RATH 72

TL: Eevee

9. The others’ stories (1)

#1 Their story: A certain students’ final battle this year

“Thank you very much.”

As a student bowed his head towards her, Professor Harian smiled.

“Fine… we lost…”

“You really were strong, Professors.”

“Fufu… I don’t think I should be hearing that from the students who beat the daylights out of said professor?”

“Thanks for everything up till now.”

“Yes, I feel like I have done a lot up til now. So go on and win so we can end all this.”

“I understand.”

As she smirked and turned her head, beside her was Muam floating like a corpse in water that he’d summoned himself, and beside him was the metal bat yelling “revive, revive!” as she beat him up.

“I didn’t think you would contract a spirit king right at the death.”

“If I couldn’t contract him, we probably would have lost.”

“Well, it’s fine since you made the contract, no?”

As we listened to the “kuweeek!” noises coming from the normally taciturn Professor Muam’s mouth, Professor Harian raised her hand and waved at Nerkia.

“Congratulations on your first escape. And this should be your last as well, right?”

“Yes, we will do everything to ensure that this is the last time we ever have to escape.”

“Yes, yes. Well then, move along now. Even if it’s me, I don’t want show people what’s going to happen to me quite soon.”

As Professor Harian glanced at the silver devil muttering “he a goner?” she turned back and smiled gently to the students.

“I understand.”

As she looked at the backs of the students that had bowed their heads again, she thought.

‘This really is the end, right?’

Neither her body nor her mind could take it any longer.

And besides, she could feel the fear creeping up on her from what the small lifeform warming up her hands in front of her would do to her!

“I, you know… all the students are going already, wouldn’t it be alright to just end it here?”

“Heehee, ya know unni, owner said ‘giving up"(1) should only be used to count cabbages. Not all the students’ve left the academy yet, rite?”

Crack. Crack.

As if the small sounds from those knuckles signalled the end of the world, Professor Harian’s face blanched as she yelled.

“I, I… I’m really at my limits? Look at Muamy over there!”

Where Professor Harian’s fingers were pointing to was Professor Muam, sprawled out with both eyes and his mouth wide open droning “heeeehh~” continually.

The blank page state where the body couldn’t take in any more of all the blessings embedded in Arcadia!

And if someone that knew Professor Muam were to see him in that state, no one would think that he was the same person!

“Nup! Unni can do it!”

“I can’t do it, I can’t! Khaaaaaaaaaaagh!”

As we listened to the desperate screams echoing throughout the first floor of Yugrasia, the students moved onwards wiping something flowing from their eyes.

“You know…”

“No, don’t look back. Don’t let the teachers sacrifices have been in vain.”

“But… it’s too cruel!”

At one female student’s tears, the others fell silent.

A moment of silence. And the tus.h.i.tushi noises that could be clearly heard through that silence.

As the fear that was engrained into everyone’s bodies began to make them shiver, the student council president Nerkia shouted.

“We have trodden over many corpses to reach where we are! And without a single man left behind, we have managed to reach our Avalon with our own hands!”

As Nerkia shouted, pointing to Avalon (the school’s main gates), everyone’s gazes turned to Avalon.

“How much have we worked, to get to that place? How much have we suffered? With the reward in front of our eyes, what must we do?”

All of the other students closed their mouths.

“That is… to move forward.”

The person that broke the long string of tus.h.i.tushis and screams was none other than Aris.

Even as Aris bit her lip, she said to Nerkia with a clear, ringing voice.

“No matter how pitiful they are, no matter how much we know their pain, they were our teachers, and our enemies.”

“Yes, if they are our enemies, then there is no need for us to show mercy. Even more so if they are our teachers. Because what we need to do is improve even more upon their sacrifices.”

The majority of people nodded their heads at Nerkia and Aris’s resolute faces, but there were also people that didn’t agree.

“But still, even still…”

“In that case, do you want to fight that devil?”

“Let’s go, to our Avalon!”

