The Knight Came to Hate the Ball (4)

"I wonder if he's had lunch already."

A humble little bell went trring, and the bicycle that wore it hurried on down the road. Levi worked the pedals hard again today. The way she took by bicycle every day of late had grown familiar, and somehow even the once-rutted stretch had been leveled, so the wheels ran beautifully.

The basket gave a clunk. A lunch box of considerable size sat inside it, packed full of food she had made herself. She had picked up a little cooking from the chef who ran Tristan's kitchens, and the taste ought not to be bad.

"I do hope he likes it..."

It was care prepared for a single person. If he took it and was simply glad, the trouble she had gone to would be repaid many times over. Above all, the man she knew was not the sort to taste such effort and call it poor. If anything, he would eat it more happily than anyone.

"Hmm..."

The thought brought a faint flush to Levi's cheeks, and she pushed the pedals faster. Delicate as she looked, she had not missed a single day of training, and holding a mere thirty kilometers an hour for an hour was nowhere near enough to tire her. A girl carrying a crush was strong by nature.

She had been at it for some time when the familiar cabin showed itself in the distance. The moment she saw it, a thoroughly pleased smile rose on Levi's face and she put on speed, as if she had held a steady pace all this way only so she could spend her strength now.

But then—

"...Huh?"

Levi blinked. Some three meters short of the cabin, a man lay sprawled on the ground. The outline was familiar. She squeezed the brakes and rolled toward him.

"A-Assistant Instructor Damian Paulet?"

"..."

"Wh-what are you doing here?"

"...Ghk."

"...A-are ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠you crying?"

"...Why is my life the only miserable one? Why am I the only one getting ground down like this? Hrk..."

"...Mmm."

Ah. Exactly the same as usual. It was a sight ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠she already knew, and Levi gave a small nod. Master is educating the assistant instructor again.

The relationship between her instructor and Damian Paulet was already famous at the academy. Day after day he ran without rest or drowned in ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠paperwork, and even if he had no wish to be famous, rumors like that were bound to spread. Guessing what had happened was not difficult.

And so—

...I'm jealous.

Levi envied him. Envied a man receiving private lessons from her master like that. If Damian could have read her thoughts he would have gone mad and leapt straight into the air, but she was not simply jealous that he had their master all to himself. He looked as if he were being ground down for no good reason, and yet Damian Paulet was unmistakably growing.

He's grown again.

Even before this, Damian Paulet had ranked among the stronger students of the sword faculty. He was the scion of a renowned knightly house, and training worthy of that reputation had put him clearly above the rest. Only this year, crowded as it was with abnormal students people called geniuses, did that fail to show. In any ordinary year it would not have been strange for Damian to stand first in the faculty. Ground under her master, even that Damian was climbing a curve that had grown unmistakably steep. Keep on like this, and he might never catch the black-haired young master, but the day could yet come when he overtook one of that trio.

They say people grow strong in a crisis. Isn't Assistant Instructor Damian the same?

A master was someone who grew strong in order to bear danger. To Levi, who wanted to grow stronger even a day sooner, Damian's growth was something to envy.

...For the man himself, it was probably hell.

"...What are you doing here?"

"Ah, Master!"

"Bear-Girl. What are you up to this time?"

"Ah, I— I thought we might eat lunch together. I-if you haven't eaten yet..."

"...You packed all that, and if I said I'd already eaten, I'd be the villain, wouldn't I?"

"Hehe."

"Give me a break. Luckily I haven't eaten yet. I was about to bake a pizza in the oven. We'll have it with what you brought."

"Yes! Ah, but Assistant Instructor Damian..."

"Leave him. He's milking it. He hasn't been listening lately."

"If you don't want lunch, there's none for you."

"That's just too much. Really..."

Damian grumbled and hauled himself upright. Set against a scene straight out of a comedy, Levi couldn't help herself.

"Hehe."

She laughed, bright and clear.

The papers Assistant Number One had won by running himself back and forth now covered Lee Han's table, but he only flicked through them in a rough sort of way. His attention was plainly on lunch. He ate in silence: oven pizza, the cheese pulling into long strands, and the rice-shaped pasta Levi had brought.

"This is too much. Do you have any idea what I went through to bring those..."

"Enough. Is this all of it?"

"...For now, that's everything they had. And Guildmaster Simon asked me to pass this along. 'With this much, you'll think a little better of the guild now, won't you?'"

"What a clown."

"...You're the only person who could talk to Chairman Simon like that, Instructor."

It was a strange thing, working the man at the head of the Royal Capital's guilds like a hired hand. And a chairman who followed the instructor's orders without complaint was no ordinary man either.

Do big shots only make sense to other big shots?

"Cheeky as he is, his ability is nothing special. This is really all he managed? And then he wants me to think well of him. Shameless."

