Remnants (3)
Senior Jabir was strong.
Then again, every student who had endured the Cradle over the past year and lived to tell the tale was a monster. At this point, there wasn't a single peer in my entire grade who couldn't beat me into the ground.
So what about a third-year? If anything, they were far worse, never better.
Jabir had originally been a gentle, peace-loving soul, but the passing of time had completely corrupted him. The soft-hearted boy who once bustled around clutching medicine bottles now gripped a spiked morningstar, ready to make his opponents see literal morning stars.
"Whew..."
I had been complacent. I hadn't realized that slipping away last time was nothing more than sheer dumb luck.
Still, it wasn't too late.
"Yuna! Save me!"
I had the greatest bodyguard in the world on my side.
"Yuna! There are lunatics here trying to kidnap me!"
I shrieked at the top of my lungs, utterly shameless. No, wait—was that really shameless? Not at all. There was nothing disgraceful about the weak calling upon the strong for aid. If anything, recognizing my own limitations so clearly deserved high praise.
"Yunaaa!"
Yet something felt terribly off. Normally, she would have intervened the split second I shouted like that.
"Yuna...?"
"Done squirming?" Jabir asked cheerfully.
"Jabir," Professor Georg muttered from behind him, "our dear junior has impressive lungs, which means his stamina must be top-notch. Capture him."
"Understood, Professor."
Jabir began striding toward me with heavy, deliberate steps. On his otherwise pristine morningstar, I could swear I caught the faint, ominous gleam of dried blood.
"Senior," I pleaded.
"Yohan, this is an incredible opportunity! You'll finally be able to glimpse the hidden passages of truth in this world!"
Words were useless. The man's communication circuits were completely fried.
"I'm warning you," I gritted out. "My blade doesn't have eyes."
Holding back against an upperclassman like Jabir was out of the question. I had to fight with the genuine intent to kill; only then might I stand a sliver of a chance.
"Don't worry, Yohan," Jabir replied with a warm smile. "Luckily for you, my morningstar does."
Squirm.
At Jabir's words, the spiked head of the weapon shuddered, warped, and tore open a grotesque, blinking eyeball.
"Whoa, holy shit, what the hell?! That's revolting!"
Why did it have a real, living eyeball?! Did he pledge allegiance to some underground terror cult and receive demonic blessings while I wasn't looking?
"Magnificent, isn't it?" Jabir beamed with pride. "I used bio-alchemy to fuse a chimera onto forged metal! It's a breakthrough technique that just received full accreditation from the Academic Society!"
"Those lunatic academics!" I yelled. "Are they out of their minds?!"
One glance was all it took to see how cursed that thing was! How could any sane board approve it?! This psycho had literally engineered a demonic sword that had never before existed in history!
"Hup!"
"Whoa?!"
CRACK!
Without the slightest hint of a telegraph, Jabir swung his weapon. Delivered with a serene grin, that ferocious blow pulverized the stone floor right where I had been standing an instant before, carving a jagged trench into the masonry.
"You underhanded bastard...!"
An expert pulling a dirty ambush on an amateur was against the unwritten rules of combat!
"Underhanded?" Georg chimed in, slipping into my blind spot. "The moment this became a two-on-one, petty notions of fairness ceased to matter."
"Ghk!"
Now Professor Georg was launching a pincer attack from my flank. This was turning out to be far more exhausting than I had anticipated. Fortunately, Georg was an absolute novice when it came to real martial combat, so dodging his clumsy strike was easy enough. Had it been Jabir flanking me just now, my skull would have been caved in on the spot.
"So that's how you want to play it?"
Don't expect any mercy from my blade, then.
"Hah!"
I lunged forward, slashing straight at Professor Georg. If they were going to play dirty, I had no reason to play fair. In any tactical engagement, you eliminate the weakest link first.
"Not so fast!"
CLANG!
My strike was deflected. Jabir, who had been standing directly ahead of me a heartbeat ago, crossed the room in a blur, stepping between us to parry the blow.
The gap in our physical specs was suffocating.
I had anticipated he might block it, but seeing it happen firsthand gave me a clear measure of the difference in our raw prowess. Still, it wasn't impossible. I'm not the helpless runt I used to be. Reassuring myself with that silent mantra, I tightened my grip on the hilt.
"Haaah!"
CLANG! CLANG!
Sparks showered the air as we traded blows. I poured everything I had into every swing, yet Jabir deflected each strike with an effortless flick of his wrist, his gentle smile never wavering. Looking closer, he hadn't even shifted his feet. He was nullifying my entire offensive repertoire through minimal wrist movements alone.
