Cater comments on how classwork seems so effortless for Leona, with Leona explaining he learned everything they teach at NRC from private tutors at an early age, “with a curriculum way more advanced than I’d have had in school….I don’t know what I know ’cause I’m always hittin’ the books like your housewarden. I just already know it.”
Idia says, “Leona’s still royalty. Totally makes sense he’d have top-notch magic instruction as a kid.”
Leona being objectively more intelligent than most seems to be well known by the other characters: Vil says, “As loath as I am to admit it, (Leona) wasn’t wrong when he said he was smarter than the rest of us,” and Cater’s cover story for bringing Leona into the Heartslabyul of Trey’s dream is wanting to receive tutoring “from the big brains,” also saying Leona is “so smart.”
It is possibly for this reason that Leona so rarely attends class (though he says that he does show up for test days), saying that classes “are the most boring thing in the world” for him because there is no point in doing things you already know you’re capable of.
Leona says his favorite subject is ancient incantations (“It doesn’t bore me like all the other ones”), a class about deciphering dead languages. Leona explains,
A lot of them were created to conceal magical rites, so they’re over-complicated on purpose. Even experts in the field have their work cut out for ’em. Making out individual characters is hard enough, let alone grasping the meaning of whole words or enough grammar to understand sentences. You just gotta keep inching forward, analyzing what’s there and comparing it to what’s already been deciphered, looking for similarities.”
(A lot of work for a character who is infamous for his dislike of putting in effort, Vil claims that Leona only gives an honest effort with things that make his life easier, but this also seems to apply to tasks that challenge him, such as when he stays up all night deciphering a history book on ancient food preservation methods on his birthday, for fun.)
Leona is possibly also adept at animal linguistics, eavesdropping on a conversation between Ruggie and Lucius and complimenting Ruggie’s fluency.
During Vargas Camp Leona educates his group on the history of the mine and, later, on how to find magestones, both the method taught in textbooks and a more effective method of identifying layers of rock that show volcanic activity.
Deuce: “We’ve been in here three hours and couldn’t find a single stone, but (Leona) found one in five minutes flat!”
Leona also educates his club members on how lanternblossoms work and where to find them.
During New Year’s Leona loses a tako battle against Jack and Floyd. Floyd observes, “Can’t believe a sudden gust caused Sea Lion’s tako to crash as soon as the game began,” but it is revealed that Leona was able to throw the competition on purpose because of his understanding of wind turbulence.
Floyd asks if he knew that the wind was going to “kick up” when it did and Leona explains, “The higher you fly, the more likely you are to encounter strong wind turbulence. You don’t have to know whether a gust is coming. That’s just common sense. You can get worked up about practical skills all you like, but try usin’ your noggins sometime.”
When Epel, Grim and the prefect spill a potion that it took them “hours of trial and error” to get right just once under Rook’s tutelage (Epel: “Rook happens to be a potionology expert”), Leona recreates the potion within a few minutes while being insulted by Grim (“It seems kinda impossible for a putz who’s already gotten held back a year”) and lectured by Epel about why he should give up.
During Spectral Soiree it is only Leona who recognizes instantly that they have been transported to the Spectral Realm, educating his group on ghost possession.
It is also during Spectral Soiree that Leona lectures Ace on the importance of perspective, telling him about “a lawless place” back in his home country where not even the king held any authority, that has since been transformed into a tourist attraction.
Leona explains, “It just depends on how you choose to look at a thing…You need accurate facts, not rumors and assumptions.”
During the event Leona also teaches his group about the use of mirrors as magical artifacts, warning them that the mirror fragments they are collecting for an unknown antagonist could be dangerous:
“There’s the school’s Dark Mirror, the Hall of Mirrors, the Viewglasses. The list goes on. In most of those cases, the mirror connects two places together.” The fragments are revealed to be parts of a disco ball and Floyd accuses Leona of “crying wolf,” but Leona is proven to be correct: Malleus has the students look at the disco ball in order to return them to NRC.
Leona also teaches Jack, Grim and the prefect about how “all magic’s got a loophole,” accurately identifying Azul’s claim that his contracts are unbreakable as a lie despite how he wasn’t in the room at the time.
Leona also knows to be cautious of Jade: when Jade offers him a lemonade during Spectral Soiree, Leona engages in a conversation about Floyd, but then abruptly shuts down Jade’s further efforts to “get to know (him) better,” saying, “I don’t wanna owe anyone from Octavinelle anything. So I gave you a conversation in return for the drink you brought me.” (Jade: “Fascinating. You’re quite socially conscientious. I’ve learned something new today.”)
When Vil scolds Leona for failing to take his application for his 4th-year internship seriously, Leona reveals he has actually already applied to a mining and energy business. Leona claims that interning in his own country just means he won’t need to be useful (“There’s no way an organization in my country would call their own prince incompetent, right?”), but Trey explains, “For all that Leona said, Only a small fraction of students with really high grades qualify to apply for that mining and energy internship.”
Out of the group of Riddle, Azul, Jamil and Vil, Leona was the only person familiar with the Charon: he is the only character to surrender voluntarily without attempting to put up a fight.
Malleus later observes, “Kingscholar is from an old royal house. It would stand to reason he’s heard of them.”
Leona educates the other characters on who the Charon are, what they do, why they are called Ferrymen, and even shares surface-level knowledge of the secretive agency that is STYX.
Leona also already knew of Idia’s family, and while Azul suggests that “Idia could put in a good word” to get them released Leona is skeptical, and later proven correct.
It is revealed during Master Chef that Leona does not know how to use a microwave as he had never had to do so before, but Jack says Leona is the best out of all the sports club members with tech: It is thanks to Leona setting up automatic back ups to the cloud that they did not lose the lighting-related program data for the VDC to Malleus’ restoration magic in Book 5.
Leona has a voice line of, “Sometimes fists speak louder than fancy magic spells. Though brains are the most important thing.”
We have seen multiple examples of Leona possibly knowing more than he is willing to share with those around him: When he sees Grim eating his fourth black stone at the end of Book 3 Leona asks if he is always eating stones off the ground, but when Jack asks if something is wrong Leona responds, “Nah. Don’t mind me.”
This happens again in Book 7, with Leona seemingly suspicious of the Riddle of Riddle’s own dream. Ortho asks if there is something on his mind and Leona responds, “…never mind.”
In this same way Leona chooses not to share what he knows about the mine monster with the teachers when they do not believe that the students fought one, saying, “It’s a waste of time tryin’ to argue with (Vargas).”
Twisted Wonderland Reference Note 