Midterm Evaluation (End)

In the black void, a pure white light was born—light with no telling where it began, flooding the space from edge to edge.

At the sudden radiance, Leon sensed something and fell back a step, eyeing the sight unfolding before him with misgiving.

He had driven his blade straight and true into the man's heart. The black steel still jutting from that chest was proof enough, even now.

And yet—how? How was a man who had plainly lost consciousness and crumpled to the ground now rising to his feet, whole and unharmed?

When the man finally lifted his head, his face was not the one from before. Gone was the face with its cheekbones laid bare and its eyelids carved away, the face that could never again close its eyes. Eyelids had grown anew, skin had regrown to sheathe the muscle and bone beneath, and his hands and feet had been restored to what they once were.

The only change from before was that his eyes now shone white.

But his expression, unlike those radiant eyes, was one of utter ruin. Tears fell drop by drop from pupils that gleamed far too brilliantly, and across his face lay a guilt aimed at—who could say what.

...?

The creature kept babbling sounds that meant nothing, wiping its eyes again and again. Killing that thing—so clearly out of its mind—a second time would be no great task.

So judging, Leon charged once more, black blade leveled at him.

For some reason, the black energies around him felt as though they were snagging at his ankles, but he wrote it off as imagination and kept his eyes locked on the man's throat.

His steps quickened with every stride, and when less than five paces remained between them, the black energies seized his arm as though their existence depended on it.

As if begging him to simply let the enemy before his eyes go.

Unacceptable.

The man who had every right to be called his nemesis stood there alive, bold as brass, right in front of him. Even if the one who granted him this power wished it so, he had no reason to meekly obey—and if the one to be spared was Jenison, accept it he would not.

"Let... GO!!!"

Wrenching himself free of the black energies that held him, he at last brought his blade against the man's neck.

At first came release, and with it euphoria. It felt like a grudge years in the settling. Exaltation and satisfaction surged at the thought of the man who had made him into this, brought low at last beneath his blade—confidence even bubbled up that there was nothing he couldn't do now.

What came next was bewilderment.

"...Huh?"

The blade he had forged had not sunk into that throat so much as a hair's breadth. The neck that had taken his swing head-on showed not one drop of blood—if anything, his sword felt as though it were drifting away from the man, as if the steel itself recoiled from him and fled on instinct.

Then, the man who had kept still all this while slowly raised his head. The man who had wept without pause, offering apologies that could never reach—raised his head. Those eyes still shone, dazzling and beautiful, and yet for some reason Leon found himself shrinking from them. And from the lips that finally parted came not an apology, but something else entirely.

"What did you—"

With that murmur, Leon's world flipped upside down. The question he'd spat out was left hanging in empty air, and what filled his eyes next was his own body, toppling headless—

A h... hand...?

—and the finger that, sometime between one breath and the next, had stretched out and swept across in a single horizontal arc.

Silence flows.

First there had been a scream, steeped in agony. Then an apology had lingered, festered through with guilt. And now, third, a stillness empty of all things fills the black space.

In that silence-choked void, only two figures remain in view. One: a being on the blood-drenched ground, face buried in both hands, weeping. The other: a black shape lying before it, body gone rigid, cold as stone.

Nothing else remained.

White tears fell again like droplets from the eyes of the being who apologized without end, and it grieved so pitifully that anyone who saw would have ached for it.

After perhaps a minute of that weeping, cracks began to split the black membrane surrounding her. It meant she could remain in this body no longer.

Remorse, pity, guilt, compassion—all of it churned together into something thick and filthy. What am I supposed to do with a mess of feelings like this?

The black ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠blade buried in my chest crumbles to dust. I stayed only the briefest of moments, and already the pain pulses through me as though it were breathing. The longer it lasts, the more the guilt swells in proportion. Even offering up this body and apologizing to him over and over would fall short—and instead here I am, flinging out apologies that will never reach him, tears streaming down my face in the most wretched ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠display.

What can I possibly do for him?

The answer, unexpectedly, comes easily.

He despises me. Loathes me, reviles me, hates me.

Then let me take all of that resentment and hatred as my own. Let me accept, gladly, whatever pain follows. Perhaps that is the only apology I have left to give.

The realization that she had acted just like her 'younger sibling'—the one so despised—plunged her back into self-blame. And now, only one thing remained that she could do for him.