Part of it was Jabir's absurd individual skill, but that freakish, eyed morningstar reeked of suspicion. Did the weapon possess an ego of its own? It looked as if it were tracking my trajectory and adjusting its guard autonomously.
Furthermore, the man was clearly underestimating me.
Well, why wouldn't he? I was the bottom of the barrel among my peers, while Jabir was an elite upperclassman. On paper, I didn't possess the skill to overturn those odds. Having spent extensive time around me, Jabir was well aware of my mediocre track record.
What he didn't know, however, was that I had grown.
"Hup!"
I deliberately twisted my posture into an exaggerated feint. Concealing the motion from his line of sight, I drew upon a Magic Engineering Battery, channeling concentrated mana along the edge of my steel.
"Oh?"
As my body pivoted through a full turn, the unstable flicker of artificial sword aura consolidated into a sharp, luminous edge. For the first time, a flicker of genuine bewilderment crossed Jabir's face.
"Oops."
CLANG!
Yet that brief shock amounted to nothing. His defense barely shifted. My trump card failed to become a decisive variable. When confronted with my absolute best, Jabir didn't even bother to reposition; he simply stood his ground and gave another casual flick of his wrist to bat the blade aside. His momentary surprise hadn't been panic—he was merely startled that his junior had learned a new parlor trick.
"Haaah...!"
Fatigue began to drag at my limbs. My best attack had been brushed aside, and no matter how relentlessly I slashed, his stance remained completely unyielding. Sweat stung my eyes, and a sharp prickle of anxiety crept into my chest.
"Yohan, why not just surrender peacefully and sign the papers?" Jabir coaxed gently. "If the research burden feels overwhelming, Professor Georg can easily solve that for you."
"He's going to shoot me full of experimental drugs!"
"Drugs that bring boundless happiness."
"That is an extraordinarily dangerous sentence! Haaah!"
I swung wide once more. Burning through my stamina like this was reckless, but I had no alternative. I wasn't just fighting Jabir. Like a hungry jackal, Professor Georg prowled nearby, waiting for the slightest opening to jab a syringe into my neck.
To keep him at bay, I had to keep my sword arcs sweeping and broad. Since Georg lacked combat training, the mere threat of a lethal blade was enough to restrict his footwork. While someone of his academic stature could certainly manage an opening if he rushed me, he had no reason to take unnecessary risks. Just by standing there, Georg was pulling his weight as a constant psychological hazard.
"Phew..."
"My, you sound out of breath, Yohan. Don't you think the end is in sight?"
"Is that so? Isn't it a bit early to call it?"
"No, I'd say the timing is just right."
"...I think so too."
The exact moment Jabir's guard lowered to its absolute nadir.
I gathered every scrap of strength left in my body and unleashed a colossal slash. On the surface, it looked like another desperate, full-power strike meant to overwhelm him. Under normal circumstances, the outcome would have been identical to the last ten exchanges.
Except I held the power to overturn this single, fleeting instant.
Advanced Illusion Magic: Sensory Disruption
"Huh?"
Just for a fraction of a second.
I scrambled the spatial and kinetic feedback in Jabir's right wrist. The morningstar veered wildly in a direction completely opposite to his intended parry, leaving his entire upper body exposed. The opening was massive. I couldn't afford to waste this singular chance.
"Hup!"
THWACK!
A brutal strike arced toward him. As insane as he was, I couldn't actually decapitate my senior, so at the final millisecond, I rotated the blade and slammed the flat of the steel against his temple. That was more than enough. Taking a concussive blow without any defensive reinforcement meant he wouldn't be standing back up anytime soon.
Only one remained.
"I warned you, didn't I?"
Pivoting on my heel, I locked my sight onto Professor Georg. As expected of an academy instructor, his reaction was sharp. The instant Jabir crumpled, Georg lunged forward with a syringe drawn, fully aware that this split second was his only window of opportunity.
Unfortunately for him.
"I'm not the same person I used to be."
This match was mine.
SMACK!
A picture-perfect counter.
My very first personal victory within the Cradle. What a glorious, heart-swelling achievement.
"Haah..."
Yet my triumphant reverie lasted only a brief moment.
"What the hell do I do now?"
Looking down at the carnage I had wrought in the workshop, a heavy sigh escaped my lips. Even Princess Lobelia's political threats were no longer enough to deter these two. I had been far too competent in the lab; my own success was strangling me.
I had barely pulled off a win today by catching them completely off guard, but a trick like that would never work a second time. How was I supposed to resolve this sheer madness? Unless I could pacify the lunatic professor who thrust a University Application Form into my face every time I stepped foot into the Alchemy Workshop, continuing my research would be impossible.
The only solution that came to mind was securing Yuna as a permanent bodyguard. But even if we spent most of our days glued together, she couldn't shadow me twenty-four hours a day. It was nothing more than a stopgap.
