How To Survive A Calamity-Chapter 236 - 235: New Rank

The changes in the Academy—especially within the First Year—spread like an ebbing tide: slow, yet inevitable.

With routines resuming as they should, at least on the surface, the once-sparse First Year corridors began to fill again. Even with the official restart of all activities, some students still took the liberty of a few extra days away—though, of course, only with a "valid" excuse.

But nothing lasts forever. Change is constant. And the Academy, unwilling to dwell too long on the shadow of its greatest mistake, was forced to move forward. Lingering in the past would only deepen the damage already done.

In a little over a week after the official resumption, things were... exactly the same. Almost like half of us hadn’t died in a Dungeon run hijacked by an actual Demon whose motives were still anyone’s guess. You know, just another "class experience."

Like nothing happened.

—Or so I’d like to say.

The Aegis Academy had slapped down a ban on even breathing about the incident, backed by a punishment strict enough to make war criminals flinch. But the empty seats of the fallen Cadets — and the sudden absence of certain friends — weren’t exactly easy to ignore. Figuratively and literally.

Still, while I was busy wrestling with my own mess, the Academy had a buffet of other disasters to chew on, and time trickled by until—

Thwaam!

"We will now be re-assigning Ranks and Positions."

Marching in like a war general who’d forgotten how to smile, Wrenna Munrow slapped a thick, leather-bound tome onto the podium. The poor thing coughed up loose pages like it had been in a bar fight.

Her amethyst eyes glinted with something between mild irritation and homicidal intent — the red veins at the edges making her look like she’d been awake since the last century. The dark, deep circles under her eyes? Classic mark of someone who hated their job and possibly everyone in the room.

She stormed in like a force of nature.

One sharp sweep of her gaze, and the entire room fell silent.

Our homeroom instructor, Wrenna, looked like she hadn’t slept in days—but the exhaustion in her eyes didn’t dull the weight of her presence.

"Usually, this is too early," she began, her voice cutting clean through the air. "But given the current... circumstances, the Academy can only adapt in ways that push us forward."

She paused—just long enough to make us uneasy—before continuing.

"So instead... you will be assigned new, temporary Ranks. A re-assessment will follow after mid-terms, based on your participation. Is that clear?"

The words hit like a dropped blade.

No one moved. No one spoke.

The shock was too fresh—settling slow, like a cold weight in the stomach.

It took a while for it to settle in the minds if everyone, Wrenna’s words still just freshly registering slowly.

That was until—

"Uh... yes?"

A cadet in the front row raised his hand.

Wrenna’s eyes slid to him. Her brow arched, her mouth curling into something between a smirk and a snarl as she regarded him, if you can even call it that.

The poor boy flinched under the sharp edge of an overworked middle-aged woman’s tone, but still rose to his feet.

"U-uhm... what’s the point of assigning temporary Ranks now, if they’ll just be changed again after the upcoming midterm exams? And these new ’temporary’ Ranks—what exactly will they be judged on this time?"

"It’s a management issue," she replied curtly. "Nothing for you Cadets to concern yourselves with. Secondly, a major part of your temporary Ranks will be determined by your performance and contribution in the recently concluded Practical Field Experience."

"The one whose assessment criteria we still don’t know about—?" the same boy cut in, bold enough to push his luck.

Wrenna’s amethyst gaze flickered to him again. They glowed, but not nicely. Her expression soured slightly, though she kept it in check. Still, if looks could kill, that poor boy would’ve been dead, and buried, since last week.

"Yes," she said, the word edged with something close to a snarl.

"None of the formalities matter to you lot." She rolled her eyes, i couldn’t help but think she looked particularly exasperated for such a fine day.

"As I already said, your standing will be determined by your performance and contributions to your assigned groups as a member." She paused, then continued.

"What you need to understand is that your temporary ranking has a significant chance of influencing your official rank after the mid-term assessment."

"So... in other words, these temporary ranks are like a preliminary draft of our positions before the real ranking comes at mid-term?" Wrenna was cut again. This time by a different cadet— a female.

"Precisely," Wrenna said curtly, her tone slicing through the room before she immediately moved on.

"Pay attention. To get this over with, I’ll begin by taking attendance. Listen carefully for your names—and your new temporary Ranks."

