I CHOSE to be a VILLAIN, not a THIRD-RATE EXTRA!!

Not everyone had received Metal Bracers.

In fact, most hadn't.

The majority of these bracers landed before students in the Aether Class, while only a small handful reached students from the Wyrd Class. The pattern was hard to ignore.

Two students, in particular, received full arm-length bracers—polished steel that extended from wrist to elbow, heavier and thicker than the others.

One was Leon and the other was Varnok.

The rest received smaller ones—half-arm bracers, lighter but still demanding.

Ashok glanced down at the ground near his feet.

But there was nothing.

A quiet sigh of relief escaped him in his mind, internally he had already lit a candle of gratitude.

Because he knew exactly what those bracers were made of.

Tricelium.

One of the most abundant metals in the known world… and the Heaviest.

Even heavier than famed materials like Mithril or Adamantine, which were often known for their strength, magical conductivity, or the weapons forged from them.

But unlike those metals of legend, Tricelium had no magical properties, no enchantable core, no resonance with mana.

It was just... a mass.

A cold, lifeless hunk of metal that existed for the sole purpose of being deadweight.

'If only Mithril or Adamantine were half as abundant as this useless thing,' thought Ashok.

Even a small piece of Tricelium—about the size of a ping pong ball—could weigh a full kilogram. It had no elegance, no grace, no value to blacksmiths beyond being used for shackles for prisoners.

Though the Academy used it for Training.

Though to an outsider it may have seemed like Griselda had handed out the metal bracers at random—flinging heavy tools of torture at students without rhyme or reason—the reality was far more calculated.

There was nothing random about her judgment.

Ashok, who had been silently observing everything from his spot, knew better.

'She may not hold a candle to the Three Senior Teachers when it comes to magical might or aura mastery, but when it comes to the physical domain, the raw mechanics of the body—she is unmatched.'

And there was a reason for that.

Griselda wasn't just teaching physical courses in the Academy.

She was the one and only instructor trusted to handle every single one of them—from endurance and agility to strength and even hand to hand combat for all the years of the Academy.

Her understanding of body constitution, racial instinct, and the vast variation between humanoid physiques together with experience from teaching.

Over the years, she had honed her knowledge into something more.

She had developed a unique perception-based skill, something so refined it practically bordered on myth parallel along with Special Eyes.

The Eyes of True Body Potential.

The name, as Ashok had often thought before, was a little heavy-handed—"lacking taste," according to as he knew in the game.

But the function? The function was nothing short of terrifyingly precise.

'Naming aside,' he mused, 'this so-called eye is nothing less than a Special Eyes in itself.'

It worked on a principle similar to the X-Ray Vision.

When she activated it, Griselda could peer directly through the layers of skin, into muscles, tendons, ligaments, and even bone structure.

Consider how extremely rare and powerful Special Eyes were like Seeker's Eye, X Ray Vision might be considered useless however it was far from that.

She had taken it even a step further.

It let her see potential.

With a single glance, she could not only identify the makeup of a student's physical form, but also predict its growth with near-perfect accuracy.

She could determine muscle mass, fiber density, ligament elasticity, and the natural rate of muscle regeneration after training or injury.

She could measure bone thickness, bone density, joint wear, and how well a student's skeletal frame would adapt under physical strain.

Even something as minute as how a student's posture might evolve over time did not escape her vision.

But perhaps most impressively, her vision wasn't limited by race or species.

Griselda's eye worked seamlessly across all known humanoid and non-humanoid physiologies—

Elves with their wiry grace, Dwarves with their compact muscle frames, Beastkin with their unique internal structures, and even more exotic hybrids.

Her ability extended beyond the classroom into the battlefield: she could read the anatomy of monsters as easily as reading a scroll, instantly discerning weak points—joints, tendons, pressure nodes—and use that information to land critical strikes with terrifying efficiency.

It was no wonder, then, that she was the sole instructor in charge of the Academy's entire physical curriculum.

It was through this ability that she had now distributed the Metal Bracers.

No whimsy or favoritism.

She had scanned every student the moment they lined up and chosen exactly who could bear the bracers—and at what weight—so the training remain equal for all students.

The students who received the bracers bent to pick them up with hard faces as they slid the cold Tricelium around their arms, the bracers instantly tightened, adjusted, and locked into place.

For most, their arms dropped like dead weight, faces reddening from the sheer effort to hold them up again.

But not everyone faltered.

Leon, standing with silent resolve, clenched his fists once, then opened his palms. Over and over.

Varnok, true to his barbarian blood, merely flexed both arms and gave a small huff.

However, as the weight was distributed, murmurs began to spark beneath the surface.

Some students frowned as they glanced around—wondering why they had received bracers while others stood empty-handed.

The sense of inequity crept in, especially among the more self-important nobles.

But one look at Griselda's face, and the complaints died before they could reach anyone's lips.

