He thought it over and decided to give it a try. "Very good. Broheim's question is quite constructive. It seems everyone is very concerned about this, so why don't we do an experiment?"
Robert asked, "What experiment?"
Dark suddenly called out, "Broheim, minus five points!"
Robert's expression changed instantly!
He hurriedly picked up his Sorting Card to check. Sure enough, five points had been deducted!
Dark asked, "Well? Were any points deducted?"
Robert nodded with a grim expression. "Yes."
Dark smiled faintly. "Broheim, plus five points."
Although he had no idea how this worked, he had clearly gained the professors' authority in this class and could control the students' points.
He had finally been officially recognized as the substitute teacher.
And sure enough, once they realized that a fellow first-year really could deduct their points, the students who had been unhappy with him began to rein themselves in.
Dark said, "Since nobody has any more questions, let's begin the lesson. Take out your exercise books and turn to page xx. Oh, right—surely nobody forgot to do the homework?"
The Magister House students responded to his question with mild disdain, while one of the Knight Academy students even opened his exercise book to show him.
For that matter, the previous Arithmetic Class had been last Thursday, a full five days ago.
No normal student could possibly have failed to finish it, right?
Impossible. Surely not?
Professor Lily's usual approach was to collect the exercise books before class ended, mark them, and hand them back the following class, along with the new week's homework.
But Dark wanted to fill up as much time as he could, so he planned to go over the homework today.
After all, he was the one who marked the first-years' homework most of the time.
Going over it today would save him the trouble of marking it!
But just as he was about to open his exercise book, he looked up and noticed that something seemed off about Robert's expression!
Robert wasn't just a little off. He was practically about to cry!
Because he really had forgotten to do his homework!
And Victor beside him hadn't written down a single answer, either!
Victor was better at controlling his emotions than Robert, though, so he didn't show it much.
The Arithmetic Class homework was always assigned on Thursdays, right before the weekend. So lots of students usually saved it for the weekend.
But last weekend had been Traveler Street's first open day!
Victor and Robert had also spent a fortune on the latest Magic Chess set. They'd been fiddling with it all weekend, starting Friday afternoon.
With their minds completely on their new toy, how could they have remembered their homework?
And on Monday—last night—they'd been busy trying to borrow points. There was no chance they'd done their homework then!
"Hey."
Robert suddenly felt a sharp pain in his thigh and instinctively turned to Victor.
Victor pulled his hand back and frantically signaled: Just pretend.
Oh, just pretend, will you!
But how could he possibly pretend now...
Dark hadn't wanted to interfere—he really couldn't be bothered—but Robert's reaction was so obvious that even the Noble House students across the aisle had noticed.
One student even watched him with a malicious look and slowly raised his hand!
If Dark didn't deal with it now, he really wouldn't have a leg to stand on.
Dark said helplessly, "Powell, what would you like to say?"
Powell slowly stood up and pointed at Robert with a smug look. "Dear Dimon, I saw a rat trying to hide an exercise book in his pants."
Dark looked at Robert, then at Victor beside him, and said plainly, "Gaude, check Broheim's homework."
Victor lowered his head in resignation and reached for Robert's exercise book.
He had no choice!
He hadn't done it, either!
He could only abandon the pawn to save the king!
After pretending to check it over, Victor said helplessly, "Sorry, it seems he really did forget to do his homework."
Dark's expression turned "stern." "Very good, Broheim. Do you remember how many points you lose for not doing your homework?"
Robert gritted his teeth.
Dark said expressionlessly, "Broheim, minus ten points!"
Victor gripped the corner of the exercise book tightly.
A terrible premonition suddenly came over him!
Dark didn't press the matter further. Instead, he wrote the exercises on the blackboard and explained them one by one.
He occasionally asked questions and used stories to explain some of the harder problems. His explanations were both clear and accessible, far more effective than Professor Lily's dry recitation from the textbook!
The students gradually realized that those unusually tough exercises had suddenly become much easier!
Robert sat below with a look of utter despair.
Victor did his best to pretend he was paying attention. He had never hated himself so much for not doing his homework.
They were both first-years.
They were both sons of the Kingdom's Twin Swords.
Yet one was teaching at the front of the room, while the other sat below, terrified that someone would discover he hadn't done his homework!
His hand clenched around his pen harder than ever.
The exercises went much more smoothly than Dark had expected, especially when it came to killing time =_=!
