Royal Academy/Curriculum

During the semester, the bells ring twice as often on days with classes in the royal academy. These extra time-slots are called half-bells. Generally lessons last for one such half-bell unit.


 * 2 bell: Breakfast time
 * 2 1/2 bell: Start of first morning lessons; opening of the library.
 * 4 bell: Lunch
 * 4 1/2 bell: Start of afternoon lessons
 * 6 bell: Dinner; closing of the library.
 * 7 bell: Begin of curfew

All first and second year students learn a general curriculum, regardless of their future career choices. Upon entering the third year however, each student has to decide which specialization they will go into.

The exception to this are the archduke candidates, who are obligated to attend the archduke candidate course.

Any student is free to take on other courses in addition to their chosen main profession, if they wish.

For written lessons (and also some practical ones) the first unit each year is an exam where any students who are confident that they already know what is going to be taught that term may participate. Those who pass the exam do not have to attend any lessons of this subject for the remainder of the term. If the student fails these early exams, they have to continue taking the lessons like those that haven't taken an early exam at all.

Similar exams can also be made at any point of the term, but those have to be arranged by each student individually with the professor.

Subjects in which a student have not passed an early exam will have a final exam at the end of the regular term. Should a student fail to pass a final exam on any subject at the end of the regular term, they will have to take extra lessons for that subject during the rest of the year until they pass. Should a student fail to pass even those extra lessons before the start of the next term, they will fail to graduate and lose their chance to become a true noble and be reduced in status to the same state as those who were sent to the temple as children.

The following schedule is in order of the first day on which the respective lesson started during Lady Rozemyne's stay at the royal academy.


 * Math 1
 * Magecraft 1
 * History 1
 * Geography
 * Theology 1


 * Mana Flow Control
 * Mana Compression
 * Highbeast Creation
 * Court Etiquette
 * Schtappe Aquisition
 * Schtappe Fundamentals
 * Music 1
 * Dedication Whirl (Archduke Candidate exclusive)


 * History 2
 * Law
 * Math 2.
 * Theology 2.
 * Magecraft 2.
 * Poetry in literature
 * Sociology


 * Review of fundamentals.
 * Music 2.
 * Schtappe transformation.
 * Basic brewing and crafting
 * Feystone armour making 1
 * Dedication Whirl (Archduke Candidate exclusive)


 * Theology 3
 * Divine Protection Acquisition
 * History: Notable historical figures and their achievements relevant to the respective course.


 * Dedication Whirl


 * Fundamentals of Warfare
 * Weapon Usage

Dedication Whirl is a mostly religious dance, that has significant importance to Yurgenschmidt's noble society.

Dedication Whirl practice is unique in that it gathers students of all terms together at the same time and that, despite it starting in the first year, it is exclusive to archduke candidates, where all other specialized lessons only start in year 3. Naturally despite all archduke candidates being taught at the same time and place, the professors treat each student according to their respective year. It is held in the Small Hall.

First year students are expected to almost exclusively watch the older students, with the actual practice in essence only starting in year 2.

During the fifth year, it is determined who will participate in the dedication whirl at the Graduation Ceremony and who will act the part of which deity. This leads many students to work especially hard during this year for the chance to land the honour such a role entails.

In the final year, the students - particularly those chosen to perform at the graduation ceremony - refine their skills to make sure they give a worthy performance to the gathered nobles.

The dedication whirl practice marks one of the few occasions where archduke candidates of all ages can mingle and socialize even outside of the actual socializing season, later in the academy year.

This lesson teaches basic calculations equivalent to the first and second year of Japan's elementary school system. Noble children are expected to already know all numbers by the time they attend the academy.

In the first year lessons the focus is on the general flow of Yurgenschmidt's history.

To prepare the future nobles for high-level noble tea parties (and interactions with the royal family, for archducal candidates), they have a class on court etiquette. Like most practical lessons, court etiquette is held with the students separated by rank. But unlike most other such lessons, even archnobles and archduke candidates are taught separate from each other, where most courses have them participate together due to their comparatively small numbers. However since archduke candidates are far more likely to interact with royalty and have to behave differently than regular archnobles, their class is held separately and they are held to higher standards, befitting of the position within their duchy.

Apart from testing the students' actual knowledge and skill itself, (among other things) even when students would pass a task, they are still told to repeat it without being given any explanation, to see how well they can handle uncertainty, stress and being treated unfairly by someone of too high a status to complain about it.

