Chapter 51. Guiding a lost little lamb. (2/3)

“A secret? What do you mean?”

“You cannot tell anyone about this secret though. If you do so, this place will become much less effective.”

“Less effective? You’re saying being inside this place has some sort of effect on people?”

“Yes, inside this place your abilities are elevated to new heights. The limiters imposed on our fleshy mortal bodies and minds are all released inside this room.”

“What! No way!”

“Shhh. Keep it down. This is a place meant for silence. Can you not understand the serenity of this place, child?”

“Ah. I’m sorry. But… it’s a bit hard to believe though. Isn’t that like magic or something? Magic doesn’t really exist, right?”

“And who told you it didn’t exist?”

“Because in reality, it’s all just smoke and mirrors, isn’t it?”

“Do you see all those mystical looking stones over there, child?”

I nonchalantly pointed to the right where there were several rows of long glass displays with rocks and minerals inside.

“Mystical… stones?” His eyes sparkled enthusiastically at my carefully selected choice of words.

“Yes. They are all stones with very peculiar properties. You should not approach too close to them though, as your body will become overwhelmed by their power. Only those who are 15 years and up can withstand being near the mysterious forces those stones emit thanks to the shielding effect those enclosures provide. If someone younger than that were to approach too close their body would… well…” I closed my hand then opened it in a flash in front of the boy to imply what I meant. He’d be led to believe his body would suddenly explode or something even worse. I opted to let his imagination interpret it however he wished to.

“Anyway, if it were not for those enclosures we wouldn’t even be able to remain in this room regardless of age so they must never be broken. Do you understand?”

“Y-Yes. But… how will this even help me though? Even if my abilities are heightened in here, once I leave won’t I return to normal?”

“No, the trick here is that you will still retain the experience you gained while you were in this room even after you leave it. So although your temporarily heightened abilities may drop back to what they were before, the effectiveness of what you learned inside remains along with your experience.”

“I see.”

“If you would like proof that this effect is real, how about we perform a little test. We will do the exact same test, two times consecutively. One will be at a location far enough from here that is outside the area of effect of this room, after that we will return to this room and you will do the exact same test. I will not mark the tests until after you’ve completed both. To ensure there is nothing fishy I will specifically write down the location the test was taken. That way you can rest assured that I don’t do something like swapping them out.”

“Okay, I understand.”

Once he agreed we exited the room and walked through the underground tunnel system until we arrived at the university center. He was looking all about at the fresh new scenery, taking it all in while I remained indifferent to my surroundings and walked in front of him to lead the way.

We took a seat at one of the tables. Though it was a Sunday, there were still small groups of students scattered about here and there. There would be people who occasionally walked by. For the most part, it was quiet. During the week this place would be noisy as hell. If it was too noisy then what I was about to do would be easily seen through. The reason I had to wait a full week to help this kid and cut it so close to the week of his tests was because it had to be on a Sunday where it wasn’t too noisy here, but it still had some degree of distractions. Enough that he wouldn’t think anything of it.

“Now, here is the test that I’d like you to complete.”

I’d prepared many tests for him to do today, but they were for later. This first one was a simple grade 7 math test.

“Alright.”

“You can begin now. You have 60 minutes to complete it.”

“Okay.”

While he worked on the test I turned to the side and laid down across the two seats on my side of the table. I did this to not disturb him and so he wouldn’t feel like I was pressuring or intimidating him during the test to do worse.

I set an alarm and took a short nap. When the alarm went off I opened my eyes and sat back up.

I told him his time was up and I took the paper and wrote down, ‘First test at university center’ on it.

While we walked through the tunnels back to the small museum area I graded the paper. I didn’t allow him to see what he got right or wrong or his score yet.

Once we arrived inside I had him sit down with his back to the Tyrannosaurus, his front facing the window outside.

I handed him the exact same test but with the order of the questions scrambled.

I left him to do his own thing while seated there. I sat around the right corner and laid down. I didn’t take a nap this time as I needed to make sure he didn’t get near the glass displays.

After another hour I stood up and put down the first test he took on the seat beside him where he could see it. I retrieved his second test paper and wrote down ‘Second test inside the mystical stone room’ in front of him at the top of the page so he could see. After that, I proceeded to mark his second test. It turned out exactly as I’d expected.

The answers he came up with were different for some questions despite them being the exact same questions as the first test he took.

I put the second test paper down in front of him and told him he could take a look at how he did on both attempts.

The second he flipped both over at the same time and saw his grade his jaw dropped in shock. Utter disbelief was written all over his face. It was some sort of sorcery he thought.

“What sort of trick is this? You must’ve marked things that were incorrect as correct. I won’t be deceived, that must be it.”

“Look, these questions, answers, and solutions are all available online. You can check them for yourself to compare your answers to them. They’re all sourced from a reputable textbook too.”

I showed him on my phone the PDF file linked from a website with many good reviews. I’d spent the week planning this out. Did this brat think I wouldn’t consider this problem?

“But… but… I got 82% the first time and... 100% the second time? How is this even possible? Ah… the room, right. I forgot about the mystical stones. So they really do work after all?”

“Of course not, you idiot. You signed your soul away to the devil. The devil does not rely on nonsense like magic or mystical stones. The devil relies on lies and deceit.”

His eyes opened even wider, utter confusion swirling about in his head, unable to comprehend the situation.

“How then? What sort of trickery did you use? What lies? What sort of deceit could lead to a result like this?”

“The deceit comes in the fact of the time and place. I can’t be bothered to go into too much detail, however, the problem that arose in your first location was the place. There were distractions. Small groups of people talking quietly amongst themselves. Though they were not too loud, it was still enough to distract you. There was also the matter of people walking by in the background. Even if you were not looking at them, the fact that something was moving about in your peripheral vision is enough to distract your brain. It’s being used to process unnecessary information. The key here that I want you to take note of is pointless unnecessary information.”

“Pointless unnecessary information?” He repeated back for himself.

“The next form of deception was to manipulate your mental state into the ideal condition required for a test. When you came here, to this room, I’d created the idea that your abilities would be heightened. I rattled on about a bunch of mystical stones nonsense, I concocted and weaved a false narrative in your mind through the use of a story."

"On a subconscious level, you believed you’d do better. This place does not have any major distractions. It is dead silent. There is nature in front of you to help calm your nerves. There is a Tyrannosaurus behind you to embolden you and give you a sense of power. There are mystical stones that gave you confidence. In reality, though, there was only you. Just yourself, nobody else. There was no pointless unnecessary information here bogging your mind down like when you’re at school. Do you understand what I’m getting at?”

“...”

“What I came to teach you was not any sort of cheap tricks. The lesson you’re here to learn today is how to maintain the correct mentality when faced with a test. You’re here, not to learn the material, you’re here to practice writing tests while in the zone when your mind is at its peak condition.”

“The problem was never in your academics or how smart you were, it was with your own mental block that was hindering your own ability from truly blossoming.”