Herald of Steel

"5050!"

The number recited sounded almost magical to the presiding teacher and it caused him to turn around to face the young student with almost a blocky countenance.

"Wha.. what did you say?" Looking at the innocent face, the man's lips twitched a bit as he sought to confirm that what he had heard was indeed correct.

The reason for this overt reaction was because this teacher indeed knew the correct answer was 5050.

It was something he was even quite proud to know because this was one of the questions he faced during his qualification for priesthood.

And he was the only one among his cohorts who had managed to figure this out within the time frame and thus successfully become a clergyman.

In fact, it was this prowess that landed him a job here.

"5050! The addition of 1 to 100 is 5050." Thus, hearing a young twelve year old repeat the answer and inadvertently destroy his 'legacy' within mere moments of being presented the challenge came as truly a great shock to him.

"How… how did you figure it out? Did… you hear it from someone? Your father must have told you right!" The older man could not help but blurt so out in a slightly shaky voice, really hoping it was the latter case.

"No. I did it on my own." However, Waalie's swift reply in a clear, crisp tone dashed all those hopes.

As the boy then quickly took his fingers to near the sands to prove his claim and showed his work,

"It was easy. You see teacher, I noticed that you can add 1 and 100 to get 101. You can then also add 2 and 99 to get 101. You can add 3 and 98 to get the same number and so on. So to get the answer, you can just take the 101 and multiply it by half of the total numbers- 50. And that gives us 5050!"

What Waalie had done was very casually discover the formula for the sum of an arithmetic mean.

And it left this part time teacher, part time priest literally gaping.

He did not fully understand how the numbers added to 101 but was still able to appreciate the ingenuity of the method.

'That… so you can… ummm… I wasted so much time… for so long… was so easy… ahhhh.' Hence realizing how he had been bested by a twelve year old, the poor priest could not help but feel a small part of his heartbreak, as he then slowly turned his back to the boy

Then for the rest of the class, this particular classroom would be unusually quiet, as the teacher sat at his desk with a soulless expression, Waalie cleverly sat on the carpet, busing himself with trying out various combinations in order to test his newly discovered equation, while the rest of the class went about their business as usual, concentrating on the task at hand.

These boys were mostly too young and somewhat illiterate to understand the significance of what Waalie had done, while his teacher was too shocked to admit it.

Waalie would later go on to graduate school with the highest distinctions, and then take the post of the head of mathematics department at the University of Alexandria that Alexander would establish some time later.

For now, however, as the math class came to its closing, the young twelve year old was made to bear through the next two classes, which were history and language.

Waalie personally found these two topics to be usually quite a bore.

But there was also little he could do about it.

Hence for the next hour, he bore his ears through the onslaught of a gruff man droning on and on about the accomplishments of this king and that lord and all those riches they managed to get in the end, with Waalie barely able to keep his eyes from drooping by the end.

And the only reason the young boy did not simply start sleeping right at the start was in fear of getting called out and caned.

Now, to be fair, this lackluster response from Waalie had more to do with personal preference than the actual content.

The history that was taught here was handcrafted by Alexander, and aside from a bit of propaganda, it also contained quite a bit of useful information.

There were true records of past rulers that explained the current state of Adhania, it described the various regions of Adhania, the families ruling them, the explanation of the division of nobility, as well as Adhania's intricate layered structure style of governance, among many other things.

The book was so jam packed with necessary knowledge that it was basically vital for anyone wanting to join Zanzan's administration to memorize it.

So it seemed if Waalie truly wanted to become an official and be called a 'shaheb', he would have to one day or another catch up on this.

That remained to be seen.

For now though, the next period that came was language studies, which basically consisted of learning Azhak from the classics of the time.

Here the students were also taught poetry, philosophy, and morality, all guised in the form of stories and parables.

These paragraphs would be read in class either by the teacher or the various students, and then various discussions would occur regarding the text.

Until finally the bell signaling the end of the class would ring and the students would be dismissed, with of course no homework.

This was simply not a thing, so whatever was taught during those three hours, was all the learning the boys would get for the day.

And speaking of boys, there were indeed only boys in the school, no girls, not a single one.

And for once, this was not the parent's fault.

In fact, some of them wanted to send their daughters to get the 'free' money.

However Alexander declined!

And the reason for this astonishing move was because to Alexander this free education was not charity, but an investment.

It was designed to produce the next administrators, judges, scientists, and thinkers, people who would help him rule his lands more effectively.

And the task of ruling was primarily dominated by men during time period.

So it would be foolish for him to expect that a woman could perform jobs such as magistrate judges under the current social structure, even if Alexander appointed them.

Most of the regular people would not just respect them.

Thus, Alexander decided to push the mass education of females for a later date, when society had become a bit more fertile, and its consciousness a bit aware.

For now, the privilege of education for women primarily resided with the nobility.

Although even then it was normally quite restricted.

For most nobles of Adhania, primary education typically began around the age of 6 to 7, and was largely focused on basic literacy and numeracy- developing the ability to adequately communicate and compute simple arithmetic operations.

Both boys and girls were inducted into this endeavor, with families wealthy enough, hiring special private tutors to teach their progeny.

Or if they could not afford that, they would have the children attend private lessons conducted by an educated slave or freedman, using materials like wax tablets and coal styluses as their paper and pen.

This continued for five years until the girls graduated at 12 and then usually got married soon after.

While the boys were allowed to continue fighter secondary education if they so pleased.

This was much more comprehensive and involved the study of Azhak literature history, and 'advanced' mathematics like multiplication and division.

The primary focus of secondary education however was on the study of classical literature and most importantly the development of rhetorical skills.

A noble's ability to talk and present his case eloquently in court was seen as vital.

So most of the time, the teachers of these schools would be usually fellow nobles who had hands on experience in the process.

And lastly, if a boy had shown enough skill and will, he could pursue even higher education, specializing in a particular subject like philosophy, law, oratory, etc, which was usually done while being part of the royal court, such as a scholar, scribe or record keeper.

But Alexander's public education did away with a lot of the fat, only keeping the meat, and adding other qualities he thought were useful.

Thus, the learning period for these boys was much more truncated.

"Arghhh! Finally over!" As soon as Marcus was out of the classrooms, the boy let out this joyous cry, and then turning to his friend revealed a proud smirk,

"Guess where I'm going today? My elder brother is taking me to a whorehouse to celebrate!"

It seemed the boy was unable to hide his excitement any longer.

"Whorehouse? Like that kind…." While the much younger Waalie repeated the words with a trace of surprise but much more disdain.

Despite his young age, the boy was mature enough to know what that place was.

And somehow he felt disgusted simply hearing the tales of what went on inside.

"My old man will have my skin if he hears I even went past the front gates of that place." Thus showing that his parents strictly prohibited the underaged kid from visiting such places, Waalie revealed he had no intention to pry and after a quick farewell, bid them well.