It is very rare for even the top duchies' students to finish this course on the first day.

After learning to control how to move mana within their own bodies in the preceding course on mana flow control, nobles are taught how to compress it. For general information on mana compression itself, see mana compression.

For this lesson great care is put into safety measures, to reduce the risk of self-harm to the students. Among these measures is an especially large number of professors being present than in any other lesson, so they can more quickly spot and help any student in danger. Despite all the extra measures, each year multiple students end up fainting, though serious injury or worse are very rare.

Mana compression depends on a person's own way of thinking, so the process can't ever truly be "taught" in the classical sense of the word. The professor in charge will explain the basics of what mana compression is, its advantages and the dangers inherent in it. Afterwards the students are told of various common methods in which nobles compress their own mana but, ultimately, it is up to the students to find a mental image that suits their own personality and way of thinking.

For the exam, the professors come equipped with specialized magic tools that can measure the grade of compression a noble is using at that moment. When the tool is put on, it locks the current mana density of the wearer as the 0 value. To pass the test, a student must compress their mana to a certain degree, resulting in the pointer of the device moving to the right.

Students are taught how to control and move the mana within their own bodies and between their bodies and magical objects in direct skin-contact by pouring mana into a feystone and then withdrawing it again.

For this course the students are split into separate classes based on the statuses. Archnobles and archduke candidates attend together, while med- and laynobles each have their own class.

When a class exceeds a certain number of students, it is further split. Such was the case with the mednoble class in Lady Rozemyne's first year at the academy, where the class was divided between students of the first through to sixth ranked duchies and the rest of the duchies.

In this course students are taught how to create and use a highbeast.

The first step is to take the provided feystone and dye it in one's own mana. After accomplishing this, the student is taught to change the size of the stone and keep the connection with the stone, even without direct skin-contact. Once a student is able to do that, they learn to morph the stone into simple shapes and to lock a shape, so the stone does not return to its original shape the moment the student stops paying attention.

Following this, students are encouraged to think up and visualize a mental image of their future mount and to train to shape the stone to that image.

To pass the exam, a student is required to form their highbeast and follow the professor in charge on a flown course around the outside of the academy.

Schtappe Acquisition is not a lesson in the classical sense. After being told what to do and cautioned to be extra careful to avoid physical contact with anyone else to avoid accidental contamination from other people's mana, students are sent into the Farthest Hall, where they are going to find their Divine Will.

One they received it, the students withdraw to their respective dormitories where they spend however long it takes to dye it, in their own rooms. Once the Divine Will is fully dyed, it will be absorbed into the students body at which point they become able to manifest their own Schtappe at will.

Depending on the mana capacity of the person in question, this process can take various amounts of time. The higher the mana capacity, the longer it takes to finish the process. Some laynobles will have finished in time for the next day's breakfast, while most archnobles can take more than a full day.

In this lesson students are taught how to manifest the base-form of their Schtappes, manipulate mana with it and how to cast basic spells.

Due to not being used to manifesting their schtappes and having little experience in mana control, most students end up wasting a lot of mana and stamina for just manifesting their schtappes, resulting in them being too exhausted to move on to casting lessons on the first day. This is further exacerbated by most children wishing to manifest stylish and ornamented schtappes, instead of trying to make them as cost-efficient as possible. This makes it more difficult to visualize a clear image, which is a necessary step to manifest a schtappe and also increases the amount of mana required to do so.

To pass the exam a student needs to manifest and dismiss their schtappe three times in quick succession, charge an ordonnanz stone and use it to send a message, cast rott and successfully use a transformation spell to turn their schtappe into a knife, pen and mixing stick with the spells messer, stylo and beimen respectively.

It is exceptionally rare for even archduke candidate to finish the exam on the first day of lessons. According to Professor Hirschur only Lord Ferdinand and Lady Rozemyne managed this in her time as a professor at the academy.

As in the first year, history class in the second year focuses on the general flow of history of the country.

This lesson teaches the student about the national-level law of the country.

This lesson teaches the basics of magic circles, mostly consisting of simple single-element circles and a select few circles made with multiple elements that work well together when combined.

In this lesson, students learn math equivalent to Japan's third through fifth year of elementary school as well as how to use a mechanical calculator, similar in appearance to Earth's abacus.

This lesson teaches a combination of ethics and economics.

This lesson is on the primary gods of each season and their subordinate gods. For the exam, each student has to write about the god of their birth season and one other god and their respective subordinates. The students may freely choose the second god they write about from among those they have an affinity for. Students with only a single affinity may choose from any of the gods.

