Stop Writing! [Magical Academy Litrpg]

As Alec’s punch connected with the dummy, a bone-chilling crunch noise resounded throughout the training chamber. This noise, however, didn’t come from Alec’s hand. Instead, a long, thin crack appeared on the dummy’s chest, spanning its entire body.

However, his punch didn’t stop at that. He rained some orders to the mana brain, and in response received a detailed image of the magic circle he wanted. A purple magic circle appeared, having his right arm at its center. Alec straightened his arm right before the magic circle activated. When it did, the spell caused an enormous force to appear behind Alec’s fist, which promptly pushed into the dummy, leaving a deep, fist-shaped dent on it.

“Nice!” Alec shouted in his head. This was a technique Evan had shown him. It used a very simple telekinetic spell alongside the caster’s body, creating a strong synergy. After the first strike softened the enemy, the spell would push in a second time, doubling the damage done.

There were four days left for his first exam. During the last one and a half weeks, he had done his best studying, using stat upgrade potions, and most importantly, learning some spells that he could use while fighting. Fortunately, he had gotten used to utilizing his mana brain fast and effectively.

Jumping away from the dummy, Alec straightened his body. His mana brain sent him another image, then another. Alec took those images and raised both his hands, revealing two purple magic circles. From behind him, two daggers appeared and floated. Those daggers were then launched forward at breakneck speed, covered in a purplish aura.

Alec had also been working on his telekinetic magic with Professor Andrew. He would go to his office or lab every day and do some menial tasks alongside Douglas, and in return, the man would help him with telekinesis magic. Unfortunately, Alec didn’t have enough mana potion stocks from all the stat upgrade potions he had been writing.

[Name: Alec Greenwood

Strength: 26

Agility: 26

Health: 27

Mind: 23

Mana: 28]

As the daggers he had thrown cleanly sliced through the dummy, Alec flicked both his hands and did his best to cast two more spells. Unfortunately, before he did, the daggers collided with the further away wall and bent in a way that rendered them unusable.

With a sigh, Alec plopped down on the ground.

‘I really need my mind stat to increase. I can cast spells in a fighting situation, but can’t even recall my daggers after an attack because I can’t cast the return spells fast enough,’ he thought. Unfortunately, very low level potions didn’t seem to be working on his mind stat anymore. The other stats had also somewhat evened out, stabilizing somewhere between 26 and 28. ‘It seems like I have to start changing to low level upgrade potions. Hopefully, those will last longer…’

He wiped his sweat, took the training dummy which had somehow returned back to its pristine state, and placed it aside. He then took the daggers to be repaired by The Author’s Pen later and went back to the dorms.

‘How much could it really cost?’ Alec contemplated another one of his questions after standing in front of the dorms, watching the plethora of students either leaving or waiting for their friends. Although the time the lectures ended varied greatly, the day's first classes started at the same time for everyone. This arrangement by the academic authorities caused a huge amount of student traffic to form in the morning. Fortunately, the rest of the day would be very calm. ‘How well could the questions really be protected?’

Throughout the days he had been studying for the upcoming mid-term exams, a question had been eating away at Alec. The Author’s Pen was a godly artifact, with the ability to create things he didn’t have exact knowledge of. So, what was stopping him from writing ‘exam questions’ and getting his hands on those sweet sweet cheat sheets?

Well, one thing that stopped him from doing so was the fact that he didn’t know how well-protected the exam questions were, or if they had been prepared at all. The Author’s Pen was an artifact that worked on possibilities. If the questions were heavily protected or weren’t written yet, he would be looking at a good old mana coma.

‘Never mind…’ he thought to himself, deciding that it was both morally, and practically better to not attempt stealing.

He only had a morning class and would go to the library at noon. After quickly showering, he got done with his morning class and went to the library to meet up with his study partner.

“Hey…” She greeted him.

“Hi, Iris,” Alec answered with a small smile. They looked at each other briefly before picking a table and starting their individual study sessions. They had come across each other many times in the library and had decided to become study partners. While Alec got to practice the previous year’s curriculum while helping out Iris, Iris got help from a sophomore who had a mana brain. Although Alec didn’t see himself to be as smart as Iris, he knew he had an advantage because of both his experience and the mana brain.

