The Lord School Faction War (3)
"How many times do I have to tell you to get it through your thick skull? Stop strutting around just because you're from Lebrant and go home!"
"I'm not strutting. I told you, I'm here to earn my grades!"
Junon was currently bickering with the professor assigned to this class—or rather, an old man who merely held the hollow title without ever actually bothering to teach.
At a glance, mentioning the Faction War made it obvious he was just a visiting student, yet the young man didn't yield an inch to the elder.
"Good grief, my head aches... Didn't you even do your research before leaving Lebrant?"
"What research?"
"That Sirach Lord School is a hopeless dead end! The other three might be a different story, but this place is a remote backwater. Proper training is completely out of the question here!"
Yet when he had introduced himself moments ago, Lana had heard his words with absolute clarity.
‘I am ranked eleventh in Class E on the Lebrant Academy Page Ranking.’
Class E, Rank 11.
Class E, Rank 11...? It wouldn't even be enough if someone from Class B or Class A came!
Biting her lip until it bled, Lana couldn't help but sink into despair.
Though she had enrolled only a few weeks ago, she had already grasped how this Lord School operated. Subsidies were allocated by the central administration in Lebrant based purely on headcount and minimum attendance hours. With those funds as their cushion, the faculty did nothing more than warm their seats. Even when training supplies arrived, barely any saw actual use; the rest sat rotting in warehouses or were quietly embezzled and sold off. At Sirach Lord School, supported entirely by government handouts, neither students nor professors harbored any ambition beyond slacking off.
And into a mess like this, they sent a Class E...?
In a school rotten to the core, an E-rank wouldn't make the slightest difference. The other classes were likely in the exact same boat.
"Wake up from your daydream. You really think you can take these kids out and slay a single demonic beast?"
"..."
While Junon and the professor traded barbs, those words struck Lana's mind like a sledgehammer.
"Even if someone ranked Class E tries to teach them now, nothing will change! These kids were hopeless long before I ever got here. There's no way in hell they'll show any meaningful improvement in two weeks!"
She couldn't deny it. The Faction War was ultimately a contest of student ability—what could anyone possibly accomplish in just two weeks?
The professor's next words drove a dagger straight through her chest.
"If there was anyone in this school who truly wanted to return to Lebrant, they would have put in the effort on their own! But not a single one did! Every last one of them is a hopeless piece of dead weight!"
Lana desperately wanted to scream at him, but every word was painfully true.
Rather than relying on lazy professors at this Lord School, if she had taken the initiative to train herself, she would have yielded results long ago. If she participated in this Faction War and produced outstanding results, Lebrant might have offered her re-enrollment. Yet she had spent all this time in denial, passively waiting for an instructor's guidance.
Her very starting line had been flawed. She hadn't been trapped by the stigma of being an Academy dropout—she had walked into the trap of her own accord.
Even so, she couldn't bring herself to swallow such a bitter truth.
"Damn it all!"
"W-Why, you little...! Where does a student get off storming out while a professor is speaking?! Ugh, tsk tsk. That Lana girl will never set foot in Lebrant again as long as she lives!"
Lana brushed past Junon and sprinted down the hallway without looking back.
Not a single person asked where she was going or what she intended to do.
Except for Junon.
"..."
"Don't go giving them false hope. Just pack up and leave. Since you're only E-rank on the Page Ranking, this doesn't really matter to you anyway, does it? Hmph."
Junon, who had been quietly watching Lana's retreating back, turned and stepped slowly toward the professor.
"W-What?!"
Unnerved by the chilling aura rolling off Junon's expression, the professor felt his heart leap into his throat. A second later, a hand seized him by the collar, making his heart truly seize in terror.
"A piece of trash like you isn't a professor. You're just a stubborn old fossil whining out endless pessimism."
"Y-You insolent brat—urk!"
Junon released his grip, and the old man crashed heavily onto the floorboards. The professor glared up, desperate not to lose face, but when he met those pitch-black eyes, he involuntarily swallowed a dry lump of fear.
"Don't ever set foot in this classroom again. I will be the one teaching these students."
A voice heavy with restrained fury echoed across the silent room.
Damn it, where the hell did she run off to?
While bickering with that professor earlier, I had felt a sharp glare from the side and glanced over. Her gaze hadn't been friendly, but looking closer, I had recognized her face all too well.
Every time the professor opened his mouth, her expression had contorted with misery. It was a suffocating mix of shame and self-reproach. She was furious at the professor for claiming they could never achieve anything, but even more so, she was furious at herself for having done nothing.
What did he say her name was... Ah, right!
Lana. That was definitely it.
"Lana! Where are you?! Say something!"
Self-loathing is a terrifying emotion. It easily clouds rational thought, snaps a person's willpower, and drags them into helpless lethargy. The deeper it festers, and the longer one remains trapped without overcoming it, the more hollow a person becomes. Consumed by self-contempt, a paralyzed mind yields to impulse, driving people to reckless actions.
Right now, desperate to prove that rotten professor wrong, Lana was probably blind to everything around her.
"Answer me, Lana! Where are you?!"
I shouldn't have wasted time dealing with that idiotic old fool. I should have sprinted after her immediately!
"Lana! Where ar—oof!"
"Eek...!"
"Sorry about that! I wasn't watching where I was going, but I'm in a huge rush, so if you'll excuse m—"
Wait. The voice of the person I had collided with belonged to a girl. Could it be Lana...?
I whipped my head around with a flicker of hope, but reality wasn't that convenient. Still, it was undeniably unexpected.
"Ouch... I finally found you, Junon."
Ash-gray hair woven into a single braid draped over her shoulder. A gentle, demure voice carried a distinct, quiet frailty, paired with the familiar blue ribbon adorning her braid. It was a face I hadn't seen in quite a while.
