“Severe punishment?” Upon hearing this, William Lincoln didn’t even need to think to understand that Robert Lincoln had definitely reached some shady deal with this Mason Lincoln instructor in secret, and the price Robert Lincoln paid was to give him a good lesson. Thinking of this, he couldn’t help but smile inwardly: “Could it be that the esteemed dean doesn’t even ask about the cause of the conflict, but jumps to conclusions and convicts people?”

“Your friend first insulted the cousin of student Ryan Lincoln, maliciously slandering a beautiful lady. As a swordsman, in order to protect his family’s honor, shouldn’t he take action? And you—not only did you not uphold justice and stop student Carrie Lincoln and the others in time, you even aided and abetted them, taking advantage of student Ryan Lincoln’s inattention to launch a sneak attack and injure him. This is simply an added crime.”

William Lincoln laughed to himself. Such a distortion of black and white—yet Robert Lincoln could say it so righteously without blushing or running out of breath. Truly impressive.

He waved his hand, too lazy to waste words with them. “An added crime is an added crime. Go ahead, tell me—what kind of severe punishment do you have in mind?”

The three of them were slightly stunned. They hadn’t expected William Lincoln to not even offer a single decent rebuttal, but to directly admit his guilt. This left all the heavy accusations and excuses they’d prepared completely useless. The situation changed so quickly that for a moment, they didn’t know how to react.

Seeing their silence, William Lincoln spoke again: “Private fights between students—by rights, instructors have no authority to intervene. Even if you want to make a big deal out of this, you won’t be able to stir up much trouble. At most, you’ll abuse your power and expel me from the academy. For a student, that’s already the most severe punishment. Anything more is beyond your reach. So, you want to expel me, right?”

Volume One, Nine-Nine Supreme, Chapter Ten: Threat

A month ago, William Lincoln, who didn’t know much about the world and had little means of self-protection, might have felt a bit worried about being expelled. After all, that would mean he’d have to rely on his own limited abilities to earn his living.

But after a month of exploration, the true energy in his body had already reached the level of a perfected minor circulation, no less than the strength of an ordinary level-seven swordsman on the continent. While this wasn’t considered powerful across the land, in the Ziyun Empire, finding a high-paying, high-status job with this strength would be no problem at all. So, whether he was expelled or not, he simply didn’t care.

The vice dean and the instructors from Brilliant Academy were stunned for a moment, but quickly recovered. William Lincoln’s initiative in suggesting expulsion as punishment was indeed unexpected. After all, a diploma from a good academy was a major factor in one’s future prospects, something everyone took very seriously and wouldn’t dare treat lightly. His actions were truly an exception.

Robert Lincoln thought for a moment and immediately understood why William Lincoln was so fearless. Achieving the cultivation of a level-five swordsman at sixteen—such talent would make any academy fight to recruit him and nurture him as an elite student. He had no reason to care about the enrollment status of a small academy like theirs.

However… now that he understood this, the fact that he still dared to be so brazen toward William Lincoln meant he had his own trump card.

The vice dean raised his head, wearing an expression that said he’d seen through William Lincoln’s intentions, and with a slightly mocking smile said, “Student Lincoln, have you really thought this through? Are you truly choosing to withdraw? Although your offense today is quite serious, as long as you’re willing to publicly apologize to students Ryan Lincoln and Jane Lincoln at the academy assembly, and take a major demerit, we’ll still forgive you. You’d better think carefully—don’t ruin your whole life on a moment’s impulse…”

“Heh…” William Lincoln looked at Robert Lincoln with a half-smile, clearly amused. “You know perfectly well that I could never agree to your conditions, yet you still say them. Clearly, you have some trump card that can force me not to withdraw. In that case, let’s not waste each other’s time. Don’t you agree?”

Robert Lincoln nodded, putting on a kindly face. “It seems, student Lincoln, that you’ve forgotten your own family background. Do you need me to remind you?”

“My family background.” William Lincoln immediately recalled Charles Lincoln’s identity and family history from his memories. It turned out that this Charles Lincoln was actually a noble, and even the heir to a fallen family.

But so what if he was a noble? What did that have to do with him, William Lincoln?

“If you’re going to keep wasting time, then I won’t accompany you any longer.” With that, William Lincoln couldn’t be bothered to argue further and turned to leave.

Robert Lincoln had been confident that just a hint from him would make William Lincoln’s face change dramatically as he remembered something, and then obediently compromise and choose to apologize publicly in hopes that he’d agree not to expel him. Who could have guessed that things would go completely against his expectations? This kid acted as if he didn’t even know what expulsion would mean for him.