This second year lesson teaches students the basics of potion brewing, crafting simple magic tools and specialized feystones.

On the first day of the lesson, student learn how to brew Magic Potions, as well as the recipe for the basic and very common rejuvenation potion to replenish small amounts of mana and stamina. This lesson is held in the Small Hall, with students of all statuses taught together.

It starts with general information on how to use and clean the required tools, as well as teaching waschen and beimen, followed by the potion recipe.

The front row of tables are reserved for six brewing pots, with all the other tables provided with separate cutting boards for each student, as well as a single measuring device per table, similar in appearance to scales.

Students are told to use messer - which they have already learned in schtappe transformation class the day before - to morph their schtappe into a knife to cut the ingredients. The more evenly and smaller they are cut, the more evenly and easily they will dissolve during the brewing process later. When the cutting is complete, students are to measure them out as per the provided recipe.

Once all the ingredients have been prepared, the students approach the professor to use one of the six pots to do the brewing, after which the professor will use a magic tool to measure the produced potion's quality and efficiency.

To pass the exam a certain minimum level of both is required.

On the second day of the lesson, students are taught to craft ordonnanz stones and proposal feystones.

To create an ordonnanz stone, a feystone with strong wind-affinity is used as a base. Feystones from bird feybeasts are a quite common source for these.

As the first step, a magic circle is inscribed onto a piece of parchment. Then the feystone is put into the brewing pot and stirred with either beimen or an equivalent magic tool until it has fully melted. Once it has reached a gel-like consistency, the piece of parchment is put into the pot and immediately melts as well. To finish the stone, the brewer needs to keep stirring while pouring in a steady and consistent stream of mana. This will cause the gel to gradually harden and form clumps until it eventually combines into a single hard stone with a flash of light and a clinking sound.

Once the stone is finished, it is tested by the students sending an Ordonnanz to the professor - something they should already know from their first year schtappe fundamentals lesson. If the message is broadcast correctly, the student passes this part of the exam.

Much like an Ordonnanz, a proposal feystone is made (at the minimum) from a single raw feystone and a piece of parchment, though further feystones might be required. The raw feystone needs to be of the colour of the creator's birth season.

The quality of a proposal feystone depends on the number of elements and the mana capacity of the finished stone, with the highest number of elements and largest capacity being seen as the highest quality. At the bare minimum, the stone is required to contain the elemental affinities of the intended recipient and will naturally have the affinities of the creator. If the creator lacks any of the affinities of the recipient, the creator will need to add additional feystones of the missing element during the crafting process. Using a feystone of the missing element as a base is in itself not sufficient. Should the creator have all the affinities of the recipient and an affinity for the colour of their birth season, this step can be skipped and just using a single feystone is enough, though additional elements can still be added to increase the quality of the proposal feystone.

Unlike the previously taught ordonnanz stone, a proposal feystone does not require a magic circle to be inscribed. The parchment is only needed to write the message that is to appear on the finished stone.

The book gave no details on the crafting process, but since Lady Rozemyne compared it to making her Jureve, it is likely the same as making an ordonnanz stone, except that between the melting of the first feystone and adding the parchment, other stones can be added for additional elements.

In Lady Rozemyne's case, the finished stone was bead-shaped and deep blue, with the words appearing in golden script.

In this class students are taught how to create a feystone bodysuit. The process is quite similar to that of making a highbeast.

For the second year music exam a student has to play a song handed out by the professor, as well as a song of their own choice.

A review of the schtappe fundaments and highbeast creation as well as a presentation of the ingredients required for following lessons.

Since all further lessons on magic are building on the schtappe fundamentals, the second year practical lessons start with this review to make sure all the students can participate in the lesson of this year.

Likewise, the presentation on the ingredients is essential, since the students are expected to bring their own ingredients to brewing and crafting lessons. To make it easier on the students, the royal academy only teaches recipes made out of ingredients that grow around the academy itself, so students can obtain all they need from their respective home dormitory's gathering spot.

This lesson teaches students how to transform their schtappes into shields and various melee weapons. To pass the exam, the students' schtappes must be transformed into a shield, and needs to withstand a thrown feystone. They also need to successfully transform their schtappes into a weapon of their choice and attack a target dummy. Future knight apprentices are required to transform their schtappes into a sword and an additional weapon of their choice. Everyone else can just do a single transformation of their choice.