"Professor Arman, you have the list, right?" a staff member asked the man standing before him.
"I do, but Vice Principal Xander is announcing the rankings, right?" Arman said while texting someone on his phone.
The staff member nodded as Arman disappeared and appeared in a big temple-like building.
As he stepped in, multiple security protocols activated and started scanning him.
<Identity Confirmed: Access Granted>
<Welcome, Professor Arman, you may enter the Vault now>
The robotic voice said as the doors opened, revealing a path for him.
In the Seminar Hall,
Students were flocking into the Seminar Hall, from Class 1 to 5, every type of student trying to find a seat for themselves.
A mix of emotions could be seen on the faces of the students present in the Seminar Hall; some were excited, some were anxious, others were calm, and some didn't care about the whole thing.
"Hey, let's go sit in the back," a student said to his friend, who was looking for some seats in the front.
"What? But there are empty seats in the front rows?" his friend asked.
"Dumbass, do you want to sit near those elite family's kids and invite unnecessary trouble?" he replied.
"Now, take those seats with me before they get taken," he dragged his friend before the seats filled up.
Many other students thought similarly, and a particular pattern could be noticed in the seating arrangement in the Seminar Hall.
Those from a reasonably good background were in the middle, and those from ordinary backgrounds were in the back rows. Most of the high-profile students were sitting in the front seats, but some oddballs didn't care about such arrangements either.
The Seminar Hall was divided into 5 columns representing each class, and various familiar faces could be seen sitting in them.
"Can you stop tapping your feet?" Ria Adler said with an annoyed look on her face.
"Oh, sorry, didn't mean to annoy you," Alan smiled, but he was pretty nervous.
He hadn't performed too well in the Dungeon Exploration Test, and the biggest reason for his poor performance was Asher himself. His fear of Asher had increased quite a bit for a young person like him, getting brutally beaten and then experiencing such chilling killing intent.
If he were not trying to impress Ria, Elena's cousin, he would even avoid being in the same space as Asher. But despite being this nervous about Asher, he didn't want to lose his chance to spend time with Ria, his crush.
Unfortunately, Ria didn't hold the same sentiments regarding Alan; previously, she had thought that Alan was a fairly powerful talent, but his performance was not impressive. She was in the same class as Gavin Neville and Alan Astaria, but for her, both of them were not impressive at all.
Elena, Eva, and Kevin entered together, making many students chatter among themselves. They were people who were guaranteed to be in the Top 10, and for them, the only thing that mattered was their placement in the rankings.
Elena was entering when she saw Lishia Halcyon also walking past her to go to the Class 2 column. Lishia was in the same class as Amelia and Damian, so she tried to go to her seat, but Elena interrupted her.
"Hello, Lishia," she greeted her, but Eva and Kevin had already reached their seats, so she was the only one that greeted her.
"Hi, Elena," Lishia greeted her back.
Though they were not close friends, those from elite families knew about the family members of each elite family and a few other influential people as well.
"What rank do you think you will get?" Elena asked with a smile on her face.
It was rare for her to meet Lishia, who was said to be her rival or a better mage than herself. Although she had another plan for why she approached Lishia, ,she was only trying to be friendly with her right now.
"Let's see, I am not sure," Lishia calmly replied.
She was the Princess of Halcyon, and faking smiles was something all influential people knew. It was something everyone used to appear as friendly as possible.
"Oh, I will not take your time. Let's meet again sometime," Elena said as the crowd of students grew bigger behind her.
Both of them came from an elite family, so many students hesitated to interfere with their conversation. Noticing this, Elena quickly wrapped up her talks with Lishia, who also nodded back at her.
Lishia sat down as she noticed Amelia and Damian already sitting together, but she ignored them both. She had taken her father's advice seriously, who told her to stay away from the Greville family as much as possible.
The seminar hall kept filling out as Damian also noticed Asher and Alyssa coming in. Their entrance made the seminar hall burst with chatter all over the place. Some girls, secretly interested in Asher, were cursing Alyssa for being a burden and getting him injured.
