Author: Himezaki Shiu	Original Source: Syosetu
Translator: PunishedLyly	English Source: Re:Library

Project GB is an official initiative by Re:Library.

Well, it doesn’t concern us. What does concern us, I guess, are the earnest examinees.
I have a rough estimate of the academic level of the people here.
While failure is, of course, out of the question, it would be troublesome if we scored too highly.
Ideally, I’d like us to land average… No, slightly above average scores.

If my concerns prove unfounded and we end up with low scores, it wouldn’t be an issue. But being the top scorer is absolutely off the table. Failing would be preferable to that.
Though since Princess Leshimiiya is also taking the exam, it’s unlikely we’ll rank at the very top anyway.

Speaking of which, I wonder which classroom Princess Leshimiiya is in.
Even though she’s the lowest in the line of succession, she’s still royalty. I imagine that sharing a classroom with her—or worse, sitting next to her—could be extremely nerve-wracking for most people.
Of course, Ciel probably wouldn’t pay her much attention.
Then again, it’s also possible that Princess Leshiimiya would be assigned to a private room.

As I mulled over this, a familiar figure entered the room.
Red hair and amber eyes—it was unmistakably the girl who was with Princess Leshimiiya before.
The aristocratic-looking students showed visible surprise at her presence, so I take it that she’s a high-ranking noble. While Princess Leshimiiya’s attendance here had been announced beforehand, I couldn’t fathom why this girl would enroll in the second academy as well.

With no clear answer, I decided to stop thinking about it.

She scanned the classroom, seemed to have noticed something that made her blink in surprise, but then shook her head and took her seat.
Shortly afterward, the exam began.

◇◇◇

The second academy’s entrance exam is divided into three types: written tests, practical tests, and potential assessment tests.
The potential test, to put it simply, evaluates one’s Job and magic power.
For the entrance exam, not all parts of it are mandatory, nor do you need to have a passing score in every test you participated to pass.

If the academy relied solely on academics and technical skill for their assessment, noble children or those from wealthy families—who could afford early education—would be sure to dominate the ranks.
Consequently, this would result in the academy possibly overlooking commoners with rare and valuable Jobs.
So, for example, someone with a Job like “Sword King” could pass simply for possessing such a Job. Conversely, someone could be rejected if they merely had decent scores overall and nothing more.

That said, there is a basic minimum requirement: students must be able to read and write.
Furthermore, your exam results determine the courses you can enroll in.
For instance, someone accepted solely because of their “Sword King” Job would likely be restricted to hunter or knight training courses. It wouldn’t make sense to teach sorcery to someone with no aptitude for it, after all. Similarly, individuals admitted solely due to having a certain level of magic power would only have access to sorcery-related courses.

However, out of all the courses, hunter courses are apparently open to everyone.
This is because anyone can become a hunter to begin with and, by the very nature of this country, the more skilled hunters there are available, the better.

The academy also offers courses on etiquette. For this in particular, it is mandatory for all examinees to take the etiquette test, and those who score poorly are required to take etiquette courses after enrollment.
Since the second academy is designed to cultivate excellence, even commoner students are expected to interact with the upper class at some point. Some might even land an occupation within the royal palace.
Hunters, too, may need to interact with nobles if they want to accept lucrative requests.
While we rarely ever dealt with such requests ourselves, there are situations where, for example, hunters might have to cooperate with knights.
Knights of high position and standing generally come from noble families, so knowing proper etiquette helps minimize unnecessary friction from occurring.

Given this, it’s important to achieve good scores overall. However, standing out too much is the last thing we want. And so our goal is to be on the lower end of above average.

Back to the written exam, while Ciel is working through the test, I answer it in my head as well.
Honestly, we could cheat as much as we wanted, but that wouldn’t do good for Ciel’s education, so she will be answering the test on our behalf.
As for me, since I plan to take some courses too, I’m answering to gauge my current knowledge level.
Between the two of us, Ciel usually scores better. It’s odd to say, considering we share the same body, but she just seems more in sync with it. Perhaps it’s my old memories interfering, or maybe I’m simply less enthusiastic about studying compared to her.

While I enjoy studying sorcery—likely because I managed to learn so much through self-study—going back to the basics feels tedious.

After answering the simpler questions on economics and politics, Ciel finished answering the test, and now it’s my turn to work.
And by work, what I mean is to peek at the other’s answers and intentionally choose wrong answers for questions only a few people answered correctly.
At the very least, it’s best to make sure that there are no questions only Ailniege has the correct answer to. Isn’t this bad for Ciel’s education, you ask? This is this, and that is that.
Ciel has already seen enough of the darker side of society through her work as a hunter, so I trust she’ll be just fine.

Taking some distance from Ciel to observe the other test answers, I noticed some interesting patterns.
The aristocrats had a generally low error rate, while the commoners struggled more. Among them, the red-haired noble girl might even be capable of achieving a perfect score.
I breathed a sigh of relief, since it meant we probably wouldn’t outscore her. However, I noticed her struggling with a magic circle problem that Ciel had solved in no time, so I adjusted our answer to be the trick answer instead. These sorts of adjustments are the most tedious parts of the written exam.

As to be expected, there were some prodigies among the commoners as well, with one boy in particular having nearly the same answer rate as the red-haired noble girl. While I can’t be sure whether his answers are correct, he had the same answers as Ciel, or rather I had, so he’s likely correct… Or so I hope.
There was also one examinee who strangely excelled at the hunter-related questions, but as I continued observing, Ciel was growing visibly bored, so I decided to chat it up with her.

And as we were reviewing our answers, the announcement came: the written exam is over.

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This ends the written exam chapter! Yay!

It’s funny how our girls are literally cheating the exams just to make sure that they won’t have a high score. It was also interesting how Ain let Ciel answer first and just adjusted things afterwards, but it’s probably so they can memorize Ciel’s answer and compare it later. We are also introduced to a few interesting characters who remain unnamed so far.

Now then, I hope you enjoyed this chapter. Please feel free to comment. Stay healthy, stay safe, and have a nice day~!