Chapter 30: Cheat
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 30: Cheat
It didn't take long for everything to be revealed as a misunderstanding. My Teacher, horrified to see me sobbing in the living room while being comforted by Margaret, came rushing over at once.
“Yo-Yohan!? What’s wrong!?”
“T-Teacher?”
Seeing her run toward me with her usual attitude, I asked if she had come to hate me, and if that was why she had been distancing herself.
Hearing this, my Teacher began shaking her head at a furious pace, insisting that could never be the case.
“Of course not! Th-that was just…”
“Just?”
“…S-someone said that acting that way was better for seducing a man.”
She explained why she had been acting that way. She had bought a book to make herself look better to me and had simply been following its instructions.
Hearing her words, I realized that both of us had been swayed by a single book. It was a relief that she didn't hate me, but the fact that all my actions had been upended by a few lines of text from some unknown author was quite depressing.
As I wallowed in my gloom, my Teacher, realizing her mistake, grew restless. Then, she presented an option that also seemed to come straight from that book.
“A-are you okay? Yohan? Do you want to touch my breasts?”
“…Yes, please.”
As I began to fondle the breasts offered right before my eyes, my Teacher started to let out a sweet hum.
And as I touched her soft chest, my gloomy mood and all the negative thoughts I’d just had completely vanished.
It was then that I realized something.
‘This book… isn’t so bad, is it…?’
Hadn’t I been so swayed by its contents that I ended up confessing my love to my Teacher? And when I felt a little down afterward, I even got to touch her breasts.
In the end, this book wasn't so bad for either of us.
“Ngh- Good boy, such a good boy… my Yohan. It was my fault. I’ll throw that wicked book out right away─.”
“…Teacher.”
“Hm? What is it?”
“I’ve been thinking, and… I don’t think it would be so bad to have a book like that around.”
“…Really?”
Despite having just said she’d throw it away, it seemed she herself was reluctant to part with it, as she immediately agreed with me.
Delighted, my Teacher declared that today should be designated a very special day and gave herself an errand.
“Then let’s have a party today! I’ll prepare the food, so Yohan, could you go to the city with Ritz and buy some alcohol?”
“Alcohol?”
“Yes! There’s a good brewery in a nearby city. Go there and…”
The moment Margaret and I arrived in the nearby city at my Teacher’s request, my breath caught in my throat as if I had just stepped into a steam sauna.
It seemed I wasn't the only one feeling suffocated by the surrounding air. Margaret also covered her mouth and frowned.
“What is this place? Why is it so hot…”
It didn't take long to find out why. All the buildings in the city had been reduced to piles of ash.
Not only the wooden buildings, which were bound to burn easily, but even the stone city walls and the lord's castle—everything had been completely burned away.
I covered my mouth and looked around.
“…What in the world is this?”
“Doesn’t look like a simple fire.”
“I agree. A normal fire wouldn’t have burned everything so thoroughly.”
This city, typical of the medieval era, had a river flowing around the castle and even a moat built using that river.
But with the riverbed itself now dry, it was impossible to think that the city's tragic state was the result of an accidental fire.
Rustle, rustle- After identifying the unknown substance crunching under my feet with every step, I scowled.
“…Are these, by any chance, corpses?”
“Probably. Ugh, look how sticky it is. It’s completely plastered to the ground.”
“…Huu, Margaret. For now, should we go back?”
“Yeah, let’s go back.”
Margaret immediately began preparing a spell. While she did, I scanned our surroundings to see if there were any survivors.
It was highly unlikely there would be any survivors in a city that had been so thoroughly incinerated… but since all the buildings had melted away, a quick glance was enough to see all the way to the distant plains.
As I was looking around, I spotted something and quickly grabbed Margaret’s arm, stopping her from casting her spell.
“What? All of a sudden─.”
“Margaret, over there.”
“There?”
Following my finger, Margaret saw a girl standing in the distance and stopped her spell. She stared at the girl for a moment, then let out a hollow laugh as if she understood. She immediately grabbed my hand.
“Let’s run.”
“What? But, there’s a survivor over there…”
“You idiot, do you really think anyone could have survived this mess? That’s not a survivor─.”
Fwoosh-!
Just as Margaret was about to say something, a stream of fire suddenly flew toward us, threatening to engulf us. It was an inferno that felt well over thousands of degrees, a heat so intense it felt like my lungs would cook just from breathing near it.
The flames were blocked by the force field Margaret deployed, merely swirling around us. Margaret watched the stream of fire and spoke.
“─She’s a witch.”
“…Seriously, why are witches so common?”
“Who knows─ Anyway, we’re getting out of here, okay? We shouldn’t come here anymore.”
