Chapter 1214 – Wine Bottle of Beer

The Viper was silent for several moments as he considered Jake’s question before he spoke.

“Again, that’s a complicated question,” the Viper said, less jokingly this time around. “I would say, considering everything, you did very well. It was your first time teaching a class like that, and you got through it pretty decently, and the students left the auditorium having been bettered from the experience. Shit, based on how a few of them even leveled up, they even got literal experience.”

“You said it’s complicated, which makes me think that isn’t all you have to say,” Jake pointed out.

“True,” the Viper nodded, though he didn’t seem intent on elaborating.

“Fine… give it to be straight. How did I actually do?” Jake sighed.

“As I said, you actually did well,” the Viper reiterated. “But it’s all relative. From an objective standpoint, if we compare you to other teachers around peak C-grade who usually do this kind of thing, your lesson was… well, let’s just be honest here, absolute dogshit.”

“Ow,” Jake muttered, having seen that one coming. “But definitely do give me some feedback about just how horrible I was.”

“Again, don’t get me wrong and become all discouraged; this is comparing you to those who do this for a living,” Villy said in a calming tone. “But there were some obvious objective shortcomings. Your time management was less-than-ideal, you had way too many examples, you should probably have included some written material to hand out, you repeated yourself a lot, a lot of stiffness in there, and… eh, no reason to harp on. Though I will point out that perhaps worst of all was that you focused way too much on those who couldn’t follow along to the detriment of those who were keeping up.”

Jake frowned at the last one the Viper mentioned. “What do you mean? Shouldn’t I want to try to make sure everyone is involved and getting something out of the lesson?”

“No,” the Viper said, recoiling at the notion. “Fuck no. Don’t waste your time on the idiots in the audience, but focus on those who are doing well. You kept trying to catch up to those behind rather than further accelerating those already up to speed. If people can’t keep up, that’s just because they’re either too stupid or the topic doesn’t suit their Path; in either case, it’s not your problem. Sure, it’s bad if no one can keep up, but if at least a couple are capable, they should have the vast majority of your focus.”

“That… kind of goes against good teaching practices from my understanding,” Jake muttered.

“This isn’t the Holy Church,” Villy shook his head. “Those left in the dust are to be walked past or trampled. No one should waste their time trying to pick them up and carry others, as that would only slow them down. Of course, the hope is that those who’ve fallen will stand up on their own and keep marching, but if they lack the will to do so, they aren’t worth anyone’s time.”

“… what happened to No Child Left Behind?” Jake asked semi-jokingly.

“Children aren’t enrolled in the Academy in the first place,” Villy answered in a deadpan tone.

“Fair enough, I guess,” Jake sighed. He still wasn’t entirely on board with what Villy said, but he understood the logic. The Order preferred to focus on those already standing out to help uplift them further, even if it came at the cost of those who were struggling.

Culturally, based on his life before the system, Jake found this a questionable approach, but he knew that was how the majority of factions liked to do things, and he reckoned they knew more than him when it came to nurturing talent. Only the Holy Church had a policy of trying to help everyone, but even that had its limits and was ultimately only implemented due to the existence of the Holyland, allowing these weaker individuals to still contribute to the Church as a whole.

Besides, Jake didn’t really have much to say, considering he was one of the main beneficiaries of the Order’s system.

“So, seeing as you didn’t fuck up entirely, how about making this a regular thing so-“

“Fuck off,” Jake scoffed.

“Just a suggestion,” the Viper grinned, clearly enjoying teasing Jake.

“It also took so much damn time to prepare,” Jake sighed.

“Yeah, that’s another point of criticism that I didn’t really see the need to include, seeing as it was your first time. You spent way too much prep time, but again, if you decided to teach more regularly, you would inevitably get more efficient,” Villy said with a smile. “I also can’t say you wasted your time, seeing as spending a month to prepare to get a level while closing in on peak C-grade is pretty damn good.”

“Definitely getting closer to maxing out the profession,” Jake nodded, having nine levels left of C-grade. His class still needed nearly double that, but from experience, it leveled a lot faster than his alchemy.

Especially if he included a cheeky little dragon hunt in there.

“For sure,” the Viper nodded in agreement as he turned a bit more serious. “Now, I do have a small confession to make. I wasn’t so insistent on making you do this lesson just because I thought it would be good for you – which it was – but I also had some ulterior motives.”

“What, record it to bully me in the future?” asked jokingly, having definitely not read the mood right.

“No, to try to sniff out the people behind the ambush in the void,” the snake god said, not a hint of jest in his voice.

“Oh…” Jake muttered as he thought about it a little more. “Wait, why would someone involved in that participate in the lesson? That just seems to be needlessly risky.”

“It’s a long shot, but there is a chance that…”

Villy proceeded to explain his thoughts about the other party wanting to confirm Jake wasn’t injured, as well as some other rather loose reasons, and overall, Jake found the reasoning seriously questionable. But… he also understood that they really didn’t have anything else to go off, and while he had zero faith in this leading to anything, he didn’t see any harm in it. Well, besides completely stomping over the privacy of every single participant in Jake’s lesson.

Stolen novel; please report.

When the Viper was done, Jake thought for a while before asking:

“So, you’ve noticed anyone suspicious yet? I didn’t see anything off on my end or had any weird feelings from anyone during the lesson, but I’m also fully aware that my nerves were tense and I wasn’t exactly paying attention,” Jake said.

He also didn’t even question why the Viper hadn’t told him about this plan beforehand, as he fully understood. If Jake had been told this was also part of a plot to try to find a spy from an unknown, powerful faction, he would have been even more stressed out and nervous, and he seriously didn’t need that.

“Nope,” the Viper shook his head. “But I didn’t expect to either. Clearly, whatever method this faction is using doesn’t allow us to easily spot those part of it. The Pantheon of Life didn’t notice they had spies among them, even if they were mortals, so I would have been highly surprised if there was anything detectable to identify them. No, I think the best way is to monitor every single person part of the lesson and see if they do anything suspicious.”