“So…” Alec muttered as he started getting tired of studying. “That mana eye… How does it feel?”

Iris kept looking at a book in front of her for a few more seconds before raising her gaze to meet up with Alec’s. She then swept aside her bangs to give Alec a better look at the mana eye.

“It has been there for a long time. I would have a hard time remembering how it feels to not have it,” she said. “But from what I can tell, it is a better eye that works separately from my two real ones. It can focus somewhere else, giving me a higher field of view. It can help my depth perception, movement detection, heat detection, and a bunch of other stuff.”

“Huh, so it’s like a bunch of perception magic pieced together and permanently engraved into your head?” Alec asked to confirm. When he saw Iris nod, he continued. “Does it consume mana?”

“It works similarly to a mana brain, so no. But it does occupy mana when it’s active. Currently somewhere around 15%. But it’s worth it most of the time,” she said. Alec nodded. He was still having a hard time seeing the circle.

“Can I take a closer look?” he asked. When Iris nodded, he got up from his chair and kneeled in front of her. It took him about five minutes to be satisfied. He told the mana brain to keep the magic circle memorized, however, got back a signal that it couldn’t remember the entire thing. Then, Alec decided to help and memorized a smaller part. It would be hard to hold on until he went back home, but it would still be worth it.

“How do you get it engraved?” Alec asked. Iris thought to herself for a second, then replied while pushing away her textbooks and placing her arms on the table.

“You have to do a ritual, similar to every other ritual magic. You would need someone who can help you, and some simple ingredients,” she said. “The ingredients are really simple. I can give you a list if you want.”

“Thanks,” Alec said sincerely. With the list of the ingredients, he wouldn’t even need to ask Professor Andrew. Although he was the man’s assistant, he still didn’t want to end up owing him a debt. “It’s about time we left anyway,” he decided. Now that the mana brain had memorized the mana eye’s pattern, he couldn’t do anything else with it. Or else, the thing would forget as soon as it focused on something else.

“Mm…” Iris nodded her head sheepishly. Whenever he saw the girl like this, he felt a pang of guilt inside him. The more he interacted with her, the more he started becoming sure she wasn’t another transmigrator. Of course, there was the chance she was just acting, but he couldn’t think of a motive for that. And that left only one possibility.

‘She has actually lost her memories,’ he thought with a bitter smile on his face. Iris used to be a strong girl as far as he knew. Her image he remembered back from their duel was a strong and determined one, ready to fight whatever she was facing. Now, however, she was like a weak little rabbit. She was easily scared, and constantly wanted to rely on someone. ‘Well, at least this version of her is easy to manipulate. No matter how much I don’t like using that word, I just stole the mana eye recipe from her, so…’

After parting with the white-haired girl, Alec went back to his dorm. Evan, Alexei, and Thomas were all whispering to each other when he entered. As soon as they heard the door open, however, they stopped talking and looked at him.

“Hey..?”

“Welcome, Mr. Alec,” Evan said with a playful voice.

“Hi..?” Alec paused and thought for a moment. However, he couldn’t understand and still had a mana eye circle to note down. So, he sat in front of his desk, quickly took out some papers, and started drawing.

“Wow, so busy writing letters he can’t even answer,” Alexei continued. Evan and Alexei had gotten up and were walking toward Alec, however, Thomas held them by their arms to stop them.

“Come on guys… Don’t do him dirty like that,” he said. However, both Evan and Alexei disregarded his words.

“I’m sorry, but what’s going on?” Alec said angrily. He got up, pushed away the papers, and looked at his friends. He felt like the mana eye was about to slip off his mind, so he had to overload the mana brain slightly to help it remember his part too.

“Calm down, lover boy!” Alexei said with a shit-eating grin on his face. “What? Fought with your cute freshman girlfriend?”

For a moment, Alec looked at Alexei with knitted brows.

“Huh..?”