The Transmigrated Professor

“All right, class, listen up!” 

With a single sentence, boys and girls turned their complete attention to Misa.

“This week’s announcement is going to be pretty special! We are going to be selecting students for the Inter-Academy Sports Tournament!”

Seventy years ago, during the Catastrophe, the human world was split into 5 continents. 

4 of them were later taken away by the other Races, leaving humanity with a single piece of land and a few islands around it. 

They were later named the Human Continent and the Sanskriti Archipelago, respectively.

After a great deal of struggle, humanity was finally able to establish 5 major cities on their continent.

Capital City in the center.

Aquilo City in the North. 

Auster City in the South. 

Solanus City in the East.

Aqua City in the West.

To fight the looming threat of monsters, the League decided to build the Star Academy in Capital City, a billion-dollar educational institute where they could train and protect their future Heroes.

Unfortunately for them, many parents were against sending their young children so far away, either because of financial constraints or fear of monsters and the Fallen.

Because of this, the Hero League realized that many of humanity’s promising talents were wasting their potential. To counter this, the League decided to build Academies with almost similar state-of-the-art facilities in each of the four major cities. And this intervention by the League was readily supported by the mayors of each of the cities.

Of course, their reasons for this weren’t as selfless as the League. The mayors wanted to keep the talented Heroes in their cities so that they could protect their cities from future disasters.

And with the establishment of the Four Academies, emerged a tradition of an annual tournament. Academies from all over would send their students from all three years to the Star during December and have them compete in various tournaments. 

The media portrays it as a friendly competition to foster good relationships between the students of the Cities and future top Heroes. However, if one looked a little deeper, they would see it was more of a ruthless showdown. 

The students of the Four Academies aimed to get one up on the students of the Star Academy, while the students of the Star Academy tried to defend their #1 status.

With all the competition in the air, the Inter-Academy Tournament soon became akin to the Olympics of the past. Every year new competitions were added, and students of all years were encouraged to attend all sorts of competitions both solo and in teams.

“I will be handing out forms to you all today. Tick the competitions you are interested in participating in. And remember, everyone has to participate in at least one competition. You have the end of next week to hand in your forms to me. My office is open to all of you.” Finishing her announcement, Misa distributed the forms to the class. 

“Once all your forms are submitted, specialised instructors will be training you all-week round until your competitions. One week before the tournament, the instructors will choose students based on their class performance. Those students will be the ones that will take part in the tournament and represent the Star Academy.”

Hearing this, one of the students raised his hand. “If only a few of us are going to be selected, what’s the use of all of us applying to the competitions?”

“No need to worry. Although only a select few will be able to actually compete, the competitions were made keeping in mind the difficulties faced by active Heroes out in the field. So even just training for the competitions will allow you to gain insight into the problems you will have to face when you graduate from here and the different ways you can face them.”

“Now these competitions happen across all three years during your time in the Academy. You can also think of it as practice and aim to participate in the Tournament next year. Remember, many Guilds come to watch these competitions, so you will basically be showing what you have to offer to these Guilds. Don’t lose this opportunity!”

“Remember you have until next week to submit your forms. Choose wisely!” After handing out the forms, Misa left the classroom.

The students followed suit and left for their dorms, either to train or rest.

“Hey, Rhian! Which competitions are you going to take part in?” Beside him, Rachel asked.

“I am not sure yet.” Rhian shrugged in denial. The first thing he would have to do was analyse all the competitions and check which suits him best.

“Luke, which ones will you be competing in?” Rhian turned to Luke, who was standing up to leave.

He was the #2 First-Year of the Academy, so he would be a worthy opponent to fight in the Tournament.

“Get lost.” Without facing him, Luke left with a quick reply. Following behind him, were his two lackeys, Richie and Adam.

Although it might be hard for others to believe, this was Luke being kind to him. When Rhian first tried to talk to him, his tone was far more rude and he cursed a lot more, using terms like ‘lowly insect’ and other “peasant” terms.

Now, he was just mildly rude, and without all the cursing, no doubt thanks to Rhian’s irresistible charm. 

The humans in this world were unimaginably weak to good looks. Rhian couldn’t help but pity them.

In the demon world, no matter how smart or beautiful you were, no one would take you seriously unless you had the strength to back it up. 

Even then, if you are strong, those around you will wait like hyenas for the moment you falter and then destroy you, stealing all the glory for themselves.

A true dog-eat-dog world.

It was surprising how the Demon King was able to unite such a self-destructive species to conquer the other planets.

‘…Or, maybe not.’

 As his right hand, he was well aware of just how oppressively powerful the Demon King was.

A True Monarch!

Those were the words that came to mind, the moment they saw the Demon King.

And it was also the level Rhian aimed to reach, no, surpass, if he were to survive and reach his former glory. 

And he had to do it as soon as possible.

After all, the world is changing, and soon he will have to face those whom he once called his comrades.

He had to be powerful enough to at least fight them, if not defeat them.

But for now, let’s focus on the Tournament.

Watching Luke’s back walk away from him, Rhian’s mischievous instincts kicked in, as his voice went slightly up on the decibel scale, enough to just grab the attention of the entire class.

“Well, if you are scared of me participating in the same competitions as you, that’s alright. I will make sure to steer clear, LUKE!”

Sensing the tension in that particular corner of the class, all those who were preparing to leave suddenly stopped as all the eyes stopped on the two handsome gents.

