Scarlet Asger

“Now, many of you should have noticed by now that demons often follow certain patterns in the Fractures. That’s because of their instincts, or what we demonologists often refer to as their demonic instincts,” the professor for my Demonology class – one of the core classes for first years for obvious reasons – explains while walking up and down the various aisles of the half-circle shaped classroom, her heels clicking on the tile floor every time she goes down a step. “We don’t know why demons have these instincts, since they’re a clear obstruction for their own survival more often than not. Almost as if they were artificially put into them somehow, outside of natural evolution. But some people believe it to be some sort of curse. Others just think it’s a balance for their advantages in power over us humans.” She reaches the front of the room again and pauses for a second while turning around. “But no matter how many theories there are, none of them have ever been proven.”

I continue writing down my notes on my terminal’s screen splayed out in front of me on the device used in each classroom – one that connects to a student’s terminal and allows them to stream their screen to the much larger screen on the device here.

“Yes, Katana Maiden,” the professor calls out a student by their title – which seems to be a common thing since the other class I took today had the professor doing it as well. So I look up from my notes to find the very same girl that I had defeated at one point in the ranking tournament duels. The one who’s wearing samurai magi-tech armor from one of the countries to the East before the nations all merged into the Republic.

Actually, I think it may have originated from the country of the old world that had fallen to the demons and is now their home. The island now known as the Demon Island.

The girl stands up rather stiffly for some reason as she answers, “Haven’t the researchers from the government been able to gather demon corpses from the Demon Island? Did they not find anything out from them?”

“Good question,” Professor Loris – otherwise known as Sharpshooter – says with a nod before answering, “yes, the government has plenty of demon corpses from the island. But even with those, they weren’t able to find out anything about the demon’s instincts beyond that it is not a chemical process in their body like human hormones.”

I frown at that before tapping my stylus against my chin a few times in thought.

If the instincts aren’t through chemicals, then some sort of curse or just a magical process sounds most likely.

What do you think Tar? Do you know the reason behind it?

“No,” Tar answers, but then he adds, “we fae do suspect that it may have had something to do with the humans that used to live on Tartarus though. Likely some sort of curse. But even we haven’t been able to confirm it, and father won’t say anything on the matter either.”

Hmm. A curse does sound most likely to be the cause, but who… wait, your father might know but isn’t telling anyone?

Tar doesn’t respond to that.

Guess that’s something he can’t tell me.

The professor looks at her terminal on her forearm before saying, “Looks like that’s all the time we have for today.” She raises her head. “Make sure you look over the syllabus once more before coming into class again next week.”

I blink in surprise at that before remembering that we only have core classes on Mondays of each week. So I won’t be having Demonology or the Guardian Law class that I had earlier again until next Monday.

Everyone begins gathering their stuff and I do the same, disconnecting my terminal from the device and shutting it off before getting up from my seat and beginning to walk towards the door.

I don’t actually personally know many of the people in this class, outside of when I beat half of them up in the tournament, so it’s a rather peaceful class in general. The university seems to have five sets of classes for each class on Monday, with five professors teaching each of the two classes. And it looks like I just didn’t end up in the same class as any of the others for Demonology.

Although Guardian Law is different, since I have it with both Belle and Emily. Not that it matters much since we all stay silent during the professor’s boring lecture.

Since laws are indeed very boring to learn about in a class.

“Have you decided on which electives you’re gonna take yet?” Tar asks as I leave the classroom, thankful that I don’t have any bags or anything to carry like I would’ve back in high school.

Mostly.

I know I’ll be taking the class over Blood magic and the one for indoor combat, since battling in the middle of a cramped hallway is annoying. But as for the other elective…

“I’d recommend taking the class over Achievements,” Tar suggests, making me a raise a brow for a moment before shrugging and mentally adding it to the list.

That makes my schedule complete.

“There was another required class tomorrow, right?” Tar asks, sounding curious as he shows just how little attention he was paying when I went over everything earlier.

Then again, I don’t really blame him.

Yeah, there was. This one is System Basics. A mandatory class for all first year students to make sure they understand the basics of how the System works.

“Oh, right,” Tar mutters before suddenly appearing in the air in front of me and then moving to land on my head, but the moment he touches my ears I duck, almost yelping in the process. He pauses for a second only to go to my shoulder instead and sit down.

I frown as I glance at him.

Why are you sitting on me?

He glances back and asks, “Why not?”

We stare at each other for several seconds until I shrug and mutter, “Touché.” Then continue walking towards the Top class gated area.