"Heroes..... what do you know about heroes, Lucas?" She asked.
"Well, I've never really payed much attention to them." He said.
He was, of course, lying.
He had spent hours in the game just reading the lore so of course he would know a thing or two about the heroes of the continent.
It was just that he felt if he knew the answer to everything Lydia would know something was off with him asking to be tutored, and maybe would no longer want to do it.
When she heard what he said, Lydia gave him a smile and said:
"Well then, I'll try my best to get you up to speed. The continent has produced many legendary figures throughout the ages. Heroes like Theron the Lightbringer, who defeated the Shadow Dragon of Mount Ksoiith, or Yusionis the Storm Caller, who ended the Endless Winter..."
As Lydia began to talk about the tales of legendary heroes, Lucas found his mind wandering in an unexpected direction.
The stories began to remind him of the comic books and superhero movies from his previous life that he had loved in his previous life.
If he wasn't reading manga or watching anime in his previous life then he was most likely reading a comic book or watching a superhero movies.
He had really loved them especially Spiderman. Unfortunately for him though, he hadn't lived long enough to see the upcoming Spiderman: Brand New Way film.
A major thing he loved around them was that they were individuals with extraordinary abilities who fought against evil and somehow still had time to have secret identities to protect their normal lives.
It was a life he had longed for at the time after years of being stuck in his house due to..... nevermind, it wasn't important.
Secret identities.
Why didn't he think of this before? It was so freaking obvious!
In the superhero comics, the heroes would obviously keep their secret identities seperate from their real life. Why couldn't he do the same?
Even in the Isekai webnovels he read the MC would always have a secret identity, so the fact that it hasn't been the first thing to cross his mind when he found out he'd have to be a Villian was insane!
After all, the Villian System wanted him to do some villainous actions but that didn't mean he had to use his identity to do them.
In fact, it would be best if he created a entirely new secret identity whose sole purpose was to do the evil things that way he could stick close to the important characters in his base form!
It was so freaking obvious!
He could even use the Villian identity to stay close to some villain characters making it so that he would have an eye on both sides of the conflict and would be better able to find out about and get items that could help him get powerful fast enough to survive the Legion and it's invasion.
And even better, a lot of the items he needed for the secret identity was already sold in the System Shop.
All he had to do now was come up with the secret identity and he would be set.
Lucas became more excited as he thought about it.
His excitement must have been visible on his face because Marie suddenly chuckled and said:
"Look at him. He's smiling from ear to ear. You must really love learning about historical figures. Am I right?"
Lucas quickly tried to calm his expression into something more neutral after realizing he had been grinning like an idiot the whole time.
"I just think their stories are really entertaining and inspiring, you know." he said.
It was technically true, just not the way Marie probably thought.
"I'm glad you're finally giving caring about school. These legendary figures' ability to change the world through sheer will is worthy of respect." Lydia said.
"Yes," Lucas said with a nervous laugh, "That's why I love legendary heroes. That's definitely why I love legendary heroes."
For the next two hours, they kept studying. Lucas managed to stay focused on the school stuff while part of his brain worked on his secret identity thing.
Lydia went through a bunch more history topics, from old kingdoms rising and falling to the political deals that shaped how things work now.
Marie jumped in sometimes with memory tricks or funny stories that made everything easier to remember for Lucas.
As the afternoon sun started getting lower through the library windows, Lydia finally closed her notebook and stretched.
"I think that's enough for today," she said. "We covered a ton of stuff, and I don't want to fry your brain on the first day."
Lucas nodded. "Thanks, both of you. This was super helpful in more ways than one."
After all, you gave me the idea for how to move forward with my plans.
Marie stood up and grabbed her stuff. "That was fun! I loved watching Lydia go full teacher mode. She's quite impressive when she gets going."
Lydia blushed but looked happy. "We should do this again soon. Maybe in a few days? I want to see how much you actually remember before we tackle harder stuff."
"For sure," Lucas said.
He knew this would help him catch up on what was going on in the world while also letting him see how the timeline changes were messing with these important "characters".
"Actually, before we're done," he said, "could you tell me about the Orientation? I missed it because of that stomach bug, and I feel completely out of the loop."
"Oh yeah! It was pretty crazy, actually. There was the usual sorting into classes, boring speeches from teachers..." She paused.
"Oh, and there was some drama with the class assignments. You know Damion Valorheart, right? That commoner kid everyone's been gossiping about?" Lydia asked.
"I've heard the name. What happened with him?" Lucas said.
"Well, turns out he's not actually a commoner," Marie said. "He got adopted by the Castille family when he was little. Can you believe it? House Castille, one of the most powerful noble families out east!"
Lucas was shocked. The Castille family. In the game, they'd been completely destroyed eight years ago, along with three nearby villages, by what everyone thought was a freak plague.
It was only way later in the story that players found out the truth - the plague had been a weapon made on purpose by one of the Legion's ten strongest generals, just called "The Doctor."
The Castille massacre had been one of The Doctor's first major atrocities, it served as a practice run for the biological warfare stuff that would later wreck entire kingdoms during the Legion's full-scale invasion.
The fact that Damion had grown up as some orphaned poor kid in the game was directly because of this tragedy.
But here, in this reality, the Castille family wasn't just alive but doing well enough to adopt kids and still be important in noble society.
"You okay?" Lydia asked after seeing his shocked face. "You look like you've seen a ghost."
"I'm fine. It's just that I didn't expect Damion to be some big shot." Lucas said.
"Right?" Lydia continued, apparently buying his explanation. "But because he's got high potential and noble blood, they put him in S Class with all the other high-ranking kids."
"There was some tension with Zacard Tosin at first, you know how the duke's son gets about poor people, but once Zacard found out about the adoption, they actually seemed to hit it off pretty well. Although, they did get demoted to Class A because of a little scuffle they had before everything was sorted out."