None of them could imagine that the girl in the wheelchair they were mocking had enough power to kill every single first-year student in a one-on-one duel. Except for Asher, even Kevin could not defeat Alyssa now that she was cured.
Even Amelia was one of the people who saw Alyssa in a similar light. She didn't know why Asher would bother to harm his 1st Rank to help a girl like her.
Although she would have talked with Asher, knowing his personality, she decided not to. But unlike Amelia, Damian did not view Alyssa in a similar light. Instead, he sensed something weird about the way Asher handled situations around her.
In 5 minutes, everyone had sat in their seats, and now the entrance to the seminar hall was closed, so latecomers couldn't enter even if they wanted to.
Venessa was one of those people who was not sitting in the front seats of Class 1 despite being powerful enough to sit in those seats. Despite her outgoing personality, she disliked doing stuff that gathered attention towards her.
A man with broad shoulders, tall stature, slightly grey hair, and black eyes walked on the stage, gathering the attention of everyone present in the seminar hall.
"Hello, I am Xander Demarcus, the Vice-Principal of the World Academy," Xander introduced himself.
The way he carried himself with pride and dominance, and his image of being strict, was evident from looking at him.
A big screen behind him showed his face to the people in the last rows.
"I am here to announce and reward the Top 10 Rankers among the First Years of the World Academy," he said as the sound of clapping was heard.
Multiple professors were present here, and they were also looking forward to seeing the rankings as well.
"Apart from the Top 10 people, the names of the Top 50 students will be displayed on the screen behind me," Xander said as 10 blocks appeared behind him, numbered 1 to 10.
"But before I announce, let me show you the prize that the 1st Ranker would get," Xander raised his hand as a crown appeared in his hands.
"This is one of the SSS Rank Artifacts that we give to the Rank 1 of each year to use," Xander said as Asher looked at the crown like many others did.
His eyes focused on the crown, and the system notification popped up.
[ Analyzing Artifact....]
Fallen's Crown
Rank SSS - Increases the Comprehension Rate of its wearer by 50 %
Passive Effect - Intelligence +100
Limitations - Only works on beings below A Rank
Limitations - Only works for 2 minutes the first time you wear it and becomes useless after that
Limitations - Needs Recharge Period of One Month
"This Artifact is one of the rarest artifacts that increases your comprehension rate and gives you a considerable boost in the path you choose for yourself," Xander said seriously.
Many students started to think about having such an artifact, but they would never be able to use it.
"As it has a recharging period of 1 month, we cannot use it for all the students,"
"So only Rankers can use this Artifact, but the one who uses it first will have a clear advantage over the others," Xander's words made Kevin a bit happy and nervous at the same time.
'I have a good chance to get this,' he thought in his mind.
"I will start to call the names of the Top 10 Students, so come on the stage one by one," Xander looked at the front rows of all columns, making the whole seminar hall look forward to it.
"In the Tenth Place, we have Venessa Baker," Xander said as she stood up from the middle rows to go up the stage.
Her name shocked many students, and among them were the ones sitting in the front rows.
She walked up to the stage and stood on the spot Xander pointed at. The whole time, she avoided looking at Xander's eyes but looked at Alyssa, who was also looking at her.
"In the Ninth Place, we have Damian Seymour," Xander said as Damian stood up, and Amelia clapped for him among many students as he walked up and stood beside Venessa.
Although Damian wanted a higher rank, he was still content with being a Ranker.
"In the Eighth Place, we have Eva Williams," Xander said as Eva stood up to walk up to the stage as Kevin and Elena cheered for her, along with others.
Many boys cheered for her as well because she was among the most beautiful girls in the first years.
"In Seventh Place, we have Amelia Von Greville," Xander looked at Amelia as she proudly walked onto the stage with a confident yet sharp look on her face.
Damian smiled as she took the seventh spot beside Eva, who got a bit angry at herself for losing to Amelia.
The rankings were moving up as many people awaited the next 6 spots, but the most confused person was none other than Sam Allister, who didn't know what was happening.
'How did I not get Seventh or Eighth place?' Sam asked himself.
If others knew what Sam was thinking, they would have thought he was making a joke because Sam Allister was a person that was predicted to secure fifth place or higher.
