Remnants (4)

"Yuna. From now on, whenever I head to the workshop, you have to come with me. Got it?"

"What's this? Are you confessing to me?"

"I'm begging you."

"Begging for my love, I see."

"You're really something else, you know that?"

"I do have my charms."

Her uncanny ability to spin everything in a positive light bordered on worthy of genuine respect.

How could anyone be so brazenly shameless?

Not to mention, saying things like that to a man who already had an official fiancée was unhinged, to put it mildly. At this rate, it felt as though I were genuinely carrying on an illicit affair.

Yet what choice did I have? Ever since I first experienced having Yuna watch my back, I couldn't even fathom relying on any other bodyguard. She wasn't just monstrously powerful; she moved more covertly than anyone alive. There was simply no bodyguard more reliable or convenient to have around.

"So, if I act as your guard, what are you going to do for me, Yohan?"

"What do you want?"

"Honestly, I don't really want anything special. You just need me, right, Yohan? You want me by your side no matter what, don't you?"

"……."

"Come on. Say the line I just said out loud."

"Huh?"

"Hurry up."

And she claimed she didn't want anything!

She was practically salivating for a line dripping with pure romantic longing!

"……Yuna, I need you. I really want you to stay by my side."

"Puhihi! All right then."

No, this truly felt like infidelity. Step by step, it felt as if I were granting her access to territory where no other person should ever be permitted to tread.

I was being invaded.

Conquered by Yuna.

"Well, if you're going to plead that much, I suppose I have no choice. I'll stay by your side, Yohan."

"……."

"Aren't you going to say thank you?"

"…Thank you."

"Mmhmm!"

Yuna beamed with a pleased giggle.

Thanks to Yuna's presence, no further obstacles disrupted my research in the alchemy workshop.

Or rather, whenever one threatened to rear its ugly head……

"Keep that up and you'll die, you know! Puhihi!"

Yuna snuffed it out with decisive violence.

Senior Jabir, who had cowardly tried to ambush me from behind while I was engrossed in my research, had his neck violently snapped, and Instructor Georg went sailing through the air.

"Just who in the world are you to interfere with us?!"

Instructor Georg roared in outrage.

"Then by what right are you trying to knock Yohan out and force him to sign graduate school admission forms, Instructor? Should I bring this up with the Director?"

"Ack! I'm sorry! I was wrong!"

Instantly refuted.

Instructor Georg turned utterly groveling before the undisputed supreme authority of the Cradle. Sure enough, threats only worked when backed by real power. Had I said the exact same words, he would have jammed a syringe straight into the nape of my neck before I could finish the sentence.

Now that someone capable of walking away with her sanity intact had stepped in, Instructor Georg and Senior Jabir had no choice but to behave themselves.

"By the way… it felt so natural that it completely slipped my mind, but who actually are you?"

Senior Jabir asked, still sprawled on the floor in a grotesque heap after having his neck twisted by Yuna moments earlier. To think he could still move and speak in that state—was this just par for the course at the Cradle? It was downright creepy and terrifying.

"Oh, right. I'm Yohan's girlfriend, Yuna."

"Yohan has a girlfriend? I know this might sound rude, but what part of him could you possibly like?"

"That really is rude, Senior."

Rude to me, not her.

Had he thought so little of me all this time? Here I was thinking he was a kind soul because he always looked after me with a genial smile.

"The fact that no matter what I do to him, he doesn't have the strength to resist?"

Wait, you like me for that reason……?!

The chilling horror of her answer froze everyone in the room solid.

"……May you have a lovely romance."

What kind of 'lovely romance' is this?!

"Well, this is the Cradle, so having a twisted kid ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠like that around isn't particularly strange. Ah, youth."

Instructor Georg took it one step further. What infuriated me most was that his reasoning actually made sense, even though Yuna wasn't even a student of the Cradle to begin with. Granted, if it was the Cradle, someone like that would indeed fit right in.

"So if you mess with Yohan from now on, I'll break your necks. Because if anyone's going to bully him, it has to be me."

"Wow, there's really no helping this."

"Professor, I think we have to give up. When someone is that unhinged, there's no telling what she might do."

True madness curing pseudo-madness.

Whatever the process was, I was once again liberated from the horror of forced graduate admissions. Part of it was that the two of them gave up…… but mostly, it was because one terror had been superseded by an even greater terror.

Today, I had witnessed a whole new side of Yuna.

And the name of that facet was……

"Puhihihi!"

'Sadism.'

While research into the new cure for Transcendence Sickness progressed at breakneck speed, vacation came to an end and the second semester began.

