feeling. I was upset because I wasn't even powerful like they thought. My increase in strength was so negligible that you could barely call it growth, and yet because of a randomly timed attack on the Academy I was made a suspect.

I understood that this was unfair, but also that life was unfair in general.

"So I'm going to have to kill more... Right?"

I asked, looking at Alice with tired eyes. I saw the sadness in her eyes, and understood then that this was something that she also went through. 

"Yes... But you can also save people."

She began to explain, picking up a nearby flower.

"This flower would be thought to be poisonous, because it is nearby these poisonous plants, but with a discerning eye one can identify it as a healroot. Used to make healing potions... Our job is not just to kill. We also collect information, and investigate people. If we do our job right, we can save lives that were originally meant to be extinguished."

She then placed the plant into my hand.

I looked at the plant, and at the large field of poisonous plants.

I sighed, before looking her in the eyes.

"Okay... I'll be in your care, Teacher."

She smiled, and her eyes gained a little bit of life.

"There is a cabin, in there."

She pointed past the poisonous plants.

"You will live there from now on, but be careful, as if you get even a scratch from one of these poisonous plants you can die. So you'll need to practice your ability to walk carefully, and traverse the forest. A vital skill for someone like us."

She then began to walk carefully through the plants, weaving through open spaces and occasionally using trees or logs to move past different areas. I followed her steps carefully, and clumsily. Thankfully, the path she chose was wide and forgiving.

However as we walked I noticed the plants behind us moving. 

'Oh fuck.'

I said to myself as I realized the plants move, requiring you to find new paths constantly.

****

After we arrived at the cabin, we walked in and I noticed all my stuff had been moved to the entrance of the cabin.

"..."

I looked at the pile of my stuff, and then at Alice. She simply gave me a helpless shrug. I didn't bother asking what was supposed to happen if I hadn't accepted her offer to become her apprentice, as I figured it would have involved my torture and subsequent death. 

She then gave me a tour of the cabin. The rooms were all pretty normal, but when we got to the basement it became more real what I would be doing here. There was a large lab, fitted with an alchemy table, and another table that had tools to create different gadgets or such. 

Then there was an iron door, with a small window covered with bars. Inside I saw a mostly empty stone room, with a bed and chains on the wall. There was a table that came up from the ground, and on it were restraints. There was the smell of what I could only describe as death and despair in the room. 

I didn't even step foot into the room, as I understood this was where people would be tortured and killed. It made me even more uncomfortable at how clean the room was. Everything was clear of any traces of blood, but that made me understand how meticulous Alice was.

After she showed me the room, she stepped out and closed the door. She then walked over to the alchemy table.

"I spent a long time at this table... I don't have a talent for fighting direct confrontations, and I was also weaker than my peers growing up... However I utilized a weapon many others didn't."

She then looked at me, and tapped her head.

"To do what we do, you have to be smart, and use your brain. So, I want you to focus on a few things during your stay at the Academy. First, you will be the top student for your grade, in academic studies. That's non negotiable. Second, you will never be idle. If you have free time, I want you to read. Knowledge is power."

"I understand."

I agreed, and when I agreed, a prompt appeared.

[Quest complete!]

[Pick one of Alice's skills to copy:]

[Fast Reader (A-Rank)]

[Photographic Memory (S-Rank)]

[...]

The list was long, and many of them did indeed revolve around utilizing her brain. Another section of them were seduction or deception skills, which didn't interest me as much, since men were not sought after like that as much.

I was looking at her other skills, like movement skills, when I saw a skill that I immediately wanted more than any other skills.

'I want to copy Alice's [Concoct Flask] skill.'

[Concoct Flask (F-Rank) skill has been rewarded.]

[Rank of skill has been reduced, due to the difference in experience.]

I was disappointed it was F-Rank, but I didn't mind really. It was a really useful skill, that after reading made me pretty happy. I was able to mix flasks of chemicals, if I had the materials on hand, without having to go through the alchemic process instantly.

I then told Alice, casually, about the existence of my skill to do it, and her eyes showed surprise again. She then told me about how she also had the skill, and she then went to a shelf to grab a belt. The belt she handed me was a worn leather belt with multiple slots where there were vials that could be slipped in and out of the belt. 

