Not long after I rejected Seraphine and Lizzy’s offers, two events, one major and one minor, caused a stir in the academy.

The first was the protagonist rescuing Selena, who was being threatened by delinquent students from the Swordsmanship Department, which further strengthened the relationship between the two.

This event wasn’t much different from the original story, so I just took note of it and moved on. As expected, the protagonist’s heroic actions were the talk of the female students.

To me, who had cleared Luminor Academy 24 times, it seemed like an event that had to be completed once Selena was brought in.

‘For a proper Selena route, you must rescue her. If you don’t do this after bringing her in, you’re practically abandoning her.’

Not only does the protagonist’s favorability with Selena increase greatly when he saves her, but if he doesn’t, Selena will have an injury penalty until the end due to wounds sustained in this incident.

From this perspective, the protagonist’s actions seemed to be moving properly towards clearing the game, and I also slightly revised my evaluation of him in my mind.

Of course, I still hadn’t directly met or talked to him even once.

At least, seeing that he was maintaining a lukewarm relationship with Ethan without unnecessary conflicts, it seemed that, fortunately, he didn’t think of Ethan as the villain from the original work. [GalaxyTL/Axiomatic]

He probably couldn’t think that the story would flow the same way when Ethan’s body had completely changed to the point of being unrecognizable.

While the love story between the protagonist and Selena was what it was, the part that surprised me a bit more was the second incident that occurred.

Although it was certainly less talked about compared to the protagonist’s main story, for me, it was a rather unexpected event that happened sooner than I had anticipated.

The incident where Luke, Seraphine’s guard, shed his male disguise and changed his position to be Seraphine’s exclusive maid felt even more unexpected to me.

As you might have guessed from my mention of him shedding his male disguise, Luke was the only cross-dressing female heroine in this game.

Originally, in these types of games, having one cross-dressing female heroine who gets into various situations with the protagonist was part of its unique charm.

Of course, being a sub-heroine of the game, she was also available for “conquering.” The easiest way to get her was to enroll in the Technical Department and use a two-person dormitory room with her.

By sharing the same dormitory, no matter how careful Luke was, situations would inevitably arise where the protagonist would discover that she was a woman, and from there, the protagonist would keep Luke’s secret while building friendship and affection with her.

Therefore, usually, only the protagonist and Seraphine knew that she was a woman throughout the game, and in some routes, her being a woman wasn’t revealed even until the ending.

This time, Luke revealing herself as a woman and starting to attend the academy in a female uniform with maid frills was a sight I had never seen before, even after 24 clears.

Moreover, she didn’t stop there but added laces to her uniform, wore a headdress, and clearly presented herself as an exclusive maid.

Seeing her attend school in an outfit strangely similar to mine, I wondered if I might have been the cause.

‘Maybe Seraphine left that position open trying to make me her exclusive maid, but when I refused, she ended up filling that position with Luke.’

Anyway, to manage Seraphine’s long hair and take care of her body, an exclusive maid was essential, and that role couldn’t be done by Luke while she was crossdressing and attending the academy.

It would be untrustworthy to hastily make another student her exclusive maid, and bringing in a maid from outside was only possible from the next semester.

From Seraphine’s perspective, moving Luke to be her exclusive maid in this way was probably the best choice.

‘Wait, then the reason the exclusive maid position was vacant in the first place was to bring me into that position from the start….’

To be honest, this was the most likely possibility.

This was the first time Seraphine had entered the academy without her exclusive maid, and she had a personality that tried to keep people she thought were capable close to her.

Originally, she would have brought one of her exclusive maids from the Imperial Palace to enroll in the academy together, but the fact that she left that position empty and enrolled without one suggested that she had likely acted with the intention of putting me in that position from the start. [GalaxyTL/Axiomatic]

Of course, even if I hadn’t been Ethan’s exclusive maid, I probably would have refused Seraphine’s offer anyway.

I mean, how could I, who was a man in my previous life, take on the duties of an exclusive maid for Seraphine, a woman?

I didn’t mind ironing uniforms and combing hair, but changing clothes and bathing her were actions that felt too burdensome for me to do, no matter how I thought about it.

It’s not a matter of feeling sexual desire or not, it’s just that I don’t think I could handle it because it would make me feel uncomfortable. Even now, I felt incredibly guilty whenever I entered the bathroom with Isabel.

…And Lizzy’s offer to be her personal secretary that day… I rejected it mainly because I still found it difficult to trust her.

I had a feeling that if I hastily accepted the position of Lizzy’s personal secretary, she would take every opportunity to work me to the bone without rest.

No matter how I thought about it, I couldn’t be sure that the current Lizzy didn’t harbor any ill feelings towards me, and above all, her offer to hire me as a personal secretary itself was suspicious.

She was already skilled enough at gathering and managing people to create her own independent group among the Pharmacy Department freshmen, so why would she need to hire someone like me? And to compete with the princess for it?

