Research

The next class was a module on methodology to teach students how to do research and interpret studies when doing a project or writing a paper.

John was truly embracing the theme of the class but a lot less the example subject given by the young Mr Landcliff an undergrad who taught it to finance his PhD.

He found little reference online to the Golden Rose directly, but he saw something strange. On some gravures describing events under the Inquisition some of the guards or knights drawn had roses on their clothes, the gravures were black and white, so he had no way to know if it was related to the order. But it was a hint that they might not be as benevolent as they pretended.

This time he thought of continuing to gather panties for the quest. But this module being in a computer room had only 22 students and out of the 13 girls only 3 still had panties on. He realized that he could have taken dry panties and swapped them on already aroused girls, he could have farmed one girl for multiple pairs during one hour.

His research on Mrs Wentworth did give him even stranger results. There was no trace of a Victoria Wentworth on any social media. The only trace he found was on an old article of a local newspaper. It was about the scandalous wedding of Archibald Wentworth, vice president of Odracir International Trading, with a Victoria Kern. She was the widow of Steven Kern of Kern Manufacturing. The wedding became a scandal because there were suspicions of an affair between her and Winston Hawthorne senior, the other vice president of Odracir International Trading.

John was perplexed, the link with Vanessa's family was intriguing. But there was more. Winston Hawthorne senior was Vanessa's grandfather and the article was dated of November 23rd 1963.

On the picture of the wedding he could recognize his teacher, wearing a wedding gown and looking exactly like she did today. The article even stated that she had been wed to Steven Kern for 40 years.

Victoria Wentworth looked like she was about 50 years old and she did already look like that 54 years ago. John began to understand the scale of the powers that could be harnessed. She told him that the order had forgotten about her, that she remembered her sisters burnt at the stake. How old could she really be?

John guessed that to even look like that if she was 120 years old would require some great power. And maybe some grisly price, he remembered her draining all the slimes of their energy in the barrier, was she limiting herself to monsters?

For the Order to protect him from others they only asked that he didn't join any other organization, he was not a member of their order, just under their protection. But who would protect him from them if they thought he was dangerous?

Mrs Wentworth had only asked of him that he didn't take side against her and would even help him keep the less heroic aspects of his abilities under wraps.

With Moira in his pocket and his teacher being markedly independent there might be a way... He could interact with her to gain knowledge and power without being part of any organization, while using his influence on Moira to distract the Order from what he would be doing.

Bored, troubled, with mana to spare, and nothing to do he began looking around. There might be someone here to give something to or take something from.

Few at the Academy were poor (you had to be able to afford the fees) but not everyone walked around with tons of cash on them. Using the new option of Observe he checked inventories, but there wasn't anything worth taking on someone who deserved to lose it (few of the girls deserved to lose their panties, but he had a quest to finish and really do they needed panties that much?).

Something to give then? He picked the girl on his left.

Lucy Jones
Lvl 3 student
-59 rp

She was not hating him, just at the negative score his nerd status, the rumors about his dick, and his former appearance put him. She was a brunette, somewhat unremarkable, except that she had a very flat ass. It was almost ridiculous and he was sure she would be mocked in the showers by other girls.

He decided to give her something to make her life easier. He used Move to lift her skirt and once he got her bare ass in sight he cast Augment body 4 times in a row on it to cap it.

Her ass was very noticeably rounder by now. He remarked he got two crits on the spells.

A pop up had just opened in front of him.

Achievement unlocked: Good Samaritan.
You helped someone without expecting anything in return. Care to continue?
+20% crit rate on spells or skills you cast selflessly.

The achievement, true to its nature, didn't even give him any xp. And because it only worked if he didn't get anything out of the action, it could not be of any use to him other than being better at helping others for free. He guessed even doing things that would increase his rp score would prevent this from working. Getting crits didn't make his skills lvl up faster, so he would just get better results from spells wasted in grinding, provided they helped someone.

Would it work in reverse? Was there a reward for messing with someone for absolutely no reason? John had yet to figure out if he was a free agent or if the rewards and skills he got were leading him in some direction like a compass.

He had only gathered 27 of the 50 pairs of panties he needed and he doubted he would get many more in his next class.