During the break, I had done nothing but work.

I accelerated the research, periodically visited Emily to check on her progress, kept tabs on the movements of Marquisate Ereticus through Cattleya, and stayed in touch with Jeff and Melana. And aside from opening a book in the library to wait for Ariel, or the occasional times Yuna dragged me outside against my will because she was bored, that was pretty much how I spent every single day.

Living like that made the vacation feel criminally short.

"This can't be real."

Give me back my vacation.

"What's with that gloom-and-doom face, Yohan? The new semester has started, so let's hurry up and go see everyone's faces!"

"What's the point of seeing their faces? ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠I don't even know their names anyway."

Those bastards stubbornly refused to tell me their names and ostracized me. Well, if someone pointed out that my own behavior at the start of the year was simply coming back like a boomerang, I wouldn't have an excuse. Since I couldn't keep up with the other kids, I hadn't made any effort to get close to them either…… Still, occasionally feeling left out was inevitable.

"Hurry up!"

"Yuna, stop pulling. What good is going early anyway……?"

"Who knows? You might find something interesting once we get there."

"Did something happen?"

"Yep! Even for a school break, there were barely any people around ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the Cradle, so I looked into it and found out something fun happened."

"A terrorist attack?"

"Geez, say it like that and it sounds like nothing exists in the Cradle except terrorism."

Well, what else is there? Isn't the Cradle's core identity an uninterrupted schedule of terrorist attacks three hundred and sixty-five days a year?

"Besides, you shouldn't call something like that 'fun.'"

"……Fair point."

A slip of the tongue. I was lucky Yuna was the one listening; if anyone else had heard that, I wouldn't have been surprised if they grabbed me by the collar. How many people had suffered from terrorist attacks, after all?

"Sometimes I feel like you've got more common sense than I do."

"I know."

Following Yuna's lead, we arrived at Class F as usual. The classroom was bustling with commotion, and a freshly penned document was posted right by the door.

"Class Restructuring Notice? Due to the unavoidable decrease in the student body over the past year, the classes have been consolidated?"

There was nothing like this in the game!

I couldn't even begin to guess where this snowball had started rolling. If I had to guess, could it be Under Chain's massive raid? The scars left behind by the Great Sage Faust had clearly run deep.

"Oh, I'm in Class D? Wait a minute. Is Class D serving as the new Class F now? Nothing's changed for me then?"

"Pretty much."

"Hah! They were a bit hasty with this evaluation. I'm high-grade talent now—I can even cast High-Tier Illusion Magic!"

"Want to go complain?"

"No."

Why would I go that far? It didn't matter to me which class I was in. Besides, just because I learned one High-Tier spell didn't mean I could take on the other students head-on and win. And as long as it wasn't Class S, that was plenty fine by me.

"By the way, why are you in Class D? You were keeping your grades right in the middle. Shouldn't that put you in Class C?"

"Hmm, I wonder why?"

I thought she had looked suspiciously well-informed since this morning; she had definitely pulled some strings. Though at most, she probably just manipulated things so she'd be in the same class as me……

"Does the Director know?"

"Got her permission."

"Then it's fine."

As long as it hadn't gotten on the bad side of the Cradle's supreme authority. Besides, even if this punk were assigned to a different class, she'd just storm into mine anyway. Maybe that was factored into the placement to begin with……

"Ugh, when am I going to finish packing my things?"

A classroom that would soon sit empty. In the room steeped in a semester's worth of memories, students began gathering the belongings they had left behind over the break. From heavy loads like books and training uniforms to small trinkets that had decorated desks. Once the commotion in Class F subsided, we headed toward the new epicenter of chaos: Class D.

"It's even more chaotic here."

"Tell me about it."

Compared to Class F, which was being completely vacated, Class D was far more disorderly as students from different classes mixed together. Students packing up their belongings, newcomers unpacking into the newly vacated spots, and those who were delayed in the queue, left standing blankly in the hallway with armfuls of luggage.

"Hm?"

And amidst it all, there was a student wearing a deep hood who looked suspicious by any metric.

What's this? I wasn't the type to memorize every classmate's face, but I'd definitely never seen someone like that before.

"Yuna."

"Yeah?"

"Do you know who that is?"

"Who, who?"

"Over there. That person with the hood pulled down, looking conspicuously shady."

"Oh, wow, you're right! I wonder who it is?"

"You don't recognize them?"

"Nope. More to the point, I didn't even realize they were there until you pointed them out, Yohan. They must be pretty skilled. But why Class D?"