There was definitely some ulterior motive, 100%. It’s obviously not something you should accept, being such a suspicious offer.

Fortunately, the excuse of wanting to keep my loyalty to Ethan, with whom I had worked for a long time, was more effective on both of them than I had expected.

I was able to reject both offers smoothly without disgracing either Seraphine or Lizzy.

As a result, my rejection of Seraphine’s offer led to Luke dropping his male disguise and becoming Seraphine’s exclusive maid, but that’s not really my fault.

I was just keeping my loyalty to Ethan, and there’s no reason for a servant to be criticized for being loyal to one master, right?

If you have any complaints, take them to your master, Luke. Though, of course, you can’t.

…And so, amid various major and minor incidents, the rest of the first semester at Luminor Academy began to pass by in a blur.

Before we knew it, we were left with only the final evaluation event of the first semester: the evaluation duel.

『Lilith has reached Level 10!』

『Lilith can now use ‘Mana Imbue’!』

As Luminor Academy’s first semester classes were coming to an end one by one, the time to wrap up the first semester was also approaching.

As with any academy game, the most important thing at the end of a semester was the final evaluation event.

Actually, for students directly attending the academy, the midterm evaluation exam was just as important as the final evaluation event, but the midterm exam wasn’t an interesting enough event to be given significant weight in the game.

Who would find it fun to watch and play through everyone gathering in an exam hall, feeling like they’ve gone back to their primary/secondary school days, solving test problems or hitting targets in an outdoor training ground with magic?

Anyway, to finish the semester on a strong note, it was necessary to perform well in this final evaluation event, and fortunately, my preparations were going fairly well.

The biggest change was that my level had increased from 9 to 10.

As I gained experience by dueling with Swordsmanship Department students three times a day in Harold’s class, my level had naturally risen to Level 10 during the duels.

Thanks to this, I also acquired the Mana Imbue skill that is automatically learned at level 10.

It was support magic that strengthened weapons by imbuing them with mana, so it increased the stability of my dagger attacks to some extent. [GalaxyTL/Axiomatic]

You might ask, what does the stability of dagger attacks have to do with being a mage? 

Whether I used magic or melee attacks wasn’t particularly important in gaining an advantage in the final evaluation duel.

Using all means at your disposal to somehow defeat your opponent and secure victory – that was the ‘evaluation battle’ event that accounted for the largest proportion of the Magic Department’s first-semester final evaluation.

Incidentally, this wasn’t just limited to the Magic Department.

All departments that taught combat-related subjects conducted this kind of evaluation battle duel to wrap up the first semester.

The Swordsmanship Department, including Ethan, as well as the Spearmanship Department, the Archery Department, and the Martial Arts Department, all concluded the classes of their first semester with this type of final.

Of course, since the completion rate of the courses was also important, the evaluation battle alone didn’t determine the entire semester’s grades, but it was inevitable that it would account for the largest proportion.

Originally, an academy was a place to nurture talented individuals with combat abilities, and evaluating students based on how strong they were in actual combat was perhaps the most obvious and fair method of assessment.

At least, ranking combat power is the most definitive evaluation method compared to test score evaluations that many people might not understand.

Anyway, as a result of focusing on increasing my Luck stat through various hardships over the past semester for this end-of-semester evaluation battle event, I was able to somehow raise my Luck stat, which was barely 2 when I entered, to a usable level.

The increase in Luck gained through reading the book I got from Lizzy, “Understanding Mana Flow,” was 2.

The increase in Luck after completing the accuracy-focused lectures was 2. I took two of these, so that’s 4.

Lastly, my Luck increased along with my level, rising by 1.

Seeing my Luck stat that had increased more than fourfold from 2 to 9, I couldn’t help but feel a surge of emotion.

It was truly miraculous to have raised Lilith’s Luck to this point.

Fortunately, a Luck of about 9 corresponded to an actual hit rate of about 20%. With this, I could roughly raise it to close to 50% through triple casting.

This level should be enough to secure a win comfortably, even if I couldn’t gain an overwhelming advantage over my opponent.

“…It really was a lot of hard work.”

…But once I somehow get through this semester, from the next semester on, it should become somewhat manageable. [GalaxyTL/Axiomatic]

As long as I wasn’t matched with an opponent stronger than me in the end-of-semester duel, I should be able to win comfortably and wrap up the first semester.

Considering that the evaluation battle duels are only matched within the same department and that Luminor Academy’s matching system allows top performers during the semester to choose their opponents for the final evaluation battle, there should absolutely be no chance of me facing a stronger opponent.

…At that time, I hadn’t anticipated it. 

I never expected that there would be a crazy woman who performed better than me and would designate me as her opponent for the evaluation battle duel, marking the end of the first semester, and ignoring easier opponents.