“I AM NOT SCARED OF ANYTHING! Especially someone like you.” As expected, Luke’s arrogance refused to let the bait slip. 

Rhian did his best to hide the wide smile on his face, but the edges of his mouth traitorously lifted up in a smile.

“Are you laughing at me?” Luke yelled at him, seeing Rhian mocking expression. Richie and Adam tried to stop him, but Luke pushed them away. “I will take part in the Student Duels and Monster Hunting. So make sure you enter these two competitions, 'cause I will be bringing your ass down.”

“Sure, I will do that.” Rhian smiled, as Luke arrogantly stormed off.

“He’s just so easy.” A slight chuckle escaped his lips as Rhian glanced back at Rachel.

She, in turn, nudged him on the shoulder. “You should stop pushing him like that. No wonder Luke hates you.”

“I would, but he’s my only source of entertainment.” Rhian innocently shrugged his shoulders. 

Rachel sighed at his reply. This petty competition between boys was out of her realm of understanding.

“Let’s head to the library. We need to fill up our forms.”

Grabbing their bags, the two quickly headed to Star Academy’s Library - the biggest treasure of human knowledge on the Human Continent.

It was a large 10-storey tall building, with the more dangerous or advanced research papers on the higher floors, while the basic and intermediate books were on the bottom and middle floors respectively.

The first-years were only allowed access up to the 3rd floor, while second-years to the 5th and third-years to the 7th floor. Only Professors were allowed to enter the 8th and 9th floors, with the 10th floor being a forbidden, highly-secured vault filled with rare Manuals to learn Sword Arts, Footwork, and more, as well as many high-Rank Skills.

The treasures inside these vaults were enough to rival the resources of many top-tier Guilds.

Of course, the only ones able to access this vault were those with permission from the Academy’s President, Jaoquin Hernando.

Although Rhian wanted to study the books locked away in the higher floors, to try to better his mana control and increase his strength, it wasn’t yet time. Plus, the books in the lower were quite enough for his current Rank.

Higher Rank resources would just be a waste at his current level, considering he didn’t even have the Mana Capacity to even use them.

As Rachel and Rhian entered the 2nd Floor of the library, they could already see various students occupying the tables. There were small groups of friends, couples, and individual students, all with sheets of paper in their hands, mulling over which competitions to enter.

“Looks like everyone is taking this Inter-Academy Tournament quite seriously.” Rhian commented as he and Rachel took their seats.

“Of course, they are. The Tournament is the only annual event, where Guilds are welcomed into the Academy for the world to see what Humanity’s future pillars are capable of.”

“But won’t your Academy Rank do that? It already tells you how much better you are compared to the other students.”

Rachel shook her head. “Unless you are in the Top 300 of your year, a Rank is just a number on a pretty piece of paper. That’s why the rest select competitions that highlight their advantages and hide away their weaknesses. This way the Guild will know exactly what they have to offer.”

“How tedious…” Rhian was once again reminded of how different the demon and human societies were.

But since he was now human, he had to do his best to assimilate with them. 

Heeding Rachel’s words, he carefully checked all the competitions listed on the form in front of him. 

There were over 30 different competitions in the Tournament that highlighted different aspects of Heroes out in the field. Ranging from regular battles such as Student Duels, Monster Hunting, Dummy Massacre, and Artifact Treasure Hunt, there were many academic competitions as well, such as Herb Quiz, Monster Identification, and Basics of Alchemy.

After much contemplation, Rhian chose four competitions. Student Duels and Monster Hunting as he had promised Luke he would participate in them. In addition, he decided to participate in Monster Identification and Survival Fortress.

As the name suggested, Monster Identification was a quiz competition where one had to guess the species and subspecies of various monsters. 

Although it might sound easy, it wasn’t as simple. 

All monsters had hard-to-notice, distinct characteristics that set them apart from the rest of the species, such as Goblin Mages had smaller fingers than Goblin Warriors, and while Lunar Wolves and Glacier Wolves had similar white fur, one would find a slight tint of blue in the Glacier Wolves’ fur if they looked close enough.

In real combat, this information could save one’s life, considering each subspecies had completely different Skills befitting their name and thus would need different countermeasures for each of them.

Thankfully, Rhian was a Demon Duke who had raided multiple planets in the universe at the side of the Demon King, with a plethora of experience under his belt. It wasn’t hard for him to notice such minute differences in a monster’s appearance.

As for the Survival Fortress, it was basically a game of hide-and-seek, with the ‘It’ being one of the non-Academy affiliated Heroes. A method to see how easily one could hide and escape in case they were faced with a much stronger opponent. 

The students would have to hide from the instructor all the while trying to escape the fortress.

It seemed quite intriguing to Rhian, so he decided to select the competition.

After filling up his form, he looked up to see Rachel completing her own.

“Which ones did you choose?” Rhian asked her.

“Archer’s Hunting Ground. That’s it!”

Rhian was surprised. “You are only selecting one?”

“Like I said, if you are in the Top 300, the Tournament doesn’t matter much. Also, with my grandfather’s connections, I could get into any Guild I want.”

“That’s…true.”

Rhian once again realised how high the status of this human girl in front of him was. He couldn’t help but be jealous!

But he also knew how fickle such status was.

“Let’s go submit our forms and go train.” 

Packing their things up, Rhian and Rachel dropped the forms in Professor Misa’s office and left for their dorms.