With that, she used the spell she had been preparing and we escaped the city.
“…They’re… gone?”
The witch of fire, who had been roaming the city and burning everything in sight, realized that the man she had just encountered had vanished before her eyes.
He hadn't simply burned to death; his very existence had disappeared from this place. Like magic.
“Not a human… but a witch, then?”
She felt a pang of guilt for attacking a fellow witch, but in the next moment, rage surged within her at the thought that another witch hadn't saved her until now.
A witch who could vanish like that should have had no trouble saving a single person like her. So why hadn't she?
The reason was simple. Humans might believe that persecuted witches help each other survive, but that wasn't the reality.
Witches, who were not so different from humans, also persecuted and despised one another.
The reason she had never been saved was likely the same.
“Yes, not just this city… but everything.”
Everything must burn.
The city, the country, humanity, the world.
And so, all that has melted will mix together.
“Everything.”
Witches would be no exception.
Upon returning to the cabin, I immediately told my Teacher what had happened—that the city she mentioned had been completely burned down by a witch.
Hearing this, my Teacher wore a serious expression and fell deep in thought. After a long moment, she looked at me with an awkward expression, then gave me a reassuring grin.
“It’s okay! That city is quite a distance from here, and more importantly, I’m protecting this forest! You have nothing to worry about, Yohan!”
“…Is there anything I can do to help?”
“Help? Don’t do anything foolish. The best way for you to help is to just stay put.”
“But I can use magic, too. A broken, cheat magic that nullifies all other magic.”
“Cheat magic…? I don’t know what that is, but your ability isn’t that broken, Yohan. If anything, it’s a rather common ability.”
“…What?”
My ability… is common? The statement was so unbelievable, so shocking, that I stared at her and asked again.
My Teacher seemed reluctant to say more, but perhaps realizing she couldn't stop me from trying to help if she kept it a secret, she revealed the truth she had been hiding from me.
“The ability the Holy Knights use, that’s your ability, Yohan.”
“…Holy Knights can nullify magic?”
“Yes. Well, to be precise, it’s slightly different from yours—but the end result is that Holy Knights can nullify the magic we witches use.”
She added explanations about how Holy Knights gain superhuman strength through special training methods, and how their blades, imbued with divine power, can cut through a witch's magic.
In any case, I, who had thought I might one day save the world with my cheat ability to nullify magic, was crushed to learn that other people could commonly do the same.
Seeing my despair, my Teacher delivered the final blow.
“So, even the Holy Knights failed to stop that witch. There’s no need for you to go and take such a risk. Understand?”
“…Yes.”
“Good, as long as you understand. And hey! Just because my Yohan isn’t great at fighting doesn’t mean he’s useless! You can just stay here and give your Teacher a shoulder massage, right?”
My Teacher offered this as a form of comfort, but to be honest─it wasn't very comforting at all.
The disappointment of discovering that what I thought was my unique cheat magic was nothing more than a common, run-of-the-mill ability did not fade so easily.
“Then I’ll go do some chores…”
“Yohan, I already did everything while you were out, so you can go rest.”
“Ah, right. Of course.”
Yohan said he would go rest for a bit and shut himself in his room. He looked quite dejected after learning his ability wasn't so rare.
Watching Yohan trudge back to his room, Margaret scribbled something on a piece of paper she had brought and handed it to Evangeline.
[What was that about?]
“What was what about?”
[Your disciple’s ability. It’s completely different from the Holy Knights’.]
“So, Ritz, you’re saying I should just let Yohan go fight a witch?”
[Even though his ability is basically an anti-witch special weapon?]
Margaret recalled Yohan’s magic as she wrote—that unique magic that shattered anything she considered to be magic.
It was qualitatively different from the ability the Holy Knights used. The Holy Knights genuinely believed that this world was equal under God's name, and they shattered everything that was not of God's power.
Unlike that inflexible ability that rejected everything in God's name, Yohan's magic allowed him to subjectively choose which magic to nullify… It was, in every sense, a superior version of the Holy Knights' power.
“That’s why.”
[What do you mean, ‘that’s why’?]
“An ability that guarantees victory against a witch… In other words, that means Yohan can crush any witch he meets, right?”
[That’s… right?]
“You alone are annoying enough, and you want me to add more witches to the mix? I can’t do it. Absolutely not.”
Evangeline thought about what would happen if Yohan defeated a witch. Witches, who had been fundamentally persecuted, shunned, and unloved, were creatures who couldn't help but fall in love with the one who defeated them, especially one who was immune to their curses.
It was a natural instinct for them, as witches and as females.
“Yohan is mine. I won’t give him to anyone.”
She could not tolerate that fact.
She would not hand him over to anyone.
Not to anyone.