"You can fill these with different chemicals you concoct, and make poisons on a dime."

I took the belt gingerly, and was glad that I received an item that worked so well with my new skill. I thanked Alice, but she simply waved it off. She then sat next to me on the bench by the alchemy table, and began to go over a book of poisons. 

We sat together late into the night, going over the thousands of different poisons and mixes we could create. The benefits of different ones and such.

Eventually we both walked upstairs and went to sleep. There were two separate bedrooms, so we said goodnight and went into our different rooms. Again, I had troubles sleeping through the entire night, and went downstairs to find Alice awake reading in the living room.

We made eye contact and exchanged a knowing laugh between the two of us. She then made some coffee, and we went back to the basement to studied until I had to leave for my classes.

****

"Phew... Good thing I left an hour early, otherwise I wouldn't have had enough time to get through the plants this morning... At least I got some exercise in this morning, maybe after a couple months I can raise my agility to D-Rank... Maybe even higher?"

I mused to myself as I walked to class. I felt weird being away from Alice, as we had spent the past week together all day, but I put those thoughts aside. I saw all the other students coming from their dormitories, as I walked out of the forest. This caused many people to look at me weirdly, confused why I was walking out of the forest, since they thought no one would live in the forest when they had been expressly warned that the forest was dangerous.

I ignored their gazes, and walked steadily to my classes. Classes at this school were broken up in two different schedules. There were traditional classes in the mornings, about history, demonology, and other classes like math. Then, after lunch would be the physical classes. The first class right after lunch was conditioning, which was just to build up our stamina. It was running, working out, and doing anything to everything just to build up a person's endurance. 

After that was combat courses, meant to take advantage of being tired to train the students' willpower and to encourage them to move with minimal effort. After that would be team tactics, which would be students training in smaller groups of four to eight, building their teamwork and adaptability. The last class of the day was magic practice. This would be where students practiced using spells and casting under pressure.

There were a total of 54 freshmen this year, so we all had to cramp into a lecture hall and class began at exactly 8:30 AM. 

I stayed diligent in class, paying close attention and doing my best to internalize the information. I had gone through primary school, along with an entire six years at college, so I was somewhat confident in my ability to study well.

At some point I noticed that many students were giving me dirty looks. I assumed it was because of the articles I read a week ago. I ignored them and simply went along my day focusing on my studies. The morning classes went by quick, since there was so much information to digest, but when lunchtime came problems started to rise.

*smack*

A boy I didn't know had run into me, causing my food to spill all over myself and my clothes. I looked down, and then back at the boy who had clearly done it intentionally. 

"What do you think you're doing?"

I asked, annoyed.

He sneered and laughed with his friends.

"Hahahah, it was an 'accident', besides what can you do to me at the Academy? We're all equals in treatment here."

The three of them laughed, but I had simply set my tray down before taking out my phone. I then looked up the student roster, and found the three boys in front of me.

I then began to make a call, on speaker, for everyone nearby to hear.

*ring ring ring*

"Hello, how can I help you, Young Master Darius?"

The voice of my butler sounded through the phone. The boys had stopped laughing and were listening, when they heard that it was a butler or something they laughed again.

"What? You're gonna cry to daddy?"

I simply looked at the three with a dead expression.

"I want you to buy up the debt belonging to the families of Braum Rylan, Richie Amber, and Brian Mitchell."

When I said this, their expressions changed.

"Understood, do you want me to pass along a message when their patriarchs contact us?"

"Tell them to raise their sons better."

With that I hung up the phone, and put it back into my breast pocket. I then looked at the three boys before pointing at a table.

"I am going to sit there. Get me a new tray and bring it to me." 

With that I then left to the table I had pointed to just a moment ago.

While there was fair treatment to all students, that was only from the staff. If I wanted to ruin their families, I easily could, using my family's influence. I thought it was ridiculous that they didn't realize this. They soon came back with a new tray of food for me, and I simply told them to leave without bothering me again. 

I then quietly ate my lunch alone. Ignoring the new wave of looks I was receiving. It was now that I realized something, and accepted it.

'If all they are going to see is a villain... Then I'll become a villain.'