"It was the same with DemiDevimon."
"Perhaps this is the basic effect of the 'Pride' series of Magitech Cards."
"If 'Pride 1' can be upgraded to 'Pride 2,' there should be further changes."
One ten past one in the afternoon.
Dark headed to the Potions classroom early, but ran into Victor, Robert, and Emma on the way.
It seemed they were arguing?
Chapter 26: Victor and Robert's Debt Crisis
Robert Broheim had never imagined that Emma Metis could be such a malicious woman!
He had thought this fellow countrywoman, who came from the same city as him, was reliable (that is, someone he could borrow money from). Little had he known that she had been scheming against him from the moment she lent him her credits!
"Two-faced bitch!"
He burst into a tirade!
"Robert..."
Victor tried to hold him back, but failed.
Robert came from a military family. Although he was an idiot, he had strength to spare!
Victor, on the other hand, had inherited the Hero's bloodline, but his parents had both died, and he had never received a proper education. He was also undernourished, so he was a little scrawny.
Perhaps the balance of strength between them would shift in the near future, but not yet.
Robert was so furious that his face and neck had turned red.
His spittle nearly sprayed onto Emma's face as he roared.
Emma, however, remained cold and unmoved.
Seeing Robert raise a fist as big as a meat bun, Victor hurriedly grabbed his hand. Emma only gave a cold laugh. "Immature people can only use their fists."
Robert's expression stiffened, and his fist went limp, allowing Victor to pull his arm down.
But his anger hadn't faded. He still gritted his teeth. "It's only five credits! I'll go borrow some from someone right now!"
Emma replied coolly, "We made a contract, Robert."
Robert roared, "We're only five credits short!"
Emma remained unconcerned. "It's already too late, Robert. We're in the fourth round of doubling now."
The deadline had originally been one o'clock on Friday afternoon.
Robert had always thought a new day began when the calendar page turned, and had subconsciously ignored Friday itself.
But in reality, a day meant twenty-four hours from the moment the contract was signed.
After one o'clock Saturday afternoon, the second day began.
The third day began at one o'clock Sunday afternoon.
It was now past one o'clock Monday afternoon: the fourth day!
The first day, double. The second day, four times. The third day, eight times. The fourth day, sixteen times.
Five multiplied by sixteen made a full eighty credits!
Robert had thought they only needed to scrape together forty credits sometime today.
They already had thirty-five credits, and after Potions class in the afternoon, they'd have fifty-five. Paying off the debt would be easy!
Even if the worst came to pass, they could just borrow five credits from someone to make up the difference!
You could always rob Peter to pay Paul. Everyone knew how to do that, right?
Those old army grunts were the best at it!
Having grown up around them, Robert thought along similar lines.
"Don't get worked up, Robert," Victor finally said.
He'd sensed something was wrong from the start, and now he finally understood.
"Even if it's already eighty credits, we can still pay it off easily. We have one class this afternoon and two tomorrow morning. Add that to what we already have, and we'll have a full ninety-five credits! More than enough!"
"Right!"
Robert did the math, and finally calmed down. "Once we pay back all the credits tomorrow, Emma, we'll have nothing to do with each other ever again!"
"So it's just a debt repayment drama. I thought it was something else. Looks like the trio's still stuck together, even if their relationship isn't exactly normal..."
Seeing that there wouldn't be a fight, Dark turned and left.
It was only eighty credits. He could pay it off in the blink of an eye.
Potions class.
Starting with this lesson, Professor Thompson began teaching the students how to brew Speed Magic Potion.
This was a special potion that helped Magicians quickly replenish enough mana for three Normal Summons. They could drink one bottle a day.
Once a duel competition began, it became a battle of endurance, putting a Magician's total mana and recovery ability to the test.
Speed Magic Potion could often prove useful at a critical moment.
Victor and Robert listened and worked on their experiment with great focus, hoping to avoid losing any credits and earn as many as possible during class.
But they were simply too impatient.
While brewing the potion, Robert accidentally added an extra dose of Expansion Grass. The cauldron exploded, sending its lid flying!
Victor tried to help Robert deal with the potion overflowing everywhere, but accidentally knocked over his own cauldron!
Not only did they each lose five credits, but they were also ordered to stay behind and clean the classroom!
"Professor Thompson explained the dangers of Expansion Grass two weeks ago, Robert."
Emma made a point of taunting him as she left the classroom.
—Whether or not she really meant to taunt him.
