The Rebirth of Evelyn Knox

The boy who entered appeared to be about the same age as Evelyn, although that wasn't much of a surprise. What did surprise her was that she knew who this boy was.

Evelyn hadn't expected to meet anyone she knew on this journey, aside from her own group. This was because she couldn't possibly know of any younger children among the commoners, and the ones in ancient families were all mostly older than her.

But if she recalled correctly, this boy had been in the same area as Cecilia, before the girl had dragged her away.

She had just assumed he was either a servant or an attendant to the older looking boy, but apparently that wasn't quite the case.

She hadn't been able to talk to any of the others that day, but considering that Cecilia told her the others were badmouthing her during the ceremony, she did not have high expectations from any of them anyway.

The young boy with brown hair and yellow eyes did not look much different from regular humans at first glance, but his gold lined white three-piece suit made it clear that he must be from a well-off family, at the very least.

Perhaps due to his 'normal' appearance, the commoner children did not have as much aversion to him. Some even waved him over.

The brown haired boy hesitated for only a few moments as his eyes flitted between the pink haired girl and the commoner children, but in the end he walked towards the larger group timidly.

In his mind, someone like Evelyn would only willingly associate with those of Cecilia's level. In her eyes, he was probably just a worm.

The children greeted him enthusiastically, offering up their names one by one. Clearly, if it was not an 'abnormal', these children were quite eager.

The yellow eyed boy's voice was demure, and he looked quite easy to bully.

"Hello! I-I'm Aeron."

He did not tell them his last name, because although he was shy, he was not an idiot. The surname 'Ventura' would be a dead giveaway of his identity, and he knew what kind of reaction these commoner children will have.

Although the children from the ancient families got a 'guaranteed' seat in the academy, the commoner children had to pass multiple rounds of testing just to be considered as a potential student.

If these qualifying candidates were too many, sometimes there would even be elimination tournaments.

To make matters worse, these tests and tournaments could be held throughout the year, and would only be conducted in the capital cities.

This meant that those commoner students who were truly destitute would be completely hopeless. At the very least, they needed to be able to arrange enough resources to survive in a capital city for an entire year.

Otherwise, they would end up missing a test if it came with a notice of only a day or two, and all their hard work would go down the drain.

Considering how most of them would only be level one and have abysmal stats, not to mention their insignificant background, the sheer difference between these commoners and the 'privileged' students from the big families or royalty was like an uncrossable chasm.

For them to be here, their parents had sacrificed almost their entire life savings, and many were even in heavy debt. The envy they must feel for those born with a silver spoon in their mouth was obvious.

And now that Aeron had made some new friends, how could he bear to let the surname 'Ventura' take it all away so soon?

Evelyn's ears twitched a few times as she listened to their conversation, and Amara couldn't help but giggle.

The pink haired girl tilted her head curiously.

"What is it, what are you giggling about?"

The redhead smiled. "I'm just thinking, you pretend to look so cold, but your ears are twitching when you try to eavesdrop."

Evelyn's face flushed in shame.

"I-I'm not eavesdropping! My hearing is just sensitive."

"Fufu… okay, little Eve, whatever you say."

"Hmph."

With her mood now ruined, Evelyn turned her head away from the commoner's seat and sulked while petting her little fox, who made a smug face at the puppy.

'Look, who's always the first priority? It is I, the great Ruru.'

"Only little Ruru doesn't judge me. Good girl, good girl."

"Wuff!"

"Oh, you too Bree. You're also good, c'mere."

As she was holding the two fluff balls in each of her arms, a heavy weight crashed into her thighs.

"Me too!"

Evelyn rolled her eyes. "Vivian… you're not a pet, don't act like that!"

"Aw."

Amara giggled.

Unfortunately, their good mood was ruined as a rather ostentatious group entered their compartment. They didn't phase in from the outside, they walked in from the opening leading to one of the forward compartments.

"I heard there was Lavinian scum boarding here, and turns out it was right. Who let these cowards in?"

The commoner children did not dare to speak, because even though the boy had dark brown hair and eyes, the sheer aura of dominance from him made it clear that he was nothing like them.

As for Aeron, he could only clench his fists in anger and keep his eyes glued on the ground. He had always hated people like his older step-brother.

Why can't they leave others alone? Why do they only feel happy when someone else is in distress?

"Well, why is the trash not speaking?"

Amara and Evelyn knew it was best to ignore these kinds of idiots. After all, if a conflict broke out then the academy would dole out a heavier punishment on the 'instigator'.

Trading words with someone who clearly had some hostile agenda would just end up getting them goaded into aggression.

As for the other 'solution', if he started a fight, they could only serve him with his own medicine.

Unfortunately, despite Evelyn pressing down on her palm to hint her, Vivian still exploded when she heard 'trash'.

"Who are you? Dare to speak like that to us?!"

"Hoh, seems like it's not just trash here, guys, why did you guys give me wrong info?"

The people following the brown haired boy seemed familiar with this routine, and their responses were almost as if they had it all scripted.

"Our apologies, master Rufus, we didn't know that there was noisy trash here too instead of just normal trash."

Their raucous laughter finally ticked Evelyn off. Even if she knew they were doing it deliberately, some people really did need to be taught a lesson.

The dark skinned boy grinned widely as he saw the pink haired girl stand up from her seat after settling down the jumping little redhead and carefully setting down her 'pets'.

His smile faded a little as she stood in front of him, looking at him straight in the eyes.

In his family, children fought viciously as soon as they learned how to walk. Judging an opponent's physical strength as they stood face to face was almost an instinct to him.

And although his heavily muscular frame made it look like he could snap the delicate looking girl in front of him in half, his instincts were screaming at him to… run! Run, and never look back.

"May I know your name?"

His attitude shifted abruptly, leaving his follower's minds reeling in confusion.

"Evelyn Knox. And who are you?"

The brown haired boy seemed to realize that if he backed off too fast now, his prestige amongst his friends would definitely take a hit. But if he got beaten up, wouldn't be worse?

His cousin was right, he really shouldn't be so impulsive! But now he was stuck between a rock and hard place, and did not know how to respond at all.

"I-I am Rufus Stonehardt. The eldest son of the Stonehardt family from Masengale. You know, our Masengale is twice the size of your Moreen city, and your Lavinian Empire is bound to lose against our Earthbound Alliance!"

The pink haired girl tilted her head with a smile. "Okay. But what does that have to do with me?"

"H-Huh?"

Rufus expected her to get into an argument about how their Lavinian Empire was definitely not inferior. He hoped it would change the confrontation from being violent to just argumentative, but his hopes were clearly dashed.

Evelyn flicked her long pink hair, looking at the buff looking boy as if looking at an idiot.

"I'll tell you what, Ron."

"Rufus!"

The pink haired girl rolled her eyes dismissively.

"Whatever. Listen, Ringo. You can use either use those stubby little legs of yours and run out with all four of your dirty tails, or I can use you like a foot rest for the next two weeks."

As the muscular boy and his companions gawked at her in disbelief, Evelyn gave them a 'gentle' smile.

"I'll give you ten seconds to decide."

If it had been before, the companions following Rufus would have already jumped the pink haired girl to rain down punches and kicks, but looking at their leader's apparent cowardice, they did not dare step in the line of fire.

Of course, at this point Rufus knew if he really ran away, he might as well bury his face in sand and forget about earning any glory at the academy. This would become the greatest shame of his life!

Just as Rufus was about to grit his teeth and fight it out, a lightning fast figure darted in from one of the rear compartments and crashed straight into the pink haired girl, leaving everyone else reeling in shock.