She flipped open the thick binder she’d brought earlier, its pages heavy with authority.

There were over a thousand First Years this year, and honestly, I had no idea how the whole system even worked. What I did know was this—my rank sat rock-bottom at 1,499.

Obviously, Wrenna wasn’t about to read out every single Cadet name. She’d narrowed it to Class A only.

Still, I was the last on that list, which meant I had plenty of time before she called mine.

So, while she read out names, my focus drifted—half on the roll call, half lost in the mess of thoughts swirling in my head.

It had been nearly a week since that strange letter arrived.

Since then—nothing. No signs, no slips, no strange movements from anyone.

A week was far too little time to confirm anything, but it was enough to start crossing names off my preliminary list. I’d done my own digging, quietly, methodically.

Still, I couldn’t stake everything on a single handwritten letter. This was going to take time—weeks, maybe months—before anything solid surfaced.

Unless, of course, the sender—the culprit—slipped up first.

"And finally—Victor Bright. Previously Rank 1499..."

My thoughts broke off mid-track, my awareness snapping back to the present as Wrenna’s amplified voice carried across the classroom.

Leaning lazily against my arm, I lifted a blank gaze toward her at the front.

Wrenna Marlowe met it instantly. The room seemed to still.

Eyes shifted toward me—dozens of them, sharp, curious, waiting.

I didn’t move. Back arched over my desk, gaze unwavering, I let the silence speak for me.

Go on.

Wrenna held my stare. One beat. Then another. The pause stretched, quiet pressing in around us, until she finally spoke—her voice steady, her face unreadable, though slower than before.

"You’ve also been assigned a new position. Your new temporary rank is... Number 846."

.

.

.

.

"846..." The number slipped from my lips like I was testing how it felt in my mouth.

I scratched the back of my head. Somehow, my new ranking didn’t carry the same strange weight that 1499 once did.

It felt... odd.

Was I seriously getting sentimental over this? I’d climbed out of the pit, right? From rock bottom to somewhere in the middle. That was supposed to feel good.

I wasn’t feeling bad, but i also wasn’t particularly excited.

My rise was only expected. This was only the beginning.

Right now, I stood before the familiar noticeboard mounted along the hallway wall, its surface lined with a fresh list of newly released Temporary Ranks.

Some names had climbed, others had fallen. Yet, plenty still clung to their old positions, untouched by the shuffle—especially those in the top 100, and even more so the top 120. 𝒇𝓻𝓮𝓮𝙬𝙚𝒃𝒏𝓸𝙫𝒆𝙡.𝓬𝓸𝒎

One group, however, remained utterly unmoved.

The top 50—more precisely, the top 20.

Ceres. Deandra. Xavier. Their ranks hadn’t budged an inch.

As my eyes traced the neatly printed list, a thought pressed at the back of my mind: How exactly are these ranks decided?

From what I knew, a Cadet’s standing was determined by several assessments... but there was one deciding factor that carried the most weight.

Talent.

That single word was the weight behind my place at the very bottom. My first evaluation had stamped my Talent Assessment across my file in brutal, clinical ink— Null Talent. Non existent.

Meanwhile, Ceres stood unshaken at Rank 1. Seventeen years old, already Awakened into the Heroic Ranks, her name glittered at the top like it had been carved there. I didn’t know the exact Assessment they gave her Talent score, but whatever it was, it had to be absurd.

And yet, this was the system that decided our Temporary Rankings—this so-called "re-assessment."

Basing someone’s worth almost entirely on an invisible metric like Talent felt... wrong. Shallow, even. Especially coming from the behemoth that was Aegis Academy. But perhaps that was why it was hardly surprising.

But this was perfectly structured when you broke it down.

First, they gave you a Rank based on your Talent.

And while it was fundamentally almost impossible to change your Talent Assessment over time, you did have a chance—however slim—to change your Rank.

The Academy built its hierarchy methodically around that truth.

It started with the creed: Power, Strength, and Talent are all that matter.

Then it trickled down to the secondary virtues: Effort. Intelligence. Opportunity.

It was a mirror of the Awakened world itself—sporadic, ruthless, and unyielding. A perfect reflection of the society we lived in where nothing is fixed, and only those at the top have a say.