But at the student council president’s follow up words, the female student shook her head, made a bright expression and began walking towards the main gates.

“Now, see for yourself! Feel for yourself! And walk down the path to victory! This is the results of what we have worked for, a road we have paved with our own efforts! Through this, starting tomorrow, we will claim victory at the imperial festival!”

“Uwoooooooooohh!”

As the students marched towards the front gates like a well-trained elite force, they shouted as one.

“We, are, victorious!”

“Uwwoooooooohh!”‘

#2 Their story: Ria el Nermia’s story.

The holidays began.

Although there were countless temptations, the unease I felt for Yugrasia made me continue to train even in our family home, and I became as strong as I trained.

Of course I didn’t grow as much as I did in the evil organization, but if you went by normal standards and not the organization’s, the speed of my growth would definitely not be that of a girl my age.

And every time I went out to the academy as a member of the student council, in order to make preparations for the imperial festival, that belief only solidified further.

‘Nothing’s changed…’

As I looked at the student council that were supposedly the elites of this academy, I sighed to myself.

The holidays ran for approximately three months in the majority of the academies in the empire.

That’s three months on paper, when you included the summer and winter holidays that was six months in total.

When you considered that a year was 12 months that meant that nearly half of the year was spent on vacation.

Meaning that out of the four years a student would study here, realistically they would only study for two years in total.

And even out of those two years, if you took out the other miscellaneous time not spent on studying, just how much time was actually spent learning anything?

Was there any meaning to this kind of academy lifestyle?

Could I learn even half of what I learned in my four years at the evil organization, including my three years in the low-cla.s.s barracks?

No, the one year I spent with the instructor probably taught me more than four years’ worth of learning in this academy.

…Although of course if you asked me if I wanted to go back to those times, I’d refuse.

Anyways, after a whopping three months that were the summer holidays, there was absolutely no change in the supposed greatest talents of the school that were the student council.

Perhaps if any of them had an even greater potential than I did, but they were all far below me.

No, if the instructor saw them, he’d treat them as trash and actually dispose of them into the burnable trash, and despite them being at that measly level, nothing’s changed in three months.

Are they truly the future of the empire?

I thought this at the organization as well, but is the empire truly alright?

It’s not like I was overflowing with patriotism or anything, but as a citizen of the empire I was actually worried because of this.

“Is there a problem, Lady Nermia?”

“Y-, no.”

For a second I was about to yell your abilities are the problem you dips.h.i.ts! but thankfully I was able to control myself.

d.a.m.n it, how does this kid who feels like he’s barely survived in the low-rank barracks the student council president in the greatest magic academy of the empire?

Was it just that the organization, which I sincerely wondered why it didn’t just fall to ruin, and as if to answer my curiosities actually did fall to ruin for an incredibly ridiculous reason, have standards that were a lot higher than I’d antic.i.p.ated?

-Wasn’t it just because that human was living at that organization, owner?

-True… this place would be different as well if the instructor was here, wouldn’t it?

Just what would happen if the instructor had come to this place?

Would he have led the school to glory by giving us access to unprecedented theories?

Or, would he continued the training from h.e.l.l and made even these people into usable talents?

What was certain that if the instructor was here, Marcis would never be considered a rival to Arucis.

It would rule over all four academies as the greatest among the four, no, the greatest in the entire continent.

And if he was.

“And because of this, this year is the year that we will crush Arucis and prove Marcis as the greatest academy!”

He wouldn’t be spouting bulls.h.i.t about how Marcis could be the greatest just because I was here!

What kind of meeting would just revolve around the lines of me going out and stomping everyone else?

Considering this academy has great interest in the politics between the empire and the magic towers, do they have no interest in actually improving their skills?

They should be saying how they would improve even the slightest bit to make Marcis the greatest!

“Now, since tomorrow’s the imperial festival we’ll finish it here.”

“Good work, everyone.”

“Good work, pres!”

Just what the h.e.l.l did they actually do to end things here?

And what the h.e.l.l did the others actually do to say good work to the president?