Ten minutes of questions and half an hour of exercises. In the blink of an eye, forty minutes had passed.
Dark glanced at the clock, realizing it was time to teach them something useful.
So he followed the idea he'd started with and told them a story about "exponential explosion."
Of course, he couldn't actually teach them exponents. That would have been far beyond the curriculum.
The idea had come from his chance encounter yesterday with Emma, Victor, and Robert's debt dispute.
Although Dark hadn't heard the details, that didn't stop him from remembering a story about a millionaire going bankrupt.
Now that he was standing at the lectern, he wanted to leave them with something worthwhile.
So he continued with his explanation. "The famous Dragon Egg Magician Da Vinci once said that arithmetic is the foundation of all Magic Guidance! Some of you think arithmetic has little effect on magical duels, so you don't bother learning it properly. Some of you even neglect to do the little homework you've been assigned. That's incredibly foolish!"
"If you don't even know basic arithmetic, then forget magical duels—even in everyday life, you could be tricked by someone."
"Once upon a time, there was a millionaire named Jamie who went bankrupt because he didn't understand arithmetic!"
One day, the millionaire Jamie encountered something strange.
A man named Weber said to him, "I'd like to make a deal with you. For an entire month, I'll give you 100,000 Holy Coins every day, and on the first day, you'll only have to give me one cent. Every day after that, you'll give me twice as much as you did the day before."
Jamie saw only the difference between one cent and 100,000 and asked excitedly, "Really?! You promise?"
The contract went into effect, and Jamie was overjoyed.
On the first day, Jamie paid one cent and received 100,000.
On the second day, Jamie paid two cents and received 100,000.
By the tenth day, Jamie had received a total of one million, while he'd paid only 5.12 Holy Coins altogether.
By the twentieth day, Jamie had received a total of two million, while Weber had received only a little over 5,000 Holy Coins.
Jamie couldn't help thinking, "If only we'd made the contract for two or three months!"
But from the twenty-first day onward, things changed!
On the twenty-first day, Jamie paid more than 10,000 and received 100,000.
By the twenty-eighth day, Jamie paid more than 1.34 million and received 100,000.
In the end, over the course of one month—thirty-one days—Jamie received 3.1 million Holy Coins, but paid Weber more than 21 million Holy Coins in total!
Jamie went bankrupt!
Victor and Robert Try to Get Back on the Right Track
Robert regretted shouting the moment the words left his mouth.
But once something had been said, there was no taking it back.
He braced both hands on the desk, half-rising to his feet as nearly every first-year stared at him. Suddenly, his head cleared, and he understood his situation.
"Broheim, do you have a problem with Emma Metis?"
Dark's voice remained calm and dispassionate.
But Robert heard something different in it. He broke out in a cold sweat, his legs almost giving way.
The story about the millionaire Jamie had far too much in common with his own situation.
He'd already been on edge after getting caught for not doing his homework. Then, putting himself in Jamie's shoes, it was as if Emma had taken more than 21 million points from him. He lost control completely!
It's over. I've completely screwed up!
Robert was utterly despondent. He didn't even notice Victor desperately tugging at his sleeve.
"Broheim, I'll ask you again. Do you have a problem with Emma Metis?"
Standing at the lectern, Dark asked him for the second time.
Robert finally forced himself to answer. "N-no."
Dark said, "Then, Broheim, minus ten points."
Arithmetic Class was over.
Dark gathered up his books and headed to Professor Lily's office to help tidy it up. At the very least, he'd throw away all the bottles.
Only after he left did the first-years burst into an uproar!
The Noble House students were the most excited. Dark's lesson had been simply fantastic!
They all said they'd rather have Dark teach them from now on than Professor Lily!
Even the Magister House students had to admit that Dark had done a great job in class.
The Fool House students also praised him in their down-to-earth way.
Only the Knight Academy students were left bearing the strange looks from the other three houses, their feelings a tangled mess.
In that class, they'd been the cautionary example—the members of a clown's circus.
And Robert, the star clown, had nearly crawled under the desk!
He'd lost a full twenty points that class!
Not only had all the points he'd earned in class been deducted, but Victor had lost all his, too!
The brothers had earned a combined seventy-five points. They'd been just five points short of paying off their debt, but those five points had turned into an insurmountable chasm!
So whose fault was this?
Before you continue