As far as Robert was concerned, it was an incredibly nasty taunt!
"What are we going to do, Victor? We've lost another ten credits!"
After his brief fit of anger, Robert sank into despair.
Victor, however, was checking the contract on his Sorting Card.
Then he couldn't help saying, "What's with this contract? The amount doubles at a minimum, and it has to be paid all at once? I thought we could pay a little first to reduce the debt, so there'd be less to double next time."
"Damn Emma! She really was scheming against us from the start!" Robert leaned the mop hard against the wall, then clutched his head in anguish.
Victor was much more level-headed after all. "Looks like we should borrow some credits from someone else as insurance before one o'clock tomorrow afternoon."
Robert shuddered. "Borrow again? That doesn't seem right. As long as we don't lose credits in our two classes tomorrow morning, we'll have forty, and with today's forty-five, that'll be enough."
Victor shook his head. "Can't you see? Five credits per class—that's our normal rate."
He really was the Son of the Hero!
After cleaning the classroom, Victor and Robert began asking people for loans.
Their first targets were naturally their peers in the Knight Academy.
Andrina was a good girl.
She always wore her brown hair in twin tails, had a few harmless freckles on her face, and smiled brightly.
Victor and Robert had barely managed to exchange a few words with her—and that had been during the first week.
The first week of school had also been when Victor was most popular.
But Little Magisters always came to their senses eventually. As Victor grew closer to Robert and started going along with him, they got called out and docked credits by their professors in almost every class. Even if he was the son of ten Heroes, the Little Magisters' opinion of him was bound to worsen.
By the third week, none of the girls would approach them to start a conversation.
Robert shoved Victor to the forefront, saying that his fame would make it easier for them to borrow money.
With no other choice, Victor forced himself to ask.
Andrina finally understood why the two of them had called her into the corridor, and asked, "Is Robert short on credits to buy a Magic Phantom Beast materials kit?"
Victor wanted to explain, but felt too embarrassed to say it.
Robert immediately said, "That's right, Andrina. You've seen it yourself—all our credits went to buying Magic Chess! Just lend us a few, okay? We can sign a contract and pay you back within three days!"
But Andrina only shook her head. "I'm sorry, but I need to buy a Magic Phantom Beast materials kit too."
Chapter 27: Victor and Robert Set Out on the Road of Life
"Just five credits, three credits—even one would help!"
"I'm really sorry, but I have to save the credits I have left. What if I fail to make the Magic Phantom Beast again? I don't want to fail the assignment."
"One credit? What good is one credit? A toothpick can't plug a giant vat. You'll have to figure something else out."
"Robert? If you're short on credits, why not ask Victor to lend you some? Huh? The Son of the Hero is short on credits too? Well, then, there's nothing I can do."
"Actually, I've already agreed to lend my credits to Barbara. She's been spending far too much on Traveler Street, and still can't scrape together a hundred credits."
"Robert? Never mind, then. If Victor had asked me... Well, I need to buy a Magic Phantom Beast materials kit too. Hehe."
"'Hehe,' my ass!"
Just as Victor and Robert were struggling to find anyone willing to lend them money, Dark discovered a new source of amusement in his bedroom.
"Research project: Magic Spirit!"
As expected, if you put your mind to it, you could find countless possibilities. Even a strict bloodline like that of the Demon God had to yield to the boundless imagination of humanity.
As Dark researched, he cuddled Eevee, neither slacking off nor putting on airs, and only gave Eevee a light cuddle.
A small pleasure in life.
So this was all the Seven Deadly Sins amounted to.
The research on "Magic Phantom Beast: Eevee" was going very smoothly.
Once the effect of "Pride 1" wore off, Eevee returned to its soft and adorable temperament. It no longer seemed arrogant, but the intelligence in its eyes remained.
Its intelligence level still fell short of DemiDevimon's, but at 2.5, it was close to that of an ordinary Familiar.
However, unlike Familiars, Magic Spirits couldn't maintain their forms for long.
They constantly consumed mana.
At first, the mana they consumed came from the Summoning Technique used by the Magician to call them forth.
This portion of mana was consumed relatively slowly. Even a small amount could keep them going for three to five minutes, after which they began to consume their own mana.
A one-star Magic Spirit consumed mana at a rate of one point per second.
With Eevee's total mana of 100, it could last an additional minute and forty seconds.
If it used its ultimate move, "Mimic," which consumed 100 mana, it would vanish on the spot!
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