Chapter 494
At last, the day of the problem arrived. The Summon Materials Science performance evaluation had begun.
The evaluation site was a place within the Keyzen campus known as the "Botanical Hall".
"Everyone ready?"
A man with his upper-body muscles bared and wearing sunglasses spoke loudly. It was Professor Grerion. The students answered with spirited voices, "Yes!"
"From now, I'll start the timer. Begin!"
The students, eyes blazing, scattered in all directions.
The "Botanical Hall" of Keyzen was a massive structure made of steel beams and vinyl, housing vegetation from across the continent.
With Grerion's permission, students were allowed to collect two plant species here and fuse them to create their own chimera.
The key to this evaluation was how powerful a synergy one could produce through their chimera.
"It's unbelievably hot in here."
Toto wiped the sweat dripping from his forehead. Simon had already taken off his school jacket, tying it around his waist while examining the plants.
"Toto, have you decided what to combine?"
"Yeah! I figured it might be this kind of evaluation, so I made a few lists in advance!"
Toto waved his notebook excitedly, but Simon covered his ears.
"Toto, cover your ears."
"Huh?"
"Someone pulled a Mandragora."
Kkeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeek!
A plant that screams when uprooted. The Mandragora was infamous.
The students who heard the scream quickly clutched at their ears.
The student who had pulled it hurriedly stuffed it into a black plastic bag, then packed soil over its body until it quieted down.
Lowering the hands that had been blocking his ears, Toto muttered,
"...Someone's definitely going to modify a Mandragora into a chimera that turns its scream into a singing voice and get an A+."
"Oh, that's actually a really good idea."
Toto quickly found the plants he wanted and left the greenhouse, while Simon ventured deeper inside.
[Extremely Dangerous.]
[Risk of Being Eaten.]
Before long, he had reached the section filled with insectivorous plants and plant-type monsters related to them.
Any further inside lay temperamental creatures said to swallow monsters whole, but even with Grerion's authority, students couldn't go that far.
Time wasn't plentiful. Simon hurried to look through the insectivorous plants in the greenhouse.
"Found it!"
It was a carnivorous plant dripping toxic fluid from its mouth. Its color and shape were exactly as described in the plant compendium.
Simon carefully pulled it out by the roots and placed it in his collection bag. Just in case, he gathered a few more plants as well.
'Good, next.'
Next, he headed to the section where plants from cold regions were grown.
From the ceiling, magic circles breathed cold air, and the farther in he went, snow appeared—strange specimens had even taken root in ice itself.
His breath fogged. Simon untied the jacket from his waist, put it back on, and buttoned it tightly.
'Alright. Let's find something good!'
* * *
An hour later, Simon had easily secured all the harvest he needed and exited the Botanical Hall.
Outside, worktables had been prepared.
Here, the chimera fusions would take place. Students who had arrived earlier were already using every bit of knowledge learned so far to create their plant chimeras.
Simon looked around, searching for an empty spot.
'Oh, that's Loraine.'
Her table was full of cute plants reflecting her personal taste.
When she noticed Simon passing by, she shyly explained that she was trying to make a chimera for perfume ingredients. Simon, though he had never asked, quietly cheered her on with a "Fighting".
Next to her, however, Hector was causing chaos.
He had collected a vine-like plant monster, but it was now fighting a bloody battle against the materials on his table. The vine monster tangled Hector in its tendrils, while Hector ripped and tore back with brute strength.
Simon quietly slipped away, pretending he hadn't seen.
'There's an empty spot!'
Finally securing a table, Simon carefully laid out the plants he had gathered.
He washed his hands clean, set up the tools, and ripped open the magic tape.
Thanks to memorizing the plant compendium by heart, the moment he heard Grerion's evaluation task, ideas had immediately come to mind.
'Let's just make exactly two types.'
* * *
"Time's up for the evaluation."
Grerion, stopping the timer in his hand, addressed the students.
"Everyone, hands above your heads. Anyone who touches the table even a little now gets an F."
"Step back three steps from your tables, students."
The students smacked their lips regretfully and stepped back. Some even let Darkness trickle out in lingering frustration, but were stopped by the assistants.
"Now, I'll introduce a special artifact to be used for this chimera evaluation."
Grerion spoke, and from behind, four assistants carried in a massive flowerpot with great effort.
"This is the 'Flowerpot of Roinah', brought here with the permission of Lady Neftis. As you know, plant chimeras just fused today cannot yet exhibit their full abilities. Plants take time. But if you plant them in this pot, you can see an illusion of what they'll look like six months later."
The students murmured at this new evaluation method.
"Without further ado, I'll show you how it works. Start from the front row, one by one."
The students in the first row carried their chimera plants reverently and lined up.
"Report."
The first boy spoke.
"I'm Matt Comer! I fused the Linset, which produces sweet, delicious fruits, and the plant-type monster Furice."
"Why those two?"
"Linset has wonderfully sweet fruits, but only produces one at a time. Furice, on the other hand, produces clusters of fruits in abundance! By combining them, I wanted to make a chimera that yields many valuable Linset fruits."
He spoke confidently, citing examples of successful improvements in other plant-monster hybrids.
"So, a chimera crop enhancement. We'll see from the results. Plant it in Roinah's Flowerpot."
"Yes!"
Matt placed his chimera into the pot, and soon after, an identical illusion of the plant appeared beside it.
"...Ah."
But—
The chimera in the illusion drooped lifelessly, rotted black through and through.
"If you combine plants that are incompatible, this is the result. You just killed off perfectly fine specimens. Your score: F."
