The villainous young master just wants to live a Buddhist-like life.

　Dak glanced around and found Doron in the corner.

　Doron was listening intently to Mike Irwin, a fourth-grader, telling him strange and wonderful stories.

　Compared to the previous two years, the atmosphere in the House of Lords is indeed much more peaceful this year. This is mostly because Edwin Clarissa is the president of the Society for the Study of the History of the Nobles this year, which has made the Society less hostile than before.

　Edwin Clarissa was sitting nearby, talking to a sixth-year student.

　That senior is the sixth-year singles duelist this year. He is very strong, but he lost to Pandora Drogon, who was a fourth-year student at the time, in last year's cross-class challenge, and was in a slump for a while.

　However, this year, he has made a comeback with an even stronger will, determined to avenge his previous defeat and leave the Holy Grail for the House of Nobles.

　Students of the House of Nobles have never lacked the will to win, and in this respect, there is no need for encouragement.

　After Dak sat down, he naturally joined in the conversation between Doron and his senior, Owen.

　Then, gradually, more people gathered in the common room. Once all the participants in this year's Academy Cup had arrived, Edwin Clarissa smiled and said, "Professor Jones, everyone's here."

　Professor Jones nodded slightly to him and began, “Now that everyone is here, let’s begin. The main reason I’ve gathered you all here tonight is to have a chat with you all. I’ve been the dean of this branch for quite some time now, and I’ve known all of you since you were freshmen. Now, this sixth-year class is about to graduate from the academy. Once you leave, who knows when we’ll see each other again. I only hope that after graduation, you will continue to pursue your magical path…”

　Unexpectedly, Professor Jones did not specifically talk about the Academy Cup, but instead slowly recounted his life memories over the years.

　The students, who had been laughing and joking, fell silent as they listened intently to her.

　Professor Jones spoke with such familiarity that she seemed to know the names of everyone present. She talked about the students' achievements over the years, their changes, and many unexpected growths, which made those mentioned blush slightly.

　At that moment, Darko Dimon was just one of the students. He did nothing but listen quietly.

　After listening, like everyone else, I felt an even stronger desire to win.

　"This year's Academy Cup will belong to us."

　At 10:30, Dak returned to dormitory 301, checked the items he had prepared for entering the dungeon, and then went to sleep after practicing the Netherworld God Technique.

　He can't stay up late tonight; he needs to be in the best spirit and condition to face tomorrow's game.

　The Academy Cup Dungeon Adventure Competition will begin at 8:00 PM on Friday and end at 8:00 PM on Sunday, lasting two days and forty-eight hours.

　I woke up the next day, and it was Friday.

　After confirming that he had not missed anything, Dark continued his research on the targeted transmutation of the "Blue-Eyes White Dragon".

　However, he intentionally slowed down his research to reduce energy expenditure. He also chose the most nutritious and abundant meals for breakfast and lunch. Once inside the dungeon, he would use "food cards" to satisfy his hunger, ensuring nothing went wrong.

　At 2 p.m., as planned, he had "Little Devil Beast" give him a "devil hypnosis" on the forehead. After sleeping for four hours, he woke up at 6 p.m.

　Then, as agreed, he went to Doron's dormitory to meet up with the other two players in the team competition—Diana and Rose.

　Doron prepared dinner in the room, and the four of them ate and chatted, filling in some details of the plan.

　Their plan was not complicated; it was simply based on Doron's suggestions, with some adjustments made.

　The power gap between Dark, Diana, and Rose is too large. If the three of them team up, it will only become a one-man show for Dark Dimon.

　While a "one-man show" isn't necessarily a bad thing, it means that Diana and Rose's combat abilities aren't being fully utilized.

　Furthermore, although monsters in the dungeon will respawn, the number in a limited area and at a limited time is still finite.

　The respawn rate doesn't increase just because Dark hunts them quickly. So even if Dark kills a lot, he might not be able to create a significant gap between himself and others.

　Moreover, the academy will impose restrictions on monster scoring.

　As a result, the efficiency of a three-person team is far less than that of a team acting separately.

　Therefore, as Doron mentioned last Saturday night, the best approach is to divide into two groups.

　Dark will be in a single group, while Diana and Rose will each be alone. This way, their combined combat power can be maximized. However, this also raises another issue.

　Can Diana and Rose, as a team, compete with the other three-person teams?

　The "Monster Points Handbook" distributed by the academy before the competition began specifies the monsters and points based on the grade level.