"Seriously, where did that girl wander off to...? She's always missing the second I actually need her."
Especially on days like this.
The Cradle's grand conference hall was filled with quiet tension. Chancellor Olga Hermod had gathered the homeroom instructors in charge of each class.
"It is time we finalize matters," Olga stated, her gaze sweeping across the seated faculty. "We must adjust the class placements for the second semester."
"Hmm..."
"Due to the sudden vacancies among both our student body and teaching staff, we have decided to temporarily dissolve Class F and Class E."
A collective swallow rippled through the instructors at Olga's calm announcement. Every educator in the room understood the horrific context behind this meeting. Whenever their eyes drifted toward the empty chairs beside them, a chill crept down their spines. Over a hundred traitors had been purged in a single sweep. The sheer scale of that void was impossible to ignore.
"Shall we begin with Class E?" Olga asked smoothly. "Which students should be promoted, and which should be reassigned? You have observed their conduct for half a year now, so please propose an appropriate standard."
"Ah, first, regarding student roster number one..."
Discussions proceeded smoothly based on the evaluations of Class E's former homeroom teacher, and the class was systematically redistributed. Following the agenda, the time arrived to reassign the students of Class F. For the most part, the deliberations were routine.
"Student Yohan Damus should be placed in Class D," one teacher proposed.
"Agreed."
"Seconded."
"Then, by unanimous decision, Student Yohan Damus is assigned to Class D."
The faculty's consensus on Yohan was so harmoniously aligned that there wasn't a single dissenting voice. However, there were exceptions.
"Student Yuna possesses talent that would make her fit right into Class A without issue," an instructor argued.
"Yet if you examine her academic transcripts, her performance is hardly stellar," another countered immediately. "I concede she has immense latent potential, but she displays an absolute lack of personal ambition. Wouldn't placing her between Class B or Class C be far more appropriate?"
"That is a fair point, but..."
When it came to Yuna, opinions clashed with unusual ferocity. As the debate among the faculty began to grow heated, Olga raised a single hand, her calm voice cutting through the noise.
"Let us assign Student Yuna to Class D."
"Excuse me? Chancellor, with all due respect, that is unacceptable."
"If you are enforcing reverse discrimination simply because she entered the academy under your personal patronage, we cannot view that favorably as fellow educators."
"..."
It was a blatant display of insubordination. Yet Olga Hermod did not display the slightest irritation at their challenge. Though she held the supreme titles of Archmage and Chancellor of the Cradle, she was fundamentally a fair and righteous educator. In fact, it was precisely because she possessed such integrity that the teachers felt safe enough to speak their minds with genuine conviction.
These instructors had spent the past year pouring their blood and sweat into their students. They harbored a fierce, protective affection for their pupils and demanded fair, uncompromised evaluations. For that, Olga respected them deeply.
Even so...
"No matter which class she is assigned to," Olga remarked with a faint, wry smile, "Student Yuna will not care in the slightest."
"If that is the case, then all the more reason—!"
"Because the moment the semester begins," Olga continued serenely, "she will simply stroll into Class D and sit down anyway."
"...Pardon?"
"That child is... well, it feels awkward praising her myself, but she is extraordinarily capable."
Olga's glowing assessment caused the assembled instructors to swallow hard. They understood the terrifying weight behind those words. It meant that Yuna's true combat prowess exceeded that of the faculty itself—placing her on the exact same pedestal as the monsters residing in Class S.
In truth, the students of Class S were hardly students at all. The number of instructors capable of teaching them could be counted on one hand, and their enrollment was maintained purely out of imperial obligation rather than academic need. They were beings of an entirely different dimension.
"Isn't that right, Student Yuna?" Olga asked, shifting her gaze toward the edge of the conference table.
"Puhihi! I actually snuck in here to ask for that exact favor, Chancellor! You really understand my heart best!"
"How could I not, when you've been staging such a silent protest right under our noses?"
There, casually occupying an empty leather chair among the senior faculty, sat a pink-haired girl. Yuna looked so natural, so utterly at ease, that it felt as though she had been attending the meeting from the very start.
"Wh-What in the world...?!"
Only then did the surrounding teachers grasp the reality of Olga's warning. Yuna possessed the uncanny, terrifying gift of blending seamlessly into any environment she chose. Imposing administrative control over such a phantom was fundamentally impossible.
"Choose between Class S and Class D," Olga offered, presenting the girl with a choice nearly identical to the one she had offered someone else at the start of the first semester.
"Mmm, decision made!" Yuna chirped without a second thought.
And the reply that followed matched the one given months ago to the letter.
"I'm going to Class D!"