A powerhouse of such caliber that even Yuna hadn't noticed them?

Unease stirred. An inexplicable dread felt like cold fingers tracing down my spine.

"Ah, now that I think about it, they said they'd be recruiting people from outside this term."

"From outside? You don't mean new freshmen, so…… transfer students?"

"Yeah. But seeing as they're transferring into the second year, they definitely have serious skills. Who among our peers could be that capable?"

"Who knows…… More than that, I just hope they don't cause any trouble. Or if they do, I hope they do it somewhere I'm not around."

Since outsiders were being admitted, it was certain the Director had personally vetted them at least once.

"Should I go check?"

"No, leave it. Even if we don't butt in, it'll all come to light soon enough."

The nail that sticks out gets hammered down. Whoever it was, someone was bound to question their identity, so we could just observe when that time came.

As the commotion settled and the new homeroom teacher stepped up to the podium, I observed our surroundings and pieced together the situation.

First, roughly half of Class D was made up of the top-performing first-years who had skipped a grade. In some sense, the reputation here was even worse than when it was Class F. We were suddenly placed in a position where we'd be compared to first-years.

And the first-years' mood was equally sour. Having been top achievers in their year, their noses were practically in the clouds. They were likely disgruntled about being dumped into second-year Class D. Insolent runts who didn't know their place.

"Looks like there are five transfer students. And there's a familiar face among them."

"Really?"

The transfer students hadn't entered the classroom yet. Being newcomers, it seemed they'd be introduced separately.

"All right, quiet down. Quiet, please."

A voice rang out to quell the chatter. The homeroom teacher standing at the podium was the one who previously taught Class E.

"I'm sure you're all confused in many ways. I'll make a quick announcement."

The teacher's explanation was brief: first, Olga Hermod had swept away the vermin infesting the Cradle; second, because the student body had dwindled significantly, students were skipped ahead and transfers were brought in from outside; third, it was now time for self-introductions.

Pretty much what I had anticipated. The only unexpected detail was that the Director had deliberately unsheathed her blade to clean house.

"Now, shall we start from the left?"

Before I could ponder further, self-introductions began under the teacher's guidance. Naturally, all eyes were on the transfer students. The four who introduced themselves first were largely the types one might expect: mercenaries who made a name for themselves in the Northern Snowy Plains, late bloomers whose talents awakened only recently, or intellectuals formerly affiliated with academic societies.

And one among them was……

"Hello, Yohan Oppa."

"Emily? You were a transfer student?"

After introducing herself, Emily scampered over and took a seat near me.

"His Imperial Majesty issued a decree, and things turned out this way."

"His Majesty did?"

Even with her ties to Ex Machina kept hidden, Emily was undoubtedly an exceptional talent. Still, the mere fact that the Emperor's influence was involved made my skin crawl. In that case, the individual we were keeping an eye on might also be a plant from the Imperial Family. If so, even Olga Hermod wouldn't have had much say in the matter.

"Did you get a look at the others?"

"No."

"Didn't talk to them?"

"No one talked to me."

"……Right."

Maybe I was asking too much of Emily. She was inherently the type who rarely spoke first unless someone approached her. The fact that she had spoken to me first in the past was just an exceptional case.

"Then that means you don't really know who that person is either?"

"Who do you mean?"

"That one wearing the hood over there. Don't they look blatantly suspicious?"

"Are they suspicious?"

Ah, I asked the wrong person. Since she herself was suspicious to the core, she couldn't even tell that someone looking so overtly shady was actually shady.

In the end, gaining nothing, we had no choice but to wait for the hooded student to reveal herself. Following the lengthy, pedantic self-introductions—which were really just bragging sessions—of the preceding transfer students, the hooded student's turn ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠finally arrived.

"Now, the last student."

"Yes."

For some reason, the moment I heard that voice, a strange sense of déjà vu washed over me. This voice…… where have I heard it before? Just who is this?

"Hello."

Presently, the owner of that familiar voice lowered the hood that had been concealing her face, speaking in an even cadence.

Blonde hair that seemed spun from molten gold.

Vibrant blue eyes sparkling like cut jewels.

"What……?"

The moment I saw that face, it felt as though all sound had vanished from the world. Like a bomb had detonated right beside me, a sharp tinnitus rang in my ears, and my field of vision narrowed to a pinprick.

"My name is Alice."

I thought I had shaken off the past.

I believed I had freed myself from those lingering regrets and taken a step forward.

I was wrong.

The remnants of the past hadn't disappeared; they reached out and seized my ankles.

As if to say there was no escape.