　In other words, all four colleges in the second year received the same "Monster Points Handbook".

　Therefore, they will definitely meet during the process of searching for and hunting monsters, and there is even a possibility of fierce conflict.

　According to the default rules, when students encounter resource allocation problems in the dungeon, they need to engage in a silent duel, with the loser having to back down.

　Although under normal circumstances, they would follow the "first come, first served" rule rather than dueling to avoid unnecessary losses.

　However, if the common goal is a group of monsters with a large number of points... there will always be times when neither side is willing to back down.

　At this point, being able to determine ownership through a duel is actually a good thing. Most of the time, they will use methods of "interfering" with each other to directly steal and kill the monsters.

　Such conflicts are inevitable.

　Diana and Rose would find it difficult to handle such conflicts. Moreover, it would be hard for the two of them alone to maximize their hunting efficiency.

　In view of this situation.

　Doron proposed that Dark send several magical spirits to support Diana and Rose!

　Sending magical spirits to support allies is actually a very simple idea.

　Upperclassmen are not allowed to support lowerclassmen in this way.

　However, it is only natural that the three lower-grade students can support each other! And Dark's magical spirits, who roam the academy all day, are a special type that everyone knows can exist for a long time.

　Therefore, after careful consideration, Doron made this suggestion. This suggestion was crucial.

　While not as many of Dark's magical spirits could actually survive for a long time as he had imagined, there were indeed some.

　The safest and most reliable magical spirit is named "Shami"! The other magical spirits lose contact when teleporting between dungeon floors, so Dark cannot provide magic power alone for an extended period.

　However, as long as "Shami" remains in its "terrestrial form," it can exist almost permanently even if its connection with Dark is severed.

　With the support of the ten-star magical spirit "Shamy", Diana and Rose's hunting efficiency will see a qualitative leap.

　However, "Shami" is made using "grass element seed" as the core material.

　Theoretically, it used something belonging to Professor Sylph as a transmutation material. Therefore, Dark initially didn't even intend to use it for magical duels.

　Similarly, there is the "Cosmic Brain Monster".

　But when he subtly hinted at his idea, Diana asked doubtfully, "But we also used the academy's resources..."

　Once those words were spoken, Darke couldn't hold back anymore.

　He suddenly realized that the college had indeed provided resources for many students during this last month.

　Many of the members recruited into "Hidden Serpent" also participated in the Academy Cup—or rather, they were selected into "Hidden Serpent" precisely because they were outstanding enough to represent their respective academies in the Academy Cup.

　Therefore, it's pointless to dwell on things that are or aren't relevant at this point.

　At least "Shemi" and "Cosmic Brain Monster" were magical spirits that he personally created.

　Thinking about it that way, Diana and Rose no longer needed to hide those Pokémon.

　Rose can definitely use "Marilluri".

　However, under these circumstances, the overall difficulty of this Academy Cup will definitely increase.

　The students have all shown significant improvement compared to before. The subsequent one-on-one duels will be even more exciting.

　As he spoke, Doron took out a form he had just printed and said, "As of today, the total credits of all students in the four departments are as follows. Rounded to the nearest thousand, our department leads the Magic Department and the Knight Department by about three to four thousand credits, but is lower than the Fool's Department. I didn't expect that this year, in terms of the total number of student credits alone, the Fool's Department would have the most. However, the difference between the lowest and the highest is less than five thousand, which is not a big deal."

　Dark said, "This should be good news, right? In previous years, judging solely by credits, our Noble Academy must have had the lowest numbers."

　Doron chuckled: "Our academy students do have a higher spending level. But most of it is still used for studying. After all, everyone is working hard. Sometimes when I see that I still have credits on my college card that I haven't used up, I feel empty, as if I haven't given it my all."

　Dark: "..." "That makes sense. Never mind."

　He shook his head and said, "How many points could you usually get in the old dungeon battles?"

　Doron said, "Hunting a monster earns you between 100 and 1000 points. If you only hunt ordinary monsters, even if you kill a thousand of them (each worth 500 points) in two days, you'll only get 500,000 points. Besides, the chance of killing a thousand monsters is not high; killing five hundred is already considered very good. As for those 100 quest bosses, each one is worth over 10,000 points, and the strongest quest boss is worth 100,000 points."