And moreover, the magic tower faction all gravitated to the president, a fellow magic tower faction member.

Whereas the empire faction all gathered around the fellow empire faction member the vice-president, and that was all just pathetic.

Because…

“Um, Lady Nermia, if it’s alright then would you be free to consult with me about tomorrow’s imperial festival…”

“No, I will be the one to escort Miss Ria, Ferrell.”

“Kireil…”

Ahh, this is b.l.o.o.d.y annoying.

These G.o.d d.a.m.ned small fry, instead of improving themselves they’re playing politics.

Just as the student council president was farewelling the other magic tower faction students with an obviously fake smile, he came to me to annoy me and.

The vice-president quickly takes up a position on my other side.

“Ah, I still have training left to do today.”

But both of them are sons of high-ranking marquis families.

I wanted nothing more to just blow them all away and yell at them to p.i.s.s off and don’t bother me, but unfortunately this was not the evil organization Howling.

It was heaven compared to when I had to fight tooth and nail with my fellows over a single meal, but it was incredibly annoying that I couldn’t just send them flying as I wanted to.

Because of that I was just glossing over them with n.o.ble-like smiles and laughs, but it seemed like these annoying things just weren’t going to drop off me today.

“Tomorrow is the imperial festival. I am very aware that milady is making endless efforts towards the study of magic, but what about resting just for today?”

“While I dislike the idea of making the same opinion as him, for once I agree. Miss Ria is our Marcis’s hidden card and our strongest one.”

“Thank you for evaluating me so highly, even when our seniors are here.”

As I expressed etiquette by lifting the hems of my skirt ever so slightly, everyone else wasted no time shaking their heads and fawning over me.

d.a.m.n it, I want to wear pants. Men just need to nod their heads a bit!

“No, that is an undeniable truth, after all.”

“To ceaselessly pursue academia even during the holidays, you are an exemplary student of Marcis.”

That’s not an exemplar but obvious fact.

Just why are they so confident in their abilities?

Can they even sleep soundly with that level of skill?

When I thought of the Yugrasia that I saw there’d be no way they could ever hope to beat them.

-Aren’t they just believing in owner?

-Then they’re insane.

Our instructor told us.

No matter what strategy or strategem you employed, there was nothing better than force of numbers.

In a battle between groups, there was a limit to what a single individual could do.

No matter how powerful I was, if I ran out of stamina, if I ran out of mana then I would lose.

Even if I was healed up at the end of a match, my mental state was hard to recover.

But since there isn’t even a decent support among the student council…

And so as I held my false smile while wondering if they seriously couldn’t hear me internally yelling at them to p.i.s.s off before I killed them.

I barely managed to shake off those two leeches, and by the time I finished warming up in the academy’s training grounds, the sky had already begun to darken.

‘I should head back.’

As I wandered home wondering whether I should shower off the sweat running down my back, or take a long relaxing bath for the first time in a while.

“We, are, victorious!”

“Uwwoooooooohh!”

“Wh, what?”

I heard shouts filled with madness.

I realised instantly that something had happened, and also realised where that something was.

“Yugrasia, again?”

The Four Great Academies were always geographically close to each other, and Marcis and Yugrasia in particular was close enough that only a single wall separated the two schools, and Yugrasia was closer to the city center than all the other academies as well.

Meaning, if I went home, then naturally I would pa.s.s by Yugrasia.

Because of that, the moment I realised that the source of the sound was Yugrasia, I immediately used magic to run as fast as I could to the source of the sound and what I saw there were countless warriors.

The complete opposite of the people who used their t.i.tles as students as an ent.i.tlement for sloth I’d been with not long ago!

Just what had they done so that their uniforms that were enchanted with defence magic and cleaning spells were in tatters like that?

No, even before that, just what would make all those students voluntarily stay at the academy for so long?

Could I… could I fight all of them?

I didn’t know why, but as I saw the students crying as they left through the gates of their academy, I couldn’t help but stare at them, unaware of my own gulps of nervousness.