Chapter 370

At that moment, Hector stood up with a deeply moved face.

…Come to think of it, it was indeed hard to distinguish him from the bear.

“Senior Nia, it has been a long time! Seeing that you rescued me after all…!”

*Ruuuuuuumble—*

“…Your love for humanity is truly extraordinary! I deeply respect you!”

‘At least he seems to know when his life is in danger. Well, he must have survival instincts at the very least.’

Nia’s intimidating presence even made the clueless Hector quick-witted!

In any case, thanks to the active rescue efforts of Alphard, Nia, Roan, and his friends, the playground was cleaned up in no time.

The students gathered in one place again, and Nia stepped forward in front of them.

The students whispered as they looked at her unique appearance.

“A human-looking holy beast?”

“Is she strong?”

“She even lifted the bear earlier.”

Since there was almost no bare skin showing, packed tightly with scales and feathers, they seemed to be even more confused.

Roan nodded.

“She is strong.”

It was not a lie.

Except for Alphard and Roan, there was a high probability that even if everyone present attacked her, they wouldn’t be able to handle her.

In terms of pure combat power, Nia would be ranked within the top five among the Acherandir students.

The students who heard Roan’s words were overjoyed.

“Wow! That’s awesome!”

“Darc says she’s strong!”

“But just as you expect, she cannot participate in Sacred Combat.”

“Aw, what. Was she a banned holy beast?”

“I got excited for nothing.”

Sure enough, the students quickly lost interest and withdrew their attention from Nia.

Sion looked at the students in dismay and said,

“Senior Nia is not a holy beast, she is a human. She is our senior.”

“Excuse me? She is a human, Saintess candidate?”

When Sion nodded, the students widened their eyes and looked at Nia again.

Then, they blushed and quickly averted their gazes.

“Is-Is it okay to dress like that?”

“Thinking of her as a human makes it a bit…”

“I heard there was no problem with the screening.”

“Screening?”

“Naturally, the school rules screening.”

“Ah~”

Sion repeated the words Roan had told her, and then looked at Roan with an expression that said, ‘Did I do well?’

When Roan nodded roughly, Sion flashed a bright smile.

Meanwhile, Nia, who heard their conversation, spoke cheerfully.

“It’s fine! I also prefer being viewed as a holy beast rather than a trashy human!”

…?

The students felt that the atmosphere was somewhat unusual.

No matter how much one liked holy beasts, they wouldn’t normally call a human trash.

Of course, not everyone thought that way.

“Then do you run the Sacred Combat yourself?! Or do you just participate as a player?!”

The leader of the Sacred Combat hooligans, Sherry, asked with a bright smile.

Nia smiled back and replied.

“Yes, that is a typically trashy human thought! Since there is nothing but Sacred Combat in your heads! How on earth are you any different from a black mage?”

“Hahaha! Because black mages cannot participate in Sacred Combat?”

Roan felt dizzy as he listened to the conversation between Nia and Sherry.

‘I have to do Sacred Combat while being a black mage… Even putting that aside, they are truly properly insane.’

Compared to those people, a black mage who had sneaked into the Holy Academy didn’t even seem to belong to the insane category.

*Hum—*

‘That is not true.’

‘Tsk. If you say so.’

Roan clicked his tongue inwardly at the voice of the False Divinity, which did not easily let a single word slide.

There was a brief battle of nerves between Nia and Sherry, but the class proceeded again under Alphard’s lead.

In fact, Alphard also knew very well that the majority of the students were nobles who had never held a frying pan in their lives.

He had learned from experience what would happen if he left the cooking to them.

“There are various types of food for divine spiritual beasts. Wet and dry. Since dry food is mostly for travel, we will exclude it—this time, we will make wet food. Here, wet food refers to…”

‘Hmm, he really explains it well from the basics.’

Roan listened carefully to Alphard’s explanation.

Although it was all information he already knew, it was an excellent explanation that allowed him to organize the concepts regarding divine spiritual beast food once more.

On the other hand, the other students?

*Stab!*

“Heeek! That senior stabbed a wild boar with a knife…!”

“Even Darc wouldn’t do something like that!”

“Poor wild boar…”

The students shed tears, deeply distracted by Nia butchering the beasts behind Alphard.

But when one animal was completely butchered into chunks of meat in an instant,

“M-Meat!”

“The wild boar turned into meat!”

they cheered, extremely amazed.

Bell looked at them in wonder and asked,

[Master, I think these people have a similar mental age to me?]

‘Strictly speaking, you are a bit better.’

Because Bell was truly young, whereas they had only grown older.

[Hehehe.]

At the rare approval from his master, Bell flapped his wings in joy.

Then, he flinched upon seeing the face of Hector standing next to Roan.

[Whoa, what is this?]

…Hector was watching the piling meat while drooling heavily.

He looked like a rock from which mineral spring water trickled.

Roan was worried that Bell might become an Abyssal Dragon who forgot basic manners.

‘He’s still a person, how can you say “what is this”.’

[Ah, I’m sorry. I was just startled.]

Fortunately, that didn’t seem to be the case.

“Hey, fanatic. Does your family eat things like that too?”

“Huh? Ah, yes. I thought building intimacy might work if I adopt eating habits as close to a divine spiritual beast as possible.”

“Hmm…”

“What’s with that ambiguous reaction?”

“Can I say it?”

“Go ahead.”

“I don’t think it’s very effective.”

“You bastard!!!!”

“I shouldn’t have said it!!”

