Chương 48: The Zookeeper Arrives

[Time]: Day 32 of Enrollment (Eve of Midsummer), 08: 00 AM [Location]: Yggdrasil Academy · Lecture Hall 7 Click. The sound of the high heel hitting the floor was singular, sharp, and terrifyingly precise. In an instant, the scraping of the serrated alchemy file against the Cat Witch's tail ceased. The Tentacle Witch froze, her four translucent hair-limbs halting mid-calculation, the quill dropping silently onto the parchment.

The Purgatory Fortress Witch clamped her mouth shut with an audible clack, cutting off her story about the dragon bones mid-sentence. The arrogant laughter, the exchanging of research data, and the buzzing of high-density mana were cut off as if by a guillotine. To Hathaway's left, the Balor Witch's finger froze in mid-air. The ball of Hellfire didn't vanish, but it stopped dancing, burning with a silent, tense vigilance.

To her right, the Ghost Witch's fingers stopped phasing inside the microscope, hovering there like suspended smoke. The chaotic, vibrant "Apex Predator Tea Party" had ended. The Zoo had fallen silent. Because the Zookeeper had arrived. On the podium, the air twisted. Space didn't just ripple; it folded neatly, like someone turning the page of a book. A tall, slender figure stepped out of the void. Ten seconds of absolute silence. Three thousand geniuses sat rigid in their seats, not daring to breathe too loudly.

In the center of this suffocating stillness stood a woman. Professor Nino Lucent. She stood in violent contrast to the glamorous, effortlessly omnipotent Sorceresses smiling on the academy's admission brochures. Yet, anyone expecting the chaotic, ink-stained charm of an overworked eccentric would be gravely disappointed. She was a Lucent; a lapse in physical elegance was a biological impossibility. Her dark grey silk robe was immaculate, the fabric magically pressed to razor-sharp perfection.

Her long silver-grey hair was flawlessly pinned up with a single, lethal-looking Mithril Probe. Not a single strand was out of place. But that was exactly what made her terrifying. The perfection was automated. It was a passive cosmetic ward barely masking a collapsing ecosystem. In a society where "0-Hour Workdays" and "Strategic Brunches" were the norm, Nino radiated the aura of a Natural Disaster that hadn't slept in three months.

Her physical body was pristine, but her soul looked like it was running on fumes and pure, concentrated spite. She didn't look like a professor holding the keys to Truth. She looked like a Tyrant whose Sanity Meter was hovering on the edge of zero, and who held a deep, burning resentment against the entire universe for keeping her awake. Exhaustion. Rage. These weren't physical stains on her clothes; they were an atmospheric pressure crashing down on the room.

Nino leaned heavily on the lectern with both hands, hanging her head low. The immaculate silk of her robe draped perfectly, but the knuckles gripping the wood were white with tension. She didn't speak immediately. She just stood there, a perfectly groomed bomb that had missed her "15% Energy Management" target by a catastrophic margin. Another ten seconds passed. The silence stretched until it was almost painful. The Fortress Witch was sweating bullets, terrified that her gossip had been heard.

Finally, the Tyrant spoke.

"... I know what you are thinking." Nino's voice was hoarse, low, and heavy with nasal tones—the voice of someone living on pure caffeine and hatred.

"Summer break. The Golden Coast of the Astral Sea. Void-Cocktails. Or perhaps colonizing some undeveloped plane to enslave the locals for resources. By Witch Law, I should be there right now. I deserve to be there right now." Someone in the back row let out a nervous, awkward chuckle, but it was immediately choked back as Nino slowly raised her head. Her grey, unfocused eyes swept across the hall. There was no mercy in them, only the manic obsession of a Perfectionist pushed to the brink.

"But I have no vacation. Because my project... is stuck at 99. 8%." The number hung in the air like a curse. For a High Witch, 99. 8% wasn't "Good Enough." It was an insult. It was an itch inside the brain that couldn't be scratched. It was the reason she couldn't sleep, couldn't eat, and couldn't enjoy her cat-huffing time at the café.

"The data is a mess. The variables are chaotic. And until that 0. 2% is resolved, my obsession will not let me rest." She pulled a heavy piece of official vellum from her pocket and slapped it onto the podium with violent force. Smack. [S-Class Summer Project · Assistant Recruitment Form]"I am tired of doing the dirty work myself. It is inefficient. It is undignified." Nino said flatly, holding up two fingers.

"I need two assistants. Not to learn. Not to ask questions. But to be Processors."