She couldn't know what future this would bring. But at the very least, it would leave his lot no worse than before.

And so, in the instant before the black space dissolved, a small light came to rest upon Jenison's forehead—if only for a breath.

Almost... done.

Outside, Luiné—Chairwoman of the Academy, who had been unwinding the spell from without—could feel the work drawing toward its end.

The Academy evaluation is suspended for the time being. All of you, save those in charge of guiding the students, gather at that place.

"Y-yes?!"

"W-wait just a moment, Chairwoman?!"

The moment she had laid eyes on the paper Cadet Leon produced, she had cast the evaluation protocols aside and made for that place at the greatest speed she could manage—only to find a massive black dome already sealing the site away from them, while the cadets who had been fighting alongside Jenison hurled spell after spell against its surface.

"Step aside."

"Uh... huh? Chairwoman?!"

"Chairwoman!! Jenison is in there—!"

"I am aware. Step aside."

As she drew near, a viscous magi tried to fasten itself to her body, but the slightest stir of her mana was enough to keep it off. One look at the magi and she knew it for the demonkin's craft—and she threw herself into unraveling it then and there.

Demonic magic was, in the end, still magic. It could be unwound in turn; the method existed, and though it would take time, it was certain. She might have simply blasted the barrier apart with her own power, but by that road the safety of the cadet inside could not be guaranteed.

Trusting that, with all he had shown himself capable of, he would hold out until then, she began the unwinding at the utmost speed she could muster. The professors who arrived on her heels would lend their strength to the work, and it would end all the sooner for it.

So she thought, as the first minute passed, then the second, and the third crept by. To her ears—she who could feel the unwinding nearing its end—came the voices of two.

"I-is it... still far from done...?"

"Please... just stay alive..."

The words belonged to the Saintess and to Albert, each in turn—though they were hardly the only ones wringing their hands.

"Please... please..."

"...Calm down, Lianna. Please."

Everyone who had fought at his side was sick with worry for him—and so, too, was Professor Frenche, quietly devouring herself over her blunder. That the one who had dragged him away was, by every sign, Leon—corrupted into a Majin—only tightened the knot in their chests. however kindly it was wrapped, no one could believe Leon bore Jenison any goodwill.

The professors who thought little of Jenison were sunk in worry of an entirely different stripe. A Majin, come from within the Academy itself. A Majin whose entry had gone undetected. And because of it, a cadet's life now hanging by a thread. It was, unmistakably, an incident primed to become delicious gossip—and so more of them were quietly wondering whether their own livelihoods would survive the scandal. Even so, if this was to ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠be tied off as neatly as possible, it was far better that Jenison came out of it alive.

Before long—four minutes or ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠so into the unwinding—cracks finally began to race across the black barrier. They spread wider and wider, and then, like a great pane of glass giving way, the dome scattered into shards and was gone.

"Je... Jenison!!"

"Is he alive?!"

Lianna and Albert plunged inside the instant it fell, and so they were the first to find him where he lay. All around him were scattered things that might have been fingers and toes, and the ground beneath him was soaked with blood and other fluids. It took no expert to recognize a chamber of torture—and the moment they grasped what it meant that he lay face-down at the center of it, the color drained from their faces.

"I-is it true? No—tell me it's not!"

"Calm down..! He's breathing."

By sheer fortune, he was breathing; he seemed to have simply lost consciousness. How he had survived, they couldn't begin to guess—but for now, that one fact was comfort enough. Steadying themselves and sweeping their gazes around, they found Leon's corpse as well: a body that radiated a sinister aura despite its severed neck, and beside it a single head, its hollow expression still not wiped away.

"That's... Leon?!"

"I doubt Jenison did it, but..."

Before long, those who came after heard the news that Jenison lived, and relief seemed to wash over them all. All but one.

"Wha...?!"

The Saintess, Hildegard—the instant she saw him, she fought to rein in pupils that trembled as if gone mad and stumbled toward Jenison, only for her legs to give out beneath her, dropping her where she stood.

"..?!"

"...!!"

"H-how is this..."

Voices clamored around the girl who had suddenly crumpled, but she heard none of them. Her gaze was fixed on one place, and one place only—

on the forehead of the boy still sleeping, breath soft and slow.