　Dark did a rough calculation and said, "Each grade group has 25 points, so five grade groups have 1.25 million points. The mission boss has a total score of 2 million, which is divided equally among the four departments, with each department receiving 500,000 points. In other words, the final score for each department will be around 175 points."

　Doron nodded and said, "The data is similar to last year's." Dark stroked his chin and pondered for a moment.

　One million seven hundred and five thousand points; a little more and you'd have two million points. For a branch to earn two million points is quite impressive.

　However, the four departments are of similar strength, so it is indeed difficult to create a significant gap between them.

　If he wants to freely choose his opponents in the duel competition, then in the dungeon competition, he would conservatively need to have a lead of 100,000 points over the second place.

　Where do I get these 100,000 points?

　Are we really going to have to compete with the sixth graders for the strongest boss?

　However, searching for the boss's trail is not easy; it's like spending the time hunting ordinary monsters in exchange for the chance to obtain 100,000 points.

　If he participates in the robbery with sixth-year students from the Noble Academy, it will consume twice the amount of time.

　One wrong calculation here and you're in for a loss. "Team games are just so troublesome!"

　Dak sighed.

　In fact, we can see a lot from the results of the recently concluded "Golden Cup".

　This year, the Noble Academy is at a disadvantage compared to the other three academies. Even if he can maintain his lead in the second year, it's possible that none of the third, fourth, fifth, or sixth year teams will win the championship.

　In that case, it would be difficult to even take the lead, let alone have a lead of 100,000 points.

　"We still need to proceed steadily and surely, and not be overly ambitious."

　"At the very least, we must ensure that the House of Nobles takes the lead in the Dungeon Fighter Tournament."

　"Ordinary monsters have limited resources; quest bosses are the key." "Let me think, let me think carefully..."

　Seven-fifteen.

　The three who had met in Duolong's dormitory returned to their respective dormitories to make final preparations.

　Fifteen minutes later, it's 7:30.

　The trio, plus their substitute, headed to the banquet hall on the first floor of the castle. Starting at 8 PM tonight, the banquet hall would broadcast live updates on the credit changes for each year of study across the four academies.

　Although students cannot see the live video broadcast, they can still see the trend from these changes in credits.

　While you can see the temporary credits for each college using the "College Card", you cannot break it down to the year level.

　Therefore, many students will gather in this banquet hall for the next two days.

　……"·

　……

　[I rested for a day, but the cough still won't stop, and I feel increasingly fatigued. I wanted to write last night, but I collapsed again. I only managed to get back up tonight, and then it was a long, tedious sitting session, coughing as I wrote. I finally managed to get a little bit done. I really want to rest for a few more days.]

Chapter 1033 Darkdemon Splits into Two Groups (5k)

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　Chapter 1033 Darkdemon Splits into Two Groups (5k)

　The atmosphere in the banquet hall was very lively. Many students from grades one to six had come, chatting in small groups while waiting for the Academy Cup to begin.

　Meanwhile, on the faculty seats to one side of the stage, the deans of the four colleges had all arrived, along with some other professors who enjoyed watching the spectacle, chatting and laughing as they waited.

　However, the "Academy Cup" does not have a formal opening ceremony.

　The college opened its banquet hall simply to provide a place for students to gather together.

　The organization responsible for hosting this "Academy Cup" is a semi-official organization called the Duel Club.

　The Duel Club's president, Inya Knight, still sported her signature ponytail and was offstage overseeing the event.

　When the clock struck 7:45, Inya Knight walked onto the stage, nodded slightly to the contestants waiting in front of her, and said, "I don't think I need to say anything more. Today, I will only say one thing: I wish you all good luck in your matches."

　After she finished speaking, she waved her hand deftly, and the staff of the Duel Club presented her with a total of five sealed bags.

　These five sealed bags are labeled according to grade level, and each bag contains five copies of the "Monster Points Handbook"—one of which is kept for safekeeping.

　She first picked up the first sealed bag to show the contestants below the stage, letting them confirm that the bag was intact. Then, in front of everyone, she removed the seal on the bag and took out the "Monster Points Handbook" one by one, which was then distributed by the staff.

　But offstage.

　The contestants from the four colleges were divided into four groups. The Noble College side...

　Dak and his two companions had been waiting there for some time.

　As a substitute, Duolong was kept outside by the staff and could only watch them longingly.

　Once participants receive the "Monster Points Handbook," they must proceed directly to the dungeon entrance accompanied by staff.

　The second-grade "Monster Points Handbook" was distributed first.