"Mm..."

Or perhaps he simply obeyed because he was afraid of being hit. It was a small guess of Damian's. Even as he felt a fellowship of suffering with the chairman of the Guild Association, he noticed something else. Lee Han looked as if he cared only about his food, and yet he was reading the documents through, front to back, with care. Hand the instructor papers he had to check himself, and Damian had often watched him read them with astonishing thoroughness. That was how he knew.

Incredible focus.

The man was no friend of paper, and yet on rare occasions he showed a fearsome concentration. His eyes were as murderous as if he had picked a fight with the documents themselves.

Concentrate, and he treats it like a battle. Every time. Is that why he's strong?

The question had only just occurred ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠to him when the paper snapped flat under Lee Han's hand.

"Figures. He isn't dead."

"?"

"Ah, I wasn't talking to you. Finish your food. You know you've got basil and fruit trees to plant before the day's out, right?"

"...Instructor, I am an assistant instructor, not a laborer. And how am I supposed to get all of that done today!"

"Did I say do it alone? You've got interns. Work them hard."

"Ah!"

This man might be a genius. Whether Damian's reason had shorted out, or he was simply delighted to have a lawful excuse to grind the interns, he gazed at his instructor in wonder. The ways one could torment a person were without end. It was a great teaching, and Damian had received it.

Whether one assistant learned something rotten was none of Lee Han's concern. He turned the materials over in his head.

And yet...

He could turn the hide of a face inside out. At the line that named the man a master of living-skin masks, Lee Han judged it likely he was still alive. He read on, into the illegal experiments themselves.

The one stripped of Mystery died, but the Mystery itself could be preserved and made to endure forever, and so it would help in war and raise the authority of a royal house. Such was the claim of the spell-monger named Greg Bin.

"...A bastard worse than a gnoll."

Lee Han sneered as he read the logic. A spell-monger, sure enough. The words had been dressed up nicely, but in the end—

He envied other people's talent, it rankled him, and so he researched a way to steal it. That's all this is. This bastard is definitely dark-path scum. Blood Cult trash.

In the old martial tales, let a Nine Yin Severed Meridian or a Five Elements Body appear and someone was forever kidnapping the poor wretch to drink the power down. The spell-monger's talk was much the same. Was it not the logic of killing others to take their strength?

Worse than a beast that sucks another man's blood—

If the man called Greg had been standing in front of him, Lee Han would have killed him. The light in his eyes said as much.

"An imperial bastard..."

What caught him was that the man had once belonged to the Imperial Magic Tower.

The Magic Tower. From what he had heard, an ivory tower of mages, and one that existed only on the Central Continent.

Pretentious garbage.

They used the refined term, but it was a gathering of spell-mongers all the same. To Lee Han it felt like nothing more than the irritation of having found a deeply unpleasant termite nest. The Tower itself was suspicious, too.

So the Magic Tower knew about experiments like this, and they still let him slip? ...How does a bunch that incompetent even stay standing?

......Ah.

Right. There are the White Cats.

The thought that they were no different from the Silver Lions almost let him accept the Tower's incompetence for a moment. He did not let the suspicion go. The instant doubt stirred, he wanted to investigate the Magic Tower itself, but did he have time to go all the way to the Central Continent?

"Wait. I don't have to go myself, do I?"

He was sure he had heard it, if only in passing. Someone from the Magic Tower was coming. And the reason, he was almost certain, was—

"Instructooor~!!"

"......"

"Hehe."

"...The neighbor chick. More useful than I thought."

Had they said she was coming to meet that?

The chick from the house next door, who looked as if she had only just woken once the afternoon was well underway, came flying in bright as anything, and a very good idea occurred to Lee Han.

Namely—

"Bear-Girl."

"Yes, Master."

"Something I've been wondering. Is kidnapping a Magic Tower spell-monger a crime?"

"......Pardon?"

Righteous theft. Or in this case, righteous kidnapping?

"I just have something I want to ask. Personally."

"Uh... th-then couldn't you simply ask? Instead of kidnapping anyone..."

"That won't do."

"?"

"You think a spell-monger is going to answer just because you asked nicely?"

"......"

He had stated a perfectly obvious fact, and still his disciple's face filled with disbelief. It stung to look at. This innocent thing. She was like that because she had not seen enough of the world.

"You really are short on experience out there. You don't even know something this obvious."

"...Mmm. Am I the strange one?"

"Not that. You just don't know yet."

How to handle a spell-monger, that was.

"I'll teach you, while we've got the chance."

"...??"

A new lesson for his disciple. The thought put a satisfied smile on his face. And besides—

Nothing teaches you how the world works like doing it for real.

What pleased Lee Han was that this would not be an explanation. It would be something she learned with her own body.