Hector grabbed Demona by the collar and shook her wildly.

Demona’s slender body fluttered like a paper doll.

In any case, even in the midst of this, Alphard maintained his composure like an AI and continued to explain.

“Spiritual beasts in nature mostly consume raw food—but it is bad for their health due to problems with infection and hygiene. Also, eating it cooked makes the meal easier to digest. Therefore, the simplest and most efficient cooking method is to grill it over fire without seasoning. If you grill the meat well—you will be able to pass the pop quiz.”

At this, the students joked around.

“Oh, Professor~ Anyone can grill over fire!”

“We are Acherandir students, so please teach us a more difficult recipe than that!”

Apparently, they thought that it was over once they just put the meat over the fire until it was cooked.

Roan looked at them in dismay.

‘If that were the case, all the steak houses in the world would have gone bankrupt.’

How many complex principles and processes were hidden in the simple act of grilling meat.

Because they couldn’t do it properly, a magical steak that was cold where it was cooked and hot where it was raw had been served at the restaurant run by Professor Selinder last time.

Acherandir was similar in this regard, whether it was professors or students.

However, Alphard provided the information the students requested like an AI.

“In that case—I will explain about steaming, stir-frying, boiling in a double boiler, deep-frying, soup, and boiling, which are suitable for instant cooking.”

And not long after.

*Zzz— Zzz—*

“Finally, boiling is…”

“Hey, wake me up when it’s over.”

“Who’s going to wake you, everyone is sleeping?”

The students demonstrated the amazing skill of falling asleep while standing on the playground.

The students had listened with some interest up to the initial steaming or stir-frying, but the explanation was so dry, and they didn’t have much interest in the first place.

For Alphard, it was a learned sight every year anyway, so he didn’t particularly care.

“Then now take the ingredients—and cook.”

“Hey, I told you to wake me up when it’s over.”

“Yeah, thanks for waking me up.”

“???”

The students went forward one by one, intending to receive the ingredients Nia had brought.

“Senior, I will use roe deer meat!”

“No.”

“Pardon? Uh… then bear meat?”

“Are you playing around?”

“Then… how about that pheasant?”

“Don’t say nonsense.”

“???”

However, the students had no choice but to be flustered.

For Nia, standing in front of the meat and plants she had trimmed like a storehouse keeper, refused to give them anything!

”’Then why did she bring it?”’

Did she bring it just to throw it at us from the sky?

The students rolled their eyes in complete confusion.

At that moment, Roan stepped forward.

“Oh, Roan.”

Instead of abruptly asking for something, Roan carefully examined the ingredients and said,

“The ingredients are truly of the highest quality. Indeed, the mountains always provide us with many things.”

“As expected of a proper junior!”

Nia smiled broadly and was pleased by Roan’s praise.

Although she had borrowed the help of Professor Alphard, Nia also had to go through considerable trouble to gather such a large quantity.

“However, to think that nature has to be damaged this much for a mere pop quiz, we need to be careful of human selfishness.”

“Khh! Kee-oo-yat, kyap!”

“What is she saying?”

“She said ‘Kee-oo-yat, kyap’?”

“You fool, I know that much too.”

It roughly meant ‘You are truly the best!’ in the desert lizard race’s language.

In any case, in order to get something from Nia, who had a strong hostility toward humans, this level of pleasantry was necessary.

…Although he wondered if he really had to go this far just to get pop quiz ingredients, that was how it was.

“I will take wild boar meat as the main, along with one scale flower root, five Ungbarami, three Sallangwa, and simple seasonings.”

Nia wiped away the tears that trickled out and nodded.

“Of course, you can take it. Will that be enough?”

“Yes, it is enough…”

“No, I think you’ll need this too? Ah, it will be good to add this as well. Yes, this too!”

Nia handed over an armful of ingredients as they caught her eye and came within reach, in addition to what Roan had requested.

“I do not need this much, though.”

“It’s better for these creatures to be used by you. If they fall into the hands of those lawless, trashy humans, they will meet a terrible end.”

…Honestly, Roan couldn’t deny it either.

‘Well, if I keep them, they’ll all come in handy someday.’

Roan, who was flustered at first, quickly accepted and packed them all up.

In the end, Roan returned carrying a pile of ingredients stacked higher than his upper body.

“Boo, greedy Darc.”

“I heard that senior is in the same club as Darc?”

“Such dirty school ties, regional ties, and blood ties…!”

“Why is that dirty?”

“Ah, is that so?”

As always, the students criticized Roan, but soon they also paid pleasantries to Nia first, just as he had done.

“Indeed, the senior must have worked hard to bring that much.”

“I truly love nature, Senior.”

“Yeah, I don’t believe you. You smooth-talking human.”

…?

…Such pleasantries also had to be done strategically, not randomly.

At that moment,

*Step—*

“Oh, it’s Wicronon!”

“Wicronon only hits the nail on the head!”

‘…It would be a relief if she doesn’t get hit herself.’

Demona came out from among the students and walked toward Nia.

Nia sent a sharp gaze as if telling her to bring it on, but Demona walked forward confidently without being intimidated in the slightest.

*Step—*

Demona stood in front of Nia, looked around at the ingredients for a moment, paused, and then opened her mouth.

“…Senior, how much you must have suffered all this time?”

“””?”””

“?”

[???]

At that single remark, not only Roan and his friends, but also the students and even the divine spiritual beasts couldn’t help but tilt their heads.

”’Is that really Demona?”’