Chapter 23
I could have smashed through the window and stormed in, but I didn't bother.
I knew exactly who Aipman was.
Everyone did.
He was that eccentric old man who'd turned down the Emperor's personal order without a second thought.
I had climbed here in my bare skin, yet Aipman barely flinched.
He must have been surprised, but the shock had worn off.
He wasn't afraid of death.
"I didn't come here to kill you. There must be something else on your mind, wearing a mask like this."
I had bought the face-covering mask on the way here.
If Aipman learned I was the prince of Solea, the boy who would soon enroll in the academy, things would go badly.
"I came because I hoped the professor would live longer."
"What? You came to warn me not to get cocky?"
"No. It's a health issue."
"My health? Why? I have no desire to cling to this frail, ugly body any longer. If that's what you want to say, then leave. I'll die when I die."
I had met Aipman in the most disrespectful way possible.
And because of that, he treated me with outrageous bluntness.
"Would the Imperial Academy fall apart if the professor passed away?"
"It would probably limp along somehow."
My words carried weight.
They deserved thought.
But Aipman answered without a pause.
This wasn't because he hadn't listened.
It was because his conviction was already ironclad.
Not simple stubbornness.
The product of decades of knowledge and experience.
"From the beginning, then. The professor will pass in three years if things stay as they are."
"You curse me with three more years of life?"
"How dramatic."
"And do you know who will succeed him?"
Aipman finally hesitated.
"I hadn't considered that. You naming a candidate gives me something to think about. Thanks."
"Berold."
"Wha—"
My name sent shock through Aipman.
He spun toward the window, threw it open, and pointed outside.
"Only a complete fraud would wear a mask like that. Get out right now!"
"Why do you think I'm lying?"
"Berold is the treacherous bastard the Emperor himself banished. How could someone who fled for dirty tricks and shady dealings ever take over the academy? The Imperial Academy stands for values completely opposite to what he pursues!"
I said nothing more.
I simply stared at Aipman.
I didn't need many words to convey my truth.
I spoke nothing but the unvarnished truth.
And that truth reached the wise old scholar's ears through my voice.
"Hah…"
When I remained silent, Aipman closed the window and returned to his desk.
"Who exactly are you?"
"I am a graduate of this academy."
"A graduate? Our academy produces plenty of skilled fighters, but I don't recall any student who could climb this high in bare hands."
"Professor."
It was better to skip the small talk and get to the point.
"I know what illness you suffer from."
"Illness? That's laughable. Even at my age, I still walk every day."
"You love your wife far too much."
Aipman blinked.
Then he laughed.
"You've done your homework. You're right about the love part. I keep telling her how tired I am of the meat, but she forgets every word and insists on cooking it until it burns. Still, even while grumbling…"
"And your wife will outlive you by one day."
"My wife takes better care of vegetables than I do, and she walks farther. If I die first, it won't be because of illness. It won't be because Emma dies before me."
"Of course. Lifestyle habits won't kill her. But if you want to extend your wife's lifespan…"
Aipman's gaze changed completely.
"You need the Holy Water of Lungran."
"You brat! How the hell do you—"
Aipman had been a brilliant, obsessive scholar in his youth.
He built a laboratory at home and studied day and night without sleeping.
That hunger drove him to forbidden experiments.
Twenty years ago, he found old records of a failed study.
His knowledge was still strong, but he felt a calling.
He believed that with his abilities, he could succeed where others had failed.
He threw everything into the research.
He brought materials and supplies from home and worked through the nights.
But the research carried deadly risks.
The smoke from processing the ingredients might not kill him instantly, but it could harm him over time.
The faint poisonous smoke from the experiments seeped into the house.
At first the smell was terrible.
Then it grew sweeter.
His senses dulled.
His mood lifted.
"I respect you, Professor. If you hadn't stopped, you would have succeeded. You could have saved countless lives."
"How little you know. I had no choice! What good does saving others do if I can't even save my own wife?"
Aipman's research extracted the numbing ingredient from a narcotic plant.
Once completed, it would ease pain from any disease or wound.
He had become addicted to the smoke while processing the plants.
But the real problem was his wife.
Emma had developed immunity.
She was the one who had to endure the smoke regularly.
She had begun seeing hallucinations.
Her senses dulled.
Her memories faded.
Aipman quit the research and searched for a cure.
He found none.
So he turned to the only solution: Holy Water.
Holy Water blessed by the gods could ease any pain.
But Emma's addiction would not improve with ordinary Holy Water.
Among the Holy Water blessed by Lungran, only twelve bottles were produced each month.
The Pope's blessing was required.
After drinking it, she could barely hold out for half a year.
"The Emperor is now paying a fortune for the Pope's Holy Water and sending it to the professor. But if the professor is no longer useful to the Emperor…"
"The Emperor will discard me without mercy. He has plenty of reasons."
"Hah. Everything you said is true. But the Emperor still favors me. The academy's current prestige is all thanks to me. He will never cast me aside."
"Will he really?"
"Try me. If you don't, I'll call the guards."
Aipman took pride in the academy's success in producing talented graduates.
I used that pride against him.
"Professor, where have all the graduates gone?"
"To every corner of the world, spreading benefits everywhere."
"So how does that help the Empire?"
"The Empire fed and educated them. Naturally, they feel grateful to the Empire."
"Oh? Then why is the eastern front suffering? I hear a single skilled commander is dragging the war out."
The Empire had three fronts.
The northern front against the northern tribes.
The southern front against pirates for trade.
And the eastern front against the allied colonies centered on the warrior nation of Parta.
Of all the fronts, the eastern one was the fiercest.
Nelaos, the prince of Parta, was fighting with overwhelming strength and brilliant command, overcoming the Empire's numerical disadvantage.
And Nelaos was a graduate of the Imperial Academy who had studied combat and strategy.
"Soon the Imperial Academy will stop raising talent and become an institution that holds hostages and brainwashes them for the Empire. What do you think the professor will do then?"
I offered him a cold, hard reality.
And the threat of death before his eyes.
Whether the old man was senile or not, it didn't matter.
This was the only way to break his stubbornness.