Grerion handed down the F mercilessly, and the students looked at each other with fearful expressions.
"Next!"
Last week, when Grerion had first announced this evaluation, a debate had broken out among the students over how the plant chimeras would be judged.
After all, unlike monsters or undead, it was obvious that freshly-made plant chimeras couldn't function properly right away.
Some argued they would be stored for months to observe their growth. Others insisted that since it was an idea competition, even somewhat impractical combinations that sounded plausible should earn high marks.
Thus, the students who chose impact and audacity over the stability of their chimeras all revealed the form of dead plants and were handed an F.
"They're at least alive. Grade C."
As long as a chimera survived six months into the future, the minimum score was a C.
Grerion valued survival highly. In nature, surviving for months was proof of both the student's understanding of the chimera and the completeness of their creation.
And then came the turn of the one everyone had been waiting for—Hector.
"The Poeti Vine can only detect prey through touch, so its aggression is low. But by adding a plant that senses temperature, I created a more aggressive monster."
The only problem was… it was far too aggressive. Its vines lashed out in every direction, and by bad luck, one wrapped around Toto's leg and dragged him across the ground.
As for Hector, whether or not the vines tangled around him, he stood still with a resigned air, his body covered in dragon-scale armor.
"This would be quite useful in the field."
When Hector planted it into Roinah's Flowerpot, the illusion showed a much larger chimera after six months. Grerion's face broke into satisfaction.
"A+. Hector Moore."
"Thank you!"
Grerion was a field-oriented necromancer himself.
So long as the condition of survival after six months was met, students who made bold, combat-capable chimeras earned high grades.
A little later, it was finally Simon's turn.
Unlike the other students, who had chosen large, flashy plant monsters, Simon had brought out a small, somewhat unimpressive insectivorous plant.
Grerion gave a slight nod.
"Report."
"I am Simon Follentia. I combined a plant monster called Povea with a tuberous red lotus root."
Simon calmly continued his explanation.
According to the plant compendium, Povea grows on the "Island of Bees", where it evolved to prey on swarms of insect-type monsters known as Killer Bees.
Killer Bees were a major monster species, even ranked 6th on the hierarchy list, and one that the "Queen Bee Meridiana" herself often used as her main force.
They carried many kinds of strong venom, but Povea would swallow them whole and then metabolize the poisons with its own bodily compounds, breaking them down into harmless substances which it expelled into the ground through its roots.
"So your goal is an antidote."
Grerion stroked his chin.
"But I've never seen a toxicologist use Povea as an antidote ingredient."
"Yes. That's because once it neutralizes poison, it simply dumps the harmless substance into the soil through its roots. So I replaced its root with a tuberous plant, making it store the detoxified compounds in the stem instead of wasting them. If the stem is cut and consumed, it could have antidote effects."
"We'll see."
Grerion immediately planted Simon's Povea into Roinah's Flowerpot.
Soon after, the illusion of Simon's Povea appeared, properly grown, with its stem swollen and solid.
Whether or not that tuber truly held antidotal properties couldn't be known from the illusion—but the intent was clear, and more importantly, it had survived.
"Well done. Grade A. Simon Follentia."
"Thank you!"
Simon had worried, since he couldn't prove the antidotal effect, but he was very satisfied with the result. Grerion then called the next student, and Simon returned to his seat.
"Good work."
The words came from none other than Fitzgerald Ingels, who, along with Hector, was the only one to earn an A+. From his first year, Fitzgerald had specialized in chimera necromancy, and this subject was his greatest strength.
"Thanks, Fitzgerald."
"If I may give a personal opinion…"
Fitzgerald gestured toward the large insectivorous plant sitting on Simon's table.
"If you had used something with more impact than Povea, you might have been able to aim for A+."
"I don't regret my choice."
Simon smiled faintly.
"When I fused them, the Povea responded beautifully. No resistance at all. It merged cleanly."
"Really?"
"Yeah. It just felt right."
Once the evaluations ended, the students were free.
Some crowded around Roinah's Flowerpot to observe other chimeras, while others sat and chatted, or used the leftover time to play around making more chimeras.
Simon was tidying up his messy table when a voice called out.
"The Summonology class looks pretty fun."
Simon spun around in surprise.
A gray-haired boy with bandages over his body was walking toward him.
"Kajan!"
Kajan scratched at the scar near his eye with a tired smile.
"Magical Combat class spent the whole day running across Roke Island with cursed bracelets strapped on. For the evaluation, they called it a desert crossing."
"...Ahaha. Well, Professor Hongpeng always emphasizes stamina above all else."
Kajan glanced around once, then motioned toward a quieter spot. Simon nodded and followed.
Behind a deserted building, on a bench.
Kajan pulled out the request slip he had taken.
Request Registration: Corpse Disassembly
Request Rank: F
Reward: 5 Gold
Location: Dresden Kingdom, Tarados Fiefdom
Details: Disassembly of monster corpses, labor service provided
Special Notes: 1168798164
"The problem was in the special notes. As I thought, it was a code."
Kajan began to explain.
"In Tarados, they used a language called Rukier. It's a native tongue of the original inhabitants, but now it's nearly extinct, replaced by the continental language."
He pulled out a word table for Rukier.
"I matched these numbers with the first words in Rukier associated with those numbers."
"Let me try."
Simon alternated between the request slip and the Rukier word table.
"One word for every two numbers, right?"
"Correct."
"Sae. Ryeo. Ju. Yo. Sal. What could that… mean…?"
Suddenly, a chill ran down Simon's entire body.
"Help me."
"Exactly."
Kajan nodded gravely.
"Something insane is happening in Tarados."