"One to handle the repetitive core calculations. One to handle the miscellaneous material processing. I need you to be my hands and my calculator, so I can finally go back to my office and sleep for a week." She snapped her fingers. Snap. Space warped above every desk. Three thousand Transparent Levitation Capsules instantly appeared in front of every student. Inside each capsule floated a ball of energy about the size of a walnut.

It was a chaotic, swirling mess of Red (Fire) and Blue (Ice) mana, violently conflicting and expanding, looking like a bomb about to go off.

"This is project waste. A Simulated Mana Heart in a critical state." Nino's voice was devoid of emotion. [Task Requirements] Objective: Cut it open. Separate the flow. Channel the Fire element, preserve the Ice element. Unauthorized use: this story is on Amazon without permission from the author. Report any sightings. Constraint 1: Cut error < 0. 1 microns. Constraint 2: Time limit < 15 seconds. Constraint 3: One chance only. Nino glanced at her pocket watch, a flash of impatience in her grey eyes.

Every second she spent here was a second she wasn't fixing that 0. 2%.

"Begin." Zheng—! The entire hall moved in unison. For that spot—wealthy enough to be life-changing and prestigious enough to gild their resume—and to get close to the legendary Lucent family, everyone unleashed their ultimate skills. Hathaway glanced sideways. The Balor Witch on the left moved. She didn't need tools. Her slender, powerful hand reached out directly, a wisp of pure Hellfire igniting at her fingertip.

The flame acted as the most precise scalpel, vaporizing the capsule wall upon contact while instantly extracting all violent energy with her absolute racial dominance over fire. Time: 3. 2 seconds. Elegant, domineering. Not just technique, but art. The Ghost Witch on the right was equally impressive. Her pale hands turned intangible, reaching into the capsule as if passing through water. As a race hovering on the border of life and death, her sensitivity to energy was acute to the extreme.

Without damaging any physical structure, she stripped away the Fire element. Time: 4. 1 seconds. And Victoria behind her... Hathaway couldn't see her at all. Not even a peripheral glimpse. She already knew exactly what was happening back there. Victoria's eyes had no focus, yet they were locking onto the target with terrifying precision. She didn't employ destructive elemental talents like the others. Instead, she activated the passive supremacy of the Wellington bloodline.

Through her [Mystic Eyes], the chaotic blur of the physical world faded away, leaving only the high-definition vectors of mana flow. To her, that unstable energy mass wasn't a mess—it was a 3D blueprint with a clear "Cut Here" dotted line. She didn't need to guess. She simply traced the line that only she could see. One cut. Accurately severed. Time: 5. 5 seconds. A flawless, textbook operation borne of Absolute Vision.

Victoria put down her knife, gently adjusted her lace gloves, and a confident curve appeared on her lips. She had delivered the "Perfection" she promised. She even had the spare energy to turn her head and give Hathaway a look that said:"You lose." This is the top-tier ecosystem of Yggdrasil. Not a single slacker here. And Hathaway... She took a deep breath and gripped her [Aether-Membrane Scalpel]. She remembered 33 days ago, the self who couldn't even control "Mage Hand," tearing up carpets like a bulldozer.

She remembered the past month, Victoria's almost sadistic micromanagement training. ("Control. Hathaway.") ("Treat every strand of your mana as your last gold coin. Spend it like a miser.") The funding was the bait, yes. But sitting here now, surrounded by the absolute elite of Yggdrasil, a much older, deeper instinct ignited in her gamer soul. I want to win. Hathaway's red pupils contracted sharply. Swish! The transparent blade sliced through the air. She didn't fight the violent energy mass.

She submitted to it. Using the Aether-Membrane Scalpel's absolute zero-resistance property, Hathaway's wrist performed extremely high-frequency micro-adjustments. She was mimicking the vibration frequency of the energy mass! In this moment, she was no longer the bulldozer who believed in "Brute Force Miracles." She forced herself to become a dancer walking on a tightrope. Poof. The Fire element dissipated. A pure ice-blue core remained. Time: 7. 8 seconds. Hathaway's hand trembled slightly.

That was the backlash after a momentary burst of mana. At the end of the cut, a micron-level flaw, almost invisible to the naked eye, remained. I did my best. Hathaway wiped the fine sweat from her forehead. Although I can't compare to the three monsters next to me, this is the current limit of this body. Victoria was right... Technically, I lost. Click. Click. Click. Nino Lucent walked down the aisle. Her steps were slow, rhythmic, and terrifying. She didn't look like a professor grading papers.

She looked like a grim reaper harvesting souls that failed quality control. She moved like a grey ghost, beginning The Inspection. She started with the most conspicuous presence on the Left. The Balor Witch.