"Adele...?"
"Mm... It's been a while, hasn't it?"
"Uh, yeah... it really has."
I never anticipated running into her here. But an apology had to come first.
"I'm sorry, Adele. It's complicated, but I have to track someone down right now. Can we catch up later?"
"Huh? W-Wait, Junon—! Hold on a second!"
I had no choice; a reckless student was out there on the verge of doing something stupid! I'd make sure to apologize properly to Adele later—
Wait, what?
Before I knew it, Adele had dashed past me. Channelling mana, she used a spell to plant herself firmly in my path.
"If you're looking for someone, magic will be much faster than searching on foot."
"What?"
"I used to be an Academy student too, remember?"
Adele's mana stirred a gentle breeze. Magic flowed from her small wand, tracing glowing geometric circles in the air, and condensed wind coalesced into three ethereal sparrows.
Adele was an elemental wind mage who specialized in shaping and concentrating wind for auxiliary support. As a wizard, detection and tracking magic fell well within her repertoire.
She made a fair point. Asking for her help was infinitely more efficient than blindly running around on foot.
"North, northwest, and northeast. Can you send them in those three directions? She's a female student slightly shorter than you, with freckles and a hairpin holding back her bangs instead of a ribbon."
"Leave it to me."
Closing her eyes, Adele cast a sensory link onto the wind sparrows. Sharing a portion of their senses, the constructs became her airborne eyes.
Only a few minutes passed before Adele opened her eyes.
"Northwest. She's alone, not too far from here. I'll guide you."
"Thanks, Adele."
"Y-Yeah. We can't lose track of her..."
"Right. Let's hurry."
She certainly covered some ground. Adele said she was alone, so hopefully she hadn't gotten herself into trouble just yet. My immediate priority was stabilizing Lana's mental state before she did something irreversible.
‘Wake up from your daydream. You really think you can take these kids out and slay a single demonic beast?’
No.
‘Even if someone ranked Class E tries to teach them now, nothing will change! There's no way in hell they'll show any meaningful improvement in two weeks!’
No!
‘If there was anyone in this school who truly wanted to return to Lebrant, they would have put in the effort on their own! Every last one of them is a hopeless piece of dead weight!’
It's not true!
That professor had labeled her as someone who would never amount to anything. He claimed she could never achieve any meaningful change. He had sneered that she was nothing more than a hopeless piece of dead weight.
She had to prove him wrong.
"I just have to... show him myself!!"
All she had to do was wipe away the shameful brand of being a dropout who barely dipped her toes into Lebrant. All she had to do was put in the effort and forge that change with her own hands.
Lana had emptied her pockets, spending every last coin she possessed on a cheap steel sword. Then, she had sprinted like a madwoman toward the outskirts where demonic beasts roamed.
If she hunted down a beast with her own two hands and dragged its carcass back to school, she could refute every word that professor said—the insults calling her hopeless dead weight, the accusations of being an unmotivated dropout.
Creak— Crack—
A Stump approached, fixing an ominous, repulsive gaze upon her. It was a massive, ancient tree monster known for snatching wild birds and preying on livestock throughout the province.
Good. If I bring something like that back, he won't be able to say a word.
Her hands and feet trembled violently. Facing a real demonic beast outside the safe, simulated confines of a Talbrut Ark was infinitely more terrifying than she had imagined. Even so, Lana refused to retreat. Even though stepping out of the Stump's territory right now would let her escape unharmed, she stood her ground.
"Hyaaaah!"
Drawing her blade, Lana charged straight at the Stump.
By this point, the impulse born of her wounded pride far outweighed any instinct for self-preservation. The brutal consequence of rushing in blindly was an agonizing blow: a whip-like branch cracked across her flank, sending her tumbling violently across the dirt.
"Gasp—!"
A searing agony of broken ribs surged through her chest, stealing the air from her lungs. Only now did Lana truly comprehend reality.
The dry creaking of branches drew nearer. With every inch the towering wooden beast closed in, an emotion blossomed within her, blooming cold and raw.
It was terror. Pure, paralyzing terror.
Sensing the creeping approach of death, she tried desperately to move, but her legs refused to budge. The whip-like bough that had slammed her into the earth reared back once more. If the first strike had swept horizontally from right to left, this one descended from directly overhead, poised to crush her flat.
Mom... I'm sorry...
She had been arrogant. Reckless. Utterly foolish.
Not a single word the professor said had been wrong.
‘Wake up from your daydream. You really think you can take these kids out and slay a single demonic beast?’
A hopeless piece of dead weight who couldn't even defeat a single beast. Accepting that this was all she was, Lana squeezed her eyes shut.
Yet, the killing blow never landed.
Instead, warm sunlight washed over her face, accompanied by a dry, splintering crash.
"Huh...?"
The girl cracked an eye open. Peering down at the ground, she realized something had vanished.
The shadow was gone.
The towering shadow cast by the ancient branch hurtling down to crush her had disappeared entirely. But was that all?
"Did you think knowing you're lacking means it's the end of the line?"
The shadow hadn't merely vanished.
The branch had been utterly obliterated.
The devastating limb that had cracked her ribs and tossed a human body like a ragdoll now lay scattered across the soil in splintered fragments. The only beings standing here were herself and the man whose voice had just cut through the air.
Lana slowly lifted her head.
There, standing tall against the bright sky, was a young man whose pitch-black hair remained unblemished by the blazing sunlight.
"If you know you lack the skills, you solve it by learning. Don't you ever pull a reckless, suicidal stunt like this again."
No. If anything, the brilliant sunlight seemed to form a radiant halo around him.