Kain spent the remainder of the meal in silence. Distraught that there was no fixing the issue with the System. Instead, he just listened in on the topics of conversation around him.
"Do you have any idea what the classes are like? Nobody else from my hometown has gotten into Dark Moon in decades." Elias said. Elias—that was the name Kain found out of the gloomy-looking kid.
"I heard it's pretty much like high-school, just the content is different. We'll still have exams, just that the form of the exams will be different. However I did hear that wilderness survival could be a pain for students that aren't accustomed to staying in the wild for long periods of time."
'Huh, I guess that's one course I don't have to worry about. Considering that I already have a lot of experience'
"However, I did hear that they will take us to extreme climates as well such as in the far north, or the deserts to the south to test our ability to survive.
"However, we are first and foremost beast-tamers, so they shouldn't overload us too much with class work to the point that it impedes our progress. We also have to complete a certain amount of missions every year in order to move on to the next year. Not as many as Starfire students, but still quite a few."
"I'm more worried about the re-rankings…" Said Finn, who was Aiden's neighbour. "I barely scraped into the top 20 at rank 17. Who knows if people's strengths have grown greatly since the admissions exam? I don't want to have to give up my single room."
Leonara, Addison's neighbour, also nodded in agreement, "Tell me about it, I'm ranked right at 19. Not to mention the re-rankings are usually determined by a head-to-head battle, my contracts are more focused on support and healing…"
"Huh, that's right. Some people's contracts may not have the best offensive capabilities. Why do they decide the top 5 by a person-to-person battle?" Bridge questioned.
Aiden, ever knowledgeable, clarified "It has to do with what the top 5 candidates for each year symbolize. Do you know how the colleges are ranked? First Celestial is first, Supernova is second, we're third, Starfire is fourth, and Frozen Sun is fifth. While the rest of the colleges fight over the rest of the rankings after that, the top 5 have never changed.
However, the order within the top 5 can change each year."
Addison scoffed, "Except First Celestial, I think the last time they slipped to second place was at least 20 years ago."
Aiden continued, "The top 5 of each year must fight against the same-year students at the other colleges. Points are then awarded based on the final ranking. A maximum of 100 points each for first place among the first years, second years, and so on. The competition format is a single one-on-one battle, a three-on-three battle, and one five-on-five battle.
Whichever side can win 2 of the three matches will win the round and advance.
"Then there's the measure of the college's overall combat power, one-on-one individual matches of the top 5 strongest students of each school, a face-off of the elites. Regardless of year level. It's usually composed of third and fourth years, but occasionally a second year manages to make the elite team. I believe the current captain of our school's elite team entered it in his second year.
The first-place team will receive 200 points. So, in theory, a school could win a maximum of 600 points if they take first place in everything."
Addison cut in, "That's why the re-rankings favor individual combat abilities. If you have excellent crowd-control abilities, then you should still be able to rank high enough to be in the top 5, and there's not really any need for a healer in the fast-paced competition.
Rather it's more detrimental if the enemy senses that there's a weak link in the team who can't take care of themselves and needs to be protected. Therefore, regardless of whether you classify yourself as more of a control, support, or healer, your solo combat abilities must meet a suitable standard to represent the school.
The competition doesn't bar the use of gifts, therefore it's actually not that unusual to see those that didn't contract offensively focused beasts within the top 5 of their year. They make up for their shortcomings in combat with incredibly powerful gifts."
Aiden finished off, "that's also why the treatment for the top 5 of each year is so much better compared to the rest of the students. The school's ranking for the next year and, consequently, the amount of funding and resources we'll all have access to is dependent upon them."
The other 3 at the table looked as though they weren't that surprised by the news, but this was the first Bridge and Kain were hearing about it. Perhaps because they were both so focused on either studying (Kain) or working to earn money (Bridge) neither of them had paid much attention to the college competition scene the last few years.
'So that means that I'm going to represent the school?! I guess that amazing room isn't given for nothing,' Kain will have to work his ass off for the school in return.
Kain was now incredibly nervous. He had hunted numerous wild beasts, but he had no experience fighting beast-tamers. Much less the most talented of beast-tamers among his peers.
He could imagine that fighting against talented beast-tamers would be much more difficult. He'd have to deal with more than one spiritual creature working together at the direction of their contractor. Not to mention, he'd also have to deal with a variety of troublesome gifts. He wasn't confident about the school's future ranking resting on his shoulders.
"We'll be in your hands then, Kain. Take us to first place next year please." Bridge joked while patting him heavily on the back, while Kain's eye twitched in annoyance.