Reader Mage-Stubbing August 10! Chapter 110: 110-Club-Phobia, Maybe?

Read chapter 110 of Reader Mage-Stubbing August 10! by A_Random_Turtle on NovelPedia.

“That’s completely absurd!” Hakyun grumbled as they took care of their dorm room, dusting whatever needed to be dusted, and wiping whatever needed to. “Why should a competition determine the rankings of the Academies?” Merlin cocked his head. “I thought you would be happy?” he asked. “If we win, we get to be the number one Mage Academy in the world. This is an easier path than the usual which is, well, the upper bodies deciding based on the number of top class Mages produced.” He had been quite curious as to how rankings worked, and, as such, had taken it upon himself to ask Professor Jung for an answer to his questions. “He’s afraid of the pressure,” Chima said with a scoff. “No, I’m not afraid of the pressure,” Hakyun sneered. “It’s just, reason with me now, what if we end up dropping down the rankings instead? What if we end up third? Oh my, I don’t even want to think about it.” “You really need to start being optimistic, four-eyes,” said Chima as he bent over and wiped the underneath of the table in their living room. “Repeat after me: ‘we can win!’” “My toes, we can,” Hakyun grumbled as he picked up the dishes he had washed and rinsed them one by one before setting them in their respective shelves. Merlin sighed. He didn’t have anything to say in contribution to the current topic of discussion; after all, the whole talk about competitiveness and losing and winning was bringing back his memories of how the last term had ended and the rankings. Cohort Spearhead had finished the term first with three-hundred-and-sixty-five points, while coming in second was Cohort Dragon Eye with two-hundred-and-eighty points. And it would have all been perfect if only the academic rankings hadn’t seen him pushed down to third, coming behind Park Yuri and Nora, the second and first on the rankings respectively. Well, it was obvious that he wouldn’t have stayed first for long. It was even a miracle he had only dropped to third in the first place. Technically, it was his hard work, surviving Senior Sun-Hee’s cold stares, and Nora’s grumbles while teaching, just to make sure he didn’t fall too behind. Hopefully, he could keep it up in the current term. Merlin clicked his tongue as he finished his task of taking care of the windows. For a combination of different reasons pressing down on his mind, he was now somewhat pissed. “I’m going to unpack,” he said to Chima and Hakyun, and he was met with a nod and a hum as a reply. Satisfied with that, he vanished into his room. And…his eyes widened. “Blue…” Merlin screamed as he rushed at his little dragon preparing to heave out a breath of ice at his luggage. He scooped the dragon from the floor and set his hand in front of its mouth. Flaky breaths touched his skin, and for a moment, Merlin felt all his nerves lose function. He instantly activated Reader Mage and deconstructed Blue’s Ice Breath, and fell to the bed. Blue purred, cocking his head obliviously to Merlin’s furious stare. “Be more discreet, will you?” Merlin growled, keeping his voice low. “I’m trying to keep your identity a secret here.” The dragon snorted, turned around on the bed as though circling his nest, and fell down to sleep once again. Merlin could only picture Nora’s happy face when she’d realized that Blue would no longer be her responsibility. Maybe he would sneak the dragon back to her one day, Merlin thought. That way he could take a break. Otherwise, how would he survive? He also thought about telling Chima and Hakyun about the dragon, but, just like with every other strange thing about him, that would result in them finding out about the System. He trusted them well enough now, but he was still waiting for that click. When the time was right, he would tell them everything. Merlin huffed as he jumped up from the bed. He took one more glance at Blue to confirm that the dragon wouldn’t be stirring awake anytime soon, locked his room’s door to prevent any unprecedented occurrences of it being suddenly flung open, and then set t