"... 3. 2 seconds?" Nino commented coldly, barely glancing at the finished core.

"Too slow. With Balor racial talents, you should have finished within 2. 5 seconds. And..." She pointed to a microscopic ripple on the edge of the core, invisible to the naked eye.

"... Too hot. 0. 001 microns of structure here were heated by your body temperature. My ancient tomes can't handle this temperature difference. Fail." The Balor Witch's golden vertical pupils contracted sharply. The Hellfire at her fingertips flickered and died instantly, extinguished not by her will, but by the sheer atmospheric pressure of Nino's judgment. The proud "Mobile Fortress" slumped slightly in her chair.

The tip of her majestic tail—which had been resting confidently on her thigh—quietly tucked itself underneath the coils wrapped around her waist, hiding like a scolded pet. Nino turned, walking toward the Right. The Ghost Witch.

"... Phasing extraction?" Nino didn't even stop walking. Her tone was as casual as sweeping dust off a table.

"Cheap trick. Your phasing frequency fluctuated by 0. 5 Hertz. Too gloomy. Your necromantic aura contaminated the core. Fail." The Ghost Witch did not argue. But for a fraction of a second, her flawless, aristocratic mask fractured. Her deep green pupils dilated in absolute, uncomprehending shock. She didn't look at her 'failed' core; her gaze snapped directly to Nino's retreating back. It wasn't the indignation of a defeated genius. It was a profound, paralyzing disorientation.

It was the look of a machine encountering a line of code that simply shouldn't exist. For someone of her specific background, being discarded wasn't just an insult; it was a conceptual impossibility. Slowly, stiffly, she withdrew her pale fingers. She lowered her long, transparent eyelashes, burying the glitch beneath a wall of dead silence. Crack... A faint sound of freezing.

A thin layer of white frost silently climbed up the brass base of the microscope she was holding, spreading violently across her desk as her emotional lockdown caused her aura to leak. Nino continued forward, stepping past Hathaway—who was currently playing dead in the middle—and looked at the Second Row. Victoria. Nino's footsteps finally paused. She looked at Victoria's flawless, practically Standard Answer of a core. Victoria straightened her back, her unfocused eyes shining with anticipation.

She was certain this was the standard Nino Lucent wanted.

"... Wellington family Mystic Eye calculation?" Nino said faintly, her voice void of any ripple.

"Precise. Efficient. No wasted movement." She pulled a Funding Application Form from her sleeve and gently placed it in front of Victoria.

"Standard industrial-grade operation. You handle core data calculation. Pass." Victoria let out a breath, a smile of "as expected" appearing on her face. She won. She proved with her strength that she was worthy of Lucent's lab. Finally. Nino turned around, her gaze landing back on the Center of the Front Row. That transfer student with silver hair and red eyes, sandwiched between the Balor and the Ghost. Hathaway. Hathaway's palms were sweating. She knew her work. 7. 8 seconds.

More than twice as slow as the Balor. Two seconds slower than Victoria. And there was that micron-level jitter flaw. Surrounded by the Perfect Victoria (Behind), the Violent Balor (Left), and the Eerie Ghost (Right), she was practically a defective product. Nino looked down at the core. Her grey eyes swept over the tiny flaw. Hathaway's heart was in her throat. It's over. Hathaway's grip on the scalpel tightened until her knuckles turned white. 7. 8 seconds. A visible flaw.

Comparing me to the monsters next to me... there is no logical reason to keep me.

"Fail." Hathaway had almost pre-emptively heard the word in her mind. However. Nino didn't speak immediately. The Tyrant's gaze lingered on the flawed core for a second, then slowly drifted up. She looked at Hathaway's silver hair. She looked into those deep red eyes that were filled with tension. The air in the lecture hall seemed to freeze. The Balor Witch smirked.

Her striking appearance usually drew a relentless swarm of suitors—right up until she began beating them unconscious and hanging them from the academy towers to air-dry. This silver-haired newcomer had possessed the rare survival instinct to just sit down and keep her mouth shut. But silence wouldn't save her from Nino Lucent. A shaky scalpel and a flawed core guaranteed a merciless, humiliating "Fail." The Ghost Witch simply stared blankly ahead, utterly apathetic to the existence of the Witch beside her.

Nino's expression didn't change. It was still the same exhausted, tyrannical apathy. But she didn't look away. She just stared at Hathaway, her grey pupils unreadable, locking Hathaway in a silent, suffocating cage of judgment. Is she going to say it? Or is she going to roast me like she did the others? Time stretched into infinity. Hathaway held her breath, waiting for the executioner's axe to fall.