Her expression was carved from stone, a clear message etched in her eyes:

'Question me and you'll regret it.'

'The half-arm bracers should weigh around fifteen kilograms... and the full-arm ones must be close to thirty,' Ashok estimated silently, his eyes flicking between the students now burdened with their respective metal accessories.

His gaze lingered on Leon and Varnok—both of whom had received the full-arm bracers.

Despite the substantial addition of weight—thirty kilograms, neither of them flinched.

They stood, as if nothing had changed at all.

Ashok's expression didn't shift, but a thought passed quietly through his mind. 'Muscular Monsters.'

And truly, in that moment, they looked the part.

Before any more observations could be made, Griselda's voice cut through the morning haze with calm authority. "Now," she said, folding her arms behind her back, "return to the entrance of the field."

Without protest, the students obeyed. Aether and Wyrd alike shuffled toward the far end of the massive open training ground.

Robert followed closely behind the line, walking at a slow, measured pace, like a herder following a sluggish group of cattle.

Once they reached the boundary—the open mouth of the sprawling field that lay ahead—Griselda turned to face them again.

Her voice, though calm, rang with power as she amplified it with a subtle touch of Aura.

"Twenty laps. Start running."

Her tone was so level, so devoid of emotion, that for a brief moment the words didn't even register.

'TWENTY LAPS!?'

The phrase echoed in the minds of every student like the chime of a death bell.

Twenty laps. Around a field that stretched half a kilometer per loop.

That meant a full ten kilometers—without energy, without aura, with some of them burdened with enough metal to sink a fishing boat.

Even the most physically trained among them hesitated for a breath.

Ten kilometers under normal conditions was grueling.

But under Energy Suppression, it bordered on insanity.

Their disbelief was written in their eyes.

Griselda didn't wait for questions. Instead, she turned her head slightly and called one name:

"Robert."

The instant the word left her mouth, Robert sprang into motion like a trained warhound. Without hesitation, he broke into a run around the perimeter of the field.

As he moved, he began dropping a fine white powder behind him in a straight line, letting it trail from a pouch in his hand. The powder scattered with each step, settling into the soil like snow dust.

He was marking the track—a visible circuit to ensure no one could take shortcuts.

A white border to frame their torment.

"Everyone will remain within the marked line," Griselda declared, her voice once again infused with a pulse of Aura that made even the grass seem to quiver.

"NOBODY will stop. Not even for a single breath. The moment your feet stop moving, your lap count will be doubled. And let me make one thing absolutely clear—none of you, mark me NONE OF YOU will leave this field until your laps are complete."

The calm smile that curled across her lips was not one of encouragement—it was a smirk which was a warning.

And for the students watching her, that expression alone sent an invisible chill racing down their spines.

They simply stood frozen, pinned between fear and disbelief. The burden of the bracers, the absence of mana, and the oppressive air made even standing feel like a test.

And then, her voice rang out again—crisp, cold, and merciless.

"Whosoever is still standing at the starting line by the time Robert finishes drawing the cris—will have their laps tripled."

That single sentence turned their quiet dread into outright panic.

Heads whipped around like dominoes collapsing in sequence.

All eyes locked on the sprinting figure of Robert. The white powder he carried fell in a smooth stream behind him as he carved the boundary line like a craftsman with a chalk blade.

And now, he was—just a few meters away from completing the full perimeter.

'Just how fast is that Fourth Year?!' thought many of the students at once.

His pace had been nearly inhuman—he had circled the entire 500-meter field before most students had finished processing Griselda's first sentence.

And it didn't seem to be even breathing hard.

SWOOSH~

A sudden gust of wind blew past the students.

One student dashed forward, cutting through the stagnant stillness.

Legs pumping, posture upright, and already accelerating past the dust trail Robert had left behind.

It was Leon.

Even without his mana, he ran at his maximum speed leaving behind every single student.

Then came a voice—a roar that shook the training field like a battle horn:

"I WILL NOT LOSE!!"

Varnok.

The barbarian's war cry thundered across the open air like a charge from a war camp as he started chasing after Leon's dashing figure with his large body.

The sheer force of his declaration jolted the other students out of their stupor.

Something about the Barbarian's War Cry made their Pride ignited like wildfire.

In that instant, the entire training field exploded into motion.

A wave of students from both Aether and Wyrd surged forward in a stampede of bodies, their shoes pounding against the ground in rhythmic panic.

No one wanted to be the last.

But despite the pride, the desperation, the fury—one student lagged behind the group of students who dashed worth chasing after the first place.

Neither Running Nor Walking.

Just… jogging.

With hands swinging lightly at his sides and a neutral expression on his face, he moved at a leisurely pace that stood in stark contrast to the chaos unfolding ahead of him.

It was Ashok

While others pushed for first place, Ashok ran at his pace without giving a shit about the bunch of idiots before him.

So, he ended up being the dead last.

And he didn't care.