Chapter 263: Vlad’s evaluation

"Shh!!" Seraphina placed her hand over Vlad’s cold mouth, afraid that the Principal might hear him. "Don’t say anything stupid."

She was standing before him on her toes, the only way her hand could reach his towering face. Once Vlad seemed a bit calmer, she lowered her hand to his chest. A warm crimson flow of mana spread across his body from Seraphina’s hand. Vapors rose from the few shards of ice still clinging to his body. The bone-chilling cold he had been feeling vanished, replaced by the warmth of Seraphina’s familiar mana.

"Thank you," Vlad whispered, looking at Seraphina’s serene face with a warm smile, as if he had not been furious enough to flip the table just a few seconds ago.

"I-it’s nothing," Seraphina’s pink eyes turned sideways shyly as she removed her hand.

"Ahem," Aldric cleared his throat, or at least pretended to, to gather the couple’s attention.

Seraphina immediately took a few steps back from him, moving beside Hugo, Raphael, and Alisha with her cheeks tinted red. Although she was quite bold with Vlad in private, she was very shy about intimacy in public.

Aldric picked up the quest report from the desk. Lirien had already analyzed it carefully, even marking the sections where she must deduct credits and where credits must be rewarded.

"I will begin from where Miss Principal left off," Aldric said, standing beside Lirien’s chair.

"So the credits that she deducted..." Vlad grinned shamelessly, a hint of pleading in his voice.

"I can’t change the decision already made by her," Aldric shook his head. His declaration turned the poor man’s face completely pale. "I will only convey what she has already written in the report."

Vlad’s face dropped. He began calculating inside his mind. ’I have around six thousand Credits in my account. If I subtract the guaranteed ten thousand Credits that I would receive for completing the quest from the twenty-three thousand credit penalty imposed by that old hag, I’m still at a twelve thousand credit loss.’

Vlad pressed his temples between his thumb and index finger. ’Am I going to end up with a negative balance after finishing an S-Ranked quest?’

"Slaying an Oni, a Rank Five Monster, without suffering any injuries," Aldric’s voice pulled him out of his thoughts as he read the highlighted summary written by Lirien on the left, blank side of the report. "Plus Three Thousand Credits."

Vlad blinked. There were actual rewards as well.

"Saving your team members’ lives on multiple occasions. Plus Five Thousand Credits."

Aldric’s eyes lowered, his glasses reflecting the highlighted text as he continued, "Discovering the second cave inside the dungeon and destroying the monster breeding farm, which might have caused some damage to the academy if it hadn’t been discovered. Plus Six Thousand Credits."

Vlad’s eyebrows rose, his lips curling into a wide smile. ’I’m not at a loss anymore,’ he exclaimed inwardly. ’With these rewards, I’m now two thousand credits in profit.’

He was about to celebrate with a loud "Yes!" but was interrupted just as he clenched his fists.

"Slaying Daemoth, a Rank Five Necromancer. Plus Twenty Thousand Credits."

"H-how many credits again?" Vlad asked, leaning forward over the table, making sure he hadn’t heard it wrong.

Aldric ignored his rude posture and repeated the amount again.

"Hell yeah!" Vlad exclaimed, hurling both his arms into the air.

Seeing him so happy naturally brought a smile to Seraphina’s face. "So adorable," she murmured, her eyes never leaving his celebrating figure.

"Hmm, he is really adorable," a voice entered Seraphina’s ears.

"Of course—" Seraphina’s words stopped mid-sentence when she found Alisha leaning closer, her chubby cheeks looking like dumplings from the teasing smile on her face.

"You aren’t allowed to say that," Seraphina hissed, giving her a sharp glare. "He is my adorable man."

Now, Alisha was completely taken aback. She had only wanted to tease Seraphina, but she hadn’t expected her to react so possessively. Still, her declaration meant that the two were already together. Alisha was happy that things had really worked out between them.

"I will restrain myself from commenting on your man, Lady Seraphina," Alisha stated, giving her a playful wink.

"There is also one thing that Miss Principal wanted to convey to you all," Aldric’s words gathered the attention of the squad back to him.

His emerald eyes moved to Hugo, Alisha, and Raphael as he stated, "You must have seen some secrets of your teammates during this mission. It would be best if you didn’t reveal them to anyone else."

They immediately understood what he was referring to. He wanted them to keep their mouths shut about Seraphina being a vampire.

"We haven’t told a soul, and we never will," Raphael stated, stepping forward in his usual calm tone.

Hugo and Alisha also repeated the words after him seriously.

Aldric slowly blinked, tapping the bridge of his glasses. He turned the page of the report, reaching the last page. "Now to the final topic of discussion."

’Is it time for Sera’s evaluation?’ Vlad thought, stepping back and moving beside the team.

"It’s about the Genesis Artifact," Aldric stated, looking at Vlad. "As you all are aware, the Academy has the right to ownership of the Genesis Artifact, and you, as the team members who discovered it, may each receive five percent of its value in either taels or credits."

’So it’s about the artifact,’ Vlad gulped inwardly. ’Is he really going to carve out my eye to claim the artifact?’

"But you must be aware that Vlad had already absorbed the Genesis Artifact, the very reason he survived and managed to slay the necromancer," Aldric continued. "Since the artifact is bound to Vlad now, the Academy has decided to let him keep it at a fifty percent discount."

’Oh... Never thought the Academy would be this generous,’ Vlad released a sigh of relief. Although from the outside, it seemed like the Academy was hogging the treasure that the students had risked their lives to claim, but that wasn’t true at all. Since the Academy commissioned this quest, they were already aware of the possible existence of a Genesis Artifact. Any professor could have easily found it, but they let the students do the work so that it could broaden their horizons about the wider world. Yet the Academy was willing to give the artifact to Vlad for just fifty percent of its value.

’Wait...’ Vlad’s eyes narrowed as he realized something. "Professor Aldric, what is the value of this Genesis Artifact?" Vlad asked, swallowing hard.

"Since we haven’t seen it, we can’t determine its value, but the Principal decided to price it the same as the Genesis Artifact that was priced the cheapest after its discovery," Aldric revealed, slightly leaning on the black cane in his hand.

’The Principal did that?’ Vlad gasped inwardly. Now that he thought about it, Lirien was also the one who evaluated his performance and set the rewards and penalties. But he had lashed out at her before she could even reach the reward section. Now he felt guilty for getting ahead of himself.

He decided to apologize to her when he met her next time.

"Five hundred thousand gold taels."

Vlad snapped back to reality, hearing something ridiculously large.

"What did you say, Professor?" Vlad asked, tilting his head innocently.

"The cost of the Genesis Artifact after the discount," Aldric explained again. "It’s Five Hundred Thousand gold taels or Five Million Credits."

Aldric had not even finished his words, and Vlad’s soul had already crossed halfway to the River Styx, sitting peacefully beside the Grim Reaper on the boat, telling the tales of the short but quite enjoyable life that he had lived.